[rustbucket]

Botts book can also be found here in one of those Google books. http://books.google.com/books?id=Vy4OAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA194&lpg=PA194&dq=%22jb+baldwin%22+confederate+virginia&source=web&ots=SBKu2wFkJz&sig=LWhQD237kMp2suHRRmMlBp6orH8

[rustbucket]

There is more information in the footnote of pages 197-202 in Botts’ book relative to Lincoln’s offer to evacuate Sumter. These pages list additional people to whom Lincoln made the same proposition. Botts claimed to have letters from them confirming this.

Botts is a somewhat questionable source. He was a minor league politician with thoughts of grandeur. But apparently on this matter he had some corroborating letters and testimony.