Following the American Civil War Sesquicentennial with day by day writings of the time, currently 1863.

Friday, November 5, 2010

Post image for The Republicans and Slavery.

The Republicans and Slavery.

November 5, 2010

New York Times

November 5, 1860

Senator SEWARD, in his speech on Friday night, declared the whole aim and duty of the Republican Party to be to leave Slavery just where it is. They do not seek to abolish or disturb it; but they do propose to prevent its extension or increase. It is not easy to see what objection any rational man can make to such a policy. The whole disturbance which prevails through the country has been caused by the efforts of the South to increase Slavery. They have pursued this policy steadily for some years past, covering its purpose by charging its opponents with designing to interfere with it where it now exists.

Senator SEWARD’s declaration on this point ought to have weight with candid and fair-minded men. He has always been regarded as among the most advanced of the Anti-Slavery Republicans. If any one had designs upon Slavery in the South, he was supposed to be the man. But his disclaimer on this point is direct and complete. All he aims at is to have Slavery left where it is, – and this is all the Republican Party proposes to do about it.

The Charleston Mercury not long ago declared that the success of the Republican Party would put an end to the slavery agitation as a sectional question. “It will cease to be a contest between the North and South,” said the Mercury, and will be transferred to the Southern States.” Is not that precisely where it belongs? Has it not been a standing reproach for years that we were meddling with a subject which did not concern us, – that we were stirring up a sectional agitation, – that the question of Slavery belonged exclusively to the South, and should be left for the South to manage? Yet this is precisely the result which the Charleston Mercury dreads and deprecates as the result of a Republican victory.

We venture the prediction that, in less than one year after the incoming of a Republican Administration, that party will be generally recognized as the most truly national and conservative party in the Union. It proposes the settlement of the Slavery question on the only possible basis, – that of checking the increase of the evil, and leaving it to the operation of natural causes and the laws of social economy.

Post image for Illegal Registration of Voters.

Illegal Registration of Voters.

November 5, 2010

New York Times

November 5, 1860

A warrant was issued yesterday by Justice QUACKENBUSH for the arrest of GEORGE K. COOKE, the Democratic member of the Board of Registry for the Eighth District of the Fifteenth Ward, on a charge of having violated the Registry law. An affidavit has been made to the effect that COOKE, while acting as Registrar on the 17th ult., caused his name to be placed on the list of voters for that District, giving No. 308 Bowery as his place of residence. It was subsequently ascertained, however, that he resided at No 373 Fourth-street, which is not in the Eighth District, and that he had also been to the registering-place of the Ninth District, of the same Ward, and had his name registered there. NAPOLEON B. HOBBS, a clerk for LORD & TAYLOR, is also charged with an offence similar to the one of which COOK is accused. On the 30th inst. he caused his name to be registered as a legal voter in the Eighth District of the Fifteenth Ward, and went off boasting that he should vote for “The Union, the Constitution, and the enforcement of the laws.” As, however, he had not lived in this State one year, having come here from Baltimore, Md., in March last, he was unqualified for voting at all, and his arrest was effected on the ground that he had willfully violated the law. Justice QUACKENBUSH required him to funish bail in $500 to answer. The penalty, upon conviction of the offences charged, is not less than one year’s imprisonment in the State Prison.

Post image for Operations in Charleston Harbor

Operations in Charleston Harbor

November 5, 2010

War of the Rebellion: a Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies

Fort MOULTRIE, S. C., November 5, 1860.

Col. H. K. CRAIG,
Chief of Ordnance, U. S. Army, Washington, D.C.:

COLONEL: Your communication of 1st instant, with its inclosure, in reference to placing forty muskets in the hands of the Engineer officer in charge of Fort Sumter as a precautionary measure proper to this time of excitement, is received. My views are asked on two, or rather three points:

1st. On that which forms the condition of the Secretary’s approval of the issue, namely, that I concur in its expediency;

2d. On the “propriety” of placing the arms in the hands of hired men for the purpose indicated; and,

3d. On the “expediency” of doing so.

To the first I reply that I have already said in effect, on my post return for last month, that while I do not apprehend that any attempt upon the United States works here will receive the countenance of the State or city authority, it is by some thought that a tumultuary force may be incited by the feeling of the time, and invited by the present disordered condition of the works to make such an attempt without it, and that this possibility makes it incumbent on me to provide as far I may against it, and forty additional musketeers would then be desirable.

As to the “propriety” of the issue I see no objection. The arms need not be delivered to the men selected by the Engineer officer till the occasion should actually obtain. The workmen in charge of the property are bound on principles of common law to defend it against purloiners, to say nothing of the 96th Article of War, applicable to all “persons whatsoever receiving pay from the United States.”

The “expediency” of the measure is quite another question of less obvious features.

There are one hundred and nine men at Fort Sumter, most of them laborers of foreign nativity, of whom it is prudent to be somewhat suspicious, for I am just informed that on some of them being questioned (as is the wont of the times) on the point of their proclivity in the event of secession, replied to the effect that they were indifferent, and intimated that the largest bribe would determine their action, and they can, you know, discharge themselves of their public obligations at any moment, and thus be free to choose sides.

Now, forty muskets in the hands of the faithful among them might control the rest, but certainly not on a close push from outside. The Engineer officer can, he says, keep the arms beyond the physical possibility of being taken from him by the untrustworthy, and he can cut off all communication peremptorily with citizens. Now, unless some such precaution be taken, this large body of laborers may, in the possible event in question, unrestrainedly deliver up the post and its contents on a bribe or demand. Meanwhile they cannot be removed outside of that isolated island post, which has not a foot of ground beyond the walls of the fort. In this connection I may add that at this post too (Fort Moultrie) we have about fifty laborers of like description with known secession propensities, as they are residents permanently of this quarter.

On the point of expediency, then, I am constrained to say that the only proper precaution–that which has no objection–is to fill these two companies with drilled recruits (say fifty men) at once, and send two companies from Old Point Comfort to occupy respectively Fort Sumter and Castle Pinckney.

I am, colonel, yours respectfully,

JNO. L. GARDNER,

Brevet Colonel, U. S. Army.

[Indorsement.]

ORDNANCE OFFICE, November 8, 1860.

Respectfully submitted to the Secretary of War, with the remark that as the issue of forty muskets, approved by him 31st ultimo, was contingent on the approval of Colonel Gardner, it is probable that the issue has not and will not be made without further orders.

H. K. CRAIG,
Colonel of Ordnance.