Major-General Howell Cobb to James A. Seddon, January 8, 1865

HDQRS. GEORGIA RESERVES AND MIL. DIST. OF GEORGIA,     

Macon, Ga., January 8, 1865.

Hon. JAMES A. SEDDON,

Secretary of War, Richmond, Va.:

SIR: Your letter of the 30th of December received by yesterday's mail. I beg to assure you that I have spared no efforts or pains to prosecute vigorously the recruiting of our Army through the conscript camp. It is true, as you say, there are many liable to conscription who have not been reached, and for reasons I have heretofore given I fear never will be reached. Rest assured, however, that I will not cease my efforts in that regard. In response to your inquiries, how our Army is to be recruited, I refer with strength and confidence to the policy of opening the door for volunteers. I have so long and so urgently pressed this matter that I feel reluctant even to allude to it, and yet I should not be true to my strong convictions of duty if I permitted any opportunity to pass without urging and pressing it upon the proper authorities. It is in my opinion not only the best but the only mode of saving the Army, and every day it is postponed weakens its strength and diminishes the number that could be had by it. The freest, broadest, and most unrestricted system of volunteering is the true policy, and cannot be too soon resorted to. I think that the proposition to make soldiers of our slaves is the most pernicious idea that has been suggested since the war began. It is to me a source of deep mortification and regret to see the name of that good and great man and soldier, General R. E. Lee, given as authority for such a policy. My first hour of despondency will be the one in which that policy shall be adopted. You cannot make soldiers of slaves, nor slaves of soldiers. The moment you resort to negro soldiers your white soldiers will be lost to you; and one secret of the favor with which the proposition is received in portions of the Army is the hope that when negroes go into the Army they will be permitted to retire. It is simply a proposition to fight the balance of the war with negro troops. You can't keep white and black troops together, and you can't trust negroes by themselves. It is difficult to get negroes enough for the purpose indicated in the President's message, much less enough for an Army. Use all the negroes you can get, for all the purposes for which you need them, but don't arm them. The day you make soldiers of them is the beginning of the end of the revolution. If slaves will make good soldiers our whole theory of slavery is wrong—but they won't make soldiers. As a class they are wanting in every qualification of a soldier. Better by far to yield to the demands of England and France and abolish slavery, and thereby purchase their aid, than to resort to this policy, which leads as certainly to ruin and subjugation as it is adopted; you want more soldiers, and hence the proposition to take negroes into the Army. Before resorting to it, at least try every reasonable mode of getting white soldiers. I do not entertain a doubt that you can by the volunteering policy get more men into the service than you can arm. I have more fears about arms than about men. For heaven's sake try it before you fill with gloom and despondency the hearts of many of our truest and most devoted men by resorting to the suicidal policy of arming our slaves.

Having answered the inquiries of your letter, let me volunteer in a few words a suggestion. Popularize your administration by some just concessions to the strong convictions of public opinion. Mark you, I do not say yield to popular clamor, but concede something to the earnest convictions of an overwhelming, and, I will say, an enlightened public opinion. First, yield your opposition to volunteering in the form and manner which I have heretofore urged; second, restore General Johnston to the command of the Army of Tennessee, and return General Beauregard to South Carolina.

With Lee in Virginia, Johnston here, and Beauregard in South Carolina you restore confidence and at once revive the hopes of the people. At present I regret to say that gloom and despondency rule the hour, and bitter opposition to the Administration, mingled with disaffection and disloyalty, is manifesting itself. With a dash of the pen the President can revolutionize this state of things, and I earnestly beseech him to do it.

Sincerely, yours,

HOWELL COBB,     

Major-general.

SOURCE: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series IV, Volume 3 (Serial No. 129), p. 1009-10

John M. Forbes et al to Gideon Welles, July 10, 1863

While failing to accomplish any great object, we hope that we have done something to enlighten public opinion by our constant intercourse with leading public and literary men and others, and also by aiding and encouraging our consuls in their efforts to stop the outfit of pirates in what ought to be the friendly ports of Great Britain.

SOURCE: Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, Volume 2, p. 64

Flag Officer Samuel F. Dupont to Gustavus V. Fox, March 14, 1862

Off St. Augustine

14 March 62

My Dear Sir

All these reports are interesting. Do have them published, they encourage the officers more than anything else.

The great want of the Govt. is an official Organ for National effect, if not for Political. The Nat, Intell^g will publish everything. I think the Ass. Press concern a curse.

I hope to catch the Casslin—but I have nothing to cross that Mosquitoe Inlet bar, but this ship's launches and they are away up at Jacksonville—and lucky they are there. I am sending to Wright to hurry troops there—he thought it ought not to be occupied—but it must be to secure loyal people.

I rec^d the Dept's mail—will take an early opp^y. to write about the blockade. None of those vessels reported from London and Liverpool ever dare approach the coast, showing what they think of the blockade— but transship at Nassau N.P. aided and abetted by those English hypercritical scoundrels—into vessels about the size of our launches.

The Fingal was the last foreign vessel that got into Savannah, after the gale of the 24, but has never got out and is sold to the rebels.

The Isabel and Nashville, with local Pilots of extraordinary skill, fogs and accident, and Steam have eluded us—but how many have been kept out? Skiddy run through Lord Cochrane's whole fleet blockading one port. Steam has quadrupled the advantage to those who run the blockade, over those who cover the ports.

But the game is up with them now, I promise you. The merchants ought to be glad the Nashville is in. This place Smyrna which I knew nothing about, has let in good many arms I am now satisfied.

Much disappointed about the Vermont, but expected nothing less. A clever old Port Captain would have taken that place.

Now my friend for the last time let me implore you to send coal. I have begged in vain. Two weeks more and this whole fleet will be laid up. Lardner writes only one vessel has arrived and this gulf people swallow that up.

The coming Equinoxial gales, will upset half the ships I have—all their Paddle wheels are nearly out of the water.

I can't tell you how I feel about it. I have written and begged Lenthall and you—but it produces nothing —two miserable schooners on the way, which will not both of them fill up the Bienville.

Yrs faithfully

S. F. DUPONT

SOURCE: Robert Means Thompson & Richard Wainwright, Editors, Publications of the Naval Historical Society, Volume 9: Confidential Correspondence of Gustavus Vasa Fox, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, 1861-1865, Volume 1, p. 112-4

John M. Forbes to William Bathbone, Jr. of Liverpool, October 31, 1863

Boston, 31 October, 1863.

Your note about Sumner's speech was duly received and has been used so that it will do good. Being marked private, I could not show it to Sumner, but I read it to him without giving your name. I have also sent a copy of its substance to one of our campaign orators who was disposed to pitch into your government and people too!

Sumner was much disturbed at it, and at other similar letters; but insists that he was right in telling the truth, and that he thus best served the interests of Peace. He does not shine in the perceptive faculties; has eloquence, scholarship, high principle, and many other good qualities, but he has not the faculty of putting himself in the position of an opposing party, and conceiving of how things look from a different standpoint than his own.

Nobody can appreciate the extreme sensitiveness of the English mind to anything which can, however remotely, be construed into a threat, unless he has been in the little island within the past year. When to this honest sensitiveness you add the many causes for taking offense in the selfishness of certain parties and the prejudice of others who wish to see our experiment fail, there is an array of dangers against speaking out which will deter most men from doing so. Sumner claims to be, par excellence, the friend of Peace and of England, and therefore thinks he can best sound the alarm when he sees war threatening.

