Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: December 15, 1864

Cloudy and cool.

A dispatch from the West states that the enemy have made a heavy raid from Bean's Station, Ky., cutting the railroad between Abingdon and Bristol, destroying government stores, engines, etc. Breckinridge and Vaughan, I suppose, have been ordered away. Dr. Morris, Telegraph Superintendent, wants to know of the Secretary if this news shall be allowed to go to the press.

The President is ill, some say very ill, but I saw indorsements with his own hand on the 13th (day before yesterday).

Our affairs seem in a bad train. But many have unlimited confidence in Gen. Beauregard, who commands in South Carolina and Georgia, and all repose implicit trust in Lee.

A writer in the Sentinel suggests that if we should be hard pressed, the States ought to repeal the old Declaration of Independence, and voluntarily revert to their original proprietors― England, France, and Spain, and by them be protected from the North, etc. Ill-timed and injurious publication!

A letter from G. N. Sanders, Montreal, Canada E., asks copies of orders (to be certified by Secretary of War) commanding the raid into Vermont, the burning, pillaging, etc., to save Lieut. Young's life. I doubt if such written orders are in existence—but no matter.

It is said the enemy have captured Fort McAlister, Savannah Harbor.

Mr. Hunter is very solicitous about the President's health-said to be an affection of the head; but the Vice-President has taken his seat in the Senate.

It was rumored yesterday that the President would surely die, an idle rumor, perhaps. I hope it is not a disease of the brain, and incurable.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 2, p. 355

Senator Robert M. T. Hunter to George N. Sanders,* May 9, 1851

LLOYDS, ESSEX [Co. Va.], May 9, 1851.

MY DEAR SIR: You will be surprised to hear that your letter has just reached me. The mail comes here from the North but twice a week and it is irregular at that. No man can appreciate such a compliment more highly than I do and I wish to act according to the advice of my friends but they differ as to this matter. The same mail which brought your letter brought also one from Douglass. Confidential it was but there are no secrets from you. He advises me to decline, but to visit New York without parade during the summer. In the same letter he speaks in the highest terms of the skill and judgment with which you manage affairs. He himself I think is one of the coolest observers even when he himself is concerned that I ever saw. For myself I do not mean or wish to be obstinate. You know what my opinion has been all along. But I suppose and hope I shall soon hear from you again. Your report of progress is encouraging beyond any expectations I have ever had. I think that Douglass will take well in this state.

P. S. If Bev[erly] Tucker is in New York when this reaches you please tell him I had intended writing him by this mail but upon considering [?] the day of his sailing I found the letter would probably not reach him. I regret this very much as it was an oversight on my part.

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* This and the following letter are in the Library of Congress.

SOURCE: Charles Henry Ambler, Editor, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1916, in Two Volumes, Vol. II, Correspondence of Robert M. T. Hunter (1826-1876), p. 127-8

Senator Robert M. T. Hunter to George N. Sanders,* June 20, 1851

(Private.)

LLOYDS, ESSEX Co. [Va.], June 20, 1851.

MY DEAR SIR: I found your second favors here upon my return and I avail myself of the first mail to reply to them. I am under many obligations to you for your kindness and for the skill and address with which you have managed matters. The affair of the Herald I think will do neither good nor harm. The moment you mentioned Westcotts name I understood the whole matter. You ask me what is the cause of his dislike to me? I know of no cause and was not aware that he had any dislike to me. In truth I do not believe that he either likes or dislikes me or cares one cent about me. He has a natural propensity for mischief and delights in making a sensation. He could indulge these propensities better by the course which he pursued than by following your suggestions. This I suspect is the key to his conduct unless there is somebody in New York whom he wished to annoy. Mr. Jefferson said of Burr that he was like "crooked gun" and no one could ever tell where he would shoot. The same may be said of W[estcott]. The best way is to let him alone. He will be satisfied with what he has done unless somebody pursued it further.

I am glad that you are satisfied with my letter. I was afraid you might think I did not attach sufficient importance to your wishes which was far from being the case. But after weighing the matter well it seemed to me most prudent to decline. But enough of this subject. What does Donelson mean by his constant praises of Webster? Is he bolstering him up to give him strength enough to divide the whig party or is there an alternative in which he contemplates the possibility of supporting him. Scarcely the latter I should think. But there must be some object. Pray let me hear from you when you have leisure. Have the North Western papers said any thing of my letter? Where is Douglass and what is he about?

P. S. I will write you a letter in relation to Cushing. He would make a capital selection.

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* This letter is in the Library of Congress.

