The Prayer Of Twenty Millions

To ABRAHAM LINCOLN, President of the United States:

        DEAR SIR: I do not intrude to tell you--for you must know already--that a great proportion of those who triumphed in your election, and of all who desire the unqualified suppression of the Rebellion now desolating our country, are sorely disappointed and deeply pained by the policy you seem to be pursuing with regard to the slaves of the Rebels. I write only to set succinctly and unmistakably before you what we require, what we think we have a right to expect, and of what we complain.

        I. We require of you, as the first servant of the Republic, charged especially and preeminently with this duty, that you EXECUTE THE LAWS. Most emphatically do we demand that such laws as have been recently enacted, which therefore may fairly be presumed to embody the present will and to be dictated by the present needs of the Republic, and which, after due consideration have received your personal sanction, shall by you be carried into full effect, and that you publicly and decisively instruct your subordinates that such laws exist, that they are binding on all functionaries and citizens, and that they are to be obeyed to the letter.

        II. We think you are strangely and disastrously remiss in the discharge of your official and imperative duty with regard to the emancipating provisions of the new Confiscation Act. Those provisions were designed to fight Slavery with Liberty. They prescribe that men loyal to the Union, and willing to shed their blood in her behalf, shall no longer be held, with the Nation's consent, in bondage to persistent, malignant traitors, who for twenty years have been plotting and for sixteen months have been fighting to divide and destroy our country. Why these traitors should be treated with tenderness by you, to the prejudice of the dearest rights of loyal men, We cannot conceive.

        III. We think you are unduly influenced by the counsels, the representations, the menaces, of certain fossil politicians hailing from the Border Slave States. Knowing well that the heartily, unconditionally loyal portion of the White citizens of those States do not expect nor desire that Slavery shall be upheld to the prejudice of the Union – (for the truth of which we appeal not only to every Republican residing in those States, but to such eminent loyalists as H. Winter Davis, Parson Brownlow, the Union Central Committee of Baltimore, and to The Nashville Union) – we ask you to consider that Slavery is everywhere the inciting cause and sustaining base of treason: the most slaveholding sections of Maryland and Delaware being this day, though under the Union flag, in full sympathy with the Rebellion, while the Free-Labor portions of Tennessee and of Texas, though writhing under the bloody heel of Treason, are unconquerably loyal to the Union. So emphatically is this the case, that a most intelligent Union banker of Baltimore recently avowed his confident belief that a majority of the present Legislature of Maryland, though elected as and still professing to be Unionists, are at heart desirous of the triumph of the Jeff. Davis conspiracy; and when asked how they could be won back to loyalty, replied "only by the complete Abolition of Slavery." It seems to us the most obvious truth, that whatever strengthens or fortifies Slavery in the Border States strengthens also Treason, and drives home the wedge intended to divide the Union. Had you from the first refused to recognize in those States, as here, any other than unconditional loyalty – that which stands for the Union, whatever may become of Slavery – those States would have been, and would be, far more helpful and less troublesome to the defenders of the Union than they have been, or now are.

        IV. We think timid counsels in such a crisis calculated to prove perilous, and probably disastrous. It is the duty of a Government so wantonly, wickedly assailed by Rebellion as ours has been to oppose force to force in a defiant, dauntless spirit. It cannot afford to temporize with traitors nor with semi-traitors. It must not bribe them to behave themselves, nor make them fair promises in the hope of disarming their causeless hostility. Representing a brave and high-spirited people, it can afford to forfeit anything else better than its own self-respect, or their admiring confidence. For our Government even to seek, after war has been made on it, to dispel the affected apprehensions of armed traitors that their cherished privileges may be assailed by it, is to invite insult and encourage hopes of its own downfall. The rush to arms of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, is the true answer at once to the Rebel raids of John Morgan and the traitorous sophistries of Beriah Magoffin.

        V. We complain that the Union cause has suffered, and is now suffering immensely, from mistaken deference to Rebel Slavery. Had you, Sir, in your Inaugural Address, unmistakably given notice that, in case the Rebellion already commenced were persisted in, and your efforts to preserve the Union and enforce the laws should be resisted by armed force, you would recognize no loyal person as rightfully held in Slavery by a traitor, we believe the Rebellion would therein have received a staggering if not fatal blow. At that moment, according to the returns of the most recent elections, the Unionists were a large majority of the voters of the Slave States. But they were composed in good part of the aged, the feeble, the wealthy, the timid – the young, the reckless, the aspiring, the adventurous, had already been largely lured by the gamblers and negro-traders, the politicians by trade and the conspirators by instinct, into the toils of Treason. Had you then proclaimed that Rebellion would strike the shackles from the slaves of every traitor, the wealthy and the cautious would have been supplied with a powerful inducement to remain loyal. As it was, every coward in the South soon became a traitor from fear; for Loyalty was perilous, while Treason seemed comparatively safe. Hence the boasted unanimity of the South – a unanimity based on Rebel terrorism and the fact that immunity and safety were found on that side, danger and probable death on ours. The Rebels from the first have been eager to confiscate, imprison, scourge and kill: we have fought wolves with the devices of sheep. The result is just what might have been expected. Tens of thousands are fighting in the Rebel ranks to-day whose, original bias and natural leanings would have led them into ours.

