Showing posts with label War of 1812. Show all posts
Showing posts with label War of 1812. Show all posts

Thursday, February 22, 2024

Congressman Albert G. Brown’s Speech on Homesteads, July 26, 1850

WHEN arrested in the progress of my remarks yesterday, I was about to say that I approved of the main object of the bill reported by the Committee on Agriculture, and which had been advocated with so much zeal and ability by the gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. Johnson]. I was about to say that my judgment approved the policy of supplying, by some appropriate means, a home to every citizen.

Ours is essentially an agricultural community. The national prosperity of this country, more than any other, depends upon the production of its soil. Whatever tends to increase that production, enhances the national wealth, and, by consequence, increases the national prosperity. The first care of this nation should be to promote the happiness and prosperity of its citizens; and acting on this hypothesis, it has been my constant aim to promote the passage of all laws which tended to ameliorate the condition of the toiling millions.

I have always thought, and now think, that some salutary reform in our land system, by which a fixed and permanent home should be placed within the reach of every citizen, however humble his condition in life, would promote the national prosperity, add to the wealth of the states, and give fresh impetus to the industry and perseverance of our people.

I repeat, sir, that I am for giving to every man in the United States a home—a spot of earth—a place on the surface of God's broad earth which shall be his against the demands of all the world—a place where, in the full enjoyment of all his senses, and the full exercise of all his faculties, he may look upon the world, and, with the proud consciousness of an American citizen, say, This is my home, the castle of my defence; here I am free from the world's cold frowns, and exempt from the Shylock demands of inexorable creditors. These, sir, are my sentiments, long entertained, and now honestly expressed; nor am I to be deterred from their advocacy by any general outcry. Call these sentiments Socialism, Fourierism, Free-Soilism—call them what you please—say this is the doctrine of "vote yourself a farm"—say it is anti-rentism—say what you please—it is the true doctrine; it embraces great principles, which, if successfully carried out, will lead us on to higher renown as a nation, add to the wealth of the separate states, and do more for the substantial happiness of the great mass of our people than all your other legislation combined.

Congress has been in session nearly eight months, and what have you done?—what have you been trying to do? More than six months of that time has been expended in attacking and defending the institution of slavery—the North depreciating and trying to destroy the sixteen hundred millions of dollars invested in this species of property; and the South, forgetting for a season her party differences, banding together for the defence of this vast interest. Sometimes the monotony of this tedious drama has been relieved by a glance at other matters,—a member has appeared to advocate the manufacturing interests, or possibly to put on foot some grand scheme of internal improvement. But, whatever has been said in all our discussions, or by whomsoever it has been said, "the upper ten" have been constantly in view. No one has thought it worth his while to take account of the wants of the millions who toil for bread. The merchants and the manufacturers, the mariners and the speculators, the professions and the men of fortune everywhere, have their advocates on this floor. I speak to-day for the honest, hard-fisted, warm-hearted toiling millions—I speak here, in the councils of this nation, as I speak in the midst of my constituents; and whilst I do not object to the consideration which you give to other interests and other pursuits, I stand up here to demand even-handed justice for the honest but humble cultivator of the soil.

I cannot forget my allegiance—I know the men whose devotion sustains this government—I know the men whose friendship sustains me against the attacks of slander and the malignity of the interested few. For them I speak, and by no senseless cry of demagoguism, will I be turned from my purpose of vindicating their rights on this floor.

Talk, sir, of your lordly manufacturers, your princely merchants, your professional gentry, and your smooth-tongued politicians. The patriotism of one simple-hearted, honest old farmer would outweigh them all; and, for private friendship, I had rather have the hearty good will of one of those plain old men than the hypocritical smiles of as many of your smooth-tongued oily fellows as would fill this Capitol from its dome to its base.

It is my fortune to represent a constituency in which is mingled wealth and poverty;—whilst some are wealthy, and many possess more than a competency, there are many others on whom poverty has fixed his iron grasp. All, I hope, are patriotic. But, sir, if I were going to hunt for patriots who could be trusted in every emergency; patriots who would pour out their blood like water; and who would think it no privation to lay down their lives in defence of their country, I would go among the poor, the squatters, the preemptors, the hardy sons of toil. Though I should expect to find patriots everywhere, I know I should find them here.

Sir, in the great matter of legislation, shall men like these be neglected? I invoke gentlemen to forget for a moment the loom and the furnace, the storehouse, and the ships on the high seas, and go with me to the houses of these people; listen to the story of their wrongs, and let us together do them justice.

Men in affluent circumstances know but little of the wants of other men, and, unfortunately, care less for the miseries of the poor. Rocked in the cradle of fortune from infancy to manhood, they do not understand why it is that some men toil with poverty all their lives, and die at last in penury. Let gentlemen picture to themselves a man reared in humble life, without education, and with no fortune but his hands; see him going into the wild woods with a wife and a family of small children, there, by his unaided exertions, to rear his humble dwelling, to clear the forest and make way for his planting. See him after the toils of the day are over, returning to that humble dwelling to receive the smiles of his wife and hear the merry prattle of his little children. Watch him as he moves steadily and firmly on from day to day; fancy to yourself his heart buoyant with hope as he marks the progress of his growing crop, and pictures to himself the happiness of his wife and little children when he shall have gathered the reward of his summer's toil, sold it, and with the proceeds secured this his humble home.

Look, sir, at this scene; gaze on that sun-burnt patriot, for he is worthy of your admiration. Now go with me one step further, and behold the destruction of all these fairy visions; blighting seasons, low prices, disease, a bad trade, or some unforeseen disaster has overtaken him. His year of honest industry is gone-the time has come when government demands her pay for this poor man's home. He is without money—government, with a hard heart and inexorable will, turns coldly away, and the next week or the next month she sells her land, and this man's labor, his humble house and little fields, are gone. The speculator comes, and with an iron will, turns him and his family out of doors; and all this is the act of his own government—of a government which has untold millions of acres of land. Now, Mr. Speaker, let me ask you, can this man love a government that treats him thus? Never, sir, never. To do so, he should be more than man, and scarcely less than God. Treatment like this would have put out the fire of patriotism in Washington's breast, and almost justified the treachery of Arnold.

Instead of treating her citizens thus, I would have this government interpose its strong arm to protect them from the iron grasp of the heartless speculator. By doing so, you encourage industry, promote happiness, develope the resources of the soil, make better men and purer patriots. In a word, you perform a vast amount of good without the possibility of doing harm.

Not having seen the bill reported by the committee under circumstances which afforded an opportunity for a critical examination, I am not prepared to say that its details meet my approbation.

I am disinclined to give to the settler an absolute title to lands. I am so, sir, because I would secure him in the possession of his home against his misfortunes, and even against his own improvidence. If he is an honest and industrious man, he should have a home where that honest heart could repose in peace, and where the hand of industry could find employment. If he be dishonest, give him a home where, in the bosom of his family, he may hide his shame, and where they may find shelter from the frowns of a cruel world. If he is idle and worthless, give him a home where his wife and children may toil, and, by their example, bring him back to habits of honest industry. In any and in every event, give him a home, and secure him in the possession of that home, against all the contingencies of life and vicissitudes of fortune. When you have done this, rest satisfied that you have at least made a better man, and done something towards the general prosperity.

My own scheme has been reduced to the form of a bill, and before I take my seat I beg leave to send it to the Clerk's desk, that it may be read—promising that I am wedded to no special plan. The object is a good one; it meets my cordial approbation, and I shall most heartily unite in any scheme which gives reasonable promise of success.

