Posted on 12/15/2020 6:41:20 AM PST by Homer_J_Simpson
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Free Republic University, Department of History presents U.S. History, 1855-1860: Seminar and Discussion Forum
Bleeding Kansas, Dred Scott, Lincoln-Douglas, Harper’s Ferry, the election of 1860, secession – all the events leading up to the Civil War, as seen through news reports of the time and later historical accounts
First session: November 21, 2015. Last date to add: Sometime in the future.
Reading: Self-assigned. Recommendations made and welcomed.
Posting history, in reverse order
https://www.freerepublic.com/tag/by:homerjsimpson/index?tab=articles
To add this class to or drop it from your schedule notify Admissions and Records (Attn: Homer_J_Simpson) by reply or freepmail.
Link to previous Harper’s Weekly thread
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3913324/posts
The City of Washington and the Capitol – 1-2
Editorials – 3-4
The Lounger – 4-5
Humors of the Day – 5
Affray in Boston – 5-6
Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens, Ch. VI-VII – 6-9
Departure of the St. Louis Brigade for Kansas – 9
Domestic Intelligence – 10-11
Foreign News – 11-12
In the Indian Summer – 12
The Old House in the Five Points – 12, 15-16
A Record of the Day – 13
Assembling of Congress, Hall of Representatives, Washington City, December 3, 1860 – 14
Love – 16
She Wished to Be Something – 16-17
Non Satis – 17
Life Scenes in the South: A True Shark Story – 17-18
A Day’s Ride: A Life’s Romance, by Charles Lever. Ch. XXVI-XXVII – 18-20
The Sort of Seed Garibaldi is Sowing – 21
Scene on the Levee at New Orleans – 21
Continued from November 21 (reply #22).
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3906799/posts#22
David Herbert Donald, Lincoln
Continued from December 10 (reply #15).
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3913324/posts#15
Doris Kearns Goodwin, Team of Rivals
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3913324/posts#22
Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings 1859-1865, edited by Don E. Fehrenbacher
Continued from December 13 (reply #28).
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3913324/posts#28
With Lincoln in the White House: Letters, Memoranda, and Other Writings of John G. Nicolay, 1860-1865, edited by Michael Burlingame
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3913324/posts#29
The Diary of George Templeton Strong, Edited by Allan Nevins and Milton Halsey Thomas
David Donald’s Lincoln at reply #3
Team of Rivals at #4
Letter from Lincoln at #5
John G. Nicolay at #6
George Templeton Strong at #7.
WASHINGTON, December 15, 1860.
SIR:
I have received your resignation of the office of Secretary of State with surprise and regret. After we had passed through nearly the whole term of the administration with mutual and cordial friendship and regard, I had cherished the earnest hope that nothing might occur to disturb our official relations until its end. You have decided differently; and I have no right to complain.
I must express my gratification at your concurrence with the general principles laid down in my late message, and your appreciation, “with warm sympathy, of its patriotic appeals and suggestions.” This I value very highly; and I rejoice that we concur in the opinion that Congress does not possess the power under the Constitution to coerce a State by force of arms to remain in the Confederacy.
The question on which we unfortunately differ is that of ordering a detachment of the army and navy to Charleston, and is correctly stated in your letter of resignation. I do not intend to argue this question. Suffice it to say that your remarks upon the subject were heard by myself and the Cabinet with all the respect due to your high position, your long experience, and your unblemished character; but they failed to convince us of the necessity and propriety, under existing circumstances, of adopting such a measure. The Secretaries of War and of the Navy, through whom the orders must have issued to reinforce the forts, did not concur in your views; and whilst the whole responsibility for the refusal rested upon myself, they were the members of the Cabinet more directly interested. You may have judged correctly on this important question, and your opinion is entitled to grave consideration; but, under my convictions of duty, and believing as I do that no present necessity exists for a resort to force for the protection of the public property, it was impossible for me to have risked a collision of arms in the harbor of Charleston, and thereby defeated the reasonable hopes which I cherish of the final triumph of the Constitution and the Union.
