The Life and Writings of Abraham Lincoln (93 page)

Do you doubt that taking the initiatory steps on the part of those States and this District would shorten the war more than eighty-seven days, and thus be an actual saving of expense?

A word as to the time and manner of incurring the expense. Suppose, for instance, a State devises and adopts a system by which the institution absolutely ceases therein by a named day—say January 1, 1882. Then let the sum to be paid to such a State by the United States be ascertained by taking from the census of 1860 the number of slaves within the State, and multiplying that number by four hundred—the United States to pay such sums to the State in twenty equal annual installments, in six percent bonds of the United States.

The sum thus given, as to time and manner, I think, would not be half as onerous as would be an equal sum raised now for the indefinite prosecution of the war; but of this you can judge as well as I. I inclose a census table for your convenience.

In April, 1862, McClellan’s Peninsular campaign was just getting under way. The Battle of Shiloh had been fought in the West; the country was impatiently awaiting action from McClellan who seemed to be moving with intolerable slowness. Lincoln had long disagreed with McClellan about his plan of campaign, and there had been further disagreement about the number of troops that should be left for the defense of Washington
.

Washington, April 9, 1862

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
: Your dispatches, complaining that you are not properly sustained, while they do not offend me, do pain me very much.…

After you left I ascertained that less than 20,000 unorganized men, without a single field-battery, were all you designed to be left for the defense of Washington and Manassas
Junction, and part of this even was to go to General Hooker’s old position; General Banks’s corps, once designed for Manassas Junction, was divided and tied up on the line of Winchester and Strasburg, and could not leave it without again exposing the upper Potomac and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. This presented (or would present, when McDowell and Sumner should be gone) a great temptation to the enemy to turn back from the Rappahannock and sack Washington. My explicit order that Washington should, by the judgment of all the commanders of corps, be left entirely secure, had been neglected. It was precisely this that drove me to detain McDowell.

I do not forget that I was satisfied with your arrangement to leave Banks at Manassas Junction; but when that arrangement was broken up and nothing was substituted for it, of course I was not satisfied. I was constrained to substitute something for it myself.

And now allow me to ask, do you really think I should permit the line from Richmond
via
Manassas Junction to this city to be entirely open, except what resistance could be presented by less than 20,000 unorganized troops? This is a question which the country will not allow me to evade.

There is a curious mystery about the number of the troops now with you. When I telegraphed you on the 6th, saying you had over 100,000 with you, I had just obtained from the Secretary of War a statement, taken as he said from your own returns, making 108,000 then with you and en route to you. You now say you will have but 85,000 when all en route to you shall have reached you. How can this discrepancy of 23,000 be accounted for?

As to General Wool’s command, I understand it is doing for you precisely what a like number of your own would have to do if that command was away. I suppose the whole force which has gone forward to you is with you by this time; and if so, I think it is the precise time for you to strike a blow. By
delay the enemy will relatively gain upon you—that is, he will gain faster by fortifications and reinforcements than you can by reinforcements alone.

And once more let me tell you it is indispensable to you that you strike a blow. I am powerless to help this. You will do me the justice to remember I always insisted that going down the bay in search of a field, instead of fighting at or near Manassas, was only shifting and not surmounting a difficulty; that we would find the same enemy and the same or equal intrenchments at either place. The country will not fail to note—is noting now—that the present hesitation to move upon an intrenched enemy is but the story of Manassas repeated.

I beg to assure you that I have never written you or spoken to you in greater kindness of feeling than now, nor with a fuller purpose to sustain you, so far as in my most anxious judgment I consistently can; but you must act.

McClellan’s Peninsular campaign was still proceeding very slowly with more talk and wrangling than actual fighting. Lincoln again writes a fatherly letter of advice to his young commander
.

Fort Monroe, Virginia, May 9, 1862

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
: I have just assisted the Secretary of War in framing part of a dispatch to you relating to army corps, which dispatch of course will have reached you before this will.

I wish to say a few words to you privately on this subject. I ordered the army corps organization not only on the unanimous opinion of the twelve generals whom you had selected and assigned as generals of division, but also on the unanimous opinion of every military man I could get an opinion from (and every modern military book), yourself only excepted. Of
course I did not on my own judgment pretend to understand the subject. I now think it indispensable for you to know how your struggle against it is received in quarters which we cannot entirely disregard. It is looked upon as merely an effort to pamper one or two pets and to persecute and degrade their supposed rivals. I have had no word from Sumner, Heintzelman, or Keyes. The commanders of these corps are of course the three highest officers with you, but I am constantly told that you have no consultation or communication with them; that you consult and communicate with nobody but General Fitz-John Porter and perhaps General Franklin. I do not say these complaints are true or just, but at all events it is proper you should know of their existence. Do the commanders of corps disobey your orders in anything?

When you relieved General Hamilton of his command the other day, you thereby lost the confidence of at least one of your best friends in the Senate. And here let me say, not as applicable to you personally, that Senators and Representatives speak of me in their places as they please without question, and that officers of the army must cease addressing insulting letters to them for taking no greater liberty with them.

But to return. Are you strong enough—are you strong enough, even with my help—to set your foot upon the necks of Sumner, Heintzelman, and Keyes all at once? This is a practical and very serious question for you.

The success of your army and the cause of the country are the same, and of course I only desire the good of the cause.

On May 9, General Hunter, in command of the Department of the South, had issued a proclamation emancipating the slaves in
Georgia, Florida and South Carolina. This was exactly the same kind of difficulty that Lincoln had had with Frémont during the autumn of 1861. Again he had to countermand his commander’s order; he here does so
.

