was disappointed at the result, and so anxious about the matter that he redoubled his energies to have justice done. money, had preyed on the commerce, destroying British trading vessels by scores, what would have been the general feeling in this country?" I subjoin a fac-simile of the call for a meeting. SHIPS OF WAR FOR THE SLAVEHOLDERS' CONFEDERACY. On MONDAY, April 6th, 1863, A PUBLIC MEETING Of the Members and Friends of the UNION AND EMANCIPATION SOCIETY, will be held in the FREE TRADE HALL, MANCHESTER, To PROTEST against the Building and Fitting-Out of At this meeting Professor Goldwin Smith, of Oxford, thus spoke: "The duties of nations towards each other were not bound by the technical rules of law. They were as wide as the rules of morality and honor and if in our dealings with America we violated the rules of morality and honor, we should abide the consequences of wrong doing, though our lawyers might advise us that we were secure. . . . No nation ever inflicted upon another a more flagrant or more maddening wrong [permitting the Alabama to escape]. No nation with English blood in its veins had ever borne such a wrong without resentment. Built and equipped in a British port, the hostilities are all on her side.'" Pierce's Sumner, vol. iv. p. 129. On receipt of this letter, Cobden wrote Earl Russell in regard to the matter, with good effect, ibid., note 5; Cobden to Sumner, Am. Hist. Rev., Jan. 1897, p. 309; see Cobden to Forster, April 5, Life of Forster, Reid, vol. i. p. 358. Sumner wrote Bright, March 30: 'If those ships get to sea, our commerce is annihilated." On April 7: "All the signs are of war, more surely than in the time of the Trent. . . . All look forward to action of a most decisive character, should those ships come out." After he read the report of the debate of March 27, he was sad and anxious. - Pierce's Sumner, vol. iv. p. 130 et See also N. Y. Times, March 7, April 13; Letters of Belmont, privately printed, p. 79. seq. 1 See letter to his wife, April 7, Life of Forster, Reid, p. 359. He went to see Adams, and asked "if the stopping of one vessel would do any good." Adams said, Adams said, "Yes, much good." 1 April 5 Earl Russell stopped the Alexandra. While the decision of the Lord Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer was against the position which the government had taken in seizing the ship, still the case remained in the courts, on one legal point and another, for a long while, with the result that she never got into the hands of the Confederates to be used against American commerce.2 The significance of this seizure lay in the excellent action of the English government, directed undoubtedly by Earl Russell, and the sincere manner in which it prosecuted the case.3 manned by British seamen, with the English flag flying, she [the Alabama] went forth to cruise from an English port against the commerce of our allies. That was the substantial grievance of the American government, and no technicalities of the Solicitor-General would make it otherwise than a heinous wrong. . . . The Americans would soon have read the speech of the Solicitor-General, treating their complaints with little courtesy, and the speech of Mr. Laird avowing (it might be said) his crime; they would have seen that a large party in the House of Commons received Mr. Laird, not with disapprobation, but with enthusiastic cheers; they would have seen that the announcements of the success of the Alabama herself were cheered by the House; and all this would excite in them bitter feelings, and perhaps they might do on their side something that would cause our government to demand reparation. . . . We could not mistake from the bearing of Lord Palmerston that he was at the head of the Southern party. It was clear, too, from some expressions of Lord Russell that his heart was on the right side." Daily News, April 8. 1 Adams's Diary, March 29. 2 Ibid., entry April 5, June 24; Appendix to the British Case at Geneva, p. 219 et seq. 3 Adams to Seward, April 23; Memorials of Earl of Selborne, vol. ii. p. 440 et sey. The Manchester meeting of April 6 received with loud cheers the intelligence that the Alexandra had been stopped. There came simultaneously a considerable fall in the Confederate loan. Mason, in a letter of April 9 (Confed. Dip. Corr., MS.), tells of the desperate efforts he, Slidell, Erlanger & Co, and Fraser, Trenholm & Co. made to sustain the market. See Bigelow, p. 179 et seq. An incident shows the indirect pressure on men of position. R. P. Collier had been of such service in the Alabama that Adams desired to retain him again, but he intimated that he "had been found fault with for his former course, and that his connection with the admiralty might conflict with further engagements to us." Adams added: "No lawyer of eminence will The effect of the stopping of the Alexandra was good, but the uneasiness continued pretty nearly through the month of April. The debate of April 24, in spite of a bitter attack on the North by one member had an assuaging effect, and the next day Adams had a call from the speaker of the House, who "made a species of apology for his inability to put a check on the abuse of America under the rules of order, which," Adams adds, "quite moved me."2 In the first days of May a change of tone for the better is apparent.3 have the courage to repeat Mr. Collier's experiment." - Entry March 18. Collier was appointed Solicitor-General in Oct., 1863, and later became Lord Monkswell. William M. Evarts was sent to London by the United States government to assist Adams with his legal advice, and he was of much service. 66 1 Adams wrote in his diary, April 10: "I am conscious of a much increased pressure of anxiety of late, from the course which matters are manifestly taking here." It was at this time that Sir George C. Lewis died, and Gibson told Adams "that it was a great loss to us, as he had generally exercised his influence in the Cabinet for our benefit." - Entry April 15. Adams adds: "Matters are daily approaching a crisis, and the turn of the tide may send me on my way home with the countries on the brink of a conflict." April 16 he wrote: Mr. Forster talked of the probability of avoiding a collision, about which I grow more and more doubtful." John Bright wrote Sumner, April 24: "There seems mischief brewing between your government and ours. You are justly irritated about the pirate ships. . . . I hope the course taken by our government in respect to the ship Alexandra now in Liverpool, will do something to calm the feelings of your people. So far as I can learn, our government is in earnest in the prosecution begun against the persons concerned in the building and equipment of this ship, and I believe they will act at once in any other case where evidence can be obtained."