Showing posts with label Expansion of Slavery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Expansion of Slavery. Show all posts

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Diary of William Howard Russell: June 18, 1861

On looking out of my cabin window this morning I found the steamer fast along-side a small wharf, above which rose, to the height of 150 feet, at an angle of forty-five degrees, the rugged bluff already mentioned. The wharf was covered with commissariat stores and ammunition. Three heavy guns, which some men were endeavoring to sling to rude bullock-carts, in a manner defiant of all the laws of gravitation, seemed likely to go slap into the water at every moment; but of the many great strapping fellows who were lounging about, not one gave a hand to the working party. A dusty track wound up the hill to the brow, and there disappeared; and at the height of fifty feet or so above the level of the river two earthworks had been rudely erected in an ineffective position. The volunteers who were lounging about the edge of the stream were dressed in different ways, and had no uniform.

Already the heat of the sun compelled me to seek the shade; and a number of the soldiers, laboring under the same infatuation as that which induces little boys to disport themselves in the Thames at Waterloo Bridge, under the notion that they are washing themselves, were swimming about in a backwater of the great river, regardless of cat-fish, mud, and fever.

General Pillow proceeded on shore after breakfast, and we mounted the coarse cart-horse chargers which were in waiting at the jetty to receive us. It is scarcely worth while to transcribe from my diary a description of the works which I sent over at the time to England. Certainly, a more extraordinary maze could not be conceived, even in the dreams of a sick engineer — a number of mad beavers might possibly construct such dams. They were so ingeniously made as to prevent the troops engaged in their defence from resisting the enemy's attacks, or getting away from them when the assailants had got inside — most difficult and troublesome to defend, and still more difficult for the defenders to leave, the latter perhaps being their chief merit.

The General ordered some practice to be made with round shot down the river. An old forty-two pound carronade was loaded with some difficulty, and pointed at a tree about 1700 yards — which I was told, however, was not less than 2500 yards — distant. The General and his staff took their posts on the parapet to leeward, and I ventured to say, “I think, General, the smoke will prevent your seeing the shot.” To which the General replied, “No, sir,” in a tone which indicated, “I beg you to understand I have been wounded in Mexico, and know all about this kind of thing.” “Fire!” The string was pulled, and out of the touch-hole popped a piece of metal with a little chirrup. “Darn these friction tubes! I prefer the linstock and match,” quoth one of the staff, sotto voce, “but General Pillow will have us use friction tubes made at Memphis, that ar’n’t worth a cuss.” Tube No. 2, however, did explode, but where the ball went no one could say, as the smoke drifted right into our eyes.

The General then moved to the other side of the gun, which was fired a third time, the shot falling short in good line, but without any ricochet. Gun No. 3 was next fired. Off went the ball down the river, but off went the gun, too, and with a frantic leap it jumped, carriage and all, clean off the platform. Nor was it at all wonderful, for the poor old-fashioned chamber carronade had been loaded with a charge and a solid shot heavy enough to make it burst with indignation. Most of us felt relieved when the firing was over, and, for my own part, I would much rather have been close to the target than to the battery.

Slowly winding for some distance up the steep road in a blazing sun, we proceeded through the tents which are scattered in small groups, for health's sake, fifteen and twenty together, on the wooded plateau above the river. The tents are of the small ridge-pole pattern, six men to each, many of whom, from their exposure to the sun, whilst working in these trenches, and from the badness of the water, had already been laid up with illness. As a proof of General Pillow's energy, it is only fair to say he is constructing, on the very summit of the plateau, large cisterns, which will be filled with water from the river by steam power.

The volunteers were mostly engaged at drill in distinct companies, but by order of the General some 700 or 800 of them were formed into line for inspection. Many of these men were in their shirt sleeves, and the awkwardness with which they handled their arms showed that, however good they might be as shots, they were bad hands at manual platoon exercise; but such great strapping fellows, that, as I walked down the ranks there were few whose shoulders were not above the level of my head, excepting here and there a weedy old man or a growing lad: They were armed with old pattern percussion muskets, no two clad alike, many very badly shod, few with knapsacks, but all provided with a tin water-flask and a blanket. These men have been only five weeks enrolled, and were called out by the State of Tennessee, in anticipation of the vote of secession.

I could get no exact details as to the supply of food, but from the Quartermaster-General I heard that each man had from ¾ lb. to 1¼ lb. of meat, and a sufficiency of bread, sugar, coffee, and rice daily; however, these military Olivers “asked for more.” Neither whiskey nor tobacco was served out to them, which to such heavy consumers of both, must prove one source of dissatisfaction. The officers were plain, farmerly planters, merchants, lawyers, and the like — energetic, determined men, but utterly ignorant of the most rudimentary parts of military science. It is this want of knowledge on the part of the officer which renders it so difficult to arrive at a tolerable condition of discipline among volunteers, as the privates are quite well aware they know as much of soldiering as the great majority of their officers.

Having gone down the lines of these motley companies, the General addressed them in a harangue in which he expatiated on their patriotism, on their courage, and the atrocity of the enemy, in an odd farrago of military and political subjects. But the only matter which appeared to interest them much was the announcement that they would be released from work in another day or so, and that negroes would be sent to perform all that was required. This announcement was received with the words, “Bully for us!” and “That's good.” And when General Pillow wound up a florid peroration by assuring them, “When the hour of danger comes I will be with you,” the effect was by no means equal to his expectations. The men did not seem to care much whether General Pillow was with them or not at that eventful moment; and, indeed, all dusty as he was in his plain clothes he did not look very imposing, or give one an idea that he would contribute much to the means of resistance. However, one of the officers called out, “Boys, three cheers for General Pillow.”

What they may do in the North I know not, but certainly the Southern soldiers cannot cheer, and what passes muster for that jubilant sound is a shrill ringing scream with a touch of the Indian war-whoop in it. As these cries ended, a stentorian voice shouted out, “Who cares for General Pillow?” No one answered; whence I inferred the General would not be very popular until the niggers were actually at work in the trenches.

We returned to the steamer, headed up stream, and proceeded onwards for more than an hour, to another landing, protected by a battery, where we disembarked, the General being received by a guard dressed in uniform, who turned out with some appearance of soldierly smartness. On my remarking the difference to the General, he told me the corps encamped at this point was composed of gentlemen planters, and farmers. They had all clad themselves, and consisted of some of the best families in the State of Tennessee.

