Diary of Private John J. Wyeth, December 21, 1862

CAMP STEVENSON.

Sunday. A splendid day; but what a miserable-looking set of boys we are!—stiff, lame, and dirty, and hungry for more beans. We received the welcome order, "No work for three days." We went to church this morning, so there are really only two days and a half, and they will soon be gone. But we have letters to answer, trips down-town to make, for those who can get passes; and the first thing we know it will be Wednesday.

SOURCE: John Jasper Wyeth, Leaves from a Diary Written While Serving in Co. E, 44 Mass. Dep’t of North Carolina from September 1862 to June 1863, p. 30

Diary of Private John J. Wyeth, December 24, 1862

Wednesday, and our duties have commenced again: regular camp routine,—drill, guard, and police, the same as before the last march.

We are forgetting the sore feet, and gaining flesh every day, and an occasional run down town to Blagg's tends to rub off the rough edge of being cooped behind sentries.

SOURCE: John Jasper Wyeth, Leaves from a Diary Written While Serving in Co. E, 44 Mass. Dep’t of North Carolina from September 1862 to June 1863, p. 30

Diary of Private John J. Wyeth, December 25, 1862

Christmas. A fine day, and, being my birthday, I was allowed a furlough, for chum and self, from reveille till tattoo.

We started as early as possible for New Berne, and, among other things, had a first-class turkey dinner, with all the fixings, silverware, cut glass, white tablecloth, and some one to wait on table. But for us, as for all, the day came to a close, and at the usual time we were back, no better than about eighty others, excepting the memory of home-life which the associations of the day had called up.

SOURCE: John Jasper Wyeth, Leaves from a Diary Written While Serving in Co. E, 44 Mass. Dep’t of North Carolina from September 1862 to June 1863, p. 30

Diary of Private John J. Wyeth, December 30, 1862

The paymaster looked in on us. He is the first we have had any dealings with, and we are glad he came, for most of "E" have been "hard up." We received pay from August 29th to November 1st,—$27.30 each. We expected to get the whole, and were disappointed; for when many of us squared up, it took about all that we received to settle our debts. We are drilled now as a brigade nearly every day, firing blank cartridges; consequently our guns need extra cleaning, and we get more marching. Evidently they mean our brigade to be number one.

SOURCE: John Jasper Wyeth, Leaves from a Diary Written While Serving in Co. E, 44 Mass. Dep’t of North Carolina from September 1862 to June 1863, p. 31

Diary of Private John J. Wyeth, December 31, 1862

The last day of an eventful year to us, but the matters worthy of note are few and far between.

We drilled hard from two o'clock till we had barely time to clean up for dress parade, and very little can be said of brigade drills in their favor. The principal thing being, we passed the "defile" many times, and formed en echelon, about all the afternoon. It may be it was to celebrate the new "star,”—our Gen. Stevenson wearing his for the first time to-day. If that was it we will forgive him, but if the star is going to increase the brigade drills we shall wish he never had won it.

Our brigade now is the 2d in the 1st Division, Acting Major-General Wessels, and is composed of the 5th R. I., 10th Conn., 24th Mass., 44th Mass., and Belger's R. I. Battery.

SOURCE: John Jasper Wyeth, Leaves from a Diary Written While Serving in Co. E, 44 Mass. Dep’t of North Carolina from September 1862 to June 1863, p. 31

Senator Charles Levi Woodbury to Senator Robert M. T. Hunter, April 1, 1856

BOSTON, [MASS.], April 1st, 1856.

DEAR SIR: I send you a copy of the French Tariff whose promulgation has reached here in the last mail. In the pendency of the proposed revision of our own, the new position of France, possesses much [of] importance. Our constitutional and treaty limitations necessarily make the task of revising a tariff, full of perplexity and requiring mature analysis.

With all the aid the Treasury Department have furnished to the experience of Genl. [Charles Tillinghast] James,¹ there are some features in his otherwise able bill, which are based on principles that cannot be justified in the free trade school of Statesmanship. There is a living faith in popular opinion eventually rendering to a patriot and a statesman the acknowledgment of his merit and forecast. You are beginning to experience this in the North. It has happened to me several times within a few weeks, conversing with leading merchants and manufacturers of this section, to hear from their lips those acknowledgments with regard to yourself that none of our party could ever have expected.

