Diary of Adam Gurowski, November 1861

THE season is excellent for military operations, such as any Napoleon could wish it. And we, lying not on our oars or arms, but in our beds, as our spes patriæ is warmly and cosily established in a large house, receiving there the incense and salutations of all flunkeys. Even cabinet ministers crowd McClellan's antechambers!

The massacre at Ball's Bluff is the work either of treason, or of stupidity, or of cowardice, or most probably of all three united.

No European government and no European nation would thus coolly bear it. Any commander culpable of such stupidity would be forever disgraced, and dismissed from the army. Here the administration, the Cabinet, and all the Scotts, the McClellans, the Thomases, etc., strain their brains and muscles to whitewash themselves or the culprit—to represent this massacre as something very innocent.

Victoria! Victoria! Old Scott, Old Mischief, gone overboard! So vanished one of the two evil genii keeping guard over Mr. Lincoln's brains. But it will not be so easy to redress the evil done by Scott. He nailed the country's cause to such a turnpike that any of his successors will perhaps be unable to undo what Old Mischief has done. Scott might have had certain, even eminent, military capacity; but, all things considered, he had it only on a small scale. Scott never had in his hand large numbers, and hundreds of European generals of divisions would do the same that Scott did, even in Mexico. Any one in Europe, who in some way or other participated in the events of the last forty years, has had occasion to see or participate in one single day in more and better fighting, to hear more firing, and smell more powder, than has General Scott in his whole life.

Scott's fatal influence palsied, stiffened, and poisoned every noble or higher impulse, and every aspiration of the people. Scott diligently sowed the first seeds of antagonism between volunteers and regulars, and diligently nursed them. Around his person in the War Department, and in the army, General Scott kept and maintained officers, who, already before the inauguration, declared, and daily asserted, that if it comes to a war, few officers of the army will unite with the North and remain loyal to the Union.

He never forgot to be a Virginian, and was filled with all a Virginian's conceit. To the last hour he warded off blows aimed at Virginia. To this hour he never believed in a serious war, and now requiescat in pace until the curse of coming generations.

McClellan is invested with all the powers of Scott. McClellan has more on his shoulders than any man—a Napoleon not excepted—can stand; and with his very limited capacity McClellan must necessarily break under it. Now McClellan will be still more idolized. He is already a kind of dictator, as Lincoln, Seward, etc., turn around him.

In a conversation with Cameron, I warned him against bestowing such powers on McClellan. "What shall we do?" was Cameron's answer; "neither the President nor I know anything about military affairs." Well, it is true; but McClellan is scarcely an apprentice.

Again the intermittent fear, or fever, of foreign intervention. How absurd! Americans belittle themselves talking and thinking about it. The European powers will not, and cannot. That is my creed and my answer; but some of our agents, diplomats, and statesmen, try to made capital for themselves from this fever which they evoke to establish before the public that their skill preserves the country from foreign intervention. Bosh!

All the good and useful produced in the life and in the economy of nations, all the just and the right in their institutions, all the ups and downs, misfortunes and disasters befalling them, all this was, is, and forever will be the result of logical deductions from pre-existing dates and facts. And here almost everybody forgets the yesterday.

A revolution imposes obligations. A revolution makes imperative the development and the practical application of those social principles which are its basis.

The American Revolution of 1776 proclaimed self-government, equality before all, happiness of all, etc.; it is therefore the peremptory duty of the American people to uproot domestic oligarchy, based upon living on the labor of an enslaved man; it has to put a stop to the moral, intellectual, and physical servitude of both, of whites and of colored.

Eminent men in America are taunted with the ambition to reach the White House. In itself it is not condemnable; it is a noble or an ignoble ambition, according to the ways and means used to reach that aim. It is great and stirring to see one's name recorded in the list of Presidents of the United States; but there is still a record far shorter, but by far more to be envied—a record venerated by our race—it is the record of truly great men. The actually inscribed runners for the White House do not think of this.

No one around me here seems to understand (and no one is familiar enough with general history) that protracted wars consolidate a nationality. Every day of Southern existence shapes it out more and more into a nation, with all the necessary moral and material conditions of existence.

Seeing these repeated reviews, I cannot get rid of the idea that by such shows and displays McClellan tries to frighten the rebels in the Chinaman fashion. The collateral missions to England, France, and Spain, are to add force to our cause before the public opinion as well as before the rulers. But what a curious choice of men! It would be called even an unhappy one. Thurlow Weed, with his offhand, apparently sincere, if not polished ways, may not be too repulsive to English refinement, provided he does not buttonhole his interlocutionists, or does not pat them on the shoulder. So Thurlow Weed will be dined, wined, etc. But doubtless the London press will show him up, or some "Secesh" in London will do it. I am sure that Lord Lyons, as it is his paramount duty, has sent to Earl Russell a full and detailed biography of this Seward's alter ego, sent ad latus to Mr. Adams. Thurlow Weed will be considered an agreeable fellow; but he never can acquire much weight and consideration, neither with the statesmen, nor with the members of the government, nor in saloons, nor with the public at large.

Edward Everett begged to be excused from such a false position offered to him in London. Not fish, not flesh. It was rather an offence to proffer it to Everett. The old patriot better knows Europe, its cabinets, and exigencies, than those who attempted to intricate him in this ludicrous position. He is right, and he will do more good here than he could do in London—there on a level with Thurlow Weed!

Archbishop Hughes is to influence Paris and France,—but whom? The public opinion, which is on our side, is anti-Roman, and Hughes is an Ultra Montane—an opinion not over friendly to Louis Napoleon. The French clergy in every way, in culture, wisdom, instruction, theology, manners, deportment, etc., is superior to Hughes in incalculable proportions, and the French clergy are already generally anti-slavery. Hughes to act on Louis Napoleon! Why! the French Emperor can outwit a legion of Hugheses, and do this without the slightest effort. Besides, for more than a century European sovereigns, governments, and cabinets, have generally given up the use of bishops, etc., for political, public, or confidential missions. Mr. Seward stirs up old dust. All the liberal party in Europe or France will look astonished, if not worse, at this absurdity.

All things considered, it looks like one of Seward's personal tricks, and Seward outwitted Chase, took him in by proffering a similar mission to Chase's friend, Bishop McIlvaine. But I pity Dayton. He is a high-toned man, and the mission of Hughes is a humiliation to Dayton.

Whatever may be the objects of these missions, they look like petty expedients, unworthy a minister of a great government.

Mason and Slidell caught. England will roar, but here the people are satisfied. Some of the diplomats make curious faces. Lord Lyons behaves with dignity. The small Bremen flatter right and left, and do it like little lap-dogs.

Governor Andrew of Massachusetts, ex-Governor Boutwell, are tip-top men—men of the people. The Blairs are too heinous, too violent, in their persecution of Fremont. Warned M. Blair not to protect one whom Fremont deservedly expelled. But M. Blair, in his spite against Fremont, took a mean adventurer by the hand, and entangled therein the President.

The vessel and the crew are excellent, and would easily obey the hand of a helmsman, but there is the rub, where to find him? Lincoln is a simple man of the prairie, and his eyes penetrate not the fog, the tempest. They do not perceive the signs of the times - cannot embrace the horizon of the nation. And thus his small intellectual insight is dimmed by those around him. Lincoln begins now already to believe that he is infallible; that he is ahead of the people, and frets that the people may remain behind. Oh simplicity or conceit!

Again, Lincoln is frightened with the success in South Carolina, as in his opinion this success will complicate the question of slavery. He is frightened as to what he shall do with Charleston and Augusta, provided these cities are taken.

It is disgusting to hear with what superciliousness the different members of the Cabinet speak of the approaching Congress—and not one of them is in any way the superior of many congressmen.