I have only to add that you will take with you into retirement my heartfelt wishes that the evening of your days may be prosperous and happy.
JAMES BUCHANAN.
HON. LEWIS CASS.
* Buchanan Papers, Historical Society of Pennsylvania; S. Ex. Doc. 7, 41 Cong. 1 Sess. 2; Curtis's Buchanan, II. 398.
SOURCES: John Bassett More, Editor, The Works of James Buchanan, Volume 11, p. 60-1; Cass Canfield, General Lewis Cass 1782-1866, p. 37-41
https://civilwarnotebook.blogspot.com/2014/08/james-buchanan-to-lewis-cass-december.html
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3909150/posts#27
Home Letters of General Sherman, edited by M.A. DeWolfe Howe, 1909
The Diary of George Templeton Strong, Edited by Allan Nevins and Milton Halsey Thomas
I have been writing letters the whole day, and now conclude. I suppose I can hardly add anything to what you have already heard of the condition of things here. Public affairs certainly wear a very bad aspect at present. South Carolina will leave the Union, so far as she has the power, this week, beyond question. Five or six States may follow her, and I think that some of them will be sure to. There will be an effort to go peacefully, but war of a most bitter and sanguinary character will be sure to follow in a short time. We can never divide the army, the navy, the public lands, the public buildings, the public debt, the Mississippi River, etc., in peace. All these questions must be submitted in the end to the arbitrament of the sword, and the strongest battalions will be victors. This is certainly deplorable, but there is no help for it. No reasonable concession will satisfy the rebels. It is not that Lincoln is elected, or that there are personal liberty laws in some of the States, or that their negroes occasionally run off, that troubles them. They want to debauch the moral sentiment of the people of the North, by making them agree to the proposition that slavery is a benign, constitutional system, and that it shall be extended in the end all over this continent.
There is, as you have heard, much talk about all sorts of compromises, but there is not the slightest probability that anything will be done. We have a rumor every few hours of bloodshed that is to be, but I do not imagine that anything of the kind is to be apprehended here. A great many men make a great many foolish remarks, and they are sure to increase in magnitude and nonsense as they pass from mouth to mouth.
General Cass has resigned, as well as Mr. Cobb. The whole cabinet is tumbling to pieces, and what remains is without influence. Mr. Buchanan, it is said, about equally divides his time between praying and crying. Such a perfect imbecile never held office before. When Cobb resigned, he sent him a letter, saying that he was going home to Georgia, to assist in dissolving the Union, and breaking up the Government; and Buchanan replied to the letter, and complimented Mr. Cobb, as you have seen.
SOURCE: William Salter, The Life of James W. Grimes, p. 132
https://civilwarnotebook.blogspot.com/2014/08/senator-james-w-grimes-to-elizabeth-s_23.htm
BURLINGTON, IOWA, December 16, 1860.
JAMES PIKE: I am fructified in spirit to see “J. S. P.” again at the foot of a Washington letter. How are you, and where have you been? I should have written to you a long time ago, but I have been busy all the season “crying in the wilderness,” and to some purpose, too, for we have done a large business in Iowa as well as in the “inductive” State of Maine.
Being at a safe distance from South Carolina and Georgia, I look on very calmly. Several gentlemen are to be killed before my turn comes. Oh for an hour of Old Hickory or Old Zach! Are we to have turbulent times? I do not exactly see the end, for I am ignorant what the new Administration is to be. Let Abraham put in Corwin for Secretary of Treasury; Pennington, Secretary of the Interior ; and Colfax, Postmaster-General, and we shall have a lovely time. That committee, with C. for chairman, will have an illustrious labor and parturiate a generation of mice.
Give me a letter occasionally, with a history of the green-room rehearsals and other items.
Who is to be senator from Maine?
FITZ-HENRY WARREN.
JAMES S. PIKE, Esq.