As we walked down the gangway to the shore, the band on the upper deck struck up, out of compliment to the English element in the party, the unaccustomed strains of “God save the Queen!” and I am not quite sure that the loyalty which induced me to stand in the sun, with uncovered head, till the musicians were good enough to desist, was appreciated. Certainly a gentleman, who asked me why I did so, looked very incredulous, and said “That he could understand it if it had been in a church; but that he would not broil his skull in the sun, not if General Washington was standing just before him.” The General gave orders to exercise the battery at this point, and a working party was told off to firing drill. ’Twas fully six minutes between the giving of the orders and the first gun being ready.

On the word “fire” being given, the gunner pulled the lanyard, but the tube did not explode; a second tube was inserted, but a strong jerk pulled it out without exploding; a third time one of the General's fuses was applied, which gave way to the pull, and was broken in two; a fourth time was more successful — the gun exploded, and the shot fell short and under the mark — in fact, nothing could be worse than the artillery practice which I saw here, and a fleet of vessels coming down the river might, in the present state of the garrisons, escape unhurt.

There are no disparts, tangents, or elevating screws to the gun, which are laid by eye and wooden chocks. I could see no shells in the battery, but was told there were some in the magazine.

Altogether, though Randolph's Point and Fort Pillow afford strong positions, in the present state of the service, and equipment of guns and works, gunboats could run past them without serious loss, and, as the river falls, the fire of the batteries will be even less effective.

On returning to the boats the band struck up “The Marseillaise” and “Dixie's Land.” There are two explanations of the word Dixie — one is that it is the general term for the Slave States, which are, of course, south of Mason and Dixon's line; another, that a planter named Dixie, died long ago, to the intense grief of his animated property. Whether they were ill-treated after he died, and thus had reason to regret his loss, or that they had merely a longing in the abstract after Heaven, no fact known to me can determine; but certain it is that they long much after Dixie, in the land to which his spirit was supposed by them to have departed, and console themselves in their sorrow by clamorous wishes to follow their master, where probably the revered spirit would be much surprised to find himself in their company. The song is the work of the negro melodists of New York.

In the afternoon we returned to Memphis. Here I was obliged to cut short my Southern tour, though I would willingly have stayed, to have seen the most remarkable social and political changes the world has probably ever witnessed. The necessity of my position obliged me to return northwards — unless I could write, there was no use in my being on the spot at all. By this time the Federal fleets have succeeded in closing the ports, if not effectually, so far as to render the carriage of letters precarious, and the route must be at best devious and uncertain.

Mr. Jefferson Davis was, I was assured, prepared to give me every facility at Richmond to enable me to know and to see all that was most interesting in the military and political action of the New Confederacy; but of what use could this knowledge be if I could not communicate it to the journal I served?

I had left the North when it was suffering from a political paralysis, and was in a state of coma in which it appeared conscious of the coming convulsion but unable to avert it. The sole sign of life in the body corporate was some feeble twitching of the limbs at Washington, when the district militia were called out, whilst Mr. Seward descanted on the merits of the Inaugural, and believed that the anger of the South was a short madness, which would be cured by a mild application of philosophical essays.

The politicians, who were urging in the most forcible manner the complete vindication of the rights of the Union, were engaged, when I left them arguing, that the Union had no rights at all as opposed to those of the States. Men who had heard with nods of approval of the ordinance of secession passed by State after State were now shrieking out, “Slay the traitors!”

The printed rags which had been deriding the President as the great “rail-splitter,” and his Cabinet as a collection of ignoble fanatics, were now heading the popular rush, and calling out to the country to support Mr. Lincoln and his Ministry, and were menacing with .war the foreign States which dared to stand neutral in the quarrel. The declaration of Lord John Russell that the Southern Confederacy should have limited belligerent rights had at first created a thrill of exultation in the South, because the politicians believed that in this concession was contained the principle of recognition; while it had stung to fury the people of the North, to whom it seemed the first warning of the coming disunion.

Much, therefore, as I desired to go to Richmond, where I was urged to repair by many considerations, and by the earnest appeals of those around me, I felt it would be impossible, notwithstanding the interest attached to the proceedings there, to perform my duties in a place cut off from all communication with the outer world; and so I decided to proceed to Chicago, and thence to Washington, where the Federals had assembled a large army, with the purpose of marching upon Richmond, in obedience to the cry of nearly every journal of influence in the Northern cities.

My resolution was mainly formed in consequence of the intelligence which was communicated to me at Memphis, and I told General Pillow that I would continue my journey to Cairo, in order to get within the Federal lines. As the river was blockaded, the only means of doing so was to proceed by rail to Columbus, and thence to take a steamer to the Federal position; and so, whilst the General was continuing his inspection, I rode to the telegraph office, in one of the camps, to order my luggage to be prepared for departure as soon as I arrived, and thence went on board the steamer, where I sat down in the cabin to write my last despatch from Dixie.

So far I had certainly no reason to agree with Mr. Seward in thinking this rebellion was the result of a localized energetic action on the part of a fierce minority in the seceding States, and that there was in each a large, if inert, mass opposed to secession, which would rally round the Stars and Stripes the instant they were displayed in their sight. On the contrary, I met everywhere with but one feeling, with exceptions which proved its unanimity and its force. To a man the people went with their States, and had but one battle cry, “States’ rights, and death to those who make war against them!”

Day after day I had seen this feeling intensified by the accounts which came from the North of a fixed determination to maintain the war; and day after day I am bound to add, fine impression on my mind was strengthened that “States’ rights” meant protection to slavery, extension of slave territory, and free-trade in slave produce with the outer world; nor was it any argument against the conclusion that the popular passion gave vent to the most vehement outcries against Yankees, abolitionists, German mercenaries, and modern invasion. I was fully satisfied in my mind also that the population of the South, who had taken up arms, were so convinced of the righteousness of their cause, and so competent to vindicate it, that they would fight with the utmost energy and valor in its defence and successful establishment.

The saloon in which I was sitting afforded abundant evidence of the vigor with which the South are entering upon the contest. Men of every variety and condition of life had taken up arms against the cursed Yankee and the Black Republican — there was not a man there who would not have given his life for the rare pleasure of striking Mr. Lincoln's head off his shoulders, and yet to a cold European the scene was almost ludicrous.

