v1.1.2 / chapter 9 of 93 / 01 oct 09 / greg goebel / public domain
* The last months of 1861 saw the further rise of General George McClellan as General Winfield Scott retired, but increased authority was only to bring McClellan more troubles. In the meantime, the Union undertook a successful operation to obtain a new blockade port at Port Royal in South Carolina, and laid plans for an even more ambitious amphibious operation against New Orleans. Such advances were offset by muddled Union actions in Missouri, not to mention a furious international crisis brought on by an overly enthusiastic US Navy officer, Captain Charles Wilkes.
* General McClellan had been delighted to get Winfield Scott out of his way, but whatever trouble Scott had been to McClellan, the old man was still one of the country's greatest heroes and commanded respect. On the morning of 2 November 1861, the day after taking General Scott's place, McClellan and his staff got out of bed and escorted Scott to the train station in the rain. Scott was dejected by his enforced retirement, saying: "I have become an encumbrance to the Army as well as myself." He was touched by the escort, as well as by a general order McClellan had issued in his praise with Little Mac's usual flair for the high-flown ("... let our victories illuminate the close of a life so grand."). The two men partly cordially, with Scott giving his regards to McClellan's wife and baby. McClellan and his group saluted as Scott boarded the train that would take him to New York City. Scott would live at Delmonico's for a time, then take up residence at West Point, seeing out the end of the conflict with satisfaction and dying in 1866 at age 79.
McClellan wrote his wife later that day:
BEGIN QUOTE:
The sight of this morning was a lesson to me which I hope not soon to forget. I saw there the end of a long, active, and industrious life, the end of the career of the first soldier of the nation; and it was a feeble old man scarce able to walk; hardly anyone there to see him off but his successor. Should I ever become vainglorious and ambitious, remind me of that spectacle.
END QUOTE
He might have stood reminding right away. McClellan's grasp of his all-important political environment was weak. He looked down on the cabinet secretaries and the impatient Congressmen who demanded action from him, and his patience with the President himself was running short. Lincoln took an active interest in McClellan's work and deferred to the young general. Lincoln had been reading military treatises in the late hours of the night in order to better grasp the war he had to direct, and McClellan treated the president's clumsy attempts to grasp strategy with a certain amused tolerance.
The problem was that McClellan was something of a back-East snob, and like many of his kind he privately regarded the President as a hick. He was encouraged in this prejudice by Edwin M. Stanton, the Democratic lawyer who had been Buchanan's Secretary of War, now legal advisor to Secretary of State Seward. McClellan had taken to visiting Stanton to escape "enemies" such as "browsing presidents" and the like. Stanton had little good to say about anyone and nothing good to say about Lincoln, who he called "the original gorilla", much to McClellan's amusement.
On one mid-November evening, the President, his private secretary John Hay, and Secretary of State Seward dropped by McClellan's house. The servant informed them that the general was at a wedding, but would be back soon, The three men waited for an hour. McClellan returned, the servant told him of his visitors, but the general simply went upstairs. Lincoln and his colleagues waited another half-hour, and then asked the servant to inform the general once more of their presence. The reply was that the general had gone to bed. As they walked back home, Hay angrily complained about McClellan's rudeness, but Lincoln calmed him. "I will hold McClellan's horse if he will only bring us success," he said later, likely echoing what he had told Hay. But Hay noted that from that time on when the President wanted to speak with McClellan, the general was summoned to the White House.
General McClellan was in no position to be antagonising his superiors. The pressure for action was strong, and the people applying the pressure were inclined to ruthlessness. In early December, the radical Republican activists led by Senator Ben Wade acquired by the grace of Congress formal standing as the "Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War". The Committee set up shop in the basement of the Capitol building and began to issue summons to officers of McClellan's Army of the Potomac. The Federal government was spending massive funds on the prosecution of the war, and Congress was going to get their money's worth, Wade saying: "We must stir ourselves, on account of the expense." The fact that this effort extended the hand of the radicals over McClellan and his generals was of course just an incidental benefit.
