The New York Legislature's Concurrent Resolutions Tendering Aid to the President of the United States in Support of the Constitution and the Union

Concurrent Resolutions Tendering Aid to the President of the United States in Support of the Constitution and the Union.

Whereas, Treason, as defined by the constitution of the United States, exists in one or more of the States of this confederacy, and

Whereas, The insurgent State of South Carolina, after seizing the post office, custom house, moneys and fortifications of the federal government, has, by firing into a vessel ordered by the government to convey troops and provisions to Fort Sumter, virtually declared war; and whereas, the forts and property of the United States government in Georgia, Alabama and Louisiana, have been unlawfully seized, with hostile intentions; and whereas, further, senators in congress avow and maintain their treasonable acts; therefore,

Resolved (if the senate concur), That the legislature of New York, profoundly impressed with the value of the Union, and determined to preserve it unimpaired, hail with joy the recent firm, dignified and patriotic special message of the president of the United States, and that we tender to him, through the chief magistrate of our own State, whatever aid in men and money he may require to enable him to enforce the laws and uphold the authority of the federal government. And that in defence of “the more perfect union,” which has conferred prosperity and happiness upon the American people, renewing the pledge given and redeemed by our fathers, we are ready to devote “our fortunes, our lives, and our sacred honor” in upholding the Union and the constitution.

Resolved (if the senate concur), That the Union-loving representatives and citizens of Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Kentucky, Missouri and Tennessee, who labor with devoted courage and patriotism to withhold their States from the vortex of secession, are entitled to the gratitude and admiration of the whole people.

Resolved (if the senate concur), That the governor be respectfully requested to forward, forthwith, copies of the foregoing resolutions to the president of the nation, and the governors of ill the States of the Union.

STATE OF NEW YORK,

IN ASSEMBLY, January 14, 1861.

The preceding preamble and resolutions were duly passed.

By order.

H. A. RISLEY, Clerk.

STATE OF NEW YORK,

IN SENATE, January 14, 1861.

The foregoing preamble and resolutions were duly passed.

By order.

 JAS. TERWILLIGER, Clerk.

SOURCE: Supplement to the Fifth Edition of the Revised Statutes of the State of New York, p. 107

Parson Brownlow In Cincinnati

His Straight Out Union Speech

__________

Parson Brownlow, of East Tennessee, accompanied by his son, arrived in this city yesterday, and took quarters at the Gibson House.  At 9 o’clock the Union Committee met him in the ladies’ parlor, and he was welcomed by Pollock Wilson, Esq., who alluded with emotion to the services of Brownlow in the cause of the Union, and his heroic endurance of persecution.  The Parson was much moved by the cordiality of his reception, and commenced speaking with a stammering voice, and eyes filled with tears.  He had been for Clay in 1836, for Harrison in 1840, for Webster in 1856, for Bell and Everett in 1860.  Speaking of Bell always reminded him of “pity the sorrows of a poor old man.”  He (the Parson) had never had any sympathy with secessionists.  He had been offered large bribes to sustain the rebellion; but though he was a poor man he was not for sale.  He gave an account of his correspondence with Judah P. Benjamin, all of which he had preserved and would publish in his forthcoming book.  He could not express the joy he felt in finding the old Union flag at Nashville.  When the army went to East Tennessee he wanted to go along.  It was in Fremont’s Department and he was glad of it.  Fremont was his sort of a man, and he wanted to go with him to East Tennessee.  There had been a great deal of hanging on one side, and he wished to superintend it on the other.  He could say, and without profanity, that the Federal army in East Tennessee would be hailed with a joy only equaled by the hosannahs of the angels when Christ was born.

He never had any sympathy with Disunionists, Secessionists or Abolitionists.  He was born in Virginia, and his parents before him.  He is a slaveholder, but he had no hesitancy in saying that when the question comes, as it will, “the Union and no slavery,” against “slavery and no Union,” he was for the Union and let slavery go to the dogs, or where else it may be sent.  He was for the Union above that or any other institution.

The wicked rebellion, he felt confident, was on its last legs.  It is almost played out.  When the rebel Crittenden’s army passed him, the men were literally barefooted and almost naked.