When Congress meets, the true national balance account will be struck. The commercial and piratical flag of the secesh is virtually in all waters and ports. (The little cheese-eater, the Hollander, was the first to raise a fuss against the United States concerning the piratical flag. This is not to be forgotten.) 2d. Prestige, to a great extent, lost. 3d. Millions upon millions wasted. Washington besieged and blockaded, and more than 200,000 men kept in check by an enemy not by half as strong. 4th. Every initiative which our diplomacy tried abroad was wholly unsuccessful, and we are obliged to submit to new international principles inaugurated at our cost; and, summing up, instead of a broad, decided, general policy, we have vacillation, inaction, tricks, and expedients. The people fret, and so will the Congress. Nations are as individuals; any partial disturbance in a part of the body occasions a general chill. Nature makes efforts to check the beginning of disease, and so do nations. In the human organism nature does not submit willingly to the loss of health, or of a limb, or of life. Nature struggles against death. So the people of the Union will not submit to an amputation, and is uneasy to see how unskilfully its own family doctors treat the national disease.

Port Royal, South Carolina, taken. Great and general rejoicing. It is a brilliant feat of arms, but a questionable military and war policy. Those attacks on the circumference, or on extremities, never can become a death-blow to secesh. The rebels must be crushed in the focus; they ought to receive a blow at the heart. This new strategy seems to indicate that McClellan has not heart enough to attack the fastnesses of rebeldom, but expects that something may turn up from these small expeditions. He expects to weaken the rebels in their focus. I wish McClellan may be right in his expectations, but I doubt it.

Officers of McClellan's staff tell that Mr. Lincoln almost daily comes into McClellan's library, and sits there rather unnoticed. On several occasions McClellan let the President wait in the room, together with other common mortals.

The English statesmen and the English press have the notion deeply rooted in their brains that the American people fight for empire. The rebels do it, but not the free men.

Mr. Seward's emphatical prohibition to Mr. Adams to mention the question of slavery may have contributed to strengthen in England the above-mentioned fallacy. This is a blunder, which before long or short Seward will repent. It looks like astuteness—ruse; but if so, it is the resource of a rather limited mind. In great and minor affairs, straightforwardness is the best policy. Loyalty always gets the better of astuteness, and the more so when the opponent is unprepared to meet it. Tricks can be well met by tricks, but tricks are impotent against truth and sincerity. But Mr. Seward, unhappily, has spent his life in various political tricks, and was surrounded by men whose intimacy must have necessarily lowered and unhealthily affected him. All his most intimates are unintellectual mediocrities or tricksters.

Seward is free from that infamous know-nothingism of which this Gen. Thomas is the great master (a man every few weeks accused of treason by the public opinion, and undoubtedly vibrating between loyalty here and sympathy with rebels).

All this must have unavoidably vitiated Mr. Seward's better nature. In such way only can I see plainly why so many excellent qualities are marred in him. He at times can broadly comprehend things around him; he is good-natured when not stung, and he is devoted to his men.

As a patriot, he is American to the core—were only his domestic policy straight-forward and decided, and would he only stop meddling with the plans of the campaign, and let the War Department alone.

Since every part of his initiative with European cabinets failed, Seward very skilfully dispatches all the minor affairs with Europe—affairs generated by various maritime and international complications. Were his domestic policy as correct as is now his foreign policy, Seward would be the right man.

Statesmanship emerges from the collision of great principles with important interests. In the great Revolution, the thus called fathers of the nation were the offsprings of the exigencies of the time, and they were fully up to their task. They were vigorous and fresh; their intellect was not obstructed by any political routine, or by tricky political praxis. Such men are now needed at the helm to carry this noble people throughout the most terrible tempest. So in these days one hears so much about constitutional formulas as safeguards of liberty. True liberty is not to be virtually secured by any framework of rules and limitations, devisable only by statecraft. The perennial existence of liberty depends not on the action of any definite and ascertainable machinery, but on continual accessions of fresh and vital influences. But perhaps such influences are among the noblest, and therefore among the rarest, attributes of man.

Abroad and here, traitors and some pedants on formulas make a noise concerning the violation of formulas. Of course it were better if such violations had been left undone. But all this is transient, and evoked by the direst necessity. The Constitution was made for a healthy, normal condition of the nation; the present condition is abnormal. Regular functions are suspended. When the human body is ruined or devoured by a violent disease, often very tonic remedies are used—remedies which would destroy the organism if administered when in a healthy, normal condition. A strong organism recovers from disease, and from its treatment. Human societies and institutions pass through a similar ordeal, and when they are unhinged, extraordinary and abnormal ways are required to maintain the endangered society and restore its equipoise.

Examining day after day the map of Virginia, it strikes one that a movement with half of the army could be made down from Mount Vernon by the two turnpike roads, and by water to Occoquan, and from there to Brentsville. The country there seems to be flat, and not much wooded. Manassas would be taken in the rear, and surrounded, provided the other half of the army would push on by the direct way from here to Manassas, and seriously attack the enemy, who thus would be broken, could not escape. This, or any plan, the map of Virginia ought to suggest to the staff of McClellan, were it a staff in the true meaning. Dybitsch and Toll, young colonels in the staff of Alexander I., 1813-'14, originated the march on Paris, so destructive to Napoleon. History bristles with evidences how with staffs originated many plans of battles and of campaigns; history explains the paramount influence of staffs on the conduct of a war. Of course Napoleon wanted not a suggestive, but only an executive staff; but McClellan is not a Napoleon, and has neither a suggestive nor an executive staff around him. A Marcy to suggest a plan of a campaign or of a battle, to watch over its execution!

I spoke to McDowell about the positions of Occoquan and Brentsville. He answered that perhaps something similar will be under consideration, and that McClellan must show his mettle and capacity. I pity McDowell's confidence.

Besides, the American army as it was and is educated, nursed, brought up by Gen. Scott, —the army has no idea what are the various and complicated duties of a staff. No school of staff at West Point; therefore the difficulty to find now genuine officers of the staff. If McClellan ever moves this army, then the defectiveness of his staff may occasion losses and even disasters. It will be worse with his staff than it was at Jena with the Prussian staff, who were as conceited as the small West Point clique here in Washington.

West Point instructs well in special branches, but does not necessarily form generals and captains. The great American Revolution was fought and made victorious by men not from any military schools, and to whom were opposed commanders with as much military science as there was possessed and current in Europe. Jackson, Taylor, and even Scott, are not from the school.

I do not wish to judge or disparage the pupils from West Point, but I am disgusted with the supercilious and ridiculous behavior of the clique here, ready to form prætorians or anything else, and poisoning around them the public opinion. Western generals are West Point pupils, but I do not hear them make so much fuss, and so contemptuously look down on the volunteers. These Western generals pine not after regulars, but make use of such elements as they have under hand. The best and most patriotic generals and officers here, educated at West Point, are numerous. Unhappily a clique, composed of a few fools and fops, overshadows the others.

McClellan's speciality is engineering. It is a speciality which does not form captains and generals for the field,— at least such instances are very rare. Of all Napoleon's marshals and eminent commanders, Berthier alone was educated as engineer, and his speciality and high capacity was that of a chief of the staff. Marescott or Todleben would never claim to be captains. The intellectual powers of an engineer are modeled, drilled, turned towards the defensive,—the engineer's brains concentrate upon selecting defensive positions, and combine how to strengthen them by art. So an engineer is rather disabled from embracing a whole battle-field, with its endless casualties and space. Engineers are the incarnation of a defensive warfare; all others, as artillerists, infantry, and cavalry, are for dashing into the unknown—into the space; and thus these specialities virtually represent the offensive warfare.

When will they begin to see through McClellan, and find out that he is not the man? Perhaps too late, and then the nation will sorely feel it.

Mr. Seward almost idolizes McClellan. Poor homage that; but it does mischief by reason of its influence on the public opinion.

SOURCE: Adam Gurowski, Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862, pp. 115-28

Diary of Gideon Welles, Monday, July 9, 1866

Senator Morgan spent last evening at my house. Our conversation was chiefly on public affairs, but there was not that unreserved and cordial intimacy which we have sometimes had. No allusion was made to the national convention, which was unnatural and could not have been, had there been our old and friendly sympathy.

I censured strongly, perhaps harshly, the proposed Constitutional changes and the method of getting them through Congress by caucuses, excluding the Democratic minority and one third of the States, etc. He attempted no defense or justification. Trumbull, he tells me, has introduced another of his revolutionary bills to deprive the President of his Constitutional right of removing from office. This subject, like most measures in each house, was passed through a caucus crucible. M. says he refused to give it his sanction, and so did one other.

