Diary of Sir Arthur James Lyon Fremantle: Thursday, June 18, 1863

At 10 A.M. I called by appointment on Mr Sedden, the Secretary at War. His anteroom was crowded with applicants for an interview, and I had no slight difficulty in getting in. Mr Sedden is a cadaverous but clever-looking man; he received me with great kindness, and immediately furnished me with letters of introduction for Generals Lee and Longstreet.

My friend Major Norris then took me to the President's office and introduced me to the aides-de-camp of the President — viz., Colonels Wood, Lee, and Johnston. The two latter are sons to General Lee and General Albert Sidney Johnston, who was killed at Shiloh.

Major Norris then took me to the capitol, and introduced me to Mr Thompson the librarian, and to Mr Meyers, who is now supposed to look after British interests since the abrupt departure of Mr Moore, the Consul. I was told that Mr Moore had always been considered a good friend to the Southern cause, and had got into the mess which caused his removal entirely by his want of tact and discretion. There is a fine view from the top of the capitol; the librarian told me that last year the fighting before Richmond could easily be seen from thence, and that many ladies used to go up for that purpose. Every one said, that notwithstanding the imminence of the danger, the population of Richmond continued their daily avocations, and that no alarm was felt as to the result.

The interior of the capitol is decorated with numerous flags captured from the enemy. They are very gorgeous, all silk and gold, and form a great contrast to the little bunting battle flags of the Confederates. Amongst them I saw two colours which had belonged to the same regiment, the 37th New York (I think). These were captured in different battles; and on the last that was taken there is actually inscribed as a victory the word Fairoaks, which was the engagement in which the regiment had lost its first colour.

Mr Butler King, a member of Congress, whose acquaintance I had made in the Spottswood Hotel, took me to spend the evening at Mrs S——’s, a charming widow, for whom I had brought a letter from her only son, aide-de-camp to General Magruder, in Texas.

Mrs S—— is clever and agreeable. She is a highly patriotic Southerner; but she told me that she had stuck fast to the Union until Lincoln's proclamation calling out 75,000 men to coerce the South, which converted her and such a number of others into strong Secessionists. I spent a very pleasant evening with Mrs S——, who had been much in England, and had made a large acquaintance there.

Mr Butler King is a Georgian gentleman, also very agreeable and well informed. It is surprising to hear the extraordinary equanimity with which he and hundreds of fellow-sufferers talk of their entire ruin and the total destruction of their property. I know many persons in England suppose that Great Britain has now made enemies both of the North and South; but I do not believe this is the case with respect to the South, whatever certain Richmond papers may say. The South looks to England for everything when this war is over; — she wants our merchants to buy her cotton, she wants our ships to carry it;—she is willing that England should supply her with all the necessaries which she formerly received from the North. It is common to hear people declare they would rather pay twice the price for English goods than trade any more with Yankeedom.

SOURCE: Sir Arthur James Lyon Fremantle, Three Months in the Southern States: April-June, 1863, p. 218-21

Farewell Address of Major-General John A. Dix to the Middle Department, June 1, 1862

Head quarters, Middle Department, Baltimore, Md., June 1,1862.

General Orders, No. 14:

The Major-general commanding, having received orders to repair to Fort Monroe and assume the command at that point, and having but two hours to prepare for his departure, takes leave of the troops under his command in the only mode left to him — through the medium of a General Order.

Of the corps composing his command when he first assumed it, more than ten months ago, two regiments — the Third New York Volunteers, under Colonel Alford; the Fourth New York Volunteers, under Colonel Taylor; and the regular garrison of Fort McHenry, under Colonel Morris — are all that remain. The admirable discipline of these deserves the highest commendation; and he returns to all his sincere thanks for their promptitude and fidelity in the performance of their duties.

It is a source of great regret to him that he is compelled to leave without being able to review the regiments of New York Militia — the Seventh, Eighth, Thirteenth, Twenty-second, Thirty-seventh, and Forty-seventh — which, under a second appeal from the Chief Magistrate of the Union, have laid aside their various occupations on the briefest notice, at great personal sacrifice, and, hurrying to the field, are now occupying positions in and around Baltimore. In their patriotism and their devotion to the Government of their country the Union feeling of the city will meet with a cordial sympathy. It is a great alleviation of the regret with which the Major-general commanding parts with them, that he is soon to be succeeded by a distinguished general officer of the regular army from their own State. In the interim the command of the Department devolves on Brigadier-general Montgomery, United States Volunteers.

The Major-general commanding cannot forbear, in taking leave of the citizens of Baltimore, among whom his duties have been discharged, to express the grateful sense he will ever retain of the aid and encouragement he has received from those of them who have been true, under all the vicissitudes of a wicked and unnatural contest, to the cause of the Union. The ladies of the Union Relief Association are entitled to a special acknowledgment of his obligations to them. It is believed that the records of philanthropic devotion do not contain a brighter example of self-sacrificing service than that which is to be found in their own quiet and unobtrusive labors. The military hospitals have, from the commencement of the war, borne unceasing testimony to their untiring zeal and sympathy. The wounded prisoners of the insurgent army have, like our own, been solaced in their dying hours by the ministrations of these devoted ladies: nobly suggesting to the misguided masses who are in arms against the Government that suffering humanity, under whatever circumstances it may present itself, has the same claim on our common nature for sympathy and ministering care. And it is to be hoped that this lesson of magnanimity may not be without its proper influence on those who, under the influence of bad passions, seem to have lost sight of their moral responsibility for indifference and cruelty.

It is a source of great gratification to the Major-general commanding that in the eight months during which the municipal police was under his control no act of disorder disturbed the tranquillity of the city, and that the police returns, compared with those of a corresponding period of the previous year, exhibit a very great reduction, in some months as high as fifty per cent., in the aggregate of misdemeanors and crimes. The police having on the 20th of March last been surrendered to the city authorities, they have since then been responsible for the preservation of the public order. The zeal and promptitude of the Police Commissioners and Marshal of Police on the occurrence of a recent disturbance, provoked by a brutal expression of disloyal feeling, gives earnest of their determination to arrest at the outset all breaches of the public peace, which, by whatever provocation they may seem to be palliated, are sure to degenerate, if unchecked, into discreditable and fatal excesses.

The Major-general commanding, with this imperfect acknowledgment of his obligations to the loyal citizens of Baltimore and their patriotic defenders, tenders to them all, with his best wishes, a friendly and cordial farewell.

By order of Major-general Dix.

Danl. T. Van Buren, Colonel and Aide-de-camp.

SOURCE: Morgan Dix, Memoirs of John Adams Dix, Volume 2, p. 47-8

Texan Rangers Surprised

WASHINGTON, Man 29. – A dispatch from Gen. Heintzelman, dated Fort Lyon to-day, addressed to Assistant Adjutant General Williams, says, last night a force of 50 men of the 37th New York regiment under Lieut. Col. Burke, sent out by Col. Hayman, surprised the enemy, some Texas rangers, at Mrs. Lee’s House at the head of Belmont, on Occaquon Bay.  The rebel force was about 30 men.  They fought till all but one was killed whom Col. Burke took prisoner.  Our loss was one killed and four wounded.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, February 1, 1862, p. 2