The policy you have advocated is now successful and the manufacturers here, express their unqualified confidence that you can arrange a revision of the tariff which would be absolutely satisfactory to the South and agreeable to the North. From the known accordance of my views with your policy, it could not have been intended I should withhold these expressions from your knowledge.

In my judgment the time has come when the tariff may be set on a permanent footing of low duties and equitable adjustments. To reaffirm at this juncture the cardinal principles of the advalorem and foreign valuations, to establish the free trade policy on the admitted basis of its general welfare and to reduce the unnecessary and enormous revenue now derived from customs, would carry important consequences in the political world which none can better estimate than yourself. I should not write thus frankly, did I not presume you were occupied with the proposed revision. The confidence all these great interests repose in you make this a happy moment for your effecting permanent good, and with your permission, it would give me great satisfaction to aid in bringing the interests here to that communication, which would possess you of their views, and show that they approved this question in a spirit of concession heretofore unknown to them. Allow me to renew the expressions of my sincere esteem.

_______________

¹ A Democratic Senator in Congress from Rhode Island, 1851-1857. He was elected as a protective tariff Democrat.

SOURCE: Charles Henry Ambler, Editor, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1916, in Two Volumes, Vol. II, Correspondence of Robert M. T. Hunter (1826-1876), p. 185-6

Francis Mallory to Senator Robert M. T. Hunter, April 13, 1856

NORFOLK, [VA.], April 13, 1856.

DEAR HUNTER: Since my return home I have been so unwell that I have had no opportunity of mixing extensively among the people though so far as I can learn you have gained much in this district. Buchanan's popularity is based on that of Wise whose friends have sought to make the impression that he (B) is the strongest man now before the people. This causes the timid and time serving to represent themselves as preferring Buch[ana]n. Wise has lost all power in the East save among his Eastern Shore men and such as they can influence. The Eboshin and Fendum have done their work effectually and two or three appointments made in this place within a few weeks past have given great dissatisfaction because they were taken from among the Eastern Shore men in preference to residents. Buck's [Buchanan's] is only a reflection of Wise's popularity and to dissipate it is no difficult matter. The idea that to insure success for the Cincinnatti nominee he must be from the North has been industriously circulated over the South, and this has been the chief weapon of the W. and B.¹ men. Let something be done in the right quarter to cause doubt of its truth and we can carry every Eastern district. Give me a program for operations and I will carry it out. If you wish an open demonstration made I will have it started here or in some county. How are you and Pierce now? Would it be safe to make one for him as the choice of the Northern candidates, if so would [it] whip the office holders into measures? But as to this I will not move till I hear from you. Banks sends me word all is right above-that is in the upper part of the district. Simkins, Wise's friend, is proud of the Demo[cratic] Associations but the selections was not plain because of the jealousy over here about Eastern men. He talks of resigning, if so a Hunter man will fill it. The election was no test but was owing to the personal popularity of Simkins. Tell me what I can do and I am ready to act

I may be in Washington in 10 or 12 days. Pierce promised my son a commission in the army, the first vacancy last spring or summer but I have not troubled him since. He was disposed to confer it then but Davis defeated me. Pierce felt and expressed some compunction for his move against me as Navy agent and wished to make amends in this way. I care nothing for it myself but the boy (now 22 years old) is anxious for it. He was educated at Lexington and would make, so says Col[onel] Smith a fine officer. He seems to have no turn for anything else but he is well behaved, handsome and brave. He had much better marry a rich girl but he seems to prefer fighting Indians at $40 per month, and being a wilfull boy he must have his way. Is there any chance? Some forty vacancies have occurred within a few months. But I started to write you about other matters and did not design to trouble you with my small wants.

[P. S.] How would it do for me as an old Fillmore man to come out in a letter assigning reasons why I could not vote for him and giving reasons also for my preference for others. If this would be politic give me an outline of my platform-who I should war upon-who pray-and how far to go in either case. Is not Millson² against Pierce? I should think so from questions he put to me the other day.

_______________

¹ Wise and Buchanan men.