Along the covered deck lay tall Tennesseans, asleep, whose plumed felt hats were generally the only indications of their martial calling, for few indeed had any other signs of uniform, except the rare volunteers, who wore stripes of red and yellow cloth on their trousers, or leaden buttons, and discolored worsted braid and facings on their jackets. The afterpart of the saloon deck was appropriated to General Pillow, his staff, and officers. The approach to it was guarded by a sentry, a tall, good-looking young fellow in a gray flannel shirt, gray trousers, fastened with a belt and a brass buckle, inscribed U. S., which came from some plundered Federal arsenal, and a black wide-awake hat, decorated with a green plume. His Enfield rifle lay beside him on the deck, and, with great interest expressed on his face, he leant forward in his rocking-chair to watch the varying features of a party squatted on the floor, who were employed in the national game of “Euchre.” As he raised his eyes to examine the condition of the cigar he was smoking, he caught sight of me, and by the simple expedient of holding his leg across my chest, and calling out, "Hallo! where are you going to?" brought me to a standstill — whilst his captain who was one of the happy euchreists, exclaimed, “Now, Sam, you let nobody go in there.”

I was obliged to explain who I was, whereupon the sentry started to his feet, and said, “Oh! indeed, you are Russell that's been in that war with the Rooshians. Well, I'm very much pleased to know you. I shall be off sentry in a few minutes; I'll just ask you to tell me something about that fighting.” He held out his hand, and shook mine warmly as he spoke. There was not the smallest intention to offend in his manner; but, sitting down again, he nodded to the captain, and said, “It's all right; it's Pillow's friend — that's Russell of the London ‘Times.’” The game of euchre was continued — and indeed it had been perhaps all night — for my last recollection on looking out of my cabin was of a number of people playing cards on the floor and on the tables all down the saloon, and of shouts of “Eu-kerr!” “Ten dollars, you don't!” “I'll lay twenty on this!” and so on; and with breakfast the sport seemed to be fully revived.

There would have been much more animation in the game, no doubt, had the bar on board the Ingomar been opened; but the intelligent gentleman who presided inside had been restricted by General Pillow in his avocations; and when numerous thirsty souls from the camps came on board, with dry tongues and husky voices, and asked for “mint-juleps,” brandy smashes,” or “whiskey cocktails,” he seemed to take a saturnine pleasure by saying, “The General won't allow no spirit on board, but I can give you a nice drink of Pillow's own iced Mississippi water,” an announcement which generally caused infinite disgust and some unhandsome wishes respecting the General's future happiness.

By and by, a number of sick men were brought down on litters, and placed here and there along the deck. As there was a considerable misunderstanding between the civilian and military doctors, it appeared to be understood that the best way of arranging it was not to attend to the sick at all, and unfortunate men suffering from fever and dysentery were left to roll and groan, and lie on their stretchers, without a soul to help them. I had a medicine chest on board, and I ventured to use the lessons of my experience in such matters, administered my quinine, James's Powder, calomel, and opium, secundum meam artem, and nothing could be more grateful than the poor fellows were for the smallest mark of attention. “Stranger, remember, if I die,” gasped one great fellow, attenuated to a skeleton by dysentery, “That I am Robert Tallon, of Tishimingo county, and that I died for States' rights; see, now, they put that in the papers, won't you? Robert Tallon died for States’ rights,” and so he turned round on his blanket.

Presently the General came on board, and the Ingomar proceeded on her way back to Memphis. General Clarke, to whom I mentioned the great neglect from which the soldiers were suffering, told me he was afraid the men had no medical attendance in camp. All the doctors, in fact, wanted to fight, and as they were educated men, and generally connected with respectable families, or had political influence in the State, they aspired to be colonels at the very least, and to wield the sword instead of the scalpel.

Next to the medical department, the commissariat and transport were most deficient; but by constant courts-martial, stoppages of .pay, and severe sentences, he hoped these evils would be eventually somewhat mitigated. As one who had received a regular military education, General Clarke was probably shocked by volunteer irregularities; and in such matters as guard-mounting, reliefs, patrols, and picket duties, he declared they were enough to break one's heart; but I was astonished to hear from him that the Germans were by far the worst of the five thousand troops under his command, of whom they formed more than a fifth.

Whilst we were conversing, the captain of the steamer invited us to come up into his cabin on the upper deck; and as railway conductors, steamboat captains, bar-keepers, hotel clerks, and telegraph officers are among the natural aristocracy of the land, we could not disobey the invitation, which led to the consumption of some of the captain’s private stores, and many warm professions of political faith.

The captain told me it was rough work aboard sometimes, with “sports” and chaps of that kind; but “God bless you!” said he, “the river now is not what it used to be a few years ago, when we'd have three or four difficulties of an afternoon, and maybe now and then a regular free fight all up and down the decks, that would last a couple of hours, so that when we came to a town we would have to send for all the doctors twenty miles round, and maybe some of them would die in spite of that. It was the rowdies used to get these fights up; but we've put them pretty well down. The citizens have hunted thom out, and they's gone away west” “Well, then, captain, one's life was not very safe on board sometimes.” “Safe! Lord bless you!” said the captain; “if you did not meddle, just as safe as you are now, if the boiler don't collapse. You must, in course, know how to handle your weepins, and be pretty spry in taking your own part.” “Ho, you Bill!” to his colored servant, “open that clothes-press.” “Now, here,” he continued, “is how I travel; so that I am always easy in my mind in case of trouble on board.” Putting his hand under the pillow of the bed close beside him, he pulled out a formidable looking double-barrelled pistol at half-cock, with the caps upon it. “That's as purty a pistol as Derringer ever made. I've got the brace of them — here's the other;” and with that he whipped out pistol No. 2, in an equal state of forwardness, from a little shelf over his bed; and then going over to the clothes-press, he said, “Here's a real old Kentuck, one of the old sort, as light on the trigger as gossamer, and sure as deeth. Why, law bless me, a child would cut a turkey's head off with it at a hundred yards.” This was a huge lump of iron, about five feet long with a small hole bored down the centre, fitted in a coarse German-fashioned stock. “But,” continued he, “this is my main dependence; here is a regular beauty, a first-rate, with ball or buckshot, or whatever you like — made in London. I gave two hundred dollars for it; and it is so short and handy, and straight shooting, I'd just as soon part with my life as let it go to anybody;” and, with a glow of pride in his face, the captain handed round again a very short double-barrelled gun, of some eleven or twelve bore, with back-action locks, and an audacious “Joseph Manton, London,” stamped on the plate. The manner of the man was perfectly simple and bonรข fide; very much as if Inspector Podger were revealing to a simpleton the mode by which the London police managed refractory characters in the station-house.

