Speech of Samuel Gridley Howe, September 24, 1846

I have been requested, Fellow-citizens, as Chairman of the Committee of Arrangements for this meeting, to make a statement of the reasons for calling this meeting, and of the objects which it is proposed to attain; and I shall do so very briefly. A few weeks ago, there sailed from New Orleans a vessel belonging to this port, owned and manned by New England freemen, under the flag of our Union—the flag of the free. When she had been a week upon her voyage, and was beyond the jurisdiction of the laws of Louisiana, far out upon a broad and illimitable ocean, there was found secreted in her hold, a man lying naked upon the cargo, half suffocated by the hot and stifled air, and trembling with fear. He begged the sailors who found him not to betray him to the captain, for he had rather die than be discovered before he got to Boston. Poor fellow! he had heard of Boston; he had heard that there all men are free and equal;—he had seen the word Boston written on that ship, and he had said to himself—“I, too, am a man, and not a brute or a chattel, and if I can only once set my foot in that blessed city, my claims to human brotherhood will be admitted, and I shall be treated as a man and a brother,”—and he hid himself in the hold. Well, Sir, the knowledge of his being there could not long be kept from the captain, and he was dragged from his hot and close hiding-place, and brought upon deck. It was then seen that he was a familiar acquaintance,—a bright intelligent mulatto youth, who used to be sent by his master to sell milk on board; he had been a favorite, and every man, from the captain to the cabin-boy, used to have his jokes with “Joe.” They had treated him like a human being, could he expect they would ever help to send him into slavery like a brute?

And now what was to be done? Neither the captain nor any of his officers had been privy to his coming on board; they could not be convicted of the crime of wilfully aiding a brother man to escape from bondage; the man was to them as though he had been dropped from the clouds, or been picked up floating on a plank at sea; he was thrown, by the providence of God, upon their charity and humanity

But it was decided to send him back to New Orleans; to deliver him up to his old owner; and they looked long and eagerly for some ship that would take charge of him. None such, however, was found, and the “Ottoman” arrived safely in our harbor. The wish of the poor slave was gratified; his eyes were blessed with the sight of the promised land. He had been treated well for the most part, on board, could he doubt that the hearts of his captors had softened Can we suppose that sailors, so proverbial for their generous nature, could have been, of their own accord, the instruments of sending the poor fellow back I, for one, will not believe it.

But the captain communicated with his rich and respectable owners, men whom he was accustomed to honor and obey, and they decided that whether a human being or not, poor “Joe” must be sent back to bondage; they would not be a party, even against their will, to setting free a slave. (Loud cries of “Shame,” “Shame,” and “Let us know the name of the owner.”) The name of the firm is John H. Pearson & Co. (Repeated cries of “Shame,” “Shame,” “Shame.”). It was a dangerous business, this that they undertook; they did not fear to break the laws of God—to outrage the laws of humanity; but they did fear the laws of the Commonwealth, for those laws threatened the State's Prison to whoever should illegally imprison another. They knew that no person, except the owner of the runaway slave, or his agent, or a marshal of the United States, had any right to touch him; they were neither the one nor the other; and they therefore hid their victim upon an island in our harbor and detained him there.

But he escaped from their clutches; he fled to our city—to the city of his hopes—he was here in our very streets, fellow-citizens! he had gained an Asylum, he called on us for aid. Of old, there were temples so sacred that even a murderer who had taken refuge in them was free from pursuit; but no such temple did Boston offer to the hunted slave; he was pursued and siezed, and those of our wondering citizens who inquired what it all meant, were deceived by a lie about his being a thief, and he was dragged on board ship. But the news of this got abroad; legal warrants were at once procured; the shield of the habeas corpus was prepared to cover the fugitive; officers of justice were urged to the pursuit; the owner of the vessel was implored to give an order for the man's surrender, but all in vain. A vessel was found, bound for New Orleans, which would consent to be made a slave-ship of (Loud cries for the name of the ship.) The Niagara, belonging to the same owners, and on board of this ship the man was sent back, to receive the lash, and to wear the shackles, for his ill-starred attempt to be free, and to drag out all the days of his life, a degraded, wretched, and hopeless slave!

And now, fellow-citizens, how does all this differ from piracy and the slave-trade? The man was free—free at sea, free on shore; and it was only by a legal process that he could be arrested. He was siezed in our city; bound and carried into slavery by those who had no more right to do so than has the slave-trader to descend upon the coast of Guinea and carry off the inhabitants. All these facts are known and admitted; nay, they are defended by some who call themselves followers of Him who said, “As ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so to them;” they are defended, too, by some of those presses, whose editors arrogate to themselves the name of Watchmen on the towers of Liberty!

And now it will be asked,—it has been asked, tauntingly,–How can we help ourselves? What can this meeting do about it?

In reply, let me first state what it is not proposed to do about it. It is not proposed to move the public mind to any expression of indignation, much less to any acts of violence against the parties connected with the late outrage. As to the captain, it is probable that he was more sinned against than sinning. I am told that he is a kind, good man, in most of the relations of life, and that he was made a tool of Let him go and sin no more. As for the owners and their abettors—the men who used the wealth and influence which God gave them, to kidnap and enslave a fellow-man,—a poor, trembling, hunted wretch, who had fled to our shores for liberty and sought refuge in our borders—let them go too, their punishment will be dreadful enough without our adding to it. Indeed, I, for one, can say that I would rather be in the place of the victim whom they are at this moment sending away into bondage,_I would rather be in his place than in theirs: Aye! through the rest of my earthly life, I would rather be a driven slave upon a Louisiana plantation, than roll in their wealth and bear the burden of their guilt; and as for the life to come, if the police of those regions to which bad men go, be not as sleepy as the police of Boston, then, may the Lord have mercy upon their souls'

But, Mr. Chairman, again it is asked, “What shall we do?” Fellow-citizens, it is not a retrospective but a prospective action which this meeting proposes, and there are many ways in which good may be done, and harm prevented, some of which I hope will be proposed by those who may follow me, and who probably will be more accustomed to such meetings than I am. But first, let me answer some of the objections which have been urged by some of those gentlemen who have been invited to come up here to-night and help us, and have declined to do so. They say, “We must not interfere with the course of the law.” Sir, they know as well as we know, that if the law be the edge of the axe, that public opinion is the force that gives strength and weight to the blow.

