Major-General Henry W. Slocum: General Orders No. 4, May 5, 1864

General ORDERS No. 4.}

HDQRS, DISTRICT OF VICKSBURG,        

Vicksburg, Miss., May 5, 1864.

I. No persons except those in the employ of the United States Government, and loyal citizens, or those who have taken the oath of allegiance, will hereafter be permitted to pass the picket-lines at any post within this district.

II. No goods or merchandise of any kind will hereafter be allowed to pass outside the lines, except the necessary supplies for planters working lands leased from the United States, and limited quantities to citizens who have taken the oath of allegiance. No citizen will be allowed to take out supplies for any persons except himself and his immediate family, and in no case will more than thirty days' supplies be taken out.

III. The provost-marshal at every post will keep an accurate record of every pass granted, and of all permits approved by himself, or the post commander. Books for this purpose will be supplied by the quartermaster's department and the records will be kept open for the inspection of any officer of the Government, at all hours between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. A record will be kept by the officers of the picket-line of all passes and permits presented, which record will be compared with that of the provost-marshal, and any discrepancy will at once be reported.

IV. All trade stores within the district at points not garrisoned by at least one regiment of troops will at once be discontinued. No goods or merchandise will be landed at any point on the river within the limits of the district which is not garrisoned by troops, except necessary supplies for planters working land leased from the Government, in which case the goods may be landed under cover of a gun-boat at the nearest practicable point to the plantation.

V. All boats ladened with merchandise detected in landing in violation of this order will be seized and brought to this post.

VI. All persons charged with the duties of imposing upon citizens, or of seizing property for the Government, will keep an account of all such transactions, specifying the persons from whom the money or property was received and the disposition made of it. This account will be kept open for the inspection of any officer of the Government, or of any citizen who has been taxed, or from whom property has been taken.

VII. No Government wagon, transport, or vessel of any kind will be used in bringing cotton or other stores to market, except in cases where such stores have been seized for the Government.

VIII. All clerks and citizen employes in every department whose services are not absolutely necessary will at once be discharged.

IX. No rations will be issued, nor property of any kind transferred to citizens to reimburse them for losses sustained by the operations of the war. The persons to whom damages are to be paid, and the amounts due, are questions which no military officer is authorized to adjust.

X. It is the duty of every person in the employ of the Government and of every loyal citizen to aid in the correction of all evils. Any practice on the part of either civil or military officers or citizens which tends to aid the enemy or defraud or injure the Government should be promptly reported, and sustained by such proof as will enable the commanding general to correct the evil, and bring the guilty parties to punishment.

By command of Maj. Gen. H. W. Slocum:

H. C. RODGERS,        

Assistant Adjutant-General.

SOURCE: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, Volume 39, Part 2 (Serial No. 78), p. 30-1

Diary of Henry Greville: Thursday, January 3, 1861

The King of Prussia¹ died yesterday at Sans-Souci.

The American Secession question now occupies public attention more than any other subject. Mr. Motley, who is here, considers it as certain, but does not think the Northern States will thereby lose any of their importance.

Fanny Kemble writes to me, December 9:

'What can I tell you, except that the election of Mr. Lincoln to the Presidency appears to be precipitating the feud between the Northern and Southern States to immediate and most disastrous issues? The Cotton-growing States declare their purpose of at once seceding from the Union—the Slave-growing States depend upon them for their market, but depend still more upon the undisturbed security of the Union for the possibility of raising in safety their human cattle.

‘The Northern States seem at last inclined to let the Southern act upon their long threatened separation from them—the country is in a frightful state of excitement from one end to the other.

'The commercial and financial interests of all the States are already suffering severely from the impending crisis. It is a shame and a grief to all good men to think of the dissolution of this, in some respects, noble and prosperous confederacy of States. It is a horror to contemplate the fate of these insane Southerners if, but for one day, their slaves should rise upon them, when they have ascertained, which they will be quick enough to do, that they are no longer sure of the co-operation of the North in coercing their servile population. In short, there is no point of view from which the present position of this country can be contemplated which is not full of dismay. Conceive the position of the English in India if they had known beforehand of the murderous projected rising of the natives against them and had been without troops, arms, means of escape, or hope of assistance, and you have something like the present position of the Southern planters. God knows how fervently I bless that Providence which turned the worldly loss of my children's property, by their father's unprincipled extravagance, into so great a gain. Their shares were sold more than a year ago, and it will never be their fate to inflict injustice and oppression, or tremble before impending retribution.'

_______________

¹ Frederick William IV.

SOURCE: Alice Countess of Stratford, Leaves from the Diary of Henry Greville: 1857-1861, p. 339-41

Senator Daniel S. Dickinson to Henry Orr, September 13, 1853

BINGHAMTON, N. Y., September 13, 1853.

MY DEAR SIR—I have this moment received your favor of the 10th, calling my attention to a communication in the Washington Union, charging me in substance with having favored and advocated the Wilmot Proviso in the Senate of the United States, in 1847, and presenting partial extracts of a speech I then made to prove it.

The "free-soil" journals of this State have recently made a similar discovery, probably aided by similar optics; but as these journals, because of this very speech, and the vote thereon, honored me with the distinction of stereotyping my name enclosed in black lines, at the head of their columns for months, and recommended that I be burned in effigy, and treated with personal indignities and violence, it gave me little concern to see them endeavoring to divert attention from their own position by assaulting me in an opposite direction. Nor, since the Washington Union has furnished its contribution, should I have thought the matter worth my notice. Those who are pursuing me in my retirement, whether as open and manly opponents or otherwise, have their service to perform and their parts assigned them, and I have no more disposition to disturb their vocation than I have to inquire as to the nature and amount of their wages, or question the manner in which they execute their work.

I was honored with a seat in the Senate of this State four years, and there introduced resolutions upon the subject of slavery, and spoke and voted thereon; was President of the same body two years, and was seven years a Senator in Congress—from the annexation of Texas until after the passage of the compromise measures. I have, too, for the last twenty years, often been a member of conventions—county, State and national; have presented resolutions, made speeches and proposed addresses; and if, in my whole political course, a speech, vote, or resolution can be found favoring the heresy of "freesoil," I will consent to occupy a position in the public judgment as degraded as the most malevolent of that faction, or its most convenient accomplice.

