On this date in 1864 President Lincoln receives a Christmas gift.

[Bull Snipe]

"I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the City of Savannah, with one hundred and fifty heavy guns and plenty of ammunition and about twenty-five thousand bales of cotton." General William T. Sherman's "March to the Sea" was over. During the campaign General Sherman had made good on his promise d “to make Georgia howl”. Atlanta was a smoldering ruin, Savannah was in Union hands, closing one of the last large ports to Confederate blockade runners. Sherman’s Army wrecked 300 miles of railroad and numerous bridges and miles of telegraph lines. It seized 5,000 horses, 4,000 mules, and 13,000 head of cattle. It confiscated 9.5 million pounds of corn and 10.5 million pounds of fodder, and destroyed uncounted cotton gins and mills. In all, about 100 million dollars of damage was done to Georgia and the Confederate war effort.

[Pelham]

"Withdrawal from the American Union is governed by the Founding Charter of the United States which is also known as "The Declaration of Independence."

Actually the "Founding Charter of the United States" is Richard Henry Lee's Resolution, proposed on June 7th and passed by the 2nd Continental Congress on July 2nd.

The Declaration is really just the public relations announcement of what Lee's Resolution effected. John Adams thought that July 2nd would be our national holiday.

Resolved, That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.

That it is expedient forthwith to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign Alliances.

That a plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective Colonies for their consideration and approbation.

[Kalamata]

>>BroJoeK wrote: "In both cases we see Democrats so filled with hatred of Republicans they can't stifle their urges to fantasize nonsense and present it as if it happened."

The modern-day Democrats sounds eerily like the hateful lunatic and Lincoln supporter named Thaddeus Stevens. "Brother" Thaddeus promoted Southern genocide; and Lincoln's war criminals, Sherman and Sheridan, and their subordinate generals, along with the "Reconstructionists," carried out the genocide:

"In the Congress, there was a significant group of South haters, with murderous demands. The chairman of the Ways and Means Committee of the House of Representatives, Thaddeus Stevens, was willing that the South "be laid waste, and made a desert, in order to save this Union from destruction." Before a Republican state convention in September 1862, he urged the government to "slay every traitor-bum every Rebel Mansion.... unless we do this, we cannot conquer them." The New York Times wrote in March 1861 that the North should "destroy its commerce, and bring utter ruin on the Confederate states," and this was before the bombardment at Fort Sumter."

"Congressman Zachariah Chandler expressed the spirit of so many in the Congress: "A rebel has sacrificed all his rights. He has no right to life, liberty, property, or the pursuit of happiness. Everything you give him, even life itself, is a boon which he has forfeited."

Such sentiments found their way to the European observers of the war, who found them hard to believe from a civilized people. A correspondent for the pro-Northern Macmillan Magazine, in December 1863, wrote, "How can you subjugate such a people as this? And even supposing that their extermination were a feasible plan, as some Northerners suggested,I never can believe that in the nineteenth century the civilized world will be condemned to witness the destruction of such a gallant race."

"On 5 May 1861, this genocidal passion against the South found analysis in the New York Herald. It quoted the views of the abolitionists: "When the rebellious traitors are overwhelmed in the field, and scattered like leaves before an angry wind, it must not be to return to peaceful and contented homes. They must find poverty at their firesides, and see privation in the anxious eyes of mothers, and the rags of children."

"Another radical editor noted that the New York Herald called "for the punishment of all individuals in the South by hanging, and the confiscation of everybody's property in the seceding States." "Richmond," said another, "must be laid in ashes," and as for Baltimore, "it must become a heap of cinders and ashes, and its inhabitants ought either to be slaughtered, or scattered to the winds." Virginia and Maryland deserve to be "laid waste and made desolate" and 500,000 troops should "pour down from the North, leaving a desert track behind them." The editor responded, "Submission on the part of the South would not satisfy these bloody journalists of the Republican party. Far from it. They cry out: 'We mean not merely to conquer, but to subjugate.'" The editor then adds, "The people of the North are prepared for no such extremities as the brutal, bloodthirsty journals of the abolitionist school suggest."

