Diary of Henry Greville: Friday, April 26, 1861

Intelligence has reached London this morning from New York dated 14th, by which it appears that Fort Sumter had been attacked by the Secessionists, who, after a bombardment of forty hours' duration, had taken it without much loss on either side. Letters received in the City state that the excitement in New York and Washington was prodigious. John Russell declared in the House of Commons that Her Majesty's Government had no intention of offering their mediation.

SOURCE: Alice Countess of Stratford, Leaves from the Diary of Henry Greville: 1857-1861, p. 371

John Bright to John M. Forbes, July 31, 1863

Rochdale, July 31,1863.

My Dear Me. Forbes, — I am glad to hear of your safe arrival, and I rejoice that on your arrival so much good news should await you. I have a note from Mr. Aspinwall this morning of a very satisfactory character; and I only now begin to fear that your cause may go on too fast, for I am not sure that the North is yet resolute and unanimous enough to be able to deal wisely with the great slavery question. To me it seems needful to declare the Proclamation an unalterable decree, and to restore no State to its ancient position in the nation until its constitution and laws are made to harmonize with the spirit of it. Till this is done, you will be legally entitled to hold and govern every slaveholding State by that military power which has restored it to the control of the central government.

The “recognition” motion in our House of Commons was a ludicrous failure, as you will have seen. I had the opportunity of preaching some sound doctrine to some unwilling ears. Now the press and the friends of “Secesh” are in great confusion, and their sayings and doings are matter of amusement to me and to many others.

. . . And now for your kind words to me, and your hope that I may come to the States. Many thanks for them and for your invitation. I fear I am getting too far on in life to cross the ocean, unless I saw some prospect of being useful, and had some duty clearly before me. It is a subject of constant regret that I have not paid a visit to the States years ago. Mr. Walker and many others alarm me by telling me I should have a reception that would astonish me.

What they promise me would be a great affliction, for I am not ambitious of demonstrations on my behalf. We will hope affairs in the States will be more settled, and passions in some degree calmed down, before I come, if I ever come; and then I might spend three months pleasantly, and perhaps usefully, in seeing your country and its people.

I have had great pleasure in making your acquaintance in London, and only regret that, having no house in town, I was not able to offer you the hospitality I wished to have offered to you and to others of your countrymen.

With all good wishes for you and for your country and government,

I am with much respect, yours sincerely,

John Bright.

SOURCE: Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, Volume 2, p. 52-4

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, March 5, 1864

New York, March 5, 1884.

I send you a copy of the amendments which I think, and many of which I have long thought, ought to be engrafted on our Constitution. I have endeavored to show the perfect propriety of making amendments, — the necessity of doing so; that our Rebellion arose out of two elements, slavery and State-rights doctrine, and that the points which we now must consider as settled and past all discussion are: that the integrity of our country and our nationality shall not be given up; that slavery must be extinguished. I have tried to show that no one within the American polity is sovereign, and that the word ought never to have slipped in, as Coke declared in the House of Commons, when the Bill of Rights was discussing, — that the English law does not know the word sovereign. I then showed that in a constitution we cannot get at this sovereignty except through the subject of allegiance. You will also find there the reason why I use the expression “plenary allegiance,” which, accurately speaking, is a pleonasm, since all modern allegiance is plenary, and double allegiance is nonsense. There you will also see why I bring in the crime of sedition. . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 342