I offer the paper which I hold in my hand as a substitute for the original proposition, and ask that it may be included in the motion to print.

Mr. Brown's proposition was read.

Strike out all after the enacting clause, and insert as follows:

 

That the laws now in force granting preemption to actual settlers on the public lands, shall continue until otherwise ordered by Congress, and that the same be extended to all the territories of the United States.

 

SEC. 2. And be it further enacted, That from and after the passage of this act, the rights of preemptors shall be perpetuated: that is to say, persons acquiring the right of preemption shall retain the same without disturbance, and without payment of any kind to the United States, but on these conditions: First, The preemptor shall not sell, alienate or dispose of his or her right for a consideration, and if he or she voluntarily abandons one preemption and claims another, no right shall be acquired by such claim, until the claimant shall first have testified, under oath, before the register of the land office when the claim is preferred, that he or she has voluntarily abandoned his or her original preemption, and that no consideration, reward or payment of any kind has been received, or is expected, directly or indirectly, as an inducement for such abandonment; and any person who shall testify falsely in such case, shall be deemed guilty of perjury. Second: Any person claiming and holding the right of preemption to lands under this act, may be required by the state within which the same lies, to pay taxes thereon in the same manner, and to the same extent, as if he or she owned the said land in fee simple; and in case such lands are sold for taxes, the purchaser shall acquire the right of preemption only. Third: Absence of the preemptor and his family for six consecutive months, shall be deemed an abandonment, and the land shall, in such case, revert to the United States, and be subject to the same disposition as other public lands.

 

SEC. 3. And be it further enacted, That lands preempted, and the improvements thereon, shall not be subject to execution sale, or other sale for debt; and all contracts made in reference thereto, intended in anywise to alienate the right, or to embarrass or disturb the preemptor in his or her occupancy, shall be absolutely null and void.

 

SEC. 4. And be it further enacted, That the preemptor may, at any time, at his or her discretion, enter the lands preempted, by paying therefor to the proper officer of the United States one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre.

 

SEC. 5. And be it further enacted, That in case of the preemptor's death, if a married man, his right shall survive to his widow and infant children, but the rights of the older children shall cease as they respectively come of age, or when they reach the age of twenty-one years; in all cases the right of preemption shall remain in the youngest child. And in case of the death of both father and mother, leaving an infant child or children, the executor, administrator, or guardian, may at any time within twelve months after such death, enter said preempted lands in the name of said infant child or children, or the said preemption, together with the improvements on the lands, may be deemed property, and as such, sold for the benefit of said infants, but for no other purpose, and the purchaser may acquire the right of the deceased preemptor by such purchase.

 

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In reply to Mr. Morse, of Louisiana, Mr. BROWN said: Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Morse], in the progress of his remarks was understood by me to assume the ground that my proposition is unconstitutional. I did not, as you know, Mr. Speaker, undertake to explain, much less to vindicate that proposition. Its provisions are so few and so simple, that it may be well left to speak its own vindication, even against the furious assault of the honorable gentleman.

It proposes simply to perpetuate a law which has stood for years on your statute book, an honorable monument to the wisdom and justice of Congress. To-day, for the first time, it has been discovered to be unconstitutional. The preemption law struggled into existence against the combined opposition of many of the first minds in the country. It has received the repeated sanction of Congress, and to-day I know of no man from the new states who desires its repeal, or who has the boldness to avow such desire if he feels it. Instead of limiting the right of the preemptor to one year or two years, I simply propose to perpetuate that right, and this is the measure which the astute gentleman from Louisiana says is unconstitutional. I shall not stop to vindicate the measure from such a charge. The government has full power to dispose of the public lands, and in the exercise of this power, it has from time to time reduced the price, and in many hundred instances given them away.

I ask the honorable gentleman if the act by which five hundred thousand acres of the public lands were given to the state of Louisiana was unconstitutional? Were the various acts giving lands to the states, Louisiana among the rest, for educational purposes, unconstitutional? Did the honorable gentleman violate the Constitution last year, when he voted to give to his own state five millions of the public lands for works of internal improvement? Did we all violate the Constitution the other day, when we voted bounty lands to the soldiers of the last war with Great Britain and all our Indian wars?

No one knows better than the honorable gentleman, that this government has habitually given away the public lands—given them to the states for internal-improvement purposes; given them to establish colleges and primary schools; given them to railroad and canal companies given them to states and to soulless corporations, for almost every conceivable purpose; and all this has been done within the Constitution; but now, sir, when it is proposed to allow the humble citizen to reside on these lands, the gentleman starts up as though he had just descended from another world, and startles us with a declaration that we are violating the Constitution.

It has pleased the honorable member to denominate this as a villanous measure; and with great emphasis he declares, that its supporters are demagogues. It will not surprise you or others, Mr. Speaker, if I speak warmly in reply to language like this. The gentleman was pleased to extract the poison from his sting, by declaring that he used these words in no offensive sense. In reply, I shall speak plainly, but within the rules of decorum.

"Demagoguing,"—“demagoguing," says the honorable gentleman, "for the votes of the low, ill-bred vagrants and vagabonds." Sir, this is strange language, coming from that quarter. I know something of the gentleman's constituents. Many of the best of them are of this despised caste; many of them are the low, ill-bred vagabonds, of which the gentleman has been speaking. Many, very many, of them are squatters on the public lands. Sir, I should like to hear the honorable gentleman making the same speech in one of the upper parishes of Louisiana, which he has this day pronounced in the American Congress. I can well conceive how his honest constituents the squatters, would stare and wonder, to hear a gentleman, so bland and courteous last year, now so harsh and cruel. Yes, sir, the gentleman's squatter constituents would stand aghast to hear the representative denouncing them as a dirty, ill-bred set of vagabonds and scoundrels—when the candidate, with a face all wreathed in his blandest smile, had told them they were the cleverest fellows in the world!

It may do very well, Mr. Speaker, for gentlemen, when they come on to Washington, to get upon stilts and talk after this fashion. It may sound beautiful in the ears that are here to catch the sound, thus to denounce a measure intended to relieve the poor man's wants as villanous, and its advocates as demagogues. But, sir, I take it upon myself to say there is not a congressional district in the West or Southwest where a candidate for Congress would dare to use such language.

Sir, I know very well how popular electioneering canvasses are conducted, and bold and valiant as the gentleman is, he would scarcely commit the indiscretion of saying to any portion of the voters in his district that they were an ill-bred set of vagabonds, and if he did, they would hardly commission him to repeat the expression in Congress. Let me warn the gentleman, that if the speech made by him to-day shall ever reach his constituents, it will sound his political death-knell. If I owed the gentleman any ill-will, which I take this occasion to say I do not, it would be my highest hope that he would write out and print that speech just as he delivered it. I should at least have a comfortable assurance that the speech would be the last of its kind.

In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I have to repeat that, notwithstanding the maledictions of the gentleman from Louisiana, I am still for this proposition; and though that gentleman may continue to denounce the squatters on the public lands as a worthless, ill-bred set of vagabonds, I am still their friend. They are honest men, pure patriots, and upright citizens. They are worthy of our care. If the candidate can afford to flatter them for their votes, the representative should not skulk the responsibility of voting to protect their interests. I hold but one language, and it shall be the language of honest sincerity. I would scorn to flatter a poor squatter for his vote in the swamps of Louisiana, and then stand up before the American Congress as his representative, and denounce him as a worthless vagabond.