- Pierce-Sumner Papers, MS. See also Cobden to Bright, April 22, Morley's Cobden, p. 588; Letters of Belmont, privately printed, p. 81. 2 Adams's Diary, April 25. 3 Ibid., May 5. Bright wrote Sumner, May 2: "I believe Lord Russell is really sorry that the case of the Alabama occurred, and that he is now anxious to prevent further mischief. The debate [March 27] to which you refer was unfortunate, and the speeches of Palmerston and Palmer were wicked. I am satisfied that they were opposed in tone to the foreign minister's intention, and I have reason to believe that he was dissatisfied and has remonstrated against it. The subsequent debate [April 24] was a different affair, and the Prime Minister and his Solicitor-General were as mild and decent as we could wish them to be. I hear too, from the best sources, that no more ships will be allowed to go out if any fair ground can be shown for interfering with them. The speech of Mr. Cobden was excellent, and The most significant feature in the aspect of English sentiment at this time is the feeling of our friends that our cause was utterly hopeless.1 The news of the disaster of Hooker at Chancellorsville strengthened this belief.2 Then came the intelligence of Lee's invasion into Pennsylvania, fostering the rumors which were abroad that England and France would decide on intervention.3 Attempts were now made by assemblies of people, to arouse the sentiment in the country which favored the recognition of the Southern Confederacy. Meetings were held at Manchester, Preston, Sheffield, and some other places which recommended this policy, and were answered by other gatherings which protested against any interference. The Confederate commercial agent in London wrote to Benjamin, June 6: "There is, then, this new symp opinion this week is moderate and without excitement."- Pierce-Sumner Papers, MS. See also Cobden to Sumner, May 2, 22, Am. Hist. Rev., Jan. 1897, pp. 310, 311; Sat. Rev., May 9. The Confederate commercial agent wrote Benjamin, May 9: "The public mind has settled down into a state of quiescence on American affairs which resembles stagnation. Everybody that is to say, the mass of intelligence and respectability wishes well to the Confederate cause, but nobody now speaks of recognition, nobody thinks about it, nobody even writes pamphlets about it." Confed. Dip. Corr., MS. 1 The Duke of Argyll wrote Sumner, April 24: “I regard your undying confidence with astonishment, but I should rejoice to see that confidence justified by the event. . . . There are many here who hold that slavery is even more sure to fall by the success of secession than by the conquest of the South. I cannot allow my sympathies to be guided by any such belief, even if I entertained it. I wish those who are in the right to triumph; I wish those who represent a wicked cause to fail.” — Pierce-Sumner Papers, MS. 2 The Duke of Argyll wrote Sumner, May 30: "You wrote after Hooker's failure must have been known, but you still speak as if the subjugation of the rebel States would certainly be effected, and as if it were only delayed by the sympathy which you attributed to foreign nations. I confess that, however strongly my wishes have been and are with your government . . the probability of such success seems to me to be now very small." -- PierceSumner Papers, MS. 3 The Morning Post and Morning Herald, cited in the Inder of July 2, favored the recognition of the Confederacy. But the Times and Saturday Review opposed such action. 4 Dip. Corr, 1863, part i. p. 302; Confed. Dip. Corr., MS.; letter of Louis Blanc, May 17, Letters on England, second series, vol. i. p. 183; Spectator, May 30. tom to chronicle, that there is at last a people's movement and a people's champion [Roebuck, a Radical] in favor of recognition, and although I do not yet know the extent and depth of the movement, I think it worth while to support it by all the means in my power. . . . I have taken measures to placard every available space in the streets of London with representations of our newly adopted flag conjoined to the British national ensign . . . which I design simply as a ' demonstration' to impress the masses with the vitality of our cause." 1 Such expressions of public sentiment and such attempts to bias it were preliminary to Roebuck's speech in the House of Commons on June 30, when he made a motion which, had it prevailed, would be an instruction to the English government "to enter into negotiations with the Great Powers of Europe for the purpose of obtaining their co-operation in the recognition" of the Confederacy. The time has come, he said, for the recognition of the Southern States: they have vindicated their right to it, and, moreover, they offer us perfect free trade. He proceeded to relate an interview he had recently had with the Emperor of the French. Louis Napoleon said: "As soon as I learnt that that rumor was circulating in England [that I had changed my mind about recognizing the Confederacy], I gave instructions to my ambassador to deny the truth of it. Nay, more, I instructed him to say that my feeling was not, indeed, exactly the same as it was, because it was stronger than ever in favor of recognizing the South. I told him also to lay before the British government my understanding and my wishes on this question, and to ask them again whether they would be willing to join me in that recognition." The Emperor went on: "I give you full liberty to state to the English House of Commons this my wish. I have determined in all things to act with England, and, more particularly, I have determined to act with her as regards America."2 Roebuck continued: "I have to-day had 1 Confed. Dip. Corr., MS. 2 Hansard, 1776 et seq. |