Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 by Various

V >> Various >> Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21

The signatures to this appeal are not the least remarkable part of it;
for, beginning at the very steps of the throne, they go down to the
names of women in the very humblest conditions in life, and represent
all that Great Britain possesses, not only of highest and wisest, but
of plain, homely common sense and good feeling. Names of wives of
cabinet-ministers appear on the same page with the names of wives
of humble laborers,--names of duchesses and countesses, of wives of
generals, ambassadors, savans, and men of letters, mingled with names
traced in trembling characters by hands evidently unused to hold the pen
and stiffened by lowly toil. Nay, so deep and expansive was the feeling,
that British subjects in foreign lands had their representation. Among
the signatures are those of foreign residents from Paris to Jerusalem.
Autographs so diverse, and collected from sources so various, have
seldom been found in juxtaposition. They remain at this day a silent
witness of a most singular tide of feeling which at that time swept over
the British community, and _made_ for itself an expression, even at the
risk of offending the sensibilities of an equal and powerful nation.

No reply to that address, in any such tangible and monumental form, has
ever been possible. It was impossible to canvass our vast territories
with the zealous and indefatigable industry with which England was
canvassed for signatures. In America, those possessed of the spirit
which led to this efficient action had no leisure for it. All their time
and energies were already absorbed in direct efforts to remove the great
evil concerning which the minds of their English sisters had been newly
aroused, and their only answer was the silent continuance of these
efforts.

From the Slaveholding States, however, as was to be expected, came a
flood of indignant recrimination and rebuke. No one act, perhaps, ever
produced more frantic irritation or called out more unsparing abuse.
It came with the whole united weight of the British aristocracy and
commonalty on the most diseased and sensitive part of our national life;
and it stimulated that fierce excitement which was working before and
has worked since till it has broken out into open war.

The time has come, however, when such an astonishing page has been
turned in the anti-slavery history of America, that the women of our
country, feeling that the great anti-slavery work to which their English
sisters exhorted them is almost done, may properly and naturally feel
moved to reply to their appeal, and lay before them the history of what
has occurred since the receipt of their affectionate and Christian
address.

Your address reached us just as a great moral conflict was coming to its
intensest point.

The agitation kept up by the anti-slavery portion of America, by
England, and by the general sentiment of humanity in Europe, had made
the situation of the slaveholding aristocracy intolerable. As one of
them at the time expressed it, they felt themselves under the ban of the
civilized world. Two courses only were open to them: to abandon slave
institutions, the sources of their wealth and political power, or to
assert them with such an overwhelming national force as to compel the
respect and assent of mankind. They chose the latter.

To this end they determined to seize on and control all the resources
of the Federal Government, and to spread their institutions through new
States and Territories until the balance of power should fall into their
hands and they should be able to force slavery into all the Free States.

A leading Southern senator boasted that he would yet call the roll of
his slaves on Bunker Hill; and, for a while, the political successes of
the Slave Power were such as to suggest to New England that this was no
impossible event.

They repealed the Missouri Compromise, which had hitherto stood,
like the Chinese wall, between our Northwestern Territories and the
irruptions of slaveholding barbarians.

Then came the struggle between Freedom and Slavery in the new
Territory,--the battle for Kansas and Nebraska, fought with fire and
sword and blood, where a race of men, of whom John Brown was the
immortal type, acted over again the courage, the perseverance, and the
military religious ardor of the old Covenanters of Scotland, and, like
them, redeemed the Ark of Liberty at the price of their own blood and
blood dearer than their own.

The time of the Presidential canvass which elected Mr. Lincoln was the
crisis of this great battle. The conflict had become narrowed down to
the one point of the extension of slave-territory. If the slaveholders
could get States enough, they could control and rule; if they were
outnumbered by Free States, their institutions, by the very law of
their nature, would die of suffocation. Therefore, Fugitive-Slave Law,
District of Columbia, Inter-State Slave-Trade, and what not, were all
thrown out of sight for a grand rally on this vital point. A President
was elected pledged to opposition to this one thing alone,--a man known
to be in favor of the Fugitive-Slave Law and other so-called compromises
of the Constitution, but honest and faithful in his determination on
this one subject. That this was indeed the vital point was shown by the
result. The moment Lincoln's election was ascertained, the slaveholders
resolved to destroy the Union they could no longer control.