Sir, if the men are worthless the women are not, and I could appeal to the well-known gallantry of the honorable member to interpose in their behalf. If you will do nothing for the ruder sex, interpose the strong arm of the law to shield the women and children, at least, from the rude grasp of the avaricious speculator. If a man be worthless, let the appeal go up for his wife and little children. Secure them a home, and that wife will make that home her castle. It will shelter her and her little children from the rude blasts of winter, and the rude blows of a wicked world. She will toil there for bread, and with her own hand. plant a shrub, perchance a flower. She will make it useful by her industry, and adorn it by her ingenuity. Give it to her, sir, and she will invoke such blessings on your head as a pious woman alone can ask.

I thank the gentleman from Louisiana, not for his speech, but for his courtesy in giving me a part of his time in which to reply.

SOURCE: M. W. Cluskey, Editor, Speeches, Messages, and Other Writings of the Hon. Albert G. Brown, A Senator in Congress from the State of Mississippi, p. 194-9

Sunday, July 9, 2023

The Botetourt Resolutions, December 10, 1860

Offered in a large mass meeting of the people of Botetourt county, December 10th, 1860, by the Hon. John J. Allen, President of the Supreme Court of Virginia, and adopted with but two dissenting voices.

The people of Botetourt county, in general meeting assembled, believe it to be the duty of all the citizens of the Commonwealth, in the present alarming condition of our country, to give some expression of their opinion upon the threatening aspect of public affairs. They deem it unnecessary and out of place to avow sentiments of loyalty to the constitution and devotion to the union of these States. A brief reference to the part the State has acted in the past will furnish the best evidence of the feelings of her sons in regard to the union of the States and the constitution, which is the sole bond which binds them together.

In the controversies with the mother country, growing out of the efforts of the latter to tax the colonies without their consent, it was Virginia who, by the resolutions against the stamp act, gave the example of the first authoritative resistance by a legislative body to the British Government, and so imparted the first impulse to the Revolution.

Virginia declared her independence before any of the colonies, and gave the first written constitution to mankind.

By her instructions her representatives in the General Congress introduced a resolution to declare the colonies independent States, and the declaration itself was written by one of her sons.

She furnished to the Confederate States the father of his country, under whose guidance independence was achieved, and the rights and liberties of each State, it was hoped, perpetually established.

She stood undismayed through the long night of the Revolution, breasting the storm of war and pouring out the blood of her sons like water on almost every battle-field, from the ramparts of Quebec to the sands of Georgia.

By her own unaided efforts the northwestern territory was conquered, whereby the Mississippi, instead of the Ohio river, was recognized as the boundary of the United States by the treaty of peace.

To secure harmony, and as an evidence of her estimate of the value of the union of the States, she ceded to all for their common benefit this magnificent region—an empire in itself.

When the articles of confederation were shown to be inadequate to secure peace and tranquility at home and respect abroad, Virginia first moved to bring about a more perfect union.

At her instance the first assemblage of commissioners took place at Annapolis, which ultimately led to the meeting of the convention which formed the present constitution.

This instrument itself was in a great measure the production of one of her sons, who has been justly styled the father of the constitution.

The government created by it was put into operation with her Washington, the father of his country, at its head; her Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, in his cabinet; her Madison, the great advocate of the constitution, in the legislative hall.

Under the leading of Virginia statesmen the Revolution of 1798 was brought about, Louisana was acquired, and the second war of independence was waged.

Throughout the whole progress of the republic she has never infringed on the rights of any State, or asked or received an exclusive benefit.

On the contrary, she has been the first to vindicate the equality of all the States, the smallest as well as the greatest.

But claiming no exclusive benefit for her efforts and sacrifices in the common cause, she had a right to look for feelings of fraternity and kindness for her citizens from the citizens of other States, and equality of rights for her citizens with all others; that those for whom she had done so much would abstain from actual aggressions upon her soil, or if they could not be prevented, would show themselves ready and prompt in punishing the aggressors; and that the common government, to the promotion of which she contributed so largely for the purpose of "establishing justice and insuring domestic tranquility," would not, whilst the forms of the constitution were observed, be so perverted in spirit as to inflict wrong and injustice and produce universal insecurity.

These reasonable expectations have been grievously disappointed. Owing to a spirit of pharasaical fanaticism prevailing in the North in reference to the institution of slavery, incited by foreign emissaries and fostered by corrupt political demagogues in search of power and place, a feeling has been aroused between the people of the two sections, of what was once a common country, which of itself would almost preclude the administration of a united government in harmony.

For the kindly feelings of a kindred people we find substituted distrust, suspicion and mutual aversion.

For a common pride in the name of American, we find one section even in foreign lands pursuing the other with revilings and reproach. For the religion of a Divine Redeemer of all, we find a religion of hate against a part; and in all the private relations of life, instead of fraternal regard, a "consuming hate," which has but seldom characterized warring nations.

This feeling has prompted a hostile incursion upon our own soil, and an apotheosis of the murderers, who were justly condemned and executed.

It has shown itself in the legislative halls by the passage of laws to obstruct a law of Congress passed in pursuance of a plain provision of the constitution.

It has been manifested by the industrious circulation of incendiary publications, sanctioned by leading men, occupying the highest stations in the gift of the people, to produce discord and division in our midst, and incite to midnight murder and every imaginable atrocity against an unoffending community.

It has displayed itself in a persistent denial of the equal rights of the citizens of each State to settle with their property in the common territory acquired by the blood and treasure of all.

It is shown in their openly avowed determination to circumscribe the institution of slavery within the territory of the States now recognizing it, the inevitable effect of which would be to fill the present slaveholding States with an ever increasing negro population, resulting in the banishment of our own non-slaveholding population in the first instance and the eventual surrender of our country, to a barbarous race, or, what seems to be desired, an amalgamation with the African.

And it has at last culminated in the election, by a sectional majority of the free States alone, to the first office in the republic, of the author of the sentiment that there is an "irrepressible conflict" between free and slave labor, and that there must be universal freedom or universal slavery; a sentiment which inculcates, as a necessity of our situation, warfare between the two sections of our country without cessation or intermission until the weaker is reduced to subjection.

In view of this state of things, we are not inclined to rebuke or censure the people of any of our sister States in the South, suffering from injury, goaded by insults, and threatened with such outrages and wrongs, for their bold determination to relieve themselves from such injustice and oppression, by resorting to their ultimate and sovereign right to dissolve the compact which they had formed and to provide new guards for their future security.

Nor have we any doubt of the right of any State, there being no common umpire between coequal sovereign States, to judge for itself on its own responsibility, as to the mode and measure of redress. The States, each for itself, exercised this sovereign power when they dissolved their connection with the British Empire.

They exercised the same power when nine of the States seceded from the confederation and adopted the present constitution, though two States at first rejected it.

The articles of confederation stipulated that those articles should be inviolably observed by every State, and that the Union should be perpetual, and that no alteration should be made unless agreed to by Congress and confirmed by every State.

Notwithstanding this solemn compact, a portion of the States did, without the consent of the others, form a new compact; and there is nothing to show, or by which it can be shown, that this right has been, or can be, diminished so long as the States continue sovereign.

The confederation was assented to by the Legislature for each State; the constitution by the people of each State of such State alone. One is as binding as the other, and no more so.

