THE NEW YORK SEVENTH REGIMENT. 433 CHAPTER XVIII. THE CAPITAL SECURED.-MARYLAND SECESSIONISTS SUBDUED.-CONTRIBUTIONS BY THE PEOPLE. T has been observed that the Seventh Regiment of New York left that city for Washington on the memorable 19th of April. It was the favorite military corps of the metropolis, and was composed mostly of young men, a large majority of them connected with families of the higher social positions. It was known that they were to leave in the afternoon, and all New York appeared to turn out to see them depart, and bid them God speed. The regiment was formed on Lafayette Place, where an immense National flag was waving over the Astor Library. Just as it was about to march, it received intelligence of the attack on the Massachusetts Sixth, in the streets of Baltimore. Forty-eight rounds of ball-cartridges were served out to each man, and then they moved through Fourth Street into Broadway, and down that great thoroughfare to Courtlandt Street and the Jersey City Ferry. The side-walks all the way were densely packed with men, women, and children. Banners were streaming everywhere. "Banners from balcony, banners from steeple, Banners from house to house, draping the people; The shipping at the ferry was brilliant with flags. Already the Eighth Massachusetts Regiment, Colonel Timothy Monroe,' accompanied by General Benjamin F. Butler, one of the most remarkable men of our time, had passed through the vast throng that was waiting for the New York Seventh, and being greeted with hearty huzzas and the gift of scores of little banners by the people. At sunset all had gone over the Hudson-the New York Seventh and Massachusetts Eighth-and crossed New Jersey by railway to the banks of the Delaware. It had been a day of fearful excitement in New York, and the night was one of more fearful anxiety. Slumber was wooed in vain by hundreds, for they knew that VOL. I.-28 1 See pages 401 and 402. PRIVATE OF THE SEVENTH REGIMENT. 434 SPIRIT OF THE PEOPLE. their loved ones, now that blood had been spilt, were hurrying on toward great peril. Regiment after regiment followed the Seventh in quick succession,' and within ten days from the time of its departure, full ten thousand men of the city of New York were on the march toward the Capital.' He coun The Massachusetts regiment had been joined at Springfield by a company under Captain H. S. Briggs, and now numbered a little over seven hundred men. It reached Philadelphia several hours before the New York Seventh arrived there, and was bountifully entertained at the Girard House by the generous citizens. There Butler first heard of the attack on the Sixth, in Baltimore. His orders commanded him to march through that city. It was now impossible to do so with less than ten thousand armed men. seled with Major-General Robert Patterson, who had just been appointed commander of the "Department of Washington," which embraced the States of Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland, and the District of Columbia, and whose head-quarters were at Philadelphia. Commodore Dupont, commandant of the Navy Yard there, was also consulted, and it was agreed that the troops should go by water from Perryville, at the mouth of the Susquehanna River, to Annapolis, and thence across Maryland to Washington City. Butler was ordered to take that route, seize and hold Annapolis and Annapolis Junction, and open and thoroughly guard a military pathway to the Capital. 1 "The enthusiasm of the people-of the young men in particular-was wonderful. Sometimes several brothers would enlist at the same time. The spirit of our women, who were animated by the same patriotic feelings, is well illustrated by a letter written by a New York mother of five sons who enlisted, to her husband. She was absent from home at the time. Your letter,' she said, 'came to hand last evening, I must confess I was startled by the news referring to our boys, and, for the moment, I felt as if a ball had pierced my own heart. For the first time I was obliged to look things full in the face. But although I have always loved my children with a love that none but a mother can know, yet, when I look upon the state of my country, I can not withhold them; and in the name of their God, and their mother's God, and their country's God, I bid them go. If I had ten sons instead of five, I would give them all sooner than have our country rent in fragments, I hope you will provide them each with a Bible, and give them their mother's love and blessing, and tell them our prayers will accompany them, and ascend on their behalf, night and day.”—The History of the Civil War in America : by J. S. C. Abbott, i. 108. In contrast with this was the letter of a Baltimore mother to her loyal son, a clergyman in Boston, who, on the Sunday after the attack on Fort Sumter, preached a patriotic discourse to his people. The letter was as follows: "BALTIMORE, April 17, 1861. "MY DEAR SON:-Your remarks last Sabbath were telegraphed to Baltimore, and published in an extra. Has God sent you to preach the sword, or to preach Christ? YOUR MOTHER." The son replied: "BOSTON, April 22, 1861. "DEAR MOTHER:-God has sent me not only to preach the sword, but to use it. When this Government tumbles, look amongst the ruins for YOUR STAR-SPANGLED BANNER SON." 2 John Sherman, now (1865) United States Senator from Ohio, was then an aid-de-camp of General Patterson. He was sent by that officer to lay before General