"On 24 May 1861, the Daily Herald in Newburyport, Massachusetts, said that "if it were necessary, we could clear off the thousand millions of square miles so that not a city or cultivated field would remain; we could exterminate nine millions of white people and re-settle-re-people the lands. There is no want of ability; and if such a work is demanded, there would be no want of a will."

"It is no wonder that the Civil War generated hatred for the North and the Republican party among Southerners for well over a hundred years the bloodthirsty rhetoric of the radicals in the North in time found expression in the devastation of civilians and civilian property by Sherman, Sheridan, Grant, and the commander in chief-Lincoln. It didn't end with the war, for it was then carried on in a less violent form in the Reconstruction laws for the South by the radicals. The object was to exterminate the culture of the Southerners, and to subjugate then destroy the political force of the Southern establishment, and not just the planter-slave owner class. There was to be a new order in the South, excluding the established Southerners of all classes. The radicals succeeded for a while and then moved on, leaving a wasteland in which secret societies and lawlessness prevailed. Thus, in a sense, the Northerners did exterminate a society in every way except genocide. By contrast, no such genocidal threats were made by Southerners against the North.

[Charles W. Adams, "When in the Course of Human Events: Arguing the Case for Southern Secession." Rowman & Littlefield, 2000, pp.54-56]

The Northern "republican" leadership was despicable, to say the least. Historian James Thurslow Adams described Thaddeus in those same "Democratic Party" terms:

"Cities [in the Civil War North] grew rapidly. Everywhere there was a"boom," although labor did not fare as well as capitalists and speculators. There was scarcely any fighting on Northern soil, and almost no damage from that source. Unfortunately, on Lee's dash into Pennsylvania, the ironworks of a man whose one idea had been to get rich as quickly as possible were destroyed. They belonged to Thaddeus Stevens, perhaps the most despicable, malevolent, and morally deformed character who has ever risen to high power in America."

[James Truslow Adams, "The Epic of America." 3rd Ed, 1938, p.275]

Perhaps Bernie and Maxine learned their rhetoric from Thaddeus.

Mr. Kalamata

[DiogenesLamp]

You mean Star of the West don’t you?

Yes. My mistake. Thanks for pointing that out.

That is why they chartered two steam tugs and put extra boats on Powhatan.

Not according to Porter. He said that all the little boats on the Powhatan were unserviceable. He said none of them were useable. He makes no mention of any "new" boats being put on the Powhatan.

[Bull Snipe]

May be wrong about the extra boats on Powhatan. But the plan never called for the supply ship or the warships to enter Charleston Harbor. They were to be anchored about 4 miles from Sumter. That would have put the ships beyond the range of the Confederate gun batteries. The tugs and small boat would come within about 1200 yards of those batteries and have been well within their range.

[Bull Snipe]

“Still, this did not excuse the behavior of the Citadel Cadets who fired at them without provocation”

These were not school boys on an afternoon lark. They were Cadets being trained in gunnery, under the leadership of instructors who were officers of the South Carolina militia. They fired those guns on orders from those officers. What prompted the militia officers to order the guns being fired? That is a question to look into. Beauregard said that he did not order that action.

[DoodleDawg]

The modern-day Democrats sounds eerily like the hateful lunatic and Lincoln supporter named Thaddeus Stevens. "Brother" Thaddeus promoted Southern genocide; and Lincoln's war criminals, Sherman and Sheridan, and their subordinate generals, along with the "Reconstructionists," carried out the genocide...

Have you ever been tested for rabies? Just curious.

[BroJoeK]

Night Hides Not: "After reading the first page of the thread, I skipped ahead to the last, as I expected it to devolve into hubris, innuendo, and personal attacks.
I was not disappointed...lol."

Some of our Lost Causers have large inventories of proof-texts they can quote from, and usually begin by posting them.
When those are debunked, or just run out, then they throw whatever cr*p they can at us.

Of course we do our best to remain civilized, but... well... what can I say, Schiff happens.

