Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (57 page)

These signs of northern opinion hardened Lincoln's resolve. Meanwhile, however, Seward continued to tell Confederate commissioners that Sumter would be given up. One of the three emissaries that Lincoln sent to Charleston to appraise matters, his old friend Ward H. Lamon, seems to have told Carolinians and Anderson himself that evacuation was imminent. Hawks and doves within the administration were clearly on a collision course. The crash came on March 28. That day Lincoln learned that General Scott wanted to evacuate
both
Forts Pick-ens and Sumter. His grounds for urging this were political rather than military: "The evacuation of both the forts," wrote the general, "would instantly soothe and give confidence to the eight remaining slave-holding States, and render their cordial adherence to this Union perpetual."

72
. Perkins, ed.,
Northern Editorials
, 652; Strong,
Diary
, 109; Current,
Lincoln andthe First Shot
, 118; Stampp,
And the War Came
, 266.

73
.
New York Times
, April 3, 1861;
New York Morning Express
, April 5, 1861, quoted in Stampp,
And the War Came
, 268.

Lincoln called his cabinet into emergency session after a state dinner that evening. "Blank amazement" registered on most faces as an obviously nettled president read to them Scott's memorandum. The general (a Virginian) was advising unconditional surrender to the Confederacy. Whether or not influenced by Seward (as most cabinet members assumed), Scott's politically motivated recommendation rendered suspect his initial opinion that reinforcement of Sumter was impossible. The cabinet reversed its vote of two weeks earlier. Four of the six members (Caleb Smith still went along with Seward; Cameron was absent) now favored resupply of Sumter. All six supported additional reinforcement of Pickens. Lincoln issued orders for a secret expedition to carry out the latter task. More momentously, he also instructed Fox to ready ships and men for an attempt to reinforce Sumter.
⁷⁴

This backed Seward into a corner. His assurances to southern commissioners, his peace policy of voluntary reconstruction, his ambitions to be premier—all appeared about to collapse. To recoup his position Seward acted boldly—and egregiously. He intervened in the Fort Pickens reinforcement and managed to divert the strongest available warship from the Sumter expedition, with unfortunate consequences. Then on April 1 he sent an extraordinary proposal to Lincoln. In mystifying fashion, Seward suggested that to abandon Sumter and hold Pickens would change the issue from slavery to Union. Beyond that, the secretary of state would "demand explanations" from Spain and France for their meddling in Santo Domingo and Mexico, and declare war if their explanations were unsatisfactory. Presumably this would reunite the country against a foreign foe. "Whatever policy we adopt," Seward pointed out, "it must be somebody's business to pursue and direct it incessantly." He left little doubt whom he had in mind.

Lincoln's astonishment when he read this note can well be imagined. Not wanting to humiliate Seward or lose his services, however, the president mentioned the matter to no one and wrote a polite but firm reply the same day. He had pledged to hold, occupy and possess federal property, Lincoln reminded his secretary of state, and he could not see how holding Sumter was any more a matter of slavery or less a matter of Union than holding Pickens. Ignoring Seward's idea of an ultimatum

74
. Nicolay and Hay,
Lincoln
, III, 394–95, 429–34; Current,
Lincoln and the First Shot
, 75–81. Rumors had already reached Washington that Lincoln's first order to reinforce Pickens had not been carried out.

to Spain or France, Lincoln told him that whatever policy was decided upon, "
I
must do it."
⁷⁵
A chastened Seward said nothing more about this and served as one of Lincoln's most loyal advisers during the next four years.

Seward recognized that he would have to endure accusations of deceit from southerners when his assurances of Sumter's evacuation turned out to be wrong. He made one last effort to salvage the situation. The Virginia convention, still in session, would undoubtedly vote to secede if a clash of arms occurred. Seward persuaded Lincoln to meet with a Virginia unionist in Washington on April 4. The purpose was to see if a bargain could be struck: evacuation of Sumter in return for adjournment of the convention without secession. Just before his inauguration Lincoln had expressed interest in this idea. Whether he explicitly offered such a deal in his private conversation with John Baldwin in April 4 has long been a matter of controversy.
⁷⁶
In any event nothing came of this meeting, from which Lincoln emerged with a soured view of Virginia unionism. That very day he gave the go-ahead for the Sumter expedition.
⁷⁷

The nature of that enterprise had changed subtly but significantly from Fox's first proposal. Instead of trying to shoot its way into the harbor, the task force would first attempt only to carry supplies to Anderson. Warships and soldiers would stand by for action but if Confederate batteries did not fire on the supply boats they would not fire back, and the reinforcements would remain on shipboard. Lincoln would notify Governor Pickens in advance of the government's peaceful intention to send in provisions only. If Confederates opened fire on the unarmed boats carrying "food for hungry men," the South would stand convicted of an aggressive act. On its shoulders would rest the blame for starting a war. This would unite the North and, perhaps, keep the South divided. If southerners allowed the supplies to go through, peace and the status quo at Sumter could be preserved and the Union government would have won an important symbolic victory. Lincoln's new conception of the resupply undertaking was a stroke of genius. In effect he was

75
.
CWL
, IV, 316–18, for Seward's memorandum and Lincoln's reply.

76
. Historians have analyzed the meager evidence on this matter in varying ways; for a summary of the evidence, with citations to relevant works, see William C. Harris, "The Southern Unionist Critique of the Civil War,"
CWH
, 31 (1985), 50–51.