Scott the advantages of the Annapolis route, suggested by General Patterson. The route was approved of by the Lieutenant-General. See A Narrative of the Campaign in the Valley of the Shenandoah: by Robert Patterson, late Major-General of Volunteers. In the midst of the wild tumult, caused by the call to arms-the braying of trumpets and the roll of drums-the representatives of a sect of exemplary Christians, who had ever borne testimony against the prac tices of war, met in the City of New York (April 23), and reiterated that testimony. That sect was the Society of Friends, or Quakers. They put forth an Address to their brethren, counseling them to beware of the temptations of the hour, and to pray for divine blessings on their country. They were a loyal “Peace party for conscience' sake. "We love our country," they said, "and acknowledge, with gratitude to our Heavenly Father, the many blessings we have been favored with under its Government, and can feel no sympathy with any who seek its overthrow; but, in endeavoring to uphold and maintain it, as followers of the Prince of Peace, we must not transgress the precepts and injunction of the Gospel.”—Address to the Members of the Religious Society of Friends within the limits of the New York Yearly Meeting. Signed, "WILLIAM Wood, Clerk.” Similar testimony was borne by the Quakers elsewhere; yet the homily was practically unheeded by a large number of the younger members, who, with many of their seniors, held that the war was an exceptional one— a holy war of Righteousness against Sin. They were, as a body of Christians, universally loyal to the flag, even is BUTLER'S EXPEDITION TO MARYLAND. 435 Late in the evening General Butler summoned all of his officers, thirteen in number, to his room. It was a singular council of war. On his table lay thirteen revolvers. "I propose," said the General, substantially, "to join with Colonel Lefferts, of the Seventh Regiment of New York, sail for Annapolis from Havre de Grace, arrive there to-morrow afternoon at four o'clock, occupy the capital of Maryland, and call the State to account for the death of Massachusetts men, my friends and neighbors. If Colonel Lefferts thinks it best not to go, I propose to take this regiment alone." Then,. taking up one of the revolvers, he said: "I am ready to take the responsi bility. Every officer willing to accompany me will please take a pistol." Not one hesitated; and then the General sketched a plan of his proposed operations, to be sent to Governor Andrew after his departure. He proposed to hold Annapolis as a means of communication, and, by a forced march with a part of his command, reach the Capital in accordance with his orders. He telegraphed to the Governor to send the Boston Light Battery to Annapolis to assist in the march on Washington.' Colonel Lefferts did not feel at liberty to accept General Butler's propo sition, and the latter made preparations to go on with the Massachusetts troops alone. The President of the Philadelphia, Wilmington, and Baltimore Railway Company placed their great steam ferry-boat Maryland, at Perryville, at his disposal; and two companies were ordered to go forward early in the morning and take possession of it. Word came mean while that the insurgents had already seized and barricaded it, and Butler resolved to push on with his whole force and capture it. "If I succeed," he wrote to Governor Andrew, 66 success will justify me. If I fail, purity of intention will excuse want of judgment, or rashness. Butler left Philadelphia at eleven o'clock in the morning, and April 20, when near the Susquehanna his troops were ordered from the 1861. cars, placed in battle order, and marched toward the ferry, in expectation of a fight. Rumor had been untrue. There were no insurgents in arms at Perryville or Havre de Grace; and there lay the powerful ferry-boat in the quiet possession of her regular crew. The troops were soon embarked, and at six o'clock in the evening the huge vessel-with a captain who seemed to need watching by the vigilant and loyal eyes of the soldiers, lest he should run them into Baltimore or aground-went out toward Chesapeake Bay. Making good time, she was off the old capital of Maryland at a little past midnight, when, to Butler's surprise, Annapolis and the Naval Academy were lighted up, and the people were all astir. The town and the Academy were in possession of the secessionists. They were expecting some insurgents from Baltimore, and they intended, with united force, to seize the venerable frigate Constitution, then moored there as a school-ship, and add her to the "Confederate navy." For four days and nights her gallant commander, North Carolina; and while they avoided, as far as possible, the practices of war, which their conscience and Discipline condemned, they aided the Government in every other way, such as services in hospitals, and other employments in which non-combatants might engage. A large number of their young men, however, bore arms in the field, and acted in compliance with the spirit of the alleged injunction of the Philadelphia mother:— "Let thy musket not hold a silent meeting before the enemy." 1 General Butler in New Orleans, &c.: by James Parton, page 71. Report of the Adjutant-General of Massachusetts, December 31, 1861, page 22. 