It has been stated that the people of the border States had been divided in sentiment, and it was very doubtful for a time, which way they would go; but the attack upon Fort Sumpter, and the call by the President, for troops, forced the issue, and the unscrupulous leaders were able to carry Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas, into the Confederate organization, against the will of a majority of the people of those States. Virginia, the leading State of the Revolution, the one, which under the leadership of Washington and Madison had been the most influential in the formation of the National Government, the "Old Dominion," as she was usually called, the "Mother of States and of statesmen," had been for years, descending from her high position. Her early and Revolutionary history had been of unequalled brilliancy; she had largely shaped the policy of the Nation, and furnished its leaders. Her early statesmen were antislavery men, and if she had relieved herself of the burden of slavery, she would have held her position as the leading State of the Union; but, with this heavy drag, the proud Old Commonwealth had seen her younger sisters of the Republic rapidly overtaking and passing her in the race of pro gress, and the elements of National greatness. Indeed she had fallen so low, that her principal source of wealth was from the men, women, and children, she raised and sent South to supply the slave markets of the Gulf States. Her leading men had been advocating extreme State rights' doctrines, fatal to National Unity, and thus sowing the seeds of secession. Her politicians had threatened disunion, again, and again. Still, when the crisis came, a majority of her people were true; a large majority of their Convention was opposed to secession, and when afterwards, by violence and fraud, the ordinance was passed, the people of the Northwest, the mountain region of Virginia, resisted, and determined to stand by the Union. This portion of the State maintained its position with fidelity and heroism, and ultimately established the State of West Virginia.

Although Virginia, in January, 1861, voted a million of dollars for defensive purposes, yet as late as April 4th, the Convention, by a vote of eighty-nine to forty-five, voted down

an ordinance of secession. But the Union men in the Convention, under various appliances, the promises, threats, and violence used, yielded one after another, until, under the excitement growing out of the attack upon Fort Sumter and the President's call to arms, the ordinance of secession was forced through. Before this could be done, however, a mob was raised at Richmond by the conspirators and a Committee appointed to wait upon certain Union men in the Convention, and advise them that they must either vote for secession, absent themselves, or be hung. The secession of Virginia, added greatly to the danger of Washington, and a bold movement upon it, then, in its defenceless condition, would have been successful.

Alexander II. Stephens, Vice President of the Confederacy, came to Richmond, and everywhere raised the cry of "on to Washington!"

The State authorities of Virginia did not wait the ratification of the secession ordinance by the people, to whom it was submitted for adoption or rejection, but immediately joined the Confederacy, commenced hostilities, and organized expeditions for the capture of Harper's Ferry and the Gosport Navy-yard. Senator Mason immediately issued an address to the people, declaring that those who could not vote for a separation of Virginia from the United States, "must leave the State!" Submission, banishment, or death was proclaimed to all Union men of the Old Commonwealth. No where, except in West Virginia, and some small localities, was there resistance to this decree. In the Northwest, the mountain men rallied, organized, resolved to stand by the old flag and protect themselves under its folds.

The secession of Virginia, gave to the Confederates a moral and physical power, which imparted to the conflict the proportions of a tremendous civil war. She placed herself as a barrier between her weaker sisters and the Union, and she held her position, with a heroic endurance and courage, worthy of a better cause and of her earlier days. Indeed, she kept the Union forces at bay for more than four long years, preserving her Capital, and yielding only, when the hardy soldiers of the North had marched from the

Cumberland to the sea, cutting her off and making the struggle hopeless.

North Carolina, naturally followed Virginia, and on the 21st of May, adopted by a unanimous vote an ordinance of secession, and her Governor, Ellis, called for an enrollment of 30,000 men.

Tennessee, was the daughter of North Carolina, yet her people were widely divided in sentiment and sympathy; East Tennessee, embracing the mountains of the Cumberland range, and the Western slopes of the Alleghanies, where there were few slaves, and peopled by a brave, hardy, and loyal race, were devoted to the Union. In the West, a majority of the people were in sympathy with those seeking to overthrow the Government. The Governor, Isham G. Harris, was an active conspirator, and in full accord with the enemies of the Union. General Pillow, on the organization of the rebel Government, hastened to Montgomery, and tendered it 50,000 volunteers from Tennessee. On the 9th of February, the people voted down secession by 65,000 majority! The Union men of that State, under the lead of Andrew Johnson, Horace Maynard, Governor Brownlow, and their associates, determined to maintain the Union. But the loyal people of Tennesseee were isolated from the free States, unapproachable from the East, except across Virgmia, and over the Alleghanies; and from the North separated by the semi-rebellions State of Kentucky. Under these circumstances, it was difficult for Mr. Lincoln to furnish them aid and succor. The State was nearly surrounded by secession influences; the State Government was in the hands of traitors to the Union, and in June following, by means of fraud, violence, intimidation, and falsehood, an apparent majority was obtained in favor of secession. East Tennessee, however, still indignantly rejected secession, and her sous made a gallant fight for the Union.