From such matters as these I was diverted by the more serious subject of the attitude taken by England in this quarrel. The concession of belligerent rights was, I found, misunderstood, and was considered as an admission that the Southern States had established their independence before they had done more than declare their intention to fight for it.

It is not within my power to determine whether the North is as unfair to Great Britain as the South; but I fear the history of the people, and the tendency of their institutions, are adverse to any hope of fair-play and justice to the old country. And yet it is the only power in Europe for the good opinion of which they really seem to care. Let any French, Austrian, or Russian journal write what it pleases of the United States, it is received with indifferent criticism or callous head-shaking. But let a London paper speak, and the whole American press is delighted or furious.

The political sentiment quite overrides all other feelings; and it is the only symptom statesmen should care about, as it guides the policy of the country. If a man can put faith in the influence for peace of common interests, of common origin, common intentions, with the spectacle of this incipient war before his eyes, he must be incapable of appreciating the consequences which follow from man being an animal. A war between England and the United States would be unnatural; but it would not be nearly so unnatural now as it was when it was actually waged in 1776 between people who were barely separated from each other by a single generation; or in 1812-14, when the foreign immigration had done comparatively little to dilute the Anglo-Saxon blood. The Norman of Hampshire and Sussex did not care much for the ties of consanguinity and race when he followed his lord in fee to ravage Guienne or Brittany.

The general result of my intercourse with Americans is to produce the notion that they consider Great Britain in a state of corruption and decay, and eagerly seek to exalt France at her expense. Their language is the sole link between England and the United States, and it only binds the England of 1770 to the American of 1860.

There is scarcely an American on either side of Mason, and Dixon's line who does not religiously believe that the colonies, alone and single-handed, encountered the whole undivided force of Great Britain in the Revolution, and defeated it. I mean, of course, the vast mass of the people; and I do not think there is an orator or a writer who would venture to tell them the truth on the subject. Again, they firmly believe that their petty frigate engagements established as complete a naval ascendency over Great Britain as the latter obtained by her great encounters with the fleets of France and Spain. Their reverses, defeats and headlong routs in the first war, their reverses in the second, are covered over by a huge Buncombe plaster, made up of Bunker's Hill, Plattsburg, Baltimore, and New Orleans.

Their delusions are increased and solidified by the extraordinary text-books of so-called history, and by the feasts and festivals and celebrations of their every-day political life, in all of which we pass through imaginary Caudine Forks; and they entertain towards the old country at best very much the feeling which a high-spirited young man would feel towards the guardian who, when he had come of age, and was free from all control, sought to restrain the passions of his early life.
Now I could not refuse to believe that in New Orleans, Montgomery, Mobile, Jackson, and Memphis there is a reckless and violent condition of society, unfavorable to civilization, and but little hopeful for the future. The most absolute and despotic rule, under which a man's life and property are safe, is better than the largest measure of democratic freedom, which deprives the freeman of any security for either. The state of legal protection for the most serious interests of man, considered as a civilized and social creature, which prevails in America, could not be tolerated for an instant, and would generate a revolution in the worst governed country in Europe. I would much sooner, as the accidental victim of a generally disorganized police, be plundered by a chance diligence robber in Mexico, or have a fair fight with a Greek Klepht, suffer from Italian banditti, or be garrotted by a London ticket-of-leave man, than be bowie-knived or revolvered in consequence of a political or personal difference with a man, who is certain not in the least degree to suffer from an accidental success in his argument.

On our return to the hotel I dined with the General and his staff at the public table, where there was a large assemblage of military men, Southern ladies, their families, and contractors. This latter race has risen up as if by magic, to meet the wants of the new Confederacy; and it is significant to measure the amount of the dependence on Northern manufacturers by the advertisements in the Southern journals, indicating the creation of new branches of workmanship, mechanical science, and manufacturing skill.

Hitherto they have been dependent on the North for the very necessaries of their industrial life. These States were so intent on gathering in money for their produce, expending it luxuriously, and paying it out for Northern labor, that they found themselves suddenly in the condition of a child brought up by hand, whose nurse and mother have left it on the steps of the poor-house. But they have certainly essayed to remedy the evil and are endeavoring to make steam-engines, gunpowder, lamps, clothes, boots, railway carriages, steel springs, glass, and all the smaller articles for which even Southern households find a necessity.

The peculiar character of this contest develops itself in a manner almost incomprehensible to a stranger who has been accustomed to regard the United States as a nation. Here is General Pillow, for example, in the State of Tennessee, commanding the forces of the State, which, in effect, belongs to the Southern Confederacy; but he tells me that he cannot venture to move across a certain geographical line, dividing Tennessee from Kentucky, because the State of Kentucky, in the exercise of its sovereign powers and rights, which the Southern States are bound specially to respect, in virtue of their championship of States' rights, has, like the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, declared it will be neutral in the struggle; and Beriah Magoffin, Governor of the aforesaid State, has warned off Federal and Confederate troops from his territory.

General Pillow is particularly indignant with the cowardice of the well-known Secessionists of Kentucky; but I think he is rather more annoyed by the accumulation of Federal troops at Cairo, and their recent expedition to Columbus on the Kentucky shore, a little below them, where they seized a Confederate flag.

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, p. 309-21

Saturday, July 23, 2016

William Cullen Bryant to Abraham Lincoln, December 25, 1860

New York Dec. 25, 1860
My dear Sir,

The rumor having got abroad that you have been visited by a well known politician of New York who had a good deal to do with the stock market and who took with him a plan of compromise manufactured in Wall Street, it had occurred to me that you might like to be assured of the manner in which those Republicans who have no connection with Wall Street regard a compromise of the slavery question. The feeling of decided aversion to the least concession was never stronger than it is now. The people have given their verdict and they do not expect that either their representatives in Congress or their politicians out of Congress will attempt to change or modify it in any degree. The restoration of the Missouri Compromise would disband the Republican Party. Any other concession recognizing the right of slavery to protection or even existence in the territories would disgust and discourage the large majority of Republicans in the state and cool their interest in the incoming administration down to the freezing point. Whatever else be done the slavery question, so far as it is a federal question must remain as it is or the Republican party is annihilated. Nor will any concession of the sort proposed satisfy the South. South Carolina cannot be hired to return to the Union by any thing short of the removal of all restraints on the African slave trade. To do that would convert at once into friends of the Union, a class of the Southern politicians who are now doing a great deal to foment the discontents of the South and might effect what the Wall Street managers hope to bring about by restoring the Missouri line, and give protection to slavery South of it.