He says that all the arguments you and I use against plain speaking were used with even more force against speaking the truth against slavery. It would irritate the South, would hurt our friends, would strengthen the hands of our enemies, etc., etc., and if he had listened then we should now be the supporters of a mighty slave empire. There is something in this, but analogies are not conclusive, and I shall continue to do my best to keep people's tongues quiet! The more I think and know of the whole subject, however, the more sure I am that the only safeguard against a war, if not now, certainly the first time you get into war when we are at peace, is your prescription, — a radical change of your and our law. I am sure, although I cannot prove it, that if Mr. Adams's whole correspondence were published you would see that we accepted the proposal to modify our laws (and yours) although we had found ours sufficient to protect you up to this time.

But the experience of the doings of the Alabama, etc., has shown that steam changes the practical effect of the law, and that the right to sell ships of war, even if sent out honestly for sale, is incompatible with friendly neutral relations. Moreover, the irritation caused by your privateers will surely change the practical mode of executing our law.

You will then go to war with us for doing precisely what your government have done, — unless you abstain from the same motives we do, expediency. No maritime nation will hereafter see its commerce destroyed and its people irritated by steamers doing such widespread mischief as any steamer can, without going to war about it. Hence the need of new treaties modifying the present construction of the law of nations permitting outfit of vessels adapted to war purposes, whether bona fide for sale or the property of belligerents.

You and I know very well how easy it is to pass over a bill of sale the moment a vessel is three miles from the shore; and that when the law is once fully established that warships may legally be exported for sale, the rebels or any other belligerents can get them delivered at convenient points without the builders or anybody else breaking the letter of the law.

As you told me the day I landed in Liverpool, your law is, under your practice, radically defective. Ours did well under our practice, but you can never for a moment count upon our continuing the same practice in the face of your precedents. You hit the nail on the head when you told me that your law was worthless for our protection. Accept my assurance that ours will be worthless for your protection in your next war. Our mutual safety is to change it, and that promptly, while you are strong and can do it with a good grace, and while we are still in danger from its defects. It is absurd to say that your navy would have been much more efficient than ours in catching the Alabama, etc. All naval ships are loaded down with guns and stores and trash. Our mercantile warships are better for speed than either your or our warships.

I was only yesterday talking with one of our old clipper captains whom I got appointed two years ago volunteer lieutenant, and who has a merchant steamer bought and armed by government. He has been very successful in catching blockade runners and assures me that the Clyde and other trials of speed are perfectly illusory. He has taken several vessels that were going sixteen knots, his ship beating them at ten knots.

It is not the Alabama's or Honda's speed; but the ocean is a big place, and we shall always have numerous light-built, fast steamers that can repeat the Alabama feats even with the whole British navy divided between blockading ports and chasing privateers!

Depend upon it, we can export for sale to any belligerent as many Alabamas as he can pay for. It is for merchants and statesmen to look ahead and avert the mutual danger.

With best regards to your father and all your circle.

SOURCE: Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, Volume 2, p. 59-63

Gustavus V. Fox to Flag Officer Samuel F. Dupont, February 28, 1862

Navy Department

March 6” 1862.

My dear Commodore:

I had a long talk with McClellan to-day to see if he had any objections to giving Sherman orders to go ahead with the first programme. I was rather surprised to find that he did not know why it had not been carried out, and upon comparing notes more freely, we both found that we were entirely ignorant of what was going on or intended. Meigs was with us, and he had a letter from Sherman one month old, which seemed to intimate that the other expedition was about to move. Under these circumstances, an order will be given by both Departments, suggesting that the matter go forward at once, unless incompatible with some operation now on hand. I do not think, as I have several times written you, that the Government place much importance upon the acquisition of Savannah, beyond the possession of Pulaski, but the recovery of a whole state is a moral victory that cannot be too highly estimated. The people expected Sherman to march at once upon Savannah or Charleston, which was ridiculous, and impossible, though I think he could have cut the railroad. He and his compeers, expected the gun boats to go directly into the Savannah river, and dash up to the city, which was impossible, so that a month ago he seemed to be waiting for the Navy to go South. In the meantime there is an immense force and the sickly season almost upon us. I look forward to it with dire apprehension. The Nashville has got into Wilmington, Southern accounts say by hoisting the American flag and going through our ships. A regular trade seems to be carried on from Nassau and Havana to some parts of our Southern coasts in small vessels. I suppose it cannot be entirely prevented, of course, but I do not believe they use Charleston and Fernandina as they pretend. There are eight steamers fitting out in England for the Southern coast, and the blockade would give us very serious trouble were it not for the desperate condition of the rebels, owing to their sudden reverses in the west. I think Europe will now withdraw their material aid. The Vermont, having met with serious losses, the extent of which are yet unknown, the Relief is now loading for Port Royal. I hope Lenthall and Harwood keep you well up in ammunition and coal. The resolution for you went through unanimously and I trust we shall obtain for you higher honors yet. The Maratanza “double Ender” is nearly ready at Boston and we will send her down for Rodgers. The Miami steered badly but it was the fault of the constructor at Philadelphia. The Octorara is a gem. We shall get off the Vermont again at the earliest possible moment, but she is not yet saved, and I hear has lost her masts. Any little trophies from your district would be most gratefully received by the members of Congress, and as they constantly ask me for such, I have ventured to ask you to make up a box of the most trifling things. One word more, and good night. Don't write confidential letters upon a former flag officer to your short friend.

Yours most truly,

G. V. FOX.

Flag Officer S. F. DuPont, G. V. FOX.

Comd’g So Atlantic Blockd’g Squadron

Port Royal

SOURCE: Robert Means Thompson & Richard Wainwright, Editors, Publications of the Naval Historical Society, Volume 9: Confidential Correspondence of Gustavus Vasa Fox, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, 1861-1865, Volume 1, p. 109-11

John M. Forbes to Senator Charles Sumner, September 8, 1863

Naushon, September 8, 1863.

I hear you are to speak on foreign relations, — a delicate subject for a man in your position.

May I give you a hint? I hear from good authority that great doubt exists whether the English government will consider our prima facie case made out against the ironclads, and if not they will make no attempt to stop them.

It will not do, therefore, to say that the letting out of these vessels means war between us and England, for your saying so may make your prophecy into its fulfillment!

Of course, we must tell the English people how much the going out of these vessels will increase the danger of war, and try to wake them up to this danger, but we cannot afford to go to war yet, even for this. We are in a sad state of want of preparation for a war with a naval people. We must gain time, must wait, and even when ready must still hope to avoid the fatal necessity.

It is a great point that the “Times” backs up the Emancipation Society's petition; it shows which way Palmerston wishes the public mind turned; but it is not conclusive, and the whole subject needs the greatest caution, as far from threats as from any indication that we will submit.

Forgive me for ever seeming to preach to an adept like yourself; but I have been there and know the sensitiveness of the British people (even decent ones) to threats, and also the readiness of the government to avail of any appearance of weakness on our part to push us. . . .

I delight in the President's plain letter to plain people!¹

_______________

¹ See page 73.

SOURCE: Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, Volume 2, p. 58-9

Diary of William Howard Russell: July 21, 1861

The calmness and silence of the streets of Washington this lovely morning suggested thoughts of the very different scenes which, in all probability, were taking place at a few miles' distance. One could fancy the hum and stir round the Federal bivouacs, as the troops woke up and were formed into column of march towards the enemy. I much regretted that I was not enabled to take the field with General McDowell's army, but my position was surrounded with such difficulties that I could not pursue the course open to the correspondents of the American newspapers. On my arrival in Washington I addressed an application to Mr. Cameron, Secretary at War, requesting him to sanction the issue of, rations and forage from the Commissariat to myself, a servant, and a couple of horses, at the contract prices, or on whatever other terms he might think fit, and I had several interviews with Mr. Leslie, the obliging and indefatigable chief clerk of the War Department, in reference to the matter; but as there was a want of precedents for such a course, which was not all to be wondered at, seeing that no representative of an English newspaper had ever been sent to chronicle the progress of an American army in the field, no satisfactory result could be arrived at, though I had many fair words and promises.

