HISTORICAL

SUMMARY.

85

of Secessionists, encamped near St. Louis. The Winans steam gun captured near the Relay House, Maryland, on its way into Virginia.

the line of the Potomac from Alexandria to George town. Colonel Ellsworth assassinated in an Alexandria hotel. The assassin bayonetted on the spot.

May 11.-Government troops in St. Louis again Portion of a rebel cavalry company captured. This

onward movement gives great satisfaction to the loyal States. It relieves the Capital from danger of a bombardment. Butler moves his troops out of the Fortress Monroe and occupies Virginia soil.

delegates to the Provisional - Government ConvenMay 26.-Western Virginia, at a vote ordered for tion, declares overwhelmingly for the Union.

May 27.-Major-General Butler, in command at
Fortress Monroe, receives over one hundred run-

away negroes, and refuses to give them up to their
rebel masters, declaring them to be" contraband
of war."
Department and approved by the President.
His decision was sustained by the War

-Chief-Justice Taney, of the United States Supreme Court, issues a habeas corpus writ for the person of one John Merrymun, a Baltimore mob ring

-The Queen of England issues a proclamation of leader, confined by General Cadwalader, in Fort neutrality. (See Appendix, Vol. II.)

McHenry. The General refuses to comply with the hav-writ, by denying the United States Marshal entrance to the Fort. This case afterwards became a precedent for other seizures of persons charged with treason, and greatly excited the class of citizens who believed in making the military subsidiary to the civil power. The seizures though arbitrary

May 14.-The Maryland Legislature adjourns, ing taken little or no action on National affairs. -Governor Hicks, of Maryland, issues a call for the Maryland quota of troops for the United States service. Large seizures of arms in Baltimore by the United States troops. Ross Winans arrested and sent to Fort McHenry.

May 15.-Massachusetts Legislature offers to loan the Federal Government seven millions of dollars.

-The Wheeling (preliminary) Convention adjourns. The permanent "provisional" Convention is to assemble June 12th.

May 16.-Brigadier-Generals Butler and McClel lan made Major-Generals. Harper's Ferry is fortified by the rebels, and bridges on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad are destroyed.

May 17. All communication by letters, expresses or otherwise, with the South, prohibited.

-The Slave-trader yacht Wanderer (rebel) captured off Key West.

May 18.-Arkansas admitted to the Southern Confederacy.

The first naval operation of the war. The United States gunboats dislodge a rebel battery at Sewall's Point, Virginia.

May 20.-Governor Magoffin proclaims Kentucky's "neutrality," and forbids any troops to occupy her soil, but her own State Guards.

were justified by the people.

-Mobile is blockaded by Federal vessels of war. May 28.-Savannah blockaded. Newport News, Virginia, occupied by Federal troops.

May 29.-Jefferson Davis reaches Richmond. He makes a violent harangue in response to the crowd. June 1st he addressed the people, characterizing Lincoln as 64 an ignorant usurper."

May 30.-N. P. Banks and John C. Fremont commissioned Major-Generals in the United States Army. -Grafton, Virginia, in possession of the Union troops, under Colonel Kelly.

May 31.-The gunboat Freeborn, Captain Ward, attacks the rebel batteries at Acquia Creek. Batteries silenced. Gallant dash of Lieutenant Tompkins with seventy-five mounted men into the enemy's lines at Fairfax Court House. Union loss one killed, one missing and four wounded. Rebel loss ten killed, a number wounded and five brought away prisoners. Captain Lyon commissioned BrigadierGeneral, and supercedes Harney in Missouri.

June 3.-Battle of Phillippi, Virginia. The Ohio and Indiana volunteers route the rebels and secure tents, stores, &c. Colonel Kelly, of the First It Virginia, in command of the Federals, is seriously wounded. Rebel loss sixteen killed, ten prisoners. Federal loss two killed, seven wounded. -Senator Douglas dies at Chicago.

General seizure of telegraphic dispatches throughout the North, by the Government. "spots" a great many disunionists, and gives a clue to their designs.