I have no doubt Morgan feels a little uncomfortable in the existing state of things, and I fancy he is conscious he has committed a mistake. There are strange men in position in New York. The Weed school is a bad one. Raymond is a specimen. A man of considerable talent, but of little consistency of principle. I have so said to the President more than once, and I think he understands R., yet Seward is in with him, directs his movements by Weed's help, and has influenced the President in R.'s favor to some extent. No man has more injured the cause of the President in Congress or more strengthened the Radicals than Raymond, the pronounced organ of the Administration, but only the confidant of Seward. He has by his fickle, versatile changes, attempting to go with the President but always deserting him, and always clinging to party, deterred [some] by his example, others by his ridiculous somersaults. No one follows him.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, pp. 549-50

Diary of Gideon Welles, Tuesday, July 10, 1866

No very striking matters in Cabinet. Seward read a long dispatch to Mr. Adams. Stanton excepted to the mention of our domestic affairs in such a document. I cared less about it in a confidential dispatch to our own Minister, but I did not like the phrase, or expressed hope, that Congress would concede to the Southern Members their seats. I preferred to hope that Congress would not much longer deny them their rights to seats.

Dennison, who has been absent for a fortnight in Ohio, was present.

Received telegram from California that my nephew, Samuel Welles, was severely injured by explosion of a boiler. Am distressed and anxious about him.

Doolittle called, and I went with him to McCulloch's. Had an hour's conversation. Doolittle is getting along and doing well. He is an honest, conscientious, and patriotic but credulous man. In this movement for a convention, of which he is the principal getter-up, he had permitted himself to be hampered by a hope that he could control in a great degree the Republican organization and retain it intact. He cannot give up that organization, of which the Radicals have possession, without reluctance. This is Seward's policy, and he has influenced Doolittle much on this point. Even yet he clings to Raymond. Is confident that Raymond will get a majority of the National Republican Committee to unite in favor of the Philadelphia Convention. It may be well enough, but is of less consequence than D. supposes. I think R. has scarcely any influence with the Committee. Seward thinks otherwise.

I told both Doolittle and McCulloch that I would thank them to inform me of the shape things were in, and were to be in, in New York. The President's friends and supporters were the Democrats, whom Seward, Weed, and Raymond were opposing, while their special friends were all Radicals and fighting the President. But while their followers are thwarting and resisting the President, the triumvirate claim to be his friends, and are actually and undeniably, by their intrigues, directing his movements, influencing and controlling such men as Doolittle to evade the true issue. I trust D. is beginning to have a more correct appreciation of matters.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, pp. 550-1

Diary of George Templeton Strong, May 16, 1860

Chicago Convention is in full boil and bubble. Strong opposition to Seward, but he will be nominated at last. That wily old Thurlow Weed, the most adroit of wire-pullers, seldom fails when he takes hold of a case in earnest. General Dix is to be Fowler’s successor in the post office. Butterworth of the assay office will decline the appointment.

SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, p. 27

Diary of Gideon Welles, Thursday, June 21, 1866

Senator Doolittle took tea with me. He wished me to go with him to the President, where some friends were to assemble to consider and decide in relation to the proposed call for a national convention. Senator Cowan, Browning,¹ Randall,² and three other persons whom I did not know, but who seemed attachés of Randall, and who, I understood, belonged to the National Union Johnson Club, composed the sitting. The call, which had been modified in slight respects, still omitted any allusion to the Constitutional changes, the really important question before the country. This I thought a great and radical defect, and Cowan and Browning concurred with me, as did McCulloch. Randall, who is flattered and used by Seward, opposed this, and his principal reason was that he would leave something for the convention to do. I asked why the convention was called, if not on this great issue which stood prominent beyond any other. "Well," he said, "it would hasten the calling of the State Legislatures to pass upon it." That, I told him, if properly used might be made to weaken them and strengthen us, we would demand an expression of popular sentiment through the instrumentality of an election, and thereby expose the recent hasty action which was intended to stifle public opinion.

Much of the conversation between eight and eleven o'clock was on this point, during which I became satisfied that Randall was prompted by Seward and unwittingly used for party purposes of Weed and Seward. The President evidently was with me in his convictions but forbore taking an active part. My impressions are that Seward has, in his way, indicated objections to making the Constitutional question a part of the call; that it would prevent Raymond and others from uniting in the movement. Finally, Browning and then McCulloch and Cowan yielded. They probably saw, as I did, that it was a foregone conclusion, was predetermined, that the meeting had been cunningly contrived and pushed by Randall.

Doolittle stated his purpose of having the members of the Cabinet sign the call. Both McCulloch and myself had doubts of its expediency and effect. The President, without expressing an opinion, showed that he concurred in Doolittle's suggestion.

McCulloch asked if Seward would put his name to it, and two or three undertook to vouch for him. I expressed my readiness to unite in what would be best for the Administration and the cause. If it was to have official significance, a proclamation I thought best. Seward, I am satisfied, would not sign it if the Constitutional point was presented, and I doubt if he will under any circumstances.

Something was said respecting Thurlow Weed, and the President remarked that Weed would be here to-morrow, but he knew Weed approved this movement and would sign the call. All this pained me. Seward and Weed are manifestly controlling the whole thing in an underhand way; they have possession of the President and are using the Administration for themselves and party rather than the President and country. They have eviscerated the call and will dissect and, I fear, destroy the effect of this move. Randall is a man of lax political morality, and I think his influence with the President is not always in the right direction. Seward knows his influence and intimacy in that quarter and has captured him, probably without R.'s being aware of it. The President finds that R. agrees with Seward, and it carries him in that direction. While R. means to reflect the President's wishes, he is really the tool of Seward and Weed, and is doing harm to the cause and to the President himself. But this matter cannot be corrected and will, I fear, prove ruinous.

I left soon after eleven and came home, desponding and unhappy. The cause is in bad and over-cunning if not treacherous hands, I fear. The proposed convention has no basis of principles. It will be denounced as a mere union with Rebels.

_______________

¹ O. H. Browning, who shortly succeeded Harlan as Secretary of the Interior.

² A. W. Randall, soon to succeed Dennison as Postmaster-General.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, pp. 533-5

Diary of Gideon Welles, Saturday, June 23, 1866

The President sent me a note this A.M. to call upon him this evening at eight. Although under the doctor's care and ordered to remain perfectly quiet, I rode over at the time. Doolittle called and went with me. Seward soon came in, followed by McCulloch, Cowan, Browning, and Randall. We went into the library, where the proposed call for a national convention was finished up. Seward, who, with Weed and Raymond, drew up or arranged this call which Doolittle fathers, now suggested two or three verbal alterations, most of which were adopted. It is intended that these "suggestions" shall cover up Weed's tracks.

In all that was said and done Seward fully agreed. He intends to keep within the movement, which has become a New York scheme, in order to control it. His belief is that the Republicans, of New York at least, will respond promptly to the call and make the President's cause, which he means shall be his and the old Whigs', their own. How this is to be done, and the course of the Senators and Representatives of that State be sustained by the Administration, he does not disclose. The Democrats, who in their way are the chief supporters of the President's measures, are snubbed. I perceive Seward is satisfied with both the President's and his and Weed's positions. The President, I think, is aware of this discrepancy, yet tries to believe all is right.

Seward remarked that McCulloch and myself had been uneasy because there had not been an earlier demonstration made and the President's policy distinctly stated, but he had been satisfied it was best to delay. I said that by the delay many of our friends had got committed against us, particularly on those Constitutional changes, — men whom we could by a plain, frank course have kept with us. He said they would come right, but we must give Congress an opportunity to show its hand. They had had seven months and had done nothing that they were satisfied with themselves. We have done nothing which it was our duty to have done, and are we and sound principles benefited by the Seward policy of delay?