A great outcry had arisen in the North against the course and policy of England, and the journal I represented was assailed on all sides as a Secession organ, favorable to the rebels and exceedingly hostile to the Federal government and the cause of the tumors. Public men in America are alive to the inconveniences of attacks by their own press; and as it was quite impossible to grant to the swarms of correspondents from all parts of the Union the permission to draw supplies from the public stores, it would have afforded a handle to turn the screw upon the War Department, already roundly abused in the most influential papers, if Mr. Cameron acceded to me, not merely a foreigner, but the correspondent of a foreign journal which was considered the most powerful enemy of the policy of his government, privileges which he denied to American citizens, representing newspapers which were enthusiastically supporting the cause for which the armies of the North were now in the field.

To these gentlemen indeed, I must here remark, such privileges were of little consequence. In every camp they had friends who were willing to receive them in their quarters, and who earned a word of praise in the local papers for the gratification of either their vanity or their laudable ambition in their own neighborhood, by the ready service which they afforded to the correspondents. They rode Government horses, had the use of Government wagons, and through fear, favor, or affection, enjoyed facilities to which I had no access. I could not expect persons with whom I was unacquainted to be equally generous, least of all when by doing so they would have incurred popular obloquy and censure; though many officers in the army had expressed in very civil terms the pleasure it would give them to see me at their quarters in the field. Some days ago I had an interview with Mr. Cameron himself, who was profuse enough in promising that he would do all in his power to further my wishes; but he had, nevertheless, neglected sending me the authorization for which I had applied. I could scarcely stand a baggage train and commissariat upon my own account, nor could I well participate in the system of plunder and appropriation which has marked the course of the Federal army so far, devastating and laying waste all the country behind it.

Hence, all I could do was to make a journey to see the army on the field, and to return to Washington to write my report of its first operation, knowing there would be plenty of time to overtake it before it could reach Richmond, when, as I hoped, Mr. Cameron would be prepared to accede to my request, or some plan had been devised by myself to obviate the difficulties which lay in my path. There was no entente cordiale exhibited towards me by the members of the American press; nor did they, any more than the generals, evince any disposition to help the alien correspondent of the "Times," and my only connection with one of their body, the young designer, had not, indeed, inspired me with any great desire to extend my acquaintance. General McDowell, on giving me the most hospitable invitation to his quarters, refrained from offering the assistance which, perhaps, it was not in his power to afford; and I confess, looking at the matter calmly, I could scarcely expect that he would, particularly as he said, half in jest, half seriously, "I declare I am not quite easy at the idea of having your eye on me, for you have seen so much of European armies, you will, very naturally, think little of us, generals and all."

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, Vol. 1, p. 439-41

Mr. Thompson at Lynn, published June 13, 1835

[From the Lynn Record,]

This distinguished young friend and disciple of Wilberforce, and justly celebrated orator, who has been repeatedly invited by the Anti-Slavery Society of this town, arrived on Saturday afternoon last, and was received with great satisfaction and delight. The society had a meeting on business, at the Town Hall, at the close of which, Mr. Thompson addressed a large crowded assembly of people, ladies and gentlemen, nearly two hours, in a strain of eloquence and power, quite beyond any thing we ever heard, and equally beyond our power to describe. All were held, as if by enchantment, to the close. It would be difficult to decide in which he most excelled, matter or manner. He took a comprehensive and varied view of the enormous injustice and evil of slavery, and brought up and considered the most prominent and popular objections to the plan of immediate abolition, and exposed their hypocrisy and absurdity in his own peculiar and effectual manner of cutting sarcasm. The effect was evidently great.

After Mr. Thompson had closed, a stern Pharisaical looking man, who had been sitting near the speaker, announcing himself as a preacher of the Gospel, from the South, desired the privilege of putting a few questions to Mr. Thompson, which was readily granted, and the questions as readily answered, to the satisfaction of the audience generally. The object of the stranger was to cavil and carp at what had been said. But the tables were adroitly turned upon the poor man, in a manner least expected, and most mortifying to him. One of the questions, in substance at least, was—‘Do you consider every slaveholder a thief?’ ‘I consider every person who holds and claims the right of holding his fellow being, as property, A MAN STEALER.’

After several questions, captious in their nature, had been asked and answered, Mr. Thompson turned upon his assailant, ‘If you have now done, sir, I, in turn, should like to ask you a few questions.’

‘Do you consider slavery a sin?’

‘I consider slavery a moral evil.’

‘Do you consider slavery a sin?’

‘I do consider slavery a sin.’

‘Is the marriage of slaves legal in the Southern States?’

‘It is legalized in Maryland.’

‘Can the Slaveholder, by the laws of Maryland, separate husband and wife?’

‘He can,’ &c. &c.

The gentleman stranger, (who is said to belong to Springfield in this state, formerly from the South) appealed to the people, but finally withdrew his appeal, and declared himself ‘satisfied.’ Whether satisfied or not, we believe he had as much as he could digest, and as much as he could swallow, including the question and answer system.

On Sunday evening, Mr. Thompson delivered a lecture on Slavery, in a religious view, as opposed to the doctrines of the Bible. The meeting-house (Rev. Mr. Peabody's) was much crowded, and many went away unable to gain admittance.

On Monday evening, Mr. Thompson lectured on the sin of slavery, before a newly formed ‘Anti-Slavery Society, of the New England Conference of Methodist Episcopal Ministers, consisting of about 60 or 70 Ministers—(a glorious phalanx!) at the South street Methodist meetinghouse. The house was well filled; but owing to a misunderstanding by many, that the lecture was to be delivered at the Woodend Meeting-house, (which was otherwise engaged) all who went were enabled to get in. The lecture was a powerful and splendid production both in argument and in manner of delivery.

On Tuesday evening, Mr. Thompson lectured at the Friend’s meeting-house, which is very large, and was thoroughly filled. He was assisted by Rev. A. A. Phelps, one of the public Agents of the Society, whose address was able, and well received. Mr. Garrison and several other friends of the cause, from Boston and Salem, were present. Mr. T. took occasion to glance at the past history and conduct of the Friends in regard to slavery, the lively interest they had taken in the cause of the oppressed, and the liberal contributions they had made; and exhorted to a continuance in the ways of well doing.

There may be men in our own country of more learning and more depth of mind, and strength of reasoning, than Mr. Thompson, though, we think, rarely to be found; but for readiness and skill in debate, and splendor of eloquence, as an orator, we believe he stands unrivalled. His amiableness, mildness of temper, urbanity, and blandness of manners and deportment, are adapted to win the love and affection of all, who are honored with his acquaintance. That the haughty, and the envious, should whisper their malignant hints that something evil is lurking about his character, is no more than may be naturally expected; though they are most fully and satisfactorily refuted by his numerous and honorable testimonials of respect which we have seen, from benevolent societies and individuals in England, where he is well known. These all breathe the warm friendship and esteem which goodness and greatness of soul alone can inspire.

The independence of mind which Mr. Thompson possesses, is one of the most striking and important traits in his excellent character. He shrinks from nothing. He is ready to attack sin and wickedness in every shape—in high or low places: and his thrusts never miss—never fail of effect.

The name of ‘Mr. George Thompson’ was often associated in the public journals, with distinguished orators and philanthropists, at the various public meetings of benevolent societies in England, long before he embarked for this country. He was there ranked among the most able and popular orators. But here, in this country, there are certain would-be great men, who dare not meet Mr. Thompson in the open field, who vent their pitiful malice, and strive to induce others to treat him with that neglect, to which themselves are so well entitled; because he brings out and exposes to the light of day their works of darkness.

