Washington

  The Premier’s Advice

  February 24–27

  Lincoln again turned his attention to his inaugural speech. He asked two more men to review it and give him their thoughts. One was Francis P. Blair, Sr., father of Lincoln’s proposed postmaster general, Montgomery. The elder Blair gave the address his wholehearted approval.

  Lincoln also gave a copy to William Seward, and Seward, imbued still with his belief in himself as the true power behind the government, gave the draft the closest possible reading, to the point of numbering each line of the speech in order to isolate his proposed changes as precisely as possible. Seward sent his recommendations, six pages in all, to Lincoln on the evening of Sunday, February 24, Lincoln’s second day in Washington.

  In his letter, Seward proclaimed himself the one man who truly understood the situation. “I, my dear sir, have devoted myself singly to the study of the case—here, with advantages of access and free communication with all parties of all sections….You must, therefore, allow me to speak frankly and candidly.” Others in the Republican Party, he wrote, “know nothing of the real peril of the crisis. It has not been their duty to study it, as it has been mine. Only the soothing words which I have spoken have saved us and carried us along thus far. Every loyal man, and, indeed, every disloyal man in the South, will tell you thus.”

  Like Orville Browning before him, Seward found particular danger in two paragraphs in Lincoln’s draft, where Lincoln vowed fealty to the Republican platform and declared his intention to reclaim federal property in places where it had “fallen.” These passages, Seward warned, would antagonize the secessionists to the point where even Virginia and Maryland would secede, and, he feared, “we shall within ninety, perhaps within sixty, days be obliged to fight the South for this capital, with a divided North for our reliance, and we shall not have one loyal magistrate or ministerial officer south of the Potomac.” Merely editing the two paragraphs would not suffice, Seward warned; they had to be excised entirely, otherwise “the dismemberment of the republic would date from the inauguration of a Republican Administration.” He urged, too, that Lincoln inject a little warmth into the speech, “some words of affection. Some of calm and cheerful confidence.”

  Seward suggested forty-nine changes ranging from altering a single punctuation mark to deleting whole sentences and paragraphs. Lincoln accepted twenty-seven of these. He cut the second and third paragraphs, per Seward’s admonition, and eliminated the notion of reclaiming fallen properties, but at a point roughly halfway through the speech, as eventually delivered, he did insert the following: “The power confided to me, will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property, and places belonging to the government, and to collect the duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary for these objects, there will be no invasion—no using of force against, or among the people anywhere.”

  Seward felt strongly that Lincoln also needed a better ending. Lincoln’s draft had closed on a belligerent note, with Lincoln asserting that he was obligated to “preserve, protect and defend” the government: “You can forbear, the assault upon it, I can not shrink from the defense of it. With you, and not with me, is the solemn question of ‘Shall it be peace, or a sword?’ ”

  Seward sent along a paragraph of his own as a possible ending that emphasized Lincoln’s intent to serve the entire country, “east, west, north and south.” Lengthy and convoluted, it was utterly unlike anything Lincoln himself would ever have written. One sentence was 139 words long.

  Lincoln suggested that he try again.

  Seward’s second attempt at least offered a few phrases that flickered with stylistic promise. Alluding to the bonds that tied Americans to their shared past, Seward wrote of “mystic chords” and “patriot graves.” These Lincoln liked. Seward’s proposed ending also made reference to “the guardian angel of the nation,” though Seward toyed with changing this to “better angels” of our nation before crossing it out. But that phrase, too, caught Lincoln’s eye.

  The final ending, though heavily influenced by Seward’s changes, was very much Lincoln’s own, laden with reverence and barely suppressed emotion. “I am loth to close,” he wrote. “We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battle-field, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels in our nature.”

  Seward, however, had no idea as yet whether Lincoln had incorporated any of his suggested changes into his final draft. For all he knew, Lincoln was still planning to announce his intention to reclaim fallen properties.

  * * *

  —

  The Peace Convention ended on Wednesday, February 27. Outside Willard’s Dancing Hall the city shuddered with the celebratory firing of one hundred cannon, an ironic form of salute given the pacific mission of the conference.

  William Rives, feeling the first symptoms of what would become a ferocious cold, went home to his Castle Hill plantation in Albemarle County, Virginia, and promptly took a “nap”—for twenty hours.

  Two fellow Virginians, John Tyler and former congressman James Seddon, returned as well and condemned the amendment approved by the conference. Seddon called it “a delusion, a sham, an insult, an offense to the South.” He and Tyler both now publicly endorsed secession. Hard-line Lincoln Republicans also dismissed the result, denouncing it as just another accommodation to Southern grievance. “Away with such compromise!” wrote Horace Greeley—the government, he said, should “not concede an inch.”

  From Lincoln’s home state of Illinois, however, came renewed confidence that time would heal all, with the Vermilion County Press projecting that “secession will play itself out in less than six months if left to itself.” In a breezy aside the paper added: “There may be some bloodshed but it will not be much.”

