Admiral Farragut and
Mrs. F. are staying with us, and I find little time to write. Have had several
interviews with the President and Mr. Seward in relation to the cruise of the
Chattanooga and passage of Colonel Robert Johnson, under an appointment of the
State Department. The President evidently feels embarrassed, yet anxious on his
son's account. He is aware of the importance to himself and the country that he
should be relieved from the care of this unfortunate young man, but is
unwilling that anything personal to himself should be done.
I called last
Thursday with Captain McKinstry and introduced him first to the President and
then to Messrs. Stover and Robert Johnson. Subsequently I saw Mr. Seward, who
arranged the subject-matter of the mission. I addressed him a letter, stating
the cruise of the Chattanooga and the principal points at which she would stop.
By request of Mr. S. an alteration was made, avoiding Australia and going to
China and Japan instead of running directly on the west coast of South America.
At the
Cabinet-meeting I submitted Admiral Godon's dispatch of the 23d of January,
stating the demands and difficulties of Mr. Washburn,1 our Minister
to Paraguay, who had been absent from his post more than a year and has been
wintering since last September with his family in Buenos Ayres. In the mean
time the allies have blockaded the river and object to his passing through the
lines, and he has made a demand for the Wasp or some other naval vessel to convey
him and his family.
Mr. Seward, without
knowing all the facts, at once requested that Mr. Washburn should have public
conveyance. I showed him Godon's dispatch, who states that no foreign power has
attempted to pass the blockade, that he cannot do it without obtaining from the
Buenos Ayres authorities coal, and that to return the courtesy by setting them
at defiance would be ungracious; that no foreign government has a
representative in Paraguay; that we have no interests there, and that if Mr.
Washburn gets there he will be almost the only American in the territory and
will require a naval force to protect him.
Although taken a
little aback by the statements of Godon, Seward had committed himself too
strongly to back down. He said the Minister must go through the blockade,
whether it cost $3000 or $30,000; that he must get the coal of the Buenos Ayres
authorities and disoblige them by violating the blockade, if Mr. Washburn could
not go without; and he (Seward) wanted to take Godon's dispatch and read.
_______________
1 Charles Ames Washburn, brother of Elihu B.
Washburne.
SOURCE: Gideon
Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and
Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 490-2