Sir, we have tried the “let alone system" long enough ; we have a right to judge the future by the past, and we know that the law will not prevent such outrage in time to come, unless the officers of the law are driven by public opinion to do their duty. What has made the African slave-trade odious? Was it the law, or public opinion?

But, Sir, in order to test the strength of this objection, let us suppose that instead of the poor hunted mulatto, one of the clergymen of Boston had been carried off into slavery. Would the pulpit have been silent? Had one of our editors been carried away, would the press have been dumb Would there have been any want of glaring capitals and notes of exclamation? Suppose a lawyer had been kidnapped in his office, bound, and carried off to work on a slave plantation; would the limbs of the law have moved so lazily as they did week before last Or suppose a merchant had been torn from his counting-room in State street, and shipped for the slave-market of Tunis; would there not have been an excitement all over the city? Think you there would not have been “Indignation meetings” on “Change?”

And yet, Sir, are any of these men more precious in the sight of God than the poor mulattoo Or suppose a slave ship from the coast of Guinea, with her human cargo on board, had been driven by stress of weather into our port, and one of her victims had escaped to our shore, and been recaptured and carried off in the face of the whole community; would there have been any want of “indignation” then ? And, Sir, is there any difference, would it be a greater crime to carry such an one away, except that as this man had been once a slave, he might be made a slave again, that is, that two wrongs might make a right.

No, Mr. Chairman, these are not the true reasons. It is, Sir, that the “peculiar institution,” which has so long been brooding over this country like an incubus, has at last spread abroad her murky wings, and has covered us with her benumbing shadow. It has silenced the pulpit; it has muffled the press; its influence is everywhere. Court street, that can find a flaw in every indictment, and can cunningly devise ways to save the murderer from the gallows—Court street can find no way of escape for the poor slave; State street, that drank the blood of the martyrs of liberty, State street is deaf to the cry of the oppressed slave: the port of Boston, that has been shut up by a tyrant king as the dangerous haunt of freemen, the port of Boston has been opened for the slave-trader; for God's sake, Mr. Chairman, let us keep Faneuil Hall free. Let there be words of such potency spoken here this night as shall break the spell that is upon the community. Let us devise such means and measures as shall secure to every man who seeks refuge in our borders, all the liberties and all the rights which the law allows him.

Let us resolve that even if the slave-hunter comes to this city to seek his runaway victim, we will not lay our hands upon him, but we will fasten our eyes upon him, and will never take them off till he leaves our borders without his prey. Sir, there is a potency, a magic power, in the gaze of honest indignation. I am told that one of the parties of the late outrage—one of the owners of the “Ottoman,” came up here to this temple of liberty the other night to hear Mr. John P. Hale talk about slavery. He was discovered and pointed out. And, Mr. Chairman, what was done to him? Why, Sir, he was fairly looked out of this Hall. No one touched him ; but he could not stand the look of indignation, and he fled away. Sir, this beats the hunters of the West; they boast that they can “grin the varmint off the trees,” but they cannot look a slave-hunter out of countenance, as the freemen of the East Can.

I say, Sir, if ever the slave-hunter come among us in pursuit of his victim, let us not harm a hair of his head—“let us touch not the hem of his garment; but let him be a Pariah among us,” and cursed be he who gives him aid, who gives him food, or fire, or bed, or anything save that which drove his friend and coadjutor from Faneuil Hall the other night.

SOURCES: Laura E. Richards, Editor, Letters and Journals of Samuel Gridley Howe, Volume 2, p. 399-400; Address of the Committee Appointed by a Public Meeting: Held at Faneuil Hall, September 24, 1846, Appendix, p. 2-6

Diary of Gideon Welles: Tuesday, April 12, 1864

To-day have a letter from Admiral Lee respecting the exportation of French tobacco from Richmond. This is an arrangement of Mr. Seward to which I have always objected, but to which the President was persuaded to yield his assent some months ago. The subject has lingered until now. Admiral Lee says the French naval vessels and transports are at the Roads and about to proceed up the James River, and inquires if he shall keep an account of their export.

I took the dispatch to the Cabinet-meeting to ascertain from Mr. Seward what his arrangements were, but he was not present. When the little business on hand was disposed of, I introduced the subject to the President, who told me he had seen the dispatch to me and also one to Mr. Stanton from General Butler. He saw them both at the telegraph office, and after he got home he had sent for Fred Seward and Mr. Stanton. They appear neither of them to think the subject of much consequence, but after Stanton had returned to the War Department and read Butler's dispatch, he sent the President word that Mr. Seward ought to give the subject attention. The President had therefore told Fred Seward to telegraph his father, who is in New York, to return.

It is curious, that the President who saw Adl Lee’s dispatch to me should have consulted the Secretary of War and Assistant Secretary of State without advising me, or consulting me on the subject. He was annoyed, I saw, when I introduced the topic. The reason for all this I well understood. He knew full well my opposition to this whole proceeding, which I had fought off two or three times, until he finally gave in to Seward. When, therefore, some of the difficulties which I had suggested began to arise, the President preferred not to see me. It will not surprise me if this is but the beginning of the trouble we shall experience.

