Woodland Hill,
June 23rd, 1861.
I continue my letter interrupted at Washington. Thursday
evening I passed with Mr. Chase, the Secretary of the Treasury, the hardest
worked man, except Mr. Cameron, just now in Washington. He is a tall,
well-made, robust man, with handsome features, fine blue eye, and a ready and
agreeable smile —altogether "simpatico." The conversation, of
course, turned very much upon our English relations, and I told him I would
stake my reputation on the assertion that the English Government would never
ally itself with the Southern Confederacy, or go any further in the course
already taken towards its recognition. I said that I had been over and over
again assured, by those in whom I had entire confidence, that the sympathy of
the English nation was with the American cause, but that it was exceedingly
difficult to make the English understand that which to us was so self-evident a
proposition, that we meant two things — first, to put an end for ever to
slavery extension and the nationalisation of slavery; secondly, to maintain the
constitution and laws of the Great Republic one and indivisible; that war was
not contemplated as possible between the two countries, except by a small and
mischievous faction in England.
Mr. Chase is a frank, sincere, warm-hearted man, who has
always cordially detested slavery and loved the American constitution as the
great charter of American liberty and nationality. Like every man, public or
private, throughout the Free States, he is convinced of the simple truth that
the constitutional union of the whole people is all which guarantees to each
individual the possession of his life and property, because it is the basis of
all our laws. Destroy this, and anarchy and civil war are the inevitable
results. He expressed a most undoubting conviction that the rebellion would be
put down and the Union restored. It was not of much consequence who was in
power—who occupied this or that office. The people was resolved that it would
not be disinherited of its constitution and its national life, nor of the right
possessed by every individual in the country to set his foot at will on any
part of the whole broad country of the United States. It was as idle to attempt
resistance to the great elemental forces of nature as to oppose this movement.
The people would put down the rebellion without a government, were it
necessary. In six weeks an army of 250,000 men had been put into the field,
armed and equipped for service. In six months there would be half a million,
and as many more as might be necessary. There is nothing of the braggart about
Mr. Chase, nor about the President, nor about Cameron, and, after all, the
Minister of Finance and the Secretary of War are the men who are of necessity
most alive to the stern realities of the crisis. They know that money, men,
beef, bread and gunpowder in enormous amounts are necessary for suppressing
this insurrection, but they have not the slightest doubt as to the issue.
“Already a great result is secured,” said Chase. The idea
even of extending slavery has for ever vanished from men's minds. It can
never go an inch further on this continent, and, in addition, slavery as a
governing power (as it has been for forty years) is for ever dethroned. It can
never be nationalised, but must, so long as it remains, be local, exceptional,
municipal and subordinate, restricted to the States where it at present exists,
while the policy of the Government will be the policy of freedom. The South
will be forced to come back into the Union, such as it has ever existed under
the Constitution. This, he thinks, will be brought about by the pressure caused
by the blockade, by the sufferings of the people thus imprisoned, as it were,
and thrown out of employment, by the steady pressing down upon them of immense
disciplined armies, backed by the boundless resources of a fertile country and
a well-organised commissariat and vast wealth; while, on the other hand, the
South cannot be inspired by the enthusiasm which has often enabled a feebler
nation to resist triumphantly & foreign invasion. The United States
Government is no foreigner. It is at home everywhere upon its own soil, from
the Canada line to the Gulf of Mexico, but conspirators have excluded it for a
time from its own rights, its own property, and the exercise of its benignant
functions over the whole people of which it is the minister and guardian,
appointed by the people itself. The inhabitants of the Slave States must ere
long awake from the madman's dream which has deprived them of their reason. For
the leaders, of course, there is no returning.
There is already a beginning, and a good beginning, on the
border. Maryland, which seemed but a few weeks ago so rabid in the Secession
cause, has just voted largely for the Union. The progress of the counter
revolution in Virginia is steady. The inhabitants of Western Virginia have
repudiated the action of the State Convention, and are about establishing a
government of their own — not as a separate state, but as claiming to be
Virginia, with the intention of sending members and senators to Congress,
and electing governor and legislature. This course is supported by United
States troops, and will be recognised by Congress, which has had to deal with
similar cases before, and is the sole judge according to the
Constitution as to the claims of its members to their seats. According to Chase
and other Cabinet Ministers with whom I have conversed, this movement will be
triumphant. Thus in the rebel States, fire is fighting fire, as in a prairie
conflagration. The same phenomenon will be manifested in Eastern Tennessee,
where there are 30,000 or 40,000 fighting men, who will fiercely dispute the
power of a Convention to deprive them of their rights as citizens of the United
States, and who will maintain the Union with arms in their hands to the death.
The same will be sooner or later the case in North Carolina, in North Alabama,
in Louisiana.