SOURCE: James Shepherd Pike, First Blows of the Civil War: The Ten Years of Preliminary Conflict in the United States from 1850 to 1860, p. 526
https://civilwarnotebook.blogspot.com/2016/07/fitz-henry-warren-to-james-s-pike.html
FORT SUMTER, SOUTH CAROLINA,
December 16, 1860.
8 P. M.
colonel:
I have the honor to report that I have just completed, by the blessing of God, the removal to this fort of all my garrison, except the surgeon, four non-commissioned officers and seven men. We have one year's supply of hospital stores and about four months' supply of provisions for my command. I left orders to have all the guns at Fort Moultrie spiked, and the carriages of the 32-pounders, which are old, destroyed. I have sent orders to Captain Foster, who remains at Fort Moultrie, to destroy all the ammunition which he cannot send over. The step which I have taken was, in my opinion, necessary to prevent the effusion of blood.
Colonel S. COOPER, Adjutant-General.
SOURCE: Samuel Wylie Crawford, The Genesis of the Civil War: The Story of Sumter, 1860-1861, p. 106-7
https://civilwarnotebook.blogspot.com/2015/03/major-robert-anderson-to-colonel-samuel_22.html
That was the "real reason" the Brits freed slaves, in 1833, in the West Indies and paid slaveholders 20 million pounds sterling to free their 800,000 slaves.
Brits set the example that American abolitionists were then eager to follow, transforming themselves from very gentle & gradual persuaders into radicals scorning & mocking Southerners over their "peculiar institution."
So... it turns out, according to this opinion, that the root cause of the US Civil War was dastardly British aristocrats freeing 800,000 slaves in the West Indies, paying slaveholders 20 million pounds (about US $95 million at the time, roughly twice the US national budget) in 1833.
Who knew?
Turns out, the first Republican president was the genuine article.
He made no moves to further antagonize secessionists, but neither did he try appeasing them.
There will be an effort to go peacefully, but war of a most bitter and sanguinary character will be sure to follow in a short time.
We can never divide the army, the navy, the public lands, the public buildings, the public debt, the Mississippi River, etc., in peace.
All these questions must be submitted in the end to the arbitrament of the sword, and the strongest battalions will be victors.
This is certainly deplorable, but there is no help for it.
No reasonable concession will satisfy the rebels.
It is not that Lincoln is elected, or that there are personal liberty laws in some of the States, or that their negroes occasionally run off, that troubles them.
They want to debauch the moral sentiment of the people of the North, by making them agree to the proposition that slavery is a benign, constitutional system, and that it shall be extended in the end all over this continent."
I don't know if he is advocating that or merely reporting popular sentiment in NYC.
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3913324/posts#21
Bruce Catton, The Coming Fury
Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings 1859-1865, edited by Don E. Fehrenbacher
The Diary of George Templeton Strong, Edited by Allan Nevins and Milton Halsey Thomas
On Monday, 17 December, 1860, both Mr. Thompson & Judge Black informed me that they had held conversations with General Cass on the subject of his resignation & that he had expressed a desire to withdraw it & return to the Cabinet. I gave this no encouragement. His purpose to resign had been known for several days, & his actual resignation had been prepared three days before it was delivered to me. The world knew all about it, & had he returned, the explanation would have been very embarrassing. Besides, I knew full well that his fears would have worried the administration as well as himself in the difficult times which were then upon us. His great error was that he would assume no responsibility which he could possibly avoid.
SOURCE: John Bassett Moore, Editor, The Works of James Buchanan, Comprising his Speeches, State Papers, and Private Correspondence, Volume 11: 1860-1868, p. 67
https://civilwarnotebook.blogspot.com/2017/09/memorandum-of-james-buchanan-monday.html
COLUMBIA, December 17, 1860.
MY DEAR SIR: With a sincere desire to prevent a collision of force, I have thought proper to address you directly and truthfully on points of deep and immediate interest.
I am authentically informed that the forts in Charleston harbor are now being thoroughly prepared to turn, with effect, their guns upon the interior and the city.