Throughout the preliminary proceeding of this call there was a disinclination to make the proposed Constitutional changes an issue, yet it is the real question. This shirking from an open, honest course I can trace chiefly to Seward, though others have become complicated with him. Even the President himself has incautiously and without sufficient consideration used some expression in relation to the basis of representation which embarrasses him; and so of Doolittle and some others. Seward's confidants are fully committed, and hence he and they cannot act freely; consequently the great and important question is omitted in the call, which should have made the invasion of organic law prominent above all other points. He also, whilst conforming to the President's policy, strives to preserve Stanton as an ally, who intrigues with the Radicals.

This movement is an important one, and it has annoyed and pained me that there should have been a sacrifice of principle to gratify any one. If it proves a failure, which I do not mean to anticipate, it will be mainly attributable to the intrigues by which Seward and Weed have been brought into it and finally controlled or shaped proceedings. The intrigue has been cunningly and artfully managed by them. They have mainly shaped the call, although it is in all respects not what they wished. The President, I think, flatters himself that he has arranged to bring them in, whereas the truth is, he would have found it difficult to keep them out. Their aim and purpose are to remain with the old Republican organization, of which the Radicals, or old Whigs, have possession, but which, by the assistance of the President's patronage and the hocus-pocus of New York politics, Seward and Weed will work into their own schemes in that State. I am apprehensive that this movement in the cause of the Administration will by their intrigues and deceptions be made secondary to their purpose.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, pp. 538-40

Diary of Gideon Welles, Tuesday, June 26, 1866

We had not a protracted Cabinet meeting nor any specially interesting topic. I had thought the subject of the call for the convention, which appeared in this morning's paper, might be alluded to either before or after the business session, but it was as studiously avoided as if we had been in a Quaker meeting. There is no free interchange nor concurrence of views. Stanton is insincere, more false than Seward, who relies on expedients. Blair tells me he likes the call and thinks it will be effective. This inspires me with more confidence, for I had doubted whether he and men of his traits and views would acquiesce in it, particularly in its omissions. He does not apprehend the difficulty from Seward and Weed which has troubled me, for he says the President will cast Seward off and Stanton also. I had long seen that this was a necessity, but continued delay has disheartened expectation. Whether Blair has any fact to authorize his assertion, I know not. I can suppose it certain as an alternative. Stanton is unfaithful and acting secretly with the Radicals. He has gone. Either Seward must be discarded or the people will discard both him and the President. The latter does not realize that he is the victim of a double game, adapted to New York intrigues.

The papers state that the Senate of Connecticut adopted the Constitutional Amendment at midnight yesterday. This does not surprise me, yet had the President showed his hand earlier, the result might have been different in that State. But Seward, Weed, Raymond, and company are satisfied with this Radical Amendment. The latter voted for it. Weed has given it a quasi indorsement, and I do not remember to have heard Seward say a word against it. He hastened off a notice to Connecticut and the other States as the Radicals wished, without consulting the President or any member of the Cabinet. There has not been in Connecticut, or elsewhere, any deliberate, enlightened, intelligent, or comprehensive discussion of this measure, but a paltry, narrow, superficial talk or rant, all of the shallowest and meanest partisan character.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, pp. 541-2

Diary of Gideon Welles, Thursday, June 28, 1866

I understand that the Democratic Members of Congress have concluded to unite in the movement for the national convention of the 14th of August. I had some doubts whether they would readily come into it. Old party organizations and associations are strong. The Democratic papers have hesitated, and the New York World opposed the movement.

This opposition of the World is agreeable to Weed and company, and was intended by the New York Times, which was prompted by Weed and Seward, to foreshadow the convention and to assume that it was the Union Convention or Union Party Convention.

Senators Doolittle, Nesmith, Buckalew, and Harris and myself met in Colonel Cooper's room this evening, casually and accidentally. Most of the conversation was on the convention and the condition of parties. Harris is something of a trimmer, and, I perceive, a good deal embarrassed how to act, yet not prepared to take anti-Radical ground. Doolittle tried to persuade him that his true course was to go forward with the new movement, and, among other things, said that it was the movement which would ultimately prevail, — we should not succeed this fall but that the next election we should be successful. Of course such an admission would make such a calculating politician as Harris stick to the Radicals, for the next fall elections will be decisive of the Senatorial contest in New York. He will, therefore, under Doolittle's admission, go with the Radicals as the most likely way to secure his return to the Senate, — of which, however, there is not the remotest probability. He will be disappointed.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, pp. 542-3

Diary of Gideon Welles, Saturday, June 30, 1866

Had a long talk this afternoon with the President on the condition of affairs and especially in regard to the proposed national convention. He does not like the composition of the Cabinet, yet does not, in my opinion, perceive the most questionable feature in it. Harlan and Speed, he does not conceal from me, are in the way. The course and position of Dennison do not suit him. Dennison, like others, has been drawn into the Radical circle against his better judgment, is committed to the Republican Party, and is appointing extreme Radicals to the local post-offices, carrying out the views of the Radical Members and strengthening them by displacing friends of the President. In this I do not think D. intends antagonism to the President, although it is that and nothing else. But he does not permit himself to believe that the President and the Party, which is now a mere machine of Thad Stevens, are not identical.

Seward knows the distinction and yet contrives to persuade the President to acquiesce, while favoring the Radicals. It is curious, but by no means pleasant, to witness this proceeding. The President, usually sagacious, seems not to discern the management and ultimate purpose of the Secretary of State, who is prompted by Stanton, one of the Radical chiefs. Stanton has an assumed frankness, but his coarse manner covers a good deal of subtle duplicity. Seward never differs with the President. If he has taken an opposite view from or with others, or before the President's opinion is known, it disappears forever when the sentiments of the latter are ascertained. His knowledge and estimate of men are weak and erroneous in the extreme.

The President understands the political dexterity of Seward and yet does not apprehend that it may ever operate adverse to himself, nor does Seward intend to antagonize his chief. Some recent proceedings, connected with the schemes of the Radicals, are to me inexplicable, and in our talk I so informed the President. I could not understand how all the Republican Members from New York, a considerable portion of whom are under the influence of Seward and Weed, should vote steadily with the Radicals and against him, if Seward and Weed are his true friends.

The New York Times, Raymond's paper controlled by Weed, declared that the President and Radicals were pretty much reconciled on the Constitutional changes, and by this representation multitudes were entrapped into the measure. Seward, hastily and without consulting the President, hastened to send certified copies of the Amendment by the first mail to the State Executives. These and other things I alluded to as very singular, and that I could hardly reconcile them to sincere and honest friendship. The President was puzzled; said it was strange.

I told him I could account for these proceedings readily, if it were to build up and sustain the Weed and Seward party in New York, but it certainly was not strengthening the Administration.

Raymond and Seward knew of the movements for the convention, and the Times in advance spoke of it as a move to unite the Republican Party while it would certainly injure the Administration. The effect was, when the call appeared, to cause distrust among Democrats, and to repel the World, the Herald, etc. It looks like design or stupidity. I knew they were not fools.

My efforts to incorporate with the call a clause adverting to the proposed Constitutional changes which made a convention advisable were resisted and defeated by the tools of Seward, because it would be agreeable to the Democrats and opposed to the Radicals. His friends were committed on that subject. They had adopted it and were, therefore, antagonistic to Johnson, yet they succeeded through the assistance of Radicals who care little for principles.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, pp. 543-5

Diary of Gideon Welles, Monday, June 18, 1866

Senator Doolittle brought me last evening the rough draft of a proposed call for a national Union convention which he had prepared. Some of the points were well put, but there was too much restriction, too much fear that we should have men we did not care to fellowship with, although we might agree on present issues. To this I excepted, but my strongest point was the omission to meet and present the real issue, our objections to the proposed change of the Constitution which has passed the two houses of Congress.

"What," said I, "are the reasons for calling a convention at this time? Is it not because the faction in Congress, assisted by schemers out of Congress, have concocted a scheme under party excitement and by party machinery to change the Constitution in important particulars, and that by a snap judgment Governor Curtin has addressed a circular letter to the Governors of the several States, inviting an immediate convening of the State legislatures to adopt the proposed change, before the people can have an opportunity to express an opinion? An alarm should be sounded, warning the people of the movements that are being made to alter the organic law, and insidiously change the government."

