CHAPTER XVI.

RESIGNATION--PRIVATE LIFE--LIFE AT GALENA--THE COMING CRISIS.

My family, all this while, was at the East. It consisted now of a wife

and two children. I saw no chance of supporting them on the Pacific

coast out of my pay as an army officer. I concluded, therefore, to

resign, and in March applied for a leave of absence until the end of the

July following, tendering my resignation to take effect at the end of

that time. I left the Pacific coast very much attached to it, and with

the full expectation of making it my future home. That expectation and

that hope remained uppermost in my mind until the Lieutenant-Generalcy

bill was introduced into Congress in the winter of 1863-4. The passage

of that bill, and my promotion, blasted my last hope of ever becoming a

citizen of the further West.

In the late summer of 1854 I rejoined my family, to find in it a son

whom I had never seen, born while I was on the Isthmus of Panama. I was

now to commence, at the age of thirty-two, a new struggle for our

support. My wife had a farm near St. Louis, to which we went, but I had

no means to stock it. A house had to be built also. I worked very

hard, never losing a day because of bad weather, and accomplished the

object in a moderate way. If nothing else could be done I would load a

cord of wood on a wagon and take it to the city for sale. I managed to

keep along very well until 1858, when I was attacked by fever and ague.

I had suffered very severely and for a long time from this disease,

while a boy in Ohio. It lasted now over a year, and, while it did not

keep me in the house, it did interfere greatly with the amount of work I

was able to perform. In the fall of 1858 I sold out my stock, crops and

farming utensils at auction, and gave up farming.

In the winter I established a partnership with Harry Boggs, a cousin of

Mrs. Grant, in the real estate agency business. I spent that winter at

St. Louis myself, but did not take my family into town until the spring.

Our business might have become prosperous if I had been able to wait for

it to grow. As it was, there was no more than one person could attend

to, and not enough to support two families. While a citizen of St.

Louis and engaged in the real estate agency business, I was a candidate

for the office of county engineer, an office of respectability and

emolument which would have been very acceptable to me at that time. The

incumbent was appointed by the county court, which consisted of five

members. My opponent had the advantage of birth over me (he was a

citizen by adoption) and carried off the prize. I now withdrew from the

co-partnership with Boggs, and, in May, 1860, removed to Galena,

Illinois, and took a clerkship in my father's store.

While a citizen of Missouri, my first opportunity for casting a vote at

a Presidential election occurred. I had been in the army from before

attaining my majority and had thought but little about politics,

although I was a Whig by education and a great admirer of Mr. Clay. But

the Whig party had ceased to exist before I had an opportunity of

exercising the privilege of casting a ballot; the Know-Nothing party had

taken its place, but was on the wane; and the Republican party was in a

chaotic state and had not yet received a name. It had no existence in

the Slave States except at points on the borders next to Free States.

In St. Louis City and County, what afterwards became the Republican

party was known as the Free-Soil Democracy, led by the Honorable Frank

P. Blair. Most of my neighbors had known me as an officer of the army

with Whig proclivities. They had been on the same side, and, on the

death of their party, many had become Know-Nothings, or members of the

American party. There was a lodge near my new home, and I was invited to

join it. I accepted the invitation; was initiated; attended a meeting

just one week later, and never went to another afterwards.

I have no apologies to make for having been one week a member of the

American party; for I still think native-born citizens of the United

States should have as much protection, as many privileges in their

native country, as those who voluntarily select it for a home. But all

secret, oath-bound political parties are dangerous to any nation, no

matter how pure or how patriotic the motives and principles which first

bring them together. No political party can or ought to exist when one

of its corner-stones is opposition to freedom of thought and to the

right to worship God "according to the dictate of one's own conscience,"

or according to the creed of any religious denomination whatever.

Nevertheless, if a sect sets up its laws as binding above the State

laws, wherever the two come in conflict this claim must be resisted and

suppressed at whatever cost.

Up to the Mexican war there were a few out and out abolitionists, men

who carried their hostility to slavery into all elections, from those

for a justice of the peace up to the Presidency of the United States.

They were noisy but not numerous. But the great majority of people at

the North, where slavery did not exist, were opposed to the institution,

and looked upon its existence in any part of the country as unfortunate.

They did not hold the States where slavery existed responsible for it;

and believed that protection should be given to the right of property in

slaves until some satisfactory way could be reached to be rid of the

institution. Opposition to slavery was not a creed of either political

party. In some sections more anti-slavery men belonged to the

Democratic party, and in others to the Whigs. But with the inauguration

of the Mexican war, in fact with the annexation of Texas, "the

inevitable conflict" commenced.

As the time for the Presidential election of 1856--the first at which I

had the opportunity of voting--approached, party feeling began to run

high. The Republican party was regarded in the South and the border

States not only as opposed to the extension of slavery, but as favoring

the compulsory abolition of the institution without compensation to the

owners. The most horrible visions seemed to present themselves to the

minds of people who, one would suppose, ought to have known better.

