Diary of Gideon Welles: Friday, February 26, 1864

Only three of us were at the Cabinet council to-day. Some matters of interest were touched upon, but there was soon a discussion on recent political movements. The President has been advised of the steps taken to forward the Chase operations. Circulars were put in his hands before signed.

A spicy debate sprung up yesterday on the passage of the Navy Bill. Holman, a Copperhead partisan, made an attack on me, — sprawling, personally vituperative, and abusive. H. Winter Davis sustained him, but flung his vindictive spite more malignantly at Fox, whom he called a "cotton-spinner," than at me. He eulogized Du Pont, whom the Navy Department had withdrawn from the command of the South Atlantic Squadron, and denounced the Balaclavian order compelling him to attack Sumter, etc., etc. Kelly and Griswold defended the Department, but Frank Blair made the best points, and told Davis that, while he was active in getting up investigations against the Navy Department, he opposed all investigation of the Treasury. Things took such shape that I perceive the instructions to and correspondence with Du Pont will be called for.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 531

Diary of Gideon Welles: Tuesday, January 6, 1864

A patent lawyer named Dickerson prepared and published what he calls a plea or argument in a case before the court in Washington that is a tissue of the vilest misrepresentations and fabrications that could well be gathered together, if I may judge from such parts as I have seen. I do not see the New York Herald, in which it was published and paid for. The great object appears to have been a reckless assault on Isherwood, Engineer-in-Chief, but the Department is also in every way assailed. Of course the partisan press in opposition take up and indorse as truth these attacks, and vicious men in Congress of the opposition and equally vicious persons of the Administration side adopt and reëcho these slanders. It is pitiable to witness this morbid love of slander and defamation. That there may have been errors I cannot doubt, but not in the matter charged by Dickerson.

I think Isherwood has exerted himself to discharge his duty, and serve the government and country. His errors and faults — for he cannot be exempt — I shall be glad to have detected and corrected, but the abuse bestowed is wholly unjustifiable and inexcusable. As he is connected with the Navy Department, any accusation against him, or any one connected with the Department, furnishes the factious, like J. P. Hale, an opportunity to vent their spite and malignity by giving it all the importance and notoriety they can impart. I hear of Hale and H. Winter Davis and one or two others cavilling and exerting themselves to bear down upon the Engineer-in-Chief. There is an evident wish that he should be considered and treated as a rogue and a dishonest man, unless he can prove himself otherwise. Truth is not wanted, unless it is against him and the Department.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 504-5

Diary of Gideon Welles: December 1863

It has been some weeks since I have opened this book. Such time as I could spare from exacting and oppressing current duties at the Department has been devoted to gathering and arranging materials for, and in writing, my Annual Report. Most of this latter labor has been done in the evening, when I was fatigued and exhausted, yet extending often to midnight. Likely the document itself will in style and manner show something of the condition of the author's mind. In examining, analyzing, and weighing matters, I have sometimes felt discouraged and doubted my ability to do equal and exact justice to all, injustice to none. Every statement and sentence will be scrutinized, criticized, and scanned; politicians, naval men, legislators, statesmen at home and abroad will in this period of war and controversy study what may be said, with a zeal and purpose beyond what is usual. My wish is to do wrong to no one, to present the facts correctly and to serve my country honestly. The two or three friends to whom I have submitted the paper speak encouragingly of it. Mr. Faxon has been most useful to me and assisted me most. Mr. Fox and Mr. Lenthall have made sensible suggestions. I have found Mr. Eames a good critic, and he twice went over the whole with me. When finally printed and I sent off my last proof, I felt relieved and better satisfied with the document than I feared I should be. There is a responsibility and accountability in this class of papers, when faithfully done, vastly greater and more trying than in ordinary authorship. I believe I can substantiate everything I have said to any tribunal, and have omitted nothing which the Congress or the country ought to know. I do not expect, however, to silence the captious, or those who choose to occupy an attitude of hostility. If what I have said shall lead the government to better action or conclusions in any respect, I shall be more than satisfied.