* On the other side of the lines, Jefferson Davis was continuing to have his own troubles, but he did receive considerable encouragement on 6 November 1861 when a Confederate national election confirmed him in his six-year term as president, and established the legitimacy (at least as far as Southerners were concerned) of his previously-provisional government. Davis also had an ace-in-the-hole, in the form of hoped-for recognition by the great powers of Europe. To this end, in October he had sent two prominent Southerners, ex-US Senators James Mason of Virginia and John Slidell of Louisiana, across the Atlantic to present the Confederate case. There was no great reason for optimism in their mission, since previous overtures to the British had received a chilly response. However, European recognition of the Confederacy would be a badly-needed ray of light, since the day after Davis's election, the Southern cause was dealt yet another demoralizing blow.
Even before the easy Federal victory at Cape Hatteras in late August, the US Navy had been planning a much more ambitious amphibious operation. The target was Port Royal Sound, on the South Carolina coast, 60 miles (96 kilometers) south of Charleston and 30 miles (48 kilometers) north of Savannah, Georgia. Port Royal Sound was an ideal site for a Federal forward naval base. The harbor was big and deep enough to accommodate any fleet, and there was no city of importance there to require occupation and control. Once seized, Port Royal Sound would be a hub of activity for coastal-patrol gunboats, as well as the larger vessels needed for deep-ocean operations against blockade runners and privateers.
The Confederates were known to have strong fortifications at the entrance of the harbor, and stiff resistance was expected. Formal orders were cut in early August, specifying the biggest fleet the Navy could pull together and at least 12,000 soldiers as a ground force. The operation was under the command of Captain Samuel du Pont, an aristocratic sailor from the wealthy du Pont family of Delaware, who had been in command of the Philadelphia Navy Yard. Since the Navy didn't have the rank of admiral at the time, he was given the improvised title of "flag officer" for the occasion. The Army provided Brigadier General Thomas W. Sherman -- no particular relation to William T. Sherman -- to command the soldiers for the mission. The two men went New York immediately to assemble and organize their force.
Their efforts quickly ran foul of the bickering between General Scott and General McClellan. McClellan, demanding every soldier he could get his hands on, took control of Thomas Sherman and his regiments in September; he would have kept them but President Lincoln intervened personally, writing on 18 September to Secretary of War Cameron and General Scott:
BEGIN QUOTE:
To guard against misunderstanding I think fit to say that the joint expedition of the Army and Navy agreed upon some time since, and in which Gen. T.W. Sherman was and is to bear a conspicuous part, is in no wise to be abandoned, but must be ready to move by the first of, or very early in, October. Let all preparations go forward accordingly.
END QUOTE
McClellan continued to protest, but without effect. Late in October, Sherman loaded up his troops at Annapolis on a bewildering variety of transports, ranging from ferries to ocean liners, and joined du Pont's vessels massing at Hampton Roads. There was a total of 49 ships in the fleet, plus 25 schooners loaded with coal. It was the largest fleet the United States Navy had ever assembled. Sealed orders were issued to the commanders of the ships, and on 29 October 1861 the armada sailed out of Hampton Roads, past Cape Henry at the mouth of Chesapeake Bay into the Atlantic, and then turned south.
The wind came up and turned into a gale, and on the afternoon of 1 November du Pont signaled from his flagship, the WABASH, that all ships were to look after themselves. If the convoy was scattered, the captains were to open their sealed orders to find out where they should reassemble. The next morning du Pont could only see one other vessel, but by 4 November the vessels had reassembled off the bar at the entrance of Port Royal Sound. One transport had gone down, though all of her crew and all but seven of the 600 marines on board were rescued; a cargo ship carrying army supplies had sunk as well.
Du Pont sent his ships in across the bar, which was 10 miles (16 kilometers) offshore, and anchored near the entrance of the sound. The gunboats went in and swept away a little squadron of improvised Confederate warships -- three tugs, each with one gun, and an armed river steamer -- under the command of Flag Officer Josiah Tatnall. The channel was then marked and the warships fitted for combat, only to be stalled by a strong wind from the southwest that made entrance to the sound hazardous.