² John S. Millson, a Representative in Congress from Virginia, 1849-1861.

SOURCE: Charles Henry Ambler, Editor, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1916, in Two Volumes, Vol. II, Correspondence of Robert M. T. Hunter (1826-1876), p. 186-8

Major Robert Selden Garnett to Senator Robert M. T. Hunter, April 20, 1856

POST AT MUCKLESHUTE PRAIRIE,        

NEAR STEILACOONE, W. T., April 20, 1856.

MY DEAR COUSIN: By the time this reaches you the excitement growing out of the Cincinnati Convention will, I presume, have somewhat subsided. I need not tell how much I hope it may find you the successful man in the struggle that may occur there. Should however this be not the case, I hope you will console yourself with the reflection that there is yet sufficient time ahead for your turn.

It was my intention at an early day after my arrival in this country to post you up thoroughly on the origin and merits of this war going on here with the Indians. But I no sooner landed than I was packed off to this outpost where I have been unable to see any intelligent or disinterested man who could give me the information I wanted. Nor have I been able to meet any hostile Indians in action or otherwise and learn from them their own accounts of their difficulties. Indeed it is in this respect that I conceive one of the greatest blunders of the whole business has been committed, for I have been unable yet to see any one who can give me an intelligent and consistent account of what the Indians regard as the cause of the war, and as its object, and upon what terms &c they desire. We in the Army are campaigning and fighting here in the dark. Without understanding the cause or the object of the war, and consequently without the means of knowing what are the best means to bring about a peace. Most of the whites say it is dissatisfaction with the treaties made by Gov. Stevens. If so instead of going to War on the subject, and, attempting to teach them a lesson on adhering to treaties which will cost us some millions of money, why not send for them and learn what features of the treaty are distasteful to them, and if reasonable why not let them have what they want as long as it does not interfere with the just wants and safety of the settlers. I am told the Indians complain that by these treaties they are required to live upon small reserves incapable of subsisting them and their animals in their mode of life. That the Indians [?] have been located upon lands badly situated, indeed so much so that the whites can't use it, with no prairie or pasture lands for their animals and no clear lands for their potatoes &c; and that if they are all crowded upon such small ill-selected spots they must starve to death.

If there is truth in this, and no one has tried that I know of, to see the hostile Indians to ascertain whether this be so or not, it is in my opinion a just cause not only of dissatisfaction and complaint but of war. We cant expect men to change their habits of life, the habits of their race, or to starve to death quietly merely to satisfy the wild schemes of white men. If this be true I can see no reason why they should not have larger and more suitable reserves given them, particularly too since they have relinquished by these treaties more lands than will be sufficient for the settlers of this country, at present rates, and for the next hundred years. In making this concession to them we should be giving them nothing more than humanity demands us to give them, and which common justice should never have permitted us to take away from them. But you will gather from the enclosed newspaper slips something of the merits of the question at issue between the authorities here. From all that I can learn I am well satisfied that this War has been very unnecessarily brought on by Govr. Stevens' treaties. Not only by the ill judged provisions of the treaties themselves, but especially by entering into treaties with them where the wants of the country (in my judgment) did not require anything of the sort. As bad fortune would have it I am told that this treaty, out of the large number which he made on his Quixotic pilgrimage in the interior of the continent where no white men will settle in the next 300 years perhaps, was the only one which reached Washington City in time to be confirmed by the Senate during the last Congress, and is now the law of the land. I am satisfied that if this were not the case and I had the power from Mr. Pierce to annul and destroy Stevens' treaty I could establish a permanent peace here in six weeks and not fire a rifle, a peace by which the settlers should be safe from danger, and not checked in their settlement of the country. And I would make no concession to the Indians which any practical and reasonable man could find fault with.

SOURCE: Charles Henry Ambler, Editor, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1916, in Two Volumes, Vol. II, Correspondence of Robert M. T. Hunter (1826-1876), p. 188-9

Diary of Private Adam S. Johnston, July 8, 1862

Left Camp Cooper, and arrived the sameday at Wartrace, remaining in the above mentioned camp twenty-six days, without moving. Encamped for the night in Wartrace, guarding commissary or station all night ; making a march of 8 miles.