At the Cabinet-meeting, Chase, after presenting his weekly exhibit, showing our national debt to be over sixteen hundred millions, said he should have to request the Navy Department and also that of the Interior to make no farther calls on the Treasury for coin. I told him he must provide for foreign bills which stood different from any others, and if he had paid the Interior or any other Department than the State and Navy, which had foreign bills, and possibly the War Department some foreign purchases, I thought it not right; that I had experienced great difficulty in making California payments, but had met them, because I supposed all domestic bills were treated alike.

Chase did not meet the point squarely, but talked on other subjects, and answered some questions of the President's about the daily custom receipts, and explained the operations of his gold dollar certificates, etc. I brought him back to the Navy matter by asking him how our paymasters and agents were to draw abroad, — by what standard of value. He said the legal-tender standard. “What is that standard,” I inquired, “in Nassau, in Rio, in China, or London?”

He made me no other answer than that he was anxious to reduce the price of gold, and that something must be done to effect it. Talked of taxing bank circulation and driving it out of existence. I told him that might be a step in the right direction, perhaps, provided he did not increase his paper issues, but that if he issued irredeemable Treasury paper instead to an unlimited amount, there would be no relief; that by reducing the amount of paper and making it payable in specie on demand he would bring his legal tenders and gold nearer to equality. The President remarked that something must be done towards taxing the bank paper; said he did not fully comprehend the financial questions in all their bearings; made some sensible inquiries of Mr. Chase concerning his issues, which were bought for custom-house purposes.

Mr. Usher made some inquiries and suggestions about bringing down the price of gold and compelling banks and others to disgorge that were worthy an old Whig of thirty years gone by. His ideas were crude, absurd, and ridiculous. He evidently has never given the subject attention.

Mr. Grimes and Mr. Hale had a round in the Senate yesterday. The former had the best of the debate, but still did not do himself, the Department, and the service full justice.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 9-11

Diary of Gideon Welles: Friday, April 8, 1864

Answered a letter from J. P. Hale, Chairman of Naval Committee, on the question of increasing the Marine Corps. In answering the inquiries of Mr. Hale, it is important to so word my communication as to leave the honorable gentleman some discretion, for he makes it a rule to oppose any measure which the Department strongly recommends. Mr. Rice, Chairman of the Naval Committee of the House, informs me of a conversation he had with Hale a few days since, when he lectured Hale severely for his course. Told him that, while professing to be a friend of the Administration, he exerted himself to see if he could not in some way find fault with it, as though he could gain popularity to himself personally while denouncing the Administration and especially that branch of it with which he was more particularly identified. Hale replied that he had the most implicit confidence in the integrity and fidelity of Gideon Welles, but that he had no confidence in Mr. Fox or Admiral Smith, etc., etc.

But little at the Cabinet. Neither Chase nor Blair attended. Seward says our friends in the British Ministry are to be defeated. Told him I regretted it, but that it was not an unmitigated evil. I had not the apprehensions from it which he seemed to entertain. I certainly felt disinclined to make concessions to retain them.

Called this evening on Admiral Dahlgren, who is inconsolable for the loss of his son. Advised him to get abroad and mingle in the world, and not yield to a blow that was irremediable.

Wise, who is Chief ad interim of the Ordnance Bureau, is almost insane for the appointment of Chief, and, like too many, supposes the way to promotion is by denouncing those who stand in his way, or whom he supposes stand in his way. Mr. Everett writes to old Mr. Blair against Dahlgren. Admiral Stringham and Worden called on me yesterday in behalf of Wise and both opposed D. They were sent by Wise.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 6-7

Diary of Gideon Welles: Monday, April 4, 1864

Heard an excellent discourse yesterday from Bishop Whipple.

Called on Stanton, respecting the letters of General Gillmore from June 12 to July 6, 1863.

Had a call from J. P. Hale respecting appointments. This man, so long a Senator, has no comprehensive or statesmanlike views. Would set aside legislative action and law because he thinks it operates hard on a lieutenant whom he knows.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 5

Hopkins Holsey to Howell Cobb, December 31, 1847

Athens, Ga., Dec. 31st, 1847.

Dr. Sir: I avail myself of a leisure moment to reply to your communication of the¹ ——. Your favor in sending to this office the National Intelligencer is duly appreciated, in as much as the editor of the Union admits that his reports of the proceedings of Congress, thus far, have not been accurate. I find this to be the case particularly in regard to Mr. Giddings's instructions to the Judiciary Committee relative to the slave trade in the District of Columbia. These instructions as reported in the Intelligencer open up the whole question of property in slaves; and the double vote of Mr. Winthrop, in first deciding the tie vote against the South, and afterwards upon the correction of the Journal repeating his position, is peculiarly unfortunate for the Southern Whigs. It is also an unlucky omen for them that Northern Democrats were the only members from the non-slaveholding states, voting against the agitation of the question. In the other wing of the Capitol a similar mishap seems to have befallen them almost at the same time upon the movement of John P. Hale on the same subject, in the disposition of which I observe all the Northern democratic Senators voting with the entire South to lay the question of reception on the table, and all the Northern Whigs voting against it.

Previous to this conclusive demonstration by the Northern Democrats in both Houses came the resolutions by Mr. Dickinson of New York, which assume the same ground taken by Mr. Dallas in Pennsylvania last summer. Satisfactory as this position must be to us in all respects (leaving out the absolute monomania of the Calhoun faction) it becomes us to ascertain, before we adopt it as the basis of our action in the next campaign, whether the Northern Democracy will rally to its support? This is the all important preliminary question to be decided before we can properly solve that other question, whether we should take the basis of Mr. Buchanan or Mr. Dallas. I perceive in your letter the expression of a belief that our Northern friends will come to the support of Dallas and Dickinson and Cass ground. By the bye, this is the first and most gratifying intimation that we have here of Gen. Cass's position. Resuming the question which of these two propositions, leaving the matter to be settled by the Territories or adopting the Missouri basis, will best unite the Northern Democracy, I can only say at this distance you have a better opportunity of judging than I can possibly have as to the actual state of things North. If our friends there are of the opinion that they can stand better upon one of these propositions than the other, of course we should let them have their own way. They are certainly better judges than we can be of what they may be able to effect. It is needless to say to you that the Southern Democrats will be satisfied with either position.