The President requested that each head of Department would prepare a few paragraphs relating to his Department which might, with such modifications as he chose to make, be incorporated into the message. Blair and myself submitted ours first, each about three weeks since; the others were later.

I was invited and strongly urged by the President to attend the ceremonials at Gettysburg, but was compelled to decline, for I could not spare the time. The President returned ill and in a few days it was ascertained he had the varioloid. We were in Cabinet-meeting when he informed us that the physicians had the preceding evening ascertained and pronounced the nature of his complaint. It was in a light form, but yet held on longer than was expected. He would have avoided an interview, but wished to submit and have our views of the message. All were satisfied, and that portion which is his own displays sagacity and wisdom.

The Russian government has thought proper to send its fleets into American waters for the winter. A number of their vessels arrived on the Atlantic seaboard some weeks since, and others in the Pacific have reached San Francisco. It is a politic movement for both Russians and Americans, and somewhat annoying to France and England. I have directed our naval officers to show them all proper courtesy, and the municipal authorities in New York, Boston, and Philadelphia have exhibited the right spirit. Several of the Russian ships arrived and ascended the Potomac about the 1st instant.

On Saturday, the 5th instant, the Admiral and his staff made me an official visit, and on Monday, the 7th, the Secretary of State and myself with Mr. Usher returned the visit. Taking a steamboat at the navy yard, we proceeded down to the anchorage near Alexandria, where we were received with salutes and dined with the officers. On Monday dined with Baron Stoeckel and the Russian officers at Seward's. Tuesday we were entertained at Stoeckel's. On Wednesday, the 9th, received and entertained fifty Russian officers, the Cabinet, foreign ministers, and the officers of our own Navy who were in Washington, and all professed to be, and I think were, gratified. It was a question whether some of the legations would attend, but I believe all were present at our party.

Mr. Colfax was elected Speaker, and the House was organized without difficulty. There was an attempt to elect some one else, but it was an abortion. Washburne of Illinois wanted the place, but found few supporters and finally gave up the effort. Blair, to my surprise, went for Washburne, who, though the oldest, is confessedly the meanest man in Congress. Colfax is exceedingly sore over the course of Blair, who, he says, advised him not to compete with Grow, and now, when the field is open and fairly his, goes for W., whom he (C.) knows B. does not like. I not only preferred Colfax, but did not conceal my contempt for Washburne, whose honesty and veracity I know to be worse than indifferent. Blair tells me his opinion of W. is pretty much the same as mine and that he suggested and spoke of him at the instigation of the President, who, while he has not a very high opinion of Washburne, wants confidence in Colfax, whom he considers a little intriguer, — plausible, aspiring beyond his capacity, and not trustworthy.

In the appointment of committees, Colfax avows a desire to do justice to the Departments, which Grow did not in all cases, but placed some men on the Department committees that were positively bad. In no instance did he consult me. There is a practice by some Secretaries, I understand, to call upon the Speaker and influence his selections. The practice is, I think, wrong, yet courtesy and propriety would lead a fair-minded Speaker to appoint fair committees and consult the Departments and not put upon committees any of the class mentioned, objectionable characters who would embarrass the Secretary or be indifferent to their own duties. The conduct of Colfax is, so far as I am concerned, in pleasant contrast with Grow. Not that I do not appreciate Grow, nor that I am not on friendly terms with him. But C. has called and consulted with me, which G. never did. I neither then nor now undertook to select or name individual members, as I know has been done by others. Colfax named or showed me a list of names from which he proposed to make up the Naval Committee. He says Schenck intimates he would like to be chairman, — that when, in Congress twenty years ago, he was on the Naval Committee, the duties were pleasant and familiar to him. There are, however, family rather than public reasons which now influence him. If on the Naval Committee he would expect to legislate and procure favor for his brother. The Schenck family is grasping and pugnacious. I objected to him, and also to H. Winter Davis, who is Du Pont's adviser, and who is disappointed because he was not made Secretary of the Navy.