The constitution, it is true, established a government, and it operates directly on the individual; the confederation was a league operating primarily on the States. But each was adopted by the State for itself; in the one case by the Legislature acting for the State; in the other "by the people not as individuals composing one nation, but as composing the distinct and independent States to which they respectively belong."

The foundation, therefore, on which it was established was federal, and the State, in the exercise of the same sovereign authority by which she ratified for herself, may for herself abrogate and annul.

The operation of its powers, whilst the State remains in the Confederacy, is national; and consequently a State remaining in the Confederacy and enjoying its benefits cannot, by any mode of procedure, withdraw its citizens from the obligation to obey the constitution and the laws passed in pursuance thereof.

But when a State does secede, the constitution and laws of the United States cease to operate therein. No power is conferred on Congress to enforce them. Such authority was denied to the Congress in the convention which framed the constitution, because it would be an act of war of nation against nation-not the exercise of the legitimate power of a government to enforce its laws on those subject to its jurisdiction.

The assumption of such a power would be the assertion of a prerogative claimed by the British Government to legislate for the colonies in all cases whatever; it would constitute of itself a dangerous attack on the rights of the States, and should be promptly repelled.

These principles, resulting from the nature of our system of confederate States, cannot admit of question in Virginia.

Our people in convention, by their act of ratification, declared and made known that the powers granted under the constitution being derived from the people of the United States, may be resumed by them whenever they shall be perverted to their injury and oppression.

From what people were these powers derived? Confessedly from the people of each State, acting for themselves. By whom were they to be resumed or taken back? By the people of the State who were then granting them away. Who were to determine whether the powers granted had been perverted to their injury or oppression? Not the whole people of the United States, for there could be no oppression of the whole with their own consent; and it could not have entered into the conception of the convention that the powers granted could not be resumed until the oppressor himself united in such resumption.

They asserted the right to resume in order to guard the people of Virginia, for whom alone the convention could act, against the oppression of an irresponsible and sectional majority, the worst form of oppression with which an angry Providence has ever afflicted humanity.

Whilst, therefore, we regret that any State should, in a matter of common grievance, have determined to act for herself without consulting with her sister States equally aggrieved, we are nevertheless constrained to say that the occasion justifies and loudly calls for action of some kind.

The election of a President, by a sectional majority, as the representative of the principles referred to, clothed with the patronage and power incident to the office, including the authority to appoint all the postmasters and other officers charged with the execution of the laws of the United States, is itself a standing menace to the South—a direct assault upon her institutions—an incentive to robbery and insurrection, requiring from our own immediate local government, in its sovereign character, prompt action to obtain additional guarantees for equality and security in the Union, or to take measures for protection and security without it.

In view, therefore, of the present condition of our country, and the causes of it, we declare almost in the words of our fathers, contained in an address of the freeholders of Botetourt, in February, 1775, to the delegates from Virginia to the Continental Congress, "That we desire no change in our government whilst left to the free enjoyment of our equal privileges secured by the constitution; but that should a wicked and tyrannical sectional majority, under the sanction of the forms of the constitution, persist in acts of injustice and violence towards us, they only must be answerable for the consequences."

"That liberty is so strongly impressed upon our hearts that we cannot think of parting with it but with our lives; that our duty to God, our country, ourselves and our posterity forbid it; we stand, therefore, prepared for every contingency."

Resolved therefore, That in view of the facts set out in the foregoing preamble, it is the opinion of this meeting that a convention of the people should be called forthwith; that the State, in its sovereign character, should consult with the other Southern States, and agree upon such guarantees as in their opinion will secure their equality, tranquility and rights within the Union; and in the event of a failure to obtain such guarantees, to adopt in concert with the other Southern States, or alone, such measures as may seem most expedient to protect the rights and insure the safety of the people of Virginia. And in the event of a change in our relations to the other States being rendered necessary, that the convention so elected should recommend to the people, for their adoption, such alterations in our State constitution as may adapt it to the altered condition of the State and country.

SOURCE: Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume I, No. 1, January 1876, p. 13-9

Monday, February 13, 2023

Diary of George Mifflin Dallas, December 23, 1860

The Arabia brings the news that Secretary Cobb has resigned. He goes then to join the Disunionists, who, in Georgia, object to joint, but are in favor of separate, secession. Mr. Cobb is forty-five years of age; before he becomes sixty, he will have discovered that a good cause is really only injured by violence, and best promoted by calm and steady action; he will then have become, for he has ample ability, a safe American statesman.

The news in no respect diminishes the gloom of affairs in the United States. The situation is deplorable already, and worse is in prospect. I think it at once proper and becoming to manifest sympathy with my countrymen in their present trials. I have, therefore, declined Mr. Bates's invitation to the New-Year festivities at Sheen. It is impossible to be merry when one's country is gasping for breath.

China news is highly interesting. The first Napoleon has been always condemned by the British press for despoiling the academies and temples of Italy of their treasures of art, which he collected in his gallery of the Louvre. Still, they vindicated the burning of our Capitol and White House in 1814 by Ross; they bombarded the superb private residence of Prince Woronzow at Odessa; and here they are again, this time conjointly with the French, avowedly plundering and carrying off the ornaments and comforts of an imperial summer palace! War necessarily leads to excesses, which every effort should be made to restrict as much as possible. What conceivable benefit to the cause in which they are engaged could the allies derive from purloining pictures, statuary, and articles of novelty? But such are the two heads of European civilization. The French have made a separate convention, after the Treaty of Peace, bargaining for liberty to carry off coolies (hem!), for a recognition of Catholicism throughout China, and an indemnity of twelve millions of dollars! Pretty well for Louis Napoleon, and better, considering his looting, for Marshal Montauban.

SOURCE: George Mifflin Dallas, Diary of George Mifflin Dallas, While United States Minister to Russia 1837 to 1839, and to England 1856 to 1861, Volume 3, p. 423-5

Tuesday, July 28, 2020

Brigadier-General Thomas Benton Smith.

General Thomas Benton Smith, who was the youngest general in the Confederate army and enjoys the further distinction of being the only one now living, has reached the venerable age of eighty-five years. His birth occurred in Rutherford county, Tennessee, on the 24th of February, 1838, his parents being James M. and Martha (Page) Smith, the former a native of Dinwiddie county, Virginia. He comes of English ancestry in the paternal line and of Welsh descent on the maternal side, and his mother's people lived in North and South Carolina before coming to Tennessee. General Smith still has in his possession a silver piece that his maternal ancestors brought from Wales and which was given to him by his mother. His maternal grandparents, John and Martha Page, lived ten miles from Franklin and five miles from Triune. James M. Smith, the father of General Smith, was a carpenter of Mechanicsville, Rutherford county, this state, who made and sold gins, while his wife made cloth to provide wearing apparel for her children and the ten negro slaves owned by the family. Their home was a log house of two rooms and a side porch. James M. Smith was a soldier of the War of 1812, participating in the battle of New Orleans under Andrew Jackson. When the Civil war was inaugurated he and his wife owned one hundred and five acres of land and other property to the value of about ten thousand dollars.