SOURCE: Charles Henry Ambler, Editor, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1916, in Two Volumes, Vol. II, Correspondence of Robert M. T. Hunter (1826-1876), p. 128

Senator Robert M. T. Hunter to George N. Sanders,* March 27, 1851

March 27, 1851.

DEAR SAUNDERS: I was in Richmond when your letter reached Garnett. By the way it went first to the army hands. M. R. H. Garnett is the name of my nephew. The other is M. Garnett and a whig. So note the distinction when next you write. By the way I see you still talk of that dinner. If gotten up it would be owing to nothing but your personal address, not to any hold which I have there. And if gotten up it would do harm. Trust my judgment for this matter at least. In all that you say in relation to the new Editors of the Union I concur. That is to say I concur as far as I know Donalson, but my knowledge of him is very slight. He is not for "the ticket" as you call it. At least I do not believe that he is. I heard Douglass well spoken of in Richmond. Gen[era]! Chapman is ardent. I did not hear what were the leanings of the Speaker Hopkins.

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* This letter can be found in the Library of Congress.

SOURCE: Charles Henry Ambler, Editor, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1916, in Two Volumes, Vol. II, Correspondence of Robert M. T. Hunter (1826-1876), p. 126

Diary of Gideon Welles: May 2, 1865

A very protracted session of the Cabinet. The chief subject was the Treasury regulations. There was unanimity, except McCulloch, who clings to the schemes of Chase and Fessenden. The latter can, however, hardly be said to have schemes of his own. But the policy of Chase and his tools, which F. adopted, is adhered to by McCulloch, who is new in place and fears to strike out a policy of his own. He fears to pursue any other course than the one which has been prescribed.

McCulloch is a correct man in business routine but is not an experienced politician or educated statesman. He wants experience in those respects, and needs grasp and power to extricate himself from among a rotten and corrupt swarm of leeches who have been planted in the Treasury. Some legal points being raised, the subject was referred to Attorney-General Speed to examine and report.

Stanton produced a paper from Judge-Advocate-General Holt, to the effect that Jeff Davis, Jacob Thompson, Sanders,¹ and others were implicated in the conspiracy to assassinate President Lincoln and others. A proclamation duly prepared was submitted by Stanton with this paper of Holt, which he fully indorses, offering rewards for their apprehension. McCulloch and Hunter, whose opinions were asked, went with Stanton without a question. I, on being asked, remarked if there was proof of the complicity of those men, as stated there was, they certainly ought to be arrested, and that reward was proper, but I had no facts.

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¹ George N. Sanders, a Confederate agent in Canada.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 299-300

From the World.

Peace, on the basis of a restored Union, is a consummation so devoutly to be wished that the people will watch with intense interest the faintest indications of its return.  Now that the Government, by authorizing Mr. Greeley’s mission, has turned the public mind in that direction, the country will hardly let the occasion pass without a free expression of opinion on the possibility, method, conditions, and probable consequences of the peace which all but army contractors and abolitionists so ardently desire.  The President having sanctioned the Niagara negotiations, the subject is fairly before the public for such discussion as may seem appropriate.

We are bound to say that we expect no results from the breaking of the diplomatic ice across the Niagara river.  It is, probably, on one side and on the other, a mere politician’s trick.  But it wears the external form of duly authorized preliminaries to a more formal negotiation   On the same side, the presence of the private secretary of the President of the United States is as valid an authentication of Mr. Greeley’s mission as would be a written letter of credentials; and it is to be presumed that the President would not have given the affair this degree of countenance had he not been satisfied that the alleged commissioners on the other side were duly authorized.  The selection of Mr. Greeley as an intermediary was on many accounts politic, and especially as protecting Mr. Lincoln from the kind of imputations put upon Secretary Seward for his informal intercourse with rebel commissioners in the first days of the Administration, previous to the attempt to provision Fort Sumter.

P. S. Since writing the above we have received the papers that passed in this odd negotiation; and, if the subject were not to serious for laughter, we should go into convulsions.  That dancing wind-bag of popinjay conceit, William Cornell Jewett, has achieved the immortality he covets; he has reversed the adage about the mountain in labor bringing forth a ridiculous mouse—the mouse has brought forth this ridiculous mountain of diplomacy.  This is Jewett’s doings, and it is marvelous in our eyes!  He got Greeley and the President’s private secretary to the Falls on a fool’s errand, and made even the President an actor in this comedy; he has bade each of them play the part so well suited to himself, of

———“A tool

That knaves do work with, called a fool.”

Sublime impudence of George Sanders!  Enchanting simplicity of Colorado Jewett!  “But—ah!—him”—how, oh benevolent Horace, shall we struggle with the emotions (of the ridiculous) that choke the utterance of THY name?  Greeley and Jewett—Jewett and Greeley; which is Don Quixote and which is Sancho Panza?