You will however agree with me that great caution should be observed by us in weighing the evidences of the state of Northern feeling. Buchanan, Dallas, Cass are all for the Presidency; and may not the fact that Mr. Buchanan having broken ground on the Missouri basis have operated upon the other two to vary their positions from his, and thus mislead us? Both of the latter have numerous friends who will adhere to their positions, and could we be assured they were sufficiently numerous to give tone to the Northern Democracy, the question would be settled. But I apprehend that the surer data of conjecture on our part should be laid deeper in the nature of things than the mere personal or immediate political attachments to individuals, however prominent they may be.

Upon a survey of the whole ground, I must express to you my strong apprehension that our Northern friends can not be brought to any other position with half the strength that they would rally to the Missouri basis. You will perceive that I treat it alone as a practical question. Let me now assign you a few reasons. First, the Herkimer men in New York will not yield to Mr. Dickinson's or Dallas's ground. Their pride, their passions, are all enlisted against it. Secondly, the Democrats of New Hampshire occupy the same ground as the Radicals of New York. If we adopt the Missouri basis may we not yet hope that both of these States will yet be saved? The ground of my hopes may be found in Clingman's speech. It is difficult to convince our Northern friends that Congress has not the complete control of this question. You know how they stood in relation to the constitutional power over the District. The Missouri basis will enable them to retain their constitutional prepossessions and yet to seek refuge from an unjust, unequal or destructive exercise of the power.

The South on the other hand may retain its constitutional opinions and yet yield to the Missouri basis for the sake of peace and harmony. This idea that constitutional questions may not be compromised is all fallacious. In Mr. Jefferson's letter to Mr. Cartwright on the powers of the state and federal governments, speaking of questions of this nature he says, “if they can neither be avoided or compromised,” etc.

There is however another and more conclusive view in favor of occupying the compromise ground to which I ask your attention. Henry Clay holds the card in his hand which he is yet to play upon this subject. He will wait for us to shew our hands. If he finds we have adopted Mr. Dickinson's ground — he will himself trump us with the Missouri Compromise, and win the game m spite of us! Clingman's speech shews how easily it could be done. Mr. Clay is the father (if I mistake not) of that Compromise. He will rally his party to it and kill us with the word Union. We might struggle in vain. The Democratic party of Georgia is already committed, in the convention of last spring. Our press, with but one exception, are committed also. Virginia is committed, South Carolina even is now committed by a unanimous vote to abide the Missouri line. Leading politicians all through the South are committed. We can not war against a position which we have already sanctioned." If the issue should be formed by the two parties in this manner, Mr. Clay would sweep through the non-slaveholding States with irresistible power, and find none but a partial check, at least in the South. I am therefore of the opinion that, strengthened as the Compromise has been by the recent developments in the South, and strong as it must be in the nature of things North, that we should never relinquish it. We must occupy it in the Baltimore Convention or the Whigs will, and kill us off at the South with our men weapons. You will have observed also in the recent democratic meeting at the Museum in Philadelphia that the Missouri line was adopted. This is at least evidence of the state of feeling and opinion among our Northern friends. It was unanimously adopted.

The Herkimer men will send delegates to the convention. So will the Conservatives. Both delegations should be admitted. The Ultras will eventually find so strong a current against them, that they would fain compromise. But if that word is not to be known in the Convention, they will return home enemies to the party. This will probably be the case with the N. Hampshire delegation also. It may also be the case with Maine and Rhode Island. Besides, the Compromise is so intimately blended with the idea of preserving the Union that hosts of men of all parties, North and South, will follow the banner upon which it may be inscribed. If we do not write it upon ours, the Whigs will upon theirs, and we must fall under its influence.

P. S. — The Ultras, North, says that Dallas's proposition virtually excludes Union. That's their feeling—we must respect it, though erroneous. Exclusion either way would weaken the bonds of Union, and thus our own shaft would recoil upon us.

_______________

¹ Blank in the original.

SOURCE: Ulrich Bonnell Phillips, Editor, The Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1911, Volume 2: The Correspondence of Robert Toombs, Alexander H. Stephens, and Howell Cobb, p. 91-4

Diary of Gideon Welles: Saturday, February 20, 1864

Two or three committees are investigating naval matters, — contracts, supplies, engineering, etc. Senator Hale labors hard to find fault with the Department; is searching, as with a lantern, for errors and mistakes. Has detectives, rotten and disappointed contractors, and grouty party men of the Navy, as well as politicians of every kind of politics, to aid him, but has thus far seemed to injure his friends as well as himself and not the Department.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 528-9

Diary of Gideon Welles: Saturday, February 13, 1864

Senator Hale called on me today. Was very plausible and half-confidential. Baker, the detective, had been before his committee. Had told many things of men in the Department. Lowering his voice, Hale said, “He tells some things about your Chief Clerk that are very suspicious.” I cautioned the Senator about receiving all the gossip and suspicion of Baker, who had no powers of discrimination, little regard for truth, believed everything bad, suspected everybody, and had no regard for the character and rights of any man. Told him I would be answerable for the honesty of Faxon, that no truthful man could doubt it, and that, having heard Baker's scandal and suspicion, I requested him to bring me a fact, or find one if he could from his lying detective.