Many educated and, otherwise, sensible persons appeared to believe that

emancipation meant social equality. Treason to the Government was

openly advocated and was not rebuked. It was evident to my mind that

the election of a Republican President in 1856 meant the secession of

all the Slave States, and rebellion. Under these circumstances I

preferred the success of a candidate whose election would prevent or

postpone secession, to seeing the country plunged into a war the end of

which no man could foretell. With a Democrat elected by the unanimous

vote of the Slave States, there could be no pretext for secession for

four years. I very much hoped that the passions of the people would

subside in that time, and the catastrophe be averted altogether; if it

was not, I believed the country would be better prepared to receive the

shock and to resist it. I therefore voted for James Buchanan for

President. Four years later the Republican party was successful in

electing its candidate to the Presidency. The civilized world has

learned the consequence. Four millions of human beings held as chattels

have been liberated; the ballot has been given to them; the free schools

of the country have been opened to their children. The nation still

lives, and the people are just as free to avoid social intimacy with the

blacks as ever they were, or as they are with white people.

While living in Galena I was nominally only a clerk supporting myself

and family on a stipulated salary. In reality my position was

different. My father had never lived in Galena himself, but had

established my two brothers there, the one next younger than myself in

charge of the business, assisted by the youngest. When I went there it

was my father's intention to give up all connection with the business

himself, and to establish his three sons in it: but the brother who had

really built up the business was sinking with consumption, and it was

not thought best to make any change while he was in this condition. He

lived until September, 1861, when he succumbed to that insidious disease

which always flatters its victims into the belief that they are growing

better up to the close of life. A more honorable man never transacted

business. In September, 1861, I was engaged in an employment which

required all my attention elsewhere.

During the eleven months that I lived in Galena prior to the first call

for volunteers, I had been strictly attentive to my business, and had

made but few acquaintances other than customers and people engaged in

the same line with myself. When the election took place in November,

1860, I had not been a resident of Illinois long enough to gain

citizenship and could not, therefore, vote. I was really glad of this

at the time, for my pledges would have compelled me to vote for Stephen

A. Douglas, who had no possible chance of election. The contest was

really between Mr. Breckinridge and Mr. Lincoln; between minority rule

and rule by the majority. I wanted, as between these candidates, to see

Mr. Lincoln elected. Excitement ran high during the canvass, and

torch-light processions enlivened the scene in the generally quiet

streets of Galena many nights during the campaign. I did not parade

with either party, but occasionally met with the "wide awakes"

--Republicans--in their rooms, and superintended their drill. It was

evident, from the time of the Chicago nomination to the close of the

canvass, that the election of the Republican candidate would be the

signal for some of the Southern States to secede. I still had hopes

that the four years which had elapsed since the first nomination of a

Presidential candidate by a party distinctly opposed to slavery

extension, had given time for the extreme pro-slavery sentiment to cool

down; for the Southerners to think well before they took the awful leap

which they had so vehemently threatened. But I was mistaken.

The Republican candidate was elected, and solid substantial people of

the North-west, and I presume the same order of people throughout the

entire North, felt very serious, but determined, after this event. It

was very much discussed whether the South would carry out its threat to

secede and set up a separate government, the corner-stone of which

should be, protection to the "Divine" institution of slavery. For there

were people who believed in the "divinity" of human slavery, as there

are now people who believe Mormonism and Polygamy to be ordained by the

Most High. We forgive them for entertaining such notions, but forbid

their practice. It was generally believed that there would be a flurry;

that some of the extreme Southern States would go so far as to pass

ordinances of secession. But the common impression was that this step

was so plainly suicidal for the South, that the movement would not

spread over much of the territory and would not last long.

Doubtless the founders of our government, the majority of them at least,

regarded the confederation of the colonies as an experiment. Each

colony considered itself a separate government; that the confederation

was for mutual protection against a foreign foe, and the prevention of

strife and war among themselves. If there had been a desire on the part

of any single State to withdraw from the compact at any time while the

number of States was limited to the original thirteen, I do not suppose

there would have been any to contest the right, no matter how much the

determination might have been regretted. The problem changed on the

ratification of the Constitution by all the colonies; it changed still

more when amendments were added; and if the right of any one State to

withdraw continued to exist at all after the ratification of the

Constitution, it certainly ceased on the formation of new States, at

least so far as the new States themselves were concerned. It was never

possessed at all by Florida or the States west of the Mississippi, all

of which were purchased by the treasury of the entire nation. Texas and

the territory brought into the Union in consequence of annexation, were

purchased with both blood and treasure; and Texas, with a domain greater

than that of any European state except Russia, was permitted to retain

as state property all the public lands within its borders. It would

have been ingratitude and injustice of the most flagrant sort for this

State to withdraw from the Union after all that had been spent and done

to introduce her; yet, if separation had actually occurred, Texas must

necessarily have gone with the South, both on account of her

institutions and her geographical position. Secession was illogical as

well as impracticable; it was revolution.

