378

VIRGINIA CONSPIRATORS APPLAUDED.

had sent his defiant response to the President's call for troops;' and now, under the direction of that Convention, which assumed supreme April 16, authority in the State, he issued a proclamation, ordering "all armed volunteer regiments or companies within the State forthwith to hold themselves in readiness for immediate orders."

1861.

When, on the following day, the passage of the Ordinance (upon which fact a temporary injunction of secrecy had been laid) was announced, the joy of the secessionists in Richmond was unbounded. The streets resounded with the acclamations of great crowds. The sign, in gilt letters,— United States Court,-over the north entrance to the Custom House, was taken down and broken in pieces by the populace; and the National officers suddenly found their occupation gone. The flag of the "Southern Confederacy," with an additional star for Virginia (making eight in all), was unfurled over the Capitol. It was also displayed from the Custom House and other public buildings, and from hotels and private dwellings. The Custom House was taken into the keeping of Virginia troops; and the packets Yorktown and Jamestown, belonging to the New York and Virginia Steamship Company, were seized and placed in charge of the same body of armed men.

⚫ April 19.

6.66

As the news from Richmond went over the land, it produced the most profound sensation. In the cities of Slave-labor States, and especially of the more Southern ones, there were demonstrations of great delight. At Charleston the event caused the wildest excitement. "The news of the secession of the mother of Presidents and Patriots," said a telegraphic dispatch to Philadelphia," was received here with great joy. The old secession gun was fired in front of the Courier office, by the venerable Edmund Ruffin. The old gentleman was surrounded by many Virginians, who cheered lustily." The Virginians then in Montgomery, headed by Pryor, who had gone up from Charleston,' fired a hundred guns on their own account; and from the far Southwest went forth the greeting:—

"In the new-born arch of glory,

Lo! she burns, the central star;
Never shame shall blight its grandeur,
Never cloud its radiance mar.
'Old Virginia! Old Virginia!'

Listen, Southrons, to the strain;
'Old Virginia! Old Virginia!'
Shout the rallying-cry again!"'s

In the Free-labor States the action of Virginia was observed with alarm, for it threatened immediate danger to the National Capital and the archives of the Republic. Only the hope that the people of Virginia would refuse to ratify the Ordinance, calmed the fears of the loyalists. The expectation that they would do so, if an opportunity should be offered them, made the conspirators more active and bold. They did not wait for the people to speak concerning the matter; but, within twenty-four hours after the passage of the Ordinance, and while the vote was still covered by an injunction of secrecy, they set on foot, doubtless under directions from Montgomery,

1 See page 337.

2 See page 316.

New Orleans Picayune.

THE SEIZURE OF WASHINGTON CITY EXPECTED.

379

expeditions for the capture of Harper's Ferry and of the Navy Yard near Norfolk, preparatory to an attempt to seize Washington City.

A few days afterward, Alexander H. Stephens arrived in Richmond, to urge the Convention to violate its own Ordinance, and to take measures for annexing Virginia to the "Confederacy" without the consent of the people. He was clothed with full power to make a treaty to that effect. Troops were then pushing forward from the Gulf States toward her borders. The conspirators, having promised the people of the Cotton-growing States that no harm should come nigh their dwellings, and perceiving war to be inevitable, were hastening to make the Border States the theater of its operations, and, if possible, secure the great advantage of the possession of the National Capital. At various points on his journey northward, Stephens had harangued the people, and every where he raised the cry of "On to Washington!" That cry was already resounding throughout the South. It was an echo or a paraphrase of the prophecy of the "Confederate Secretary of War." "Nothing is more probable," said the Richmond Enquirer on the 13th of April," than that President Davis will soon march an army through North Carolina and Virginia to Washington," and it called upon Virginians who wished to "join the Southern army," to organize at once. "The first-fruits of Virginia secession," said the New Orleans Picayune of the 18th, "will be the removal

(Mis-Eg

of Lincoln and his Cabinet, and whatever he ate The can carry away, to the safer neighborhoods of Harrisburg or Cincinnati-perhaps to Buffalo or Cleveland." The Vicksburg (Mississippi) Whig of the 20th said :-"Major Ben. McCulloch has organized a force of five thousand men to seize the Federal Capital the instant the first blood is spilled." On the evening of the same day, when news of bloodshed in Baltimore was received in Montgomery, bonfires were built in front of the Exchange Hotel, and from its balcony Roger A. Pryor said, in a speech to the multitude, that he was "in favor of an immediate march upon Washington." At the departure of the Second Regiment of South Carolina Infantry for Richmond, at about the same time, the Colonel (Kershaw), on taking the flag presented to the regiment, said, as he handed it to the Color-Sergeant (Gordon):-"To your particular charge is committed this noble gift. Plant it wherever honor calls. If opportunity offers, let it be the first to kiss the breezes of heaven from the dome of

1 The New York Commercial Advertiser of April 25th had an account of the experience of a gentleman who had escaped from Fayetteville to avoid impressment into the insurgent army. He traveled on the same train with Stephens from Warsaw to Richmond. At nearly every station," he says, "Stephens spoke. The capture of Washington was the grand idea which he enforced, and exhorted the people to join in the enterprise, to which they heartily responded. This was the only thing talked of. It must be done!' was his constant exclamation."