In the Senate there is a singular state of things, I hear. Their proceedings are secret, but I am informed the Senators are unanimously opposed to placing John P. Hale on the Naval Committee, where he has been Chairman, but persistently hostile to the Department. The sentiments of Senators, I am told, confounded Hale, who alternately blusters and begs. Some, very likely a majority, want the moral courage to maintain and carry out their honest convictions, for there is not a Senator of any party who does not know he is a nuisance and discredit to the Naval Committee, and that he studies to thwart and embarrass the Department and never tries to aid it. This movement against Hale is spontaneous in the Senate. It certainly has not been prompted by me, for though he is the organ of communication between the Department and the Senate, I have ceased to regard him with respect, and have been silent respecting him.

. . . The Senators have failed to pay attention to him, and do well in getting rid of him, if they succeed in resisting his importunities, which, I hear, are very persistent. . . . The Senators have, in their secret meetings, let [Hale] know their opinion of him, — that their confidence in him has gone. Should they continue him as Chairman of the Naval Committee, he will have no influence, and his fall, which must eventually take place, will be greater. . . .

The interference of Members of Congress in the organization of the navy yards and the employment of workmen is annoying beyond conception. In scarcely a single instance is the public good consulted in their interference, but a demoralized, debauched system of personal and party favoritism has grown up which is pernicious. No person representing a district in which there is a navy yard, ought ever to be placed on the Naval Committee, nor should a Member of Congress meddle with appointments unless requested by the Executive. It is a terrible and increasing evil.

A strange sale of refuse copper took place in September at the Washington Navy Yard. I have had the subject investigated, but the board which I appointed was not thorough in its labors, and did not pursue the subject closely. But the exhibit was such that I have dismissed the Commandant of the Yard, the Naval Storekeeper, and two of the masters, who are implicated, yet I am by no means certain I have reached all, or the worst.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 479-83

Diary of Gideon Welles: Saturday, October 31, 1863

My time has been so occupied that I was unable to note down daily current events, which, however, have not been of special importance. It has been my practice to make a minute of transactions on the day they occurred, usually after my family had retired for the night, but for some days I have been occupied until near midnight with matters that cannot be dispensed with. I was getting materials and preparing the outlines for my Annual Report, when I received a communication from Du Pont, deliberately prepared, and with evident malicious intent, at his home “near Wilmington,” complaining of “harsh language,” “wounding words,” and “injurious imputations” in my letters and dispatches relative to his failure on the 7th of April. I am conscious of no such wrong as he attributes to me. Though grieved and disappointed in what took place, I felt no resentment, expressed none, to call out such denunciations, nor could he have had any such opinion in the day and time of those occurrences, as he would then have made his complaint. But the correspondence closed last June; he has been for months in Delaware, nursing discontent and chafing under disappointed ambition. His mind, as Drayton reports, has become morbid. He was for a time the great naval hero, but Farragut has eclipsed him. He has seen Farragut toasted and complimented, dined and extolled by our countrymen and by foreigners, until his envy and vexation could no longer be repressed. He therefore reviews the past, and, too proud to acknowledge or admit errors, faults, or infirmities, he assails me, who have been his friend, and declares he must again place on the files of the Department his indignant refutation of my charges. He specifies no charges, quotes no language, mentions no exceptional remark. I have treated him gently, for I respect his acquirements, though I dislike his intrigues. He doubtless thought I should refuse to receive and place on file his unjust complaint, and I at first hesitated whether to do so.

Du Pont has ability, pride, and intrigue, but he has not the great essentials of a naval commander, — heroic valor, unselfish energy, and devotion to the country. Thinks of himself more than of the country and the service. No more accomplished officer could command our European Squadron, but he is not made for such terrific encounters as that of Farragut at Mobile and New Orleans, and as are necessary to resist Sumter and capture Charleston. He has too much pride to be a coward, — would sooner die than show the white feather, — but the innate, fearless moral courage of Farragut or John Rodgers is not his. He feels his infirmity, and knows that I perceive it. But it is a weakness for which I did not reproach him, or use harsh language. I pitied him.