Now, the right of revolution is an inherent one. When people are

oppressed by their government, it is a natural right they enjoy to

relieve themselves of the oppression, if they are strong enough, either

by withdrawal from it, or by overthrowing it and substituting a

government more acceptable. But any people or part of a people who

resort to this remedy, stake their lives, their property, and every

claim for protection given by citizenship--on the issue. Victory, or

the conditions imposed by the conqueror--must be the result.

In the case of the war between the States it would have been the exact

truth if the South had said,--"We do not want to live with you Northern

people any longer; we know our institution of slavery is obnoxious to

you, and, as you are growing numerically stronger than we, it may at

some time in the future be endangered. So long as you permitted us to

control the government, and with the aid of a few friends at the North

to enact laws constituting your section a guard against the escape of

our property, we were willing to live with you. You have been

submissive to our rule heretofore; but it looks now as if you did not

intend to continue so, and we will remain in the Union no longer."

Instead of this the seceding States cried lustily,--"Let us alone; you

have no constitutional power to interfere with us." Newspapers and

people at the North reiterated the cry. Individuals might ignore the

constitution; but the Nation itself must not only obey it, but must

enforce the strictest construction of that instrument; the construction

put upon it by the Southerners themselves. The fact is the constitution

did not apply to any such contingency as the one existing from 1861 to

1865. Its framers never dreamed of such a contingency occurring. If

they had foreseen it, the probabilities are they would have sanctioned

the right of a State or States to withdraw rather than that there should

be war between brothers.

The framers were wise in their generation and wanted to do the very best

possible to secure their own liberty and independence, and that also of

their descendants to the latest days. It is preposterous to suppose

that the people of one generation can lay down the best and only rules

of government for all who are to come after them, and under unforeseen

contingencies. At the time of the framing of our constitution the only

physical forces that had been subdued and made to serve man and do his

labor, were the currents in the streams and in the air we breathe. Rude

machinery, propelled by water power, had been invented; sails to propel

ships upon the waters had been set to catch the passing breeze--but the

application of steam to propel vessels against both wind and current,

and machinery to do all manner of work had not been thought of. The

instantaneous transmission of messages around the world by means of

electricity would probably at that day have been attributed to

witchcraft or a league with the Devil. Immaterial circumstances had

changed as greatly as material ones. We could not and ought not to be

rigidly bound by the rules laid down under circumstances so different

for emergencies so utterly unanticipated. The fathers themselves would

have been the first to declare that their prerogatives were not

irrevocable. They would surely have resisted secession could they have

lived to see the shape it assumed.

I travelled through the Northwest considerably during the winter of

1860-1. We had customers in all the little towns in south-west

Wisconsin, south-east Minnesota and north-east Iowa. These generally

knew I had been a captain in the regular army and had served through the

Mexican war. Consequently wherever I stopped at night, some of the

people would come to the public-house where I was, and sit till a late

hour discussing the probabilities of the future. My own views at that

time were like those officially expressed by Mr. Seward at a later day,

that "the war would be over in ninety days." I continued to entertain

these views until after the battle of Shiloh. I believe now that there

would have been no more battles at the West after the capture of Fort

Donelson if all the troops in that region had been under a single

commander who would have followed up that victory.

There is little doubt in my mind now that the prevailing sentiment of

the South would have been opposed to secession in 1860 and 1861, if

there had been a fair and calm expression of opinion, unbiased by

threats, and if the ballot of one legal voter had counted for as much as

that of any other. But there was no calm discussion of the question.

Demagogues who were too old to enter the army if there should be a war,

others who entertained so high an opinion of their own ability that they

did not believe they could be spared from the direction of the affairs

of state in such an event, declaimed vehemently and unceasingly against

the North; against its aggressions upon the South; its interference with

Southern rights, etc., etc. They denounced the Northerners as cowards,

poltroons, negro-worshippers; claimed that one Southern man was equal to

five Northern men in battle; that if the South would stand up for its

rights the North would back down. Mr. Jefferson Davis said in a speech,

delivered at La Grange, Mississippi, before the secession of that State,

that he would agree to drink all the blood spilled south of Mason and

Dixon's line if there should be a war. The young men who would have the

fighting to do in case of war, believed all these statements, both in

regard to the aggressiveness of the North and its cowardice. They, too,

cried out for a separation from such people. The great bulk of the

legal voters of the South were men who owned no slaves; their homes were

generally in the hills and poor country; their facilities for educating

their children, even up to the point of reading and writing, were very

limited; their interest in the contest was very meagre--what there was,

if they had been capable of seeing it, was with the North; they too

needed emancipation. Under the old regime they were looked down upon by

those who controlled all the affairs in the interest of slave-owners, as

poor white trash who were allowed the ballot so long as they cast it

according to direction.