On the morning of 7 November, du Pont raised his signal flags and the fleet went in. Port Royal Sound was well protected by Fort Beauregard, at Bay Point on the north side of the entrance, and Fort Walker, on Hilton Head Island on the southern side. These fortifications were well-built and well-armed, flanking a 2 mile (3.2 kilometer) wide channel. Furthermore, Confederate intelligence had given the defenders plenty of warning of the attack, and they were completely alert. Du Pont led his ships straight down the middle of the channel, hitting the forts with a smattering of fire from his long-range guns, and then swung around south to hammer Fort Walker from 600 yards (550 meters). The Federal warships took hits but poured fire back in return, and Fort Walker began to crumble. The WABASH moved in closer and followed up with precision fire, conducted as meticulously as though the crew were engaged in target practice.
Confederate Flag Officer Tatnall reemerged with his little fleet to oppose the Federals. Tatnall flagged du Pont a salute as he did so, since the two men were friends from prewar days. The WABASH replied curtly with a volley over the rebel vessels. Tatnall thought better of committing suicide and ordered his ships to turn around. They fled, with Federal gunboats in pursuit.
After three passes of the Union fleet, the cannon fire from Fort Walker ceased entirely and the Federals could see the garrison fleeing rearward for safety. Du Pont sent a landing party ashore. The officer in charge found the fort shattered and deserted, and ran the Stars & Stripes up what was left of the flagpole. The ease with which Confederate defenses had been overwhelmed confounded the conventional wisdom that one gun on land was worth four on water. Steam power had changed the equation by greatly reducing the factors of wind and current.
The Marines arrived next, followed by Thomas Sherman's troops. The next morning a landing party took possession of Fort Beauregard, which had been hastily abandoned after the fall of Fort Walker. Everything had been left in perfect order, and the fleeing Confederates had even been so apparently considerate as to leave a flock of turkeys behind, kept in a pen in the fort, so the Federals could celebrate with a fine turkey dinner. They also left behind a mine that blew a sailor into the air, but other than having the wind knocked out of him he was unharmed.
Within three days, Federal troops had moved upriver and occupied the old colonial towns of Beaufort and Port Royal. The exercise had proven much easier than expected, and du Pont and Sherman were very pleased with things. However, they didn't grasp the full implications of their success. Southerners were fleeing with everything they could carry for a radius of 50 miles (80 kilometers), leaving behind black people who had been slaves, but who were now for all practical purposes free. They flocked to Federals and enjoyed their unexpected deliverance. A cartoon of the time showed the blacks putting on their masters' fine clothes, taking their ease on the best furniture, and pounding on the piano. They must have thought they had died and gone to heaven.
They quickly found out that wherever they were, it wasn't heaven. A Union soldier wrote of his shock and revulsion at members of a New York regiment who tried to seize a black woman. She was too quick for them and escaped; they settled for easier prey, grabbing a little black girl and raping her instead. The Yankees had not come with any noble intention to liberate the slaves, and Thomas Sherman released a proclamation that condemned secession but assured the populace that the Union forces had no intention of interfering with their "local institutions" -- which everyone in those days knew meant "slavery". The proclamation was meaningless under the circumstances. That "local institution" was seriously unstable, and the very arrival of the Federals in the area had upset it, whether the Yankees had wanted to or not. The result was that they now had a large number of black people on their hands that they didn't really have any idea what to do with, and who, after generations of oppression and dependence, weren't entirely certain what to do with themselves.
In fact, the trickle of contrabands was now becoming a flood of black folk who, having left their masters, were seeking deliverance along all the Confederacy's borders. The Army had no brief for dealing with the issue and no preparation for handling it, and so for want a better plan the refugees were often put into "contraband camps". Conditions in the camps were frightful at first, with many of those interned in them dying of disease and deprivation. Northern citizen relief groups gradually began to take charge of the camps, making sure they were properly supplied, and even giving black folk of all ages classes in how to read, write, and do figures.
