Adams Family Civil War letters; US Minister to the UK and his sons.

London, December 13, 1861

Your letter to papa announcing your metamorphosis took us as you may suppose a good deal by surprise. I endorsed it at once. As you say, one of us ought to go, and though of the three as a mere matter of accidental position I might have preferred that it should be John, still, as a question of greater or lesser evil perhaps it’s best that it should be you. If we come home, perhaps I may try it myself a little, but if we stay abroad, or if I come home alone, I do not suppose I shall be compelled to do so. At the same time, as a personal matter, I’m sorry you’re going, especially as I have, since the last shock, become satisfied that we must sooner or later yield the matter. As a mere question of independence I believe the thing to be settled. We cannot bring the South back. As a question of terms and as a means of thoroughly shaking the whole southern system, I ‘m not sorry to see the pressure kept up. . . .

You can imagine our existence here. Angry and hateful, as I am of Great Britain, I still can’t help laughing and cursing at the same time as I see the accounts of the talk of our people. What a bloody set of fools they are! How in the name of all that’s conceivable could you suppose that England would sit quiet under such an insult. We should have jumped out of our boots at such a one. And there’s Judge Bigelow parading bad law “at the cannon’s mouth,” and Governor Andrew all cock-a-hoop, and Dana so unaccustomed confident, and Mr. Everett following that “Great authority” George Sumner into a ditch, “blind leader of the blind “! Good God, what’s got into you all? What do you mean by deserting now the great principles of our fathers, by returning to the vomit of that dog Great Britain? What do you mean by asserting now principles against which every Adams yet has protested and resisted? You’re mad, all of you. It’s pitiable to see such idiocy in a nation. There’s the New York Times which I warned only in my last letter against such an act, and its consequences; and now I find the passage erased, and editorial assurances that war was impossible on such grounds. Egad, who knew best, Raymond or I? War is not only possible but inevitable on that ground; and we shall be forced to declare it. England can compel us to appear to act as the aggressors in future as now.

Thurlow Weed is here and hard at work on public opinion. He is excessively anxious about the meeting of Congress and thinks we shall be talked into a war. I have had some talk with him and like him very much. . . . The Government has not yet condescended to send us one single word as to the present question. I wonder what Seward supposes a Minister can do or is put here for, if he is n’t to know what to do or to say. It makes papa’s position here very embarrassing. . . .

London, December 12, 1861

It has given us here an indescribably sad feeling to witness the exultation in America over an event which bids fair to be the final calamity in this contest. We wonder that there has been so little of comprehension of the nature of the struggle here in public opinion not to jump at once to the conclusion that it would be turned against us by such an act. Putting ourselves in the place of Great Britain, where would be the end of the indignation that would be vented against the power committing it? Yet it seems everywhere to have been very coolly taken for granted that because she did outrageous things on the ocean to other powers, she would remain quiet when such things were done to her. A little observation of her past history ought to have shown that she never sees the right until half a century after she has acted wrong. She now admits her error in our revolution, and in the last war. Now she is right in principle and only wrong in point of consistency. Our mistake is that we are donning ourselves in her cast-off suit, when our own is better worth wearing. And all for what? Why to show our spite against two miserable wretches, twenty thousand of whom are not worth a single hair in the head of any of the persons on both sides of the controversy whose lives and happiness are endangered by the quarrel. . . .

Boston, December 10, 1861

Yours of the 23d of last month reached me yesterday… If we are going to have such a storm as you intimate, I should have to go, so anyhow, and if indeed “all that remains is to drop gracefully,” it will not do me or any one else any good for me to anxiously hang on here a few days longer. Yet it does make me feel terribly. We have blundered all summer long and now we have capstoned our blunders by blundering into a war with England. So be it. While there’s life there’s hope; but I go into the army with a bitter feeling against those under whose lead we have come to this pass, and amid all the shattered idols of my whole life I don’t feel as if I cared much when my turn came. I suppose now I shall go into the field against a foreign enemy and I ought to rejoice at that. Still, I don’t. Against the rebels I could fight with a will and in earnest. They are traitors, they war for a lie, they are the enemies of morals, of government, and of man. In them we fight against a great wrong — but against England, we shall have forced her into war when she only asked for peace; we shall have made that a cause of quarrel which a few soft words might have turned away. It will be a wicked and causeless war wantonly brought about by us and one in which I most unwillingly would go to my death.