Near the close of the session of 1847, I returned to my seat in the Senate from a most painful and distressing domestic affliction, and found the Three Million bill under discussion, during which the Wilmot Proviso (so called) was offered, and my colleague, General Dix, presented resolutions from our Legislature, passed with great unanimity, instructing us to vote in favor of the proviso. General Dix advocated the adoption of the proviso, and voted for it. I spoke against its adoption and voted against it, and, in so doing, aroused against me free-soil and abolition malignity throughout the country.

The main subject under discussion was the propriety of placing a fund of three millions in the hands of the President for the purpose of negotiating a treaty of peace with Mexico by the purchase of territory. The proviso was an incidental question, and treated accordingly. Neither my frame of mind nor the exigencies of the occasion afforded me an adequate opportunity to consider or discuss the question; but the whole drift and spirit of what I did say upon the subject, although imperfectly reported, was against all slavery agitation, as will be seen by the following extracts:

“As though it were not enough to legislate for the government of such territory as may be procured under and by virtue of this appropriation, if any shall be made—which of course rests in uncertainty—this amendment, forsooth, provides for the domestic regulation of ‘any territory on the continent of America which shall hereafter be acquired by or annexed to the United States, or in any other manner whatever.’ And thus this wholesome and pacific measure must be subjected to delay and the hazards of defeat, the war must be prosecuted afresh with all its engines of destruction, or abandoned by a craven and disgraceful retreat; one campaign after another be lost, while the wily and treacherous foe and his natural ally, the vomito, are preying upon the brave hearts of our patriotic soldiery; that we may legislate, not merely for the domestic government of Mexican territory in the expectation that we may hereafter obtain it, but that we may erect barriers to prevent the sugar manufacturer and cotton planter of the South from extending his plantation and his slavery towards the polar regions.

 

“If, then, the popular judgment shall commend that pioneer benevolence, which seeks to provide for the government of territory which, though its acquisition yet ‘sleeps in the wide abyss of possibility,’ may be acquired by this proposed negotiation; if the appropriation shall be made and a negotiation opened, and the President shall propose to accept for indemnity, and the Mexican government to cede a portion of territory, and terms shall be stipulated and a treaty be made between the two governments and ratified by both; and the territory be organized by the legislation of Congress; what adequate encomiums shall be lavished upon that more comprehensive philanthropy and profound statesmanship, which, in a bill designed to terminate a bloody and protracted war, raging in the heart of an enemy's country, casts into this discussion this apple of domestic discord under the pretence of extending the benevolent ægis of freedom over any territory which may at any time or in any manner, or upon any part of the continent, be acquired by the United States? It is no justification for the introduction of this element of strife and controversy at this time and upon this occasion, that it is abstractly just and proper, and that the Southern States should take no exception to its provisions. All knew the smouldering materials which the introduction of this topic would ignite—the sectional strife and local bitterness which would follow in its train; all had seen and read its fatal history at the last session, and knew too well what controversies, delays, and vexations must hang over it—what crimination and recrimination would attend upon its toilsome and precarious progress, and what hazard would wait upon the result—how it would array man against man, State against State, section against section, the South against the North, and the North against the South—and what must be, not only its effects and positive mischiefs, but how its disorganizing and pernicious influences must be extended to other measures necessary to sustain the arm of government.

 

“This bill not only suffered defeat at the last session, but has been subjected to the delays, hazards, and buffetings of this, by reason of this misplaced proviso. Upon it the very antipodes of agitation have met and mingled their discordant influences. This proviso, pretending to circumscribe the limits of slavery, is made the occasion for the presentation of declaratory resolves in its favor, and the bill becomes, as if by mutual appointment, the common battle ground of abstract antagonisms; each theoretic agitation is indebted to the other for existence, and each subsists alone upon the aliment provided ready to its hand by its hostile purveyor. The votaries of opposing systems seem to have drawn hither to kindle their respective altar-fires, and to vie with each other in their efforts to determine who shall cause the smoke of their incense to ascend the highest. Both are assailing the same edifice from different angles, and for alleged opposing reasons— both declare that their support of the bill depends upon the contingency of the amendment, and the efforts of both unite in a common result, and that is, procrastination and the hazard of defeat. The common enemy is overlooked and almost forgotten, that we may glare upon each other over a side issue and revive the slumbering elements of controversy, in proposing to prescribe domestic regulations for the government of territory which we have some expectation we may hereafter, possibly, acquire. This exciting and troublesome question has no necessary connection with this bill, and if, indeed, it can ever have any practical operation whatever, it would certainly be equally operative if passed separately.         *          *          *          *          *          *

 

“But suppose we do not, after all, as we well may not, obtain by negotiations any part of Mexican territory, what a sublime spectacle of legislation will a clause like this present to the world? It will stand upon the pages of the statute as an act of the American Congress designed to regulate the government of Mexican territory, but whose operation was suspended by the interposition of the Mexican veto; a chapter in our history to be employed by our enemies as evidence of rapacity, of weakness, and depraved morals; a target for the jeers and scoffs of the kingly governments of the earth, for the derision of Mexico herself, and the general contempt of mankind—a lapsed legacy to the memory of misplaced benevolence and abortive legislation.

 

“And what is more humiliating is, that the enemies of popular freedom throughout the world are scowling with malignant gratification to see this great nation unable to prosecute a war against a crippled and comparatively feeble enemy, without placing in the foreground of its measures this pregnant element of controversy, which the world sees and knows is the canker which gnaws at the root of our domestic peace; and when it is known that from this cause, especially, we have practically proved our inability to unite in the prosecution of a war, or to provide measures to establish peace, we shall be regarded as a fit object for contumely, and be laughed to scorn by the despicable government with which we are at strife, and which we have hesitated to strike because of her weakness and imbecility."

That part of the speech which, with more ingenuity than candor, has been clipped out to suit the necessities of my accusers and convict me of “free soil” sentiments, was my explanation of the general sentiment of the Northern people, in reply to a suggestion that all must be abolitionists, because the legislature instructed upon all questions relating to slavery with great unanimity. The following is the extract:

“So far as I am advised or believe, the great mass of the people at the North entertain but one opinion upon the subject, and that is the same entertained by many at the South. They regard the institution as a great moral and political evil, and would that it had no existence. They are not unaware of the difficulties which beset it, and do not intend to provoke sectional jealousies and hatred by ill-timed and misplaced discussions. They will not listen to the cry of the fanatic, or favor the design of the political schemer from the North or the South; nor will they ever disturb or trench upon the compromises of the constitution. They believe the institution to be local or domestic: to be established or abolished by the States themselves, and alone subject to their control; and that federal legislation can have very little influence over it. But being thus the institution of a local sovereignty, and a franchise peculiar to itself, they deny that such sovereignty or its people can justly claim the right to regard it as transitory and erect it in the Territories of the United States without the authority of Congress, and they believe that Congress may prohibit its introduction into the Territories while they remain such,” &c.