Teaching a person who had been a slave how to read was, as innocent as it sounds now, a revolutionary idea. The military soon came up with a more revolutionary idea: make soldiers out of black men. The slaves freed at Port Royal would be among the pioneers in this effort. It would take some time to get everything organized, but by early 1863, the First South Carolina Volunteers would be a going operation. The black regiments would always have white officers, the idea of a black officer being too much to swallow for the moment, and the black troops would be often be used as labor detachments, teamsters, or for other support roles. There was a strong belief in the Army at the time that black men weren't suited to combat, and at the outset they were also paid less than their white counterparts. It would take some time and effort to get these attitudes to shift.
* Robert E. Lee had suffered a streak of bad fortune in the mountains of western Virginia that was proving difficult to break. Jefferson Davis had appointed him to direct the defense of the coastal regions of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, and as luck would have it, Lee went to inspect Port Royal just in time to hear the boom of the guns and witness the flood of refugees.
Lee set up his headquarters at a rail stop named Coosawhatchie Station, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) from Port Royal, and considered the situation. He reported: "The strength of the enemy, as far as I am able to judge, exceeds the whole force we have in the state; it can be thrown with great celerity against any point, and far outnumbers any force we can bring against it in the field." The Federals could move troops and firepower by water to any number of vulnerable targets in the area. Lee expected Thomas Sherman to send troops inland to cut the rail line and then fall on either Charleston or Savannah.
Fortunately for Lee, not all his luck was bad. Thomas Sherman had his hands full just trying to consolidate the Federal conquest. Nobody had expected the rebels to be so weak, and nothing in Sherman's orders called for an aggressive follow-up to their victory. He was still bitterly criticised in the North by politicians, newspaper editors, and other armchair warriors for his perceived inaction.
Robert E. Lee could sympathize with Thomas Sherman. Not being the sort of fellow to trust to luck or the idleness of enemies, he had put his troops to work building fortifications. The South Carolinans howled. Digging ditches wasn't white man's work, and besides, real warriors didn't hide behind earthworks to fight. Lee made them dig anyway, and Lee got a new name: King of Spades.
The seizure of Port Royal was to quickly show results for the Union war effort. Having a forward base for conducting naval operations along the coast of the Confederacy raised the blockade from the status of a joke to a tangible pressure against the rebels. One consequence was that, as Gideon Welles had foreseen, Confederate privateering against Yankee shipping was no longer practical. Neutral ports were closed to the raiders, and, since their prizes rarely had the capability to evade blockaders, there was no way to get the prizes into Southern ports. Blockade-running was far more profitable under the circumstances, and by the end of the year the privateers would be effectively out of business.
* The lesson learned by the Federals from the sudden fall of Fort Walker quickly led to new thinking about an even more significant coastal target: New Orleans, at 168,000 people the largest city in the Confederacy, larger than the next four smaller Southern cities combined, and a center of international commerce.
Federal pressure had been building on the city as the blockade tightened. Its trade was dwindling, and the seizure of nearby Ship Island on the Gulf Coast presented an obvious threat. New Orleans was willing to fight back, as the little naval action at the Head of the Passes the month before had proven by sending a far superior Federal naval force fleeing for the open sea. The city's little scratch fleet, led by the oddball ironclad MANASSAS, was expecting impressive reinforcements in the shape of two monster ironclads, the MISSISSIPPI and the LOUISIANA, whose construction had been begun by the Confederate Navy Department in October.
If the two ironclads were finished, they might very well break the Federal blockade, and then turn around to steam up the Mississippi and destroy Federal naval power on the river. If the Union was to capture New Orleans, the threat of the new rebel ironclads would be eliminated, and the Federals would have taken a major step towards complete control over the vital Mississippi. The loss of New Orleans would also be a major blow to Confederate morale.
There was the problem of Fort Saint Philip and Fort Jackson, the two forts that flanked the Mississippi below New Orleans. Fort Saint Philip had been built by the French in 1746, been strengthened by the Spanish in 1790, and had been improved by the Americans again in 1812, to be bombarded by the British in 1815 during their unsuccessful attempt to take New Orleans. Fort Jackson had been completed in 1831, and was a solid brick pentagon surrounded by a moat. The two forts mounted a total of over a hundred guns, but none of them were the large-caliber weapons needed to shatter big warships.