As for Seward I cannot comprehend his policy and so I cannot judge of it, and most slowly and reluctantly will I surrender my faith in him. His policy has been to keep a firm front, and in this it was wise; but I think he might have made himself less offensive to foreign powers in doing it, and I somewhat doubt the expediency of bragging yourself out of the game, as you tell me he has done. Still we have made our bed and now we must lie on it.

I shall probably have joined my regiment this week or early next. You will be surprised to hear that I shall probably regularly enlist and make my debut as a simple sergeant in Caspar Crowninshield’s company. The truth is they have so backed and filled, and hesitated and delayed, that, having determined to go, I have lost my patience, and have signified to them that I am ready to wait in the ranks until they are ready to give me a commission. Caspar got his company as a promotion for his behavior at Balls Bluff, and I shall get mine, I suppose, at some indefinite future period, when Sargent ceases to be a gas-bag and Williams feels the regiment under his thumb. Meanwhile I shall rough and fight it out with the rest, sleep fifteen in a tent with stable-boys, groom horses, feed like a hog and never wash, and such is my future! Well, it is better than my present, for I shall at least, by going into the army, get rid of the war.

Your last letter, and your statement that there was nothing left but a suspension of relations with England, came peculiarly unpleasantly just now. I had again begun to hope. Our blockade has become so effective and we are developing such enormous strength, that in spite of blunders, the confederates seemed likely to be crushed by brute force and starved to death, while we are really more prosperous than we have been for a year, and our poor more comfortable than they have been for four years. The confederates already, before winter begins, are regulating by law the profit on “articles of prime necessity,” and what would it have been before spring? I had begun to hope yet to see this rebellion collapse. Of course a war with England exactly reverses positions. It will be short and desperate, and end in the establishment of a confederate government, I suppose. However, a glorious indifference is coming over me. I can live on my pay, the world will not come to an end this time, and if I do, I shall doubtless be very comfortable in my grave. But I do hate to be blundered out of existence and, before a foreign war just as we were getting the whip-hand. Even Balls Bluff will hide a diminished head; it will stand forth in all history as the Koh-i-noor of blunders. . . .

Boston, December 3, 1861

Your letters were written under the cloud of Balls Bluff, and it is hard for us just now when every one is getting elated again to go back and appreciate the bitterness of which you speak. Yes, every one is in the clouds again, but I must confess my confidence has been too much shaken to be suddenly restored. I am oppressed by a combined sense of ill-luck and incompetence. A few words of Balls Bluff affair and then let us try to forget it. I am informed by Harrison Ritchie, who has been to Washington for the Governor recently and is in “possesshun of certing infamashon,” that there is no doubt that the advance was ordered by General Scott without McClellan’s knowledge, and the advance on Romney was ordered by him at the same time. The last succeeded and the first failed, and within ten days Scott resigned. The results of the reverse were however fatal, and much in the way that I imagined, the plans of the campaign were frustrated, and here we now are with a disconnected series of successes and reverses leading to little and effecting in themselves still less. So affairs now stand, and soon we must go into winter quarters, for today it has set in bitter cold. Still there are signs of promise in the sky and the blockade promises us far greater results than our arms bid fair to win. The South already is evidently starving, and if it is so in November what will it be in April? They are wild with terror at our naval expeditions and, in despite of all and everything, I never felt so confident of crushing them in time, if no foreign force intervenes, by sheer weight, as I now do. I have lost all confidence in our skill or courage, for the present; but passing events make it pretty clear to my mind that we are learning fast and that brute force is all with us.

Every one is fearfully anxious to hear from England of the reception of Mason and Slidell’s capture, and your letter in which you mention that the James Adger was watched created a good deal of uneasiness. The English precedents so clearly justify us that I cannot fear difficulty from that cause; but I do fear very much a popular clamor and feeling of hatred towards us which will make the occurrence of future difficulty very easy. However, every day gained is a great thing now and I think there will be a Southern collapse within four months, if only we can hold over that time.