This pitiful Senator is devoting his time and that of his committee in a miserable attempt to bring reproach upon the Navy Department, to make points against it, to pervert facts, and to defame men of the strictest integrity. A viler prostitution of Senatorial position and place I have never witnessed. The primary object is to secure a reelection for himself, and a love of defamation attends it. Had a pleasant half-hour with Preston King, who made a special call to see me. Few men in Congress are his equal for sagacity, comprehensiveness, sound judgment, and fearlessness of purpose. Such statesmen do honor to their State and country. His loss to the Senate cannot be supplied. I like his successor, Morgan, who has good sense and will, in the main, make a good Senator, but he cannot make King's place good. I know not who can. Why are the services of such men set aside by small politicians? But King is making himself useful, and has come to Washington from patriotic motives to advise with our legislators and statesmen, and to cheer and encourage the soldiers.

I sometimes think he is more true to principles than I am myself. Speaking of Fernando Wood, we each expressed a common and general sentiment of surprise and disgust that any district could elect such a Representative. But the whole city of New York is alike leprous and rotten. This brought the question, How can such a place be regenerated and purified? What is the remedy? While I expressed a reluctant conviction, which is gradually coming over me, that in such a vicious community free suffrage was abased, and it was becoming a problem whether there should not be an outside movement, or some restriction on voting to correct palpable evil in municipal government, King maintained the old faith and would let the evil correct itself. If factious or partisan violence will go so far as to elect men like Wood or Brooks; if men of property and character will prostitute themselves to vote for them and consent to have their city misgoverned and themselves misrepresented, let them take the consequences. The evil will correct itself. After they have disgraced themselves sufficiently and loaded themselves with taxes and debt, they will finally rouse to a sense of duty, and retrieve the city from misrule and bad management and their district from misrepresentation. Such is the reasoning of Preston King.

I felt a return of old enthusiasm of former years, when in the security of youth I believed the popular voice was right, and that the majority would come to right results in every community; but alas! experience has shaken the confidence I once had. In an agricultural district, or a sparse population the old rule holds, and I am not prepared to deny King's conclusions, but my faith in the rectitude of the strange material that compose a majority of the population of our large cities is not strong. The floating mass who have no permanent abiding-place, who are the tools of men like Wood and Brooks, who are not patriots but party demagogues, who have no fixed purpose or principle, should not by their votes, control and overpower the virtuous and good. Yet they do. Some permanent element is wanting in our system. We need more stability and character. In our municipalities there needs some modification for good government.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 522-4

Diary of Gideon Welles: Friday, February 12, 1864

Incessant employment early and late has prevented me from making entries, and there has been little of public interest to engage me. On Monday evening I attended a party at Admiral Shubrick's which could not be avoided, and was detained later than I intended, but also went at 11 P.M. to Tassara's, the Spanish Minister. Both were very dull, the latter crowded.

Committees and resolutions of inquiry from Congress have flocked in upon the Department. Many of the latter were frivolous, and most of them for mischievous purposes. How little do the outside public know of the intrigues of Congressional demagogues, who, under the guise of great public economists, are engaged in speculating schemes and fraudulent contrivances to benefit themselves, pecuniarily! John P. Hale, who is eminently conspicuous in this class of professed servants and guardians of the public treasury, has been whitewashed for his three-thousand-dollar retainer. The committee excuse him, but propose a law which shall inflict ten thousand dollars' fine and two years' imprisonment on any one who shall again commit the offense.

Little of particular interest in the Cabinet-meeting. Seward left early, and Chase soon followed. I to-day wrote the latter, expressing pretty deliberately and effectually my opinion in regard to permits for cutting ship-timber in North Carolina. It may give offense, but I could do no less than in a mild form object to the favoritism and monopoly that the system engendered.

Blair, who, with Senator Doolittle, was at my house this evening, avers I am a fortunate man above others. He says my opponents are making me great, and that I am fortunate in the attacks and abuses that are bestowed, and repeats an aphorism of Colonel Benton, that "a man is made great by his enemies, and not by his friends." There is doubtless some truth in the remark, but not, I apprehend, as regards myself.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 521-2

Thomas Wentworth Higginson: April 1855

Judge Curtis sits disfigured by his gown, and presides with great dignity and admirable skill. I have no doubt he would sentence one to death, if necessary, with inimitable phraseology and manners. John P. Hale takes off his outside coat more sturdily than any man living can do it, I presume, and looks so hearty and solid that I should think a jury would come down like Davy Crockett's coon, without waiting for a shot. But my keen, imperturbable little Durant has his greatness also; and it delights me to see him on the right side.

SOURCE: Mary Potter Thacher Higginson, Editor, Letters and Journals of Thomas Wentworth Higginson, 1846-1906, p. 70

Diary of Gideon Welles: Friday, January 29, 1864

But little done at the Cabinet. Seward says the London Times says the Navy Department is now the most abused of any Department, but it knows not why, for no Department could have been better managed.

John P. Hale called to tell me the Department was charged with mismanagement in the purchase of the Cherokee. I asked what the charges were. He said it was stated that at the first examination she was reported not a suitable vessel for naval purposes and we therefore did not purchase her; that she was sold, and then again examined but with the same result, but that [R.] B. Forbes again persuaded us to have her reëxamined by persons from New York, and she was put off on the Navy at a large advance. But Forbes was dissatisfied and said the Navy Department expected to pay a great price to remunerate him for services which he had rendered in a friendly way.

I told him that there was some truth in the fact that the vessel was first reported against and subsequently we had a different report, but the whole story of paying off Mr. Forbes was novel, — a pure fiction. He said he knew nothing of the facts, only what he heard and read; that the subject had got in the newspapers and was being discussed. It was causing a good deal of excitement, he said, in Boston. He professed to have mentioned the subject to me in a friendly way. I thanked him and told him I would look into the case.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 516-7

Diary of Gideon Welles: Monday, January 11, 1864

Mr. Seward sent to me at my house on Saturday evening a voluminous bundle of dispatches, which had been placed in his hands by Lord Lyons, relative to the case of the Chesapeake, and desired me after reading them to interchange views in regard to the course to be pursued.