In short, the whole white population of the Seceding States
is five and a half millions, against twenty-two or twenty-three millions. Not
another State can secede by any possibility, and within the five and a half
million seceders there are large numbers who are fierce against the rebels, and
still larger numbers among the ignorant masses, who will be soon inquiring,
What is all this about? Why is all this bloodshed and misery? And they will be
made to understand, despite the lies of the ringleaders of the rebellion, that
the United States Government is their best friend; that not one of their rights
has been menaced—that it wishes only to maintain the constitution and laws
under which we have all prospered for three-quarters of a century, and which
have now been assaulted, because the people at the ballot-box, last November,
chose to elect Mr. Lincoln president, instead of Mr. Breckenridge. This
plunging into “pronunciamiento” and civil war, by a party defeated at the
polls, may be very good Mexican practice, but it will not go down in the United
States; and ere long the people, even at the South, will make this discovery.
So thinks Mr. Chase, and I think he is right. I am much pleased with the
directness and frankness of his language. “And if all these calculations fail,”
said he, “if the insurrection is unreasonably protracted, and we find it much
more difficult and expensive in blood and treasure to put it down than we
anticipated, we shall then draw that sword which we prefer at present to leave
in the sheath, and we shall proclaim the total abolition of slavery on the
American continent. We do not wish this, we deplore it, because of the vast
confiscation of property, and of the servile insurrections, too horrible to
contemplate, which would follow. We wish the Constitution and Union as it is,
with slavery, as a municipal institution, existing till such time as each State
in its wisdom thinks fit to mitigate or abolish it, but with freedom the law of
the territories and of the land; but if the issue be distinctly presented —
death to the American Republic or death to slavery, slavery must die. Therefore,”
said he, “the great Republic cannot be destroyed. The people will destroy
slavery, if by no other means they can maintain their national existence.” In
this connection we came to talk again of England and its policy. But it is
hardly worth while to repeat anything more to you on this subject. Every man
with whom I have conversed holds the same language.
I battle stoutly for England and the English, for no man
knows better than I all the noble qualities of that great nation; and how
necessary it is to our moral greatness and true prosperity to cultivate the
closest and warmest relations with our ancient mother. I maintain, and I think
have partly convinced many minds, that England has only acted under a great
delusion as to the permanence of our institutions, for which error we are
ourselves somewhat to blame; that the great heart of the nation is in sympathy
with us; that the idea of going to war with us, has never entered the minds of
any but a few mischief-makers; that the Times is no representative of
English opinion, nor of the English Government. I would pledge myself for a
marked difference before long in the whole attitude of England, and that the
last thing she contemplated was allying herself with the South in a war against
the United States Government. Already my words have been partly justified.
Recent news from England to the 8th of June has produced a good effect.
Notwithstanding the violence of language which I have described to you (in
order that you and such of our dear English friends who care to read my first
impressions may hear and see exactly as I have seen and heard), I believe that
the hearts of this, the most excitable and the most warmhearted people on the
earth, will soon turn to England, if they catch any warm manifestations of
sympathy with our cause.
While I was at Mr. Chase's, General McDowell, with one of
his aides, came in. He is a firm, square, browned, powerful-looking soldier,
some forty years of age, educated at West Point, and thoroughly experienced in
all the active warfare which we have had in his time. He commands, as I
mentioned, all the forces on the Virginia side of the Potomac, for the defence
of Washington. He told us of an alarm the night before; that the rebels were
about attacking his lines, and that they were in force to the number of 3000 in
the immediate vicinity of Alexandria. He went there, but the 3000 melted to
three, who were taken prisoners. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that there are
ready 100,000 rebels under arms in Virginia, and that they are bound by every
rule of war to carry out their boasts and make the attack.
On the other hand it is the object of the Government daily
to strengthen itself. This, as I told you, was the language of General Scott to
me the evening before. By the way, I did not tell you that on that occasion we
rather took the General by surprise (as I think Jefferson Davis will never do).
The servant ushered us at once into his little drawing-room. He inhabits a
small, modest house in — I forget what street — and we found him, the evening
being very sultry, taking a nap in his shirt sleeves, with an aide-de-camp at
each knee, and a servant brushing flies, at his, back. He started up, somewhat
confused, and beat a hasty retreat to an adjoining room, whence he emerged, a
quarter of an hour later, arrayed in all the splendour of an old black
bombazine frock coat. But he is a magnificent old fellow. He told us, with a
smile, that a price had been set upon his head by his native State of Virginia,
but he doubted whether it would ever be earned. Nevertheless his house was only
guarded by a sergeant and ten men. The rest of his conversation I have already
reported to you.
As I told you before, there is no lack of good officers. The
great cause of future trouble may be in neglecting to make proper use of them,
through this detestable system of appointing politicians and militia men to be
brigadiers and major-generals. General Mansfield, who commands in Washington,
seems to me a first-class man in every respect, and so do McDowell and Colonel
Heinzelmann. McClellan, who commands in the West, is said to be equal to Scott
in talent, and thirty years his junior; while General Lyon, a Connecticut man
and a West Pointer, seems to be carrying all before him in Missouri, and is
rather the favourite of the hour. I do not go quite into military details,
because you get them, true or false, in the papers. I have already ordered you
the Daily Advertiser, and to-morrow I shall see that you get the New
York Times regularly. Up to this time nothing of importance has happened,
and I think that you will derive from my letters as much information to be
relied upon as you could get anywhere. With regard to Missouri, there is not
the slightest possibility of her getting out of the Union. The Governor is a
Secessionist and a fugitive, and his following is comparatively small. I had a
long conversation last evening with the Attorney-General of the United States,
Mr. Bates, who is himself of Missouri, and he tells me that secession there is
simply an impossibility. General Lyon with his United States forces has already
nearly put down secession there; but should the insurrection be protracted much
longer, the State would be entered on three sides at once (for it is surrounded
by Free States) and 150,000 slaves liberated. There is no child's play intended
any longer, and the word compromise, which has been the country's curse for so
long, has been expunged from the dictionary. Bates has been the champion of
freedom for many years, and he has lived to sit in a cabinet with men of his
own faith. He is a plain man, shrewd, intelligent.