In charge of the defense of New Orleans was Confederate Major General Mansfield Lovell, a 39-year-old West Pointer who had spent many of his civilian years as a New Jersey ironworks executive. Lovell had resigned his post as New York City deputy street commissioner in September to offer his services to the Confederacy. He had been assigned to the post in October, replacing Major General David E. Twiggs, who had surrendered Federal garrisons in Texas to the Confederacy the year before; Twiggs was too old and infirm to remain in command.
Lovell made a good impression on the citizens of New Orleans with his energy, bearing, upright-in-the-saddle horsemanship, and impressive ruff of whiskers, but he found the city's defenses in sorry condition. He also knew that the two forts, despite their apparent strength, would not be a serious obstacle to a Union fleet moving upriver. Lovell immediately did everything possible to obtain more weapons and supplies and to drill his troops. He also began construction of a log raft to block the Mississippi between the two forts.
Lovell wasn't the only one who doubted the forts weren't as strong as they looked. The energetic Assistant Secretary of the US Navy, Gustavus Fox, had clearly seen how easily the Navy's ships had overwhelmed Fort Walker at Port Royal Sound. Fox came to the conclusion that a fleet of ships could run the two forts and place New Orleans under their guns. His boss, Navy Secretary Welles, liked the idea. The final push that got the operation rolling was from Commander David Dixon Porter, the 48-year-old son of a naval hero of the War of 1812. Porter was an ambitious, energetic man with an oversized ego, given to excessive self-promotion and a tendency to backstab those in his way. Porter had been on station on the Gulf Coast and had concluded himself that the forts could be run. When his ship, the POWHATAN, steamed to the Brooklyn Navy Yard for repairs, Porter went to Washington to promote his ideas, and himself, to his superiors.
Navy Secretary Welles had little liking for Porter's style, but Welles swallowed his irritation and spoke with him. Porter believed that running the forts would be easier if they were bombarded into submission by siege mortars mounted on boats before the fleet made its run, and Welles conceded that this "would probably make success more certain." Porter later characteristically took credit for conceiving the entire operation, while Secretary Welles said Porter had simply been invited to discuss existing Navy plans and had suggested the mortar boats.
In any case, Secretary Welles and Commander Porter met with President Lincoln and General McClellan on the evening of 15 November. McClellan was skeptical at first, claiming that it would take 50,000 men to capture New Orleans, and he did not want to divert such forces from his own operations. But he was generally in favor of amphibious operations, and approved when he was told that a new force would be used for the attack. This force would be raised and commanded by General Benjamin Butler, and part of the reason the idea was approved was because it would get Butler out of everyone's hair. Welles commented: "All would be relieved were this restless officer sent to Ship Island or the far Southwest, where his energy, activity and impulsive force might be employed in desultory aquatic and shore duty in concert with the Navy."
Of course, Butler wouldn't be in overall command, since this was a Navy operation, and besides, putting Butler in charge would be tempting fate a little too much. To take the top spot, Welles and Fox selected Captain David Glascow Farragut, apparently at Porter's suggestion. Farragut was 60 years old and had been in the Navy for over 50 years. He had gone to sea at age nine and had been adopted by the elder Porter. The only term that could be used to describe him neatly was the overused word "sprightly", as he was trim, bright, lively, kindly, imaginative, determined, possessed of a sense of humor, and given to a certain endearing theatrics in his speech. Pictures of the man still capture some of his charisma.
The main problem with Farragut was that his blood was solidly Southern. He had been born in Tennessee, and had married women from Norfolk twice. This background made him questionable despite the fact that he was solidly opposed to secession, replying to secessionists who had tried to encourage him to come over to their side: "You fellows will catch the devil before you get through with this business." He had even moved to New York at the outbreak of hostilities, but he was still suspected of being a security risk and had been relegated to a desk job on the Navy Retirement Board, instead of an active military command.
Gustavus Fox ordered Porter to sound out his foster brother to see where the older man stood, without giving away Federal plans. Porter met Farragut at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and the two men chatted for a while about family matters. Then Porter mentioned some of their colleagues who had gone South. Farragut said: "Those fellows will catch it yet!"