        VI. We complain that the Confiscation Act which you approved is habitually disregarded by your Generals, and that no word of rebuke for them from you has yet reached the public ear. Fremont's Proclamation and Hunter's Order favoring Emancipation were promptly annulled by you; while Halleck's No. 3, forbidding fugitives from Slavery to Rebels to come within his lines – an order as unmilitary as inhuman, and which received the hearty approbation of every traitor in America – with scores of like tendency, have never provoked even your own remonstrance. We complain that the officers of your Armies have habitually repelled rather than invited approach of slaves who would have gladly taken the risks of escaping from their Rebel masters to our camps, bringing intelligence often of inestimable value to the Union cause. We complain that those who have thus escaped to us, avowing a willingness to do for us whatever might be required, have been brutally and madly repulsed, and often surrendered to be scourged, maimed and tortured by the ruffian traitors, who pretend to own them. We complain that a large proportion of our regular Army Officers, with many of the Volunteers, evince far more solicitude to uphold Slavery than to put down the Rebellion. And finally, we complain that you, Mr. President, elected as a Republican, knowing well what an abomination Slavery is, and how emphatically it is the core and essence of this atrocious Rebellion, seem never to interfere with these atrocities, and never give a direction to your Military subordinates, which does not appear to have been conceived in the interest of Slavery rather than of Freedom.

        VII. Let me call your attention to the recent tragedy in New Orleans, whereof the facts are obtained entirely through Pro-Slavery channels. A considerable body of resolute, able-bodied men, held in Slavery by two Rebel sugar-planters in defiance of the Confiscation Act which you have approved, left plantations thirty miles distant and made their way to the great mart of the South-West, which they knew to be the indisputed possession of the Union forces. They made their way safely and quietly through thirty miles of Rebel territory, expecting to find freedom under the protection of our flag. Whether they had or had not heard of the passage of the Confiscation Act, they reasoned logically that we could not kill them for deserting the service of their lifelong oppressors, who had through treason become our implacable enemies. They came to us for liberty and protection, for which they were willing to render their best service: they met with hostility, captivity, and murder. The barking of the base curs of Slavery in this quarter deceives no one – not even themselves. They say, indeed, that the negroes had no right to appear in New Orleans armed (with their implements of daily labor in the cane-field); but no one doubts that they would gladly have laid these down if assured that they should be free. They were set upon and maimed, captured and killed, because they sought the benefit of that act of Congress which they may not specifically have heard of, but which was none the less the law of the land which they had a clear right to the benefit of – which it was somebody's duty to publish far and wide, in order that so many as possible should be impelled to desist from serving Rebels and the Rebellion and come over to the side of the Union. They sought their liberty in strict accordance with the law of the land – they were butchered or re-enslaved for so doing by the help of Union soldiers enlisted to fight against slaveholding Treason. It was somebody's fault that they were so murdered – if others shall hereafter stuffer in like manner, in default of explicit and public directions to your generals that they are to recognize and obey the Confiscation Act, the world will lay the blame on you. Whether you will choose to hear it through future History and at the bar of God, I will not judge. I can only hope.

        VIII. On the face of this wide earth, Mr. President, there is not one disinterested, determined, intelligent champion of the Union cause who does not feel that all attempts to put down the Rebellion and at the same time uphold its inciting cause are preposterous and futile – that the Rebellion, if crushed out tomorrow, would be renewed within a year if Slavery were left in full vigor – that Army officers who remain to this day devoted to Slavery can at best be but half-way loyal to the Union – and that every hour of deference to Slavery is an hour of added and deepened peril to the Union, I appeal to the testimony of your Ambassadors in Europe. It is freely at your service, not at mine. Ask them to tell you candidly whether the seeming subserviency of your policy to the slaveholding, slavery-upholding interest, is not the perplexity, the despair of statesmen of all parties, and be admonished by the general answer.

