CHAPTER V ON TO RICHMOND THE Confederate Government was closely patterned after that of the Government of the United States. This was occasion both of strength and weakness in the new organization. It was a form so familiar that the leaders on the southern side were able to get to work at once under methods of administration with which they were familiar; but it carried over existing rivalries and created offices which it was not always easy to fill. Certain southern writers maintain that the South suffered because it had to have a president and had no available man except Jefferson Davis, while possessing many men who thought themselves superior to him in fitness for the position. Jefferson Davis left the United States Senate nearly two months before Lincoln's inauguration. He was elected provisional president of the Confederacy February 9, 1861, his formal election to the presidency occurring some months later. His inauguration took place February eighteenth, fifteen days before that of Lincoln. For several weeks after their inauguration both presidents pursued a waiting policy. Neither Abraham Lincoln nor Jefferson Davis wished to take the initiative in what threatened to be a civil war. The Confederate Government appointed three commissioners to go to Washington to inform President Lincoln that seven states had withdrawn from the Union and become an independent nation, and to arrange for an adjustment, on terms of amity and good-will, all questions arising out of the separation. These three commissioners were John Forsythe, André B. Roman and Martin J. Crawford. Crawford arrived in Washington the day before Lincoln's inauguration, and Forsythe arrived a day or two later. These men, believing Seward to be the real power of the new administration, and feeling assured of Seward's earnest desire that war should be averted, endeavored to come to an understanding with the new secretary of state. In the negotiations between these commissioners and the secretary, the go-between was Judge John A. Campbell, an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court, whose conduct in the matter is not above reproach. To him Seward confided his belief that Fort Sumter would not be reinforced, and that if hostilities were averted, the fort must of necessity be evacuated before many weeks. This opinion, which the president and the Cabinet shared, the commissioners accepted as a pledge of the government. Seward was incautious in making this statement, but there is no ground for the charge that he was disloyal to Lincoln or untrue in his representations to Campbell and through him to the commissioners. As we know, the time came when Lincoln determined to relieve Sumter, sending provisions but not arms. This announcement was heralded by certain Confederate authorities, and is still proclaimed by superficial critics, as a violation of agreement. This became the pretext of the Confederates for firing upon Sumter. As a matter of fact the tension on both sides had been increasing from the time of Lincoln's inauguration. It would not have been possible much longer to avert some act of hostility. Aristotle taught "The causes of war are profound, but the occasions of war are slight." Any one of several events might have brought on war. The firing upon Sumter, however, was not the act of a mob, it was the authorized act of the Confederate Gov ernment. On April twelfth the batteries which had been erected on the shores of Charleston Harbor opened fire upon Fort Sumter. Major Robert Anderson returned the fire. The fort, after thirtyfour hours of bombardment, surrendered, the garrison march ing out with the honors of war. It can not quite be said that Sumter was forced to surrender. No one had been hurt, and provisions were not exhausted; but an honorable defense had been made, and no relief was expected. The fall of Fort Sumter unified the North and also unified the South. It hastened the decision of Virginia to enter the Confederacy, and thus forced the line of the seceded states to the bank of the Potomac opposite Washington. It removed from the South the last vestige of belief that the North was not in deadly earnest. The effect upon the North was not less significant. To the special session of Congress convened shortly after, Lincoln thus defined the issue: The assault upon and reduction of Fort Sumter was in no sense a matter of self-defense on the part of the assailants. They well knew that the garrison in the fort could by no possibility commit aggression upon them. They knew-they were expressly notified-that the giving of bread to the few brave and hungry men of the garrison was all which would on that occasion be attempted, unless themselves, by resisting so much, should provoke more. They knew that this government desired to keep the garrison in the fort, not to assail them, but merely to maintain visible possession, and thus to preserve the Union from actual and immediate dissolution-trusting, as hereinbefore stated, to time, discussion, and the ballot-box for final adjustment; and they assailed and reduced the fort for precisely the reverse object-to drive out the visible authority of the Federal Union, and thus force it to immediate dissolution. . . . ... And this issue embraces more than the fate of these United States. It presents to the whole family of man the question whether a constitutional republic or democracy—a government of the people by the same people-can or can not maintain its territorial integrity against its own domestic foes. . . . So viewing the issue, no choice was left but to call out the war power of the government; and so to resist force employed for its destruction, by force for its preservation. Two days after the fall of Fort Sumter Lincoln issued a call for seventy-five thousand volunteers to serve for three months, "to maintain the honor, the integrity and the existence of our national Union." The response was immediate and hearty. The number of men who volunteered was far in excess of the number called for. The men who responded had no doubt that the ninety days of their enlistment would be more than ample to put down the rebellion. Jefferson Davis answered Lincoln's call for troops with a desperate effort to build up the southern navy under the offer to issue letters of marque and reprisal against the United States. Lincoln on the nineteenth of April, proclaimed a partial, and on the twenty-third, a general blockade of southern ports. The Confederate States, assuming to be an independent power, formally declared war against the United States. Meantime, Washington was in peril. Confederate troops mustered and drilled within plain sight of the city. The handful of regular troops in Washington was entirely inadequate for the protection of the nation's capital. The first regiments of those who responded to Lincoln's proclamation were hastened by the shortest route to Washington. The route lay through Baltimore. Eminent military authorities assert that progress in the manufacture of weapons of war results in relative security of life. If two men fight with knives, one is likely to be killed and the other badly wounded in five minutes; but the same men in rifle-pits a mile apart may shoot at each other from time to time all winter and both emerge safe in the spring. The bombardment of Fort Sumter lasted thirty-four hours, and not a drop of blood was shed on either side. That was something for which both sides were thankful. Both governments resolved to be very careful not to do anything which should cause it to bear the onus of shedding the first blood; and each vainly hoped that if bloodshed could be postponed a little longer, actual war might be averted. The first bloodshed was not in pitched battle, nor was it authorized by either government. It was an attack by a mob, on April nineteenth, on the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment passing through Baltimore on its way to Washington. To their credit, it should be recorded that the mayor of the city and the marshal of the police force faithfully endeavored to quell the riot, but were unable to do so. The soldiers were compelled to defend themselves, and they returned the fire of the rioters. Four soldiers were killed and thirty-six were wounded. Of the mob twelve were killed and the number of wounded was not accurately reported. It could not longer be said, however, that the conflict was bloodless. The anniversary of the battle of Lexington had been celebrated by the first shedding of blood between the North and South. Wild rumors filled Washington and came up to the White House, announcing that the Rebels were marching from Baltimore and about to take Washington. It seemed as though the nation's capital might at any time fall into the hands of the Confederates. It is impossible to exaggerate the consternation felt at Washington after this fatal incident. On the following day and the next, delegations from Baltimore waited upon Lincoln earnestly beseeching him not to permit any more troops to pass through that city. Although there was only one railroad at that time connecting Washington with the North, and that railroad passed through Baltimore, Lincoln tactfully considered the request. For a few days the troops sailed down Chesapeake Bay to Annapolis, and thus reached Washington without passing through Baltimore. This arrangement, however, was only temporary. In a few days Baltimore was open to the unrestricted passage of Union troops. The days that followed in the White House were days of extreme depression. Expected reenforcements from Massachusetts and Rhode Island did not arrive. On April twentyfourth John Hay entered in his diary: This has been a day of gloom and doubt. Everybody seems |