Slavery and Four Years of War Part 59

Fernando Wood, who had kept himself in some sort of relations with President Lincoln, though at all times suspected by the latter, pretended in a letter to him, dated December 8, 1862, to have "reliable and truthful authority" for saying the Southern States would send representatives to Congress provided a general amnesty would permit them to do so. The President was asked to give immediate attention to the matter, and Wood suggested "that gentlemen whose former social and political relations with the leaders of the _Southern revolt_ may be allowed to hold unofficial correspondence with them on this subject."

Mr. Lincoln, whose power to discern a sham, or a false pretense, exceeded that of any other man of his time, promptly responded: "I strongly suspect your information will prove groundless; nevertheless, I thank you for communicating it to me." He said further to Mr. Wood that if "the _people_ of the Southern States would cease resistance, and would re-inaugurate, submit to, and maintain the national authority within the limits of such States, the war would cease on the part of the United States, and that if, within a reasonable time, a full and general amnesty were necessary to such an end, it would not be withheld." The President declined to suspend military operations "to try any experiment of negotiation."

He expressed a desire for any "exact information" Mr. Wood might have, saying it "might be more valuable before than after January 1, 1863," referring, doubtless, to the promised Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation. Wood's scheme, evidently having no substantial basis, aborted.( 3)

Others, about the same time, pestered Mr. Lincoln with plans and schemes for the termination of the war. One Duff Green, a Virginia politician, wrote from Richmond in January, 1863, asking the President for an interview "to pave the way for an early termination of the war." He asked the same permission from Jeff. Davis. His efforts came to nothing.

Alexander H. Stephens, Vice-President of the Confederacy, conceiving, in the early summer of 1863, that the times were auspicious for peace negotiations, wrote Mr. Davis, asking to be sent to Was.h.i.+ngton, ostensibly to negotiate about the exchange of prisoners, but really to try to "turn attention to a general adjustment, upon such basis as might be ultimately acceptable to both parties, and stop the further effusion of blood." He a.s.sured Mr. Davis he had but one idea of final adjustment--"the recognition of the sovereignty of the States." Mr. Davis wired Stephens to repair to Richmond, and he arrived on June 22, 1863. Davis and his Cabinet appear to have seconded, with some heartiness, Stephens' scheme; all thinking it might result in aiding the "peace party" North. The Confederate leaders had been greatly encouraged by the gains of the Democratic party in the elections of 1862; by repeated attacks on the Administration by some of Lincoln's party friends; by public meetings held in New York City at which violent and denunciatory speeches were listened to from Fernando Wood and others, and by the nomination of Vallandigham for Governor of Ohio. The military situation was critical to both governments when Stephens reached Richmond.

Pemberton was besieged and doomed to an early surrender at Vicksburg.

On the other hand Lee was invading Pennsylvania, having just gained some successes in the Shenandoah Valley; and there was a great battle imminent on Northern soil. Stephens was directed to proceed by the Valley to join Lee, and from his headquarters try to reach Was.h.i.+ngton. Heavy rains and bad roads deterred the frail Vice- President. At length the Secretary of the Confederate Navy sent him in a small steamer (the _Torpedo_) under a flag of truce, accompanied by Commissioner Robert Ould as his secretary, to Fortress Monroe. He wrote from this place a letter to Admiral S. P. Lee in Hampton Roads, of date of July 4, 1863, saying he was "bearer of a communication in writing from Jefferson Davis, _Commander-in- Chief_ of the land and naval forces of the Confederate States, to Abraham Lincoln, _Commander-in-Chief_ of the land and naval forces of the United States," and that he desired to go to Was.h.i.+ngton in his own vessel. The t.i.tles by which Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Davis were designated had been previously determined on by Davis and his advisers. Antic.i.p.ating there might be objection to the latter being referred to as President of the Confederacy, the foregoing was adopted as likely to be least objectionable. It was, however, solemnly agreed at Richmond that if the designations or t.i.tles adopted were such as to cause Mr. Stephens' communication to be rejected, he was to say that he had a communication to "President Lincoln from the President of the Confederacy." If this were objectionable as an apparent recognition of Davis as President of an independent nation, then Mr. Stephens' mission was to forthwith terminate. Admiral Lee wired to Mr. Lincoln Mr. Stephens' arrival, his mission, and desire to proceed to Was.h.i.+ngton. Mr. Lincoln did not stand on punctilio. He was, at first, inclined to send a long dispatch refusing Mr. Stephens permission to go to Was.h.i.+ngton, and saying nothing would be received "a.s.suming the independence of the Confederate States, and anything will be received, and carefully considered by him, when offered by any influential person or persons, in terms not a.s.suming the independence of the so-called Confederate States." This was, however, decided to be too much in detail, and the Secretary of the Navy was ordered to telegraph Admiral Lee:

"The request of A. H. Stephens is inadmissible. The customary agents and channels are adequate for all needful communication and conference between the United States and the insurgents."