They met and organized a Confederacy which they openly declared to be
the first republic founded on the right and determination of the white
man to enslave the black man, and, spreading their banners, declared
themselves to the Christian world of the nineteenth century as a nation
organized with the full purpose and intent of perpetuating slavery.

But in the course of the struggle that followed, it became important for
the new Confederation to secure the assistance of foreign powers, and
infinite pains were then taken to blind and bewilder the mind of England
as to the real issues of the conflict in America.

It has been often and earnestly asserted that slavery had nothing to do
with this conflict; that it was a mere struggle for power; that the only
object was to restore the Union as it was, with all its abuses. It is
to be admitted that expressions have proceeded from the National
Administration which naturally gave rise to misapprehension, and
therefore we beg to speak to you on this subject more fully.

And, first, the declaration of the Confederate States themselves is
proof enough, that, whatever may be declared on the other side, the
maintenance of slavery is regarded by them as the vital object of their
movement.

We ask your attention under this head to the declaration of their
Vice-President, Stephens, in that remarkable speech delivered on the
21st of March, 1861, at Savannah, Georgia, wherein he declares the
object and purposes of the new Confederacy. It is one of the most
extraordinary papers which our century has produced. I quote from the
_verbatim_ report in the Savannah "Republican" of the address as it was
delivered in the Athenaeum of that city, on which occasion, says the
newspaper from which I copy, "Mr. Stephens took his seat amid a burst of
enthusiasm and applause, such as the Athenaeum has never had displayed
within its walls, within 'the recollection of the oldest inhabitant.'"

"Last, not least, the new Constitution has put at rest _forever_ all
the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution,--African
Slavery as it exists among us, the proper _status_ of the negro in our
form of civilization. _This was the immediate cause of the late rupture
and present revolution_. Jefferson, in his forecast, had anticipated
this, as the 'rock upon which the old Union would split.' He was right.
What was conjecture with him is now a realized fact. But whether he
fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock _stood_ and
_stands_ may be doubted. _The prevailing ideas entertained by him and
most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old
Constitution were that the enslavement of the African was in violation
of the laws of Nature, that it was wrong in principle, socially,
morally, and politically_. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal
with; but the general opinion of the men of that day was, that,
somehow or other, in the order of Providence, the institution would be
evanescent, and pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the
Constitution, was the prevailing idea at the time. The Constitution, it
is true, secured every essential guaranty to the institution, while
it should last; and hence no argument can be justly used against the
Constitutional guaranties thus secured, because of the common sentiment
of the day. _Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested
upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error_. It was
a sandy foundation; and the idea of a government built upon it--when
'the storm came and the wind blew, it fell.'

"_Our new government is founded upon on exactly the opposite ideas: its
foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that
the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to
the superior race, is his natural and moral condition. (Applause.) This
our new government is the first, in the history of the world, based upon
this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth_.

"This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all
other truths in the various departments of science. It is so even
amongst us. Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well that this
truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. The errors of
the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago.
Those at the North who still cling to these errors with a zeal above
knowledge we justly denominate fanatics. All fanaticism springs from an
aberration of the mind, from a defect in reasoning. It is a species of
insanity. One of the most striking characteristics of insanity, in many
instances, is forming correct conclusions from fancied or erroneous
premises. So with the _anti-slavery_ fanatics: their conclusions are
right, if their premises are. They assume that the negro is equal, and
hence conclude that he is entitled to equal privileges and rights with
the white man. If their premises were correct, their conclusions would
be logical and just; but their premises being wrong, their whole
argument fails.

* * * * *

"In the conflict thus far, success has been on our side complete,
throughout the length and breadth of the Confederate States. It is upon
this, as I have stated, our social fabric is firmly planted; and I
cannot permit myself to doubt the ultimate success of a full recognition
of this principle throughout the civilized and enlightened world.