        IX. I close as I began with the statement that what an immense majority of the Loyal Millions of your countrymen require of you is a frank, declared, unqualified, ungrudging execution of the laws of the land, more especially of the Confiscation Act. That Act gives freedom to the slaves of Rebels coming within our lines, or whom those lines may at any time inclose – we ask you to render it due obedience by publicly requiring all your subordinates to recognize and obey it. The rebels are everywhere using the late anti-negro riots in the North, as they have long used your officers' treatment of negroes in the South, to convince the slaves that they have nothing to hope from a Union success – that we mean in that case to sell them into a bitter bondage to defray the cost of war. Let them impress this as a truth on the great mass of their ignorant and credulous bondsmen, and the Union will never be restored – never. We cannot conquer Ten Millions of People united in solid phalanx against us, powerfully aided by the Northern sympathizers and European allies. We must have scouts, guides, spies, cooks, teamsters, diggers and choppers from the Blacks of the South, whether we allow them to fight for us or not, or we shall be baffled and repelled. As one of the millions who would gladly have avoided this struggle at any sacrifice but that Principle and Honor, but who now feel that the triumph of the Union is dispensable not only to the existence of our country to the well being of mankind, I entreat you to render a hearty and unequivocal obedience to the law of the land.

Yours,

HORACE GREELEY

New York, August 19, 1862

– Published in New York Daily Tribune, New York City, New York, Wednesday, August 20, 1862, p. 4

Pulpit Politics and Parson Brownlow – Yancey and the Parson

From Parson Brownlow’s New York Speech.

But a few weeks prior to the Presidential election, they announced in their papers that the great bull of the whole disunion flock was to speak in Nashville – a man the two first letters of his name are W. L. Yancey – a fellow that the Governor of South Carolina pardoned out of the State prison for murdering his uncle, Dr. Earl.  He was announced to speak, and the crowd was two to one Union men.  I had never spoken to him in my life.  He called out in an insolent manner, “Is Parson Brownlow in this crowd?”  The disunionists hallowed out “Yes, he is here,”  “I hope,” said he, “the Parson will have nerve to come upon the stand and have me catechize him.”  “No.” – But the crowd hallowed to Yancey, “Brownlow is here, but he has not the nerve enough to mount the stand where you are.”  I rose and marched up the steps and said, “I will show you whether I have the nerve or not.”  “Sir,” said he – and he is a beautiful speaker, and personally a very fine looking man – “are you the celebrated Parson Brownlow?”  “I am the only man on earth,” I replied, “that fills the bin!”  (Laughter.)  “Don’t you think,” said Yancey, “you are badly employed as a preacher, a man of your cloth to be dabbling in politics, and meddling with State affairs?”  “No, sir,” said I, “a distinguished member of the party you are acting with once took Jesus Christ up upon a mount – (uproarious laughter) – and said to the Savior, “Look at the kingdoms of the world.  All this will I give thee if thou will fall down and worship me.”  “Now, Sir,” I said, “His reply to the devil is my reply to you, ‘Get thee behind me Satan.’”  (Renewed laughter and applause)  I rather expected to be knocked down by him, but I stood with my side to him, and a cocked Derringer in my breeches pocket.  I intended if I went off the scaffold that he should go the other way.  (Cheers)  “Now, sir,” I said,” “if you are through, I would like to make a few remarks.”  “Certainly, proceed,” said Yancey.  “Well, sir, you should tread lightly upon the toes of preachers, and you should get these disunionists to post you up before you launch out in this way against preachers.  Are you aware, sir, that this old grey-headed man sitting here, Isaac Lewis, the President of the meeting, who has welcomed you, is an old disunion Methodist preacher, and Buchanan’s pension agent here, who has been meddling with politics all his life time?”  “Sir,” said I, “are you aware that this man, James P. Thomas, on my left is a Breckinridge elector for this Congressional District?  He was turned out of the Methodist ministry for whipping his wife and slandering his neighbors.”  “Sir,” said I, “are you aware that this young man sitting in front of us, Colonel Loudon C. Haynes, the elector of the Breckinridge ticket for the State of Tennessee at large, was expelled from the ministry for lying and cheating his neighbors in a measure of corn?”  “Now,” said I, “for God’s sake, say nothing more about preachers until you know what sort of preachers are in your own ranks.”

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 31, 1862, p. 1

Parson Brownlow in Cincinnati

Cincinnati, April 5.

The public reception of Parson Brownlow, at Pike’s Opera House, last night, was an immense affair.  Every available spot in the house was occupied.  Mr. Brownlow was introduced to the audience by Joseph C. Butler, President of the Chamber of Commerce, in a few appropriate remarks.

Mr. Brownlow’s speech, relating to his experience of the operations of the rebellion in East Tennessee, and the sufferings of himself and the Union men while imprisoned at Knoxville, was listened to with profound attention.