The legislative instructions were nearly unanimous, and the popular sentiment of the State was equally harmonious. Being a believer in and advocate for the doctrine of instruction (which up to that time had been only employed to uphold the principles of the constitution), and being anxious to represent and reflect, wherever I could, the true sentiment of my State, I indicated my willingness on a future and suitable occasion to vote as the legislature had instructed, without any repetition of its direction; but subsequent events and developments and further reflection admonished me, that I should best discharge my duty to the constitution and the Union by disregarding such instructions altogether; and although they were often afterwards repeated, and popular indignities threatened, I disregarded them accordingly.

And now, my dear sir, I leave this matter where, but for your kind letter, I should have permitted it to repose-upon the judgment of a people who have not yet forgotten, nor will they soon forget, who sustained and who assailed their country's constitution in the moment of its severest trial, the perversions of necessitous politicians to the contrary not withstanding. But it was perhaps due to confiding friends, that the sinister misrepresentation should be corrected; and I thank you for the attention which enabled me to do it.

Sincerely yours,

D. S. DICKINSON.

TO HENRY E. ORR, Esq., Washington, D. C.

SOURCE: John R. Dickinson, Editor, Speeches, Correspondence, Etc., of the Late Daniel S. Dickinson of New York, Vol. 2, p. 476-81

William T. Sherman to Ellen Ewing Sherman,June 28, 1860

SEMINARY, June 28, 1860.

. . . Last week I dismissed summarily two cadets of good families and large connexions. One has appealed to the Board of Supervisors who may be weak enough to yield to such influence. And if they do it will severely weaken my power and influence and may shake my faith in my hold on their confidence. They meet on Saturday. This is Thursday and I will then see whether I am to govern here or be governed by the cast off boys of rich planters.

So well impressed are all gentlemen here of the necessity of some restraint on the boys, who have been indulged at home to an unlimited extent, that I doubt not they will approve my acts, but like all deliberative bodies they may take some half way course and recommend me to receive them back on their promising reformation. I will not do so unless they command me, which they have a right to do.

We will celebrate the 4th of July by a cadet oration and Declaration of Independence, etc., and our examination July 30 and 31 will be celebrated by a large attendance.

The weather has been warm but never as warm as at St. Louis or in Ohio. The summers here are long, but the proximity to the sea gives us the same air as we felt off Cuba which I think perfect. Indeed I don't object to the summers here. All are well and healthy and there is no apprehension of epidemic. These always originate in New Orleans and spread by the steamboats so that here they always have full warning and can take due precaution. Take the year all round this must be a healthy place.

The only drawbacks and they are serious are servants and marketing. All here own their slaves and there are properly speaking no servants for hire. White girls or boys will not come from New Orleans though in time they may. All groceries and meats must come from New Orleans – the grass is so poor that sheep and cattle are skeletons and milk exceedingly scarce. Goat milk will be better. This year the drought has been unbearable destroying all gardens, but the season is so long that they can plant two or three times. The soil on the river bottom is very perfect, here in the pine hills as poor as poverty itself. Still by care we can make lettuce, potatoes sweet and Irish, beans, peas and such things when the season favors. There are no market gardens; the negro slaves have small patches which they are allowed to cultivate and sell off – but these are all on the other side of the river. . .

SOURCE: Walter L. Fleming, General W.T. Sherman as College President, p. 222-3

William T. Sherman to Ellen Ewing Sherman, April 15, 1860

LOUISIANA STATE SEMINARY, ALEXANDRIA, April 15, 1860.

This is Sunday. Some of the cadets have gone to church, some fishing and the balance are walking about. The Board of Supervisors are now sitting in a large room only two removed from me, and I hear them wrangling and quarreling over points of discipline and instruction which they have been now discussing for two days.

They have authorized me to make plans and estimates for the two houses. And I expect a builder to be out any moment to help me estimate. The Board approve my selection of the site for the two new houses, and I believe the one selected for ours the best, being on a fine high point, distant from the college building yet overlooking its grounds. There is a fine spring near by. The weather continues warm and excessively dry and all are praying for rain to bring up the corn and cotton which has been planted for a month.

I have your several letters asking the price of servants, etc., but I cannot answer as all servants here are scarce and most everybody owns their own. I suppose ten dollars a month will hire a black woman but it is impossible to hire a strong man fit for field work at less than $25 a month and board. If Emily and Gertrude come with you we will still need a man and maybe a black girl, as white girls won't work down here long. Still we can agree to pay them a bonus if they stay a year. But as I wrote you there is no chance of your coming down for a long time, may be November.

Dr. Smith one of the supervisors, a physician of long standing, says that October and November are the sickly months. July and August though hot are perfectly healthy. So that he favors those months as the vacation. So great is the variation of opinion that I let them fight it out as it is proper that they who have lived here all their lives should determine the question. I hope to get the builders to work in the course of a month but all such things proceed so slowly here that I doubt if we can finish this year. Nobody seems to pay any attention to time or appointments.

Red River too has already begun to fall and soon will be navigated only by the smallest kind of boats and it will be next to impossible to procure anything from New Orleans, the only point where furniture can be had. The stores in Alexandria contain nothing of the kind. Indeed California in its worst days had a better market than this country. There are no farmers here. The planters produce only cotton and sugar on a large scale and deem it beneath their dignity to raise anything for market. Some of the negroes raise a few sweet potatoes, corn, etc., which they sell about Christmas time, but all the year else everything must come from New Orleans. We are now paying for corn one dollar and ten cents a bushel and hay costs about forty-eight dollars a ton. Everything is proportional, so that I doubt if my four thousand dollars will more than barely maintain us.

SOURCE: Walter L. Fleming, General W.T. Sherman as College President, p. 200-2

Southern Mothers

Planters and others wishing to send donations of food, cotton or anything else, to the southern mothers, Memphis, are requested to send them to the care of Sample, Mitchell & Co., who will take them to their destination.

