Wednesday, September 17, 2014

Commodore Samuel F. Du Pont to Senator James W. Grimes, February 23, 1862

Wabash, Port Royal, February 23, 1862.

Your great kindness has made a deep impression on me. It has been no trait of mine to “court honor,” and I can truly say visions of distinction formed no part or lot in my motives of action. To serve my country, do my duty, and meet the expectations of those who had given me the opportunity, have been the incentives uppermost in my mind. Yet I believe this temperament and such impulses are in no way inconsistent with feelings of profound gratitude and pride at the high distinction which has been awarded me, and which I owe to your kind instrumentality.

I am off to-morrow with a large division of my squadron to complete my work on the lower coast, and, if God is with us, in some three weeks I hope to hold everything by an inside or outside blockade from Cape Canaveral to Georgetown, South Carolina. Our hearts have been gladdened by the news from the North. Porter came in to-day on his way to the Gulf, and gave us the account of the surrender of Fort Donelson. I have never permitted any invidious feelings of rivalry with our military brethren, but we are thrilled in our esprit de corps at the deeds of the Navy, and I am sure they must be agreeable to you, as offering some return to that disinterested sympathy, guidance, and support, which you have extended to that branch of the public service since you took your seat in the councils of the nation.

We hear fine accounts of the Northwestern army, and Captain Rodgers had a letter from some officer in the West, who spoke of the impression made by the Iowa regiments. I thought this item, traveling back to you from South Carolina, would not be unacceptable.

SOURCE: William Salter, The Life of James W. Grimes, p. 169-70

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