Friday, 1st day of May—Spent this day with Jimmy.
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
May 1st. The first day of May commences with clear and pleasant weather. This afternoon the Admiral despatched the ram Switzerland up the river as far as Grand Gulf, for news of what was going on in that quarter. At nine o’clock this evening, a rocket was reported as seen sent up Red River, and soon after a steamer’s light was seen coming down. Immediately the rattle was sprung, giving the alarm, and a few minutes afterwards all hands were at their guns and stations, while nearly all, officers and men, believed it was one of our own transports from Brashear City, via Berwick’s Bay and Atchafalaya River; still, they might be mistaken, and it was proper to be prepared against a surprise should it prove to be the enemy. Soon the vessel made her appearance, coming out of Red River, and signalized, by means of different colored lights, her number. Had she been a little dilatory in doing so, I have no doubt but a fight would have been the upshot of the matter, since the men were all anxious for the fray, and ready, with fifteen broadside guns, twelve of them nine-inch, bearing on their target, and only waiting for the old hero, the Admiral, to give them the order. She proved to be the U. S. gunboat and transport Arizona. Upon our hailing her and asking in trumpet voice what steamer that was, all was excitement unbounded among officers and crew, and a few moments of stillness and suspense followed ere she returned an answer to our inquiry; when her answer was known, joy pervaded the hearts of all ; three cheers were heartily given, the retreat beat, and every one left his quarters, thanking Him whose sun is made to shine upon the just and the unjust, that such success had crowned our efforts, and communication through another channel with our army, and New Orleans was now open to us, by the arrival of this long-expected visitor and stranger. The Arizona came to off our starboard quarter, and sent a boat with her Captain in same on board of us, with despatches from General Banks to Admiral Farragut ; after communicating with us, she wended her way back again, via Red and Atchafalaya Rivers to Brashear City.
Jeff has had the laugh on us for a long time, but now the tables are turned, and we come in to relieve him and take a spell at this pleasant recreation. I wonder how he likes it? Any how, we can now say, “Jeff, as you like it; this is kind of hard treatment of you, showing that we d_______ d Yankees have very little respect for your feelings; we know how arduously you have served your constituents, and that you need some rest. It shall not be denied you, and we shall take sole charge of affairs on the Mississippi, likewise Red River, until Port Hudson and Vicksburg fall.”
Drawing by Alfred R. Waud, drawing on light brown paper : pencil and Chinese white; 12.9 x 24.1. (sheet).
Published in: Harper’s Weekly, May 23, 1863, p. 328-9
Library of Congress image.
Inscribed on verso on attached piece of cream paper: If this picture is used and I think it ought to be for the regulars always do well, and seldom get any credit, not belonging to any crowd of voters the artist will notice that two lines are represented or suggested moving up to the crest of the hill where the rebels hold their positions. As the sketch is on so small a scale a little care must be used to bring out the idea.
May 1st.—Rumored fighting going on below. General Tracy killed; went into ditches in front of Barton’s Brigade. Dick Anderson came from home and brought us nice box of provisions; cooked two days’ rations. Started towards Grand Gulf 6 P. M. Marched until 2:30 A. M. Reported heavy fighting the last two days.
Near Grand Gulf, Friday, May 1. Awoke early to be soon on the march; travelled down the levee four miles, when we embarked on the “Silverwave” at Hard Times Landing. Seven gunboats and four transports crossing troops as fast as possible in sight of the bastions of Grand Gulf. Landed two miles below, and by 11 A. M. were on the march toward Port Gibson. The flat of Louisiana was relieved by the broken surface of Mississippi. Steep hills, and obliged to lock [the gun wheels] often. Marched very fast, only one mule team along. Heard firing all the afternoon in the advance. Encamped at sundown after travelling twelve miles. Mississippi furnished plenty of sweet potatoes, fresh pork, chickens, etc. All tired. Went to bed early.
For a long time this photo was identified as being from Petersburg in 1864 or 1865. Today it is widely acknowledged as being from Fredericksburg in the spring of 1863, late April or early May.