S. C. LAW, Pres’t S. S. M.

MARY E. POPE, Secretary.

SOURCE: Memphis Daily Appeal, Memphis Tennessee, Wednesday, September 4, 1861, p. 4

Captain Charles Wright Wills: November 17, 1864 — 12 a.m.

Near Jackson, Ga., November 17, 1864, 12 a.m.

Have just had our coffee. Marched some 17 miles to-day. Begin to see where the “rich planters” come in. This is probably the most gigantic pleasure excursion ever planned. It already beats everything I ever saw soldiering, and promises to prove much richer yet. I wish Sherman would burn the commissary trains, we have no use for what they carry, and the train only bothers us. . It is most ludicrous to see the actions of the negro women as we pass. They seem to be half crazy with joy, and when a band strikes up they go stark mad. Our men are clear discouraged with foraging, they can't carry half the hogs and potatoes they find right along the road. The men detailed for that purpose are finding lots of horses and mules. The 6th Iowa are plumb crazy on the horse question.

SOURCE: Charles Wright Wills, Army Life of an Illinois Soldier, p. 320

Major-General Benjamin F. Butler: General Orders No. 22, May 4, 1862

GENERAL ORDERS No. 22.]

HDQRS. DEPARTMENT OF THE GULF,            

New Orleans, May 4, 1862.

The commanding general of the department having been informed that rebellious, lying, and desperate men have represented, and are now representing, to honest planters and good people of the State of Louisiana that the United States Government, by its forces, have come here to confiscate and destroy their crops of cotton and sugar, it is hereby ordered to he made known, by publication in all the newspapers of this city, that all cargoes of cotton and sugar shall receive the safe conduct of the forces of the United States; and the boats bringing them from beyond the lines of the United States forces may be allowed to return in safety, after a reasonable delay, if their owners so desire, provided they bring no passengers except the owners and managers of said boat and of the property so conveyed, and no other merchandise except provisions, of which such boats are requested to bring a full supply for the benefit of the poor of this city.

By command of Major-General Butler:

GEO. C. STRONG,               

Assistant Adjutant-General.

SOURCE: The War Of The Rebellion: A Compilation Of The Official Records Of The Union And Confederate Armies, Series I, Volume 6 (Serial No. 6), p. 722

George S. Denison to Salmon P. Chase, February 8, 1863

(Private)

New Orleans, February 8th, 1863.

Dear Sir: I received to-day a letter signed by you, of date Jan. 22nd, whereby I am appointed Special Agent and Acting Surveyor.

Your unofficial letter of 19th January, offered me the place above mentioned, or that of “Commissioner of Internal Revenue,” directing me to choose that which I best liked. I chose the latter, and informed you by letter written yesterday. I do not want to be Acting Surveyor unless you particularly desire it.

The Commissioner of Customs also sends me a bond to be given by myself as Acting Surveyor, in the sum of Five Thousand Dollars. I have just given a bond for Fifty Thousand, as Acting Collector. I shall avoid troubling my friends by asking their names upon so many bonds, and shall, therefore defer compliance with the commissioner's directions until I hear directly from you again.

I did not expect to receive the letters of to-day, because you had given to me the choice. My letter of yesterday was in reply to yours of the 19th. Jan. Wherever I am I shall give Mr. Bullitt all the assistance in my power, and continue, as well as possible, to keep you informed of events occurring here.

Enclosed is an order, and printed statement of a plan regulating the relations between planters and negroes.¹ The documents have not been officially issued, and the plan is under consideration. These copies are only proof sheets which I privately obtained from the printing office, to send to you.

There is no news to-day, and I cannot learn positively whether Weitzel's great expedition has started. The troops for the expedition have been collected in the Lafourche Country and have been ready several days.

Mr. Gray, Dy. Collector, should remain here by all means.

_______________

¹ General Orders No. 12, January 29, 1863, Rebellion Records, Series I, Vol. XV, pp. 666ff. Ci'. also, letters of March 14, 1863, and March 31.

SOURCE: Diary and correspondence of Salmon P. Chase, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1902, Vol. 2, p. 357

George S. Denison to Salmon P. Chase, February 7, 1863

(Private)

New Orleans, February 7th, 1863.

Dear Sir: I wrote you by the last steamer expressing a wish to receive the office of “Commissioner of Internal Revenue” which you so kindly offerred. I now repeat the wish, and am ready to commence operations whenever you direct.

The great military movement up the West side of the Mississippi has commenced to-day or will commence in a day or two. The bayous leading from the Teche and near there, lead right through to Red River, so that light draft boats can go through them above Port Hudson. About 9,000 men will advance in one column.

A rumor prevails here among the secessionists that we have been whipped off Mobile and that Ship Island is captured. The story is without foundation, though you may see it in N. Y. papers. A very strong feeling is arising among the planters against Gen. Banks. The reason is that he is not sufficiently pro-slavery to suit them. I think statements have been sent to Washington that he has commenced speculating. I am confident such charges are entirely false. 1 do not think Gen. Banks a great commander, but believe him to be completely honest.

Admiral Farragut has gone out to sea in his flagship, the "Hartford"—probably for the purpose of visiting the various blockading vessels along the coast.

In my next I shall have occasion to say something more about Dr. Zachary.

SOURCE: Diary and correspondence of Salmon P. Chase, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1902, Vol. 2, p. 356-7

George S. Denison to Salmon P. Chase, January 15, 1863

(Private)

New Orleans, January 15th, 1863.

Dear Sir: A fight is progressing on Bayou Teche. Gen. Weitzel commands. He crossed Berwick's Bay yesterday morning, and has advanced up the Teche as far as the enemy's fortifications. The enemy have 1,100 infantry and 1,000 cavalry. Weitzel will succeed without doubt, and advance to New Iberia, where fortifications will be erected by us. The rebel salt works near New Iberia, are yielding one million pounds per day. It is carried all over the Southern States. If this movement is successful, these works will be destroyed. The Teche country is full of sugar. This present movement is simply carrying out Gen. Butler's plan of operations. I urged it a week ago, but advised a flank movement. Gen. Banks has thought best to attack in front. I have traveled through that country several times, and know it well.