The documents were, first, sundry papers from a Mrs. Henry of Halifax, complaining that her husband and a brother had gone on board the Chesapeake on the 15th of December, and she apprehended they were detained. The owner and captain of the schooner Intendant, which was in [Sambro Harbor] when the American gunboat Ella and Annie took possession of that vessel, says he saw them on board and did not see them leave. He further avers that when the Ella and Annie appeared off the harbor, the Chesapeake raised the American flag union down, and he with his vessel ran a few hundred yards further up the harbor; that the boats of the Ella and Annie after taking possession of the Chesapeake, boarded the Intendant, took some trunks that had been brought from the C. and a man, Wade, who had been secreted, etc., etc. The other papers related to the capture of the Chesapeake, her surrender to the Colonial authorities, etc., much as we have in the newspapers.

It is evident the first papers, relating to the Henrys and the schooner, were thrust into the foreground for a purpose, and are a matter which should have no connection with the act of piracy.

I called on the Secretary of State this morning and told him the case required no hasty action on his part. That it had gone into the Admiralty Court, which was all very well if the British authorities had anything to do in the premises. My advice is to wait, and not be drawn into any premature action.

Mr. Blair, the elder, and Governor Dennison of Ohio called on me last evening. The chief talk related to Presidential matters, current events, and proceedings in Congress. They were both at the President's to-day, and it seems some conversation took place in regard to Senator Hale's strange course towards the Navy Department, he being Chairman of the Committee. The President said it was to him unaccountable except in one way, and that did no credit to Hale's integrity. It was unpleasant to think a Senator made use of his place to spite a Department because it would not permit him to use its patronage for his private benefit.

Both Mr. Blair and Governor Dennison were pretty full of the Presidency, and I apprehend they had a shadow of doubt in regard to my opinions and preferences, and yet I know not why they should have had. The subject is one on which I cared to exhibit no intense partisanship, and I may misjudge the tone of public sentiment, but my convictions are and have been that it is best to reelect the President, and if I mistake not this is the public opinion. On this question, while not forward to announce my views, I have had no concealment.

I am inclined to believe that there have been whispered misrepresentations from sly intriguers in regard to me that have given some anxiety to Blair and Dennison. The conduct of Dixon has been singular in some respects, and he has a willing tool in Brandegee.¹ . . .

_______________

¹ Augustus Brandegee, a Member of Congress from Connecticut.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 508-9

Diary of Gideon Welles: Saturday, January 9, 1864

Grimes tells me that the reports in last evening's papers are meagre and perverted, doing no justice to the Navy Department as it stood before the Senate, nor to the debate of yesterday. He says Hale was entirely used up, and had not a single friend in the Senate. Senator Clark, Hale's colleague, came to see me; says he has privately admonished Hale of the injury he was doing the country, as well as bringing ruin upon himself, by his strange course. I am, personally, not sorry that Hale makes this exhibition of his vicious mind and tendencies. Utterly indifferent to the rights and feelings of others, holding a position of power and yet not of responsibility, he has slandered and defamed the good more than the bad, and delighted to show his immensity and ability from his place to abuse.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 507-8

Diary of Gideon Welles: January 8, 1864

At Seward's last night, who gave a party to the scientific men of the Academy now here. The Cabinet, heads of the foreign missions, the learned gentlemen and the committees on foreign relations of the two houses were present, with a goodly number of ladies. Agassiz, Silliman, Professors Story and Caswell, etc., etc., were present.

To-day at the Executive Mansion. Only Usher with myself was present, and no business transacted. Mr. Hudson of Massachusetts, formerly Member of Congress, was with the President. Conversation was general, with anecdotes as usual. These are usually very appropriate and instructive, conveying much truth in few words, well, if not always elegantly, told. The President's estimate of character is usually very correct, and he frequently divests himself of partiality with a readiness that has surprised me. In the course of conversation to-day, which was desultory, he mentioned that he was selected by the people of Springfield to deliver a eulogy on the death of Mr. Clay, of whom he had been a warm admirer. This, he said, he found to be difficult writing so as to make an address of fifty minutes. In casting about for the material, he had directed his attention to what Mr. Clay had himself done in the line of eulogy and was struck with the fact that, though renowned as an orator and speaker, he had never made any effort of the sort, and the only specimen he could find was embraced in a few lines on the death of Mr. Calhoun. Referring to the subject and this fact on one occasion when Seward was present, that gentleman remarked that the failure was characteristic and easily accounted for, — Mr. Clay's self-esteem was so great, that he could tolerate no commendation of others, eulogized none but the dead, and would never himself speak in laudatory terms of a contemporary.

Both the President and Seward consider Clay and Webster to have been hard and selfish leaders, whose private personal ambition had contributed to the ruin of their party. The people of New England were proud of the great mind of Webster, his great intellect, but he had no magnetism, there was not intense personal devotion for him such as manifested itself for Clay. For years the Whig cause consisted in adulation of these two men, rather than in support of any well-established principles. In fact, principles were always made secondary to them.

I see by the papers that John P. Hale made an assault on the Navy Department, and tried to secure the adoption of a drag-net resolution, placing the Department on the defensive for the residue of the session. Under pretense of great regard for the country, he is really reckless and indifferent to its interests. Instead of encouraging and aiding the Department in its labors, he would divert it into a defense against groundless attacks from interested persons.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 506-7

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: Saturday, December 19, 1863

There was a reception to-day from one to three at the President's. Went over for an hour. Several of the Cabinet, most of the foreign ministers, judges of the Supreme Court, and a gay assemblage of ladies, with some of the Russian officers, were present.