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Various information and sources related to the photo:
“Union soldiers entrenched along the west bank of the Rappahannock River at Fredericksburg, Virginia” – Library of Congress image. Photograph by Andrew J. Russell. “Formerly misidentified with the title “Union Soldiers in trenches before Petersburg,” Dec. 1864.”
“Line of Brooks’ Division at Fredericksburg, May 2, 1863. Rebels charged here 20 minutes after the picture was taken but were repulsed and driven back.” – hand written caption on a copy of the photo at the Western Reserve Historical Society in Cleveland, Ohio.)
“Line of Brooks’ Division at Fredericksburg, VA. April 29 or 50, 1863” – hand written caption on a copy at U.S. Army Heritage & Education Center.
“Soldiers in the trenches before battle, Petersburg, Va., 1865. 111-B-157.” – National Archives copy identification as Petersburg has been disputed by Civil War historians and photo-historians with documentary evidence suggesting that this image of Union forces was taken by Andrew J. Russell just before the Second Battle of Fredericksburg in the spring of 1863.
A Grand Old Photo Revisited – A somewhat detailed analysis by Barry McGhan at The Center for Civil War Photography.
Union Soldiers by the Rappahannock – Encyclopedia Virginia: “Union soldiers in William T. H. Brooks’s division of John Sedgwick’s Sixth Corps huddle together on the west bank of the Rappahannock River on April 29 or 30, 1863. Comprised mostly of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania regiments, the division had just crossed the river on pontoon boats about a mile south of Fredericksburg and now occupied abandoned Confederate rifle pits, with Confederate pickets probably four hundred yards distant.”
Mrs. Lyon’s Diary.
May 1.—Our pickets were fired into last night. One man was wounded and two were captured. When we feel the most safe we appear to be in the most danger.
Friday, 1st—News came that General Sherman has again made an attack on Haines’s Bluff, the same as last fall when the plan failed because General Grant failed to co-operate with him. The plan is to be tried again this spring. A large ammunition train passed through here for Carthage, Louisiana. General Crocker left the command of our brigade, to take command of the Seventh Division of the Seventeenth Army Corps. The boys are all sorry to see him leave.
London, May 1, 1863
And so two years have passed over and gone, and still I am abroad and still you are a Captain of cavalry. You meanwhile are near twenty-eight years old. I shall never on this earth see my twenty-fifth birthday again. Does not this fact suggest certain ideas to you? Can a man at your time of life be a cavalry captain and remain a briefless solicitor? Can a man of my general appearance pass five years in Europe and remain a candidate for the bar? In short, have we both wholly lost our reckonings and are we driven at random by fate, or have we still a course that we are steering though it is not quite the same as our old one? By the Apostle Paul, I know not. Only one fact I feel sure of. We are both no longer able to protect ourselves with the convenient fiction of the law. Let us quit that now useless shelter, and steer if possible for whatever it may have been that once lay beyond it. Neither you nor I can ever do anything at the bar….
You don’t catch me entering the army now. It would be like entering college Freshman when all one’s friends were Seniors. I have a trick worth twenty of that. My friend General Zerman, who has been the means of kicking up such a row around us here, and who is an old Dugald Dalgetty; a midshipman under the French at Trafalgar; a sous-officier at Waterloo; a captain at Navarino; a Russian admiral; a Turkish admiral; a Carbonaro; a companion of Silvio Pellico in the prisons of Spielberg; a South American officer by land and sea; and lately a general in the army of the United States; now a Major General in the Mexican service; and I’ve no doubt a damned old villain, though a perfectly jovial old sinner of seventy odd; this distinguished individual offers to take me on his staff with the rank of major to Mexico. Would n’t I like to go! The chances are a thousand to one that my bones would bleach there, but for all that the chance is worth having, for it would be a great step for a young man to secure for himself a control even to a small extent over our Mexican relations. But such magnificent dreams, worthy of the daring of those heroes, Porthos, Athos, Aramis and D’Artagnan, are not for me. By the by, though, what a good Porthos Ben Crowny would make; you could do D’Artagnan, I would put in for Aramis, and no doubt you could hunt up some one that might pass equally badly for Athos. Then we could all go to Mexico together….