The U. S. armed Transport, “Hatteras”, was sunk by the “Alabama” on Sunday the 11th inst. The fight lasted about 45 minutes, and occurred sixteen miles from Galveston. The Flag officer there sent the “Hatteras” out to overhaul a strange sail — which proved to be the “Alabama”, and proved too powerful for her antagonist. Six men of the “Hatteras” escaped in a boat — the rest of the crew were killed or captured. The “Hatteras” carried ninety men. The “Brooklyn” and other vessels lying off Galveston, immediately started for the “Alabama”, but could find nothing of her. The rebels have not attempted to come out of Galveston Bay with the “Harriet Lane”. She is still lying in the Harbor, and I do not know why our Gunboats do not go in and destroy her.

Major Gen. Augur has at last been sent to Baton Rouge to take command, and organize the force there. There begins to be exhibited in this department some little energy and activity. All that is now done, ought to have been done four weeks ago.

The business of “Special Agent” under regulations of August 28th, is not now interfered with by military authorities. In consequence of this non-interference I have organized it with great success. I am satisfied that nothing, or very little, reaches the enemy from this port—and the planters within our lines are supplying themselves rapidly with whatever they need for their own use. I supervise everything myself and have an immense amount of labor to perform. I hear that large amounts of merchandise and supplies reach the enemy from Memphis and vicinity. This can be avoided by honestly adopting the right plan. Trade must be centralized and none allowed except at one or few points. I prevent it as far as possible, outside of the city, and can therefore control it. This plan is well adapted to this country, because property real and personal, is in the hands of a few planters. It is easy (and has been customary heretofore) for each planter to come to the City — take the proper oaths and be made individually responsible for whatever he wishes to take out of the City. Every boat going up the river, carries an “Aid to the Revenue” who sees that the supplies are delivered only at the proper plantation. I have to employ many additional “aids”, but make the system pay its own expenses. My personal supervision of all the details is an immense labor, but I know it will be well done if I attend to it myself — otherwise not.

The planters within and without our lines have been afraid to bring their crops of sugar and cotton because it was seized and must pass through the hands of the military commission. Gen. Butler's military commission was a dishonest plundering concern. By the enclosed order of Gen. Banks, you will see that planters are invited to bring their crops to the City and promised protection. It will have a good and marked effect. This order will not interfere with my action as “Special Agent.”

The system of furnishing supplies to planters — adopted by me, gives satisfaction to planters — but dissatisfaction to the great number of Jews, military speculators, and men from the North, who expect to swindle planters out of fortunes.

It is known here that the President has issued his proclamation, but its terms are not fully known. Gen. Banks told me this morning he is going to raise negro troops, but I fear, not in large numbers. I have information that the number of rebel troops in Texas is about 9,000 — of whom one-third are cavalry. They are provided with good arms brought through Mexico. About one-third of them are conscripts.

The number of troops in Louisiana, west of the Mississippi, is about 4,500 — nearly all of whom are in the Teche country.

SOURCE: Diary and correspondence of Salmon P. Chase, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1902, Vol. 2, p. 348-50

John A. Quitman to Colonel Platt Brush, August 23, 1823

Soldier's Retreat, near Natchez, Aug. 23d, 1823.

Since my last letter, my dear Col. Brush, I have been a refugee from Natchez, where the yellow fever is raging. Our bar is quartered at various country-seats — not boarding; a Mississippi planter would be insulted by such a proposal; but we are enjoying the hospitalities that are offered to us on all sides. The awful pestilence in the city brings out, in strong relief, the peculiar virtues of this people. The mansions of the planters are thrown open to all comers and goers free of charge. Whole families have free quarters during the epidemic, and country wagons are sent daily to the verge of the smitten city with fowls, vegetables, etc., for gratuitous distribution to the poor. I am now writing from one of those old mansions, and I can give you no better notion of life at the South than by describing the routine of a day. The owner is the widow of a Virginia gentleman of distinction, a brave officer, who died in the public service during the last war with Great Britain.¹ She herself is a native of this vicinity, of English parents settled here in Spanish times. She is an intimate friend of my first friend, Mrs. Griffith, and I have been in the habit of visiting her house ever since I came South. The whole aim of this excellent lady seems to be to make others happy. I do not believe she ever thinks of herself. She is growing old, but her parlor is constantly thronged with the young and gay, attracted by her cheerful and never-failing kindness. There are two large families from the city staying here, and every day some ten or a dozen transient guests. Mint-juleps in the morning are sent to our rooms, and then follows a delightful breakfast in the open veranda. We hunt, ride, fish, pay morning visits, play chess, read or lounge until dinner, which is served at two P.M. in great variety, and most delicately cooked in what is here called the Creole style — very rich, and many made or mixed dishes. In two hours afterward every body — white and black — has disappeared. The whole household is asleep—the siesta of the Italians. Tho ladies retire to their apartments, and the gentlemen on sofas, settees, benches, hammocks, and often, gipsy fashion, on the grass under the spreading oaks. Here, too, in fine weather, the tea-table is always set before sunset, and then, until bedtime, we stroll, sing, play whist, or coquet. It is an indolent, yet charming life, and one quits thinking and takes to dreaming.