You will excuse me if I say a word concerning the formation of the Cabinet. I am glad to hear that it is decided to have regard to the in its composition, to that part of the Republican party which is derived from the old democratic party. It would be most unfortunate if the Cabinet were to be so constituted as to turn the policy of the administration into the old whig channels. To instance a single branch of that policy – the policy of restraints upon trade for the advantage of the manufacturers. We of the old democratic party who are the friends of free trade are perfectly willing that this should be regarded as an open question, but we shall be placed in immediate antagonism to the administration, the moment this is made a part of its governing policy. A bigot to protection placed at the head of the Treasury department would at once open a controversy on that question which would be carried on with zeal, perhaps with heat.

You will I know excuse these suggestions. If not vile they are at least disinterested. I have not, that I know of the remotest interest in politics except that our country should be governed with wisdom and justice, and with the allowance of the largest liberty in all things consistent with good order. You will receive perhaps from me letters in favor of persons desiring some office under the federal government or see my signature to recommendations got up by them or their friends. I pray you, in all these cases to believe, that no personal favor will be conferred on me, in any possible instance by bestowing the desired office on the person whom I may recommend. What I say for them should be taken as my opinion of their fitness and nothing more.

I am, dear Sir,
very truly yours

W. C. Bryant.

P. S. In regard to the slave trade, the zeal for its restoration arises from its profitableness. Large capitals are invested in it and it is the most lucrative of all branches of commerce.

W. C. B.

Sunday, July 12, 2015

Lydia Maria Child to Governor Henry A. Wise

In your civil but very diplomatic reply to my letter, you inform me that I have a constitutional right to visit Virginia, for peaceful purposes, in common with every citizen of the United States. I was perfectly well aware that such was the theory of constitutional obligation in the Slave States; but I was also aware of what you omit to mention, viz.: that the Constitution has, in reality, been completely and systematically nullified whenever it suited the convenience or the policy of the Slave Power. Your constitutional obligation, for which you profess so much respect, has never proved any protection to citizens of the Free States, who happened to have a black, brown, or yellow complexion; nor to any white citizen whom you even suspected of entertaining opinions opposite to your own, on a question of vast importance to the temporal welfare and moral example of our common country. This total disregard of constitutional obligation has been manifested not merely by the Lynch Law of mobs in the Slave States, but by the deliberate action of magistrates and legislators. What regard was paid to constitutional obligation in South Carolina, when Massachusetts sent the Hon. Mr. Hoar there as an envoy, on a purely legal errand? Mr. Hedrick, Professor of Political Economy in the University of North Carolina, had a constitutional right to reside in that State. What regard was paid to that right, when he was driven from his home, merely for declaring that he considered Slavery an impolitic system, injurious to the prosperity of States? What respect for constitutional rights was manifested by Alabama, when a bookseller in Mobile was compelled to flee for his life, because he had, at the special request of some of the citizens, imported a few copies of a novel that everybody was curious to road? Your own citizen, Mr. Underwood, had a constitutional right to live in Virginia, and vote for whomsoever he pleased. What regard was paid to his rights, when he was driven from your State for declaring himself in favor of the election of Fremont? With these, and a multitude of other examples before your eyes, it would seem as if the less that was said about respect for constitutional obligations at the South, the better. Slavery is, in fact, an infringement of all law, and adheres to no law, save for its own purposes of oppression.

You accuse Captain John Brown of “whetting knives of butchery for the mothers, sisters, daughters and babes” of Virginia; and you inform me of the well-known fact that he is “arraigned for the crimes of murder, robbery and treason.” I will not here stop to explain why I believe that old hero to be no criminal, but a martyr to righteous principles which he sought to advance by methods sanctioned by his own religious views, though not by mine. Allowing that Capt. Brown did attempt a scheme in which murder robbery and treason were, to his own consciousness, involved, I do not see how Gov. Wise can consistently arraign him for crimes he has himself commended. You have threatened to trample on the Constitution, and break the Union, if a majority of the legal voters in these Confederated States dared to elect a President unfavorable to the extension of Slavery. Is not such a declaration proof of premeditated treason? In the Spring of 1842, you made a speech in Congress, from which I copy the following: —

“Once set before the people of the Great Valley the conquest of the rich Mexican Provinces, and you might as well attempt to stop the wind. This Government might end its troops, but they would run over them like a herd of buffalo. Let the work once begin, and I do not know that this House would hold me very long. Give me five millions of dollars, and I would undertake to do it myself. Although I do not know how to set a single squadron in the field, I could find men to do it. Slavery should pour itself abroad, without restraint, and find no limit but the Southern Ocean. The Camanches should no longer hold the richest mines of Mexico. Every golden image which had received the profanation of a false worship, should soon be melted down into good American eagles. I would cause as much gold to cross the Rio del Norte as the mules of Mexico could carry; aye, and I would make better use of it, too, than any lazy, bigoted priesthood under heaven.”

When you thus boasted that you and your “booted loafers” would overrun the troops of the United States “like a herd of buffalo,” if the Government sent them to arrest your invasion of a neighboring nation, at peace with the United States, did you not pledge yourself to commit treason? Was it not by robbery, even of churches, that you proposed to load the mules of Mexico with gold for the United States? Was it not by the murder of unoffending Mexicans that you expected to advance those schemes of avarice and ambition? What humanity had you for Mexican “mothers and babes,” whom you proposed to make childless and fatherless‘? And for what purpose was this wholesale massacre to take place? Not to right the wrongs of any oppressed class; not to sustain any great principles of justice, or of freedom; but merely to enable “Slavery to pour itself forth without restraint.” Even if Captain Brown were as bad as you paint him, I should suppose he must naturally remind you of the words of Macbeth:

“We but teach,
Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return
To plague the inventor: This even-handed justice
Commends the ingredients of our poisoned chalice
To our own lips.”