‘He is a foreigner—he has no right to come here interfering with our laws, our customs, and our private rights.’

Very fine, indeed! Capital! Who has a right to interfere, or say a word, if a man murders his wife and children, or sells them into bondage? It was all his own family concern. Who has a right to express an opinion of the Turks, when oppressing, starving, and murdering the Greeks, not only men, but helpless women and children : Who has a right to express an opinion against the Russians for similar conduct toward the Poles, under similar circumstances, as the latter were the vassals of the former, in both cases? Who has a right to send Gospel missionaries abroad among the benighted heathen, groping in darkness, in order to instruct and enlighten them in the way of truth? WE—we, the American people, the ‘sons of liberty,’ claim the right, and exercise it too; without once being asked, why do ye so We, the American people, claim and exercise the right, when the laws of God— the eternal laws of truth and justice, and humanity, are broken, to expose the sin, and to ‘reprove, rebuke and exhort the transgressor.

‘But slavery was brought to our shores and entailed on us by England, against our consent, when we were under her government; and now shall England send men here to complain of the injustice and cruelty of the act, when we should be glad to get rid of the evil, but cannot?’

Reason answers, Yes. If England did wrong, and afterward saw the evil, repented, and brought forth fruits meet for repentance, by liberating all their own slaves, was it not right—was it not a christian duty, to extend their acts of kindness to us also, whom they had led into error; to tell us what they had done, and how they did it ; and to aid and assist us to get out of the difficulty ? The law of God is universal. The law of Christians—the law of love, is universal; and requires the subjects of that law to oppose and expose sin and oppression wherever they are found. We send Ministers, political, religious, and masonic, to England and other places—to co-operate—to ask and give assistance, and mutually to benefit each other. But what can we, in the Northern States do? We can say, slavery is ‘a sin.’ We can enlighten public sentiment on the subject, and cause the sin of slavery—the greatest sin in the world, to become odious: and public sentiment in this country has the force of law, to correct any evil.

To assist us in these labors of love, Mr. Thompson has been sent among us, by the friends of humanity in England; and a most efficient and powerful co-worker he is, sweeping away the refuges of lies, and carrying his principles as a mighty sweeping torrent, wherever he goes. The advocates of slavery fear and hate him, the humane and philanthropic love him, and all respect and admire his talents, whatever they may pretend.

Mr. Thompson possesses all the requisites of an impressive and powerful orator—a fund of acquired knowledge, a brilliant imagination, natural pathos, a powerful voice, an elegant form, graceful gesticulation, a countenance capable of expressing any passion or emotion, and lastly, the most important of all, a benevolent heart—an expansive soul.

SOURCES: Isaac Knapp, Publisher, Letters and Addresses by G. Thompson [on American Negro Slavery] During His Mission in the United States, From Oct. 1st, 1834, to Nov. 27, 1835, p. 88-92; “Mr. Thompson at Lynn,” The Liberator, Boston, Massachusetts, Saturday, June 13, 1835, p. 3.

The Victory on the Cumberland—The End in Sight

We have reason to believe, if not the certainty, that Fort Donelson has fallen.  After a struggle, desperate on both sides, and, as far as my be judged from the imperfect details which have reached us, creditable to the fighting qualities of both, the post capitulated, and the National colors took the place, on the ramparts, of the rebel rag.  The destruction of life and the lists of wounded are probably largely in excess of those of any previous contest of the war.  It could hardly be otherwise.  The opposing forces were strong in numbers, but while the assailants were more perilously exposed, the defenders, from their very numbers, cooped up as they were in lines where they were helpless to fight, and simply in the way of each other, must have suffered frightfully from the storm of shell and shot hurled upon them from that circumvallation of fire.  It was doubtless the terrible sacrifice of life to which they were subjected within the fort that prompted these daring sorties which the besiegers so gallantly repulsed.

Having this glorious result of the fight, we may well postpone the discussion of details.  With the capture of Fort Donelson, another of those mortal blows recently struck at the heart of the rebellion has been inflicted.  Nor are we to lose sight of the fact that nearly all of these victories come from the command of Gen. HALLECK.  Fort Henry captured, the loyalty of Tennessee brought to light, the surrender if Fort Donelson, the retreat of PRICE, from Springfield, and the report of this morning that CURTIS had overtaken his rear, had seized his baggage-train and more prisoners that he knew what to do with, show with what energy and how victoriously the commander of the Western Department is executing his part of the great programme.  These, with the retreat of JOHNSTON from before BUELL, relieve, practically, both Missouri and Kentucky from the rebel enemy, and lay bare the Tennessee  to the admission of these Union armies which shall bring liberation to its oppressed but loyal people.

While the war in the West is thus drawing to a close, the signs are not less significant in the East.  There is little doubt that in North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, our forces are at this moment executing flank movements to the interior, which must effectually isolate the main rebel army in Eastern Virginia from its sources of supply.  It is clearly improbable for the rebels to hold their position at Manassas.  Their retreat must be a question of a few days—perhaps of a few hours.  There is but one reason for the evacuation of Bowling Green that is not valid for the evacuation of Manassas, and it is that no division of the Potomac army has been thrown forward to threaten an attack.  But such a threat is no longer necessary.  The news that Fort Donelson is in National hands; that the Tennessee river is open to our gunboats even to Muscle Shoals in Alabama; that the Cumberland can now be ascended to Nashville; that Memphis is in danger, and that the garrison of Columbus are for all practical purposes prisoners of war, must give that shock to the rebels near Washington which shall leave to its leaders an only alternative of withdrawing their army, or seeing it dissolve.  A retreat will be begun, but where will it end? Nowhere, we conceive short of the Gulf States.  The only pause at Richmond will probably be to witness the gloomy pageant of JEFF. DAVIS inaugurated as President, like a King crowned on his death-bed, or the succession of a Byzantine Emperor, when Byzantium itself was beleaguered and stormed by the Turks.  It will be in the Gulf States that the last stand of the rebels will be attempted.  But there our lines are already drawn tightly about them.  We hold the coast.  The blockade is pinchingly close.  What our gunboats and mortar-boats have done East and West they can do for every river and harbor on the Gulf.  Our troops will escape from the mud and the frosts of the Border States, to a theater of war, where for months to come the temperature is that of our Northern Summer, and where roads are settled, and military movements facile.  Indeed, of the resistance of the desperate traitors can be protracted through the Summer, a campaign in July and August would convey no discomfort to those who have experienced similar heats in our own latitudes; for the steady Southern Summer is far less intolerable that the varying temperatures of the North.

It is no extravagance, therefore, to say the rebellion has culminated.  Its settling must be as the flash of a meteor.  Had the illusory stimulus of the apparent victories of Bull Run and Ball’s Bluff been wanting; and had the certainty of the non-interference of France and England been earlier attained, the result must have been early reached.  After this, it certainly can[no]t be materially postponed.  The monster is already clutched and in his death struggle.

SOURCE: “The Victory on the Cumberland—The End in Sight,” The New York Times, New York, New York, Monday, February 17, 1862, p. 4.

Charles Francis Adams to John M. Forbes, September 7, 1863

London, 7 September, 1863.

I have been taking a little vacation in Scotland, which must account to you for my failure earlier to notice yours of the 4th ulto.