This excellent lady is not rich, merely independent; but by thrifty housewifery, and a good dairy and garden, she contrives to dispense the most liberal hospitality. Her slaves appear to be, in a manner, free, yet are obedient and polite, and the farm is well worked. With all her gayety of disposition and fondness for the young, she is truly pious, and in her own apartment every night she has family prayer with her slaves, one or more of them being often called on to sing and pray. When a minister visits the house, which happens very frequently, prayers night and morning are always said, and on these occasions the whole household and the guests assemble in the parlor: chairs are provided for the servants. They are married by a clergyman of their own color, and a sumptuous supper is always prepared. On public holidays they have dinners equal to an Ohio barbecue, and Christmas, for a week or ten days, is a protracted festival for the blacks. They are a happy, careless, unreflecting, good-natured race, who, left to themselves, would degenerate into drones or brutes, but, subjected to wholesome restraint and stimulus, become the best and most contented of laborers. They are strongly attached to “old massa” and “old missus,” but their devotion to “young massa” and “young missus” amounts to enthusiasm. They have great family pride, and are the most arrant coxcombs and aristocrats in the world. At a wedding I witnessed here last Saturday evening, where some 150 negroes were assembled, many being invited guests, I heard a number of them addressed as governors, generals, judges, and doctors (the titles of their masters), and a spruce, tight-set darkey, who waits on me in town, was called “Major Quitman.” The “colored ladies” are invariably Miss Joneses, Miss Smiths, or some such title. They are exceedingly pompous and ceremonious, gloved and highly perfumed. The “gentlemen” sport canes, ruffles, and jewelry, wear boots and spurs, affect crape on their hats, and carry huge cigars. The belles wear gaudy colors, “tote” their fans with the air of Spanish senoritas, and never stir out, though black as the ace of spades, without their parasols. In short, these “niggers,” as you call them, are the happiest people I have ever seen, and some of them, in form, features, and movement, are real sultanas. So far from being fed on “salted cotton-seed,” as we used to believe in Ohio, they are oily, sleek, bountifully fed, well clothed, well taken care of, and one hears them at all times whistling and singing cheerily at their work.² They have an extraordinary facility for sleeping. A negro is a great night-walker. He will, after laboring all day in the burning sun, walk ten miles to a frolic, or to see his “Dinah,” and be at home and at his work by daylight next morning. This would knock up a white man or an Indian. But a negro will sleep during the day — sleep at his work, sleep on the carriage-box, sleep standing up; and I have often seen them sitting bareheaded in the sun on a high rail-fence, sleeping as securely as though lying in bed. They never lose their equipoise, and will carry their cotton-baskets or their water-vessels, filled to the brim, poised on their heads, walking carelessly and at a rapid rate, without spilling a drop. The very weight of such burdens would crush a white man's brains into apoplexy. Compared with the ague-smitten and suffering settlers that you and I have seen in Ohio, or the sickly and starved operators we read of in factories and in mines, these Southern slaves are indeed to be envied. They are treated with great humanity and kindness. I have only heard of one or two exceptions. And the only drawback to their happiness is that their owners, sometimes, from extravagance or other bad management, die insolvent, and then they must be sold to the highest bidder, must leave the old homestead and the old family, and pass into the hands of strangers. I have witnessed one of these scenes, and but one, though they occur often, and I never saw such profound grief as the poor creatures manifested. I am opposed, as you know, to all relief laws, but, I confess, I never hear of the sale of old family servants without wishing that there was some provision by which some of them, at least, might be retained as inalienable. It is a grave question for those interested in slavery to determine whether some protection of this nature is not a necessary adjunct of slavery itself.

_______________

¹ The late Gen. F. L. Claiborne.

² Contrast this with life at the North, as recorded by his brother Henry in a letter dated Rhinebeck, Feb. 3d, 1823: “We have not had snow enough for sleighing, so every body has to stay at home. In the morning I feed the cows, take care of the horses, and cut wood until dinner-time. In the evening I take care of the cattle, and go to bed. I would willingly exchange my residence here for one where I might do for myself, were my earnings ever so small, and lay by a little for a rainy day. It is a hard place to get along in — cold winters and hot summers; snow, or slush, or dust, or drought. Work, work, work, and money always scarce. I wish I had been brought up a tailor, or shoemaker, as you say they have none at Natchez.”

SOURCE: John F. H. Quitman, Life and Correspondence of John A. Quitman, Volume 1, p. 83-6

Braxton Bragg to William T. Sherman, December 16, 1859

Thibodeaux, La., December 16, 1859.

My Dear Sherman: I received your letter from the city. Had your visit only been a week later I could have met you, as my confinement is over for the present. My crop was finished on the 12th, and is by far the most profitable one I have made-giving me a net profit of $30,000 on an investment of $145,000.

On the first Monday, January second, I intend in Baton Rouge to enter on the duties of an office to which I am just elected, “Commissioner of the Board of Public Works,” a new office in this state, but the duties are old, have been discharged heretofore by swamp land commissioner, engineers, etc. The new board is to form a bureau for the general supervision and control of all state work, to appoint all officers and agents, etc. The duties are heavy, expenditures large (over $1,000,000 a year) and the patronage extensive.

Peculations, frauds, swindling and ignorance all combined to render the previous system obnoxious, and I am told the new law was intended to clear off the whole debris, that a new state of affairs might be inaugurated. I did not and do not wish the office, as it gives no prominence and little compensation, but friends, principally Richard Taylor, son of the old general, pressed me to accept a nomination, as they could find no other man whose name could defeat the rogues. Under this pressure I gave up my privacy, and shall strive to inaugurate an honest administration of affairs.

If I do no more I shall at least deserve the thanks and probably receive the maledictions of many who do not or will not understand the merits of my conduct. How long the duties will retain me in Baton Rouge on my first visit I can not foresee; but long enough I hope, to see many members of the legislature. I believe I have some influence with R. Taylor,¹ the senator from this district, and I will try to intrest him in the Seminary. He is a very plain, straightforward man, of great independence, candid, honest and clearheaded. Whatever he promises we may rely on, as he has great influence. I have but few others to look to as acquaintances now, except the senator from Terrebonne, F. S. Goode, who is like Taylor, and with whom I shall intercede. The representatives from this parish are very poor sticks and unreliable.

We must try and secure an additional allowance or an appropriation to pay for the sixteen state cadets. I clearly see that you will need funds very soon, unless this can be done, for the people of the country are not yet sufficiently aware of the institution and its plan, etc., to patronize it beyond your suggestion. In time I have no doubt, if we can sustain it in its infancy, it will become popular and self-supporting. In the meantime, we must try to harmonize conflicting interests and opinions.

We all aim at the same great end — to furnish the most suitable and most useful education to the rising young men of our state. High literary institutions are growing up around us in every direction, but in the scientific and military we are sadly deficient. No class of people on the face of the earth are more dependent on science and discipline for success than the southern planters. Scan the whole area of our state and see what proportion of its capital and labor is devoted to science. See our levees, canals, for navigation and drainage; our steamers, our foundries, and last, our plantation machinery. Then apply this science to our soils, and see our woful deficiency and waste in our want of system in cultivation. The very plantation is a small military establishment, or it ought to be. By military I don't mean the old fogy notion of white belts, stiff leather stocks and “palms of the hands to the front,” but discipline, by which we secure system, regularity, method, economy of time, labor and material.

This all tends to secure better health, more labor and less exertion, and with infinitely less punishment, more comfort and happiness to the laborer, and more profit and pleasure to the master. The other consideration weighs no little with me. We have a large class of our population in subordination, just and necessary. Where do we find the fewest mutinies, revolts and rebellions? In the best disciplined commands. Human nature is the same throughout the world. Give us all disciplined masters, managers, and assistants, and we shall never hear of insurrection — unless as an exception — to be suppressed instanter without appeal to foreign aid.