These and other suggestions I saw made an impression on Doolittle, but still he hesitated and was embarrassed. Pressing him on this point, he admitted he wanted Raymond to sign the call, he being Chairman of the National Republican Committee, and Doolittle wanted others of that committee also to sign it. This I thought of less importance than to have a proper call; certainly I would not suppress the great essential for such a trimming, unreliable man as Raymond. As I urged the matter, he admitted that Raymond had seen the call and approved it; further that the President had read it, and I have no doubt that Seward had also seen it, although that was not distinctly stated. The call, if not the convention itself, is, I think, perverted to an intrigue in behalf of the old Whig Party, on which Weed and Seward rely.

I proposed that we should go and see Mr. McCulloch. It was raining intensely hard, but he at once accorded. He had been to Silver Spring and submitted the document to Mr. Blair and his son, who, he said, approved it.

Mr. McCulloch was not at home, and we parted, but the paper which D. presented, the convention, and the aspect of affairs gave me infinite concern. There is no doubt that Seward and Stanton have a personal understanding to act together. Stanton is in concert with the Radicals, and, at the same time, Seward is prompting Doolittle. The public is ripe for a convention, but this call is an artful contrivance to weaken it. The President is being subordinated by the intriguers, and the design is obviously to weaken the Administration and give the Radical Party the ascendant. Seward, beguiled by Stanton, expects to control the convention by the aid of Weed and Raymond. The fruition of seven months' intrigue means that and nothing else. They intend to rule the President, and I fear he will let them.

I stopped early this morning at Judge Blair's and inquired what he thought of the call. He said he had not been in any mood or mind to think of anything, having been without sleep the previous night, but it had appeared to him to have a too narrow basis. I then told him my view and the conversation Doolittle and myself had. Blair most earnestly agreed with me, said my views corresponded with his own, and promised to see the President if he could.

I called on McCulloch, who agreed to come to my house this evening and go with me to the President. When he called, I detailed the conversation with Doolittle, told him of my apprehensions, and dwelt emphatically on the subject of the Constitutional changes as the true basis of action, and our sounding the bugle-note of warning to arouse the people. My earnestness and the facts excited him, and we went to the President.

We spent an hour in a free and unrestricted conversation with the President. McCulloch, full of the views which I had urged, advised that the President should at once issue a proclamation after the manner of Jackson in regard to nullification, appealing to the people.

I inquired of the President if he had seen Doolittle since Sunday, and told him what I thought of the proposed form of call, and that the just alarm on the proposed change of the Constitution ought not on any account to be omitted. The people ought not to be deluded and cheated by trash. He concurred with me. I inquired if he had noticed that important omission in the proposed call. He did not answer direct, but said the call was too much in detail.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, pp. 529-31

Diary of Adam Gurowski: August 1861

THE truth about Bull Run will, perhaps, only reach the people when it becomes reduced to an historical use. I gather what I am sure is true.

About three weeks ago General McDowell took upon himself the responsibility to attack the enemy concentrated at Manassas. Deciding upon this step, McDowell showed the determination of a true soldier, and a cool, intelligent courage. According to rumors permeating the whole North; rumors originated by secessionists in and around Washington, and in various parts of the free States; rumors gulped by a part of the press, and never contradicted, but rather nursed, at headquarters, Manassas was a terrible, unknown, mysterious something; a bugbear, between a fortress made by art and a natural fastness, whose approaches were defended for miles by numberless masked batteries, and which was filled by countless thousands of the most ferocious warriors. Such was Manassas in public opinion when McDowell undertook to attack this formidable American Torres Vedras, and this with the scanty and almost unorganized means in men and artillery allotted to him by the senile wisdom of General Scott. General McDowell obtained the promise that Beauregard alone was to be before him. To fulfil this promise, General Scott was to order Patterson to keep Johnston, and a movement was to be made on the James River, so as to prevent troops coming from Richmond to Manassas. As it was already said, Patterson, a special favorite of General Scott, kindly allowed Johnston to save Beauregard, and Jeff. Davis with troops from Richmond likewise was on the spot. McDowell planned his plan very skilfully; no European general would have done better, and I am sure that such will be the verdict hereafter. Some second-rate mistakes in the execution did not virtually endanger its success; but, to say the truth, McDowell and his army were defeated by the imbecility of the supreme military authority. Imbecility stabbed them in the back.

One part of the press, stultified and stupefied, staggered under the blow; the other part showed its utter degradation by fawning on Scott and attacking the Congress, or its best part. The Evening Post staggered not; its editors are genuine, laborious students, and, above all, students of history. The editors of the other papers are politicians; some of them are little, others are big villains. All, intellectually, belong to the class called in America more or less well-read men; information acquired by reading, but which in itself is not much.

The brothers Blair, almost alone, receded not, and put the defeat where it belonged—at the feet of General Scott.

The rudis indigestaque moles, torn away from Scott's hands, already begins to acquire the shape of an army. Thanks to the youth, the vigor, and the activity of McClellan.

General Scott throws the whole disaster on politicians, and abuses them. How ungrateful. His too lofty pedestal is almost exclusively the work of politicians. I heard very, very few military men in America consider Scott a man of transcendent military capacity. Years ago, during the Crimean campaign, I spent some time at West Point in the society of Cols. Robert Lee, Walker, Hardee, then in the service of the United States, and now traitors; not one of them classed Scott much higher above what would be called a respectable capacity; and of which, as they said, there are many, many in every European army.

If one analyzes the Mexican campaign, it will be found that General Scott had, comparatively, more officers than soldiers; the officers young men, full of vigor, and in the first gush of youth, who therefore mightily facilitated the task of the commander. Their names resound to-day in both the camps.

Further, generals from the campaign in Mexico assert that three of the won battles were fought against orders, which signifies that in Mexico youth had the best of cautious senility. It was according to the law of nature, and for it was crowned with success.

Mr. Seward has a very active intellect, an excellent man for current business, easy and clear-headed for solving any second-rate complications; but as for his initiative, that is another question. Hitherto his initiative does not tell, but rather confuses. Then he sustains Scott, some say, for future political capital. If so it is bad; worse still if Mr. Seward sustains Scott on the ground of high military fitness, as it is impossible to admit that Mr. Seward knows anything about military affairs, or that he ever studied the description of any battle. At least, I so judge from his conversation.

Mr. Lincoln has already the fumes of greatness, and looks down on the press, reads no paper, that dirty traitor the New York Herald excepted. So, at least, it is generally stated.

The enemies of Seward maintain that he, Seward, drilled Lincoln into it, to make himself more necessary.

Early, even before the inauguration, McDowell suggested to General Scott to concentrate in Washington the small army, the depots scattered in Texas and New Mexico. Scott refused, and this is called a general! God preserve any cause, any people who have for a savior a Scott, together with his civil and military partisans.

If it is not direct, naked treason which prevails among the nurses, and the various advisers of the people, imbecility, narrow-mindedness, do the same work. Further, the way in which many leech, phlebotomize, cheat and steal the people's treasury, is even worse than rampant treason. I heard a Boston shipbuilder complain to Sumner that the ubiquitous lobbyist, Thurlow Weed, was in his, the builder's, way concerning some contracts to be made in the Navy Department, etc., etc. Will it turn out that the same men who are to-day at the head of affairs will be the men who shall bring to an end this revolt or revolution? It ought not to be, as it is contrary to logic, and to human events.

Lincoln alone must forcibly remain, he being one of the incarnated formulas of the Constitution, endowed with a specific, four years' lasting existence.

The Americans are nervous about foreign intervention. It is difficult to make them understand that no intervention is to be, and none can be made. Therein the press is as silly as the public at large. Certainly France does not intend any meddling or intervention; of this I am sure. Neither does England seriously.

Next, if these two powers should even thirst for such an injustice, they have no means to do it. If they break our blockades, we make war, and exclude them from the Northern ports, whose commerce is more valuable to them than that of the South. I do not believe the foreign powers to be forgetful of their interest; they know better their interests than the Americans.