SOURCE: Adam S. Johnston, The Soldier Boy's Diary Book, p. 17

Diary of Private Adam S. Johnston, July 9, 1862

Left Wartrace and arrived at Duck river the same day as guard for rail road bridges and fortifications there, and encamped for the night at Duck river bridge camp, making a march of 5 miles.

SOURCE: Adam S. Johnston, The Soldier Boy's Diary Book, p. 17

Diary of Private Adam S. Johnston, July 14, 1862

Left Camp Duck river and arrived the same day at Tullahoma and encamped for the night, making a march of 9 miles.

SOURCE: Adam S. Johnston, The Soldier Boy's Diary Book, p. 17

Diary of Private Adam S. Johnston, July 25, 1862

Left Tullahoma and marched to Manchester fair grounds, Coffee county, Tenn., and encamped for the night, making a march of 11 miles.

SOURCE: Adam S. Johnston, The Soldier Boy's Diary Book, p. 17-8

Daniel Webster to Fletcher Webster, March 12, 1851

Washington, March 12, 1851.

DEAR FLETCHER,—I understand that our neighbor, Mr. Waterman, furnishes Boston bakers, or roasters, which have machinery by which the spit is turned while the meat is roasting. I wish you would inquire, and if such an article is to be had, send me a good one.

It ought to be open, for the admission of air, on both sides.

Yours,

D. W.

SOURCE: Fletcher Webster, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Daniel Webster, Vol. 2, p. 421

Daniel Webster to Richard M. Blatchford, March 12, 1851

Washington, March 12, 1851.

MY DEAR SIR,—I am tired of sitting, and Mr. Sargent writes this note, while I am acting the part of a peripatetic philosopher. You will find herein a certain document, defunct and obliterated.

The weather is very fine, and I am very well. Morgan is here, and when I am in the saddle on his back, I am far from being motionless. The Morgan horse is a cross between a Normandy horse, now spread all over Canada, and the English blood horse; it has the sloping hip, and strong shoulder, and crooked hind leg, and broad shin of Normandy, with the spirit of the English hunter. Its chef-d'œuvre is best performed in a single wagon. In two respects he resembles the Narraganset horse, to wit, he has a broad spread nostril, and great breadth between the eyes; the line from the top of his head along his mane, and back to his hips, is nearly straight; on a level road, therefore, his draught is parallel to the surface of the ground. Whereas a horse, who carries his head very high, though the ground be level, is constantly pulling up hill. So much for Morgan, and a dissertation on horses. If you wish to see a perfectly graphic thing on such a subject, turn to Walter Scott's description of Lord Marmion's horse flying from Flodden Field.

Mr. and Mrs. Curtis are well; we had a very pleasant dinner there yesterday, with Mr. Stephens, and Mr. Aspinwall, and Miss Mary Scott. Mrs. Webster and I hope to see the same company to-day, at five o'clock, partaking of a Potomac shad, and some other provant or other vivres, at our house in Louisiana avenue.

When you think of it, tell me who is successor to Brigham. And here, my dear Sir, I stop from walking and talking.

Yours, always most truly,

DAN'L WEBSTER.

SOURCE: Fletcher Webster, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Daniel Webster, Vol. 2, p. 421-2

Daniel Webster to Messrs. Richards and others, March 21, 1851

Washington, March 21, 1851.

GENTLEMEN,—On the receipt of letter of the 14th of February, I deemed it advisable to postpone an answer until the carriage, harness, and horses should arrive here. They came on, and were received, all sound and in good order, in the early part of this month. Unfortunately, I failed as well at my own house as at other places, in various attempts to see Mr. Wood, who brought on the carriage, so that I only had one short interview with him; and the pressure of affairs at the breaking up of Congress, and until the final adjournment of the Senate, has obliged me to put off until to-morrow, every thing not absolutely necessary to be done to-day.

And now, gentlemen, I have to thank you for your costly and handsome present. The carriage itself is thought to be as elegant as any ever seen in the country. It appears to be of exquisite workmanship, and is rich without being gaudy. It is very commodious, and its motion pleasant and agreeable.