In the acquirement of an education Thomas Benton Smith walked two miles to attend common school and later became a student in a military academy at Nashville, Tennessee, from which he was graduated. Andrew Johnson gave him a lieutenant's commission and he then went to West Point, New York, attending school for sixteen years altogether. The opening of the Civil war found him busily engaged in the cultivation of a farm of one hundred and five acres which he owned in the vicinity of Triune and he left the plow handles to enlist in the Zollicoffer Guards of the Twentieth Tennessee Regiment, being sworn in at Triune on the 17th of May, 1861. Both he and his brother, John M. Smith, joined the Confederate forces, leaving their mother and the negroes at home. Thomas B. Smith was sent with his company to Camp Zollicoffer and in January, 1862, took part in the battle of Fishing Creek, while subsequently he fought at Shiloh, Murfreesboro, Chickamauga, Baton Rouge, Franklin and Nashville. His horse was shot from under him at Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and again at the battle of Atlanta. After he had surrendered he was struck on the head with a sword by a Yankee colonel named W. S. McMillen, the blow splitting the bone of his head and exposing his brain, and he was placed in the Tennessee state prison, which was being used as a hospital. Following his discharge at Fort Warren, Massachusetts, he was given transportation and came direct to Nashville. Vernon K, Stevenson, the first president of the Nashville & Chattanooga Railroad, who was his close personal friend, offered him a position in recognition of the fact that General Smith had made his son, Vernon K. Stevenson, Jr., a member of his staff in 1864. General Smith engaged in railroad work first as a brakeman, then as freight conductor and later won promotion to the position of passenger conductor on the Nashville & Chattanooga, being identified with railroad interests altogether for ten years, during a part of which period he was in the service of the Nashville & Decatur. After leaving the railroad he became a candidate for congress in the counties of Williamson, Wilson and Rutherford and following the election of E. I. Gollady of Lebanon, Tennessee, returned home, where he remained until the death of his mother. He was then sent to the Central State Hospital of Nashville, where he has been a patient for about forty-seven years, or since 1876, when the institution was under Dr. Callender's administration. He has always been accorded the best and kindest treatment and has numerous friends whose regard he prizes. His closest kin are nephews and nieces. He enjoyed the personal friendship of many distinguished men of an earlier day, including Andrew Johnson, General Felix K. Zollicoffer, General John C. Brown, General William B. Bate, General Bragg, who handed him his commission as brigadier general, General W. J. Hardee, General Frank Cheatham, Colonel E. W. Cole, John W. Thomas and W. L. Danley. Lieutenant James L. Cooper of Nashville and Dr. D. B. Cliff, Sr., of Franklin, Tennessee, were members of his staff while he held the rank of brigadier general in 1864. He attends the annual reunion of the Twentieth Tennessee Regiment of Confederate Veterans at Centennial Park, also goes to Mount Olivet once a year to decorate the graves of Confederate soldiers and occasionally takes other trips to Nashville. He declares that he is as happy as anyone could be under the circumstances and he is spending the evening of life in quiet content.

(Since this biographical sketch was written, General Smith has passed to his reward. In honor of his distinguished character and services his body was placed in state in the hall of the house of representatives in the capitol of Tennessee, where the funeral services were held under the auspices of the United Confederate Veterans.)

SOURCE: Tennessee: The Volunteer State, 1769-1923, Volume 2, p. 144-7

Saturday, July 20, 2019

Gerrit Smith: The News From England, January 3, 1862

Alas! that this news should find us still embarrassed, and still diddling with the negro question!  Alas! That we should still have one war upon our hands, while we are threatened with another?  Had we, as we should have done, disposed of this question at the beginning of the war, then would its beginning have also been its ending.  If slavery was not, as it certainly was, the sole cause of the war, it nevertheless, was that vulnerable spot in the foe at which we should have struck without a moment’s delay.  Instead of repelling the negroes, bond and free, by insults and cruel treatment we could have brought them all to our side by simply inviting them to it.  As it is, the war has grown into a very formidable one; and the threatened one whereas, had we not acted insanely on the negro question, we could have dreaded neither.  More than this, had we, as it was so easy to do, struck instant death into the first war, we should have escaped the threat of this second one.

For what is it that the English press threatens us with war? It is for compelling the English ship to give up the rebel commissioners, so it says. This is the ostensible reason. But would not England — she who is so famous for clinging to an almost entirely unqualified and unlimited right of search — have done the same thing in like circumstances? If she would not, then she would not have been herself. Had a part of her home counties revolted and sent a couple of their rebels to America for help, would she not have caught them if she could? And in whatever circumstances they might have been found? If she says she would not, there is not on all the earth one “Jew Apella” so credulous as to believe her. If she confesses she would, then is she self-convicted, not only of trampling in her boundless dishonesty on the great and never-to-be-violated principle of doing as we would be done by, but of insulting us by claiming that we ought to be tame and base enough to forbear to do that which her self-respect and high spirit would prompt her to do.

But perhaps England would not have done as we did.  Her naval captains have taken thousands of seamen from our ships — these captains constituting themselves the sole accusers, witnesses and judges in the cases. It was chiefly for such outrages that we declared war against her in 1812. The instance of the San Jacinto and Trent is not like these. In this instance there was no question, because no doubt, of personal identity. But I repeat, perhaps England would not have done as we did.  In a case so aggravated, she would, perhaps, may, probably, have taken ship and all.  By the way, it may be that we did act illegally in not seizing the ship as well as the rebels, and subjecting her to a formal trial; but if in this we fell into a mistake, could England be so mean as to make war upon us for it? — for a mistake which was prompted by a kind and generous regard for the comfort and interests of Englishmen? Surely, if England is not noble enough to refuse to punish for any mere mistake, She is, nevertheless, not monstrous enough to punish for the mistake, which grew solely out of the desire to serve her.

But wherein have we harmed England in this matter?  We have insulted her, is the answer. We have not, however, intended to insult her: and an unintended insult is really no insult.  If, in my eagerness to overtake the man who has deeply injured me, I run rudely through my neighbor’s house he will not only not accuse me of insulting him, but he will pardon so much to my very excusable eagerness as to leave but little ground of any kind of complaint against me.  Surely, if England were but to ask her own heart how she would feel toward men in her own bosom, who, without the slightest provocation, were busy in breaking up her nation, and in plundering and slaughtering her people, she would be more disposed to shed tears of pity for us that to make war upon us.

It is not possible that England will make war on us for what we did to the Trent, and for doing which she has herself furnished us innumerable precedents.  It is not possible that she will so ignore, nay, so deny and dishonor her own history. I will not believe that England, whom I have ever loved and honored almost as if she were my own country, and who, whatever prejudiced and passionate American writers have written to the contrary, has hitherto, during our great and sore trial done nothing through her government, nor through the great body of her people, to justify the attempt by a portion (happily a very small and very unworthy portion) of our press to stir up our national feeling against her — I say I will not believe that this loved and honored England will make war upon us for a deed in which we intended her no wrong; in which, so far as her own example is authority, there is no wrong; and in which, in the light of reason, and, as it will prove in the judgment of mankind, there is no wrong. She could not make such a causeless war upon us without deeply and broadly blotting her own character and he character of modern civilization. But, after, all, what better is our modern civilization than a mere blot and blotch if the nation which is preeminently its exponent, can be guilty, and without the least real cause of provocation, and upon pretests as frivolous as they are false, of seeing to destroy a sister nation? — a sister nation, too, whose present embarrassments and distresses appeal so strongly to every good heart? Moreover, how little will it argue for the cause of human rights, and popular institutions, if the nation, which claims to be the chief champion of that cause, can wage so wicked a war upon a nation claiming no humbler relation to that precious cause?