The Congress adjourned, abandoning, with a confidence unparalleled in history, the affairs of the country in the hands of the not over far-sighted administration. The majority of the Congress are good, and fully and nobly represent the pure, clear and sure aspirations, instincts, nay, the clear-sightedness of the people. In the Senate, as in the House, are many, very many true men, and men of pure devotion, and of clear insight into the events; men superior to the administration; such are, above all, those senators and representatives who do not attempt or aim to sit on a pedestal before the public, before the people, but wish the thing to be done for the thing itself. But for the formula which chains their hands, feet, and intellect, the Congress contained several men who, if they could act, would finish the secession in a double-quick time. But the whole people move in the treadmill of formulas. It is a pity that they are not inspired by the axiom of the Roman legist, scire leges non est hoc verba earum tenere, sed vim ac potestatem. Congress had positive notions of what ought to be done; the administration, Micawber—like, looks for that something which may turn up, and by expedients patches all from day to day.

What may turn up nobody can foresee; matter alone without mind cannot carry the day. The people have the mind, but the official legal leaders a very small portion of it. Come what will, I shall not break down; I shall not give up the holy principle. If crime, rebellion, sauvagerie, triumph, it will be, not because the people failed, but it will be because mediocrities were at the helm. Concessions, compromises, any patched-up peace, will for a century degrade the name of America. Of course, I cannot prevent it; but events have often broken but not bent me. I may be burned, but I cannot be melted; so if secesh succeeds, I throw in a cesspool my document of naturalization, and shall return to Europe, even if working my passage.

It is maddening to read all this ignoble clap-trap, written by European wiseacres concerning this country. Not one knows the people, not one knows the accidental agencies which neutralize what is grand and devoted in the people.

Some are praised here as statesmen and leaders. A statesman, a leader of such a people as are the Americans, and in such emergencies, must be a man in the fullest and loftiest comprehension. All the noblest criteria of moral and intellectual manhood ought to be vigorously and harmoniously developed in him. He ought to have a deep and lively moral sense, and the moral perception of events and of men around him. He ought to have large brains and a big heart,—an almost all-embracing comprehension of the inside and outside of events,—and when he has those qualities, then only the genius of foresight will dwell on his brow. He ought to forget himself wholly and unconditionally; his reason, his heart, his soul ought to merge in the principles which lifted him to the elevated station. Who around me approaches this ideal? So far as I know, perhaps Senator Wade.

I wait and wait for the eagle which may break out from the White House. Even the burning fire of the national disaster at Bull Run left the egg unhatched. Utinam sim falsus, but it looks as if the slowest brains were to deal with the greatest events of our epoch. Mr. Lincoln is a pure-souled, well-intentioned patriot, and this nobody doubts or contests. But is that all which is needed in these terrible emergencies?

Lyon is killed,—the only man of initiative hitherto generated by events. We have bad luck. I shall put on mourning for at least six weeks. They ought to weep all over the land for the loss of such a man; and he would not have been lost if the administration had put him long ago in command of the West. O General Scott! Lyon's death can be credited to you. Lyon was obnoxious to General Scott, but the General's influence maintains in the service all the doubtful capacities and characters. The War Department, as says Potter, bristles with secessionists, and with them the old, rotten, respectable relics, preserved by General Scott, depress and nip in the bud all the young, patriotic, and genuine capacities.

As the sea corrodes the rocks against which it impinges, so egotism, narrow-mindedness, and immorality corrode the best human institutions. For humanity's sake, Americans, beware!

Always the clouds of harpies around the White House and the Departments,—such a generous ferment in the people, and such impurities coming to the surface!

Patronage is the stumbling stone here to true political action. By patronage the Cabinet keeps in check Congressmen, Senators, etc.

I learn from very good authority that when Russell, with his shadow, Sam. Ward, went South, Mr. Seward told Ward that he, Seward, intends not to force the Union on the Southern people, if it should be positively ascertained that that people does not wish to live in the Union! I am sorry for Seward. Such is not the feeling of the Northern people, and such notions must necessarily confuse and make vacillating Mr. Seward's—that is, Mr. Lincoln's policy. Seward's patriotism and patriotic wishes and expectations prevent him from seeing things as they are.

The money men of Boston decided the conclusion of the first national loan. Bravo, my beloved Yankees! In finances as in war, as in all, not the financiering capacity of this or that individual, not any special masterly measures, etc., but the stern will of the people to succeed, provides funds and means, prevents bankruptcy, etc. The men who give money send an agent here to ascertain how many traitors are still kept in offices, and what are the prospects of energetic action by the administration.

McClellan is organizing, working hard. It is a pleasure to see him, so devoted and so young. After all, youth is promise. But already adulation begins, and may spoil him. It would be very, very saddening.

Prince Napoleon's visit stirs up all the stupidity of politicians in Europe and here. What a mass of absurdities are written on it in Europe, and even by Americans residing there. All this is more than equalled by the solemn and wise speculations of the Americans at home. Bar-room and coffee-house politicians are the same all over the world, the same, I am sure, in China and Japan. To suppose Prince Napoleon has any appetite whatever for any kind of American crown! Bah! He is brilliant and intelligent, and to suppose him to have such absurd plans is to offend him. But human and American gullibility are bottomless.

The Prince is a noble friend of the American cause, and freely speaks out his predilection. His sentiments are those of a true Frenchman, and not the sickly free-trade pro-slaveryism of Baroche with which he poisoned here the diplomatic atmosphere. Prince Napoleon's example will purify it.

As I was sure of it, the great Manassas fortifications are a humbug. It is scarcely a half-way fortified camp. So say the companions of the Prince, who, with him, visited Beauregard's army.

So much for the great Gen. Scott, whom the companions of the Prince call a magnificent ruin.

The Prince spoke with Beauregard, and the Prince's and his companions' opinion is, that McDowell planned well his attack, but failed in the execution; and Beauregard thought the same. The Prince saw McClellan, and does not prize him so high as we do. These foreign officers say that most probably, on both sides, the officers will make most correct plans, as do pupils in military schools, but the execution will depend upon accident.

Mr. Seward shows every day more and more capacity in dispatching the regular, current, diplomatical business affairs. In all such matters he is now at home, as if he had done it for years and years. He is no more spread-eagle in his diplomatic relations; is easy and prompt in all secondary questions relating to secondary interests, and daily emerging from international complications.

Hitherto the war policy of the administration, as inspired and directed by Scott, was rather to receive blows, and then to try to ward them off. I expect young McClellan to deal blows, and thus to upturn the Micawber policy. Perhaps Gen. Scott believed that his name and example would awe the rebels, and that they would come back after having made a little fuss and done some little mischief. But Scott's greatness was principally built up by the Whigs, and his hold on Democrats was not very great. Witness the events of Polk's and Pierce's administrations. His Mississippi-Atlantic strategy is a delirium of a softening brain. Seward's enemies say that he puts up and sustains Scott, because in the case of success Scott will not be in Seward's way for the future Presidency. Mr. Lincoln, an old Whig, has the Whig-worship for Scott; and as Mr. Lincoln, in 1851, stumped for Scott, the candidate for the Presidency, the many eulogies showered by Lincoln upon Scott still more strengthened the worship which, of course, Seward lively entertains in Lincoln's bosom. Thus the relics of Whigism direct now the destinies of the North. Mr. Lincoln, Gen. Scott, Mr. Seward, form a triad, with satellites like Bates and Smith in the Cabinet. But the Whigs have not the reputation of governmental vigor, decision, and promptitude.

The vitiated impulse and direction given by Gen. Scott at the start, still prevails, and it will be very difficult to bring it on the right track—to change the general as well as the war policy from the defensive, as it is now, to the offensive, as it ought to have been from the beginning. The North is five to one in men, and one hundred to one in material resources. Any one with brains and energy could suppress the rebellion in eight weeks from to-day.

Mr. Lincoln in some way has a slender historical resemblance to Louis XVI.—similar goodness, honesty, good intentions; but the size of events seems to be too much for him.

And so now Mr. Lincoln is wholly overshadowed by Seward. If by miracle the revolt may end in a short time, Mr. Seward will have most of the credit for it. In the long run the blame for eventual disasters will be put at Mr. Lincoln's door.

Thank heaven! the area for action and the powers of McClellan are extended and increased. The administration seems to understand the exigencies of the day.