Speeches were also made by Gen. F. Curry and Lieut. Gov. Fisk, of Ky.  Resolutions were adopted demanding a vigorous and unceasing prosecution of the war, and the punishment of leading traitors; resolving that the flag of our Union shall again float triumphantly over the walls of Sumter, and from every other fort belonging to the Union.;  that our warmest sympathies are with our distinguished guest; and calling on the Federal Government to afford speedy relief to the loyal Union men of the South, especially those of East Tennessee, the exercises closed by singing Hail Columbia by a large number of children from the public schools of the city, who were called on the stage.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Monday Morning, April 7, 1862, p. 2

A Point Of Honor

Meredith P. Gentry having been elected to the rebel Congress from Tennessee, called on Parson Brownlow on his way to Richmond.  He told Brownlow that he had retired from politics, but his neighbors had insisted on his going to Richmond, and that he made it a point of honor to go, just because they said McClellan would bag Richmond and capture the entire Congress.  He wished to show them that he was not afraid. – “Yes,” replied Brownlow, “and there is another point of honor which you have failed to mention.  Buell and his army are at Nashville, and are therefore nearer to Bedford county than McClellan is to Richmond.  You are like a pismire on a chunk of wood fired at each end; you have a point of honor on either side of you.”  Gentry wilted.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Friday Morning, April 4, 1862, p. 2

Parson Brownlow

In his address at Cincinnati the Parson thus describes the narrow escape he made from being hung, and the fearlessness of one of his companions:

I expected to be hung, and had made up my mind to it.  I was told that the drumhead court-martial lacked but one vote of confirming my doom, and that was the vote of a Secessionist.  No man ever came so near being hung and was not.  One of my companions, A. C. Hawn – the gallant Hawn, one of the most moral and upright men in Knoxville, with a wife and two small children – was sentenced to be hung by this court-martial, and he had but one hour’s notice to prepare himself.  He asked for a minister of one of the churches in Knoxville to be sent for, but the reply of the jailor was, “no d----d traitor in the South has the right to be prayed for, and God does not hear such prayers.”  Poor Hawn was placed on the scaffold, and a miserable drunken chaplain of one of the Southern regiments was sent to attend him.

Just as they were about to launch Hawn into eternity the chaplain said: “This poor unfortunate man desires to say that he was led into committing the acts for which he is now to atone with his life, by the Union men, and he is really an object of pity.”

Hawn rose, and in stentorian voice replied, “I desire to say that every word that man has said is false.  I am the identical man that put the torch to the timbers of that bridge, and I am ready to swing for it.  Hang me as soon as you can.”  He said he would do it again if he knew this was to be his fate for it.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Friday Morning, April 4, 1862, p. 2

Who Steals the Negroes

In a speech made at Cincinnati a few days since, Parson Brownlow thus expressed himself on the subject of negro stealing:–

“I tell you to-day, upon the honor of a man, that the Southern army and its hangers-on have stolen more negroes in Virginia, Tennessee and Kentucky during the past six months, than the Abolitionists have enticed or aided away in the last forty years, and to-day, so help me God, one half of the soldiers in the South never owned a slave, or were ever related by the ties of consanguinity with any one that ever did.  (Cheers.)  They are the off scourings of the lowest order of society, the meanest set of cowards on the face of the earth.”

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Friday Morning, April 4, 1862, p. 2

Parson Brownlow’s Book

CINCINNATI, April 1.

Parson Brownlow has accepted the liberal offer of Mr. Childs, the eminent Philadelphia publisher, and at the Parson’s request a copy of the book will be given to the editor of every paper in the country, so that they can see what it costs to be loyal in seceshdom.  Editors will apply to Geo. W. Childs, Esq., Philadelphia.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Wednesday Morning, April 2, 1862, p. 1

Parson Brownlow

LOUISVILLE, March 27.

Parson Brownlow has arrived, and leaves for Cincinnati at noon to-day.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Friday Morning, March 28, 1862, p. 1

HUNTSVILLE, Ala., March 21 [1862].

Parson Brownlow leaves for the North to-day.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Saturday Morning, March 22, 1862, p. 1

Brave Old Parson Brownlow among his Friends

WASHINGTON, March 15.

Parson Brownlow and son arrived here to-day.  He says he was imprisoned in the common jail at Knoxville, December 16^th, in violation of an agreement with the rebel government.  He was confined in a small, damp room, and was attacked by the typhoid fever.  He was moved to his resistance and laid up eight weeks under a strict guard, and having partly recovered he got a pass from the rebel government and left Knoxville two weeks ago, but was detained, by order of Gen. Hardee, at Shelbyville, ten days.  He reached the federal lines this morning.  Brownlow declines starting a paper here on account of ill health.  He proceeds North to publish a story of his martyrdom.  Brownlow is not affected by consumption, as reported.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, March 18, 1862, p. 2

PHILADELPHIA, March 17 [1862]

The well known publisher of Dr. Kane’s works has offered Parson Brownlow $10,000 for the copyright of his proposed book, giving an account of his sufferings.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, March 18, 1862, p. 1

LOUISVILLE, March 12 [1862].