Night Hides Not: "Last summer, we spent a day at Monticello.
It was incredible, including a "conversation" with Thomas Jefferson's "interpreter."
It was like going back in time, actually listening to Mr. Jefferson's words.
He adroitly addressed a woman's question on slavery, taking over 20 minutes to answer her."

Jefferson was a, ahem, complicated figure, with much to admire but some to regret.
Simplified: Jefferson, like many Founders, considered slavery a necessary evil, which should be restricted & controlled, eventually abolished.
He helped abolish international imports of slaves and restricted slavery from the Northwest Territories, even proposed a plan for compensated emancipation and recolonization.
But he never freed most of his own slaves, not even in his will, and was content to leave the problem for future generations to solve.
Iirc, he foresaw that solution would not be easy.

[DiogenesLamp]

May be wrong about the extra boats on Powhatan. But the plan never called for the supply ship or the warships to enter Charleston Harbor. They were to be anchored about 4 miles from Sumter. That would have put the ships beyond the range of the Confederate gun batteries.

So how were they going to use "all the force" at their disposal to place both men and supplies into the fort?

Warships aren't much good if you don't actually use them.

[Bull Snipe]

That would have been up to the ranking captain on scene.
The plan was to send in provisions only. If that occurred, the mission was accomplished and the ships were to return to their ports. If not, the ships were authorized to use force to land not only provisions by munitions and two companies of artillerymen. Since the fort was being fired upon, the resupply mission was not attempted.

[BroJoeK]

In his post #745 Kalamata argues that in contrast to sincere abolitionists like... Jefferson Davis, Lincoln supported slavery when it suited him politically, only opposed it when political winds blew that direction.

Kalamata: "Lincoln barely mentioned slavery before 1854, and the few times he did it was politically-timed to promote Whig economic agenda.
The amoral Whig party was split over slavery, but strictly for political reasons:"

Lincoln himself said otherwise:

• "I have always hated slavery, I think as much as any abolitionist." AL Chicago speech -1858"

• "If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong... I can not remember when I did not so think, and feel."
  AL to Hodges 1864

• "In 1841 you and I had together a tedious low-water trip, on a Steam Boat from Louisville to St. Louis.
  You may remember, as I well do, that from Louisville to the mouth of the Ohio there were, on board, ten or a dozen slaves, shackled together with irons.
  That sight was a continual torment to me; and I see something like it every time I touch the Ohio, or any other slave-border."
  AL to Speed, 1855

• "I hold it to be a paramount duty of us in the free states, due to the Union of the states, and perhaps to liberty itself (paradox though it may seem) to let the slavery of the other states alone; while, on the other hand, I hold it to be equally clear, that we should never knowingly lend ourselves directly or indirectly, to prevent that slavery from dying a natural death---to find new places for it to live in, when it can no longer exist in the old."
  AL to Durley, 1845

• Whig Congressman Lincoln supported the 1846 Wilmot Proviso, banning slavery from new territories.

• Whig Congressman Lincoln wrote & introduced a bill in 1847 to abolish slavery in Washington, DC.

• In 1849 Lincoln left Congress and returned to private law practice, but was drawn back to Republican politics by the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska act, expanding slavery into territories.

• [The pro-slavery Kansas-Nebraska Act had] "declared indifference, but as I must think, a covert real zeal for the spread of slavery.
  I cannot but hate it.
  I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself.
  I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world..."
  AL Peoria Speech -1854

The truth is, Lincoln opposed slavery all his life, and as a practical politician, all that politics would allow.

Kalamata: "Slavery was just another political tool for Lincoln and the Whigs."

The Whig party died in 1856 because it did not consistently oppose slavery.
In 1854, the Republican party grew from an alliance of anti-slavery Whigs and free-soil Democrats.
Lincoln joined the Republicans in 1856.

Kalamata quoting HL Donald, 1996: "In Washington government officials could not agree on how to deal with the increasingly serious crisis.
The President, along with many other conservatives, favored calling a national convention to amend the Constitution so as to redress Southern grievances."

That president was not Lincoln, it was Democrat James Buchanan.