I am told that the patriotic and brave Senator Wade, disgusted with the slowness and inanity of the administration, exclaimed, "I do not wonder that people desert to Jeff. Davis, as he shows brains; I may desert myself." And truly, Jeff. Davis and his gang make history.

Young McClellan seems to falter before the Medusa—ruin Scott, who is again at his tricks, and refuses officers to volunteers. To carry through in Washington any sensible scheme, more boldness is needed than on the bloodiest battle-field.

If Gen. Scott could have disappeared from the stage of events on the sixth of March, his name would have remained surrounded with that halo to which the people was accustomed; but now, when the smoke will blow over, it may turn differently. I am afraid that at some future time will be applied to Scott  *  *  *  quia turpe ducunt parere minoribus, et quæ imberbi didicere, sense perdenda fateri.

Not self-government is on trial, and not the genuine principle of democracy. It is not the genuine, virtual democracy which conspired against the republic, and which rebels, but an unprincipled, infamous oligarchy, risen in arms to destroy democracy. From Athens down to to-day, true democracies never betrayed any country, never leagued themselves with enemies. From the time of Hellas down to to-day, all over the world, and in all epochs, royalties, oligarchies, aristocracies, conspired against, betrayed, and sold their respective father-lands. (I said this years ago in America and Europe.)

Fremont as initiator; he emancipates the slaves of the disloyal Missourians. Takes the advance, but is justified in it by the slowness, nay, by the stagnancy of the administration.

Gen. Scott opposed to the expedition to Hatteras!

If it be true that Seward and Chase already lay the tracks for the Presidential succession, then I can only admire their short-sightedness, nay, utter and darkest blindness. The terrible events will be a schooling for the people; the future President will not be a schemer already shuffling the cards; most probably it will be a man who serves the country, forgetting himself.

Only two members in the Cabinet drive together, Blair and Welles, and both on the right side, both true men, impatient for action, action. Every day shows on what false principle this Cabinet was constructed, not for the emergency, not in view to suppress the rebellion, but to satisfy various party wranglings. Now the people's cause sticks in the mud.

SOURCE: Adam Gurowski, Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862, p. 78-91

Diary of Gideon Welles: Wednesday, June 6, 1866

Montgomery Blair still persists that Seward is false to the President and that he and Stanton have an understanding. There are many strange things in Seward's course, and he is a strange man. I am inclined to think he is less false to the President than adhesive to the Secretary of State. He does not like Johnson less, but Seward more. Seward is afraid of the Democrats and does not love the Republicans. But he feels that he is identified with the Republicans, thinks he has rendered them service, and considers himself, under the tutoring of Thurlow Weed, as more than any one else the father of the party. The managers of the party dislike him and distrust him, fear that he will by some subtlety injure them, and do not give him their confidence. The Democrats look upon him as a puzzle, a Mephistopheles, a budget of uncertainties, and never have and never will trust him.

The President believes Seward a true supporter of his Administration. I think he means to support it. The President finds him a convenience, but does not always rely upon his judgment. His trust in Seward begets general distrust of the Administration. It is remarkable that none of Seward's devoted friends—men who under Weed breathe through his nostrils—sustain the President on his great measures. Raymond has been a whiffler on public measures, but no others have ever doubted, or dared express a doubt of, the Radical policy. This puzzles me.

Stanton is very anxious to retain his place, and yet he has a more intimate relation with the Radical leaders than with the President or any member of the Cabinet. His opinion and judgment, I think, the President values more than he does Seward's, yet he distrusts him more,—feels that he is insincere. But Stanton studies to conform to the President's decisions and determinations when he cannot change them, apparently unaware that he occupies an equivocal position, both with the President and the public.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 523 

Diary of Gideon Welles: Thursday, June 14, 1866

The House yesterday passed the Senate proposition to change the Constitution. It was before that body about two hours and was passed under the previous question. Such a reckless body, ready to break up the foundations of the government, has never been assembled, and such legislation, regardless of the organic law, would not only destroy public confidence but ruin the country. All is for party, regardless of right or of honest principle.

Representations are sent out that Congress has made great concessions in adopting the Senate's proposition, that they have yielded about everything, and that the President is pretty well satisfied with the question as now presented. There is design in all this, and some professed friends of the President are among the most active in it. The New York Times, and papers strongly under the influence of Seward and Weed, as well as their partisans, maintain these views. Thurlow Weed has been here within a few days and is always on errands of mischief. All looks to me like a systematic plan to absorb the President, or to destroy him. He still leans on Seward and seems under his influence, though with doubts and occasional misgivings. Seward himself defers to Stanton, - is becoming afraid of him. That Seward is cheated I cannot believe, and if he is not cheated I am constrained to believe the President is. And who is to undeceive him? I have on more than one occasion suggested my doubts, but while he has received my suggestions attentively he has pondered in obvious distress, and the subject is of so delicate a nature that I cannot do more.

At the very time that the House was adopting this Constitutional change, Green Clay Smith was nominated Governor of Montana. Smith professes to be with the President, but went with the Radicals on the test oath, and is made Governor.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 526-7

Diary of Gideon Welles: Friday, May 18, 1866

Ferry was elected Senator on the part of the House of Representatives of Connecticut by some thirty majority on Wednesday. In the Senate the election was postponed for a week, three of the Republican Senators refusing to vote for Ferry. This check has caused consternation among the Radicals here, and I have no doubt at home also. A violent onset will now be made on the three recusant or independent Senators. Intriguers at New Haven, and intriguers in their respective districts will be at work to influence them, and I have my doubts whether one or more of them may not be shaken.

In the mean time our friends should be at work upon others. A great mistake, however, has been committed in getting the members pledged for persons instead of principles. I have advised that they should put themselves on impregnable ground for the Union, irrespective of men or parties.

Seward has gone home. He told me he intended to make a speech while absent in favor of the President and his policy. Originating no measure himself, and cautious and calculating in adopting the plans of others, he nevertheless supposes that what he says has wonderful influence. I do not think he has ever made a speech which gave shape or character to a party, though usually the oracle of Weed and the managers of his party. Often his remarks have been more harmful than beneficial. His harangues at Auburn are studied orations, prepared after consultation with his confidants, and he is now pregnant with one. If it is a quiet baby, passive and pleasant, I shall be satisfied; if it has some deformities, I shall not be surprised.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 509-10

Diary of Adam Gurowski, March 1861

For the first time in my life I assisted at the simplest and grandest spectacle—the inauguration of a President. Lincoln's message good, according to circumstances, but not conclusive; it is not positive; it discusses questions, but avoids to assert. May his mind not be altogether of the same kind. Events will want and demand more positiveness and action than the message contains assertions. The immense majority around me seems to be satisfied. Well, well; I wait, and prefer to judge and to admire when actions will speak.

I am sure that a great drama will be played, equal to any one known in history, and that the insurrection of the slave-drivers will not end in smoke. So I now decide to keep a diary in my own way. I scarcely know any of those men who are considered as leaders; the more interesting to observe them, to analyze their mettle, their actions. This insurrection may turn very complicated; if so, it must generate more than one revolutionary manifestation. What will be its march—what stages? Curious; perhaps it may turn out more interesting than anything since that great renovation of humanity by the great French Revolution.

The old, brave warrior, Scott, watched at the door of the Union; his shadow made the infamous rats tremble and crawl off, and so Scott transmitted to Lincoln what was and could be saved during the treachery of Buchanan.

By the most propitious accident, I assisted at the throes among which Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet was born. They were very painful, but of the highest interest for me, and I suppose for others. I participated some little therein.

A pledge bound Mr. Lincoln to make Mr. Seward his Secretary of State. The radical and the puritanic elements in the Republican party were terribly scared. His speeches, or rather demeanor and repeated utterances since the opening of the Congress, his influence on Mr. Adams, who, under Seward's inspiration, made his speech de lana caprina, and voted for compromises and concessions, all this spread and fortified the general and firm belief that Mr. Seward was ready to give up many from among the cardinal articles of the Republican creed of which he was one of the most ardent apostles. They, the Republicans, speak of him in a way to remind me of the dictum, "omnia serviliter pro dominatione," as they accuse him now of subserviency to the slave power. The radical and puritan Republicans likewise dread him on account of his close intimacy with a Thurlow Weed, a Matteson, and with similar not over-cautious-as they call them-lobbyists.