In this communication art and literary skill, on which he prides himself, are exhibited, but not true wisdom. He tries to be impudent, and, wishing to give offense, thereby lessens his dignity. Were I to return his jeremiad, it would be published, and his grief would excite sympathy. I must, therefore, in justice to myself, to him, and to truth reply. I have no doubt he has skillful advisers. H. Winter Davis, one of the most talented and ingenious men in Congress, has been his friend and adviser, and is, if I am not mistaken, his counselor now.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 476-8

Diary of John Hay: November 8, 1864

The house has been still and almost deserted to-day. Everybody in Washington, not at home voting, seems ashamed of it and stays away from the President.

I was talking with him to-day. He said:— “It is a little singular that I, who am not a vindictive man, should have always been before the people for election in canvasses marked for their bitterness:— always but once. When I came to Congress it was a quiet time. But always besides that, the contests in which I have been prominent have been marked with great rancor. . . . .”

During the afternoon few despatches were received. At night, at seven o'clock, we started over to the War Department to spend the evening. Just as we started we received the first gun from Indianapolis showing a majority of 8,000 there, a gain of 1,500 over McClellan’s vote. The vote itself seemed an enormous one for a town of that size, and can only be accounted for by considering the great influx, since the war, of voting men from the country into the State centres where a great deal of army business is done. There was less significance in this vote on account of the October victory which had disheartened the enemy and destroyed their incentive to work.

The night was rainy, steamy and dark. We splashed through the grounds to the side door where a soaked and smoking sentinel was standing in his own vapor with his huddled-up frame covered with a rubber cloak. Inside, a half-dozen idle orderlies; up-stairs the clerks of the telegraph. As the President entered, they handed him a despatch from Forney claiming ten thousand Union majority in Pennsylvania. “Forney is a little excitable.” Another comes from Felton, Baltimore, giving 15,000 in the city, 5,000 in the State. “All Hail, Free Maryland. That is superb!” A message from Rice to Fox, followed instantly by one from Sumner to Lincoln, claiming Boston by 5,000, and Rice’s and Hooper’s elections by majorities of 4,000 apiece. A magnificent advance on the chilly dozens of 1862.

Eckert came in, shaking the rain from his cloak, with trousers very disreputably muddy. We sternly demanded an explanation. He had done it watching a fellow-being ahead, and chuckling at his uncertain footing. Which reminded the Tycoon of course. The President said:— “For such an awkward fellow, I am pretty surefooted. It used to take a pretty dexterous man to throw me. I remember, the evening of the day in 1858, that decided the contest for the Senate between Mr. Douglas and myself, was something like this, dark, rainy and gloomy. I had been reading the returns and had ascertained that we had lost the legislature, and started to go home. The path had been worn hog-backed, and was slippery. My foot slipped from under me, knocking the other one out of the way, but I recovered myself and lit square; and I said to myself: ‘It's a slip and not a fall?’”

The President sent over the first fruits to Mrs. Lincoln. He said, “She is more anxious than I.”