Sumner, who arrived Wednesday night, told me that Montgomery
Blair, the Postmaster-General, was desirous of making my acquaintance. Friday
morning I was engaged to breakfast with Mr. Chase. The conversation was very
pleasant and instructive to me, turning on the topics already mentioned, and as
I walked down with him to the Treasury Department, he insisted on my going with
him into his office to finish the subject, the purport of which, he said, I
have already given you. Afterwards I went with Sumner to Mr. Blair's. He is a
Virginian by birth and education, and it is therefore the more to his credit
that, like General Scott, he is of the warmest among Unionists, and perhaps the
most go-ahead, uncompromising enemy to the rebels in the cabinet, not even
excepting Mr. Chase. While we were talking, he asked me what I thought of the
President's views. I told him that I had only passed half-an-hour with him a
few evenings before, when I had been introduced to him by Mr. Seward, and that
since then it had been advertised conspicuously in all the papers that the
President would receive no visitors, being engaged in preparing his message to
Congress. “But you must see him; it is indispensable that you should see him,
and tell him about English affairs,” said Blair. I told him that I was leaving
Washington that afternoon. He asked if I could not defer my departure. I said
no, for my arrangements were already made.
The truth is, I had resolved not to force myself upon the
President. If he did not care to converse with me, it was indifferent to me
whether I saw him or not. But Mr. Blair begged me to stop a moment in his
library, and incontinently rushed forth into the street to the White House,
which was near, and presently came back, saying that the President would be
much obliged if I would pay him a visit.
I went and had an hour's talk with Mr. Lincoln. I am very
glad of it, for had I not done so, I should have left Washington with a very
inaccurate impression of the President. I am now satisfied that he is a man of
very considerable native sagacity; and that he has an ingenuous,
unsophisticated, frank, and noble character. I believe him to be as true as
steel, and as courageous as true. At the same time there is doubtless an
ignorance about State matters, and particularly about foreign affairs, which he
does not affect to conceal, but which we must of necessity regret in a man
placed in such a position at such a crisis. Nevertheless his very modesty in
this respect disarms criticism.
Our conversation was, of course, on English matters, and I
poured into his not unwilling ear everything which my experience, my knowledge,
and my heart, could suggest to me, in order to produce a favourable impression
in his mind as to England, the English Government, and the English people.
There is no need of my repeating what I said, for it is sufficiently manifest
throughout this letter. And I believe that I was not entirely unsuccessful, for
he told me that he thought that I was right, that he was much inclined to agree
with me, but, he added, it does not so much signify what I think, you must
persuade Seward to think as you do. I told him that I found the secretary much
mitigated in his feelings compared with what I had expected. He expressed his
satisfaction. I do not quote any of his conversation because he was entirely a
listener in this part of the interview. Afterwards he took up his message,
which was lying in loose sheets upon the writing table, and read me nearly the
whole of it, so far as it was written. On the whole, the document impressed me
very favourably. With the exception of a few expressions, it was not only
highly commendable in spirit, but written with considerable untaught grace and
power. These were my first impressions, which I hope will not be changed when
the document comes before the world. It consists mainly of a narrative of
events from the 4th of March up to the present hour. Nothing had yet been
written as to foreign relations, but I understand from Seward that they are all
to be dismissed in a brief paragraph, such as will create neither criticism nor
attention anywhere.
We parted very affectionately, and perhaps I shall never set
eyes on him again, but I feel that so far as perfect integrity and directness
of purpose go, the country will be safe in his hands. With regard to the great
issue, we have good generals, good soldiers, good financiers, twenty-three
millions of good people “whose bosoms are one,” a good cause, and endless tin.
The weather has been beautiful ever since I landed,
magnificent sunshine and delicious heat. Just now there is a heavy shower. When
it is over I am going to drive over to Camp Andrew, to see the Massachusetts
2nd.
Ten more regiments have been ordered from Massachusetts, and
seven, including Gordon's, will soon be ready to take the field at once. This
will make 15,000 men from Massachusetts alone. New York has already sent
20,000, and has a reserve of 20,000 ready. Pennsylvania about the same, and so on.
The only struggle is who shall get the greatest number accepted.
Give my love to all my English friends. Kiss my three
darlings 3000 times, and believe me,
Most lovingly,
J. L. M.
SOURCE: George William Curtis, editor, The
Correspondence of John Lothrop Motley in Two Volumes, Volume 1, p. 387-95