Jurisdiction was ceded by this State expressly for the purpose of external defense from foreign invasion, and not with any view they should be turned upon the State.
In an ordinary case of mob rebellion, perhaps it might be proper to prepare them for sudden outbreak. But when the people of the State, in sovereign convention assembled, determine to resume their original powers of separate and independent sovereignty, the whole question is changed, and it is no longer an act of rebellion.
I, therefore, most respectfully urge that all work on the forts be put a stop to for the present, and that no more force may be ordered there.
The regular Convention of the people of the State of South Carolina, legally and properly called, under our constitution, is now in session, deliberating upon the gravest and most momentous questions, and the excitement of the great masses of the people is great, under a sense of deep wrongs and a profound necessity of doing something to preserve the peace and safety of the State.
To spare the effusion of blood, which no human power may be able to prevent, I earnestly beg your immediate consideration of all the points I call your attention to. It is not improbable that, under orders from the commandant, or, perhaps, from the commander-in-chief of the army, the alteration and defenses of those posts are progressing without the knowledge of yourself or the Secretary of War.
The arsenal in the city of Charleston, with the public arms, I am informed, was turned over, very properly, to the keeping and defense of the State force at the urgent request of the Governor of South Carolina. I would most respectfully, and from a sincere devotion to the public peace, request that you would allow me to send a small force, not exceeding twenty-five men and an officer, to take possession of Fort Sumter immediately, in order to give a feeling of safety to the community. There are no United States troops in that fort whatever, or perhaps only four or five at present, besides some additional workmen or laborers, lately employed to put the guns in order.
If Fort Sumter could be given to me as Governor, under a permission similar to that by which the Governor was permitted to keep the arsenal, with the United States arms, in the city of Charleston, then I think the public mind would be quieted under a feeling of safety, and as the Convention is now in full authority, it strikes me that it could be done with perfect propriety. I need not go into particulars, for urgent reasons will force themselves readily upon your consideration. If something of the kind be not done, I cannot answer for the consequences.
I send this by a private and confidential gentleman, who is authorized to confer with Mr. Trescot fully, and to receive through him any answer you may think proper to give to this.
I have the honor to be, most respectfully,
(Signed.)
F. W. PICKENS.
To the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.
* Correspondence No. 1. Governor Pickens to President Buchanan. The Record of Fort Sumter. Columbia, S. C, 1862.
SOURCE: Samuel Wylie Crawford, The Genesis of the Civil War: The Story of Sumter, 1860-1861, p. 81-3
https://civilwarnotebook.blogspot.com/2015/02/governor-francis-w-pickens-to-james.html
SHADY HILL, 17 December, 1860.
. . . In these present times of alarm and suspense my chief fear is lest we of the North should fail to see that the time has now come when the dispute between the North and the South can be settled finally, and therefore ought to be settled and not deferred. I am afraid lest we may yield some part of our convictions and be false to our principles. The longer we stave off settlement by compromises and concessions, the heavier will be the reckoning when the day of settlement at length comes. This is no time for timid counsels. Safety no less than honour demands of us to take a firm stand, and to shrink from none of the consequences of the resolute maintenance of our principles, — the principles of justice and of liberty. I believe that New England is stronger than New Africa. A nominal union is not worth preserving at the price that is asked for it.
For my own part I think it most likely that we shall come at length to the rifle and the sword as the arbitrators of the great quarrel, — and I have no fear for the result. The discipline of steel is what we need to recover our tone. But I pity the South; and look forward with the deepest sorrow and compassion to the retribution they are preparing for themselves. The harvest they must reap is one of inevitable desolation. . . .
SOURCE: Sara Norton and M. A. DeWolfe Howe, Letters of Charles Eliot Norton, Volume 1, p. 215-6
https://civilwarnotebook.blogspot.com/2014/11/charles-eliot-norton-to-george-william.html
As Catton clearly points out, South Carolina officials were making war against the United States even before they'd even declared secession.
And Buchanan's unsent letter in response clearly spells out why the US President cannot accept or recognize secessionists' demands.
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