2 See extract from Walker's speech at Montgomery on the 12th of April, page 839.

380

HYPOCRISY OF JEFFERSON DAVIS.

the Capitol at Washington." The Richmond Examiner of the 23d (the day on which Stephens arrived in Richmond), said: “The capture of Washington City is perfectly within the power of Virginia and Maryland, if Virginia will only make the proper effort by her constituted authori ties. . . . There never was half the unanimity among the people before, nor a tithe of the zeal upon any subject that is now manifested to take Washington, and drive from it every Black Republican who is a dweller there. From the mountain-tops and valleys to the shores of the sea there is one wild shout of fierce resolve to capture Washington City, at all and every human hazard." On the same day Governor Ellis, of North Carolina, ordered a regiment of State troops to march for Washington; and the Goldsborough Tribune of the 24th said, speaking of the grand movement of Virginia and a rumored one in Maryland:-"It makes good the words of Secretary Walker at Montgomery, in regard to the Federal metropolis. It transfers the lines of battle from the Potomac to the Pennsylvania border." The Raleigh Standard of the same date said:-"Our streets are alive with soldiers" (although North Carolina was a professedly loyal State of the Union), and added, "Washington City will be too hot to hold Abraham Lincoln and his Government. North Carolina has said it, and she will do all she can to make good her declaration." The Wilmington (N. C.) Journal said: "When North Carolina regiments go to Washington, and they will go, they will stand side by side with their brethren of the South." The Eufaula (Alabama) Express said, on the 25th:"-" Our policy at this time should be to seize the old Federal Capital, 1861. and take old Lincoln and his Cabinet prisoners of war." The Milledgeville (Georgia) Southern Recorder of the 30th, inspired by men like Toombs, Cobb, Iverson, and other leaders, said:" The Government of the Confederate States must possess the city of Washington. It is folly to think it can be used any longer as the head-quarters of the Lincoln Government, as no access can be had to it except by passing through Virginia and Maryland. The District of Columbia cannot remain under the jurisdiction of the United States Congress without humiliating Southern pride and defeating Southern rights. Both are essential to greatness of character, and both must co-operate in the destiny to be achieved." A correspondent of the Charleston Courier, writing from Montgomery at about the same time, said: "The desire for taking Washington, I believe, increases every hour, and all things, to my thinking, seem tending to this consummation. We are in lively hope that, before three months roll by, the Government, Congress, departments and all, will have removed to the present Federal Capital."

• April,

We might cite utterances of this kind from the leading newspapers of the more Southern Slave-labor States, and the declarations of eminent politicians, sufficient to fill a chapter, which show that every where it was well understood that the seizure of Washington, the destruction of the Republic, and the erection of a confederation composed wholly of Slave-labor States, according to the plan foreshadowed in the banner of the South Carolina Secession Convention,' was the cherished design of Jefferson Davis and his

1 See page 106.

OFFENDERS WISH TO BE LET ALONE.

...

381

This

confederates. Yet in the face of this testimony-in the presence of the prophecy of his so-called Secretary of War at Montgomery, and the action of Stephens, his lieutenant, while on his way to Richmond, and while there in assisting the Virginia conspirators in carrying out their scheme for seizing the Capital, the arch-traitor, with hypocrisy the most supremely impudent, declared in a speech at the opening of his so-called Congress, on the 29th of April, that his policy was peaceful and defensive, not belligerent and aggressive. Speaking more to Europe than to the "Confederacy," he said: "We protest solemnly, in the face of mankind, that we desire peace at any sacrifice, save that of honor. . . . In independence we seek no conquest, no aggrandizement, no cession of any kind from the States with which we have lately confederated. All we ask is to be let alone-those who never held power over us should not now attempt our subjugation by arms. we will, we must resist to the direst extremity." On the very next day Stephens, the so-called Vice-President, said in a speech at Atlanta, in Georgia :-"A general opinion prevails that Washington City is soon to be attacked. On this subject I can only say, our object is peace. We wish no aggressions on any one's rights, and will make none. But if Maryland secedes, the District of Columbia will fall to her by reversionary right--the same as Sumter to South Carolina, Pulaski to Georgia, and Pickens to Florida. When we have the right, we will demand the surrender of Washington, just as we did in the other cases, and will enforce our demands at every hazard and at whatever cost." The burglar, using the same convenient logic, might say to the householder about to be plundered by him, after having made the intended victim's near neighbor an accomplice, and with his aid had forced his way into the dwelling: "Your plate, and your money, and your jewelry fall to my accomplice as a reversionary right, and we demand the surrender of your keys. All we ask is to be let alone.”

a April 30, 1861.