This ended Mr. Stephens' first plans to secure peace. He, in his book written since the war, admits or pretends that the ulterior purpose of his proposed trip to Was.h.i.+ngton was, through a correspondence that would be published, "to deeply impress the growing const.i.tutional (_sic!_) party at the North with a full realization of the true nature and ultimate tendencies of the war ... that the surest way to maintain their liberties was to allow us the separate enjoyment of ours."( 4)

Great events took place the day Mr. Stephens reached Fortress Monroe. Vicksburg fell and Lee was, on that memorable Fourth of July, sending off his wounded, preparatory to a retreat from the fated field of Gettysburg.

Horace Greeley, a sincere enemy to slavery, who had somehow become imbued with the notion that the Administration was responsible for a prolongation of the war, became restless and complaining. He, at the head of the New York _Tribune_, gave vent to much criticism, which encouraged those in rebellion, and their friends in the North.

He listened to all sorts of pretenders and, finally, was duped into the belief that a peace could be made through some Southern emissaries in Canada. An adventurer calling himself "William Cornell Jewett of Colorado," from Niagara Falls, July 5, 1864, wrote Mr. Greeley:

"I am authorized to say to you ... that two amba.s.sadors of Davis & Co. are now in Canada with full and complete powers for peace, and Mr. Sanders requests that you come on immediately to me at Cataract House to have a private interview; or, if you will send the President's protection for him and two friends, they will come on and meet you. He says the whole matter can be consummated by _me, you, them, and President Lincoln_.( 5)

Mr. Greeley was seemingly so impressed with this as an opening for peace that he wrote a dictatorial letter to Mr. Lincoln reminding him of the long continuance of the war; a.s.serting the country was dissatisfied with the manner in which it was conducted and averse to further calls for troops; avowing that there was a widespread conviction that the government did not desire peace; rebuking the President for not having received Mr. Stephens the year before, and prophesying that unless there were steps taken to show the country that honest efforts were being made to secure an early settlement of our difficulties the Union party would be defeated at the impending Presidential election. Greeley suggested this wholly impracticable and impossible plan of adjustment: (1) The Union to be restored and declared perpetual; (2) slavery abolished; (3) complete amnesty; (4) payment of $400,000,000 to slave States for their slaves; (5) the slave States to have representation based on their total population, and (6) a national convention to be called at once. With a tirade on the condition of the country and its credit and more warnings as to the coming election, Mr. Greeley concluded by demanding that negotiations should be opened with the persons at Niagara.

Mr. Lincoln, though without faith in either the parties in Canada or Greeley's plan, wrote the latter, July 9th, saying:

"If you can find any persons, anywhere, professing to have any proposition of Jefferson Davis in writing, for peace, embracing the restoration of the Union, and abandonment of slavery, whatever else it embraces, say to him he may come to me with you, and that if he really brings such proposition he shall at the least have safe conduct with the paper (and without publicity if he chooses) to the point where you shall have met him. The same if there be two or more persons."

The President, thus prompt and frank, utterly surprised and disconcerted Mr. Greeley. Mr. Lincoln had accepted two main points in Greeley's plan--restoration of the Union and abandonment of slavery, and waived all others for the time being. The next day Mr. Greeley replied by repeating reproaches over what he called the "rude repulse" of Stephens, saying he thought the negotiators would not "open their budgets"; referring to the importance of doing something to aid the elections, and indicating that he might try to get a look into the hand of the Niagara parties. Again, on the 13th, he wrote Mr. Lincoln he had reliable information that Clement C. Clay of Alabama and Jacob Thompson of Mississippi were at Niagara Falls duly empowered to negotiate for peace, adding that he knew nothing as to terms, and saying that it was high time the slaughter was ended. The President, still without the slightest faith in Greeley or his Canada negotiators, but stung with the unjust a.s.sumption that he was averse to peace, wired Mr. Greeley, on the 15th:

"I was not expecting you to send me a letter, but to bring me a man or men," and saying a messenger with a letter was on the way to him.

The letter of Mr. Lincoln was brief, but met the case:

"Yours of the 13th is just received, and I am disappointed that you have not already reached here with those commissioners, if they would consent to come, on being shown my letter to you of the 9th inst. Show that and this to them, and if they will come on the terms in the former, bring them. I not only intend a sincere effort for peace, but I intend you shall be a personal witness that it is made."