  * * *

  —

  In Montgomery that Wednesday, the provisional Confederate government took another step toward war—a small one, but one that revealed the depth of detail its military planners were contemplating.

  A military engineer named Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard—P.G.T. Beauregard for short—sent a secret telegram to a friend in New York City, Capt. G. W. Smith, who served as the city’s street commissioner. Both men were veterans of the Mexican War, as was Confederate President Davis.

  Beauregard directed Smith to buy sixteen “Drummond lights” that burned calcium oxide—quicklime—to produce intense light capable of illuminating harbors at night. This “limelight” was commonly used in theaters to light stages. Beauregard wanted ten lights shipped to New Orleans, six to Charleston.

  “Let the whole matter be as secret as practicable,” Beauregard wrote.

  Captain Smith did as requested. The lights, he promised, would be shipped in about ten days.

  Fort Sumter

  Query

  February 28

  On Thursday, February 28, Major Anderson asked his officers to give him an assessment of how many men and ships would be required to effectively reinforce Sumter, with the idea of passing these on to the War Department and, presumably, to Lincoln. He specified that each officer was to do this on his own without consulting his colleagues. He did not actually want the government to resort to force; rather, he hoped that by providing a realistic appraisal of the size and complexity of a reinforcement mission he might be able to deter the incoming administration from entertaining any such plan. On that score, the estimates were satisfyingly bleak.

  Captain Foster, chief engineer, came in with the highest estimate: “To land and carry the batteries on Cummings Point and Morris Island, 3,000 regulars, or 10,000 volunteers; to land and carry the batteries on Sullivan’s Island (at the same time), 3,000 regulars, or 10,000 volunteers more; to hold the above positions after taking them, 10,000 regulars, or 30,000 volunteers. The forces to be overcome in the attack are supposed to be those of the South Carolinians, aided by troops that may be gathered from the adjoining States at short notice.”

  Artillery Capt. Truman Seymour offered a particularly dire appraisal. To attempt a resupply mission by ruse or deception was now impossible, he wrote, “such is the unceasing vigilance employed to prevent it. To do so openly by vessels alone, unless they are shot-proof, is virtually impossible, so numerous and powerful are the opposing batteries.” Any Union attempt to raise the necessary force of men and ships would be telegraphed south immediately; vessels approaching the fort would be exposed to continuous fire. “A projected attack in large force would draw to this harbor all the available resources in men and material of the contiguous States. Batteries of guns of heavy caliber would be multiplied rapidly and indefinitely. At least twenty thousand men, good marksmen and trained for months past with a view to this very contingency, would be concentrated here before the attacking force could leave Northern ports.” The Confederate forces would effectively close the harbor, forcing an inbound fleet to land its troops well away from the protective covering fire of Fort Sumter. “Charleston Harbor would be a Sevastopol in such a conflict, and unlimited means would probably be required to insure success, before which time the garrison of Fort Sumter would be starved out.” The carnage of the “Siege of Sevastopol,” 1854–55, which claimed over one hundred thousand casualties and ended the Crimean War, was still fresh in the world’s psyche and needed no elaboration by Seymour.

  Estimates provided by Sumter’s other officers called for invading forces that ranged in size from three thousand to ten thousand troops, transported and defended by warships. Quartermaster Hall, who advocated deploying seven warships, provided a detailed description of how his plan could be carried out but acknowledged that its success would depend “upon the most fortunate and improbable circumstances. It might succeed; but I think failure would be the rule.”

  Anderson sent these on to Washington with his own concurring assessment, in which he wrote, “I confess that I would not be willing to risk my reputation on an attempt to throw re-enforcements into this harbor…with a force of less than twenty thousand good and well-disciplined men.”

  What he was recommending was an invading force larger than the entire U.S. Army as then constituted.

  Washington

  Seward’s Trick

  March 2

  With only two days left until Inauguration Day, Lincoln had still not made the configuration of his cabinet final. The selection process thus far had been fraught with political rancor and wrangling. William Seward had accepted appointment as secretary of state, but other cabinet posts remained in contention.

  Lincoln seemed certain to tap Salmon Chase, an impassioned abolitionist, as his secretary of the treasury, which appalled Seward. In addition to just plain disliking Chase, Seward feared that the man’s intense hatred of slavery would further increase the likelihood that Virginia and other states of the upper South would follow their Deep South brethren out of the Union.

  Seward wasn’t entirely sure of his own standing with Lincoln. He still did not know whether Lincoln had taken any of his suggestions for modifying his inaugural. On top of this, an unfounded but widely circulated rumor held that Lincoln might even drop Seward as secretary of state and give the post to Chase.

  On March 2, with no forewarning, Seward took himself out of consideration. In a note to Lincoln he wrote, “Circumstances which have occurred since I expressed to you in December last my willingness to accept the office of Secretary of State, seem to me to render it my duty to ask leave to withdraw that consent.”

  He did not offer an explanation.