Some days previous to the inauguration, Mr. Seward brought Mr. Lincoln on the Senate floor, of course on the Republican side; but soon Mr. Seward was busily running among Democrats, begging them to be introduced to Lincoln. It was a saddening, humiliating, and revolting sight for the galleries, where I was. Criminal as is Mason, for a minute I got reconciled to him for the scowl of horror and contempt with which he shook his head at Seward. The whole humiliating proceeding foreshadowed the future policy. Only two or three Democratic Senators were moved by Seward's humble entreaties. The criminal Mason has shown true manhood.

The first attempt of sincere Republicans was to persuade Lincoln to break his connection with Seward. This failed. To neutralize what was considered quickly to become a baneful influence in Mr. Lincoln's councils, the Republicans united on Gov. Chase. This Seward opposed with all his might. Mr. Lincoln wavered, hesitated, and was bending rather towards Mr. Seward. The struggle was terrific, lasted several days, when Chase was finally and triumphantly forced into the Cabinet. It was necessary not to leave him there alone against Seward, and perhaps Bates, the old cunning Whig. Again terrible opposition by Seward, but it was overcome by the radicals in the House, in the Senate, and outside of Congress by such men as Curtis Noyes, J. S. Wadsworth, Opdyke, Barney, &c., &c., and Blair was brought in. Cameron was variously opposed, but wished to be in by Seward; Welles was from the start considered sound and safe in every respect; Smith was considered a Seward man.

From what I witnessed of Cabinet-making in Europe, above all in France under Louis Philippe, I do not forebode anything good in the coming-on shocks and eruptions, and I am sure these must come. This Cabinet as it stands is not a fusion of various shadowings of a party, but it is a violent mixing or putting together of inimical and repulsive forces, which, if they do not devour, at the best will neutralize each other.

Senator Wilson answered Douglass in the Senate, that "when the Republican party took the power, treason was in the army, in the navy, in the administration," etc. Dreadful, but true assertion. It is to be seen how the administration will act to counteract this ramified treason.

What a run, a race for offices. This spectacle likewise new to me.

The Cabinet Ministers, or, as they call them here, the Secretaries, have old party debts to pay, old sores to avenge or to heal, and all this by distributing offices, or by what they call it here—patronage. Through patronage and offices everybody is to serve his friends and his party, and to secure his political position. Some of the party leaders seem to me similar to children enjoying a long-expected and ardently wished-for toy. Some of the leaders are as generals who abandon the troops in a campaign, and take to travel in foreign parts. Most of them act as if they were sure that the battle is over. It begins only, but nobody, or at least very few of the interested, seem to admit that the country is on fire, that a terrible struggle begins. (Wrote in this sense an article for the National Intelligencer; insertion refused.) They, the leaders, look to create engines for their own political security, but no one seems to look over Mason and Dixon's line to the terrible and with-lightning-like-velocity-spreading fire of hellish treason.

The diplomats utterly upset, confused, and do not know what god to worship. All their associations were with Southerners, now traitors. In Southern talk, or in that of treacherous Northern Democrats, the diplomats learned what they know about this country. Not one of them is familiar, is acquainted with the genuine people of the North; with its true, noble, grand, and pure character. It is for them a terra incognita, as is the moon. The little they know of the North is the few money or cotton bags of New York, Boston, Philadelphia,—these would-be betters, these dinner-givers, and whist-players. The diplomats consider Seward as the essence of Northern feeling.

How little the thus-called statesmen know Europe. Sumner, Seward, etc. already have under consideration if Europe will recognize the secesh. Europe recognizes faits accomplis, and a great deal of blood will run before secesh becomes un fait accompli. These Sewards, Sumners, etc. pay too much attention to the silly talk of the European diplomats in Washington; and by doing this these would-be statesmen prove how ignorant they are of history in general, and specially ignorant of the policy of European cabinets. Before a struggle decides a question a recognition is bosh, and I laugh at it.

The race, the race increases with a fearful rapidity. No flood does it so quick. Poor Senators! Some of them must spend nights and days to decide on whom to bestow this or that office. Secretaries or Ministers wrangle, fight (that is the word used), as if life and death depended upon it.

Poor (Carlylian-meaning) good-natured Senator Sumner, in his earnest, honest wish to be just and of service to everybody, looks as a hare tracked by hounds; so are at him office-seekers from the whole country. This hunting degrades the hounds, and enervates the patrons.

I am told that the President is wholly absorbed in adjusting, harmonizing the amount of various salaries bestowed on various States through its officeholders and office-seekers.

It were better if the President would devote his time to calculate the forces and resources needed to quench the fire. Over in Montgomery the slave-drivers proceed with the terrible, unrelenting, fearless earnestness of the most unflinching criminals.

After all, these crowds of office-hunters are far from representing the best element of the genuine, laborious, intelligent people,—of its true healthy stamina. This is consoling for me, who know the American people in the background of office-hunters.

Of course an alleviating circumstance is, that the method, the system, the routine, oblige, nay force, everybody to ask, to hunt. As in the Scriptures, "Ask, and you will get; or knock, and it will be opened." Of course, many worthy, honorable, deserving men, who would be ornaments to the office, must run the gauntlet together with the hounds.

It is reported, and I am sure of the truth of the report, that Governor Chase is for recognizing, or giving up the revolted Cotton States, so as to save by it the Border States, and eventually to fight for their remaining in the Union. What logic! If the treasonable revolt is conceded to the Cotton States, on what ground can it be denied to the thus called Border States? I am sorry that Chase has such notions.

It is positively asserted by those who ought to know, that Seward, having secured to himself the Secretaryship of State, offered to the Southern leaders in Congress compromise and concessions, to assure, by such step, his confirmation by the Democratic vote. The chiefs refused the bargain, distrusting him. All this was going on for weeks, nay months, previous to the inauguration, so it is asserted. But Seward might have been anxious to preserve the Union at any price. His enemies assert that if Seward's plan had succeeded, virtually the Democrats would have had the power. Thus the meaning of Lincoln's election would have been destroyed, and Buchanan's administration would have been continued in its most dirty features, the name only being changed.

Old Scott seems to be worried out by his laurels; he swallows incense, and I do not see that anything whatever is done to meet the military emergency. I see the cloud.

Were it true that Seward and Scott go hand in hand, and that both, and even Chase, are blunted axes!

I hear that Mr. Blair is the only one who swears, demands, asks for action, for getting at them without losing time. Brave fellow ! I am glad to have at Willard's many times piloted deputations to the doors of Lincoln on behalf of Blair's admission into the Cabinet. I do not know him, but will try to become nearer acquainted.

But for the New York radical Republicans, already named, neither Chase nor Blair would have entered the Cabinet. But for them Seward would have had it totally his own way. Members of Congress acted less than did the New Yorkers.

The South, or the rebels, slave-drivers, slave-breeders, constitute the most corrosive social decompositions and impurities; what the human race throughout countless ages successively toiled to purify itself from and throw off. Europe continually makes terrible and painful efforts, which at times are marked by bloody destruction. This I asserted in my various writings. This social, putrefied evil, and the accumulated matter in the South, pestilentially and in various ways influenced the North, poisoning its normal healthy condition. This abscess, undermining the national life, has burst now. Somebody, something must die, but this apparent death will generate a fresh and better life.

The month of March closes, but the administration seems to enjoy the most beatific security. I do not see one single sign of foresight, this cardinal criterion of statesmanship. Chase measures the empty abyss of the treasury. Senator Wilson spoke of treason everywhere, but the administration seems not to go to work and to reconstruct, to fill up what treason has disorganized and emptied. Nothing about reorganizing the army, the navy, refitting the arsenals. No foresight, no foresight! either statesmanlike or administrative. Curious to see these men at work. The whole efforts visible to me and to others, and the only signs given by the administration in concert, are the paltry preparations to send provisions to Fort Sumpter. What is the matter? what are they about?

SOURCE: Adam Gurowski, Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862, p. 13-21