Mr. Greeley, on this letter being placed in his hands, expressed much embarra.s.sment, but decided to go in search of the Canada parties provided he had a safe conduct for C. C. Clay, Jacob Thompson, James P. Holcombe, and George N. Sanders to Was.h.i.+ngton, in company with himself. The safe conduct was obtained through John Hay, the messenger. On Mr. Greeley's arrival at Niagara he fell into the hands of "Colorado Jewett," his vainglorious correspondent, and through him addressed Clay, Thompson, and Holcombe this letter:

"I understand you are duly accredited from Richmond as the bearers of propositions looking to the establishment of peace; that you desire to visit Was.h.i.+ngton in fulfilment of your mission; and that you further desire that George N. Sanders shall accompany you. If my information be thus far substantially correct, I am authorized by the President of the United States to tender you his safe conduct on the journey proposed, and to accompany you at the earliest time that will be agreeable to you."

Mr. Greeley, in this communication, ignored all the conditions in Mr. Lincoln's letters to him. Notwithstanding this, two of the persons named responded (Thompson not having been with Clay and Holcombe), saying they had no credentials to treat on the subject of peace, and hence could not accept his offer. Clay and Holcombe did say something about being acquainted with the views of their government, and if permitted to go to Richmond could get, for themselves or others, proper credentials. Mr. Greeley reported the situation, asking of the President further instructions. It now became apparent to everybody connected with the farce that if it was kept up further, Mr. Lincoln would be put in the att.i.tude of suing the Confederacy for a peace. Lincoln determined to end the situation and at the same time define his position before the world, clearly. He dispatched John Hay to Niagara with this famous letter:

"To Whom it May Concern: Any proposition which embraces the restoration of peace, the integrity of the whole Union, and the abandonment of slavery, and which comes by and with an authority that can control the armies now at war with the United States, will be received and considered by the Executive of the United States, and will be met by liberal terms on other substantial and collateral points, and the bearer or bearers thereof shall have safe conduct both ways.

"Abraham Lincoln."

This explicit letter was communicated to Holcombe at the Clifton House by Greeley and Hay. Mr. Greeley seems to have expressed to Jewett his regret over the "sad termination of the initiatory steps taken for peace, from the charge made by the President in his instructions given him." Nothing could have been more unjust.

The Confederate emissaries wrote a long letter to Mr. Greeley, which they gave to the public, arraigning Mr. Lincoln for bad faith.

They a.s.sumed Mr. Greeley had been sent by the President, on Mr.

Lincoln's own motion, to invite them to Was.h.i.+ngton to confer as to a peace. It does not appear that Mr. Greeley tried to disabuse the public mind of this error or to make known the truth. He claimed to regard the safe conduct of July 16th as a wavier of all the President's precedent terms; also of his own previously expressed terms. The President did not think best to publish the whole correspondence, preferring to suffer the injustice in silence.

Mr. Greeley continued in a bad state of mind. He refused to visit Mr. Lincoln, as requested, for a conference. He wrote the President on the 8th and again on the 9th of August, 1864, abusing certain Cabinet officers, reiterating his reproaches of Mr. Lincoln for not receiving Mr. Stephens, censuring him for not sending, after Vicksburg, a deputation to Richmond to ask for peace, complaining to him for not sending the "three biggest" Democrats in Congress to sue for peace, saying, however, little of his Niagara Falls fiasco, but adding: "Do not let the month pa.s.s without an earnest effort for peace," and closing his last letter thus:

"I beg you, implore you, to inaugurate or invite proposals for peace forthwith. And in case peace cannot now be made, consent to an _armistice for one year_, each party to retain, unmolested, all it now holds, but the rebel ports to be opened. Meantime, let a national convention be held, and there will surely be no more war at all events."

This suggestion of an armistice for one year and the opening of the rebel ports, was equivalent to proposing to give one year for the Confederacy to recuperate at home and from abroad; to strengthen its credit, to arrange new combinations, and to tie the hands of its friends of the Union and the Administration, to say nothing of the confession of failure to suppress the insurrection.

While Mr. Greeley was a Union man and had, throughout his public life, opposed slavery, he had no faith in war, nor did he have any of the instincts of a soldier to enable him to discern its tendencies.

He was personally friendly, it may be a.s.sumed, to the President, but hostile to Mr. Seward, Secretary of State, and probably intensely jealous of all the distinguished generals of the army. Greeley had long been, through the _Tribune_, a recognized factor in moulding public opinion, and now that war had come to absorb all other interests, his power and influence through the press had waned.