May 19, 1862

W
HEREAS
there appears in the public prints what purports to be a proclamation of Major-General Hunter [freeing the slaves in Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina]:

And whereas the same is producing some excitement and misunderstanding: therefore,

I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, proclaim and declare that the Government of the United States had no knowledge, information, or belief of an intention on the part of General Hunter to issue such a proclamation; nor has it yet any authentic information that the document is genuine. And further, that neither General Hunter, nor any other commander or person, has been authorized by the Government of the United States to make a proclamation declaring the slaves of any State free; and that the supposed proclamation now in question, whether genuine or false, is altogether void so far as respects such a declaration.

I further make known that, whether it be competent for me, as Commander-in-Chief of the army and navy, to declare the slaves of any State or States free, and whether, at any time, in any case, it shall have become a necessity indispensable to the maintenance of the government to exercise such supposed power, are questions which, under my responsibility, I reserve to myself, and which I cannot feel justified in leaving to the decision of commanders in the field.…

To the people of [the Southern] States I now earnestly appeal. I do not argue—I beseech you to make arguments for yourselves. You cannot, if you would, be blind to the signs of the times. I beg of you a calm and enlarged consideration of them, ranging, if it may be, far above personal and partisan
politics. This proposal makes common cause for a common object, casting no reproaches upon any. It acts not the Pharisee. The change it contemplates would come gently as the dews of heaven, not rending or wrecking anything. Will you not embrace it? So much good has not been done, by one effort, in all past time, as in the providence of God it is now your high privilege to do. May the vast future not have to lament that you have neglected it.

This is one of many such letters that Lincoln found time to write in the midst of his multifarious duties as President
.

June, 1862

D
EAR
S
IR
: The bearer of this, William J. Post, a member of the 140th Pennsylvania Regiment, wants to go to his home in Washington, Pa. As you can see, he is nothing but a boy, has been sick in the hospital, but I believe he is made of the right kind of stuff. Please see to his release and that he gets transportation home.

The Seven Days Battle before Richmond had begun on June 25. McClellan had appealed desperately to Lincoln for more reinforcements which had not been forthcoming. Lincoln again emphasizes to McClellan the necessity for keeping Washington protected against the enemy.

War Department, June 28, 1862

M
AJOR
-G
ENERAL
McC
LELLAN
: Save your army, at all events. Will send reinforcements as fast as we can. Of course they
cannot reach you today, tomorrow, or next day. I have not said you were ungenerous for saying you needed reinforcements. I thought you were ungenerous in assuming that I did not send them as fast as I could. I feel any misfortune to you and your army quite as keenly as you feel it yourself. If you have had a drawn battle, or a repulse, it is the price we pay for the enemy not being in Washington. We protected Washington, and the enemy concentrated on you. Had we stripped Washington, he would have been upon us before the troops could have gotten to you. Less than a week ago you notified us that reinforcements were leaving Richmond to come in front of us. It is the nature of the case, and neither you nor the government is to blame. Please tell at once the present condition and aspect of things.

The Seven Days Battle was still in progress, and McClellan was still appealing for men. Lincoln telegraphs to his general who was fighting a losing battle
.

War Department, Washington, July 1, 1862

M
AJOR
-G
ENERAL
G
EORGE
B. McC
LELLAN
: It is impossible to reinforce you for your present emergency. If we had a million of men, we could not get them to you in time. We have not the men to send. If you are not strong enough to face the enemy, you must find a place of security, and wait, rest, and repair. Maintain your ground if you can, but save the army at all events, even if you fall back to Fort Monroe. We still have strength enough in the country, and will bring it out.

The Seven Days Battle had been fought, and McClellan’s army had met with defeat. McClellan was hoping to attack again. Four days after writing this letter, Lincoln went to visit McClellan at Harrison’s Landing and there realized that he would have to appoint a new man to the chief command. On July 11, he placed Halleck in charge of all the Federal armies, although he left McClellan in command of the Army of the Potomac
.

War Department, Washington, July 4, 1862

I
UNDERSTAND
your position as stated in your letter and by General Marcy. To reinforce you so as to enable you to resume the offensive within a month, or even six weeks, is impossible. In addition to that arrived and now arriving from the Potomac (about 10,000 men, I suppose, and about 10,000 I hope you will have from Burnside very soon, and about 5,000 from Hunter a little later), I do not see how I can send you another man within a month. Under these circumstances the defensive for the present must be your only care. Save the army—first, where you are, if you can; secondly, by removal, if you must. You, on the ground, must be the judge as to which you will attempt, and of the means for effecting it. I but give it as my opinion that with the aid of the gunboats and the reinforcements mentioned above, you can hold your present position—provided, and so long as, you can keep the James River open below you. If you are not tolerably confident you can keep the James River open, you had better remove as soon as possible. I do not remember that you have expressed any apprehension as to the danger of having your communication cut on the river below you, yet I do not suppose it can have escaped your attention.

P. S. If at any time you feel able to take the offensive, you are not restrained from doing so.

A. L.

After the failure of the Peninsular campaign and the appointment of Halleck to the general command, Lincoln was in the mood for vigorous action. On July 13, while attending a funeral for Stanton’s son, he intimated to Welles and Seward that he at last regarded the emancipation of the slaves as a military necessity. Nine days later he read this first draft of his Emancipation Proclamation to his Cabinet. It was at this meeting that Seward suggested that if the proclamation were issued at this moment of defeat, it would sound like a despairing cry from a bewildered administration. Lincoln agreed to wait for a more favorable moment to release it to the public. The wording of the proclamation was thought out carefully by Lincoln who brought his legally trained mind to bear upon the problem. He could not afford to antagonize the border states, consequently this military measure sets free slaves only in those areas then in rebellion against the United States Government.