We went into the Secretary's room. Mr. Welles and Fox soon came in. They were especially happy over the election of Rice , regarding it as a great triumph for the Navy Department. Says Fox, “There are two fellows that have been specially malignant to us. Hale and Winter Davis, and retribution has come over them both.” “You have more of that feeling of personal resentment than I,” said Lincoln. “Perhaps I may have too little of it, but I never thought it paid. A man has not time to spend half his life in quarrels. If any man ceases to attack me, I never remember the past against him. It has seemed to me recently that Winter Davis was growing more sensible to his own true interests, and has ceased wasting his time by attacking me. I hope, for his own good, he has. He has been very malicious against me, but has only injured himself by it. His conduct has been very strange to me. I came here his friend, wishing to continue so. I had heard nothing but good of him; he was the cousin of my intimate friend Judge Davis. But he had scarcely been elected when I began to learn of his attacking me on all possible occasions. It is very much the same with Hickman. I was much disappointed that he failed to be my friend. But my greatest disappointment of all has been with Grimes. Before I came here I certainly expected to rely upon Grimes more than any other one man in the Senate. I like him very much. He is a great strong fellow. He is a valuable friend, a dangerous enemy. He carries too many guns not to be respected on any point of view. But he got wrong against me, I do not clearly know how, and has always been cool and almost hostile to me. I am glad he has always been the friend of the Navy, and generally of the Administration.”

. . . Towards midnight we had supper. The President went awkwardly and hospitably to work shovelling out the fried oysters. He was most agreeable and genial all the evening, in fact. . . . Capt. Thomas came up with a band about half past two, and made some music. The President answered from the window with rather unusual dignity and effect, and we came home.

SOURCES: Clara B. Hay, Letters of John Hay and Extracts from Diary, Volume 1, p. 238-42; Michael Burlingame & John R. Turner Ettlinger, Editors, Inside Lincoln’s White House: The Complete Civil War Diary of John Hay, p. 243-6

John Hay to John G. Nicolay, October 13, 1864

Executive Mansion.

Washington, Oct. 13, 1864.

MY DEAR NICOLAY:

I suppose you are happy enough over the elections to do without letters. Here are two. I hope they are duns to remind you that you are mortal.

Indiana is simply glorious. The surprise of this good thing is its chief delight. Pennsylvania has done pretty well. We have a little majority on home vote as yet, and will get a fair vote from the soldiers, and do better in November. The wild estimates of Forney and Cameron, founded on no count or thorough canvass, are of course not fulfilled, but we did not expect them to be.

Judge Taney died last night. I have not heard anything this morning about the succession. It is a matter of the greatest personal importance that Mr. Lincoln has ever decided.

Winter Davis’ clique was badly scooped out in the mayoralty election at Baltimore yesterday. Chapman (regular Union) got nearly all the votes cast. . . .

SOURCES: Clara B. Hay, Letters of John Hay and Extracts from Diary, Volume 1, p. 237; Michael Burlingame, Editor, At Lincoln’s Side: John Hay’s Civil War Correspondence and Selected Writings, p. 97

Diary of John Hay, September 24, 1864

This morning I asked the President if the report of the resignation of Blair were true. He said it was.

“Has Dennison been appointed to succeed him?”

“I have telegraphed to him to-day — have as yet received no answer.”

“What is Mr. Blair going to do?”

“He is going up to Maryland to make speeches. If he will devote himself to the success of the national cause without exhibiting bad temper towards his opponents, he can set the Blair family up again.”

“Winter Davis is taking the stump also. I doubt if his advocacy of you will be hearty enough to be effective.”

“If he and the rest can succeed in carrying the State for emancipation, I shall be very willing to lose the electoral vote.”

SOURCES: Abstracted from Clara B. Hay, Letters of John Hay and Extracts from Diary, Volume 1, p. 221-2; Michael Burlingame & John R. Turner Ettlinger, Editors, Inside Lincoln’s White House: The Complete Civil War Diary of John Hay, p. 230

Diary of John Hay: October 22, 1863

I spoke to the President to-day about Blair, his Rockville speech, and the action of the Union League of Philadelphia leaving out his name in Resolutions electing the Cabinet honorary members of the League. He says Blair is anxious to run Swann and beat Winter Davis. The President on the contrary says that as Davis is the nominee of the Union Convention, and as we have recognised him as our candidate, it would be mean to do anything against him now.