We are now all in a fever about Mr. Laird's ironclads, one of which is on the point of departure, and the other launched and getting ready, with double gangs of workmen at it night and day. The question now is, will government interfere; and it must be settled in a day or two at furthest. I have done all in my power to inspire them with a just sense of the responsibility they may incur from permitting so gross a breach of neutrality. If, however, they fail to act, you may perhaps soon see one of the vessels, with your glass from Milton Hill, steaming up to Boston, as the Richmond paper threatened. She will stand a cannonade, unless the harbor be obstructed. It will be for Governor Andrew to be on the watch the moment the news of her departure reaches America. She will be delayed a little by the necessity of taking her armament at some other point.

Of course, if all this takes place, I shall be prepared to make my bow to our friends in London, as soon as the papers can be made out. . . .

P. S. 9 September. Since writing this the government has decided to stop the vessels.

Yours truly,

C. F. A.¹

_______________

¹ On the 5th of September Mr. Adams wrote to Lord Russell: “At this moment, when one of the ironclad vessels is on the point of departure from this kingdom on its hostile errand against the United States, it would be superfluous for me to point out to your lordship that This Is War.”

The answer (Sept. 8) was: “Instructions have been issued which will prevent the departure of these two ironclad vessels from Liverpool.”

Still the decision of the British government was but a postponement, for Mr. Adams wrote (Sept. 17): “The departure of the rams seems to be uncertain.” This was confirmed by what he heard from Lord Russell (Sept. 25), that “the departure of the rams is under consideration.” Draper's American Civil War, vol. iii, pp. 171,172.

SOURCE: Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, Volume 2, p. 56-7

John M. Forbes to Thomas Baring, September 11, 1863

Yacht Azalea, Off Naushon, September 11, 1863.

I have yours of the 19th of August. The issue of 5-20's is not officially announced. . . .

The editorial of the “Times” on ironclads works well; when you see that question settled, I think you can make money by buying the bonds left with you.

I have no fear of any early collision with your country, if the North succeeds, without compromise, in whipping the scoundrels. If we could ever be so weak as to give in to them and degrade our present government in the eyes of the people, — the slaveholders, coming back with their power for mischief remaining, might join the tail of the sham democracy who have always been willing to coalesce with the sham aristocracy, and this combination might use the joint armies and the Irish to pitch into you. If we put the slaveholders under, as we mean to do, with their beautiful institution destroyed, there will be no danger of war with England until some new irritation comes up; we shall be sick of war. . . .

I wish you would pull up in time! Then we could join you in putting Napoleon out of Mexico, and in stopping French colonization in that direction. We ought to be allies! and Mexico gives us another chance to become so.

With best regard to Mr. Bates, and others round you.

N. B. My young soldier continues well, thank you. I have just sent him his eighth horse, so you may judge he has not been idle!

SOURCE: Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, Volume 2, p. 55-6

Anti-Slavery Meeting in Andover, published August 8, 1835

MR. EDITOR — I regret that the former account I was sent of your labors of our excellent brothers Thompson and Phelps, was so meager a statement of their untiring efforts among us.  Circumstances, however, obliged me to compress into a small space, what was worthy of being given at much greater length; and for the benefit of those who have not the privilege of listening to the discussion of a question of so much importance to every American citizen as that of slavery, a fuller sketch of the remaining meetings shall be given.  As my remarks will be confined for the most part to the speeches of Mr. Thompson, it must not be supposed that I can give anything like an adequate idea of the cogency of his arguments or of the power of his eloquence.  To eulogize him as an orator would be idle.  It would be like daubing paint upon a finished portrait, which would only soil it instead of adding to its beauty. Those who would form any just conception of Mr. Thompson as a public speaker and a christian philanthropist, must both see and hear him, and those who have once listened to him, are well aware that even an analysis of a speech of his , so closely joined in all its parts, so replete with profound thought, and so profusely embellished with rhetorical flowers of every hue and ever ordour, cannot be embodied in a single brief paragraph.  I shall therefore not attempt to give his own expressions, but merely a general description of his discourse.

On Sunday evening, July 12th, Mr. Thompson addressed a crowded audience, from Ezekiel xxviii. 14, 15, 16 – “Thou art the anointed the cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so : thou wast upon the holy mountain of God: thou hast walked up and down in the midst of these stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.”

Mr. Thompson remarked that though this was a passage of inimitable beauty, it was one of tremendous and awful import. While it drew the picture of the wealth and grandeur of ancient Tyre, it contained the prediction of its downfall. Mr. Thompson then proceeded to portray in matchless colors the prosperity and glory of the renowned city, whose “builders had perfected her beauty, whose borders were in the midst of the sea, whose mariners were the men of Sidon, and who was a merchant to the people of many islands.” Her fir trees were brought from Hermon, her oaks from Bashan, her cedars from Lebanon, her blue and purple and fine linen from Egypt, her wheat and oil and honey from Judea, her spices and gold and precious stones from Arabia, her silver from Tarsus, her emeralds and coral and agate from Syria, her warriors from Persia, and her slaves from Greece. Her palaces were radiant with jewels, and many kings were filled with the multitude of the riches of her merchandise. But iniquity was found in her. She had kept back the hire of the laborer by fraud. By the multitude of her riches she was filled with violence. She made merchandise of the bodies and souls of men, therefore she should be cast down. Many nations should come up against her and destroy her walls and break down her towers. All this had been literally fulfilled.

Mr. Thompson then applied his subject to America. Your country, said he, is peculiarly an anointed cherub. Heaven smiled upon the self-denying enterprise of your praying, pilgrim fathers, and in two centuries a great nation has risen into being — a nation whose territories stretches from the Canadas to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the Atlantic to the Rocky Mountains — a nation whose prowess by land and by sea is unsurpassed by any people that have a name — a nation whose markets are filled with the luxuries of every clime, and whose merchandise is diffused over the world. The keels of your vessels cut all waters. Your ships lie along the docks of every port of Europe, and are anchored under the walls of China. The deer and the buffalo fall before the aim of your hunters, and the eagle is stricken down from his eyry. Your hardy tars visit the ice-bound coasts of the North, and transfix the monsters of the polar seas. Your coasts are thronged with populous and extended cities, and in the interior may be seen the spires of your churches towering above the beautiful villages that surround them. Above every other nation under heaven, yours is distinguished for its christian enterprise. You can give the Bible to every family within the limits of your own territory, and pledge it to the world. Your missionaries are in all quarters of the globe, and your seventeen thousand clergy are preaching salvation, in the midst of your own population. Other nations of Christendom behold with complacency the good effected by your charitable societies, and would be proud to emulate you. No nation has ever been so peculiarly blessed. You are placed upon the holy mountain of God, and walk up and down in the midst of the stones of fire, but you have sinned. Ye make merchandise of the bodies and souls of men. Ye have torn the African from his quiet home, and subjected him to interminable, bondage in a land of strangers. Violence is in the midst of you, and the oppressor walks abroad unpunished. One-sixth part of your whole population are doomed to perpetual slavery. The cotton tree blooms, and the cane field wanes, because the black man tills the soil. The sails of your vessels whiten the ocean, their holds filled with sugar, and their decks burdened with cotton, because the black man smarts under the driver's lash, while the scorching rays of a tropical sun fall blistering upon his skin. He labors and faints, and another riots on the fruits of his unrequited toils. He is bought and sold as the brute, and has nothing that he can call his own. Is he a husband? the next hour may separate him forever from the object of his affections. Is he a father? the child of his hopes may the next moment be torn from his bleeding bosom, and carried he knows not whither, but at best, to a state of servitude more intolerable than death. He looks back upon the past, and remembers his many stripes and tears. He looks forward, and no gleam of hope breaks in upon his sorrow-stricken bosom. Despair rankles in his heart and withers all his energies, and he longs to find rest in the grave. But his dark mind is uninformed of his immortal nature, and when he dies he dies without the consolations of religion, for in christian America there is no Bible for the slave. Your country being thus guilty, it behoves every citizen of your republic to consider lest the fate of Tyre be yours.