I am aware that this last statement may be disputed and individual

testimony perhaps adduced to show that in ante-bellum days the ballot

was as untrammelled in the south as in any section of the country; but

in the face of any such contradiction I reassert the statement. The

shot-gun was not resorted to. Masked men did not ride over the country

at night intimidating voters; but there was a firm feeling that a class

existed in every State with a sort of divine right to control public

affairs. If they could not get this control by one means they must by

another. The end justified the means. The coercion, if mild, was

complete.

There were two political parties, it is true, in all the States, both

strong in numbers and respectability, but both equally loyal to the

institution which stood paramount in Southern eyes to all other

institutions in state or nation. The slave-owners were the minority,

but governed both parties. Had politics ever divided the slave-holders

and the non-slave-holders, the majority would have been obliged to

yield, or internecine war would have been the consequence. I do not

know that the Southern people were to blame for this condition of

affairs. There was a time when slavery was not profitable, and the

discussion of the merits of the institution was confined almost

exclusively to the territory where it existed. The States of Virginia

and Kentucky came near abolishing slavery by their own acts, one State

defeating the measure by a tie vote and the other only lacking one. But

when the institution became profitable, all talk of its abolition ceased

where it existed; and naturally, as human nature is constituted,

arguments were adduced in its support. The cotton-gin probably had much

to do with the justification of slavery.

The winter of 1860-1 will be remembered by middle-aged people of to-day

as one of great excitement. South Carolina promptly seceded after the

result of the Presidential election was known. Other Southern States

proposed to follow. In some of them the Union sentiment was so strong

that it had to be suppressed by force. Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky and

Missouri, all Slave States, failed to pass ordinances of secession; but

they were all represented in the so-called congress of the so-called

Confederate States. The Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of Missouri,

in 1861, Jackson and Reynolds, were both supporters of the rebellion and

took refuge with the enemy. The governor soon died, and the

lieutenant-governor assumed his office; issued proclamations as governor

of the State; was recognized as such by the Confederate Government, and

continued his pretensions until the collapse of the rebellion. The South

claimed the sovereignty of States, but claimed the right to coerce into

their confederation such States as they wanted, that is, all the States

where slavery existed. They did not seem to think this course

inconsistent. The fact is, the Southern slave-owners believed that, in

some way, the ownership of slaves conferred a sort of patent of

nobility--a right to govern independent of the interest or wishes of

those who did not hold such property. They convinced themselves, first,

of the divine origin of the institution and, next, that that particular

institution was not safe in the hands of any body of legislators but

themselves.

Meanwhile the Administration of President Buchanan looked helplessly on

and proclaimed that the general government had no power to interfere;

that the Nation had no power to save its own life. Mr. Buchanan had in

his cabinet two members at least, who were as earnest--to use a mild

term--in the cause of secession as Mr. Davis or any Southern statesman.

One of them, Floyd, the Secretary of War, scattered the army so that

much of it could be captured when hostilities should commence, and

distributed the cannon and small arms from Northern arsenals throughout

the South so as to be on hand when treason wanted them. The navy was

scattered in like manner. The President did not prevent his cabinet

preparing for war upon their government, either by destroying its

resources or storing them in the South until a de facto government was

established with Jefferson Davis as its President, and Montgomery,

Alabama, as the Capital. The secessionists had then to leave the

cabinet. In their own estimation they were aliens in the country which

had given them birth. Loyal men were put into their places. Treason in

the executive branch of the government was estopped. But the harm had

already been done. The stable door was locked after the horse had been

stolen.

During all of the trying winter of 1860-1, when the Southerners were so

defiant that they would not allow within their borders the expression of

a sentiment hostile to their views, it was a brave man indeed who could

stand up and proclaim his loyalty to the Union. On the other hand men

at the North--prominent men--proclaimed that the government had no power

to coerce the South into submission to the laws of the land; that if the

North undertook to raise armies to go south, these armies would have to

march over the dead bodies of the speakers. A portion of the press of

the North was constantly proclaiming similar views. When the time

arrived for the President-elect to go to the capital of the Nation to be

sworn into office, it was deemed unsafe for him to travel, not only as a

President-elect, but as any private citizen should be allowed to do.

Instead of going in a special car, receiving the good wishes of his

constituents at all the stations along the road, he was obliged to stop

on the way and to be smuggled into the capital. He disappeared from

public view on his journey, and the next the country knew, his arrival

was announced at the capital. There is little doubt that he would have

been assassinated if he had attempted to travel openly throughout his

journey.