The blockade has played sad havoc with them.  They were preparing to make a desperate fight at Corinth.  If whipped there, their cause was gone.  He hoped they would be pursued through the cotton States to the peninsula, and then driven into the sea, as were the devils driven from the hogs into the sea of Galilee.

The nigger never was in this rebellion.  He was never intended to be.  Other causes had produced it, but the guilty were reaping their reward.

After the reception the Parson took an airing with some gentlemen, driving through Clifton and other attractive suburbs of the city.

He visited with the Merchant’s Exchange, where he was introduced to the merchants by President Butler, and spoke for perhaps half an hour.  He showed plainly the marks of the hard times through which he has passed.  He is very thin, and his face is haggard, bloodless and deeply marked with suffering and anxiety.  He is, however, one of that race of tall, hardy, swarthy, black haired East Tennesseans, who gave Tennessee her old time glory as the Volunteer State, and were foremost in the battles of Andrew Jackson, and with proper care he will soon recover his health.

He gave a touching narrative of his sufferings in prison, of his illness, and the care with which the guards placed over him were doubled, when he was so sick he could not turn in bed without assistance.  The jail was crowded with Union men.  Many sickened and perished miserably in it, and others were taken out and hung.  Gen. Carroll, of the Confederate army, who was at one time a great friend of his, being a Union man until a late period, visited him in Jail, and said to him: “Brownlow, you ought not to be here.”  “So I think,” the parson responded, “but here I am.”  The General said the Confederate Court was sitting within a hundred yards of the jail, and if he would take the oath of allegiance, he should be immediately liberated.  “Sir,” said the parson, looking at him steadily in the eye, “before I will take the oath of allegiance to your bogus Government, I will rot in jail or die here of old age.  I don’t acknowledge you have a Court.  I don’t acknowledge you have a Government.  It has never been acknowledged by any power on earth and never will be.  Before I would take the oath I would see the whole Southern Confederacy in the infernal regions, and you on top of it!”

The General indignantly left the jail, remarking “that is d----d plain talk.”  “Yes, sir-ee,” said the Parson, “I am a plain man, and them’s my sentiments.”  Frequently men were taken out of the jail and hung, and the secesh rabble would howl at him and tell him as he looked out from the jail windows that he was to be hung next.  He told them from those windows that he was ready to go to the gallows, and all he asked was one hour’s talk to the people before he was swung off, that he might give them his opinion of the mob called the Southern Confederacy.  The Parson said he expected to be hanged.  He had made up his mind to it.   At one time he was tried by court martial, and in the decision of his case he was within one vote of being sentenced to hang.  There was nothing between him and the gallows but the will of one man, and him a secessionist.  Great God, on what a slender thread hung everlasting things!  The jails in East Tennessee and North Alabama were overfull of Union men.  The Union men there had never flinched.  They stood firm now.  The Government, whatever else it did, should immediately relieve them from the grinding and destroying oppression of secession.

He related an instance of a young man, named John C. Hurd, and exemplary citizen and church member, with a wife and two little children, who was convicted of bridge burning.  He was notified but one hour before he was hung that he was to be executed.  He asked for a minister of the Gospel to come and sing and pray with him, but was told that praying would not do traitors to the South any good, and he was thus insultingly refused his dying request.  But the rebels Sent with him to the gallows a miserable, drunken, and demoralized Chaplain of one of their regiments, who stood on the gallows and told the crowd assembled to see the hanging, that the young man about to be executed had been led into the commission of the crimes for which he was to suffer, by designing men, and was sorry for what he had done.  The man about to be hung sprang to his feet, and called out that every word that Chaplain had uttered was false.  He was the identical man who had burned the New Creek Bridge.  He knew what he was about when he did it, and would do it again if he had a chance.  They might go on with their hanging.  He was ready for it.  And they hung him forthwith.  The Parson told of an inoffensive citizen, who was pointed out to a part of straggling soldiers, while at work in a field, as “a d--- Unionist.”  He was at once fired upon, and so mangled that he died within a few hours.