SOURCE: The Daily True Delta, New Orleans, Louisiana, Tuesday, August 2, 1864, p. 1

What Is Said Of The Peace Negotiations

The New York World, in commenting on the Niagra correspondence, closes an article as follows:

We are convinced that there is no sincerity in any of the parties to this singular transaction.  The rebels naturally feel a deep interest in our presidential election, and their emissaries are in Canada with a view to influence its result.  The unflinching purpose of their leaders is separation, and to this end they are plotting to divide the Democratic party at Chicago, as they divided it at Charleston in 1860.

P. S. Since writing the above we have received the papers that passed in this odd negotiation; and, if the subject were not to serious for laughter, we should go into convulsions.  That dancing wind-bag of popinjay conceit, William Cornell Jewett, has achieved the immortality he covets; he has reversed the adage about the mountain in labor bringing forth a ridiculous mouse—the mouse has brought forth this ridiculous mountain of diplomacy.  This is Jewett’s doings, and it is marvelous in our eyes!  He got Greeley and the President’s private secretary to the Falls on a fool’s errand, and made even the President an actor in this comedy; he has bade each of them play the part so well suited to himself, of

—“A tool

That knaves do work with, called a fool.”

Sublime impudence of George Sanders!  Enchanting simplicity of Colorado Jewett!  “But—ah!—him”—how, oh benevolent Horace, shall we struggle with the emotions (of the ridiculous) that choke the utterance of THY name?  Greeley and Jewett—Jewett and Greeley; which is Don Quixote and which is Sancho Panza?

SOURCE: The Mount Vernon Republican, Mount Vernon, Ohio, Tuesday, August 9, 1864, p. 2

The N. Y. World on the Peace Plotters.

The Copperhead press out west bloviated in favor of peace, and, and endorsed the Peace Commissioners and the peace programme of the loafing diplomats at Niagara, and denounced the President without stint. But the New York World—which has more sense if not more patriotism than these Copperhead thumb-wipers of Jeff. Davis’s myrmidons—was not to be caught in such a transparent net.  It saw through the rebel scheme of Sanders & Co. to strengthen the peace wing of the party at Chicago, and denounces and ridicules it in unsparing terms.  The World says:

We are convinced that there is no sincerity in any of the parties to this singular transaction.  The rebels naturally feel a deep interest in our presidential election, and their emissaries are in Canada with a view to influence its result.  The unflinching purpose of their leaders is separation, and to this end they are plotting to divide the Democratic party at Chicago, as they divided it at Charleston in 1860.

And the World is anxious to repudiate the entire transaction, and to place the odium of the negotiation upon other parties, and thus closes its editorial on the transaction which constitutes the chief stock in trade of the dunderhead, copperbottomed politicians hereabouts.  The editor of the World says:

Since writing the above we have received the papers that passed in this odd negotiation; and, if the subject were not to serious for laughter, we should go into convulsions.  That dancing wind-bag of popinjay conceit, William Cornell Jewett, has achieved the immortality he covets; he has reversed the adage about the mountain in labor bringing forth a ridiculous mouse—the mouse has brought forth this ridiculous mountain of diplomacy.  This is Jewett’s doings, and it is marvelous in our eyes!  He got Greeley and the President’s private secretary to the Falls on a fool’s errand, and made even the President an actor in this comedy; he has bade each of them play the part so well suited to himself, of

—“A tool

That knaves do work with, called a fool.”

Sublime impudence of George Sanders!  Enchanting simplicity of Colorado Jewett!  “But—ah!—him”—how, oh benevolent Horace, shall we struggle with the emotions (of the ridiculous) that choke the utterance of THY name?  Greeley and Jewett—Jewett and Greeley; which is Don Quixote and which is Sancho Panza?

SOURCE: The Daily Gate City, Keokuk, Iowa, Tuesday, July 26, 1864, p. 1

Diary of Edward Bates: July 22, 1864

In C.[abinet] C[ouncil]—present, Welles, Usher, Blair, Bates, and part of the time, Fessenden. absent Seward and Stanton—

The Prest. gave a minute account of the (pretended) attempt to negotiate for peace, thro' George [N.] Sanders, Clem. C. Clay and Holcolm[be] by the agency of that meddlesome blockhead, Jewitt [Jewett] and Horace Greel[e]y. He read us all the letters.

I am surprised to find the Prest. green enough to be entrapped into such a correspondence; but being in, his letters seem to me cautious and prudent.