The horses attached to the carriage are, I think, quite worthy of it. They are certainly uncommonly handsome, and their travelling and action very fine. On the whole, gentlemen, I rather fear that this equipage is too splendid and superb for a plain farmer of Marshfield; but as it has been your pleasure to make me so very valuable a gift, I accept it with all thankfulness, and shall always regard it as the measure, not of my merit, but of your bounty and munificence.

But, gentlemen, I am more deeply your debtor for the estimation in which you are pleased to hold my public services in the counsels of the country. If I have attempted to expound the Constitution, I have attempted to expound that which I have studied with diligence and veneration from my early manhood to the present day. If I have endeavored to defend and uphold the Union of the States, it is because my fixed judgment and my unalterable affections have impelled me, and still impel me, to regard that Union as the only security for general prosperity and national glory. Yes, gentlemen, the Constitution and the Union! I place them together. If they stand, they must stand together; if they fall they must fall together. They are the images which present to every American his surest reliance, and his brightest hopes. If they perish in my day or afterwards, I shall still leave, in the history of the times, my own deep, heartfelt and engrossing conviction that they are among the greatest political blessings ever bestowed by Providence on man; and that if, in any course of disastrous events, such as may happen to all human institutions, they should become severed and broken, even their history and their memories will constitute a track of light, upon which all lovers of human liberty, in after

times, may gaze with admiration. Yes, gentlemen! Union and the Constitution!

"Fortunati ambo! Si quid mea carmina possunt

Nulla dies unquam memori vos eximet ævo.

Dum domus Æneæ Capitoli immobile saxum

Accolet, imperiumque pater Romanus habebit."

I was not unaware, gentlemen, on the morning of the 7th of March last year, that I was entering upon a duty which, as you suggest, might bring into peril that favor which has been long shown me by that political party whose general principles I had for a long time steadily maintained. A crisis had arrived in which it did not become me, as I thought, to be indifferent and to do nothing. Still less did it become me to act a part which should inflame sectional animosities and tend to destroy all genuine American feeling, and shake the fabric of the government to its foundation. I was willing to trust and am still willing to trust for the vindication of my motives, to the intelligent men of my party and of all parties. I should indeed have been wholly unworthy of that character, which it is my highest ambition to maintain among my countrymen, if I had allowed any personal peril to bear with the weight of a feather against my profound sense of public duty. Whatever may now happen, I shall meet it with a clear conscience, and a fixed purpose; and while acting in full coöperation with the great mass of our fellow citizens, who hold the same sentiments that you hold, I shall fear nothing.

I am, gentlemen, your obliged friend and fellow-citizen,

DANIEL WEBSTER.

Messrs. WM. M. RICHARDS, SAMUEL C. SPROULLS, CHARLES A. STETSON, CHARLES W. A. ROGERS.

SOURCE: Fletcher Webster, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Daniel Webster, Vol. 2, p. 423-5

Daniel Webster to Edward Everett, March 21, 1851

Washington, March 21, 1851.

MY DEAR SIR,—Mr. Abbot is right. I did repeat the words. I did say, "Let it rise, let it rise, till it meet, &c."

I have no objection to have the second Bunker Hill oration immediately follow the first, and this again to be followed by whatever part you think it worth while to publish of my article in the North American Review.

I presume you would hardly think of publishing it all. I looked over a few of the first pages the other day, and thought they read well.

I suppose you will prepare a note, more or less extended, from Mr. Frothingham's book.

DAN'L WEBSTER.

SOURCE: Fletcher Webster, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Daniel Webster, Vol. 2, p. 425-6

Daniel Webster to Richard M. Blatchford, March 9, 1851

Washington, [March 28, 1851,] Friday, two o'clock.

MY DEAR SIR, —I have nothing from you to-day and am besides a little out of sorts. I am a little overworked. Yester day over my table from nine to four, and then four hours in the evening in my study, upon an embarrassing Mexican correspondence. The day is fine, I mean to mount Morgan, in ten minutes, and take the air. Business seems to press quite as hard as when Congress was here; but I will break off and go North, next Tuesday, if I am well. I want to see the sea; want to see Mr. Blatchford pull in a great cod; I want to see Mr. Baker's Alderney cows.