May 21.-The North Carolina State Convention adopts an Ordinance of Secession. The Confederate Congress adjourns to July 20th, having passed all necessary acts to empower the Confederate Executive to prosecute the war. It also authorised the seat of Government to be transferred to Richmond. Among its acts was one providing for the issue of Treasury Notes, and one to compel the payment, into the Confederate treasury, of all debts due to Northern creditors by citizens or corporations in the Confederacy.

May 24.-The Federal army at daylight moves into Virginia, occupying Arlington Heights and

--Border State Convention assembles at Frank fort, Kentucky. A very slender attendance.

-General Beauregard assumes command of the Confederate army: head-quarters at Manassas Junc tion, which is being rapidly fortified upon an ex the rebels. tensive scale. Centreville is also being fortified by

June 6.-The gunboat Harriet Lane engages the rebel batteries at Pig Point, Virginia, with little re sult. Five of her crew wounded.

June 8.--The North Carolina Convention ratifies the Confederate Constitution.

June 16.-Skirmish at Seneca Mills. Rebel loss against the acts of usurpation by which the State

DIVISION IV.

CHAPTER I.

то "COERCE" THE UNITED STATES. PROCLAOF BLOCKADE

TROOPS.

THE PRIVATEER

PROOFS OF THE DESIGN
DAVIS' CALL FOR MORE
MATION. LINCOLN'S COUNTER-PROCLAMATION
AND PIRACY. ON TO WASHINGTON! VIRGINIA'S MOVEMENTS.
LETCHER'S TREASON. HIS "RECOGNITION" OF THE SOUTHERN
CONFEDERACY. THE VIRGINIA ORDINANCE OF

SECESSION.

The Federal Government to be Coerced.

THE proclamation of Mr. | er offensive schemes were Lincoln was construed, in matured, there is good reathe Southern States, as a son to state, prior to the declaration of war. Prior to its appearance, how ever, the Confederate Government was making every effort to "prosecute a quick campaign." The hesitating Border States could only be won by vigorous action; and, now that the first assault had been made, it was determined to force the United States Government into a virtual, if not actual, recognition of the Southern Confederacy. That this "coercion" of the Union was determined upon before the call of the Federal Executive for troops, is manifest in the declaration made by the Confederate Secretary of War, on the evening of Friday, April 12th. In answer to a serenade in honor of the bombardment of Sumter, the Secretary said, in substance, that the Confederate flag would wave over the dome of the Capitol at Washington by May 1st-a sentiment which, the telegraph report informed the public, was received with unbounded enthusiasm.

The idea of granting letters of marque and reprisal, the act of confiscation and appropriation of debts due the North, the constructive treason in entertaining Union sentiments, the creation of a Southern navy and a fleet of privateers—these and many oth

The Federal Government to be Coerced.

bombardment of Fort Sumter. How steeped in hypocrisy, then, must have been the Southern leaders who called heaven and earth to witness that they were guiltless of the great crime of civil war! It was not an act of war to bombard a United States fort, to persecute and outlaw its citizens, to scorn and contemn the Federal Government; it was a Southern right to treat Uncle Sam as the Southerners saw fit; and any Federal act of resentment, of defense, of protection, the impious scoundrels who proclaimed revolution presumed to treat as the first step towards civil war! We cannot discover in the whole page of history a pusillanimity so great, a sense of honor so perverted, an hypocrisy so contemptible. Unlike the open and fair rebel, who, defying the restraints of authority, appealed to arms to decide the issue, the Confederate whined over the contest his crimes had provoked; and through all the bloody drama on which he raised the curtain, he did not fail to illustrate that most contemptible form of human nature typified in Aminadab Sleek.

Intimidation was a part of the scheme arranged, at an early moment, to compel the

1

When the

Union Administration to terms.
secret archives if such archives, indeed,
have been allowed to exist of the peripa-
tetic Government of Jefferson Davis are ex-

plored, and the truth is told, it will, unques-
tionably, be found that the scheme of forcing
the United States to accept the conditions
of settlement proposed by the South, was
matured months before the attack on Sumter,
and only awaited some act on the part of the
Washington authorities, to excuse to their
people the final appeal to arms.