The Kentucky Legislature adjourns on Monday until the 24^th of November.  Johnson, Ethridge, and Maynard, left for Nashville to-day.

The Nashville Patriot says that Parson Brownlow is on his way to Nashville, with a pass through the rebel lines, from Jeff Davis.  Brownlow is reported Ill with the consumption.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Friday Morning, March 14, 1862, p. 1

Floyd and Pillow

We sincerely hope that Parson Brownlow, of Knoxville, is yet alive, and in reaching distance of Fort Donelson; and it is so, that he may find his way thither, and see those men who so fatally to themselves plotted against the Union and the noble men who are in it, among whom he is one.  What an era in his life would it be for him to find his printing press in the fort, and there to issue those powerful missiles again at those who so basely and so wantonly conspired against the liberties of their country!  The army should send for him and retain him in their service, not only in the fort but in their all conquering march to the extreme South.  Let his bulletins fly in every direction among his deluded brethren.  They would be more dreaded than our columbiads.

We trust Floyd and Pillow have not escaped, but are caught, and will be sent to Washington City and as far as Boston, that they may look into the eyes of hones men, and conscience stricken, feel the strength of that noble indignation which burns in the breast of freemen, against such betrayers and murderers of a nations honor and peace.  They would then, like Macbeth, exclaim:

“Better be with the dead

Whom we, to gain our place, have sent to peace,

Tan on the torture of the mind to be

In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave;

After life’s fitful fever he sleeps well;

Treason has done his worst.”

The retributions of justice may be slow, but sure.  It may have the feet of velvet, but it has also the hand of steel; and with all the certainty of doom, will the rebels and their sympathizers meet the punishment due to them.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Thursday Morning, February 20, 1862, p. 2

Northern Sympathisers With Traitors

Parson Brownlow says:

If I owed the devil a debt and it was to be discharged by the rendering up to him of a dozen of the meanest, most revolting and god forsaken wretches that ever could be culled from the ranks of depraved human society, and I wanted to pay that debt and get a premium on the payment, I would make a tender to his Satanic Majesty of twelve Northern men who sympathized with this infernal rebellion. – {Great cheering.}  If I am severe and bitter in my remarks. {Cries of “no, no; not a bit of it.”}  If I am, gentlemen, you must consider that we in the South make a personal matter of this thing {laughter.}  We have no respect or confidence in any Northern man who sympathises [sic] with this infernal rebellion – {Cries of good, good,} – nor should any be tolerated in walking Broadway at any time.  Such men ought to be ridden upon a rail and ridden out of the North.  {Good, good.}  They should either be for or against the “mill dam,” and I would make them show their hands.

Parson Brownlow said in his recent New York speech:

The soldiers brought with them from the battle of Manassas, the heads of Union men that were killed, and held them by the beards and waved them, and showed them as the heads of the d----d Yankees they had captured.  This is the Secession spirit of the South.  The spirit of the vile untutored savage.  The spirit of hell and yet you have men at the North who sympathise with these murderers.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 24, 1862, p. 2

In A Nice Fix

In the breaking out of the present difficulties a good many East Tennesseans, with treason in their hearts, left and went over to the bosom of King Abraham, thinking, no doubt that they would return to their houses in a very short time with a sufficient army to protect them in their treason.  Sixteen months have gone by, and these poor deluded fools are no nearer that object they set out to accomplish than they were the day they started.  They cannot get back to their homes, and never will.  If the war was ended, and arrangements made for their return they could not live here.  They would be looked upon and treated as tories – loathed and despised – forsaken even by the cowardly wretches who persuaded them to leave their homes and dear ones for a situation in the Federal army.  Those of them that have left property behind have forfeited it to their government, and their families will be bereft of it.  Who is responsible for this state of things?  Such men as Andy Johnson, Horace Maynard, Bill Brownlow, and the smaller lights of toryism, who were suffered to run over the country and preach treason to the people.  In this county such pettifoggers as Mitch Edwards and Dr. Brown were applauded for their treachery, while men who were older and wiser were scoffed and hooted at for their loyalty.  These vile miscreants are no receiving their just reward at the hands of an indignant people.  There never was a more just retribution visited upon a corrupt set of men.  They sowed the storm – let them receive the fury of the whirlwind.  They deserve it.  They have no home, and are entitled to none in the Southern Confederacy.  They deserted her in infancy.  When she needed help the cowardly scoundrels shrank from the task and went over to the enemy – in her manhood she will never receive to her bosom these arch traitors.  East Tennessee is and will be a part of her dominion, the opinion of the Lincolnites to the contrary notwithstanding. – {Cleveland Banner.

– Published in The Daily Rebel, Chattanooga, Tennessee, Saturday, August 9, 1862, p. 1

Parson Brownlow . . .