The Parson said it might astonish them, but the greatest negro thieves in the world were the Confederate soldiers.  He spoke feelingly on this subject.  They had stolen from him a likely negro boy, fourteen years old, and worth a thousand dollars.  He had never heard from the boy since he was taken away, and never expected to see him again or get a cent for him.  It was a solemn fact that the Confederate soldiers had stolen more negroes during this war, than all the Abolitionists had stolen for forty years.  These soldiers were the off-scourings of the earth.  Not one half of them had ever owned a negro, or were connected by any degree of social affinity or consanguinity, with anybody who ever did own a negro.  Not only did they steal negroes, but they entered houses and took the clothing from the beds, broke open the drawers, and took all the money and jewelry they could lay their hands upon.  They were, emphatically, thieves as well as traitors.

He had recently had a conversation with a secesh lady, who spoke as usual of one of their chivalry whipping five Yankees.  He asked her about Fort Donelson, &c.  She explained that by saying, the people of the north-west are sons of emigrants from the South.  They were Southern stock and fought like Southerners.  He inquired what of the blue-bellied Yankees, under Burnside, but she did not know how that was; in fact had heard but little about it.

The parson spoke in an animated style, and presently his voice gave signs of failing.  He has been troubled with a bronchial affection, and is still weak from the illness contracted during his imprisonment.  He remarked that he had not for some months attempted to speak at length in public, and his failing strength admonished him that he must close.

He thanked God that he could see daylight now.  The game of the rebellion was pretty near played out.  A “little more grape” and we would have them.  His motto for the war was “grape shot for the armed masses, and hemp for the leaders.” – {Commercial.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, April 5, 1862, p. 4

Terrible Fight Between Three Rebel Regiments

An officer of our army, just returned from Manassas, called last evening, and gave us an interesting account of his visit to Manassas, and the battlefield of Bull Run.  A farmer residing near Centerville, told him that in January last a number of regiments were quartered near his house; one from Kentucky, at the expiration of their time of enlistment, unanimously resolved to return home, and accordingly stacked their arms and were preparing for a start, when their further progress was arrested by the appearance of an Alabama and a Tennessee Regiment who were ordered to reduce the Kentuckians to submission, and compel them to remain.  The Kentuckians seized their arms and a desperate fight ensued, in which many were slain on both sides, and their bodies were buried where they fell, the graves being yet visible.

From this spot the mutineers retreated a short distance, threw down their arms, and each drawing their Bowie knife, made a desperate charge upon the two regiments; the fight was terrific, in which more than a hundred were killed, and they too, were buried on the field of slaughter.

At last the brave Kentuckians were subdued.  The battle field was shown to our informant by the farmer who witnessed the fearful contest.  In traversing the field he found a large Bowie knife, which doubtless had been used in this fearful fray.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, April 5, 1862, p. 2

Senator John Sherman to Brigadier General William T. Sherman, February 15, 1862

WASHINGTON, Feb. 15, 1862.

Dear Brother:

. . . . . . . . . .

I was infinitely rejoiced to see in this morning's paper the announcement that you were to command at Cairo. I sincerely hope it is true. If so, you will have a noble opportunity to answer those who have belied you. Take my advice, be hopeful, cheerful, polite to everybody, even a newspaper reporter. They are in the main, clever, intelligent men, a little too pressing in their vocation.

Above all things, be hopeful and push ahead. Active, bold, prompt, vigorous action is now demanded. McClellan is dead in the estimation of even military men. . . .

Do not the cheers with which our gun-boats were received in Tennessee and Alabama show you what I have always contended, that this rebellion is a political one, managed by “Southern gentlemen” and not grounded in the universal assent of the people? Johnson has now more adherents in Tennessee than Jeff. Davis. Let our leading army officers who have been educated to defend the nation catch the spirit of our people, a generous, hopeful, self-sacrificing spirit. Let them go ahead and you will find the Union restored and strengthened by its trials. . . .

Affectionately yours,

JOHN SHERMAN

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman letters: correspondence between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 140

A Good Report from Tennessee and Alabama

WASHINGTON, Feb. 25. – The Navy Department to-day received the following:

CAIRO, Feb. 24.