Mr. Thompson closed by expressing his determination to labor in behalf of those in bonds, till the last tear was wiped from the eye of the slave, and the last fetter broken from his heel; and then, continued he, then let a western breeze bear me back to the land of my birth, or let me find a spot to lay my bones in the midst of a grateful people, and a people FREE indeed.

Never did the writer of this article listen to such eloquence; and never before did he witness an audience hanging with such profound attention upon the lips of a speaker. But those who take the trouble to read this article, must not suppose that what I have here stated is given in Mr. Thompson's own words. Perhaps I may have made use of some of his expressions, but my object has been to give a general view of this surpassingly excellent address of our beloved brother.

On Monday evening, Mr. Thompson gave a lecture on St. Domingo. It being preliminary to subsequent lectures, it was mostly statistics from the time of the discovery of the island, down to the year 1789. Mr. Thompson remarked that he had a two-fold object in view in giving an account of St. Domingo. First, to show the capacity of the African race for governing themselves; and, second, to show that immediate emancipation was safe, as illustrated by its effects on that island. St. Domingo, he said, was remarkable for being the place where Columbus was betrayed — for its being the first of the West India Islands to which negro slaves were carried from the coast of Africa — for the cruel treatment of the first settlers in the Island to the aborigines — for the triumph of the liberated slaves over the French, and those of the islanders who joined them — for being the birth place of the noble minded, the gifted, the honored, but afterwards, betrayed Toussaint L’Ouverture, who was born a slave, and a great part of his life labored as a slave, yet as soon as his chains were broken off, he rose at once to a man — to a general to a commander-in-chief, and finally to the Governor of a prosperous and happy Republic.

At the close of the exercises, Mr. Thompson informed the audience, that on the next evening they would be addressed by Wm. Lloyd Garrison, Editor of the Liberator, — the much despised and villified Wm. Lloyd Garrison was to address the citizens of Andover on the subject of slavery.

Tuesday evening arrived, and with it arrived Wm. Lloyd Garrison, Editor of the Liberator. The house was crowded by many, who, we doubt not, came from mere curiosity, to see the man who had been held up to the world as the “enemy of all righteousness — the “disturber of the public peace — the “libeller of his country” — the “outlawed fanatic”—the reckless incendiary, who was propagating his seditious sentiments from one end of the land to the other, and yet in this free country, suffered to live notwithstanding.

After prayer and singing, brother Garrison arose, and said, he stood before them as the one who had been represented to the public as the propagator of discord, and the enemy of his country — that almost every opprobrious epithet had been attached to his name; but since one term of reproval had been spared him — since his enemies had never called him a slaveholder, he would forgive them all the rest, and thank them for their magnanimity. He spoke for some time on the supercilious inquiry so often iterated and reiterated by our opponents; Why don't you go to the South? He remarked, that the very individuals who made this inquiry, and were denouncing us as fanatics, well knew that death would be the lot of him who should broach such sentiments at the South, and should the advocates of abolition throw away their lives by recklessly throwing themselves into the hands of those who were thirsting for their blood, then indeed, might these haughty querists smile over their mangled bodies, and with justice pronounce them fanatics. He touched upon several other important points which I must pass over in silence. His manner was mild, his address dignified and dispassionate, and many who never saw him before, and whose opinions, or rather prejudices were formed from the false reports of his enemies, and confirmed by not reading his paper, were compelled, in spite of themselves, to form an idea entirely the reverse of what they had previously entertained of him. His address did much towards removing the prejudice that many had against him, and proved an excellent catholicon to the stomachs of those who are much given to squeamishness, whenever they hear the name of Garrison mentioned.

On Wednesday evening, Mr. Thompson was to have continued his remarks on St. Domingo, but a heavy rain prevented most of the audience from coming together, and by the request of those present, the address was deferred until the next evening, and the time spent in familiar conversation. An interesting discussion took place, and lasted about an hour and a half. Many important questions were canvassed, to the entire satisfaction, we believe, of all who listened to them.

On Thursday evening, Mr. Thompson resumed his account of St. Domingo. Commencing with the year 1790, he showed that the beginning of what are termed “the horrid scenes of St. Domingo,” was in consequence of a decree passed by the National Convention, granting to the free people of color the enjoyment of the same political privileges as the whites, and again in 1791, another decree was passed, couched in still stronger language, declaring that all the free people of color in the French islands were entitled to all the privileges of citizenship. When this decree reached Cape Francais, it excited the whites to great hostility against the free people of color. The parties were arrayed in arms against each other, and blood and conflagration followed. The Convention, in order to prevent the threatening evils, immediately rescinded the decree. By this act, the free blacks were again deprived of their rights, which so enraged them, that they commenced fresh hostilities upon the whites, and the Convention was obliged to re-enact the former decree, giving to them the same rights as white citizens. A civil war continued to rage in the island until 1793, when, in order to extinguish it, and at the same time repel the British, who were then hovering round the coasts, it was suggested that the slaves should be armed in defence of the island. Accordingly in 1793, proclamation was made, promising “to give freedom to all the slaves who would range themselves under the banners of the Republic.” This scheme produced the desired effect. The English were driven from the Island, the civil commotions were suppressed, and peace and order were restored. After this, the liberated slaves were industrious and happy, and continued to work on the same plantations as before, and this state of things continued until 1802, when Buonaparte sent out a military force to restore slavery in the Island. Having enjoyed the blessings of freedom for nine years, the blacks resolved to die rather than again be subjected to bondage. They rose in the strength of free men, and with Toussaint L’Ouverture at their head they encountered their enemies. Many of them, however, were taken by the French, and miserably perished. Some were burnt to death, some were nailed to the masts of ships, some were sown up in sacks, poignarded, and then thrown into the sea as food for sharks, some were confined in the holds of vessels, and suffocated with the fumes of brimstone, and many were torn in pieces by the blood hounds, which the French employed to harass and hunt them in the forests and fastnesses of the mountains. At length the scene changed. The putrifying carcases of the unburied slain poisoned the atmosphere, and produced sickness in the French army. In this state of helplessness they were besieged by the black army, their provisions were cut off, a famine raged among them so that they were compelled at last to subsist upon the flesh of the blood hounds, that they had exported from Cuba as auxiliaries in conquering the islanders. The French army being nearly exterminated, a miserable remnant put to sea, and left the Island to the quiet possession of their conquerors. Mr. Thompson concluded with the following summary: First, the revolution in St. Domingo originated between the whites and the free people of color, previous to any act of emancipation. Second, the slaves after their emancipation remained peaceful, contented, industrious, and happy, until Buonaparte made the attempt to restore slavery in the Island. Third, the history of St. Domingo proves the capacity of the black man for the enjoyment of liberty, his ability of self-government, and improvement, and the safety of immediate emancipation. Friday evening, Mr. Thompson closed his account of St. Domingo, by giving a brief statement of its present condition. He showed by documents published in the West Indies, that its population was rapidly multiplying, its exports annually increasing, and the inhabitants of the Island improving much faster than could be reasonably expected.

After the address, opportunity was given for any individuals to propose questions. A gentleman slaveholder commenced. He made several unimportant inquiries, and along with them, abused Mr. Thompson, by calling him a “foreign incendiary.” Mr. Thompson answered in his usual christian calmness and dignity, not rendering reviling for reviling. The discusion continued to a late hour, and when it closed the audience gave evidence of being well satisfied with the answers given, and some who attended that evening for the first time, subscribed their names to the Constitution. Thus closed Mr. Thompson's labors with us for the present, and he left town on Saturday, July 18th. Mr. Phelps remained and addressed us on Sabbath evening, but the small space left to me, will not admit of my giving any account of it. As to the good accomplished by the labors of Messrs. Thompson and Phelps, some further account may be given hereafter. At present, I will only say, that upwards of 200 have joined the Anti-Slavery Society since they came among us.

