Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: December 7, 1864

Raining, and warm.

It is said several hundred of the prisoners taken by Rosser in the Valley escaped, on the way to Richmond. A relaxation of vigilance always follows success. How long can this war last?

Hon. Mr. Staples procured four and two months' details yesterday for two rich farmers, Messrs. McGehee and Heard, both rosyfaced, robust men, and yet found for "light duty" by a medical board. Thus we go. The poor and weakly are kept in the trenches, to desert the first opportunity.

It is said a dispatch came from Bragg yesterday (I saw it not) stating that Wheeler and some infantry had a sharp battle with Sherman's advance, near Millen, in which the latter suffered greatly. But reinforcements coming up, our forces fell back in order, disputing the way.

Tea is held at $100 per pound! Wood still $100 per cord.

I saw Gen. Rains to-day. He says he has over 2000 shell torpedoes planted along our lines around Richmond and Petersburg.

Col. Bayne reports the importation of 6400 packages salted meats, fish, coffee, preserved vegetables, from Nassau, Bermuda, and Halifax, since October 1st, 1864, in fourteen different steamers.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 2, p. 349

Diary of Gideon Welles: Thursday, August 18, 1864

Mr. Seward brought me this A.M. a dispatch from Consul Jackson at Halifax, saying the pirate Rebel Tallahassee had arrived at that port. I had on Sunday morning last, the 14th, sent orders to Commodore Paulding to immediately dispatch the San Jacinto, then just arrived at New York and in quarantine, to proceed to Halifax, anticipating that the pirate craft would go thither for coal. The Commodore on the same day sent me a dispatch that orders had been given the San Jacinto to proceed to sea, and a second telegram, received that evening, said she would pass through the Sound. When, therefore, I to-day got word that the Tallahassee was in Halifax, I thought the San Jacinto should be there. I immediately inquired at what time she had sailed, that I might calculate with some certainty. This evening I have a telegram from Captain Case, Executive Officer, Brooklyn Yard, that the San Jacinto has not yet sailed but was coaled and ready and would proceed in the morning. I know not when I have been more disappointed and astonished, and I have just written for an explanation. It cannot have been otherwise than there was inattention and neglect, for there could have been no purpose or design to defeat my orders. But the sin — which is great, and almost inexcusable — of this neglect will fall on me, and not on the guilty parties. They have defeated my plans and expectations, and I shall be assailed and abused by villainous partisans for it.

I trust some of the officers who have been sent in pursuit will have the perseverance and zeal to push on to Halifax, yet I have my apprehensions. They lack persistency. Not one of them is a Farragut, or Foote, or Porter, I fear. But we will see.

I have ordered the Pontoosuc, which is at Bangor, to proceed immediately to Halifax, and trust she will get there. The Merrimac is somewhere on the Banks and may fall in with the Tallahassee. Budd, who commands the Merrimac, will prove an ugly customer for the pirate, if he falls in with him.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 110-1

The Rebel Emissaries At Bermuda

The British steamer Rinaldo, with Mason and Slidell on board, arrived at Bermuda on the 7th.  The Rinaldo was to have taken the Commissioners to Halifax to enable them to take passage in the Cunard steamer for England.  She however, having met with such exceedingly bitter weather, ice having formed in thick masses around her hull, on her deck and some distance up her rigging, and having had several of her crew frost bitten, the Captain, though at one time within fifty miles of Halifax, was reluctantly compelled to bear up for Bermuda.  On the day the Rinaldo arrived at Bermuda the Naval Commander-in-Chief, Admiral Sir Alexander Milne, entertained a party at dinner, and Commander Hewitt (of the Rinaldo), and four Southern gentlemen, his guests, were invited to Clarence Hill, where they spent the evening.

It appears that Mr. Slidell in Bermuda was a blatant blusterer, even at the British Admiral’s table, but Sir Alexander Milne, who is too old to be caught with bombast, determined to allow no latitude of this kind, and took care to stop it when it became obtrusive.  Mr. Mason is described as being a perfect gentleman, and appears to have satisfied The English Admiral in every way.  It is a general rule with Admiral Milne not to allow matters involving such heavy responsibilities to be talked over at the dinner table, more particularly as it was a spirit of generous hospitality alone which prompted him to invite the rebels.  On their arrival at Camber, and before leaving Bermuda, Mason is described as looking depressed, careworn and dejected – no doubt arising from the fact that he was now a world-wide wanderer, after proving a rebel to his country and a traitor to its Constitution.  Slidell wore the appearance of a man possessing a stern, forward and uncontrollable temper, which nothing can daunt or subdue. – On the 10th inst. the Rinaldo left with the Commissioners and their Secretaries for the Island of St. Thomas.  She endeavored to land at Halifax, but was prevented by the weather. – They left Bermuda as they came – without a solitary cheer from the crowd or the slightest mark of public enthusiasm being tendered them.

The rebel agents were evidently disappointed at the absence of éclat or fuss which attended the surrender.  They complain of the “crazy” tug boat in which they were forwarded to the Rinaldo, of the manner in which the master of the boat addressed Queen Victoria’s naval officers.  “I say, man, are you the skipper of this ere craft?” And of the danger of drowning to which they were exposed had the storm overtaken the tug.  The Bermuda papers seem to adopt this strain, and condemn the manner in which the restoration was conducted.

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