Mr. Lincoln jumped up from his chair, as Mr. Rives was standing, advanced one step towards him, and said, "Mr. Rives! Mr. Rives! if Virginia will stay in, I will withdraw the troops from Fort Sumter."Virginia remained in the union. Lincoln did not remove the troops. Lincoln LIED. Lincoln KNEW that resupply attempts would cause war:
Hiram Fuller, North and South, Londen: Chapman and Hall, 1863, p.261
http://www.hti.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=lincoln;rgn=div1;view=text;idno=lincoln4;node=lincoln4%3A432Lincoln wanted WAR. Despite his acknowledgement that such was invasion and cooercion (documented by PeaRidge in #349) . And Lincoln was ALLEGEDLY against coercion:Page 289
1st. The Fort cannot be permanently held without reinforcement.This point is too apparent too [sic] need proof
The cutting off supplies and consequent starvation, not to mention disease, would compel surrender in a few months at farthest, without firing a gun
2 The Fort cannot now be re-inforced without a large armament, involving of course a bloody conflict and great exasperation on both sides, and when re-inforced can only be held by sufficient number to garrison the post and to keep open communication with it by means of the harbor.
I have said that I did not believe that this Union could be cemented by blood. It is the sincere conviction of my heart still. Mr. Seward has said the same thing, in effect, in as many as two speeches, at least, and in his foreign dispatches he says, "The President willingly accepts the doctrine as true, that the Federal government cannot reduce the seceding States to obedience by conquest;" and he adds, "Only an imperial or despotic government could subjugate thoroughly disaffected and insurrectionary members of the state."
Letter of Kentucky Governor C. S. Morehead to Senator John J. Crittendon (23 Feb. 1861), The Life Of John. J. Crittendon: With Selections from His Correspondence and Speeches, Mrs. Chapman Coleman ed., Philadelphia: J. B. Lippicott & Co. (1873), Vol. 1 pp. 338-339.
Hiram Fuller, North and South, Londen: Chapman and Hall, 1863, p.261
An interesting story, except that Fuller wasn't there and the participants who were there varied in their accounts of what happened, the two versions being either Lincoln never said any such thing, or that the recipients didn't think it worth mentioning to the Virginia convention.
COL BALDWIN: When we arrived at the house of Mr. Botts, we were shown into the parlor, and, after the ordinary salutations, Mr. Botts opened the conversation by asking me if I had reported to the Convention what had passed between Mr. Lincoln and myself on my recent visit to Washington. I replied that I had not. He asked, why not? And I told him the Convention had nothing to do with the matter, and that I had gone to see the President at the instance of some of the Union men of the Convention, to whom I had reported fully all that occurred. Taking hold of my remark, that the Convention had nothing to do with the matter, he became somewhat excited, and told me that I had taken upon myself a very grave responsibility in withholding the knowledge of such an interview from the Convention. He did not, according to my recollection, undertake to give me any account of the interview as derived from Mr. Lincoln, but pressed questions upon me as to whether the Convention had nothing to do with the question of its own adjournment; nothing to do with the evacuation of Fort Sumter. I remember telling him that both of those subjects had been discussed between Mr. Lincoln and myself, and he again inquired how I could withhold such a conversation from the Convention, to which I again replied, that I had reported to those who sent me, and that it was not reported to the Convention, for the reason that there was nothing in the conversation upon which the Convention could act, or upon which I, as a member of the Convention, would have been willing to act. I soon found that I was willing to undergo a species of reproof to which I was not accustomed, and that the conversation was likely to be a long and not a very pleasant one; so I put an end to it by telling him that if he desired to know all that had passed between Mr. Lincoln and myself I had no objection to tell him, or to discuss the matter fully with him, but that I could not do so then, as the Convention was about to meet, and I felt bound to be present at an important vote expected that morning.
Unless, of course, South Carolina simply allowed the fort to be resupplied instead of opening fire on it.