"As I have stated, the truth of this principle may be slow in
development, as all truths are, and ever have been, in the various
branches of science. It was so with the principles announced by Galileo;
it was so with Adam Smith and his principles of political economy; It
was so with Harvey in his theory of the circulation of the blood. It is
said that not a single one of the medical profession, at the time of
the announcement of the truths made by him, admitted them; now they are
universally acknowledged. May we not, therefore, look with confidence
to the ultimate universal acknowledgment of the truths upon which our
system rests? It is the first government ever instituted upon principles
in strict conformity to Nature and the ordination of Providence in
furnishing the material of human society. Many governments have been
founded upon the principles of certain classes; but the classes thus
enslaved were of the same race and in violation of the laws of Nature.
Our system commits no such violation of Nature's laws. The negro, by
Nature, or by the curse against Canaan, is fitted for that condition
which he occupies in our system. The architect, in the construction of
buildings, lays the foundation with the proper material,--the granite;
then comes the brick or marble. The substratum of our society is made of
the material fitted by Nature for it; and by experience we know that it
is best not only for the superior, but the inferior race, that it should
be so. It is indeed in conformity with the Creator. It is not safe for
us to inquire into the wisdom of His ordinances, or to question them.
For His own purposes He has made one race to differ from another, as one
star differeth from another in glory. The great objects of humanity are
best attained, when conformed to His laws and decrees in the formation
of government as well as in all things else. Our Confederacy is founded
on a strict conformity with those laws. _This stone, which was rejected
by the first builders, has become the chief stone of the corner in our
new edifice!_"

Thus far the declarations of the slave-holding Confederacy.

On the other hand, the declarations of the President and the Republican
party, as to their intention to restore "the Union as it was," require
an explanation. It is the doctrine of the Republican party, that Freedom
is national and Slavery sectional; that the Constitution of the United
States was designed for the promotion of liberty, and not of slavery;
that its framers contemplated the gradual abolition of slavery; and
that in the hands of an anti-slavery majority it could be so wielded as
peaceably to extinguish this great evil.

They reasoned thus. Slavery ruins land, and requires fresh territory
for profitable working. Slavery increases a dangerous population, and
requires an expansion of this population for safety. Slavery, then,
being hemmed in by impassable limits, emancipation in each State becomes
a necessity.

_By restoring the Union as it was_ the Republican party meant the Union
in the sense contemplated by the original framers of it, who, as
has been admitted by Stephens, in his speech just quoted, were from
principle opposed to slavery. It was, then, restoring a _status_
in which, by the inevitable operation of natural laws, peaceful
emancipation would become a certainty.

In the mean while, during the past year, the Republican Administration,
with all the unwonted care of organizing an army and navy, and
conducting military operations on an immense scale, have proceeded
to demonstrate the feasibility of overthrowing slavery by purely
Constitutional measures. To this end they have instituted a series
of movements which have made this year more fruitful in anti-slavery
triumphs than any other since the emancipation of the British West
Indies.

The District of Columbia, as belonging strictly to the National
Government, and to no separate State, has furnished a fruitful subject
of remonstrance from British Christians with America. We have abolished
slavery there, and thus wiped out the only blot of territorial
responsibility on our escutcheon.

By another act, equally grand principle, and far more important in its
results, slavery is forever excluded from the Territories of the United
States.

By another act, America has consummated the long-delayed treaty with
Great Britain for the suppression of the slave-trade. In ports whence
slave-vessels formerly sailed with the connivance of the port-officers,
the Administration has placed men who stand up to their duty, and for
the first time in our history the slave-trader, is convicted and hung as
a pirate. This abominable secret traffic has been wholly demolished by
the energy of the Federal Government.

Lastly, and more significant still, the United States Government has in
its highest official capacity taken distinct anti-slavery ground, and
presented to the country a plan of peaceable emancipation with suitable
compensation. This noble-spirited and generous offer has been urged on
the Slaveholding States by the Chief Executive with an earnestness and
sincerity of which history in after-times will make honorable account in
recording the events of Mr. Lincoln's administration.