As I shall not have time now to write General Graham, you can show him the foregoing. No consideration can overcome my preference for a military school, but I am open to policy in the course necessary to obtain it. For the present your course is plain, it seems to me. You are an agent selected to carry out the views of others. Your opinion might be expressed as a candid man, but your action should be confined to carrying out the system laid down for your government. When called upon for your views, give them freely. At all other times execute faithfully what is laid down for you. But this is advice I need not give you as from your letters it is the sensible view you have taken of the subject.

The other question, personal to yourself, I can readily see is calculated to make you sensitive and uncomfortable. I hope no one will be so unjust and indelicate as to refer to such a matter, but should it be done, keep silent and refer the matter to your friends. I will answer any such insinuations and vouch for your soundness in any and all ways. I have known you too long and too well to permit a doubt to cross my mind as to the soundness of your views. What sentiments your brother may entertain will be a subject for our representatives at Washington. It is all right and proper that you should wish him success. I do not, of course, know his opinions, but I believe that if he had your experience with us we should have no cause to fear him. His recommendation of that fellow's incendiary work was unfortunate, but I have no doubt was done without reflection or a knowledge of what he was doing, and that he heartily repents of an inconsiderate act. I have not the same charity for a good many of our northern representatives. They go too far, as do some of our own, but they being the aggressors there is some palliation on our side.

Mrs. B. joins me in regards and wishing you every success.

_______________

¹ Richard Taylor, son of President Taylor, later a confederate general. — Ed.

SOURCES: Walter L. Fleming, General W.T. Sherman as College President, p. 80-3

Captain Charles Wright Wills: May 23, 1864

May 23, 1864.

Weather is getting very hot. We have made 21 miles today, and the distance, heat and dust have made it by far the hardest march we have had for a year. Excepting about six miles of dense pine woods the country we have passed through has been beautiful, quite rolling, but fertile and well improved. In the midst of the pine woods we stopped to rest at Hollis' Mill, a sweet looking little 17-year old lady here told me she was and always had been Union, and that nearly all the poor folks here are Union. In answer to some questions about the roads and country, she said, “Well, now, I was born and raised right here, and never was anywhere, and never see anybody, and I just don't know anything at all.”

I never saw so many stragglers as to-day. For 12 miles no water was to be had; then we came to a spring, a very large one, say 4 or 5 hogsheads a minute. All the officers in the army could not have kept the men in ranks. Saw no cases of sunstroke, but two of my men from heat turned blue with rush of blood to the head, and had to leave the ranks. Some think we are moving on Montgomery, Ala. Our orders say we need not hope for railroad communications for 20 days; I think that Atlanta is our point, although we were 50 miles from there this morning and 60 to-night. The planters in this country own thousands of negroes, and they've run them all off down this road. They are about two days ahead of us, and the poor people say as thick on the road as we are. Have passed several to-day who escaped from their masters.

Four miles southeast of Van Wirt, Ga.,

SOURCE: Charles Wright Wills, Army Life of an Illinois Soldier, p. 245-6

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: October 3, 1863

Nothing from the armies; but from Charleston it is ascertained that the enemy's batteries on Morris Island have some of the guns pointing seaward. This indicates a provision against attack from that quarter, and suggests a purpose to withdraw the monitors, perhaps to use them against Wilmington. I suppose the opposite guns in the batteries will soon open on Charleston.

Thomas Jackson, Augusta, Ga., writes that he can prove the president of the Southern Express Company, who recently obtained a passport to visit Europe, really embarked for the United States, taking a large sum in gold; that another of the same company (which is nothing more than a branch of Adams's Express Company of New York) will leave soon with more gold. He says this company has enough men detailed from the army, and conscripts exempted, to make two regiments.

J. M. Williams writes from Morton, Miss., that his negroes have been permitted to return to his plantation, near Baton Rouge, and place themselves under his overseer. During their absence some ten or twelve died. This is really wonderful policy on the part of the enemy — a policy which, if persisted in, might ruin us. Mr. Williams asks permission to sell some fifty bales of cotton to the enemy for the support of his slaves. He says the enemy is getting all the cotton in that section of country — and it may be inferred that all the planters are getting back their slaves. The moment any relaxation occurs in the rigorous measures of the enemy, that moment our planters cease to be united in resistance.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 2, p. 60-1

William T. Sherman to Ellen Ewing Sherman, November 25, 1859

Seminary Of Learning, Alexandria, Nov. 25, 1859.

I am still out here at the Seminary, pushing on the work as fast as possible, but people don't work hard down here. The weather has been warm and springlike, but tonight the wind is piping and betokens rain. This is Friday. I have been writing all week, the regulations, and have been sending off circulars - indeed everything is backward, and it will keep us moving to be ready for cadets January 1. The Board of Supervisors are to meet on Monday, and I will submit to them the regulations and lists of articles indispensably necessary, and I suppose I will be sent to New Orleans to make the purchases.

The planters about Alexandria are rich but the town is a poor concern. Nothing like furniture can be had. Everybody orders from New Orleans. General Graham is at his plantation nine miles from Alexandria and twelve from here. I get a note from him every day urging me to assume all responsibility as he and all the supervisors are busy at their cotton or sugar.

I believe I have fully described the locality and the fact that although the building for the Seminary is in itself very fine, yet it is solitary and alone in the country and in no wise suited for families. Of course I will permit no family to live in the building. There happens to be one house about one-fourth mile to the rear, belonging to one McCoy in New Orleans, but that is rented by Mr. Vallas, the professor of mathematics, who now occupies it with his family, wife and seven children. They are Hungarians and he is an Episcopal Clergyman, but his religion don't hurt him much. He seems a pleasant enough man, fifty years old, fat, easy and comfortable. . . They have an Irishman and wife as servants and have plenty of complaints. The house is leaky and full of holes, so that they can hardly keep a candle burning when the wind is boisterous. Indeed the house was built for summer use and calculated to catch as much wind as possible. The design is to ask the legislature to appropriate for two professors' houses for Vallas and ourselves.

If they appropriate I will have the building and will of course see to their comfort, but I will make no calculations until the amount is settled on. I fear the cost of the building will deter the legislature from appropriating until the institution begins to make friends.