436 FRIGATE CONSTITUTION SAVED FROM SEIZURE. Captain Blake, Superintendent of the Academy, had kept her guns doubleshotted, expecting an attack every moment. The arrival of the Massachusetts troops was just in time to save the Constitution. Communication was speedily opened between General Butler and Captain Blake, and a hundred of the troops, who were seamen at home, with the Salem Zouaves as a guard, were detailed to assist in getting the Constitution from the wharf, and putting her out beyond the bar in a place of safety. With the help of the Maryland, acting as a tug, this was accomplished. That venerable vessel, in which Hull, and Bainbridge, and Stewart had won immortal honors in the Second War for Independence, was built in Boston, and was first manned by Massachusetts men; now she was preserved to the uses of the Government, for whose sovereignty she had gallantly fought, by the hands of Massachusetts men. "This," said General Butler, in an order thanking the troops for the service, "is a sufficient triumph of right; a sufficient triumph for us. By this the blood of our friends, shed by the Baltimore mob, is so far avenged." We will add, that the Constitution was soon afterward taken to New York; and when the naval school was removed to Newport, Rhode Island, she became a school-ship there. In assisting to get out the Constitution, the Maryland grounded on a sand-bank. The suspected captain was confined, and the vessel was put under the management of seamen and engineers from among the Massachusetts troops. There she lay helpless all that day and the next night, to the great discomfort of her passengers. Her water-casks were nearly emptied, and their provisions were almost exhausted. In the mean time Governor Hicks, who was in Annapolis, and still under the malign control of the secessionists, was urging Butler not to land "Northern troops." "The excitement here is very great," he said; "and I think that you had better take your men elsewhere." Butler, in reply, spoke of his necessities and his orders, and took the occasion to correct the Governor's sectional phraseology by saying of his force: "They are not 'Northern troops; they are a part of the whole militia of the United States, obeying the call of the President.” This was the root of the matter. Therein was the grand idea of nationality as opposed to State Supremacy, in which the General acted throughout with the clearest advantage. Butler now went ashore, and had a personal conference with the Governor and the Mayor of Annapolis. "All Maryland," they said, "is at the point of rushing to arms. The railway is broken up, and its line guarded by armed men. It will be a fearful thing for you to land and attempt to march on Washington."-"I must land," said the General, "for my troops are hungry."-"No one in Annapolis will sell them any thing," replied these authorities of the State and city. Butler intimated that armed men were not always limited to the necessity of purchasing food when famishing; and he gave both magistrates to understand that the orders and demands of his Government were imperative, and that he should land and march on the Capital as speedily as possible, in spite of all opposition. At the same time 1 The composition of this regiment was very remarkable. It contained men skilled in almost every trade and profession; and Major Winthrop, who went out with the New York Seventh Regiment, was nearly right when he said, that if the words were given, "Poets, to the front!" or "Painters, present arms!" or "Sculptors, charge bayonets !" there would be ample responses. NATIONAL TROOPS AT ANNAPOLIS. 437 he assured them that peaceable citizens should not be molested, and that the laws of the State should be respected. And more. He was ready to co-operate with the local authorities in suppressing a slave insurrection, or any other resistance to law. The Governor contented himself with simply protesting against the landing of troops as unwise, and begged the General not to halt them in Annapolis. April 20, 1861. All the night of the 21st, the Maryland lay aground, and immovable by wind or tide. At dawn on the 22d, another steamer appeared approaching. It was the Boston, bearing the New York Seventh Regiment. Colonel Lefferts had become convinced that he could not pass through Baltimore, so he chartered this steamer at Philadelphia with the intention of going to Washington by way of the Potomac. They embarked at four o'clock in the afternoon." Only a few officers were intrusted with the secret; the men had no knowledge of their route. Quietly they passed down the Delaware to the ocean, on a beautiful April evening, and entered the waters of Virginia between its great Capes, Charles and Henry. Informed of batteries near Alexandria, and finding no armed vessel to convoy the Boston, Colonel Lefferts deemed it prudent to follow General Butler to Annapolis; so they went up the Chesapeake, and came in sight of the grounded Maryland at dawn. The Sevent cheered the old flag seen at her fore, and the two regiments soon exchanged greetings. MARSHALL LEFFERTS. The Boston now attempted to get the Maryland from the ground. For many hours both regiments worked faithfully, but in vain. The Massachusetts troops were without a drop of liquid of any kind to drink for twelve hours, and were suffering intensely. Finally it was agreed that the Boston should land the Seventh at the Naval Academy's wharf, and then take the Eighth from the Maryland and put them ashore at the same place. This was done, In this view the buildings of the United States Naval Academy are seen. |