To Hon. Gideon Welles, Sec’y of the Navy

Lieutenant Commanding Gwynn with the gunboat Tyler has just arrived from Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama, and reports the Union sentiment in South Tennessee and North Alabama to be very strong.  I shall send him back to-day, and he will call for a regiment at Fort Henry to accompany the gun-boat, which will aid the loyal people of those States to raise Union forces within their borders.

(Signed)

A. H. FOOTE,

Flag-Officer Commanding.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, March 1, 1862, p. 3 

Interesting Southern Items

NEWS FROM RICHMOND – STATEMENT OF A RELEASED PRISONER.

From the Baltimore American of Saturday.

We had a most interesting conversation this morning with Mr. Geo. W. Walker, of Waynesboro’, Pa., one of the release prisoners.  He was taken seven months since, while on a visit to Virginia, and has acted as clerk in the Quartermaster’s Department at Richmond, performing all duties in connection with the prisoners, thus securing a parole that enabled him to mix freely with the citizens and soldiers.

He brings with him many unmistakable evidences of the fact that there exists in Richmond and the vicinity a strong and gallant band of Union men, who are willing and anxious at the proper moment to welcome the old flag, and fight, if necessary, to sustain its supremacy. – They requested him to make the following fact known to the government that they claim to be three thousand strong, and that a full regiment of drilled volunteers can be raised at an hour’s notice.  The Union ladies are also very numerous, and have freely expended their means in succoring and comforting the sick and wounded Federal Prisoners.  Mr. Walker brings with him a beautiful gold and enamel chain, which was presented to him by a party of young ladies on the eve of his departure, with the following note written in a neat elegant hand:

Richmond, Feb. 17, 1862

MR. WALKER – Dear Sir:  Please accept this chain as a token of our regard.  May the parts in the great chain of our Union be more securely linked than they have been since their formation as a Union.

Respectfully yours,

_____,

The names are omitted at the request of Mr. Walker, fearing that the publication of them would be impolitic.

THE UNION LEAGUE.

The Union men of Richmond are daily becoming more bold and earnest, and have, for mutual protection against rebel espionage, formed a league, with grips, signals and passwords.  They style themselves prisoners on parole, and have long and anxiously looked for an advance on Richmond, by way of the Rappahannock, which they are confident could be taken and held at any time with a force of three thousand men.

There are eleven earthworks in the vicinity of the railroad, only one of which is garrisoned, and has guns mounted.  So also in the Rappahannock, the defences are said to be very slight.

THE REBELS DEPRESSED.

The news of the Federal victories at Somerset, Fort Henry, Fort Donelson, and the invasion of Tennessee and Alabama, coming on their great disaster at Roanoke, has had a most depressing influence on rebel enthusiasm.  They no longer vaunt of the superior prowess and bravery of the south and the cowardice of the North – a change has come over the spirit of their dreams, and they now admit the probability of being overcome, but declare that they will kill their women and children and die to the man before they will yield.

A depression of the rebels had of course cause the Union men much joy, and they were looking forward to their early deliverance with hope and confidence.

LEVY FOR TROOPS.

The levy for troops was progressing, and all able to bear arms, between the ages of 18 and 60 were being forced to enroll their names and attend drill.  The Union men were thus being forced into the service, and were learning the manual with the determination to use the knowledge for an entirely different purpose from that intended by their instructors.  The rebels admit that unless every man capable of bearing arms is immediately brought into the service, Virginia will have to surrender within the next thirty days.

SCARCITY OF MONEY.

The Government has very little even of its own paper money, the difficulty to supply the Treasury being so great that many of the public offices are closed, with a label on the door, “out of funds.”  The Federal Treasury notes received by the prisoners of war were readily sold at 25 per cent premium two months ago, and since the recent rebel defeats have advanced to 35 per cent.

WITHDRAWALS FROM MANASSAS.