What, then, do I hold that England should do in this case?

1st. Reprimand or more severely punish the captain of the Trent for his very gross and very guilty violation of our rights in furnishing exceedingly important facilities to our enemy. This our government should have promptly insisted on, and not have suffered England to get the start of us with her absurd counter claim.  This is a case in which not we, but England, should have been made defendant.  It is her Captain who is the real offender.  Ours is, at the most, but a nominal one.  In the conduct of her Captain were in spirit and purpose, as well as the doing, of wrong.  The conduct of ours, on the contrary, was prompted by the spirit and purpose of doing right; and if, in any respect, it was erroneous, it was simply in regard to the forms of doing right.  Moreover, the guilt of her Captain can be diminished by nothing that was seemingly or really guilty in ours. The criminality of taking the rebels into the Trent was none the less, because of any mistakes which attended the getting of them out.  Nevertheless, England takes no action against him.  Her policy is to have her guilty Captain lost sight of in her bluster about our innocent one.  To screen the thief, she cries, “Stop thief!”  Her policy is to prevent us from getting the true issue before the public mind, by occupying it with her false one.

How preposterous is the claim of England to her right to make war, because we took our rebellious subjects from her ship!  The taking of them into her ship is the only thing in the case which can possibly furnish cause of war. That, unless amply apologized for, does, in the light of international law, furnish abundant cause of war.

Did every hypocrisy and impudence go farther than in England’s putting America on trial! Was there ever a more emphatic “putting the saddle on the wrong horse”? I overtake the thief who has stolen my watch, and jerk it from his pocket.  He turns to the people, not to confess his theft, but to protest against my rudeness, and to have me, instead of himself, regarded as the criminal!

An old fable tells us that a council of animals, with the lion at their head, put an ass on trial for having “broused the bigness of his tongue.” The lion (England) was constrained to confess that he had himself eaten sheep, and shepherds too.  Nevertheless, it was the offence of the ass (America) that caused the council to shudder with horror. “What! Eat another’s grass? O shame!” and so the virtuous rascals condemned him to die, and rejoiced anew in their conscious innocence.

Moreover, England, instead of turning to her own conscience with the true case, has the brazen effrontery to appeal to our conscience with her trumped-up case.  Which of the parties in this instance needs conscience-quickening, in no less certain than in the instance of the footpad and the traveler, when he had robbed of his bags of gold.  The poor traveler meekly asked for a few coins to defray his expenses homeward. “Take them from one of the bags,” said the footpad, with an air of chivalrous magnanimity; but on seeing the traveler take half a dozen instead of two or three, he exclaimed, “Why, man, have you no conscience?”  England, through her subject and servant, entered into a conspiracy against America.  America, through her subject and servant, forbore to punish the wickedness, and simply stopped it.  And yet England bids us to our conscience!

Why Should England protect her captain?  Her Queen, in her last May’s Proclamation, warned him that, for doing what he has done, he should, “in no wise obtain any protection.” He had full knowledge of the official character of the rebles, and at least inferential knowledge of their bearing dispatches with them.  But, besides that the whole spirit of it is against what he has done, her Proclamation specifies “officers” and “dispatches” in the list of what her subjects are prohibited to carry “for the use or service of either of the contending parties.

England did not protect the Captain of her mail-steamer, Teviot, who, during our war with Mexico was guilty of carrying the Mexican General Paredez.  He was suspended.  Why does she spare the Captain of the Trent?  Is it because she has more sympathy with the Southern Confederacy than she had with Mexico? — and is, therefore, more tender toward him who serves the former, than she was toward him who served the latter?  But it will, perhaps be said, that we have not demanded satisfaction in this case as we did in that.  England, nevertheless, knows that we are entitled to it; and that she is bound to satisfy us for the wrongs she did us, before she complains of the way we took to save ourselves from the deep injury with which that great and guilty wrong threatened us.  In this connexion, I add that if, upon her own principles and precedents, the Captain of the Trent deserves punishment for what he did, she is stopped from magnifying into a grave offence our undoing what we did.

2. The next thing that England should do is to give instructions, or rather repeat those in the Queen's Proclamation, that no more rebel commissioners be received into her vessels.

3. And then she should inform us whether, in the case of a vessel that shall hereafter offend in this wise, she would have us take the vessel itself, or take but the commissioners. It is true that whatever her preference, we would probably insist on taking the vessel in every case: — for it is not probable that we shall again expose ourselves in such a case to the charge of taking too little. It is, however, also true, that, should she prefer our taking the vessel, we will certainly never take less.

But such instructions and information, although they would provide for future cases, would leave the present case unprovided for; and England might still say that she could not acquiesce in our having, in this case, taken the Commissioners instead of the vessel.  What then?  She ought to be content with the expression of our regret that we did not take the mode of her choice, and the more so as that mode could not have been followed by any different result in respect to our getting possession of the Commissioners.  But this might not satisfy her: — and what then?  She should generously wait until that unnatural and horrid war is off our hands; and if the parties could not then agree, they should submit the case to an Umpire.  If, however, she should call for an Umpire now, then, although the civilized world would think badly of her for it, and our own nation be very slow to forgive her for it, I would nevertheless, in my abhorrence of all war, have our government consent to an Umpire now. Nay, in the spirit of this abhorrence, and for the sake of peace, I would go much farther.  If no other concession we could make would satisfy England, I would have our Government propose to surrender the rebels, Mason and Slidell, in case the English Government would say, distinctly and solemnly, that it would not itself disturb neutral vessels having on board rebels who had gone out from England in quest of foreign aid to overturn the English Government.  An ineffably base Government would it prove itself to be should it refuse to say this, and yet declare war on the ground of our capture of the rebels who were on their way for foreign help to overturn our government.

I spoke of my abhorrence of all war.  Our lifelong opponents of war find themselves unexpectedly in sympathy with mighty armies.  They have to confess that they never anticipated a rebellion so fast; still less did they ever anticipate that England would be guilty of coming to the help of such a satanic rebellion.

I have said that England will not go to war with us in the case of the Trent. Nevertheless I am not without fear that her government will be driven to declare war against us. The Government of no other nation (and this is honorable to England) is more influenced by the people.  By such an affair as the capture of Mason and Slidell, the patriotism of the least-informed and superficial and excitable part of her people is easily and extensively wrought upon. With this part of her people the inviolability of the British flag is more than all earth besides.  But it is not by that capture, nor by those classes to whom it appeals with such peculiar power that the Government will be moved. If an irresistible pressure comes upon the government, it will come from those portions of the people who long for the cotton and free trade of the South, and who have allowed themselves to get angry with the North by foolishly misconstruing our high tariff (which is simply a war measure) into a hostile commercial measure. The capture of Mason and Slidell will be only the pretext, not the provocation; only the occasion, not the cause of war.