Told Grimes he must remain on the Naval Committee; that the country required it; that we could not dispense with his services. He says he cannot serve under a chairman whom he knows to be corrupt, indolent, faithless, worthless. He spoke of Hale in most disparaging terms as an unfit associate of honorable men, selfish and wicked, wholly regardless of the Navy or country. There is not, he says, a man in the Senate that does not know him to be an improper person to be on the committee, yet they had not the courage to do their duty and leave him off, — in other words cannot resist his appeals to be kept in the position in order to aid him in a reëlection.

Sent a letter to Wilkes this afternoon inquiring if he procured, assented to, or knew of, the publication of his letter of the 11th inst. He coolly returns a negative, which does not surprise me, though palpably untrue. I am prepared to receive any affirmation of a falsehood or denial of a truth from him, provided his personal interest can be thereby subserved. His letter of the 11th is equivocal and in some respects untrue.

Had a call from Senator Trumbull, who feels that the Senate ought not to continue Hale in the chairmanship of the Naval Committee, but says the Department will not suffer in consequence, for Hale is well understood, and I must have seen that the Senators as against him always sustain the Department. Fessenden also called with similar remarks and views. I avoided the expression of any opinion, or wish, as to the construction of the committee. If the question were open and I was consulted, I should not hesitate to give my views, but I do not care to be intrusive, to interfere with or complain of what the Senate does, or has done, in these matters. Senator Fessenden wants a portion of the prizes should be sent to Portland. Told him of difficulties. Portsmouth, Providence, New Haven, New Jersey have made similar applications. Whatever pecuniary benefit there might be to a few individuals in each locality, the true interest of the country could not be promoted by such an arrangement. Attorneys, marshals, and their set would have additional business, but to get it, a host of additional officers must be employed and paid at each place.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 490-1

Diary of Gideon Welles: Friday, December 18, 1863

Had a letter from Commodore Wilkes Monday evening, complaining that injustice was done him in my Annual Report. The letter was studiously impudent and characteristic, was untruthful in some respects, and unofficerlike generally. He requested it should be sent to Congress with his correspondence. I replied that such proceeding would be improper, and that it would not, of course, be complied with.

I understand that before my reply left the Department he had furnished copies of his letter to me to the newspapers, which he knows is in violation of regulations as well as of decorum. He had, I see, prepared his letter with great care, while my reply was offhand and hasty. I find his letter in the New York Times and Philadelphia Inquirer. This discourtesy and repeated violation of regulations will necessitate a court martial with a troublesome man of a good deal of ability, of great leisure, and who is not delicate as regards means. Naval officers of experience have warned me that orders and favors to Wilkes would result in this, — that he is regardless of orders to himself, but tyrannical and exacting to others.

A charge of bribery against a Senator has resulted in John P. Hale's admission that he is the man referred to, acknowledging that he took the money, but that it was a fee not as a bribe. “Strange such a difference there should be twixt tweedle-dum and tweedle-dee.” This loud-mouthed paragon, whose boisterous professions of purity, and whose immense indignation against a corrupt world were so great that he delighted to misrepresent and belie them in order that his virtuous light might shine distinctly, is beginning to be exposed and rightly understood. But the whole is not told and never will be; he is a mass of corruption.

The steamer Chesapeake, seized by Rebel pirate mutineers, has been captured at Sambro, some twenty miles from Halifax. I was informed by telegram last night. Immediately sent word that she must be delivered over to the Colonial authorities, she having been captured in British waters. This order was sent within ten minutes after the telegram was received, the messenger who brought it waiting for the reply.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 489-90

Diary of Gideon Welles: Tuesday, December 15, 1863

Seward and Chase were not present at the Cabinet-meeting. The President was well and in fine spirits.

Mr. John P. Hale called this afternoon, much excited; said there was something in the New York Herald respecting him and myself which he was told came from the Department. I asked if he meant to say the statement, which I had not seen, whatever it was, originated with me. He answered no, emphatically no, for he considered me a gentleman, and had always experienced gentlemanly treatment from me; but he could not say as much of Fox, whom he denounced as coarse, impudent, and assuming, — constantly trespassing on my unsuspicious nature. Told me of incidents and intrigues which he had personally witnessed; alluded to Grimes, who, he said, favored Fox, and Fox favored Grimes; both were conspiring against me. For me, he declared he entertained high respect. He said that we may have sometimes differed, but it was an honest difference; that he had never opposed my administration of the Department, etc., etc. I listened to his eulogies calmly, and told him frankly I was not aware he had ever favored me or the Department, during the long and severe struggle we had experienced; that in this unparalleled war we had received no aid or kind word from him, though he was in a position above all others from which we might reasonably have expected it; that from no man in Congress had we received more hostility than from him. I reminded him how I had invited him to my confidence and assistance in anticipation of the extra session of 1861, and of the manner in which my warm, cordial, sincere invitation had been met; that I had, without reserve, and in honest zeal laid open to him our whole case, — all our difficulties; that I was grieved because he had not responded to my invitation and repaired to Washington as the chairmen of the committees of the other Departments had done; that my friendly greetings had been slighted or designedly treated with indifference; that in that great crisis he declined to enter into any examination of affairs, declined to prepare, or to assist in preparing, necessary laws, or to inform himself, or to consult respecting estimates; but that, as soon as the Senate met, and before any communication was received from the President, he, the Chairman of the Naval Committee, hastened to introduce a resolution, the first of the extra session, directing the Secretary of the Navy to communicate a statement of all contracts made from the day I entered upon my duties, whether they were legal, what prices I had paid, how the purchases compared with former purchases, and a variety of detail, all of which I had proposed to give him, that he should have it in his power to explain to the Senate and defend the Department from virulent violent assault; that I had invited him to come to Washington, as other Senators had come on a like request from the heads of Departments with which they were connected, but he did not come; that when he did arrive, I requested him to examine the records and papers, and all my acts, which he neglected to do; and that it was plain to me and to all others that his purpose in introducing that resolution, the first business movement of the session, was to cast suspicion on my acts, and to excite prejudice against me. He did not succeed in doing me serious injury, though he was an old Senator, and I a new Secretary, — though I had a right, in my great trials, to expect that he, the Chairman of the Naval Committee, would take me by the hand instead of striking a blow in my face. The hostility manifested and the malignity of that resolution were so obvious that it reacted. It was my belief that from the time he aimed that blow he had fallen in public estimation. I knew the President and many Senators had thought less of him. For myself I had never, from that day, expected, nor had I received, any aid or a word of encouragement from him. Neither the Department nor the Navy, in this arduous and terrific war, had been in any way benefited by him, but each had experienced indifference and hostility. Occupying the official relations which we did to each other, I had a right to have expected friendly, cordial treatment, but it had been the reverse. If the Department and the Navy had been successful, he had not in the least contributed to that success and his opposition had been ungenerous and without cause.