Mr. Walker informs us that he learned from the very best authority that an order had been issued for the withdrawal of all but thirty thousand troops from Manassas.  The Railroads leading to Kentucky, North Carolina and Tennessee, were thronged with troops, and the number leaving Manassas had been about five regiments per day for some time past.  Troops were also being sent to North Carolina to resist the advance of Burnside, mostly the North Carolina Regiments from Manassas.

UNIONISM AT MANCHESTER.

Mr. Walker assures us that the statement frequently made is true that the people of Manchester, a little town opposite Richmond, had for a long time persisted in keeping the Union flag flying, and that it was only taken down when the town was threatened by Jeff. Davis with being shelled.  The Union sentiment of Manchester is still preserved, and its population will prove most dangerous men into the rebel service under compulsion as is being done.

THE RELEASED PRISONERS.

The number of prisoners released along with Mr. Walker was one hundred and ninety three, all of whom arrived here this morning, and were escorted to the rooms of the Union Relief Association by a company of the Zouaves from Federal Hill.

The release of Colonels Corcoran and Lee, and the other officers held as hostages for the privateers, has not yet been determined upon.  The rebels say they will not give them up until the privateers are returned, and they are still at Columbia, S. C.

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

Tennessee River Expedition – Official Report of Lieut. S. L. Phelps

U. S. GUNBOAT, “CONESTOGA,”

Tennessee River, February 10, 1862

Flag Officer H. H. Foote, U. S. N. Commanding

Naval Forces Western Waters

SIR – Soon after the surrender of Ft. Henry on the 6^th inst., I proceeded in obedience to your orders up the Tennessee river with the Tyler, Lieut. Commanding Gwin, Lexington, Lieut. Commanding Shirk, and this vessel, forming a division of the Flotilla, and arrived after dark at the railroad crossing, 25 miles above the Fort, having destroyed on the way a small amount of camp equipage abandoned by the fleeing rebels.  The draw of the bridge was found to be closed and the machinery for turning it disabled.  About one and a half miles above were several rebel transport steamers escaping up stream.  A party was landed, and in one hour I had the satisfaction to see the draw open.  The Tyler being the slowest of the gun boats, Lieut. Gwin landed a force to destroy a portion of the railroad track, and to secure such military stores as might be found while I directed Lieut. Shirk to follow me with all speed in chase of the fleeing boats.  In five hours this boat succeeded in forcing the rebels to abandon and burn three of their boats, loaded with military stores.  The first one fired (Samuel Orr) had on board a quantity of submarine batteries which very soon exploded.  The second was freighted with powder, cannon shot, grape, balls, &c.  Fearing an explosion from the fired boats (there were two together) I stopped at a distance of 1,000 yards, but even then our sky lights were shattered by the concussion, the light upper deck was raised bodily, doors were forced open and locks and fastenings everywhere broken.  The whole river for half a mile around about was completely beaten up by the falling fragments and the shower of shot, grape, balls, &c.  The house of a reputed Union man was blown to pieces, and it was suspected there was design in landing the rebels in front of the doomed house.  The Lexington having fallen astern, and without a pilot on board, I concluded to wait for both of the boats to come up.  Joined by them we proceeded up the river.  Liut. Gwin had destroyed some of the trestle work at the end of the bridge, burning with them a lot of the camp equipage.  J. N. Brown, formerly a Lieutenant in the Navy, now signing himself Lieut. C. S. N. had fled with such precipitation as to leave his papers behind.  These Lieut. Gwin brought and I send them to you, as they give an official history of the rebel floating preparations on the Mississippi, Cumberland and Tennessee.  Lieut. Brown had charge of the construction of gunboats. – At night on the 7^th we arrived at a landing in Hardee county, Tenn. Known as Cerro Gordo, where we found the steamer Eastport being converted into a gunboat.  Armed boat crews were immediately sent on board, and search made for means of destruction that might have been devised.