If Captain Brown intended, as you say, to commit treason, robbery and murder, I think I have shown that he could find ample authority for such proceedings in the public declarations of Gov. Wise. And if, as he himself declares, he merely intended to free the oppressed, where could he read a more forcible lesson than is furnished by the State Seal of Virginia? I looked at it thoughtfully before I opened your letter; and though it had always appeared to me very suggestive, it never seemed to me so much so as it now did in connection with Captain John Brown. A liberty-loving hero stands with his foot upon a prostrate despot; under his strong arm, manacles and chains lie broken; and the motto is, “Sic Semper Tyrannis;” “Thus be it ever done to Tyrants.” And this is the blazon of a State whose most profitable business is the Internal Slave-Trade! — in whose highways coffles of human chattles, chained and manacled, are frequently seen! And the Seal and the Coffles are both looked upon by other chattels, constantly exposed to the same fate! What if some Vezey, or Nat Turner, should be growing up among those apparently quiet spectators? It is in no spirit of taunt or of exultation that I ask this question. I never think of it but with anxiety, sadness, and sympathy. I know that a slaveholding community necessarily lives in the midst of gunpowder; and, in this age, sparks of free thought are flying in every direction. You cannot quench the fires of free thought and human sympathy by any process of cunning or force; but there is a method by which you can effectually wet the gunpowder. England has already tried it, with safety and success. Would that you could be persuaded to set aside the prejudices of education, and candidly examine the actual working of that experiment! Virginia is so richly endowed by nature that Free Institutions alone are wanting to render her the most prosperous and powerful of the States.

In your letter, you suggest that such a scheme as Captain Brown’s is the natural result of the opinions with which I sympathize. Even if I thought this to be a correct statement, though I should deeply regret it, I could not draw the conclusion that humanity ought to be stifled, and truth struck dumb, for fear that long-successful despotism might be endangered by their utterance. But the fact is, you mistake the source of that strange outbreak. No abolition arguments or denunciations, however earnestly, loudly, or harshly proclaimed, would have produced that result. It was the legitimate consequence of the continual and constantly-increasing aggressions of the Slave Power. The Slave States, in their desperate efforts to sustain a bad and dangerous institution, have encroached more and more upon the liberties of the Free States. Our inherent love of law and order, and our superstitious attachment to the Union, you have mistaken for cowardice; and rarely have you let slip any opportunity to add insult to aggression.

The manifested opposition to Slavery began with the lectures and pamphlets of a few disinterested men and women, who based their movements upon purely moral and religious grounds; but their expostulations were met with a storm of rage, with tar and feathers, brickbats, demolished houses, and other applications of Lynch Law. When the dust of the conflict began to subside a little, their numbers were found to be greatly increased by the efforts to exterminate them. They had become an influence in the State too important to be overlooked by shrewd calculators. Political economists began to look at the subject from a lower point of view. They used their abilities to demonstrate that slavery was a wasteful system, and that the Free States were taxed, to an enormous extent, to sustain an institution which, at heart, two-thirds of them abhorred. The forty millions, or more, of dollars, expended in hunting Fugitive Slaves in Florida, under the name of the Seminole War, were adduced, as one item in proof, to which many more were added. At last, politicians were compelled to take some action on the subject. It soon became known to all the people that the Slave States had always managed to hold in their hands the political power of the Union, and that while they constituted only one-third of the white population of these States, they hold more than two-thirds of all the lucrative, and once honorable offices; an indignity to which none but a subjugated people had ever before submitted. The knowledge also became generally diffused, that while the Southern States owned their Democracy at home, and voted for them, they also systematically bribed the nominally Democratic party, at the North, with the offices adroitly kept at their disposal.

Through these, and other instrumentalities, the sentiments of the original Garrisonian Abolitionists became very widely extended, in forms more or less diluted. But by far the most efficient co-laborers we have ever had have been the Slave States themselves. By denying us the sacred Right of Petition, they roused the free spirit of the North, as it never could have been roused by the loud trumpet of Garrison, or the soul-animating bugle of Phillips. They bought the great slave, Daniel, and, according to their established usage, paid him no wages for his labor. By his cooperation, they forced the Fugitive Slave Law upon us, in violation of all our humane instincts and all our principles of justice. And what did they procure for the Abolitionists by that despotic process? A deeper and wider detestation of Slavery throughout the Free States, and the publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, an eloquent outburst of moral indignation, whose echoes wakened the world to look upon their shame.

By fillibustering and fraud, they dismembered Mexico, and having thus obtained the soil of Texas, they tried to introduce it as a Slave State into the Union. Failing to effect their purpose by constitutional means, they accomplished it by a most open and palpable violation of the Constitution, and by obtaining the votes of Senators on false pretences.*

Soon afterward, a Southern Slave Administration ceded to the powerful monarchy of Great Britain several hundred thousands of square miles, that must have been made into Free States, to which that same Administration had declared that the United States had “an unquestionable right;” and then they turned upon the weak Republic of Mexico, and, in order to make more Slave States, .wrested from her twice as many hundred thousands of square miles, to which we had not a shadow of right.

Notwithstanding all these extra efforts, they saw symptoms that the political power so long held with a firm grasp was in danger of slipping from their hands, by reason of the extension of Abolition sentiments, and the greater prosperity of Free States. Emboldened by continual success in aggression, they made use of the pretence of “Squatter Sovereignty” to break the league into which they had formerly cajoled the servile representatives of our blinded people, by which all the territory of the United States south of 36° 30’ was guaranteed to Slavery, and all north of it to Freedom. Thus Kansas became the battle-ground of the antagonistic elements in our Government. Ruflians hired by the Slave Power were sent thither temporarily, to do the voting, and drive from the polls the legal voters, who were often murdered in the process. Names, copied from the directories of cities in other States, were returned by thousands as legal voters in Kansas, in order to establish a Constitution abhorred by the people. This was their exemplification of Squatter Sovereignty. A Massachusetts Senator, distinguished for candor, courtesy, and stainless integrity, was half murdered by slaveholders, merely for having the manliness to state these facts to the assembled Congress of the nation. Peaceful emigrants from the North, who went to Kansas for no other purpose than to till the soil, erect mills, and establish manufactories, schools, and churches, were robbed, outraged, and murdered. For many months, a war more ferocious than the warfare of wild Indians was carried on against a people almost unresisting, because they relied upon the Central Government for aid. And all this while, the power of the United States, wielded by the Slave Oligarchy, was on the side of the aggressors. They literally tied the stones, and let loose the mad dogs. This was the state of things when the hero of Osawatomie and his brave sons went to the rescue. It was he who first turned the tide of Border-Ruffian triumph, by showing them that blows were to be taken as well as given.

You may believe it or not, Gov. Wise, but it is certainly the truth that, because slaveholders so recklessly sowed the wind in Kansas, they reaped a whirlwind at Harper’s Ferry.