Now, when a President and Administration who have done all these things
declare their intention of restoring "_the Union as it was_," ought not
the world fairly to interpret their words by their actions and their
avowed principles? Is it not _necessary_ to infer that they mean by it
the Union as it was in the intent of its anti-slavery framers, under
which, by the exercise of normal Constitutional powers, slavery should
be peaceably abolished?

We are aware that this theory of the Constitution has been disputed
by certain Abolitionists; but it is conceded, you have seen, by the
Secessionists. Whether it be a just theory or not is, however, nothing
to our purpose at present. We only assert that such is the professed
belief of the present Administration of the United States, and such are
the acts by which they have illustrated their belief.

But this is but half the story of the anti-slavery triumphs of this
year. We have shown you what has been done for freedom by the simple use
of the ordinary Constitutional forces of the Union. We are now to show
you what has been done to the same end by the Constitutional war-power
of the nation.

By this power it has been this year decreed that every slave of a Rebel
who reaches the lines of our army becomes a free man; that all slaves
found deserted by their masters become free men; that every slave
employed in any service for the United States thereby obtains his
liberty; and that every slave employed against the United States in any
capacity obtains his liberty: and lest the army should contain officers
disposed to remand slaves to their masters, the power of judging and
delivering up slaves is denied to army-officers, and all such acts are
made penal.

By this act, the Fugitive-Slave Law is for all present purposes
practically repealed. With this understanding and provision, wherever
our armies march, they carry liberty with them. For be it remembered
that our army is almost entirely a volunteer one, and that the most
zealous and ardent volunteers are those who have been for years fighting
with tongue and pen the Abolition battle. So marked is the character of
our soldiers in this respect, that they are now familiarly designated
in the official military despatches of the Confederate States as "The
Abolitionists." Conceive the results, when an army, so empowered by
national law, marches through a slave-territory. One regiment alone has
to our certain knowledge liberated two thousand slaves during the past
year, and this regiment it but one out of hundreds. We beg to lay before
you some details given by an eye-witness of what has recently been done
in this respect in the Department of the South.

"_On Board Steamer from Fortress Monroe to Baltimore_, Nov. 14, 1862.

"Events of no ordinary interest have just occurred in the Department of
the South. The negro troops have been tested, and, to their great joy,
though not contrary to their own expectations, they have triumphed, not
only over enemies armed with muskets and swords, but over what the black
man dreads most, sharp and cruel prejudices.

"General Saxton, on the 28th of October, sent the captured steamer
Darlington, Captain Crandell, down the coast of Georgia, and to
Fernandina, Florida, to obtain recruits for the First Regiment
South-Carolina Volunteers. Lieutenant-Colonel O.T. Beard, of the
Forty-Eighth New-York Volunteers, was given the command of the
expedition. In addition to obtaining recruits, the condition and wants
of the recent refugees from slavery along the coast were to be looked
into, and, if occasion should offer, it was permitted to 'feel the
enemy.' At St. Simond's, Georgia, Captain Trowbridge, with thirty-five
men of the 'Hunter Regiment of First South-Carolina Volunteers,' who had
been stationed there for three months, together with twenty-seven more
men, were received on board. With this company of sixty-two men the
Darlington proceeded to Fernandina.

"On arriving, a meeting of the colored men was called to obtain
enlistments. The large church was crowded. After addresses had been made
by the writer and Colonel Beard, one hundred men volunteered at once,
and the number soon reached about one hundred and twenty-five. Such,
however, were the demands of Fort Clinch and the Quartermaster's
Department for laborers, that Colonel Rich, commanding the
fort, consented to only twenty-five men leaving. This was a sad
disappointment, and one which some determined not to bear. The
twenty-five men were carefully selected from among those not employed
either on the fort or in the Quartermaster's Department, and put on
board. Amid the farewells and benedictions of hundreds of their friends
on shore they took their departure, to prove the truth or falsity of
the charge, 'The black man can never fight.' On calling the roll, a
few miles from port, it was found our twenty-five men had increased
to fifty-four. Determined not to be foiled in their purpose of being
soldiers, it was found that thirty men had quietly found their way on
board just at break of day, and had concealed themselves in the hold of
the ship. When asked why they did so, their reply was,--

"'Oh, we want to fight for our liberty, and for de liberty of our wives
and children.'