She had been scuttled, and the suction pipes broken.  These leaks were soon stopped.  A number of rifle shots were fired at our vessels, but a couple of shells dispersed the rebels.  On examination I found that there were large quantities of timber and lumber prepared for fitting up the Eastport, that the vessel itself, some two hundred and eighty feet long was in excellent condition and already half finished.  Considerable of the plating designed for her was lying on the bank and everything at hand to complete her.  I therefore directed Lieutenant Commanding Gwin to remain with the Tyler to guard the prize, and to load the lumber, &c., while the Lexington and Conestoga should proceed still higher up.  Soon after daylight we passed Easport, Mississippi, and at Chickasaw, farther up near the State line, seized two steamers the Sallie Wood and Muscle, the former laid up the latter freighted with iron destined for Richmond and for rebel uses.

We then proceeded on up the river, entering the State of Alabama and ascending to Florence at the foot of Muscle Shoals.  On coming in sight of the town three steamers were discovered, which were immediately set on fire by the rebels.  Some shots were fired from the opposite side of the river below.   A force was landed and considerable quantities of supplies, marked “Fort Henry” were secured from the burning wrecks.  Some had been landed and stored.  These I [secured], putting such as we could bring away on board our vessels, and destroying the remainder.  No flats or other craft could be found.  I found also more of the iron plating intended for the Eastport.

A deputation of the citizens of Florence waited upon me, first desiring that they might be able to quiet the fears of their wives and daughters with assurance from me that they should not be molested and secondly, praying that I would not destroy their railroad bridge.  As for the first, I told them that we were neither ruffians nor savages, and that we were there to protect from violence and to enforce the law, and with reference to the second that if the bridge was away we could ascend no higher, and that it could possess, so far as I saw no military importance, as it simply connected Florence itself with the railroad on the south side of the river.  We had seized three of their steamers, one the half finished gunboat, and had forced the rebels to burn six others loaded with supplies, and their loss with that of the freight, is a severe loss to the enemy.  Two boats are still known to be on the river, and are doubtless hidden in some of the creeks where we shall be able to find them when there is time for the search.  We returned on the night of the 8^th to where the Eastport lay.  The crew of the Tyler had already gotten on board of the prize an immense amount of lumber etc.  The crews of the boats set to work to finish it immediately, and we have brought away, probably 250,000 feet of the best quality of ship and building lumber, all the iron machinery, spikes, and plating, nails, etc., belonging to the rebel gunboat, and I caused the mill to be destroyed where the lumber had been sawed.  Lieut. Commanding Gwin, in our absence, enlisted some twenty-five Tennesseeans, who gave information of the encampment of Colonel Drew’s rebel regiment at Savannah, Tennessee.  A portion of the six hundred or seven hundred men were known to be pressed men and all were badly armed.  After consultation with Lieutenants Commanding Gwin and Shirk I determined to make a land attack on the encampment. – Lieutenant Commanding Shirk with thirty riflemen came on board the Conestoga, leaving his vessel to guard the Eastport and accompanied by the “Tyler,” we proceeded up to that place prepared to land 130 riflemen, and a 12 pound rifled howitzer.  Lieutenant Commanding Gwin took command of this force when landed, but had the mortification to find the encampment deserted.  The rebels had fled at 10 o’clock, at night, leaving considerable quantities of arms, clothing, shoes, camp utensils, provisions, implements, etc., all of which were secured or destroyed, and their winter quarters of log huts were burned.  I seized also a large mail bag, and send you the letters giving military information.

The gunboats were then dropped down to a point where arms gathered under the rebel (press) law had been stored and an armed party, under Second Master Goudy, of the Tyler, succeeded in seizing 70 rifles and fowling pieces.  Returning to Cerro Gordo, we took the Eastport, Sable Woods and Muscle in tow, and came down the river to the railroad crossing.  The Muscle sprung a leak, and all efforts failed to prevent her from sinking and we were forced to abandon her, and with her a considerable quantity of fine lumber.  We are having trouble in getting through the draw of the bridge here.

