How on earth did he get secret orders from the President to disrupt the Sumter expedition and try to start a war in Florida? Lincoln said it was all an error, and that he signed so many documents, he didn’t realize he was tasking the ship to be in two places at once, and this might be believable were it not for the fact that these were hand carried “secret” orders, not routine ship orders.
How does one forget that one wrote specific secret orders relieving a specific Captain (Captain Mercer) of duty, and handing his powerful warship to a Lieutenant? And why did they need to be secret?
From what I have read, Seward drafted the order and Lincoln signed it. When Welles found out about the change to Powhatans’s orders, he demanded Seward and he, discuss the issue with Lincoln. When the discussion ended, Lincoln directed Seward to countermand the original set of orders and direct Powhatan to join the Sumter expedition. Seward did as directed, he sent an order to Porter to join the Sumter expedition. Those orders were delivered to Porter as Powhatan sailed. Porter read the order, and chose to disregard them because only Seward’s name was on the order, and he was not in Porter’s chain of Command. Seward seems to have injected himself in some affairs that were not his to deal with, and for some reason Lincoln allowed that to happen. Lincoln did apologize to Welles, later.
As far being secret was concerned. Welles had advised Lincoln that he had serious doubts about the loyalty of a fair number of the Navy Department staff. The fact that officials in Charleston knew about the details of the resupply mission, that seems to have been the case.
According to Porter in his memoirs, he personally convinced the President to give him secret orders taking command of the ship, and the implication was that they were written in Lincoln's own hand.
Porter advised him to give him a hand carried order because if it went through the Navy department, the information contained therein would be "flashed across the wires" to the South.
I believe the order relieving Captain Mercer of command has been made public, because I think I've read a copy of it sometime in the last year.
The fact that officials in Charleston knew about the details of the resupply mission, that seems to have been the case.
You may be shocked to learn the Confederates knew the gist of the mission back in early March.
WAR DEPARTMENT, C. S. A., Montgomery, March 9, 1861.
"...There is information at this Department–not official, it is true, but believed to be reliable–that five or six United States ships are in New York Harbor all ready to start.The United States steamer Pawnee has left Philadelphia suddenly for Washington, fully provisioned and ready to go to sea, and it is probable that the effort to re-enforce Sumter may be made by sending in men in whale-boats by night. Should this plan succeed and the garrison be re-enforced sufficiently to stand an assault the attempt may be made to fight their way up by five or six war vessels.
Yes, they had spies everywhere, and the only way that Powhatan trick could have been pulled off was with hand carried secret orders.
The Confederates were expecting it to show up and lead the attack against them. The only way they were taken by surprise was this oddity of Porter making off with the ship by the authority of orders that did not come through official channels.
Like I said, the luckiest mistake Lincoln could have possibly made. A miraculously "lucky" mistake.
So why was Porter flying the British flag? What need had he for deception if it was all just a "mistake"?