Washington, November 17, 1861.
398, 16th Street.
HON. WM. H. SEWARD, SEC. OF STATE.
Sir, — For
nearly three months I have been confined a close prisoner, shut out from air
and exercise, and denied all communion with family and friends.
“Patience is said to be a great virtue,” and I have
practised it to my utmost capacity of endurance.
I am told, sir, that upon your ipse dixit the fate of
citizens depends, and that the sign-manual of the ministers of Louis XIV. and
XV. was not more potential in their day than that of the Secretary of State in
1861.
I therefore most respectfully submit that on Friday, August
23rd, without warrant or other show of authority, I was arrested by the
detective police, and my house taken in charge by them: that all my private
letters and papers of a life-time were read and examined by them: that every
law of decency was violated in the search of my house and person, and by the
surveillance over me.
We read in history that the poor Marie Antoinette had a
paper torn from her bosom by lawless hands, and that even a change of linen had
to be effected in sight of her brutal captors. It is my sad experience to
record even more revolting outrages than that, for during the first days of my
imprisonment, whatever necessity forced me to seek my chamber, a detective
stood sentinel at the open door. And thus, for a period of seven days, I, with
my little child, was placed absolutely at the mercy of men without character or
responsibility; that during the first evening a portion of those men became
brutally drunk, and boasted in my hearing of the nice times they
expected to have with the female prisoners, and that rude violence was used
towards a servant girl during that first evening. For any show of decorum
afterwards practised towards me I was indebted to the detective called Captain
Dennis.
In the careful analysis of my papers I deny the existence of
a line that I had not a perfect right to have written or to have received.
Freedom of speech and of opinion is the birthright of Americans, guaranteed to
us by our charter of liberty — the Constitution of the United States. I have
exercised my prerogative, and have openly avowed my sentiments. During the political
struggle I opposed your Republican party with every instinct of self-preservation.
I believed your success a virtual nullification of the Constitution, and that
it would entail upon us all the direful consequences which have ensued. These
sentiments have doubtless been found recorded among my papers, and I hold them
as rather a proud record of my sagacity.
I must be permitted to quote from a letter of yours, in
regard to “Russell of the London Times,” which you conclude with these
admirable words: “Individual errors
of opinion may be tolerated, so long as good sense is left to combat them.”
By way of illustrating theory and practice, here
am I — a prisoner in sight of the executive mansion — in sight of the Capitol,
where the proud statesmen of our land have sung their pagans to the blessings
of our free institutions. Comment is idle. Freedom of speech, freedom of
thought, every right pertaining to the citizen, has been suspended by what, I suppose,
the President calls a “military necessity.” A blow has been struck by this total disregard of all
civil rights against the present system of government far greater in its
effects than the severance of the Southern States. The people have been taught
to contemn the supremacy of the law, to which all have hitherto bowed, and to
look to the military power for protection against its decrees. A military
spirit has been developed which will only be subordinate to a military
dictatorship. Read history, and you will find that the causes which bring
about a revolution rarely predominate at its close, and no people have ever
returned to the point from which they started. Even should the Southern States
be subdued, and forced back into the Union (which I regard as impossible, with
a full knowledge of their resources), a different form of government will be
found needful to meet the new developments of national character. There is no
class of society, no branch of industry, which this change has not reached, and
the dull plodding methodical habits of the past can never be resumed.
You have held me, sir, to a man's accountability, and I
therefore claim the right to speak on subjects usually considered beyond a
woman's ken, and which you may class as “errors of opinion.” I offer no excuse for this
long digression, as a three months’ imprisonment, without formula of law, gives
me authority for occupying even the precious moments of a Secretary of State.
My object is to call your attention to the fact, that during
this long imprisonment I am yet ignorant of the causes of my arrest; that my
house has been seized and converted into a prison by the Government; that the
valuable furniture it contained has been abused and destroyed; that during some
period of my imprisonment I have suffered greatly for want of proper and
sufficient food. Also, I have to complain that more recently a woman of bad
character — recognised as having been
seen in the streets of Chicago as such, by several of the guard — calling herself
Mrs. Onderdunk, was placed here in my house in a room adjoining mine.
In making this exposition, I have no object of appeal to
your sympathies. If the justice of my complaint and a decent regard for the world’s
opinion do not move you, I should but waste time to claim your attention on any
other score.
I may, however, recall to your mind that but a little while
since you were quite as much proscribed by public sentiment here, for the
opinions and principles you held, as I am now for mine.
I could easily have escaped arrest, having had timely
warning. I thought it possible that your statesmanship might
prevent such a proclamation of weakness to the world as even the fragment of a
once great Government turning its arms against the breasts of women and
children. You have the power, sir, and may still further abuse it. You may
prostrate the physical strength, by confinement in close rooms and insufficient
food. You may subject me to harsher, ruder treatment than I have already
received; but you cannot imprison the soul. Every cause worthy of success has
had its martyrs. The words of the heroine Corday are applicable here: “C’est
le crime qui fait la honte, et non pas l’échafaud.”
My sufferings will afford a significant lesson to the women of the
South, that sex or condition is no bulwark against the surging billows of the “irrepressible
conflict.”
The “iron heel”
of power may keep down, but it cannot crush out, the spirit of
resistance in a people armed for the defence of their rights; and I tell you
now, sir, that you are standing over a crater whose smothered fires in a moment
may burst forth.
It is your boast that thirty-three bristling fortifications
surround Washington. The fortifications of Paris did not protect Louis Philippe
when his hour had come.
In conclusion, I respectfully ask your attention to this my
protest, and have the honour to be, &c,
&c, &c,
ROSE O'N. Geeenhow.
SOURCE: Rose O'Neal Greenhow, My Imprisonment and the First Year of Abolition rule at Washington,
p. 118-24