I now come to the most interesting portion of the report, one which has already become lengthy, but I trust you will find some excuse for this in the fact that it embraces a history of labors and movements day and night, from the 6^th to the 10^th of the month all of which details I deem it proper to give you.  We have met with the most gratifying proofs of loyalty everywhere across Tennessee, and in the portions of Mississippi and Alabama we visited. – Most affecting incidents greeted us almost hourly.  Men, women and children several times gathered in crowds of hundred, and shouted their welcome and hailed their national flag with an enthusiasm there was no mistaking.  It was genuine and heartfelt.  These people braved everything to go to the river bank, where a sight of their flag might once more be enjoyed, and they have experienced, as they related, every possible form of persecution.  Tears flowed freely down the cheeks of men as well as of women, and there were those who had fought under the stars and stripes at Moultrie, who in this manner testified to their joy.  This display of feeling and sense of gladness at our success, and the hopes it created in the breasts of so many people in the heart of the Confederacy astonished us not a little, and I assure you, Sir, I would not have failed to witness it for any consideration.  I think it has given us all a higher sense of the character of our present duties.  I was assured at Savannah that of several hundred troops there, more than one half, had we gone to the attack in time, would have hailed us as deliverers, and gladly enlisted with the national force.  In Tennessee, the people generally, in their enthusiasm, braved secessionists and spoke their views freely, but in Mississippi and Alabama what was said was guarded, “If we dared express ourselves freely, you would bear such a shout greeting your coming as you never heard.  We know that there are many Unionists among us, but a reign of terror makes us afraid of our shadow.”  We were told, too, “Bring us a small, organized force, with arms and ammunition for us and we can maintain our position and put down rebellion in our midst.”  There were, it is true, whole communities who, on our approach, fled to the woods, but these were where there was less of the loyal element.

I am, respectfully, your obedient servant,

S. L. PHELPS,

Lieutenant Commanding, U. S. N.

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

In all the late battles . . .

. . .the Union armies have triumphed.  By sea and land, in front and rear, in Kentucky, in Tennessee, in Alabama, in Virginia, in South Carolina, and now in North Carolina, the foes of the nation have been defeated.  Our armies are preparing for still further movements, too, in almost every direction, and let the conspirators beware of the “ides of March.”

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, February 22, 1862, p. 2

Arrival of Gen. Mitchell

NEW YORK, May 28 – A special dispatch to the New York Herald, dated Nashville, May 27 says that Generals Mitchell and Negley arrived here to-night.  They report everything quiet at Huntsville, Alabama, and that the Union feeling is increasing.

Jere Clemens and Judge McCane, and family are the prominent Unionists.

Gen. Mitchell speaks of his position in Alabama, as permanent.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 31, 1862, p. 3

The War News

Capture of Beaufort, N. C.

DESTRUCTION OF FT. MACON

A Union Regiment in Alabama

Rebel Barbarities at Bull Run.

BURNING OF THE STR. NAHSVILLE

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, March 25, 1862, p. 1

The War News

Murfreesboro Abandoned.

THE REBELS RETREATING TOWARDS ALABAMA.

Expected Attack at Centerville.

News from Southern Sources.

THE NEW TAX BILL.

TERRIBLE EXPLOSION IN DETROIT.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, March 4, 1862, p. 1

From Washington

WASHINGTON, March 1.

There is nothing in the official telegrams last received, to show that the rebels are evacuating Columbus, nor has any information been received from Gen. Buell since the announcement of the taking of Nashville, when he was four miles from that city.  Hence the newspaper reports of rebels being surrounded at Murfreesboro are not reliable.

Dispatches were received at the Navy Department to-day from Commodore Foote, inclosing a report from Lieut. Gwin, in which he says he returned to Cairo on the 23d inst., after having gone up the Tennessee river in the gunboat Tyler as high as Eastport, Miss.  He is happy to state that he has met with an increased Union sentiment in Southern Tennessee and Northern Alabama.  He saw few Mississippians.  In Hardin, McNary, Wayne, Decatur and a portion of Hardeman counties, all of which boarder upon the river, the Union sentiment is strong, and those who do not express themselves openly loyal, are only prevented by their fears of the military tyranny and coercion which is practiced by the marauding bands of guerilla companies of cavalry.

Learning that a large quantity of wheat and flour was stored in Clifton, Tenn., intended, of course, to be shipped South, a large portion of it having been bought for a firm in Memphis, on his down trip he landed there and took on board about 1,000 sacks and 100 brls. Of flour and some 6,000 bushels of wheat.  He considered it his duty to take possession of the above to prevent its being seized by the rebels or disposed of in the rebel country.