  “This,” wrote Lincoln secretaries Nicolay and Hay, “from the man who for several months had held intimate counsel with him, had taken active part in the formation of the Cabinet, and had read and partly revised the inaugural, was unexpected.”

  Lincoln, a canny judge of men, did not immediately acknowledge Seward’s note. To Nicolay he said, “I can’t afford to let Seward take the first trick.”

  Charleston

  Interesting News

  March 1–3

  At Fort Sumter, Private Millens learned from his father that interest in Fort Sumter back home was high, and decided to send an update.

  “Well, we are still here and, as yet, unmolested; the Charlestonians, however, are vigorously pushing their works around us, all of which are nearly completed. Morris Island, directly opposite us, has been converted into one enormous battery of several miles in length—at least I may so call it, for the batteries are so numerous and at such short intervals apart, that from our point of view they cannot be distinguished but as one enormous continuation.”

  Millens told his father about a particularly fearsome weapon said to be nearing completion in Charleston, the floating battery. This was their “master machine,” he wrote. “Until such time as I can get a peep at this machine, I shall not attempt to describe it; from accounts it must be a rather formidable affair, but at the same time clumsy and unmanageable. They intend to have this battery towed to a convenient point on our weakest side, within 600 yards of our walls, and from that point breach the fort with their heavy guns (42 pounders) four of which they will have on board. Whether or not they will be allowed quietly to take this position remains to be seen; they evidently expect that they will.” He added, however, that this seemed unlikely: To allow it would be “too much like cutting a stick to break our own head.”

  He promised his father “more interesting news” in his next letter, exactly what any father wanted to hear, and added: “We expect to live peaceably until March 4. As to what may occur after that is more than I can tell; everything depends on the line of policy adopted by the incoming Administration.”

  * * *

  —

  On Friday, March 1, the Confederate States of America officially took control of military operations in Charleston. Confederate President Jefferson Davis placed engineer Beauregard in command and promoted him to brigadier general. Beauregard left for Charleston immediately.

  That day as well, Confederate Secretary of War Leroy P. Walker wrote to Governor Pickens to assure him that President Davis shared his view “that Fort Sumter should be in our possession at the earliest moment possible.” But he added a caveat. “Thorough preparation must be made before an attack is attempted, for the first blow must be successful, both for its moral and physical consequences, or otherwise the result might be disastrous to your State in the loss of many of those whom we can least afford to lose. A failure would demoralize our people and injuriously affect us in the opinion of the world as reckless and precipitate.”

  In short, the Confederacy planned not only to move against Sumter, but to do so with overwhelming force to avoid the humiliation of failure. And a deadline was fast approaching. In just three days the man deemed by most Southerners to be the blackest of Black Republicans, Abraham Lincoln, would be sworn in as president of the United States.

  Beauregard arrived in Charleston on Sunday, March 3. Standing five-seven and weighing only 150 pounds, Beauregard, forty-two years old, was a stern, taut, unsmiling razor of a man whose Creole ancestry and vaguely French accent caused many on first meeting him to presume he was French. The women of the city swooned. They sent him flowers and flags, scarves, even furniture, which littered and perfumed his headquarters at 105 Meeting Street, a block north of the Mills House Hotel and four blocks from Ryan’s slave mart. A visiting correspondent noted that the general’s desk was surrounded by flowers—two vases full, and “a little hand bouquet of roses, geraniums, and scented flowers,” which he used as a paperweight.

  War Secretary Walker appeared unable at first to grasp how the Confederacy’s first brigadier general could be named Pierre. In his letter to Governor Pickens, Walker referred to the general as Peter.

  * * *

  —

  Among the men whom Beauregard appointed to be staff officers was one Samuel Wragg Ferguson, twenty-six, formerly of the U.S. Army. He had been a lieutenant stationed in Walla Walla in Washington Territory but resigned as soon as he learned of South Carolina’s secession. The news reached Walla Walla shortly after Christmas; Ferguson immediately headed east and had been traveling ever since. He did not reach Charleston until March 1.

  What he encountered startled him. “I had been so long and so far removed from the course of events,” he wrote, “that I was totally unprepared for the intense excitement that pervaded all classes.”

  He was delighted to find that secession brought opportunity. On arrival he was commissioned a captain of infantry in the state’s regular army. Beauregard made him an aide-de-camp, a role that would place him at the center of all that would soon unfold.

  * * *

  —

  Flush with the hubris of men who had founded a new nation, authorities in Montgomery now dispatched a new trio of commissioners north, three seeming to be the magic number for Southern deputations. Their mandate authorized the men to negotiate with the Union, this time on behalf of the entire Confederacy, not just South Carolina.

  The first to arrive was Martin J. Crawford, who reached Washington on Sunday, March 3, the day before Lincoln’s inauguration, and checked into the National Hotel (the hotel once afflicted by ptomaine poisoning and thus rejected by Mrs. Lincoln); the other two, André B. Roman and John Forsyth, followed soon afterward.