Kalamata quoting Magnus, 2017, on Corwin: "Lincoln actively lobbied behind the scenes to drum up support for the amendment after he arrived in Washington in late February.
A young Henry Adams, who was clerking for his congressman father and Corwin Amendment co-sponsor Charles Francis Adams, affirms this as well, noting that the amendment's adoption by the narrowest of two-thirds majorities came only because of 'some careful manipulation, as well as the direct influence of the new President.' "

Here's the truth: the entire argument that "Lincoln supported Corwin" is based on hearsay testimony from Lt. Col. Peter Venkman, who reported hearing from a whistleblower what Adam Schiff claimed was the President's conversation with... somebody... who? Doesn't matter, the Republican President is guilty of whatever Democrats claim. </sarcasm>

Kalamata quoting Garrison, 1993, on Lincoln's pre-emancipation plan: "abolition by individual states, with compensation to owners, and colonization of black "Americans" with their own consent, at any place or places without the United States."

Note the key words: "with their own consent".

Kalamata quoting Lind, 2005: "Most of the white American opponents of slavery in his time, like Lincoln, had no intention of creating a color-blind, multiracial society in the United States.
Among Lincoln's contemporaries, only a minority of white abolitionists and Radical Republicans... "

Lincoln was a practical politician who hated slavery and took every opportunity to oppose it, culminating in the 13th Amendment.
And Lincoln's support for the 15th Amendment (black suffrage) is what triggered John Wilkes Booth to murder him.

[jeffersondem]

“And Lincoln's support for the 15th Amendment (black suffrage) is what triggered John Wilkes Booth to murder him.”

By some accounts, the 15th amendment was passed by Congress in 1869 and ratified in 1870.

[DiogenesLamp]

That would have been up to the ranking captain on scene.

If there is no means to use "force", then it really isn't up to the Captain, is it?

If not, the ships were authorized to use force to land not only provisions by munitions and two companies of artillerymen.

And what "force" would they use?

[Bull Snipe]

There was a means to use force if the situation required.

“And what “force” would they use?”

Most probably the guns that each of the warships carried.

[DiogenesLamp]

Most probably the guns that each of the warships carried.

And could they outrage the gunnery of the shore batteries?

[BroJoeK]

HandyDandy to Kalamata: "you had stated that President Lincoln held onto his “colonization” idea till “his dying days” (your words).
That is totally incorrect."

Kalamata: "No, I am correct; and since have opened your mouth, put your money where your mouth is."

HandyDandy's problem here is: he doesn't understand that like any Democrat, but unlike every Republican, Kalamata can read Republican minds and tell us with 100% certainty (enough to impeach if not "execute") what was going on there.
So Kalamata **knows** what Lincoln was thinking "in his dying days" -- pretty amazing, isn't it?

The truth is that Lincoln's recolonization ideas were basically the same as many Founders, including Jefferson, Madison & Monroe, plus Henry Clay and Andrew Jackson.
All supported voluntary resettlement for freedmen who wanted to go.
None of their experiments proved entirely successful, though some failed more miserably than others.

At the time of Lincoln's death there were no plans for future recolonization projects and 94% of the funds Congress appropriated for recolonization were never spent.

"Lincoln actually had given up on colonization long before Congress repealed funds for the program.
Since the departure of the Vache Island colonists in April 1863, the president, while privately continuing to endorse efforts of independent agencies and foreign countries to recruit emigrants, had done nothing to promote colonization. [37]
Even his appointed agent of colonization had come to suspect the president's halting commitment.
In early 1863, Pomeroy, who recognized the Vache Island venture as a meager gesture, bitterly penned a letter to Lincoln, demanding to know whether he ever intended to honor his promise of colonizing blacks, fourteen thousand of whom had applied for emigration. [38]