But I have talked enough of politics. How do they like my going into the army in London? Did they expect it? Were they pleased or disgusted? As for me I have nothing new to tell you in that regard. The regiment is still here, but I do not expect to be ordered to join until they move to Carlisle barracks, which will probably be very soon, for winter has set in in earnest. .. .

London, November 30, 1861

If I thought the state of things bad last week you may imagine what I think of them now.¹ In fact I consider that we are dished, and that our position is hopeless. If the administration ordered the capture of those men, I am satisfied that our present authorities are very unsuitable persons to conduct a war like this or to remain in the direction of our affairs. It is our ruin. Do not deceive yourself about the position of England. We might have preserved our dignity in many ways without going to war with her, and our party in the Cabinet was always strong enough to maintain peace here and keep down the anti-blockaders. But now all the fat’s in the fire, and I feel like going off and taking up my old German life again as a permanency. It is devilish disagreeable to act the part of Sisyphus especially when it is our own friends who are trying to crush us under the rock.

What part it is reserved to us to play in this very tragical comedy I am utterly unable to tell. The Government has left us in the most awkward and unfair position. They have given no warning that such an act was thought of, and seem almost to have purposely encouraged us to waste our strength in trying to maintain the relations which it was itself intending to destroy. I am half mad with vexation and despair. If papa is ordered home I shall do as Fairfax did, and go into the war with “peace” on my mind and lips.

Our position here is of course very unpleasant just now. We were to have gone to Lord Hatherton’s on Monday, but now our visit is put off, and I am not without expectations that a very few weeks may see us either on our way home or on the continent. I think that the New Year will see the end.

This nation means to make war. Do not doubt it. What Seward means is more than I can guess. But if he means war also, or to run as close as he can without touching, then I say that Mr. Seward is the greatest criminal we ‘ve had yet.

We have friends here still, but very few. Bright dined with us last night, and is with us, but is evidently hopeless of seeing anything good. Besides, his assistance at such a time as this is evidently a disadvantage to us, for he is now wholly out of power and influence. Our friends are all very much cast down and my friends of the Spectator sent up to me in a dreadful state and asked me to come down to see them, which I did, and they complained bitterly of the position we were now in. I had of course the pleasure of returning the complaint to any extent, but after all this is poor consolation.

Our good father is cool but evidently of the same mind as I am. He has seen Lord Russell but could give him no information, and my Lord did not volunteer any on his side. You will know very soon what you are to expect. . ..

No news of importance has yet reached my ears, but you will see my views as usual in the Times. We are preparing for a departure, though as yet we have taken no positive steps towards making future arrangements.

Beaufort was good. It gave me one glowing day worth a large share of all the anxiety and trouble that preceded and have followed it. Our cry now must be emancipation and arming the slaves.

__________

¹ After the Trent affair.

Boston, November 29, 1861

What is known of Seward in the Legation? Here his fall has been tremendous. Few men are now more violently attacked on all sides. There is a very prevalent rumor that his mind is at all times befogged with liquor; that he drinks half the time, and people won’t believe me when I laugh at the idea. Then many of his oldest friends here — myself in the number — are utterly perplexed as to what he is doing. We don’t see his mind in the policy of the government anywhere. In fact, we don’t see any policy of the government. He seems not equal to the occasion. He may be overruled in the cabinet and devoting himself to his department; but that is not the popular impression and, though the cabinet is unpopular, if any of it went out he would go. I don’t understand it and my only solution is that Seward’s is one of those calm, philosophic minds which need peaceful times to operate in, when he can study cause and effect and mature his plans for gradually approaching events; but he lacks the energy, decision and “snap” for days like these. . . .

We had a Fast-day the other day and I went to church. I found it fuller than I ever saw it before on a fast-day and Mr. Wells gave us a fast sermon which made some people stare. It was hard on the war and stiff enough, but in laying down his position on slavery his Mississippi life stuck out strong, so strong, in fact, as to lead him to assert that for himself he “did not consider negro servitude as necessarily a wrong.” Some people were a little astonished, but as it was an occasional sermon it will not hurt him any. . . .

Of war news there is none, though what the steamer will carry out I can’t say. The Lexington affair is bad and Fremont has his choice of a series of successes or removal. The real difficulty with him seems to be extravagance. He spends money like water and one draft on the Secretary of the Treasury from him was for $5,800,000, I am told. Still he has an immense hold, which I cannot understand, on the West, and if successful can maintain himself. . . .