77
. Current,
Lincoln and the First Shot
, 96.

telling Jefferson Davis, "Heads I win, Tails you lose." It was the first sign of the mastery that would mark Lincoln's presidency.
⁷⁸

On April 6, Lincoln sent a special messenger to Charleston to inform Governor Pickens that "an attempt will be made to supply Fort-Sumter with provisions only; and that, if such attempt be not resisted, no effort to throw in men, arms, or ammunition, will be made, without further notice, [except] in case of an attack on the Fort."
⁷⁹
This put the ball in Jefferson Davis's court. The Confederate president was also under great pressure to "do something." Seward's dream of voluntary reconstruction was Davis's nightmare. "The spirit and even the patriotism of the people is oozing out under this do-nothing policy," complained a Mobile newspaper. "If something is not done pretty soon . . . the whole country will become so disgusted with the sham of southern independence that the first chance the people get at a popular election they will turn the whole movement topsy-turvy." Other Alabamians agreed that war

78
. Contemporaries and historians have long debated Lincoln's motives and purposes in this Sumter resupply plan. Three main positions emerged in the debate: 1) Lincoln knew that he could save his administration and party only by war, so he deliberately manipulated the Confederacy into firing the first shot so that he could have his war at maximum political advantage. The two principal historians who advanced this interpretation, both of them southerners, were Charles W. Ramsdell, "Lincoln and Fort Sumter,"
JSH
, 3 (1937), 259–88; and J. S. Tilley,
Lincoln Takes Command
(Chapel Hill, 1941). 2) Lincoln wanted to preserve the status quo to give the policy of voluntary reconstruction a new lease on life, but he feared that giving up Sumter would discredit the government and bolster the Confederacy in the eyes of the world. Hoping to preserve peace but willing to risk war, he devised the resupply scheme in such a way as to give Confederates the choice of peace or war. This interpretation has been advanced mainly by James G. Randall,
Lincoln the Liberal Statesman
(New York, 1947), 88–117, and David M. Potter, "Why the Republicans Rejected Both Compromise and Secession," in George Harmon Knoles, ed.,
The Crisis of the Union, 1860–1861
(Baton Rouge, 1965), 90–106. 3) Lincoln would have been happy to preserve the peace but probably expected the Confederates to open fire; either way he won. Numerous historians have offered this interpretation; it is most prominently identified with Kenneth M. Stampp, "Lincoln and the Strategy of Defense in the Crisis of 1861,"
loc. cit
., and Current,
Lincoln and the First Shot
, 182–208. The differences between interpretations 2 and 3 are subtle, and hinge on efforts to read Lincoln's mind to guess what he wanted or expected the Confederates to do. Although he never said explicitly what he expected them to do, Lincoln had become rather disillusioned with the prospects for voluntary reconstruction and he had plenty of reason to believe that the Confederates would open fire on a peaceful resupply effort. Therefore interpretation 3 seems most plausible.

79
.
CWL
, IV, 323.

was the best way "of avoiding the calamity of reconstruction. . . . South Carolina has the power of putting us beyond the reach of reconstruction by taking Fort Sumter at any cost. . . . Sir, unless you sprinkle blood in the face of the people of Alabama, they will be back in the old Union in less than ten days!"
⁸⁰

Even if the seven lower-South states held together, the Confederacy's future was precarious without the upper South. After talking with Virginia secessionists, the fire-eater Louis Wigfall urged a prompt attack on Sumter to bring that commonwealth into the fold. The hot-blooded Edmund Ruffin and Roger Pryor, vexed by the lingering unionism in their native state of Virginia, echoed this exhortation. "The shedding of blood," wrote Ruffin, "will serve to change many voters in the hesitating states, from the submission or procrastinating ranks, to the zealous for immediate secession." If you want us to join you, Pryor told Char-lestonians,
"strike a blow!"
The
Charleston Mercury
was willing. "Border southern States will never join us until we have indicated our power to free ourselves—until we have proven that a garrison of seventy men cannot hold the portal of our commerce," declared the
Mercury
. "Let us be ready for war. . . . The fate of the Southern Confederacy hangs by the ensign halliards of Fort Sumter."
⁸¹

Therefore to Abraham Lincoln's challenge, Shall it be Peace or War? Jefferson Davis replied, War. A fateful cabinet meeting in Montgomery on April 9 endorsed Davis's order to Beauregard: reduce the fort
before
the relief fleet arrived, if possible. Anderson rejected Beauregard's ritual summons to surrender, but remarked in passing that he would be starved out in a few days if help did not arrive. The Confederates knew that help was about to arrive, so they opened fire on April 12 at 4:30 a.m. Fox's fleet, scattered by a gale and prevented by high seas from launching the supply boats, was helpless to intervene.
⁸²
After thirty-three hours of bombardment by four thousand shot and shells which destroyed part

80
. Mobile newspaper quoted in Current,
Lincoln and the First Shot
, 134; J. L. Pugh to William Porcher Miles, Jan. 24, 1861, in Richard N. Current, "The Confederates and the First Shot,"
CWH
, 7 (1961), 365; J. G. Gilchrist quoted in Nevins,
War
, I, 68.

81
. Current,
Lincoln and the First Shot
, 151, 139; William K. Scarborough, ed.,
The Diary of Edmund Ruffin
, Vol. I:
Toward Independence
, October 1856-April 1861 (Baton Rouge, 1972), 542;
Charleston Mercury
, Jan. 24, 1861.

82
. Fox was also handicapped by the absence of U.S.S.
Powhatan
, the navy's strongest available warship. A tragicomic confusion of orders for which both Seward and Lincoln were responsible had diverted the
Powhatan
to the Fort Pickens expedition.