"Would you accept a command such as no officer in our Navy ever had to go fight those fellows?" Porter asked. Farragut suddenly realized something was up and replied: "I cannot fight against Norfolk."
Porter probed Farragut with a lie: "Then you are not the man I came after, for Norfolk will be the very place to be attacked first, and that den of traitors must be wiped out." Farragut realized he was being baited, and answered angrily: "I will take the command, only don't you trifle with me!"
Having passed this test, Farragut, still unaware of the exact purpose to which he was being called, was ordered to Washington, and met with Gustavus Fox at Montgomery Blair's home on 21 December. Fox asked him if he thought New Orleans could be taken from the Gulf. Farragut replied: "Yes, emphatically. The forts are well down the river; ships could easily run them, and New Orleans itself is undefended. It would depend somewhat on the fleet, however."
Fox continued: "Well, with such a fleet as, say, two steam frigates, five screw sloops of the Cities class, a dozen gunboats, and some mortar vessels to shell the forts from high angle?"
"Why, I would engage to run those batteries with two-thirds of such a force!"
"What would you say if appointed to head such an expedition?"
"What would I say?!" Farragut cried, jumping up and prowling the room while the matter assembled itself in his mind. "What would I say?!" he repeated, and then was unable to contain his excitement and joy. Farragut received orders on the last week of the year, and began to assemble his fleet. Not only were the rebels going to catch the devil, Farragut was going to lend the devil a hand in doing it.
* Despite the continuous low-level violence in Missouri, General Fremont's campaign against the rebels resulted in only one battle, which took place nowhere near him and his army, and then only after he had departed from the scene.
The guerrilla fighting in Fremont's rear had worried him. One particularly troublesome irregular warrior working operating in the southeast corner of the state was an eccentric but energetic fellow named M. Jeff Thompson. Thompson had once written the Confederate authorities that all they had to do to get rid of the Saint Louis Unionists was destroy the local breweries and seize all the beer: "By this means the Dutch [Germans] will all die in a week and the Yankees will then run from this State."
Fremont found Thompson irritating. He had also heard that Confederate General Polk was sending troops west across the river to assist Sterling Price, and so Fremont ordered General Grant to make a show of force to distract Polk, who was operating out of the rebel stronghold at Columbus, Kentucky, and put Thompson on the defensive. On 3 November 1861, Grant sent a column of troops south along the Missouri side of the Mississippi to try to trap Thompson.
On receiving a report on 5 November that Polk actually was sending troops to help Price, Grant decided to throw in more troops. On 6 November, he put 3,100 men onto four steamboats and steamed down the Mississippi with an escort of two wooden gunboats. In the dark hours of the next morning, 7 November, Grant received a report that Polk was ferrying forces across the river to destroy the column Grant had sent south on the 3rd. Grant decided to hit first, attacking Belmont, Missouri, on the west bank of the reiver, across from Columbus.
In reality, Thompson was lying low for the moment, Polk was not sending Price any real help, and the Federal column was under no serious threat, but Grant landed north of Belmont early on 7 November anyway, looking for a fight. In response, Polk sent four regiments under the command of Brigadier General Gideon Pillow across the river to reinforce the small garrison already in Belmont, and Grant's advance quickly led to a confrontation.
The Federals overwhelmed the rebels after about two hours of fighting. The Confederates fell back in disarray: "We are whipped! Go back!" they cried to new reinforcements coming across the river. Unfortunately, as had happened with green troops in earlier battles, winning disorganized the Federals as much as losing confused their adversaries, and it quickly became apparent that the Federals hadn't really won much. Belmont was so obviously exposed that Polk hadn't really believed the Yankees would seriously try to take it, and the Federals ended up under heavy fire from Confederate artillery sited on bluffs across the river, while Confederate reinforcements threatened to turn the tables on the Union men. An aide cried out: "General, we are surrounded!" Grant replied, as usual matter-of-fact: "Well, we must cut our way out as we cut our way in."