Things in Maryland are badly mixed. The unconditional Union people are not entirely acting in concert. Thomas seems acceptable to everyone. Crisswell is going to make a good run. But Schenck is complicating the canvass with an embarrassing element, that of forcible negro enlistments. The President is in favor of the voluntary enlistment of the negroes with the consent of their masters and on payment of the price. But Schenck's favorite way, (or rather Birney's, whom Schenck approves) is to take a squad of soldiers into a neighborhood and carry off into the army all the able-bodied darkies they can find, without asking master or slave to consent. Hence results like the case of White and Sothoron. “The fact is,” the Tycoon observes, “Schenck is wider across the head in the region of the ears, and loves fight for its own sake, better than I do.” . . .

SOURCES: Clara B. Hay, Letters of John Hay and Extracts from Diary, Volume 1, p. 111-2; For the whole diary entry see Tyler Dennett, Editor, Lincoln and the Civil War in the Diaries and letters of John Hay, p. 105-6

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, June 1, 1864

New York, June 1, 1864.

I think I wholly agree with you, dear Sumner, as to your resolution that no members of rebel States ought to come back without the consent of both houses. The very fact of your being judges of the qualification of each member, &c, would almost alone prove it. Who else should decide? Certainly not the President alone. Of course you will have all theorists against you; and every political wrong-doer in America is a theorist. Nothing is easier, and it is necessary for the ignorant masses whose votes are wanted. Men of a certain stamp become always more abstract the more they are in the wrong and the lower their hearers. The whole State-rights doctrine, the very term doctrine, in this sense is purely American. It struck my ear very forcibly when, in 1835, General Hamilton of South Carolina said to me, “Such a man was an excellent hand at indoctrinating the people of South Carolina with nullification.”  . . . I did not agree with you some time ago, when you said in the senate that the Constitution gives dictatorial power to Congress in cases like the present war. God and necessitas, sense, and the holy command that men shall live in society, and have countries to cling to and to pray for, and that they shall love, work out, and sustain liberty, and beat down treason against humanity — these may do it, but the Constitution? The simple fact is, the Constitution stops short some five hundred miles this side of civil war like ours. . . .

The last half of your letter, telling me about Chase's desire to see the Winter Davis resolution brought forward, surprised me a little. Not that he is for the Monroe doctrine, &c. That has become an almost universal American fixed idea — that is to say, the misunderstood Monroe doctrine; for President Monroe only held to a declaration that colonizing or appropriating unappropriated portions of America is at an end. What then is to be done? I believe the answer, with reference to you, is simply one of wisdom. You have done all you can to stem this business. If you find you cannot, let it go before the senate. You cannot throw yourself single against a stream. . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 346-7

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, February 12, 1864

February, 12, 1864.

Yes, my dear Sumner, that vote of which you write me — namely, thirty-one out of thirty-nine for your death-blow to slavery — is wonderful. It amazes and rejoices me. Still, I say we want four, perhaps five, amendments; we want them not by way of theoretic perfection or publicistic symmetry, but for plain common-sense adjustment of the Constitution to the state of things, and by the great behest of history.  . . . You know I am not given to extravagance; on the contrary, I consider the constant tendency of over-doing and over-saying things one of our most developed and least manly characteristics; nevertheless I boldly state that, calmly reflecting and keenly remembering the whole course of human affairs, I cannot bring to my mind any change of opinion, conviction, and feeling, as by an afflatus, equal to the change that has been wrought in the American mind concerning slavery within the last one year. I stand amazed. I, for one, would never have dared to believe it possible that but yesterday a Taney could give his opinion boldly and an Abolitionist was treated like a leprous thing, and that to-day a Winter Davis can declare in Congress that the Constitution of the United States never acknowledged man as property. I rub my eyes, and say, “Where are we?” . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 341

Fitz Henry Warren to James S. Pike, February 25, 1860

Burlington, Iowa, February 25,1860.

