Boston, August 23, 1861
I did n’t get your letter of the 5th until the steamer of the 21st was gone, so I telegraphed to Mr. Motley at Halifax, as I did n’t want to have you come blundering home under the impression that I had been ordered off, and now I will at once answer your letter. If you insist upon coming home and getting a commission, of course you are of age and no one can gainsay you. I don’t favor the idea myself for reasons which I will give you presently; but still if you insist I shall be glad to aid you and will do so. In this war some things are getting clear every day and one is that volunteers won’t do, and another that haste makes waste. If you insist on going, Ritchie advises that you should get a commission in the regular army and go into that. It will be cut down at the end of the war and meanwhile you’ll escape the curse, nuisance and danger of volunteers. If your mind is made up I will apply for you and you can doubtless get your commission and be ready for a winter campaign. Meanwhile you’ll gain nothing but blunders by rushing ahead so like the devil.
So much for that; and now allow me to state some considerations which should prevent your coming home at all. I have three in my mind, and first one relates to myself. I am trying, as well as I may, to do what strikes me as my first duty at home. It is very hard for me to stay here, and no one gives me credit for doing it for any cause save fear; but the truth is the Governor is abroad in the public service, and property was never so difficult of management as it now is. . .. Under these circumstances I concluded very reluctantly I ought to stay at home if I could, and I think you ‘ll agree I was right.
Have n’t I difficulties enough without your piling up new ones? If you insist on this step, I have no election but, at any sacrifice, must go too. The reason is obvious, for while I am single and robust and John remains at home, the world cannot go into these domestic questions, and your coming home in a hurry to get a commission, while I remained in Boston, would be regarded as a most decided implication on my courage. You can’t but see this, and as for your taking a commission under me, it’s bad enough to have a hundred men you don’t care for to look after; but when it comes to looking after a brother and having your attention taken up by what may be occurring to him, it would be intolerable. Besides I expect drafting will have to begin before long and then I have made up my mind to go, and if I go, I think the family in supplying two out of four to the public service does enough, and you ought to stay at home.
In the next place I think decidedly you ought to stay abroad and remain with your father and mother. No one knows what may happen in these days—a foreign war is possible, even an English war — and difficulties you do not now see may any day spring up, and for one I think most decidedly that while times are so troubled our father and mother have got to an age when they ought not to be deserted abroad by all of their children.
Finally, the most weighty consideration to my mind I reserve for the last. Of course you make this a question of usefulness and duty. You are not particularly well fitted for the army and your object, is to be of service to your country. As for distinction and all that sort of thing, when the whole country is rushing into the army it is hardly the place to look for a chance. Where can you be most useful in this emergency? The answer is to my mind too clear to admit of discussion. The rush for commissions is tremendous and you can only get one by shoving somebody equally capable with yourself aside, and you can really do no service, if you get one, which would not be equally well done if you were away. Where you now are you are useful to the whole country and, like a coward, you want to run home because our reverses make the post abroad into which fortune has thrown you very uncomfortable. You fight our battle in England and let us alone to fight it here. There are men enough here, but there your place, if you leave it, must remain empty.
You’ll say, you can’t do anything and have no opening. What could a second lieutenant in an infantry regiment do that would be so immense? Is that a prodigious opening? Go to work at once in England with all your energy and force your way into magazines and periodicals there and in America, so that you can make yourself heard. For there is going to be difficulty about this blockade and much bad feeling, though, God grant, no blows. For heaven’s sake try to influence that and don’t throw yourself away by rushing into this mob of bruisers. Try to raise people up a little. Look into the cotton supply question and try to persuade the English that our blockade is their interest. If they raise it and transfer it to our coasts, they have the power to do so, but they ally themselves with slavery — give it the victory, give the lie to their own protestations and secure to the South for years with the advantage of their system of labor and production that monopoly of cotton under which England groans. If the blockade lasts and forces supply, England will purchase, at the price of one year’s suffering, freedom and plenty for ever. Touch England through her pocket and help your country that way.
Then write to the Atlantic of the way fighting America appears in English eyes, of her boasting and bragging, her running and terror; tell us of the pain she causes her children abroad and how foolish her angry threats sound, and help your country that way. Here is your field, right before your nose, in which you could be of real service, and you want to rush away to do what neither education nor nature fitted you for — what others could do as well or better, and get your head knocked off without doing the least good. If you have any energy use it where you are and where it can be of value. If you have n’t any keep out of the army. Talk of backing the Governor up in the Times in these days! We’ve got beyond all that, I hope. For God’s sake take a broader view and make yourself heard where a voice is wanted. Don’t talk of your connection with the legation to me; cut yourself off if necessary from it and live in London as the avowed Times correspondent and force your way into notice of the London press that way. Wake up and look about you and make yourself useful and don’t jog on in this cart horse way, or brag over your harness and wish yourself a blood-horse, with McClellan, instead of a jackass who can’t break his traces. There, I have blown my blast and have done, and you can do as you see fit. Free from the legation you could earn a living by your pen in London and be independent, busy, happy and eminently useful. If you come home you won’t be of the slightest use to any one, and you will have deserted your post. Now if you want a commission let me know and I’ll do my best for you; but have nothing to say to Horace Sargent. He is n’t the man and I know him.’
We’ve had a bad panic, but it seems to be over now and I think they were wise in refusing the battle.