I left off by sending you the debate of last Friday night which contained Earl Russell’s brilliant remarks on the celebrated letter of our Minister to Admiral Dupont. In those remarks Earl Russell was indignant at the idea of his speaking to Mr. Adams about it. No! No! He should go straight to Washington! But my Lord, having thus pledged himself in order to please the English copper-heads, to go straight to Washington, amused himself the next morning by sending straight to Mr. Adams. Of course I know nothing of the conversation that followed. That is all a secret with Mr. Seward. But I think it is not difficult to guess. It had suited Lord Russell to yield a little to the copper-head pressure on Thursday night; it suited him to allow Mr. Adams to triumphantly purge himself of misdemeanor on Friday morning. It suited him to make the American Minister think that he (Lord R.) thought him to be in the wrong — moderately. It also suited him to make the British public think that Mr. Adams had confessed his error and contrition and had received pardon. English statesmanship consists in this sort of juggling and huckstering between interests.
Such was the position when I wrote to you, or rather, immediately after I wrote to you. Since then nothing has been heard of complaining at Washington. But now see the resources of a British Minister. Last Tuesday morning the City Article, what we call the money article, of the Times, in which most of the attack has been directed, contained the following paragraph:
“The public will be glad to learn that the difficulties occasioned by the recent issue by Mr. Adams of the certificate or pass to Messrs. Howell and Zerman, are likely to be smoothed down. It is reported that Mr. Adams is conscious of having acted in the matter upon imperfect representations and with undue haste, and that consequently he raises no pretensions such as would necessitate any absolute protest from one Government to the other on the subject. It is therefore believed that the relations between our Cabinet and the United States Legation in London will continue on a friendly footing — a result which in a personal sense will afford unmixed satisfaction, since the individual and historical claims of Mr. Adams to respect and esteem have never been disputed in any quarter.”
Now, is not this a remarkable State Paper? Did you ever see a case in which the butter was laid on so curiously over the interstices of the bread? The real fact is that you should read “Earl Russell” instead of “Mr. Adams” in the fifth line. That would be the correct thing. But this statement has received universal currency and is accepted as a conclusion of the difficulty. It now remains for Lord Russell to make the explanation which no doubt Mr. Adams must demand, at some time when the whole affair shall be forgotten, and then I hope this curious chapter will be closed….
Our own position here does not change. We lead a quiet and not unpleasant life, and I pass my intervals from official work, in studying De Tocqueville and John Stuart Mill, the two high priests of our faith. So I jump from International Law to our foreign history, and am led by that to study the philosophic standing of our republic, which brings me to reflection over the advance of the democratic principle in European civilization, and so I go on till some new question of law starts me again on the circle. But I have learned to think De Tocqueville my model, and I study his life and works as the Gospel of my private religion. The great principle of democracy is still capable of rewarding a conscientious servant. And I doubt me much whether the advance of years will increase my toleration of its faults. Hence I think I see in the distance a vague and unsteady light in the direction towards which I needs must gravitate, so soon as the present disturbing influences are removed.
We are surrounded by assistants. Mr. Aspinwall, Mr. J. M. Forbes, Mr. Robert J. Walker and Mr. Evarts are all here.
May 1, Friday. After Cabinet-meeting walked over with Attorney-General Bates to his office. Had a very full talk with him concerning the question of captured mails, — the jurisdiction of the courts, the law, and usage, and rights of the Government. He is unqualifiedly with me in my views and principles, — the law and our rights. He dwelt with some feeling on the courtesy which ought to exist between the several Departments and was by them generally observed. Although cautious and guarded in his remarks, he did not conceal his dissatisfaction with the conduct of the Secretary of State in writing to attorneys and marshals, and assuming to instruct and direct them in their official duties which were assigned to and required by law to be done by the Attorney-General.
We are getting vague rumors of army operations, but nothing intelligible or reliable.