In fact, there is no reason to believe that Lincoln ever espoused colonization after he issued the Final Emancipation Proclamation.
Scholars who argue that Lincoln still hoped to colonize blacks after the proclamation rely on only two flimsy pieces of evidence.
On July 1, 1864, the day before Congress voted to rescind its colonization appropriations, John Hay, Lincoln's personal secretary, recorded in his diary that "the President has sloughed off that idea of colonization." [39]
Benjamin F. Butler, a leading Union general, claimed that early in 1865 Lincoln told him of the black soldiers, "I believe that it would be better to export them all to some fertile country with a good climate, which they could have to themselves."
Yet Butler's account is at best dubious, and Hay's allows for the possibility that Lincoln had given up the idea before July 1864.[40]"

It seems that after the war a lot of people claimed to speak for Lincoln, with versions of Lincoln's words which are not recorded elsewhere.
In this case, excepting only Lincoln & Sherman themselves, there is hardly a more reviled Union figure than "Beast" Butler, and yet, and yet when it suits their purposes our Lost Causers will revive the tarred, feathered, flayed & burned-at-the-stake corpse of "the Beast" just long enough to utter a few words that support their own nonsense.

[Bull Snipe]

“And could they outrage (out range)the gunnery of the shore batteries?”

No they would have to move in closer to use their guns. That was a risk to be taken.

[DiogenesLamp]

We covered this. I think Benjamin Butler was talking about Lincoln's efforts to expatriate American blacks the day before Lincoln went to the Theater.

The answer I got last time was that Benjamin Butler made it up.

My answer was that I didn't think a Union General would make sh*t up.

[DiogenesLamp]

No they would have to move in closer to use their guns. That was a risk to be taken.

That's what I thought, and it coincides with Admiral David Porter's claim that they would have all been sunk in a short time.

Anderson sent Washington his information on Confederate gun types and locations before the Confederates cut off his mail.

Anyone could look at that map he sent and know the idea of sending in ships to "force" anything was folly.

[BroJoeK]

HandyDandy to Kalamata: "You also mentioned that Abe was “executed”.
Please correct that."

Kalamata: "You are asking me to lie.
No thanks.
There were executioners lined up from Washington D.C. to Texas "dying" to rid the world of that terrorist."

HandyDandy "That is an interesting comment. See above.
Abe was struck in the back of his head by the bullet of a crazed assassin. 99% of real Americans would tell you the President was “assassinated”.
You are the first I’ve heard use the term, “executed”. "

Kalamata: "From what I have read, he was sane.
However, there is no doubt the person he executed was a blood-thirsty psychopath, who burned, raped and pillaged his way to “victory,” violating every standard of warfare and common decency, while destroying the lives of perhaps a million people, or more."

For sure, John Wilkes Boothe was every bit as sane as Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler, Nancy Pelosi and Mr. Olive himself -- all typical Democrats.

Yes, Kalamata's word "executed" can apply to "a gangland style execution", but even there the word implies some kind of process and a sentence, whereas "assassinated" means only murdered, always illegal.
So here Kalamata's "executed" implies a sentence, but if so, who exactly "sentenced" Lincoln?
Certainly neither Jefferson Davis nor any other Confederate leader ever confessed to it, so who?

Well, obviously, in Kalamata's miraculous mind he himself not only sentenced Lincoln, on his own authority, but also amazingly made his sentence retroactive so that Boothe was carrying out a sentence issued 150 years later!

Truly, it boggles the mind.

[Bull Snipe]

A claim made by someone not there.
Porter’s ships were within the range of the big guns at Fort Fischer. His ships pound the Fort to rubble. His ships were not seriously damaged during the battle.
How experienced were the Charleston gun crews. How much practice had they had at hitting a target moving at 7 or 8 knot.
The ships would have lied off the coast within their gun range, and sailing a speed of 7 or 8 knots fired to suppress the batteries opposing the resupply boats.
Shore batteries have a difficult time hitting a crossing target. They have to manually traverse the gun to keep it on target. If it not practiced on a routine basis, it is not an easy task to accomplish. Naval gunners on the other hand practice hitting moving targets all the time. This is not to say that the batteries couldn’t hit those ships or that the ships could hit the batteries.
Was the Sumter expedition a risky venture. Yes it was.
Was it doomed to failure, maybe, maybe not. The Confederates firing on Sumter made the resupply mission a moot point.