Quincy, November 26, 1861

I don’t know whether you will be surprised or disgusted or annoyed or distressed by the information that I have gone into the army, but such is the fact. Before this reaches you I shall be an officer of the 1st Mass. Cavalry and probably in Carlisle Barracks. You know it now and I am glad of it! You ask what has impelled me to this unadvised and sudden step. Many reasons, I answer; a few of which I will now give you. But in the first place let me say that I have not felt sure of my appointment until within the last five days and that I would have notified you of it before had not former false alarms made me timid of present ones. Now I feel reasonably sure and will give you the reasons of my actions. You will say, of course, that the arguments which were decisive against my going two months ago are decisive now in no less degree; but this is not so. I have all along felt that it was my place to represent our family in the army in this struggle, but a higher sense of public duty kept me at home while I was useful to you; and when that usefulness was gone, the argument which had justified my staying at home became one for my going away. I can be of little future use to you here. . . .

For going I have many reasons. I do not think myself a soldier by nature. I am not sure I am doing that which is best for myself; but I feel that, if I go, I shall be better satisfied with myself, and, as I said to you before, I do not think it right that our family, so prominent in this matter while it is a contest of words, should be wholly unrepresented when it has grown to be a conflict of blows. You say there is neither glory nor honor to be won in civil strife. I answer, that it cannot be otherwise than right for me to fight to maintain that which my ancestors passed their whole lives in establishing. These however are general arguments which I have advanced to you before, but there are others nearer home. I have completely failed in my profession and I long to cut myself clear of it. I have indeed derived an income this summer from my office, but not from the law, and that I have made up my mind to give up. This mortifies me and the army must cover my defeat. My future must be business and literature, and I do not see why the army should not educate me for both, for its routine is that of business and it will go hard if my pen is idle while history is to be written or events are to be described. Thus my decision not only closes one career in which I have failed, but it opens others in which experience teaches me I can succeed if at all. . . .

Boston, November 19, 1861

We have had a little run of luck on this side this last week, and Dupont and Wilkes have bolstered up the reputation of our navy, and indeed not before it was time, as you say. I suppose the seizure of Mason and Slidell reached you before the Beaufort news and made that additionally acceptable. Here it created quite a stir and immense delight, though at first every one thought that it must be a violation of national law; but Dana crowed with delight and declared that if Lord John made an issue on that, you could blow him out of water. I don’t think people cared much for Mason, except that his arrogance has made him odious; but of Slidell every one stands in great terror, and to have him safe in Fort Warren is an immense relief. Of the Beaufort affair you can judge as well as I, and if the handling of that fleet does n’t please the English, they must be fastidious. As a whole the news is for the moment better, but the symptoms are still bad. We evidently cannot follow up our successes, and the army is perfectly unwieldy. This time and more disaster will cure, but for myself, I by no means partake of the immense elation of our press. I still think that nothing of importance will be done before the spring. . . .

Boston, November 10, 1861

I am very anxious to hear news from Europe, for I cannot believe that it was my “letter” which caused you “a sleepless night.” I fear the despatches had something to do with it. In most perfect confidence, will you tell me, does Seward want or intend to make a foreign war? He is too profound a man to brag the country into a war by simply being over-confident and overbearing; and if he does it, I know him well enough to know he means to and has a design, and just now it looks surprisingly like it. As you know I have the highest faith in Seward and would surrender it as late as any one; but a policy so comprehensive and immense, and so evidently doing evil that good might come of it puzzles me strangely. However my faith is abiding that the world will not come to an end this time.

P. S. On reading the foreign files I am annoyed to see the rumpus created in England by the Harvey Birch affair. We again present the ludicrous aspect of two people scared, the one at the other. While Englishmen are trembling over the Harvey Birch, we have been quaking over the seizure of Slidell and Mason. The Harvey Birch, I am told, belonged to secession owners in New York, and all New York is chuckling over their loss, which they most richly deserve. The public at large, so far as I can see and hear, feel no indignation, but merely a sense of intense relief at such a Godsend having just now turned up in the moment of our greatest need. . . .