Maryland, from her location between the free States and the National Capital, occupied a position of the utmost importance. Could she be induced to join the Confederates, their design of siezing the National Capital and its archives, would be made comparatively easy. Emissaries from the

conspirators were busy in her borders during the winter of 1861. But while there were many rebel sympathizers and traitors among her slave-holders, and many leading families gave in their adhesion to the conspiracy, the mass of the people were loyal. The Governor of the State, Thomas H. Hicks, though he yielded for a time to the apparent popular feeling in favor of the Confederates, and greatly embarrassed the Government by his protests against troops marching over Maryland soil to the defence of the Capital, was, at heart, a loyal man, and in the end became a decided and efficient Union leader. He refused, against inducements and threats of personal violence, to call the Legislature of the State together, a majority of whom were known to be Secessionists, and who would have passed an ordinance of secession. But the man to whom the people of Maryland are most indebted, and who was most influential in the maintenance of the Union cause, at this crisis, and who proved the benefactor of the State in relieving her from the curse of slavery, was the bold, eloquent and talented Henry Winter Davis. He took his position from the start, for the unconditional maintenance of the Union.

The officials of the city of Baltimore, were most of them Secessionists, and its Chief of Police was a traitor, and was implicated in the plot to assassinate Mr. Lincoln on his way to the Capital.

On the 19th of April, a mob in the city of Baltimore, had attacked the Massachusetts Sixth regiment, while quietly passing through to the defense of the Capital, and several soldiers and citizens were killed in the affray. The bridges connecting the railways from Pennsylvania and New York, with Baltimore, were burned, and for a time, communication by railroad was interrupted.

Gen. B. F. Butler, leading the Massachusetts troops, together with the New York Seventh Regiment, were compelled to go around by Annapolis, and to rebuild the railway to Washington. But one dark, stormy night, General Butler marched into Baltimore, encamped on Federal Hill, and re opened communication with the North. The Union men of Maryland rallied; the leading Secessionists fled, or were

arrested; and, from that time, Maryland was a loyal State, lending to the Union the aid of her moral influence, and furnishing many gallant soldiers to fight its battles.

On the 18th of April, the day before the massacre of the Massachusetts soldiers by the Baltimore mob, intelligence reached Washington of a plot, on the part of the secessionists in that city, aided by Virginia, to rise, fire the city, seize as prisoners the President and his Cabinet, and all officials present, take possession of the Government archives, and thus realize the prophecy of the rebel Secretary of War, Walker, that the flag of the Confederates should float over the dome of the Capitol before the first of May.

There were, at that time, but few troops in Washington, and the means of defense were very inadequate. Soldiers were hurrying to its defense from Pennsylvania, New York and New England, but a part of the plan was the burning of the bridges of the railways, and the interruption of communication between Baltimore and the North, and this part was successfully executed.

When intelligence of this plot was received at Washington, there were several hundred gentlemen of high personal character and social position in the city. They immediately met, organized, took an oath of fidelity to the Union, elected Cassius M. Clay of Kentucky and General Joseph Lane of Kansas their leaders, were armed by the War Department, and, for several days, acted as guards. The party under Lane took up their quarters in the East room of the White House, and the others guarded the city. Arms were placed in the Capitol, it was provisioned for a short seige, and it was prepared to be used in case of necessity as a citadel. Behind its massive marble walls it was believed that the President and the officials, and Government archives, might find safety, until the loyal people of the North, rallying to the rescue, should reach the Capital.

But Butler soon opened communications; the New York 7th reached the Capital, and then there were troops enough to make the execution of the plot madness; and it was consequently abandoned. Meanwhile Fortress Monroe, Annapolis and Baltimore, were occupied by Federal troops, and all