I have directed a boat to be made ready. We will hope that the skies may be propitious in the first ten or twelve days in April, so that we two, and Durf Hatch, and Dwelly Baker, may be on Ned's Ground, some warm, still, smoky day.

Yours,

D. W.

SOURCE: Fletcher Webster, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Daniel Webster, Vol. 2, p. 426-7

Daniel Webster to Peter Harvey, April 7, 1851

New York, April 7, 1851.

MY DEAR SIR,—I hope to arrive to-morrow evening at Boston, with Mrs. Webster, and to go to Marshfield on the afternoon of Wednesday. I hope nobody will turn out at Boston to give me any reception. If the people wish to see me, I will meet them on my return from Marshfield, where my stay will be short. It is too early to look for pleasant weather on the coast, and I shall get back to Washington as soon as I conveniently can. When the weather gets warmer, I hope to have a little time at home. I shall see you, I trust, to-morrow evening.

Yours, truly,

DAN'L WEBSTER.

SOURCE: Fletcher Webster, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Daniel Webster, Vol. 2, p. 427

Daniel Webster to Richard M. Blatchford, April 13, 1851

Green Harbor, April 13, one o'clock.

MY DEAR SIR,—The meeting is, I presume, to come off on Thursday. So I understand, although as yet I have not received the official document.

We are quite well. Mr. Appleton and his two oldest children are with us.

The weather is too cold and windy for any thing but reading, writing, and talking.

Yours,

D. W.

SOURCE: Fletcher Webster, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Daniel Webster, Vol. 2, p. 428

Daniel Webster to Millard Fillmore, April 15, 1851

Marshfield, April 15, 1851.

MY DEAR SIR,—I was very glad to receive your letter last evening, and to learn that there was nothing occurring of particular urgency at Washington. Although the weather has been cold and wet, nearly all the time I have been here, yet, I leave with regret, and should be tempted to prolong my stay, if there were not to be an occasion likely to call me from Washington again, soon. About the 10th or 15th of May the important suit between the Methodist Church and the Methodist Church South, is to come on for argument in the circuit court of the United States in the city of New York. I have been long engaged in the cause, and drew the original bill in favor of the Church South. I have been in hopes that the parties would be satisfied that Mr. Lord should take my place, with Mr. Reverdy Johnson, but they are not so inclined. Recent occurrences, perhaps, have contributed to lead to an undue estimation of the probable value of my services on the occasion. The division between North and South, you know, took place on the slavery question.

A suit, equally old, and of a similar nature, is on my hands in Massachusetts, to be tried the middle of June. It is between the Old School Quakers, and the Hicksites, so called, and the question is, which party is entitled to the funds and property.

I hope nothing may occur rendering my attention to these two things inconsistent with my public duties.

In the present state of our military means, it is to be feared we shall have trouble with Indians in the southwest. And though it is our duty to do all we can, with the means in our hands, yet it is necessary to remember also that the government will be pressed to raise volunteers, mounted men, &c., by those who would like the employment and the pay. I take it that a mounted man on the frontiers is a person exceedingly well paid for doing very little.

I go to Boston to-morrow, and expect to meet the people in Faneuil Hall on Thursday.

I am not surprised at what you say about the course of Mr. ——— and his friends. They will probably attempt a denunciation of the compromise measures, in some way, but I think they will find themselves less strong than they imagine themselves to be. The case is a curious one. These gentlemen are willing and ready to express a hearty and conscientious approbation of, or at least acquiescence in, the compromise measures, provided only that certain office-holders be not disturbed. And, on the other hand, they are equally ready and willing to denounce these measures, heartily and conscientiously, if these office-holders should be disturbed.

I lament most deeply this schism among the New York Whigs, but I do not see how it could be avoided. At the same time, I think we have friends who are not only not discreet, but who attempt to use all their influence, whatever it is, to magnify themselves and to gain a triumph over their enemies. They wish to be the administration, at least, so far as New York is concerned. They require, in my opinion, sharp looking after.

I am, dear Sir, with true regard, always yours,

DAN'L WEBSTER.

SOURCE: Fletcher Webster, Editor, The Private Correspondence of Daniel Webster, Vol. 2, p. 428-9