The new governor, Moore, lives near Alexandria and will be highly favorable to liberal appropriation. We have fine springs of pure water all round, and I doubt not the place is very healthy. Indeed there is nothing to make it otherwise unless the long hot summers create disease. I am now comparatively free of my cough and am in about usual condition - have to burn nitre paper occasionally. It is very lonely here indeed. Nobody to talk to but the carpenters and sitting here alone in this great big house away out in the pine wood is not cheerful. . .

SOURCES: The article is abstracted in Walter L. Fleming’s, General W.T. Sherman as College President, p. 60-1

John B. Lamar* to Howell Cobb, June 8, 1846

Macon [ga.], June 8th, 1846.

Dear Howell, Yours of the 31st ult. came duly to hand. I had considered all things maturely and determined not to sell my property as I intimated there was a probability of my doing in a previous letter. I have weighed matters and concluded to toil on in my old vocation the balance of my life, for fear I might by chance do worse by attempting a change. In changing my investment from its present shape to funds I might make some mis-step and ruin myself. It is dangerous for a man unused to controlling large sums of money to have the disposition of them. Such matters require experience. I find by your letter on the subject that your first thoughts were exactly the same as my second ones. You are right. I have a great many fancy ideas, but I seldom act hastily on any of them. I usually wait for “the sober second thought” in matters of moment. And the second thought is to hold on and “let well enough alone”. Planting is a troublesome business that does not pay well. It has its risks like every other business. But sum up everything and it is about as safe as most other modes of investing money. My taste leads me to a roving life, and on that account I have desired my means in such shape as to afford me a good income with little trouble. But it cannot fall to the lot of all who desire it to live like “Childe Harold” or Jabez Jackson, and so I will content myself with my fate, and steal off to Europe only now and then . . .

You say in the last sentence of your letter — “Have I erred in my course about Mr. Calhoun? I will not claim any great foresight. But have I not blundered along amazing well?” I see it “sticking out” that Lumpkin¹ has shown you my letter to him. I gave my confessions to John because I knew he would sympathise with me in the premises, which I had nothing to expect from such an old Hunker as you. Yes you have been about half right in your opinions, and I have been a little over half wrong I confess, and you take the opportunity to hint it, very modestly however. Well, when a man finds that he has been following a “will o’ the wisp” all his life you are glad to see him rub his eyes and look about for a genuine light to guide his way, I suppose. Woodbury, “ciphering Levi”, is the next man I look to as embodying my principles. But if he can't get the Granite State right side up again I am afraid I can't make him available. If he can manage that, you may feel yourself duly authorized to announce him as my candidate for the Presidency. I believe him to be the purest patriot in the United States.

_______________

* A prosperous planter with estates in central and southwestern Georgia. He managed the plantations of his sister, Mrs. Howell Cobb, as well as his own, and was one of Howell Cobb's chief political advisers.

¹ John H. Lumpkin.

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. 80-1

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: August 15, 1863

I learn an order has been issued to conscribe all commissary and quartermasters' clerks liable to military service. There will be, and ought to be, some special cases of exemption, where men have lost everything in the war, and have women and children depending on their salaries for subsistence; but if this order be extended to the ordnance and other bureaus, as it must be, or incur the odium of injustice, and the thousand and one A. A. Gr.'s, there will soon be a very important accession to the army.

Major Joseph B——, who was lately confined with over 1000 of our officers, prisoners, on Johnson Island, Lake Erie, proposes a plan to the Secretary of War whereby he is certain the island can be taken, and the prisoners liberated and conveyed to Canada. He proposes that a dozen men shall seize one of the enemy's steamers at Sandusky, and then overpower the guards, etc. It is wild, but not impracticable.

We hear nothing to-day from the enemy on the Rappahannock or at Fortress Monroe.

Our army in Western Louisiana captured some forty Yankee cotton-planters, who had taken possession of the plantations after driving their owners away. The account states that they were “sent to Texas.” Were they not sent into eternity?

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 2, p. 15

1st Lieutenant Charles Wright Wills: June 14, 1862

Rienzi, Tishomingo Co., Miss., June 14, '62.

We have located for a somewhat permanent stay, as the clumsy order said, in the most beautiful little town I have yet found in Mississippi. We have pitched our tents in a little grove in the edge of the burgh and are preparing to live.

We have been rioting on plums and blackberries the last week. Dewberries are about gone. I don't think the plums are as good as ours. There is already much suffering amongst the poor here, and God only knows how these people can live until the new crop of corn is harvested. The wheat is all cut these ten days, but ten acres of it will hardly keep one person a year. Cotton is not planted this year to any extent, a tax of $25 per bale being laid on all each man raises over one bale. I told you how we rode out to Baldwin on the 12th; well, this morning the enemy nearly surrounded our picket there and killed or captured a few of them, scattering the rest. They have nearly all got in. There are no troops between here and the picket at Baldwin, 25 miles, and this little body is 12 miles ahead of the main army. 'Tis an outrage to post troops in this manner, and if they all get cut off (the two battalions on picket) it won't surprise me. There are not many slaves here, very few planters work more than 25, though 60 miles further down many have from 300 to 400 each. We don't think these are large bodies that are troubling our outposts, but they will hover around so long as the picket is advanced thus far.

SOURCE: Charles Wright Wills, Army Life of an Illinois Soldier, p. 104-5

Diary of 2nd Lieutenant George G. Smith: July 11, 1864

Left on two small transports for Donaldsonville. Arrived next day and camped on old drill ground. Meanwhile the vegation had grown up tall and thick among the ruins so that sharp shooters could creep in and pick off the soldiers across the bayou at the Fort. So Colonel Fiske asked me if I would take the job of collecting tools and cut the weeds down. I told him I would. So I took an army wagon and enough soldiers so that my words would mean something. Most all the planters were hoeing their cotton and did not want to let their hoes go, but I told them they owed their protection to us. If the rebels got in they would strip them of everything of value. At all events I must have so many hoes. The general rule was to take one-half and leave half. So I would give him a receipt for so many scythes ,etc. I breakfasted with a planter with quite a number of negroes. He was a violent Secesh as we called them. He did not want to let me have any. We argued at the breakfast table on politics. He was sure we would never conquer the South. I was sure we should. I got half his hoes and all his scythes. I expect the bayonets were more eloquent than my words. I got in all thirty-seven hoes and scythes. I had a new detail every day. It took about three days to clear the grounds within rifle range of the fort.

SOURCE: Abstracted from George G. Smith, Leaves from a Soldier's Diary, p. 126-7