The glorious success of our armies at Forts Henry and Donelson, he says, has been most beneficial to the Union caused throughout South Tennessee and Alabama.  The Union men can now again dare to express their loyal sentiments without fear of being mobbed, especially along the banks of the river.

He brought down under arrest a man named Wm. H. Pool, who has been active in oppressing [sic] Union men in his community.  He has warned the inhabitants of the different towns along the banks of the river that he would hold the secessionist and their property responsible for any outrages in their community on Unionists, and had enlisted seventeen men and brought down a portion of the refugees.

A dispatch form Com. Goldsborough to Secretary Welles, dated U. S. steamer Philadelphia, off  Roanoke Island, Feb. 23, says the reconnoitering party sent up the Chowan river has returned.  It did not go up beyond Winton.  There the enemy in considerable force opened a heavy fire upon the vessel (the Delaware) in advance, with a battery of artillery and musketry, which induced our force to attack it in return, both by landing the New York 9^th Zuaves and with the guns of the vessels that could be brought to bear upon  the enemy.  The enemy soon took flight, and the houses they occupied as quarters were burned.  Not a man was injured on our side.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, March 4, 1862, p. 1

The Constricting of the Anaconda

The Richmond, Va. Papers are becoming excessively frightened in view of the constricting of the coils of the great anaconda which has encircled them within its folds. The only consolation that the Enquirer can find is, that if you pen up even a coward he will fight; that the very means taken by the Government to suppress the rebels will cause them to fight more desperately. True, but very many of them have no faith in their cause and would avail themselves of the earliest opportunity presented – as we have a notable case in Kentucky – and lay down their arms. The Enquirer gives in detail examples of men thus penned up and fighting their way through in Scott’s army in Mexico, which with all its communications cut off, with the enemy behind and before and on each had, yet triumphed. The Enquirer must remember that it has no pusillanimous Mexican soldiers to fight now, but men, armed with the right, men who will fight as desperately as the foe against whom they contend. Scott with ten thousand men fought Santa Anna with thirty five thousand soldiers and a hundred pieces of heavy ordnance and took a city of one hundred and eighty thousand men, hence the Enquirer argues, that the South can successfully contend against the avalanche of soldiers that will come upon it from the north. The comparison is an extreme one and the reasoning absurd. The northern soldiers will find no Churubuscos, or Chapultepecs in Virginia; no Thermopylaes among its mountain vastnesses where a hundred men can put ten thousand to flight. Its Richmond may rather prove a city of Mexico and the rebel forces that environ it, be made to strike the treasonable rag they have so long flaunted in the eyes of freedom, to numerically inferior force.

The Enquirer may have “learned to despise its enemy,” as it asserts, but the men of the South are not all cast in the same mould. Gladly would many of them, aye the great mass of them, return to allegiance if they felt sure of being guaranteed in the possession of the rights they enjoyed before the demagogues of the South entailed upon their fair country this miserable rebellion – an instance of this has been given within a few days by the loyalty and manifestations of joy exhibited by the Southerners, as the Federal gunboats passed up the Tennessee river even into the State of Alabama. Willingly would they ground their arms and beat the sword into the pruning hook, if not urged on by the specious traitors who feel that for themselves there is not alternative but victory or the gallows. Men fight desperately, most true, when their lives, their houses, all their hearts hold most dear are at stake; but when contending against a Government whose protection they have so long enjoyed and which has guaranteed them the social and political privileges that no other people on the face of the globe have possessed, and when assured that by laying down their arms they shall still be fully protected in their rights, they have not the heart to fight with enthusiasm. The Enquirer may appeal to the people of the south by all the force of rhetoric that a bad cause can command, but it will not avail; the spirit of its soldiers is broken by delay and an inglorious and fruitless war, and all the oratory of its rebel statesmen and Generals cannot again rouse up the war feeling in their breasts. The doom of treason is sealed and the pour, misled soldiers of the South feel that they have been deceived.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Friday Morning, February 14, 1862, p. 2