He listened with some surprise to my remarks, for I had always submitted to his injustice without complaint, had always treated him courteously if not familiarly, and forborne through trying years any harsh expression or exhibition of resentment or wounded feelings. My frank arraignment was, therefore, unexpected. He had, I think, come to me with an expectation that we would lock hands, for a time at least, and go forward together. He spoke of having differed on the matter of the Morgan purchases, but said it was an honest difference. I asked wherein we had differed, what there was wrong in those purchases, whether there had been through the whole war, in the expenditure of hundreds of millions, any transactions so favorable to the country? He declared he had never imputed any wrong to me; that he considered Morgan sharp and as having received a great compensation for the services performed; that he differed with me in my arrangement to pay commission instead of a salary; thought I could have employed naval officers or a competent merchant to have done the services. I requested him to name to me the man who could have done that service better or as well, or to mention a single instance where the government in any Department had done as well or been as successful. The War Department had made extensive contracts for vessels at exorbitant prices; their commissions were never less, but generally, I thought always, higher, than I paid Morgan, and the rates paid by them for vessels were from twenty-five to fifty per cent higher than I paid; yet neither he nor any one else had taken exceptions to those war purchases. I assured him such was the fact, and defied him to show the contrary; that no transactions of a pecuniary nature with the government by any Department had been so well and so advantageously managed for the government as this for which he had labored to bring censure upon me; that, had he come to the Department and informed himself, he could not have made the statements he did, then and other times, but that he, the Chairman, the organ of the Department, had seldom darkened our doors, and never on any important public measure. He had preferred to assail and denounce us in the Senate and to compliment the War Department, which had been grossly extravagant in its contracts and its purchases.

As regarded Mr. Grimes and Mr. Fox, my feelings towards them were different from his. They were my friends, and I was glad of it. They were, I was rejoiced to say, earnest and sincere in their labors for the government and the country. The people were under great obligations to both. I assured him that I intended no one should so strike, or stir up enmities, between them and me. Mr. Fox was a valuable assistant, and if, from any cause, we were to lose him, it would be difficult to supply his place in some respects. Hale said it would not be at all difficult; repeated that Fox was insolent, coarse, and repulsive, unfit for his position, made the Department unpopular. Says Fox told him last fall it was his, Hale's, duty to communicate the views of the Department to the Senate and defend them. I suggested that this was probably stronger than the case perhaps warranted, that he probably stated the Navy Department relied on him, as other Departments did on their respective Chairmen, to inform himself and state the views, purpose, and object of the Department in regard to any measure pertaining to our service. I told him that I certainly thought we were entitled to that comity, unless the Chairman was opposed, and even then a fair statement might be expected, but that he had never spoken for the Department, never came near it, never possessed himself of the facts; that it appeared to me he, having been trained and practiced in opposition, preferred to criticize and oppose, rather than support the measures of the Administration. Fox, being faithful and a strict disciplinarian, could not believe it possible that any sincere friend of the Administration and of the Navy could, without cause, persistently oppose both.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 484-9

Diary of Gideon Welles: Monday, December 14, 1863

Yesterday was warm and balmy as a day in June. Business so crowded to-day that I was unable to clear my table, which is unusual, for I make it a point to dispose of all current business daily, though to accomplish it I am sometimes unable to get away until late. Had many calls from Members of Congress. The Committees of the two houses are announced. Hale is Chairman of the Senate Naval Committee. In the House, Brandegee of New London is substituted for English. This exchange is not a good one, is made in bad faith, and, after two distinct interviews with Mr. Colfax, without consulting or apprising me. Brandegee's name was not on the list which Colfax showed me, nor was it mentioned in either of our interviews; on the contrary we had an explicit understanding that the New England Members on the committee would be retained. The President has, I see, a right appreciation of Colfax, but in this instance there is an intrigue lying behind it.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 484

Diary of Gideon Welles: Saturday, December 12, 1863

To-day the Members of Congress very generally visited the Russian fleet. I did not go down, but detailed two steamers which were at the yard to convey the members. Our Russian friends are rendering us a great service.

Senator Sumner called, and we had half an hour's interesting conversation on the topics of the day and times. He compliments my Report. Senator Morgan also called. Says the nominating committee will, he thinks, nominate Hale Chairman of the Naval Committee, though reluctantly; no one wants him. Says Hale tendered him the appointment, but he knew not Hale's power to bestow it. That wretched Senator knows not the estimation in which he is held by his associates, and I can perceive by this attempted manœuvre with Morgan that he supposes Morgan and myself have been conspiring against him, whereas the truth is we have never exchanged a word concerning him, nor have I attempted to influence a single Senator.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 484

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