The people of the North had a very strong attachment to the Union; but, by your desperate measures, you have weakened it beyond all power of restoration. They are not your enemies, as you suppose, but they cannot consent to be your tools for any ignoble task you may choose to propose. You must not judge of us by the crawling sinuosities of an Everett; or by our magnificent hound, whom you trained to hunt your poor cripples, and then sent him sneaking into a corner to die — not with shame for the base purposes to which his strength had been applied, but with vexation because you withheld from him the promised bone. Not by such as these must you judge the free, enlightened yeomanry of New England. A majority of them would rejoice to have the Slave States fulfil their oft-repeated threat of withdrawal from the Union. It has ceased to be a bugbear, for we begin to despair of being able, by any other process, to give the world the example of a real republic. The moral sense of these States is outraged by being accomplices in sustaining an institution vicious in all its aspects; and it is now generally understood that we purchase our disgrace at great pecuniary expense. If you would only make the offer of a separation in serious earnest, you would hear the hearty response of millions, “Go, gentlemen, and

‘Stand not upon the order of your going,
But go at once!’”

Yours, with all due respect,
L. MARIA CHILD.
_______________

* The following Senators, Mr. Niles, of Connecticut, Mr. Dix, of New York, and Mr. Tappan, of Ohio, published statements that their votes had been obtained by false representations; and they declared that the case was the same with Mr. Heywood, of North Carolina.

SOURCE: The American Anti-Slavery Society, Correspondence between Lydia Maria Child and Gov. Wise and Mrs. Mason, of Virginia, p. 6-12

Sunday, March 29, 2015

Diary of William Howard Russell: Monday, April 1, 1861

On Easter Monday, after breakfast with Mr. Olmsted, I drove over to visit Senator Douglas. Originally engaged in some mechanical avocation, by his ability and eloquence he has raised himself to the highest position in the State short of the Presidency, which might have been his but for the extraordinary success of his opponent in a fortuitous suffrage scramble. He is called the Little Giant, being modo bipedali staturรข, but his head entitles him to some recognition of intellectual height. His sketch of the causes which have led to the present disruption of parties, and the hazard of civil war, was most vivid and able; and for more than an hour he spoke with a vigor of thought and terseness of phrase which, even on such dreary and uninviting themes as squatter sovereignty and the Kansas-Nebraska question, interested a foreigner in the man and the subject. Although his sympathies seemed to go with the South on the question of slavery and territorial extension, he condemned altogether the attempt to destroy the Union.

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, p. 55

Sunday, March 22, 2015

John Lothrop Motley to Mary Benjamin Motley, July 14, 1861

Nahant, July 14, 1861.

My Dearest Mary: This is the first rainy day since I landed in the country, now nearly five weeks ago. It has been most wondrously bright weather day after day, sometimes very hot, but as it can never be too hot for me, I have been well satisfied. I was so glad to hear of Lady Dufferin's safe return, and I do hope sincerely that the Syrian sun has not visited her too roughly, but that the gentle atmosphere of an English summer will entirely restore her. What a comfort it must be to dear Mrs. Norton to have them safe back again!

Alas! during all my pleasure at reading your letters I could not throw off for a moment the dull, deadly horror of the calamity of which I wrote to you in my last. Yesterday I went out to Longfellow's house, by especial message from Tom Appleton, to attend the funeral. It was not thus that I expected for the first time after so long an absence to cross that threshold. The very morning after my arrival from England I found Longfellow's card, in my absence, with a penciled request to come out and sup with them, Tom, Mackintosh, and the rest. I could not go, but have been several times begged to come since that day, yet this is the first time I have been there. I am glad I had seen F–––, however. I think I told you that I saw her a few days ago, at the chair of her dying father; she was radiant with health and beauty, and was so cordial and affectionate in her welcome to me. I did not mean to look at her in her coffin, for I wished to preserve that last image of her face undimmed. But after the ceremony at the house the cortege went to Mount Auburn, and there was a brief prayer by Dr. Gannett at the grave, and it so happened that I was placed, by chance, close to the coffin, and I could not help looking upon her face; it was turned a little on one side, was not in the slightest degree injured, and was almost as beautiful as in life — “but for that sad, shrouded eye,” and you remember how beautiful were her eyes. Longfellow has as yet been seen by no one except his sisters. He has suffered considerable injury in the hands, but nothing which will not soon be remedied. He has been in an almost frenzied condition, at times, from his grief, but, I hear, is now comparatively composed; but his life is crushed, I should think. His whole character, which was so bright and genial and sunny, will suffer a sad change.

. . . We were expecting the Longfellows down here every day. Tom and he own together the old Wetmore cottage, and they were just opening it when the tragedy occurred. I still think it probable that they will come, for he certainly cannot remain in his own house now. My mother is decidedly gaining strength and is very cheerful. I don't find Mr. Cabot much changed, except that he is more lame than he was. They have invited me to Newport, and so have Mr. Sears and Bancroft, but I have no idea of going. I have hardly time to see as much of my friends and relations in Boston and its neighborhood as I wish.

I had better go back, I think, and try to do a year's hard work in the diggings, as I can be of no use here, and it is absolutely necessary for me to go on with my work.

. . . Although it seems so very difficult for the English mind, as manifested in the newspapers, to understand the objects of the war, they seem to twenty millions of us very plain — first, to prohibit forever the extension of negro slavery, and to crush forever the doctrine that slavery is the national, common law of America, instead of being an exceptional, local institution confined within express limits; secondly, to maintain the authority of the national government, as our only guaranty for life, liberty, and civilization. It is not a matter of opinion, but of profound, inmost conviction, that if we lose the Union, all is lost; anarchy and Mexicanism will be substituted for the temperate reign of constitutional, representative government and the English common law. Certainly these objects are respectable ones, and it is my belief that they will be attained. If, however, the war assumes larger proportions, I know not what results may follow; but this I do know, that slavery will never gain another triumph on this continent.

This great mutiny was founded entirely on two great postulates or hopes. First, the conspirators doubted; not of the assistance, in every free State, of the whole Democratic party, who they thought would aid them in their onslaught against the Constitution, just as they had stood by them at the polls in a constitutional election. Miserable mistake! The humiliation of the national flag at Sumter threw the whole Democratic party into a frenzy of rage. They had sustained the South for the sake of the Union, for the love of the great Republic. When the South turned against the national empire and fired against the flag, there was an end of party differences at that instant throughout the free States. Secondly, they reckoned confidently on the immediate recognition and alliance of England. Another mistake! And so, where is now the support of the mutiny? Instead of a disunited North, there is a distracted South, with the free States a unit. There is no doubt whatever that the conspirators expected confidently to establish their new constitution over the whole country except New England.