There were 5,000 angry Confederates on the field and that was no simple task, but Grant directed his men energetically and got them out, though equipment had to be abandoned. He was the last man out at the landing, except for one regiment that had marched upstream to be picked up later. The last transport had pushed off the bank, but the captain, recognizing Grant on horseback, had a plank slid out to him.
Grant had already had one mount shot out from underneath him, and he was in considerable danger, for General Polk had seen him and told his staff: "There is a Yankee; you may try your marksmanship on him if you wish." Fortunately for Grant, nobody felt this was particularly sporting. Grant had an almost supernatural knack for horses, and his new horse seemed to understand the situation. It stepped over the edge of the bank, tucked its hind legs underneath its rump, and "without hesitation or urging", slid down the bank and trotted up the plank.
Both sides took about 600 casualties at Belmont. It was clearly a Union defeat. The Northerners were discouraged, while the Confederates crowed over their victory, demonstrating the same dangerous overconfidence that had afflicted them after Wilson's Creek. Neither point of view was quite the truth. Although the fight at Belmont was a serious battle, it amounted to nothing strategically, and the Union side of the score card showed that the Federals had generals who were eager to fight. Grant's men obtained some valuable combat experience, they saw the rebels break and run on the field, and when things went wrong, their commander kept a cool head and got them out in good order under fire -- one of the most difficult of all military maneuvers. There was some spirit of aggressiveness in the Federals, and if it ever got rolling it might be hard to stop.
* Getting it rolling was a problem. McClellan having become general-in-chief of the Union armies, on 12 November he announced a reorganization. The reorganization had little effect in the East. McClellan himself stayed in command of the Department of the Potomac, and General William S. Rosecrans retained his command of the Department of Western Virginia.
It had substantial effect in the West. Fremont's old Department of the West was broken into three parts: the Kansas Department, which comprised most of the Great Plains; the Department of Missouri, which covered Missouri and part or all of its neighboring states; and the Department of the Ohio, which covered Ohio and its surrounding regions. General David Hunter, who had replaced Fremont less than two weeks before as commander of the Department of the West, was put in charge of the Kansas Department; Henry Halleck became commander of the Department of Missouri, making him Grant's immediate superior; and, as mentioned earlier, Don Carlos Buell was assigned to the command of the Department of Ohio, replacing William Tecumseh Sherman, who was put under Halleck's command until Halleck decided to send him home.
The command arrangement placed Halleck and Buell in equal positions of authority. Since neither man was particularly diplomatic or far-sighted, the split command arrangement immediately led to rivalry and antagonism, crippling coordination between their forces. Grand plans were discussed and promoted, but for the moment the two armies did nothing.
* The war wound down in the last months of 1861, leaving as the only matter of immediate concern to the Federals a confrontation, not with the Confederates, but with the British. On 7 November, the Confederate emissaries to Europe, James Mason and John Slidell, arrived in Havana on a blockade runner, and then booked passage to England on the British mail steamer TRENT. The next day, a US Navy warship, the SAN JACINTO, fired a shot across the TRENT'S bow. The steamer was then boarded by an armed party of sailors, and Mason, Slidell, and their private secretaries were arrested and taken away. The TRENT'S passengers were outraged, shouting at the Yankees: "Pirates! Villains! Throw the damned fellows overboard!".
This action was on the sole initiative of the skipper of the SAN JACINTO, Captain Charles Wilkes, a pigheaded and opinionated man in his early sixties, famous for his Antarctic explorations 20 years earlier. Since international law allowed blockaders to seize diplomatic dispatches from a belligerent off of a neutral ship, Wilkes came up with ingenious idea of declaring Mason and Slidell to be "diplomatic dispatches", justifying their capture. Seizing the Confederate emissaries not only gave him satisfaction of doing injury to the rebels, but also of stepping on the toes of the British, who he strongly disliked. The SAN JACINTO arrived at Hampton Roads on 15 November to load coal, where Wilkes received instructions to sail to Boston and turn his prisoners over to the Army. He arrived in Boston on 24 November and found himself a national hero, lionized in the newspaper and in Congress, and was given a letter of commendation by Navy Secretary Gideon Welles.