. . . in a letter to the Young Men’s Republican Union of New York city, accepting an invitation to lecture before that organization, strongly expresses himself in favor of sinking all party views in the great issue of sustaining the Government.  He says he is for Union, though it shall require the coercion or subjugation, or even annihilation of the rebel population of the land.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 17, 1862, p. 1

News From Dixie Via Fortress Monroe

ARRIVAL OF UNION REFUGEES – CAPTURE OF NEW ORLEANS – DESTRUCTION OF REBEL GUNBOATS AND ARMY STORES – GREAT PANIC IN DIXIE – PICAYUNE BUTLER COME AT LAST!

FORTRESS MONROE, April 29. – A flag of truce from Norfolk to-day brought down the wife and family of Parson Brownlow, and also the wife of Congressman Maynard. The party consisting of four ladies, two men and six children, are all from Tennessee. They bring the report that all Union families of Tennessee have been ordered by proclamation to leave within thirty-six hours. 1500 Union men left for Kentucky a week ago Friday. Out of a party of 400 attempting to leave, 100 had been killed.

There can be no doubt of the capture of New Orleans. The Southern newspapers speak of it in the most dismal strains, and demand that the mystery of the surrender of the city shall be explained.

The Norfolk Day Book, in an editorial, says it is by far the most serious reverse of the war. – It suggests future privations to all classes of society. but most to be lamented of all, it threatens our army supplies. The raising of meat and corn and wheat, instead of cotton and tobacco, is earnestly recommended by the discreet editor.

The Richmond Dispatch of yesterday says that when the enemy’s fleet arrived opposite the city and demanded its surrender, Gen. Lovell refused and fell back to Camp Moore, after destroying all the cotton and stores. The iron-clad vessel Mississippi was burnt to prevent her from falling into the hands of the enemy.

Nothing is said about the Louisiana, but it is supposed that she was scuttled. It is rumored that she was sunk at the first fire.

Camp Moore is 78 miles from New Orleans, on the Jackson Railroad.

The following are the latest despatches in today’s papers.

MOBILE, April 27. – The Yankee Commodore, Farrugat [sic], promised the Secretary of the Mayor of New Orleans, who visited the fleet, by a flag of truce, to make a second demand for the surrender of the city, but he had not done so up to this hour, five o’clock.

Our ship, the McRea, came up from the Forts under a flag of truce, with forty of our wounded. She communicated with the Federal Flag ship, but the result is unknown. It is rumored that the Federals refused to let her return.

The rumor that Fort Pike has been evacuated and blown up, is unreliable.

In a conference held with one of the Federal officers, after the correspondence between Mayor and Com. Farrugat, the officer left declaring that he would shoot down the flag on the City Hall, if it was not hauled down, and he actually bro’t his ship within range, but has not fired thus far.

It is reported that the French and English men of war, which are below, will enter their protest against shelling the city.

It is believed the Yankee vessels are short, both of provisions and ammunition.

The excitement in the city is intense, and the feeling of humiliation deep.

RICHMOND, April 28. – The following dispatch was received to-day, by Adj.-Gen. Cooper, from Gen. Lovell:

Camp Moore, April 27.

Forts Jackson and St. Phillip, are still in good condition and in our hands. The steamers Louisiana and McRae are safe. The enemy’s fleet is at the city, but they have not forces enough to occupy it. The in habitants are staunchly loyal.

MOBILE, April 28. – The Forts on Lake Ponchartrain [sic] were all evacuated on the 25th inst. – we have sustained considerable loss in supplies and dismounting, but not in destroying. The guns at Fort Pike and all the building[s] were burnt, including the telegraph office. The operator has gone to the limits of the city to open an office if possible. All the gunboats on the Lake have been burnt by our own people. The mobile boats Whitman, Brown and several others are moving troops, stores and ordnance to Manchock, after which we fear they will be burned.

The Yankee fleet was returning again to Ship Island.

In a local paragraph the Norfolk Day Book under the head of markets, named the ferry small supply of edibles exposed for sale and says it becomes a question of grave moment as to where and how the people are to be fed.

The death of Samuel B. Todd, brother of Mrs. Lincoln, is announced. He died on the battlefield, and from the effects of the wounds he received at Shiloh, in the action of the 7th.

It is reported by the flag of truce that the Merrimac had steamed up, and it was expected in Norfolk last night that she would come out to-day. She has not made her appearance, however.

The Charleston Mercury says that 9 schooners left that city on the previous Saturday to run the blockade. The Guild, Wave and two others were taken. The crew of the Guild was landed on Gibbs’ Island on Wednesday. On Friday they were seen by our pickets and fired upon under the supposition that they were Yankees. David Kauffer, of Augusta, was killed.

The other three vessels were sent to Fort Royal.