Jewitt [Jewett] a crack-brained simpleton (who aspires to be a knave, while he really belongs to a lower order of entities) opens the affair, by a letter and telegram to Greel[e]y; and Greel[e]y carries on the play, by writing to the President, to draw him out, and, if possible, commit him, to his hurt — while the pretended Confederate Commissioners play dumby, — wa[i]ting to avail themselves of some probable blunder, on this side.

I noticed that the gentlemen present were, at first, very chary, in speaking of Greel[e]y, evidently afraid of him and his paper, the Tribune; and so, I said “I cant [sic] yet see the color of the cat, but there is certainly a cat in that mealtub.” The contrivers of the plot counted largely on the Presidents [sic] gullibility, else they never would have started it by the agency of such a mad fellow as Jewitt [Jewett] — perhaps they used him prudently, thinking that if bluffed off, at the start, they might pass it off as a joke.

I consider it a very serious affair — a double trick. — On the part of the Rebel Commissioners (now at Niagara, on the Canada side) the hope might have been entertained that a show of negotiation for peace might produce a truce, relax the war, and give them a breathing spell, at this critical moment of their fate. And as for Greel[e]y, I think he was cunningly seeking to make a pretext for bolting the Baltimore nomination.

The President, I fear, is afraid of the Tribune, and thinks he cant [sic] afford to have it for an enemy. And Usher tries to deepen that impression. But Blair says there is no danger of that; that Greel[e]y is restrained by Hall,¹ who controls the paper, and Greel[e]y too, owning 6/10 of the stock, and is a fast friend of the President — (of that? [I question.])

<[Note.] Oct [ ]. It appears that Greel[e]y is now ruled in, as Blair said. He is now a sound (?) Lincoln man — Elector at large, for the State of N. Y! Having, vainly, exhausted his strength against Mr. Lincoln's candidacy, he now, adopts the candidate (manifestly forced upon him, by popular demonstration) and plays the next best game, i. e. tries to convert him to his own use, by making him as great a Radical as himself. >

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¹ Henry Hall, son of a leading New York jurist, was connected with the Tribune for twenty-six years during eighteen of which he was business manager.

SOURCE: Edward Bates, Diary of Edward Bates, p. 388-9

William C. Jewett to Horace Greeley, July 5, 1864

CATARACT HOUSE

NIAGRA FALLS.

WHITNEY, JERAULD & CO.

PROPRIETORS

Niagara July 5th 1864

My dear Mr Greely

In reply to your note— I have to advise having just left Hon Geo. N. Sanders of Ky on the Canada side — I am authorised to state to you — for our use only — not the public — that two Ambassaders — of Davis & Co are now in Canada — with full & complete powers for a peace & Mr Sanders requests that you come on immediately to me at Cataract House — to have a private interview, or if you will send the Presidents protection for him & two friends, they will come on & meet you. He says the whole matter can be consummated by me[,] you — them & President Lincoln— Telegraph me in such form — that I may know — if you come here — or they to come on — with me.

yours

W. C. Jewett

SOURCE: Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.: Lincoln, Abraham. Abraham Lincoln papers: Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833 to 1916: William C. Jewett to Horace Greeley, Tuesday,Negotiations at Niagara Falls. July 5, 1864. Manuscript/Mixed Material. https://www.loc.gov/item/mal3428100/.

Proclamation of Andrew Johnson, May 2, 1865

By the President of the United States of America:

A PROCLAMATION.

           

Whereas, it appears from evidence in the Bureau of Military Justice that the atrocious murder of the late President Abraham Lincoln, and the attempted assassination of the Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, were incited, concerted, and procured by and between Jefferson Davis, late of Richmond, Va., and Jacob Thompson, Clement C. Clay, Beverly Tucker, George N. Sanders, William C. Cleary, and other rebels and traitors against the Government of the United States harbored in Canada:

Now, therefore, to the end that justice may be done, I, Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, do offer and promise for the arrest of said persons, or either of them, within the limits of the United States, so that they can be brought to trial, the following rewards: $100,000 for the arrest of Jefferson Davis; $25,000 for the arrest of Clement C. Clay; $25,000 for the arrest of Jacob Thompson, late of Mississippi; $25,000 for the arrest of George N. Sanders; $25,000 for the arrest of Beverly Tucker; $10,000 for the arrest of William C. Cleary, late clerk of Clement C. Clay. The Provost-Marshal-General of the United States is directed to cause a description of said persons, with notice of the above rewards, to be published.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington this 2d day of May, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-five, and of the Independence of the United States of America the eighty-ninth.

ANDREW JOHNSON.

By the President:

W. HUNTER,

Acting Secretary of State.

SOURCE: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I Volume 49, Part 2 (Serial No. 104), p. 566-7