If England wishes to go to war with us for any wrongs we have done her, she shall not have the chance—for we will promptly repair the wrongs, at whatever sacrifices of property or pride. But if, as I still honor and love her too much to believe, she wishes to go to war with us at any rate, and chooses this our time of trouble as her time to make us an easy prey, then will she be gratified.  It will be but fair, however, to advertise her that she must not take our fighting in the war with the rebels as a sample of what will be our fighting in the war with herself.  The former is fooling.  The latter will be fighting.  On all subjects connected with slavery, and therefore in a war about slavery, we Americans are fools.  We cannot help it.  We have worshipped the idol so long and so devoutly, that when in its all-influential presence, we cannot be men. The powers of our moral nature are, however, not destroyed; they are but perverted.  And such an outrage as the English press threatens us with will restore their legitimate use.  Our manhood is not dead; it but sleeps.  And as it was when the Philistines fell upon the bound Samson, that the Spirit of the Lord came to his help, so, when the English shall fall upon the worse-bound Americans, this sleeping manhood will awake.  And it will awake to assert itself, not merely against the English, but against the rebels also.  And It will do this mightily, because it will, and the same time, be asserting itself against its own life-long degradations, and the hateful cause of them.  Let us but know that England, to whom we have done no wrong, has resolved to come to the help of the Pro-Slavery Rebellion, and our deep indignations against her, combining with our deeper indignation against ourselves, will arm us with the spirit of the power to snap the “cords,” and “green withs,” and “new ropes,” with which slavery has bound us to dash to dust the foul idol whose worship has so demented and debased us.  Yes, let us hear this month that England has declared war against us, and this month will witness our Proclamation of Liberty to every slave in the land.  No thanks will be due her for the happy effect upon us of her Declaration of war.  No thanks will be due her that the Declaration will have the effect to save us — to save us by making us anti-slavery.  No more half-way measures, and no more nonsense on the Subject of slavery, shall we then propose.  There will be no more talk then of freeing one sort of slaves, and continuing the other in slavery; but we shall then invite every negro in the land, bond and free, to identify himself, “arm and soul,” with our cause.  And then there will be no more talk of swapping off taxes for negroes, and no more talk of colonizing and apprenticing them.  Then we shall be eager to lift up the negroes into the enjoyment of all the rights of manhood, that so we may have in them men to stand by our side, and help us make short work with the present war, and with that with which we are threatened.

Owing to the bewitching and debauching influence of slavery upon our whole nation, there are, even in the Free States, divisions among us in regard to the present war.  But should England so causelessly, cruelly and meanly force a war upon us, there will be no divisions among us in regard to that war: — nor, indeed, will there then be in regard to the other. And so deep and abiding will be our sense of her boundless injustice, that there will never be any boundless injustice, that there will never be any among us to welcome propositions of peace with England, until her war with us shall have reached the result of our subjugation, or of her expulsion from every part of the Continent of North America.  Moreover, we shall rejoice to hear of the crushing of her power every where — for we shall feel that the nation which can be guilty of such a war is fit to govern no where — in the Eastern no more than in the Western hemisphere.

SOURCES: “News from England by Geritt Smith,” The Liberator, Boston, Massachusetts, Friday, January 3, 1862, p. 4; An abstract of thes article appears in Octavius Brooks Frothingham, Gerrit Smith: A Biography, p. 262-3

Friday, July 12, 2019

Diary of Corporal David L. Day: November 4, 1861

Sunday morning in Baltimore, and a stiller or more quiet place I never saw. No sounds are heard, no people or carriages are seen in the street. It looks and seems like a deserted city. We took a hurried glance at a portion of the city, visiting Pratt street, where the assault on the 6th Massachusetts took place. The bullet holes and scars on the walls of the buildings, gave proof that the boys got a good deal interested, while passing through that street.

OFF FOR ANNAPOLIS.

We embarked on the steamer Louisiana, about 9 a. m., for Annapolis. As we steamed past old Fort McHenry, I was reminded of an interesting scrap of history connected with this fort. When the British fleet bombarded this fort during the last war with England, there was aboard one of the ships, an American prisoner, a Mr. Key, I think his name was, who watched with the most intense anxiety, the result of the bombardment, and during its progress, wrote the song that has since become famous as one of our national anthems, The Star Spangled Banner.

"By the cannon's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night, that our flag was still there."

Arrived at Annapolis about noon, and marched up to the Naval academy, where we quartered and took dinner with the 21st Massachusetts, now doing garrison duty at this post.

Religious services this afternoon, by Chaplains Ball of the 21st and James of our own regiment. I cannot say that I was much interested in the meeting, as I was very tired, and preaching about the Pharisees and other antiquated sinners of a thousand years ago, did not seem to apply to my ease, or the present time.

SOURCE: David L. Day, My Diary of Rambles with the 25th Mass. Volunteer Infantry, p. 10-11

Wednesday, May 8, 2019

Diary of William Howard Russell: July 15, 1861

I need not speak much of the events of last night, which were not unimportant, perhaps to some of the insects which played a leading part in them. The heat was literally overpowering; for in addition to the hot night there was the full power of most irritable boilers close at hand to aggravate the natural désagrémens of the situation. About an hour after dawn, when I turned out on deck, there was nothing visible but a warm gray mist; but a knotty old pilot on deck told me we were only going six knots an hour against tide and wind, and that we were likely to make less way as the day wore on. In fact, instead of being near Baltimore, we were much nearer Fortress Monroe. Need I repeat the horrors of this day? Stewed, boiled, baked, and grilled on board this miserable Elizabeth, I wished M. Montalembert could have experienced with me what such an impassive nature could inflict in misery on those around it. The captain was a shy, silent man, much given to short naps in my temporary berth, and the mate was so wild, he might have swam off with perfect propriety to the woods on either side of us, and taken to a tree as an aborigine or chimpanzee. Two men of most retiring habits, the negro, a black boy, and a very fat negress who officiated as cook, filled up the “balance” of the crew.

I could not write, for the vibration of the deck of the little craft gave a St. Vitus dance to pen and pencil; reading was out of the question from the heat and flies; and below stairs the fat cook banished repose by vapors from her dreadful caldrons, where, Medea-like, she was boiling some death broth. Our breakfast was of the simplest and — may I add? — the least enticing; and if the dinner could have been worse it was so; though it was rendered attractive by hunger, and by the kindness of the sailors who shared it with me. The old pilot had a most wholesome hatred of the Britishers, and not having the least idea till late in the day that I belonged to the old country, favored me with some very remarkable views respecting their general mischievousness and inutility. As soon as he found out my secret he became more reserved, and explained to me that he had some reason for not liking us, because all he had in the world, as pretty a schooner as ever floated and a fine cargo, had been taken and burnt by the English when they sailed up the Potomac at Washington. He served against us at Bladensburg. I did not ask him how fast he ran; but he had a good rejoinder ready if I had done so, inasmuch as he was up West under Commodore Perry on the lakes when we suffered our most serious reverses. Six knots an hour! hour after hour! And nothing to do but to listen to the pilot.

On both sides a line of forest just visible above the low shores. Small coasting craft, schooners, pungies, boats laden with wood creeping along in the shallow water, or plying down empty before wind and tide.

“I doubt if we'll be able to catch up them forts afore night,” said the skipper. The pilot grunted, u I rather think yu'll not.” "H--- and thunder! Then we'll have to lie off till daylight?” “They may let you pass, Captain Squires, as you've this Europe-an on board, but anyhow we can't fetch Baltimore till late at night or early in the morning.”