Yours, in behalf of the A. S. Society at Andover,

R. REED, Cor. Secretary.

SOURCES: Isaac Knapp, Publisher, Letters and Addresses by G. Thompson [on American Negro Slavery] During His Mission in the United States, From Oct. 1st, 1834, to Nov. 27, 1835, p. 77-83; “Anti-Slavery Meetings at Andover,” The Liberator, Boston, Massachusetts, Saturday, August 8, 1835, p. 1.

Gerrit Smith: The News From England, January 3, 1862

Alas! that this news should find us still embarrassed, and still diddling with the negro question!  Alas! That we should still have one war upon our hands, while we are threatened with another?  Had we, as we should have done, disposed of this question at the beginning of the war, then would its beginning have also been its ending.  If slavery was not, as it certainly was, the sole cause of the war, it nevertheless, was that vulnerable spot in the foe at which we should have struck without a moment’s delay.  Instead of repelling the negroes, bond and free, by insults and cruel treatment we could have brought them all to our side by simply inviting them to it.  As it is, the war has grown into a very formidable one; and the threatened one whereas, had we not acted insanely on the negro question, we could have dreaded neither.  More than this, had we, as it was so easy to do, struck instant death into the first war, we should have escaped the threat of this second one.

For what is it that the English press threatens us with war? It is for compelling the English ship to give up the rebel commissioners, so it says. This is the ostensible reason. But would not England — she who is so famous for clinging to an almost entirely unqualified and unlimited right of search — have done the same thing in like circumstances? If she would not, then she would not have been herself. Had a part of her home counties revolted and sent a couple of their rebels to America for help, would she not have caught them if she could? And in whatever circumstances they might have been found? If she says she would not, there is not on all the earth one “Jew Apella” so credulous as to believe her. If she confesses she would, then is she self-convicted, not only of trampling in her boundless dishonesty on the great and never-to-be-violated principle of doing as we would be done by, but of insulting us by claiming that we ought to be tame and base enough to forbear to do that which her self-respect and high spirit would prompt her to do.

But perhaps England would not have done as we did.  Her naval captains have taken thousands of seamen from our ships — these captains constituting themselves the sole accusers, witnesses and judges in the cases. It was chiefly for such outrages that we declared war against her in 1812. The instance of the San Jacinto and Trent is not like these. In this instance there was no question, because no doubt, of personal identity. But I repeat, perhaps England would not have done as we did.  In a case so aggravated, she would, perhaps, may, probably, have taken ship and all.  By the way, it may be that we did act illegally in not seizing the ship as well as the rebels, and subjecting her to a formal trial; but if in this we fell into a mistake, could England be so mean as to make war upon us for it? — for a mistake which was prompted by a kind and generous regard for the comfort and interests of Englishmen? Surely, if England is not noble enough to refuse to punish for any mere mistake, She is, nevertheless, not monstrous enough to punish for the mistake, which grew solely out of the desire to serve her.

But wherein have we harmed England in this matter?  We have insulted her, is the answer. We have not, however, intended to insult her: and an unintended insult is really no insult.  If, in my eagerness to overtake the man who has deeply injured me, I run rudely through my neighbor’s house he will not only not accuse me of insulting him, but he will pardon so much to my very excusable eagerness as to leave but little ground of any kind of complaint against me.  Surely, if England were but to ask her own heart how she would feel toward men in her own bosom, who, without the slightest provocation, were busy in breaking up her nation, and in plundering and slaughtering her people, she would be more disposed to shed tears of pity for us that to make war upon us.

It is not possible that England will make war on us for what we did to the Trent, and for doing which she has herself furnished us innumerable precedents.  It is not possible that she will so ignore, nay, so deny and dishonor her own history. I will not believe that England, whom I have ever loved and honored almost as if she were my own country, and who, whatever prejudiced and passionate American writers have written to the contrary, has hitherto, during our great and sore trial done nothing through her government, nor through the great body of her people, to justify the attempt by a portion (happily a very small and very unworthy portion) of our press to stir up our national feeling against her — I say I will not believe that this loved and honored England will make war upon us for a deed in which we intended her no wrong; in which, so far as her own example is authority, there is no wrong; and in which, in the light of reason, and, as it will prove in the judgment of mankind, there is no wrong. She could not make such a causeless war upon us without deeply and broadly blotting her own character and he character of modern civilization. But, after, all, what better is our modern civilization than a mere blot and blotch if the nation which is preeminently its exponent, can be guilty, and without the least real cause of provocation, and upon pretests as frivolous as they are false, of seeing to destroy a sister nation? — a sister nation, too, whose present embarrassments and distresses appeal so strongly to every good heart? Moreover, how little will it argue for the cause of human rights, and popular institutions, if the nation, which claims to be the chief champion of that cause, can wage so wicked a war upon a nation claiming no humbler relation to that precious cause?

What, then, do I hold that England should do in this case?

1st. Reprimand or more severely punish the captain of the Trent for his very gross and very guilty violation of our rights in furnishing exceedingly important facilities to our enemy. This our government should have promptly insisted on, and not have suffered England to get the start of us with her absurd counter claim.  This is a case in which not we, but England, should have been made defendant.  It is her Captain who is the real offender.  Ours is, at the most, but a nominal one.  In the conduct of her Captain were in spirit and purpose, as well as the doing, of wrong.  The conduct of ours, on the contrary, was prompted by the spirit and purpose of doing right; and if, in any respect, it was erroneous, it was simply in regard to the forms of doing right.  Moreover, the guilt of her Captain can be diminished by nothing that was seemingly or really guilty in ours. The criminality of taking the rebels into the Trent was none the less, because of any mistakes which attended the getting of them out.  Nevertheless, England takes no action against him.  Her policy is to have her guilty Captain lost sight of in her bluster about our innocent one.  To screen the thief, she cries, “Stop thief!”  Her policy is to prevent us from getting the true issue before the public mind, by occupying it with her false one.

How preposterous is the claim of England to her right to make war, because we took our rebellious subjects from her ship!  The taking of them into her ship is the only thing in the case which can possibly furnish cause of war. That, unless amply apologized for, does, in the light of international law, furnish abundant cause of war.

Did every hypocrisy and impudence go farther than in England’s putting America on trial! Was there ever a more emphatic “putting the saddle on the wrong horse”? I overtake the thief who has stolen my watch, and jerk it from his pocket.  He turns to the people, not to confess his theft, but to protest against my rudeness, and to have me, instead of himself, regarded as the criminal!

An old fable tells us that a council of animals, with the lion at their head, put an ass on trial for having “broused the bigness of his tongue.” The lion (England) was constrained to confess that he had himself eaten sheep, and shepherds too.  Nevertheless, it was the offence of the ass (America) that caused the council to shudder with horror. “What! Eat another’s grass? O shame!” and so the virtuous rascals condemned him to die, and rejoiced anew in their conscious innocence.

Moreover, England, instead of turning to her own conscience with the true case, has the brazen effrontery to appeal to our conscience with her trumped-up case.  Which of the parties in this instance needs conscience-quickening, in no less certain than in the instance of the footpad and the traveler, when he had robbed of his bags of gold.  The poor traveler meekly asked for a few coins to defray his expenses homeward. “Take them from one of the bags,” said the footpad, with an air of chivalrous magnanimity; but on seeing the traveler take half a dozen instead of two or three, he exclaimed, “Why, man, have you no conscience?”  England, through her subject and servant, entered into a conspiracy against America.  America, through her subject and servant, forbore to punish the wickedness, and simply stopped it.  And yet England bids us to our conscience!