The gunboat Mt. Vernon arrived from the blockade of Wilmington on Sunday night. She left there the Jamestown and Victoria.

The Cambridge sailed hence for Wilmington on Sunday.

The Mt. Vernon’s boilers are defective, but she will return to her station in a few days.

There is but little news.

Fort Caswell is being strengthened by the rebels in expectation of an attack.

The schooner Kate from Nassau, was captured by the Mt. Vernon about two weeks ago while attempting the run the blockade.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 3, 1862, p. 3

The Punishment of Traitors

EXTRACTS FROM THE SPEECH OF SCHUYLER COLFAX, OF INDIANA, ON THE CONFISCATION BILL.

The Catilines who sat here in the Council Chambers of the Republic, and who, with the oath on their lips and in their hearts to support the Constitution of the United States plotted treason at night – as has been shown by papers recovered at Florida, particularly the letter of Mr. Youlee, describing the proceedings of the midnight conclaves of these men to their confederates in the Southern States – should be punished by the severest penalties of the law, for they have added to their treason perjury, and are doubly condemned before God and man. Never, in any land, have there been more guilty and more deserving of the extremest errors of the law. The murderer takes but a single life, and we call him infamous. – But these men wickedly and willingly plunged a peaceful country into the horrors of a civil war, and inaugurated a regime of assassination and outrage against the Union men in their midst, hanging, plundering, and imprisoning in a manner that throws into the shade the atrocities of the French Revolution. Not content with this they aimed their blows at the life of the Republic itself; and on many a battle-field, in a carnival of blood, they sought not only to destroy the Union itself, but to murder its defenders. Plunging into still darker crimes they have bayoneted the wounded on the field of carnage, buried the dead that fell into their ands with every possible ignominy, and then to gloat their revenge, dug up their lifeless remains from the tomb, where even savages would have allowed them to rest, and converted their skulls into drinking cups – a barbarism that would have disgraced the Visigoths of Alaric, the barbarian, in the dark ages of the past. – The blood of our soldiers cries out against them. Has not forbearance ceased longer to be a virtue? We were told a year ago that lenicy [sic] would probably induce them to return to their allegiance, and to cease this unnatural war; and what has been the result? Let the bloody battle-fields of the conflict answer.

When I return home I shall miss many a familiar face that has looked in past years with the beaming eye of friendship upon me. I shall see those who have come home with constitutions broken down by exposure and wounds and disease, to linger and to die. I shall see women whom I have seen Sabbath after Sabbath leaning on a beloved husband’s arm as they went to the peaceful sanctuary, clothed now in widow’s weeds. I shall see orphans destitute, with no one to train them into paths of usefulness. I shall see the swelling hillock in the grave-yard – where, after life’s fitful fever, we shall be gathered, betokening that there, prematurely cut off by a rifle ball aimed at the life of the Republic, a patriot soldier sleeps. I shall see desolate and hearthstones and anguish and woe on every side. Those of us who come here from Indiana and Illinois know too painfully the sad scenes that will confront us amid the circles of our constituents.

Nor need we ask the cause of all this suffering, the necessity of all these sacrifices? They have been entailed on us as part of the fearful cost of saving our country from destruction. – But what a mountain of guilt must rest upon those who by their efforts to destroy the government and the Union, have rendered these terrible sacrifices necessary.

Why do we hesitate? These men have drawn the sword and thrown away the scabbard. – They did not hesitate in punishing the Union men within their power. They have confiscated their property, and have for a year past, without any of the compunctions that troubles us here. They imprisoned John M. Botts, for silently regaining a lingering love for the union in his desolate home. They hang Union men in East Tennessee for bridge burning, refusing them even the sympathy of a chaplain to console their dying hours. They persecute Brownlow because faithful among the faithless, he refused, almost alone, in his outspoken heroism, to bow the knee to the Baal of their worship. Let us follow his counsel by stripping the leaders of this conspiracy of their possessions, and outlawing them hereafter from the high places of honor and of trust they have heretofore enjoyed.

In no other way can we more effectually be felt throughout all the region where treason rears its blackened crest. The loyal Union men of all these regions will see in this legislation, and in the concurrent advance of our armies toward the Gulf, that we have put our hands to the plow, determined not to look back; that we have resolved that every man who raises his hand against the Union shall be punished; that those who remain loyal to the nation shall be protected; and that the retribution which shall follow the leaders of this rebellion for life, shall be so thorough and severe that no reptile flag of disunion will ever again be reared on the soil of this Republic. And they will at last all realize that the inducement to sympathize with secession (so as to save their property from rebel confiscation and to claim at the same time Union protection) no longer exists; that the time for this misplaced lenity has expired; that the property of the rebels is to be confiscated, and the armies of the republic sustained thereon in the regions which treason requires them to occupy.