I heard the dialogue, and decided very quickly that as Annapolis lay somewhere ahead on our left, and was much nearer than Baltimore, it would be best to run for it while there was daylight. The captain demurred. He had been ordered to take his vessel to Baltimore, and General Butler might come down on him for not doing so; but I proposed to sign a letter stating he had gone to Annapolis at my request, and the steamer was put a point or two to westward, much to the pleasure of the Palinurus, whose “old woman” lived in the town. I had an affection for this weather-beaten, watery-eyed, honest old fellow, who hated us as cordially as Jack detested his Frenchman in the old days before ententes cordiales were known to the world. He was thoroughly English in his belief that he belonged to the only sailor race in the world, and that they could beat all mankind in seamanship; and he spoke in the most unaffected way of the Britishers as a survivor of the old war might do of Johnny Crapaud — “They were brave enough no doubt, but, Lord bless you, see them in a gale of wind! or look at them sending down top-gallant masts, or anything sailor-like in a breeze. You'd soon see the differ. And, besides, they never can stand again us at close quarters.” By and by the houses of a considerable town, crowned by steeples, and a large Corinthian-looking building, came in view. “That's the State House. That's where George Washington — first in peace, first in war, and first in the hearts of his countrymen — laid down his victorious sword without any one asking him, and retired amid the applause of the civilized world.” This flight I am sure was the old man's treasured relic of school-boy days, and I'm not sure he did not give it to me three times over. Annapolis looks very well from the river side. The approach is guarded by some very poor earthworks and one small fort. A dismantled sloop of war lay off a sea wall, banking up a green lawn covered with trees, in front of an old-fashioned pile of buildings, which formerly, I think, and very recently indeed, was occupied by the cadets of the United States Naval School. “There was a lot of them Seceders. Lord bless you! these young ones is all took by these States Rights' doctrines — just as the ladies is caught by a new fashion.”

About seven o'clock the steamer hove along-side a wooden pier which was quite deserted. Only some ten or twelve sailing boats, yachts, and schooners lay at anchor in the placid waters of the port which was once the capital of Maryland, and for which the early Republicans prophesied a great future. But Baltimore has eclipsed Annapolis into utter obscurity. I walked to the only hotel in the place, and found that the train for the junction with Washington had started, and that the next train left at some impossible hour in the morning. It is an odd Rip Van Winkle sort of a place. Quaint-looking boarders came down to the tea-table and talked Secession, and when I was detected, as must ever soon be the case, owing to the hotel-book, I was treated to some ill-favored glances, as my recent letters have been denounced in the strongest way for their supposed hostility to States Rights and the Domestic Institution. The spirit of the people has, however, been broken by the Federal occupation, and by the decision with which Butler acted when he came down here with the troops to open communications with Washington after the Baltimoreans had attacked the soldiery on their way through the city from the north.

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, Vol. 1, p. 419-22

Tuesday, February 5, 2019

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

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

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

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

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

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

Tuesday, January 1, 2019

John Bright to John L. Motley, March 9, 1863

Rochdale,
March 9, 1863.

My Dear Mr. Motley: I should have written to you sooner, but I have been a week away from town and from home in consequence of the death of my father-in-law at Newcastle-on-Tyne, and for a week past I have been unable to sit down to write, owing to a violent cold, with cough and feverishness, which has made me incapable of any business or exertion.

Your letter gave me much pleasure, and I know not that there is anything in it on your great question that I do not agree with. I am glad to find that you have observed the change of feeling which has taken place in this country, and I hope it has not been without effect in the United States.

Coming down from the War of Independence and from the War of 1812, there has always been in this country a certain jealousy of yours. It has been felt by the ruling class that your escape from George III, and our aristocratic government has been followed by a success and a progress of which England could offer no example. The argument could not be avoided, If Englishmen west of the Atlantic can prosper without Crown, without Lords, without Church, without a great territorial class with feudal privileges, and without all this or these can become great and happy, how long will Englishmen in England continue to think these things necessary for them? Any argument in favor of freedom here, drawn from your example, was hateful to the ruling class; and therefore it is not to be wondered at that a great disaster happening to your country and to its Constitution should not be regarded as a great calamity by certain influential classes here. Again, the rich, made rich by commerce, are generally very corrupt: the fluctuations of politics suddenly influence their fortunes, and they are more likely to take the wrong side than the right one. Thus, in London, Liverpool, and Manchester, on the Stock Exchange and the commercial exchanges, are found many friends of the South, from the stupid idea that, if the North would not resist, peace would of necessity be restored.

But, apart from these classes, the mind of the nation is sound, and universally among the working-classes there is not only a strong hatred of slavery, but also a strong affection for the Union and for the Republic. They know well how literally it has been the home of millions of their class, and their feelings are entirely in its favor. The meetings lately held have not generally been attended by speakers most likely to draw great audiences, and yet no building has been large enough to contain those who have assembled. The effect of these meetings is apparent in some of our newspapers, and on the tone of Parliament. In the House of Commons there is not a whisper about recognition or mediation in any form, and so far I see no sign of any attempt to get up a discussion on the part of any friends of the South. I am not certain just now that the most cunning and earnest friends of the South are not of opinion that it is prudent to be quiet on another ground besides that of a public disinclination to their cause: they think the South has more to hope now from dissensions at the North than from European sympathy; and they believe that nothing would so rapidly heal dissensions at the North as any prospect of recognition or interference from France or England. I gather this from what I heard a short time ago from a leading, perhaps the leading, secessionist in the House of Commons.

So far as England is concerned, every idea of interference in any way seems to be quite abandoned. A real neutrality is the universally admitted creed and duty of this country, and I am convinced that there is a wide-spread dissatisfaction with the tardy action of the government by which the Alabama was allowed to get out to sea.

Two days before Parliament met I made a speech to a meeting mainly of working-men in this town. The object of the meeting was to vote thanks to the New York merchants and others for their contributions to our distressed operatives. I spoke to show them how hostile the pretensions of the South not only to negro freedom, but to all freedom, and, especially, to explain to them the new theory that all difficulties between capital and labor would be got rid of by making all labor into capital, that is, by putting my workmen into the position of absolute ownership now occupied by my horses! The people here understand all this. Cheap newspapers have done much for them of late, and I have no fear of their going wrong.

But, seeing no danger here, what can be said for your own people? The democratic leaders in some of the States seem depraved and corrupt to a high degree. It seems incredible that now, after two years of war, there should be anybody in the North in favor of slavery, and ready rather to peril and to ruin the Union than to wound and destroy the great cause of all the evil; yet so it is, and doubtless the government is weakened by this exhibition of folly and treason. Military successes will cure all this — but can they be secured? Time has allowed the South to consolidate its military power and to meet your armies with apparently almost equal forces. To me it seems that too much has been attempted, and that, therefore, much has failed. At this moment much depends on Vicksburg; if the river be cleared out, then the conspiracy will be cut into two, and the reputation of the administration will be raised. If, again, Charleston be captured, the effect in Europe will be considerable, and it will cause much disheartenment through the South. But if neither can be done, I think the North will be sick of its government, if not of the war, and it will be difficult to raise new forces and to continue the war. Another year must, I think, break down the South, but something must be done and shown to make it possible for Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward to conduct this contest through another campaign.

I cannot believe in the notions of the New York “Times” as to French intervention. The Mexican mess is surely enough for the appetite of Louis Napoleon. Perhaps the story is got up to give more unity to the Northern mind. I can trace it no further than this. Your cause is in your own hands. I hope Heaven may give you strength and virtue to win it. All mankind look on, for all mankind have a deep interest in the conflict. Thank you for all your kind words to myself. I shall always be glad to have a letter from you.

Ever yours sincerely,
John Bright.

SOURCE: George William Curtis, editor, The Correspondence of John Lothrop Motley in Two Volumes, Library Edition, Volume 2, p. 318-22