Reverend Dr. Orville Dewey to William Cullen Bryant, May 14, 1863

Roslyn, May 14th

My wife and I read your second “Talk with the Camp” together, and were much edified. She thought you had written nothing better, and I was half inclined to agree with her. You cannot think how it consoles me and puts me in spirits when I see an old fellow at your time of life outdoing himself. I read the lives of literary Englishmen, and find them nearly good for nothing after a certain age that shall be nameless, and the effect is dispiriting. I declare I think that the intellect here retains its vigor longer in this country than in theirs, with all their boasts of the healthfulness of their climate.

As to the necessity of wars, I find it somewhat difficult to go along with you. It does not seem to me that they are more necessary than religious persecutions. Henry IV of France was wise beyond his age when he contemplated a tribunal for settling the differences between nations without a resort to force. But we have wars whether they be necessary or not, just as we have had religious persecutions, imprisonments, and burnings for heresy. And, while we have wars, we must try to extract what good from them we can.

SOURCE: Parke Godwin, A Biography of William Cullen Bryant, Volume 1, p. 194-5

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: May 24, 1861

Congress passed, in secret session, a resolution to remove the seat of government to Richmond; but I learn it has been vetoed by the President. There is a strong feeling against going thither among some of the secessionists in the Cotton States. Those who do not think there will be a great deal of fighting, have apprehensions that the border States, so tardy in the secession movement, will strive to monopolize the best positions and patronage of the new government. Indeed, if it were quite certain that there is to be no war for existence — as if a nation could be free without itself striking the blow for freedom — I think there would be a party — among the politicians, not the people — opposed to confederating with the border slave States.

Some of his fellow-members tell many jokes on Mr. Hunter. They say every time he passes the marble-yards going up to the capitol, and surveys the tomb-stones, he groans in agony, and predicts that he will get sick and die here. If this be true, I predict that he will get the seat of government moved to Richmond, a more congenial climate. He has a way of moving large bodies, which has rarely failed him; and some of his friends at the hotels, already begin to hint that he is the proper man to be the first President of the permanent government. I think he will be President some day. He would be a safe one. But this whisper at the hotel has produced no little commotion. Some propose making him Secretary of War, as a sure means of killing him off. I know a better way than that, but I wouldn't suggest it for the world. I like him very much.

To-day the Secretary placed in my hands for examination and report, a very long document, written by a deposed or resigned Roman priest. He urged a plan to avert the horrors of war. He had been to see Lincoln, Gov. Letcher, etc., and finally obtained an interview on “important business” with President Davis. The President, not having leisure even to listen to his exordium, requested him to make his communication briefly in writing. And this was it — about twenty pages of foolscap. It consisted chiefly of evidences of the exceeding wickedness of war, and suggestions that if both belligerents would only forbear to take up arms, the peace might be preserved, and God would mediate between them. Of course I could only indorse on the back “demented.” But the old man hung round the department for a week afterward, and then departed, I know not whither. I forget his name, but his paper is in the archives of the government. I have always differed with the preachers in politics and war, except the Southern preachers who are now in arms against the invader. I think war is one of the providences of God, and certainly no book chronicles so much fighting as the Bible. It may be to the human race what pruning is to vegetation, a necessary process for the general benefit.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 41-2