He was wholly impracticable in executive matters. His failure to inaugurate a peace and to attain prominence in administrative affairs during the war embittered him through life towards his old- time party friends.

A review of Mr. Lincoln's course relating to Mr. Greeley's attempts to negotiate a peace shows the former acted with the utmost candor, and submitted, for the time, to the latter's dictatorial course and the unjust charge of wavering and acting in bad faith, rather then crush his old friend or endanger the general cause for selfish glory.( 6)

Though in a sense inaugurated in 1863, another quite as futile attempt to bring about peace was in progress in July, 1864. James F. Jaquess, Colonel of the 73d Illinois, serving in Rosecrans' army --a Methodist Episcopal clergyman, a D.D.--in May, 1863, wrote to James A. Garfield, Chief of Staff, calling attention to the fact that his church had divided on the slavery question; saying that the Methodist Episcopal Church South had been a leading element in the Rebellion and prominent in the prosecution of the war; that a considerable part of the territory of that church South was in the possession of the Union Army; that from its ministers, once bitterly opposed to the Union, he had learned in person:

"That they consider the Rebellion has killed the Methodist Episcopal Church South; that it has virtually obliterated slavery, and all the prominent questions of difference between the North and the South; that they are desirous of returning to the 'Old Church'; that their brethren of the South are most heartily tired of the Rebellion; and that they most ardently desire peace, and the privilege of returning to their allegiance to church and state, and that they will do this on the first offer coming from a reliable source... . And from these considerations, but not from these alone, but because G.o.d has laid the duty on me, I submit to the proper authorities the following proposition, viz.: _I will go into the Southern Confederacy and return within ninety days with terms of peace that the government will accept_."

He further stated;

"I propose no compromise with traitors--but their immediate return to allegiance to G.o.d and their country... . I propose to do this work in the name of the Lord; if He puts it in the hearts of my superiors to allow me to do it, I shall be thankful; if not, I have discharged my duty."

This letter Rosecrans forwarded to Mr. Lincoln, approving Jacquess'

application. The President, seeing the difficulties, wrote Rosecrans saying Jacquess "could not go with any government authority," yet left to Rosecrans the discretion to grant the desired furlough.

The furlough was granted. Jacquess, finding a mere furlough or church influence would not aid him in getting into the Confederate lines, repaired to Baltimore and besought General Schenck to send him _via_ Fort Monore to Richmond. Schenck wired the President (July 13th) Jacquess' wishes and was answered: "Mr. Jacquess is a very worthy gentleman, but I can have nothing to do, directly or indirectly, with the matter he has in view." The Colonel, however, persuaded Schenck to send him to Fort Monroe, from whence he reached Richmond through the connivance of officers conducting the exchange of prisoners. In eleven days he was again in Baltimore asking the President by letter to grant him permission to report the "valuable information and proposals for peace" he had obtained. This permission was not granted. Mr. Lincoln well understood that he could have nothing official to report, and that in the brief time he was South he could have gained no reliable information concerning public sentiment. After lingering in Baltimore a little, this preacher- colonel rejoined his regiment. It does not appear that he ever made, even to Rosecrans or Garfield, any detailed report of this his first trip to Richmond. Though his efforts had so far failed, he was not discouraged, but with faith characteristic of his cla.s.s, resolved upon another effort. He now a.s.sociated with him one J.

R. Gilmore, a lecturer and literary character known as "Edmund Kirke," who had spent some time in the Western armies. Both were enthusiastic, but their zeal const.i.tuted their princ.i.p.al merit in the matter attempted. The President declined a personal interview with Jacquess, but gave, July, 1864, Gilmore a pa.s.s, over his own signature, to Grant's headquarters, with a note to Grant to allow both "to pa.s.s our lines with ordinary baggage and go South." Mr.

Gilmore had previously (June 15, 1864) written Mr. Lincoln telling him something of what Jacquess would propose. In substance he would say: "Lay down your arms and resume peaceful pursuits; the Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation tells what will be done with the blacks; amnesty will be granted the ma.s.ses, and no terms with rebels. The leaders to be allowed to seek safety abroad, and at the end of sixty days not one of them must be found in the United States."

On the 16th, these two men pa.s.sed from Butler's lines and were allowed to proceed, under surveillance, to Richmond. Next day they asked, through Secretary of State Judah P. Benjamin, for an interview with "President Davis," which was accorded them at nine o'clock that night, both Davis and Benjamin being present.