Mercy to traitors, it has been well said, is cruelty to loyal men. I would not imitate their crimes or their barbarity, but I would imitate their resolution. The gentleman from Kentucky nearest me (Mr. Grider) told us, a month or two ago, that the rebel army had run off $300,000 worth of slaves of Union men from counties near his residence, and they have confiscated and taken slaves as sweepingly as anything else claimed or held by these men. Their own slaves work on their fortifications, from cannon, behind which our soldiers are mercilessly slain; they perform their camp drudgery, thus increasing the power of their army; they raise the produce that feeds their troops, and the crops on the faith of which their scrip is rendered current. If we wish to break the power of the rebellion let us strike it wherever we can weaken it, and strike it boldly and fearlessly as the justice of our cause fully warrants. And let us if there are but fifty or five hundred loyal men in a State, resolve that they shall be protected by the whole power of the Government, and clothed with all the advantages hereafter that their unfaltering allegiance during these dark hours so richly merits.

None of the confiscation bills before us are ex post facto in their operation. They operate only against those who, having been engaged in this rebellion continue in arms after this long legislative forbearance. I can vote for nearly every one of them, variant as their provisions are. Any of them is preferable to none. The clerk of this House, (Mr. Etheridge,) recently returned from Tennessee, tells us that in an extensive inquiry, he heard of but a single slaveholder of that State who was a private in the rebel army. This is a striking and significant fact. With that single exception, the slaveholders were either in office, civil or military, or at home. I have no doubt that four-fifths of all the slaves held by rebels belong to officers, civil or military under the rebel government. And we cannot longer doubt that there are thousands upon thousands of men who prefer the Union who have been absolutely forced by threats, by terror, by delusions, or by conscription, into the armies of the rebellion.

I am willing, therefore, to go for the bill known as Senator Sherman’s which confiscates the property and discharges the slaves of all the leaders of the rebel government; of all who had ever taken the oath to support the Constitution and had violated it, which would include all postmasters, mail contractors, Congressmen, Governors, members of the State Legislature, judges, &c.; all of who have taken an oath of any office of any kind under the rebel authority; and of all officers of the rebel army and navy. As to our manifest, palpable duty as to all these classes, it seems to me there can be no question. Another provision in his bill I favor strongly which declares that all persons, high and low, officers and privates, who continue in arms against the Union for sixty days after the passage of the act, shall be declared infamous, and shall never hold an office of trust, honor or profit within the United States. This bill cannot be considered extreme. It runs no hazard of injuring any one whose heart is not callous with treason. It gives the privates all the benefit of a doubt as to the willingness of their enlistment. It makes allegiance to the Union the test, not only of protection under the law, but of official advancement hereafter. It prevents the conspirators of this rebellion from returning to occupy seats here. And I cannot see why a majority cannot unite on this bill, if they cannot on any other more stringent and sweeping in its provisions.

But I am not wedded to the details of any bill. I will very cheerfully support Senator Trumbull’s bill, now pending in the Senate. – I plead only for action. Let our legislation respond to the appeal of Brownlow; and let us not by a conflict between bills looking to the same end fail to strike the blow that hundreds of thousands of patriot hearts demand at our hands.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 3, 1862, p. 2

Parson Brownlow says . . .

. . . that Gen Fremont is the right man in the right place; and that he is the very man whom he wants to follow into East Tennessee to clean out the traitors. On the other hand our valorous contemporary who proposes to carry the war into Africa pronounces Fremont utterly unfit for any command.

– Published in The Gate City, Keokuk, Iowa, Thursday, April 17, 1862

From Tennessee

A gentleman who has made his way from Nashville, through the lines of both armies has informed the editor of the Louisville Democrat that Zollicoffer was averse to attacking Thomas, and when ordered to do so by Crittenden he said with tears in his eyes that he might as well take his men and hang them.

By this gentleman we learn that Parson Brownlow’s health is very poor. His son stated that he doubted if his father would live to reach the Union lines; and if his health would permit, he did not believe the rebel guard would let him go. It is to be hoped, however, that the defeat of Crittenden’s army, the death of Zollicoffer, and the panic with evidently now prevails all through east Tennessee, together with Gen. Thomas’ advance, will open the way for the safe arrival of the parson in a land of freedom.

This gentleman is on his way to see Andy Johnson and reports that the rebels have seized Johnson’s house, and turned it into a hospital, and confiscating all his property; that in order to save his mother from the most fiendish persecution, one of Johnson’s sons had taken the oath to support the rebel cause, or at least not to furnish aid and comfort to the Unionists. Another son is hiding among the hills, and has been since last December, looking with eager longing eyes for the approach of the Union forces and the relieve from a life of wretchedness.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Monday Morning, February 10, 1862, p. 2