The TRENT reached Southampton, England, on 17 November. The news of the insult suffered by the ship at the hands of Wilkes set off outrage from the halls of Parliament on down to the man in the street. 8,000 soldiers were ordered to Canada and the Prime Minister, Lord Palmerston, informed Queen Victoria that her government "should be advised to demand reparation and redress" for this deliberate insult to the British flag. Palmerston told his cabinet: "You may stand for this, but damned if I will."
The US ambassador in Britain, Charles Francis Adams, was in the countryside on that day, and on receiving a telegram with the news decided he would stay there for a day or two until the rage died down a little. While not a brilliant man, Adam was remarkably disciplined and cool under pressure, and probably one of the best men the Union could have hoped to have on the spot under the circumstances. There was no transatlantic telegraph cable at the time and communications between Britain and the US took about three weeks, so stalling for time was a practical option. Adams didn't know precisely what was going on and feared the worst. Secretary of State Seward had shown saber-rattling and anglophobic tendencies in the past, and for all Adams knew, Wilkes' act might well have been an act of deliberate provocation on the part of the US government.
Adams' fears proved exaggerated. Seward quickly wrote him that Wilkes' act was completely unauthorized. Seward added that he had consulted McClellan on the implications of a war with Great Britain, and McClellan replied with the obvious answer that if there were a war with the British, the war against the Confederacy might as well be given up for good. Furthermore, Seward found his own left and right hands fighting each other over the issue, since he had negotiated a secret deal with Britain to obtain five shiploads of saltpeter from British India, to be used by the du Pont company of Delaware to produce badly-needed gunpowder for the Union war effort. Of course, that gave the British a powerful bargaining position and they promptly made use of it, embargoing the saltpeter shipments. President Lincoln had told Seward: "One war at a time." -- and Seward had finally been convinced.
The only problem was that the seizure of Mason and Slidell was popular with the Northern public, and disavowing it could embarrass the Federal government. Fortunately, after tempers cooled, the British government recognized that the incident hadn't been a matter of Union policy and that a confrontation over it was not in Britain's interests. On 30 November, Lord Russell, the British Foreign Secretary, passed drafts of the demands he intended to present to Lincoln's government to Prince Albert, the Royal Consort. Albert, though so ill that he would die two weeks later, carefully rephrased the document to avoid unnecessary antagonism and embarrassment for the American government.
The note insisted that Mason and Slidell be released and that the US government apologise for their seizure off a vessel flying the Union Jack, but it also expressed the sentiment that Captain Wilkes had no doubt been acting on his own, and that the United States had not deliberately attempted to antagonize the British. Lord Lyons, the British ambassador in Washington, was, like his counterpart Charles Francis Adams, keeping a low profile and trying to cool off overheated tempers.
Despite articles in the US press praising Wilkes and spouting defiant language, Lord Lyons assured Lord Russell that "to a person accustomed to the strong language of the American press, these articles appear moderate and even subdued in tone." Seward was also making loud warlike noises, but anyone who knew much about Seward knew better than to take his public rhetoric too seriously. Furthermore, General Winfield Scott, who was in Paris at the time, issued a public statement, written with help from the American consul, Seward's old advisor Thurlow Weed, stating that America certainly would "regard no honorable sacrifice too great for the preservation of the friendship of Great Britain." Scott's reputation in Europe was comparable to that he possessed at home, and his statement carried weight.
Lord Lyons presented the British letter to Secretary Seward on 19 December, and after a long cabinet meeting on Christmas Day, Lord Lyons was informed that the Confederate emissaries had been seized illegally, without the knowledge or approval of the United States government, and that the men would be released immediately. The were freed on 30 December and were quickly spirited to England on board the HMS RINALDO. Although tempers had run very high during the incident, once the two sides finally came to an agreement they were actually on better terms than they had been before.
The matter was closed. The Confederacy's hopes had risen with the crisis, and were crushed when it dissipated. The magic stroke of foreign recognition or even intervention had vanished, if not beyond hope, at least beyond sight. Hopes were not enough for some. Robert E. Lee wrote: "We must make up our minds to fight our battles ourselves. Expect to receive aid from no one."