"'But would you dare to face your old masters?'

"'Oh, yes, yes! why, we would fight to de death to get our families,'
was the quick response.

"No one doubted their sincerity. Muskets were soon in their hands, and
no time was lost in drilling them. Our steamer, a very frail one, had
been barricaded around the bow and stern, and also provided with two
twelve-pounder Parrott guns. These guns had to be worked by black men,
under the direction of the captain of the steamer. Our fighting men
numbered only about one hundred and ten, and fifty of them were raw
recruits. The expedition was not a very formidable one, still all seemed
to have an unusual degree of confidence as to its success.

* * * * *

"_November_ 6. The women and children (about fifty) taken from St.
Simond's on the day previous were now landed for safety in St.
Catharine's, as a more hazardous work was to be undertaken. Much of the
night was spent in getting wood for the steamer, killing beeves, and
cooking meats, rice, and corn, for our women and children on shore, and
for the troops. The men needed no 'driver's lash' to incite them to
labor. Sleep and rest were almost unwelcome, for they were preparing to
go up Sapelo River, along whose banks, on the beautiful plantations,
were their fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, wives, and children.
Weeks and months before, some of the men had left those loved ones, with
a promise to return, 'if de good Lord jis open de way.'

"At five o'clock on Friday morning, November 7, we were under way.
Captain Budd, of the gun-boat Potomska, had kindly promised the evening
before to accompany us past the most dangerous places. On reaching his
station in Sapelo Sound, we found him in readiness. Our little fleet,
led by the Potomska, and followed by the Darlington, sailed proudly
up the winding Sapelo, now through marshes, and then past large and
beautiful plantations. It was very affecting to see our soldiers
watching intensely the colored forms on land, one saying, in the agony
of deepest anxiety, 'Oh, Mas'r, my wife and chillen lib dere,' and
another singing out, 'Dere, dere my brodder,' or 'my sister.' The
earnest longings of their poor, anguish-riven hearts for landings, and
then the sad, inexpressible regrets as the steamer passed, must be
imagined,--they cannot be described.

"The first landing was made at a picket-station on Charles Hopkins's
plantation. The enemy was driven back; a few guns and a sword only
captured. The Potomska came to anchorage, for lack of sufficient water,
a few miles above, at Reuben King's plantation. Here we witnessed a
rich scene. Some fifty negroes appeared on the banks, about thirty
rods distant from their master's house, and some distance from the
Darlington. They gazed upon us with intense feelings, alternately
turning their eyes toward their master, who was watching them from
his piazza, and toward our steamer, which, as yet, had given them no
assurances of landing. The moment she headed to the shore, their doubts
were dispersed, and they gave us such a welcome as angels would be
satisfied with. Some few women were so filled with joy, that they ran,
leaped, clapped their hands, and cried, 'Glory to God! Glory to God!'

* * * * *

"After relieving the old planter of twenty thousand dollars' worth of
humanity, that is, fifty-two slaves, and the leather of his tannery, we
reembarked. Our boats were sent once and again, however, to the shore
for men, who, having heard the steam-whistle, came in greatest haste
from distant plantations.

"As the Potomska could go no farther, Captain Budd kindly offered to
accompany us with one gun's crew. We were glad to have his company and
the services of the crew, as we had only one gun's crew of colored men.
Above us was a bend in the river, and a high bluff covered with thick
woods. There we apprehended danger, for the Rebels had had ample time to
collect their forces. The men were carefully posted, fully instructed as
to their duties and dangers by Colonel Beard. Our Parrotts were manned,
and everything was in readiness. No sooner were we within rifle-shot
than the enemy opened upon us a heavy fire from behind the bank and
trees, and also from the tops of the trees. Our speed being slow and the
river's bend quite large, we were within range of the enemy's guns for
some time. How well our troops bore themselves will be seen by Captain
Budd's testimony.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21