Esteemed Individual: I am charged to the muzzle with quinine pills, but mind asserts its supremacy over matter. I thank you for your letter of 22d ; but I am more cheered and consoled by other events of that same day. Pennsylvania knocked Baits; and Indiana, where Martin Colfax has been cross-ploughing and harrowing in the good seed, has died (in convention) and made no sign. I agree with you; take apartments for me in the Pitti Palace. My acquaintance with him is slight, but all in his favor. I revere, admire, worship, adore pluck; a stiff backbone is worth all the rest of the human anatomy. Let us have an order of knighthood established whose cognizance shall be a spinal vertebra on a field gules. Brain is nothing compared to the dorsal column. Let no man be eligible to the nomination who can take a kick behind with no change of countenance perceptible to the spectator in front. I hope that will not rule out any of your New York candidates. Will it?

I join hands with you on Pitt; and now, come out and “fight the beasts at Ephesus” (Chicago) with me.

And now, once more. Will you keep me in a stock of speeches! I want Mr. Corwin's, who is a splendid talker; Winter Davis, also, and John P. Hale. Never mind; if you are weak and cannot go to the capital on foot, take a carriage; it only costs fifty cents.

I am glad the Speaker is just what he is when it is necessary to take a candidate to please Geo. Briggs and Adrain, when the responsibility of having the control of the House is one which ought to have been dodged if it could be. I am happy that justice is more nimble-footed than usual.

I saw Pennington and Bates at Washington about the same time, and came to an early conclusion that neither of their anxious mothers knew they were out. As superb an ass as old P. is, I would rather take my chances with him for President than the Missouri pre-Adamite. You can understand my horror, then, of such a possible result as making a Republican President. Horace is kinky, but what has obfuscated Dana? My suspicion is that Weed does not want Seward, and does not intend he shall be nominated, but does want Bates? He is one of Weed's style of men. W. has been a correspondent of his for a long time, and Mister Weed could turn the crank and grind out any tune he wished. Weed made Fillmore, Fish, and Wash. Hunt. That's my theory, and it has to me great plausibility. There would be glorious picking at the Treasury for the New York banditti.

But this is private and very confidential. Use your eyes and your nose, and see if there is not something in it. Let me hear from you when the fascinations of the. federal city can be thrown off.

I suppose you dine frequently with Mr. Buchanan. Please assure him of my tender and abiding affection. With compliments to Mrs. P.,

Very truly,

Fitz-henry Warren.

SOURCE: James Shepherd Pike, First Blows of the Civil War: The Ten Years of Preliminary Conflict in the United States from 1850 to 1860, p. 496-7

Fitz Henry Warren to James S. Pike, February 6, 1860

BURLINGTON, IOWA, February 6, 1860.

James: I send you a published letter of an aged gentleman, the sands of whose political life are nearly run out. The style, as you cannot fail to notice, is copied from Washington’s Farewell Address: some may think it superior to that outlawed production. Mr. Dana is not to be permitted to read it unless his family physician is present, with burnt brandy and smelling salts. Since Horace “saw visions and dreamed dreams” out here in the land of divine inspiration, the contents, perhaps, may be broken to him gently.

Do tell me, confidentially, if Fremont will probably be the nominee. Mule-steaks can now be got cheap, and I wish to lay in a stock for the campaign.

I see the Tribune “squawks” a little over the committees. It was a very glorious victory, that election of Speaker. By the way, why don't you bring out Winter Davis for President? After the action of the Maryland legislature I think there is no doubt of his getting that electoral vote. Dana and Ripley appear to be quite well thought of down in Mississippi. Will one of them consent to take the nomination of Vice? That would take Mississippi, certain. With a pledge to make Helper Secretary of State we could bag North Carolina. In that case I shall insist on having Mr. Randall, of Philadelphia, Secretary of War; being in the “conservative zone” that would be all right. But I weary you.

Adieu.

Fitz-henry Warren.

Is Henry C. Carey temporal or eternal — “a spirit of health or a goblin damned?”

SOURCE: James Shepherd Pike, First Blows of the Civil War: The Ten Years of Preliminary Conflict in the United States from 1850 to 1860, p. 485