I find the numbers of United States troops given thus: General Patterson's command, 25,000; General McClellan, 45,000; General McDowell, 45,000; General Butler, 20,000; total, 135,000. Certainly, if we should deduct ten per cent, from this estimate, and call them 120,000, we should not be far wrong. McDowell commands opposite Washington, along Arlington, at Alexandria, etc.; McClellan is at this moment at Beverly, and Grafton in West Virginia; Butler is at and near Fortress Monroe; Patterson is at Martinsburg. I take it for granted that you have a good map of Virginia, and that you study it.

Now for the commanders. McClellan is a first-class man, thirty-seven years of age, of superior West Point education, and has distinguished himself in Mexico. The country seems to regard him as the probable successor to Scott in its affections when he shall be taken from us. McDowell is a good, practical, professional soldier, fully equal to his work, about forty years of age. Patterson is an Irishman by birth, age sixty-nine, but educated here, and has been in the army much of his life, having served both in the War of 1812 and in Mexico, and he commands against an able rebel, Johnston, who is, or was, at Winchester and its neighborhood. Butler is the militia general who commanded at Annapolis, for a time, in the first outbreak, and has since been made major-general in the army. The Gordon regiment, whose departure from Boston I mentioned in my last, are now at Martinsburg, and will be in the front ranks under Patterson, who has been perpetually menaced by Johnston with a general attack. The prevailing impression is, however, that Johnston will fall back, as the rebels have constantly been doing; all the dash, impetuosity, and irrepressible chivalry on their part have hitherto only manifested themselves on paper.

Don't be affected by any sneers or insinuations of slowness against Scott; I believe him to be a magnificent soldier, thoroughly equal to his work, and I trust that the country and the world will one day acknowledge that he has played a noble and winning game with consummate skill. He can afford to neglect newspaper criticism at present, whether cis- or transatlantic. One victory at least he has achieved: he has at last reduced the lying telegram manufacturers to submission. Henceforth you may read our newspaper accounts with tolerable confidence. Now look at the map of Virginia, and you will see his plan so far as developed. You read the American newspapers, of course, which I ordered for you. Yesterday and to-day bring accounts from McClellan, in which he officially informs government that he has routed and annihilated the rebels in West Virginia. Their general is killed, their army broken to pieces. One colonel (Pegram) has surrendered himself and his whole regiment. McClellan has at least 1000 prisoners. He has lost very few men, the rebels perhaps 200, but the result is a large one. I am sure no one wishes to hear a long list of killed and wounded on either side. What Scott wishes is to demoralize and disorganize this senseless and wanton rebellion, and to crush its leaders. Now, these 10,000 just routed by McClellan compose the main force by which the counter-revolution of West Virginia was to be prevented. There is another force in the southwest, on the Kanawha, under the redoubtable Wise, whose retreat you will soon hear of. You will also, I think, soon find that Johnston has fallen back from Winchester. Thus the rebels will soon be squeezed down toward Richmond. There, I suppose, they must make a stand, and there will, perhaps, be a great battle. Hitherto, however, they have shown no avidity for such a result. Virginia is the battle-ground for the summer.

SOURCE: George William Curtis, editor, The Correspondence of John Lothrop Motley in Two Volumes, Library Edition, Volume 2, p. 175-80

Friday, March 6, 2015

Diary of Mary Boykin Chesnut: September 19, 1861

A painful piece of news came to us yesterday — our cousin, Mrs. Witherspoon, of Society Hill, was found dead in her bed. She was quite well the night before. Killed, people say, by family sorrows. She was a proud and high-strung woman. Nothing shabby in word, thought, or deed ever came nigh her. She was of a warm and tender heart, too; truth and uprightness itself. Few persons have ever been more loved and looked up to. She was a very handsome old lady, of fine presence, dignified and commanding.

“Killed by family sorrows,” so they said when Mrs. John N. Williams died. So Uncle John said yesterday of his brother, Burwell. “Death deserts the army,” said that quaint old soul, “and takes fancy shots of the most eccentric kind nearer home.”

The high and disinterested conduct our enemies seem to expect of us is involuntary and unconscious praise. They pay us the compliment to look for from us (and execrate us for the want of it) a degree of virtue they were never able to practise themselves. It is a crowning misdemeanor for us to hold still in slavery those Africans whom they brought here from Africa, or sold to us when they found it did not pay to own them themselves. Gradually, they slid or sold them off down here; or freed them prospectively, giving themselves years in which to get rid of them in a remunerative way. We want to spread them over other lands, too — West and South, or Northwest, where the climate would free them or kill them, or improve them out of the world, as our friends up North do the Indians. If they had been forced to keep the negroes in New England, I dare say the negroes might have shared the Indians’ fate, for they are wise in their generation, these Yankee children of light. Those pernicious Africans! So have just spoken Mr. Chesnut and Uncle John, both ci-devant Union men, now utterly for State rights.

It is queer how different the same man may appear viewed from different standpoints. “What a perfect gentleman,” said one person of another; “so fine-looking, high-bred, distinguished, easy, free, and above all graceful in his bearing; so high-toned! He is always indignant at any symptom of wrong-doing. He is charming — the man of all others I like to have strangers see — a noble representative of our country.” “Yes, every word of that is true,” was the reply. “He is all that. And then the other side of the picture is true, too. You can always find him. You know where to find him! Wherever there is a looking-glass, a bottle, or a woman, there will he be also.” “My God! and you call yourself his friend.” “Yes, I know him down to the ground.”

This conversation I overheard from an upper window when looking down on the piazza below — a complicated character truly beyond La Bruyรจre—with what Mrs. Preston calls refinement spread thin until it is skin-deep only.

An iron steamer has run the blockade at Savannah. We now raise our wilted heads like flowers after a shower. This drop of good news revives us.1
_______________

1 By reason of illness, preoccupation in other affairs, and various deterrent causes besides, Mrs. Chesnut allowed a considerable period to elapse before making another entry in her diary.

SOURCE: Mary Boykin Chesnut, Edited by Isabella D. Martin and Myrta Lockett Avary, A Diary From Dixie, p. 129-30