Davis' Second Levy.

The Confederate Government made a second levy upon the Seceded States for troops, April 16th, calling for thirty-two thousand men-thus giving, with previous enlistments, a force equal to that called into the field by the Federal authorities.

April 17th, the Letters of Marque and Reprisal Proclamation was made public. read as follows:

The Privateer Proclamation.

It

the President of the United

The Privateer Proo lamation.

"And I do further notify all applicants aforesaid, that before any commission or Letter of Marque is issued to any vessel, the owner or own. ers thereof, and the commander for the time being,

will be required to give bond to the Confederate States, with at least two responsible sureties, not interested in such vessel, in the penal sum of five thousand dollars; or if such vessel be provided with more than one hundred and fifty men, then in the penal sum of ten thousand dollars, with condition that the owners, officers, and crew who shall be employed on board such commissioned vessel, shall observe the laws of these Confederate States, and the instructions given to them for the regulation of their conduct. That they shall satisfy all damages done contrary to the tenor thereof by such vessel during her commission, and deliver up the same

when revoked by the President of the Confederate States.

"And I do further specially enjoin on all persons holding offices, civil and military, under the authority of the Confederate States, that they be vigilant and zealous in discharging the duties incident thereto; and I do, moreover, solemnly exhort the good Whereas, Abraham Lincoln, people of these Confederate States, as they love their country, as they prize the blessings of free government, as they feel the wrongs of the past, and these now threatened in aggravated form by those whose enmity is more implacable because unprovoked, that they exert themselves in preserving order, in promoting concord, in maintaining the authority and efficacy of the laws, and in supporting and invigorating all the measures which may be adopted for the common defense, and by which, under the blessings of Divine Providence, we may hope for a speedy, just, and honorable peace.

States, has, by proclamation, announced the intention of invading this Confederacy with an armed force, for the purpose of capturing its fortresses, and thereby subverting its independence, and subjecting the free people thereof to the dominion of a foreign power; and whereas, it has thus become the duty of this Government to repel the threatened invasion, and to defend the rights and liberties of the people, by all the means which the laws of nations and the usages of civilized warfare place at his disposal :

Now, therefore, I, Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America, do issue this my Proclamation, inviting all those who may desire, by service in private armed vessels on the high seas, to aid this Government in resisting so wanton and wicked an aggression, to make application for commissions or Letters of Marque and Reprisal, to be issued under the Seal of these Confederate States.

"And I do further notify all persons applying for

Letters of Marque, to make a statement in writing,

giving the name and a suitable description of the

character, tonnage, and force of the vessel, and the name and place of residence of each owner concerned therein, and the intended number of the crew, and to sign said statement, and deliver the same to the Secretary of State, or to the Collector of any port of entry of these Confederate States, to be by him transmitted to the Secretary of State.

66

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the Seal of the Confederate States to be affixed, this seventeenth day of April, 1861. "By the President,

(Signed)

JEFFERSON DAVIS. "R. TOOMBS, Secretary of State." This was expected by the enterprising spirits of the South. It was put forth to inflict injury of magnitude upon the high seas' commerce of the Northern States-conceiving their commerce to be their most vulnera ble point. Leading journals in the South had often recurred to it as a certain step in event of hostilities. Although Southern men, from the time of John Randolph, had characterized the "Yankees" as a race of money-getters, and, in contrast, had exalted

DAVIS' PRIVATEER PROCLAMATION.

short by the Proclamation of Blockade, is the laws of the United States for the prevention and sued April 19th, by the President of the United States. It was a checkmate to King Stork, even before the board could be opened:

"And whereas, an Executive Proclamation has been already issued, requiring the persons engaged in these disorderly proceedings to desist therefrom, calling out a militia force for the purpose of re-organizing his cut-throat brigade for the despressing the same, and convening Congress in extraordinary session to deliberate and determine