A quaint writer in the Hartford (Connecticut) Courant, at that time, made the following amusing commentary on the conspirators' untruthful assertion-“ All we ask is to be let alone:"

"As vonce I valked by a dismal swamp,
There sot an old Cove in the dark and damp,
And at everybody as passed that road
A stick or a stone this old Cove throwed;
And venever he flung his stick or his stone,
He'd set up a song of Let me alone.'
Let me alone, for I loves to shy
These bits of things at the passers by;

Let me alone, for I've got your tin,
And lots of other traps snugly in;
Let me alone-1 am rigging a boat
To grab votever you've got afloat;
In a veek or so I expects to come

And turn you out of your 'ouse and 'ome.
I'm a quiet Old Cove,' says he, with a groan,
'All I axes is, Let me alone.""

The writer then foreshadowed the action of the Government, as follows:

"Just then came along, on the self-same way, Another old Cove, and began for to say :

Let you alone! that's comin' it strong!

You've ben let alone a darned sight too long!

Of all the surce that ever I heerd!

Put down that stick! (You may well look skeered.)
Let go that stone! If you once show fight,
I'll knock you higher than any kite.
You must have a lesson to stop your tricks.
And cure you of shying them stones and sticks;
And I'll have my hardware back, and my cash,
And knock your scow into 'tarnal smash,

And if ever I catches you. round my ranch,
I'll string you up to the nearest branch.
The best you can do is to go to bed,
And keep a decent tongue in your head;
For I reckon, before you and I are done,
You'll wish you had let honest folks alone.'
The Old Cove stopped, and the t'other Old Cove,
He sot quite still in his cypress grove,
And he looked at his stick revolvin' slow,
Vether 'twere safe to shy it or no;
And he grumbled on, in an injured tone,
All that I ax'd was, Let me alone.'"

382

STEPHENS IN RICHMOND.

CHAPTER XVI.

SECESSION OF VIRGINIA AND NORTH CAROLINA DECLARED.-SEIZURE OF HARPER'S FERRY AND GOSPORT NAVY YARD.-THE FIRST TROOPS IN WASHINGTON FOR ITS DEFENSE.

HE reception of Alexander H. Stephens by the Convention

of Virginia politicians, the authorities of the State, and the excited populace in Richmond, gave him instant assurances of the success of his mission. He saw the "Confederate Flag" waving everywhere, and heard no complaint because of the usurpation. He perceived that in Virginia, as in the Gulf States, the heel of the usurper was firmly planted on the necks of the loyal people, and that despotism was substantially triumphant. His soul was filled with gladness, and he addressed the Virginians with the eloquence and earnestness of a man whose heart was in his work. "The fires of patriotism," he said, "I have seen blazing brightly all along my track, from Montgomery to the very gates of your city, and they are enkindling here with greater brilliancy and fervor. That constitutional liberty which we vainly sought for while in the old Union, we have found, and fully enjoy in our new one. . . . What had you, the friends of liberty, to hope for while under Lincoln? Nothing. Beginning in usurpation, where will he end? He will quit Washington as ignominiously as he entered it, and God's will will have been accomplished. Madness and folly rule at Washington, but Providence is with us, and will bless us to the end. The people of Virginia and the States of the South are one in interest, in feeling, in institutions, and in hope; and why should they not be one in Government? Every son of the South, from the Potomac to the Rio Grande, should rally beneath the same banner. The conflict may be terrible, but the victory will be ours. It remains for you to say whether you will share our triumphs."

Stephens, as we have observed, was in Richmond for the purpose of negotiating a treaty for the admission of Virginia into the "Southern Confederacy." The Convention appointed Ex-President John Tyler, William Ballard Preston, S. McD. Moore, James P. Holcombe, James C. Bruce, and Lewis E. Harvie, Commissioners to treat with him. They entered upon the business at once, and on the 24th of April agreed to and signed a "Conven

1 Speech at Richmond, April 28, 1861, cited by Whitney in his History of the War for the Union, i. 402. Compare what Stephens said at Milledgeville, in November, 1860, and in the Georgia Convention, in January, 1861, pages 54 to 7, inclusive.