Why Should England protect her captain?  Her Queen, in her last May’s Proclamation, warned him that, for doing what he has done, he should, “in no wise obtain any protection.” He had full knowledge of the official character of the rebles, and at least inferential knowledge of their bearing dispatches with them.  But, besides that the whole spirit of it is against what he has done, her Proclamation specifies “officers” and “dispatches” in the list of what her subjects are prohibited to carry “for the use or service of either of the contending parties.

England did not protect the Captain of her mail-steamer, Teviot, who, during our war with Mexico was guilty of carrying the Mexican General Paredez.  He was suspended.  Why does she spare the Captain of the Trent?  Is it because she has more sympathy with the Southern Confederacy than she had with Mexico? — and is, therefore, more tender toward him who serves the former, than she was toward him who served the latter?  But it will, perhaps be said, that we have not demanded satisfaction in this case as we did in that.  England, nevertheless, knows that we are entitled to it; and that she is bound to satisfy us for the wrongs she did us, before she complains of the way we took to save ourselves from the deep injury with which that great and guilty wrong threatened us.  In this connexion, I add that if, upon her own principles and precedents, the Captain of the Trent deserves punishment for what he did, she is stopped from magnifying into a grave offence our undoing what we did.

2. The next thing that England should do is to give instructions, or rather repeat those in the Queen's Proclamation, that no more rebel commissioners be received into her vessels.

3. And then she should inform us whether, in the case of a vessel that shall hereafter offend in this wise, she would have us take the vessel itself, or take but the commissioners. It is true that whatever her preference, we would probably insist on taking the vessel in every case: — for it is not probable that we shall again expose ourselves in such a case to the charge of taking too little. It is, however, also true, that, should she prefer our taking the vessel, we will certainly never take less.

But such instructions and information, although they would provide for future cases, would leave the present case unprovided for; and England might still say that she could not acquiesce in our having, in this case, taken the Commissioners instead of the vessel.  What then?  She ought to be content with the expression of our regret that we did not take the mode of her choice, and the more so as that mode could not have been followed by any different result in respect to our getting possession of the Commissioners.  But this might not satisfy her: — and what then?  She should generously wait until that unnatural and horrid war is off our hands; and if the parties could not then agree, they should submit the case to an Umpire.  If, however, she should call for an Umpire now, then, although the civilized world would think badly of her for it, and our own nation be very slow to forgive her for it, I would nevertheless, in my abhorrence of all war, have our government consent to an Umpire now. Nay, in the spirit of this abhorrence, and for the sake of peace, I would go much farther.  If no other concession we could make would satisfy England, I would have our Government propose to surrender the rebels, Mason and Slidell, in case the English Government would say, distinctly and solemnly, that it would not itself disturb neutral vessels having on board rebels who had gone out from England in quest of foreign aid to overturn the English Government.  An ineffably base Government would it prove itself to be should it refuse to say this, and yet declare war on the ground of our capture of the rebels who were on their way for foreign help to overturn our government.

I spoke of my abhorrence of all war.  Our lifelong opponents of war find themselves unexpectedly in sympathy with mighty armies.  They have to confess that they never anticipated a rebellion so fast; still less did they ever anticipate that England would be guilty of coming to the help of such a satanic rebellion.

I have said that England will not go to war with us in the case of the Trent. Nevertheless I am not without fear that her government will be driven to declare war against us. The Government of no other nation (and this is honorable to England) is more influenced by the people.  By such an affair as the capture of Mason and Slidell, the patriotism of the least-informed and superficial and excitable part of her people is easily and extensively wrought upon. With this part of her people the inviolability of the British flag is more than all earth besides.  But it is not by that capture, nor by those classes to whom it appeals with such peculiar power that the Government will be moved. If an irresistible pressure comes upon the government, it will come from those portions of the people who long for the cotton and free trade of the South, and who have allowed themselves to get angry with the North by foolishly misconstruing our high tariff (which is simply a war measure) into a hostile commercial measure. The capture of Mason and Slidell will be only the pretext, not the provocation; only the occasion, not the cause of war.

If England wishes to go to war with us for any wrongs we have done her, she shall not have the chance—for we will promptly repair the wrongs, at whatever sacrifices of property or pride. But if, as I still honor and love her too much to believe, she wishes to go to war with us at any rate, and chooses this our time of trouble as her time to make us an easy prey, then will she be gratified.  It will be but fair, however, to advertise her that she must not take our fighting in the war with the rebels as a sample of what will be our fighting in the war with herself.  The former is fooling.  The latter will be fighting.  On all subjects connected with slavery, and therefore in a war about slavery, we Americans are fools.  We cannot help it.  We have worshipped the idol so long and so devoutly, that when in its all-influential presence, we cannot be men. The powers of our moral nature are, however, not destroyed; they are but perverted.  And such an outrage as the English press threatens us with will restore their legitimate use.  Our manhood is not dead; it but sleeps.  And as it was when the Philistines fell upon the bound Samson, that the Spirit of the Lord came to his help, so, when the English shall fall upon the worse-bound Americans, this sleeping manhood will awake.  And it will awake to assert itself, not merely against the English, but against the rebels also.  And It will do this mightily, because it will, and the same time, be asserting itself against its own life-long degradations, and the hateful cause of them.  Let us but know that England, to whom we have done no wrong, has resolved to come to the help of the Pro-Slavery Rebellion, and our deep indignations against her, combining with our deeper indignation against ourselves, will arm us with the spirit of the power to snap the “cords,” and “green withs,” and “new ropes,” with which slavery has bound us to dash to dust the foul idol whose worship has so demented and debased us.  Yes, let us hear this month that England has declared war against us, and this month will witness our Proclamation of Liberty to every slave in the land.  No thanks will be due her for the happy effect upon us of her Declaration of war.  No thanks will be due her that the Declaration will have the effect to save us — to save us by making us anti-slavery.  No more half-way measures, and no more nonsense on the Subject of slavery, shall we then propose.  There will be no more talk then of freeing one sort of slaves, and continuing the other in slavery; but we shall then invite every negro in the land, bond and free, to identify himself, “arm and soul,” with our cause.  And then there will be no more talk of swapping off taxes for negroes, and no more talk of colonizing and apprenticing them.  Then we shall be eager to lift up the negroes into the enjoyment of all the rights of manhood, that so we may have in them men to stand by our side, and help us make short work with the present war, and with that with which we are threatened.

Owing to the bewitching and debauching influence of slavery upon our whole nation, there are, even in the Free States, divisions among us in regard to the present war.  But should England so causelessly, cruelly and meanly force a war upon us, there will be no divisions among us in regard to that war: — nor, indeed, will there then be in regard to the other. And so deep and abiding will be our sense of her boundless injustice, that there will never be any boundless injustice, that there will never be any among us to welcome propositions of peace with England, until her war with us shall have reached the result of our subjugation, or of her expulsion from every part of the Continent of North America.  Moreover, we shall rejoice to hear of the crushing of her power every where — for we shall feel that the nation which can be guilty of such a war is fit to govern no where — in the Eastern no more than in the Western hemisphere.

SOURCES: “News from England by Geritt Smith,” The Liberator, Boston, Massachusetts, Friday, January 3, 1862, p. 4; An abstract of thes article appears in Octavius Brooks Frothingham, Gerrit Smith: A Biography, p. 262-3