The volunteer envoys were politely received, and the interview lasted two hours. It seems that Jacquess and Gilmore did not even mention the plan referred to in the latter's letter to Mr. Lincoln.

This was, however, immaterial, as they had no authority to submit anything. They asked Mr. Davis if the "_dispute_" was not "narrowed down to this: Union or Disunion." Davis answered: "Yes, or independence or subjugation." The "envoys" suggested that the two governments should go to the people with two propositions: (1) "Peace with disunion and Southern independence," (2) "Peace with Union, emanc.i.p.ation, no confiscation, and universal amnesty." A vote to be taken on these propositions within sixty days, in which the citizens of the whole United States should partic.i.p.ate; the proposition prevailing to be abided by. Pending the vote there should be an armistice. Mr. Davis promptly said:

"The plan is wholly impracticable. If the South were only one State it might work; but as it is, if only one State objected to emanc.i.p.ation, it would nullify the whole thing: for you are aware the people of Virginia cannot vote slavery out of South Carolina, nor the people of South Carolina vote it out of Virginia."

The interview proceeded on these lines without approaching agreement.

It is evident that the "envoys" were overmatched by Davis and Benjamin, and were subjected to a charge of ignorance of the form of their own government. Davis indulged in some _bluff_ about caring nothing for slavery, as his slaves were already freed by the war; and he declared the Southern people "will be free"--will govern themselves, if they "have to see every Southern plantation sacked and every Southern city in flames." Davis also announced that he would be pleased, at any time, to receive proposals "for peace on the basis of independence. It will be needless to approach me on any other."

The interview being over, Jacquess and Gilmore got quickly back into the Union lines, and North. The latter published an account of the interview in the _Atlantic Monthly_ for September, 1864.

His account does not materially differ from Benjamin's sent to the Confederate diplomatic agents in Europe, or Davis' in his _Rise and Fall of the Confederacy_.( 7)

On the whole the publication of the story of this visit to Richmond did much good to the Union cause in the pending Presidential campaign. The story closed the mouths of the peace factionists, though a few of Mr. Lincoln's party friends, fearing the result of the election, continued to demand more tangible testimony of his disposition to negotiate a peace; this largely for the purpose of its effect on the November election.

Henry J. Raymond, Chairman of the Republican National Executive Committee, at a meeting of the committee in New York, apprehensive of McClellan's nomination and possible election as President, August 22, 1864, indited a panicky letter to Mr. Lincoln, expressing great fear of the latter's defeat at the polls, giving some unfavorable predictions as to the result of the election by E. B. Washburne, Governor Morton, Simon Cameron, and others, deploring the failure of the army to gain victories, and a.s.signing as a cause for reaction in public sentiment:

"The impression is in some minds, the fear and suspicion in others, that we are not to have peace in any event under this Administration until slavery is abandoned."

Continuing:

"In some way or other the suspicion is widely diffused that we can have peace with Union if we would. It is idle to reason with this belief--still more idle to denounce it. It can only be expelled by some authoritative act, at once bold enough to fix attention and distinct enough to defy incredulity and challenge respect."

Raymond was bold enough to ask that a commission be appointed to offer "peace to Davis, as the head of the rebel armies, on the sole condition of acknowledging the supremacy of the Const.i.tution--all other questions to be settled in a convention of the people of all the States." He stated that if the proffer were accepted the people would put the execution of the details in loyal hands; if rejected "it would plant seeds of disaffection in the South and dispel all delusions about peace that prevail in the North." He demanded the proposal should be made at once, as Mr. Lincon's "spontaneous act."

Mr. Raymond seemed to express the concurrent views of his Republican a.s.sociates.( 8) Three days later he and his committee reached Was.h.i.+ngton to personally urge prompt action on the President. In the light of recent attempts at Niagara and Richmond the Raymond proposition was inadmissible, yet Mr. Lincoln resolved, if the step must be taken, to again make the proposer the instrument to demonstrate its folly. The President wrote a letter of instructions, which he felt he might have to give to Mr. Raymond, authorizing him to proceed to Richmond, and propose to "Honorable Jefferson Davis that upon the restoration of the Union and the national authority, the war shall cease at once, all remaining questions to be left for adjustment by peaceful modes." If this proposition were not accepted, Mr. Raymond was then "to request to be informed what terms, if any, embracing the restoration of the Union, would be accepted." "If the presentation of any terms embracing the restoration of the Union" were declined, then Mr. Raymond was directed to "request to be informed what terms of peace would be accepted; and on receiving any answer report the same to the Government."