
CHAPTER I
THE SHEEP FROM THE GOATS
Anna Ella Carroll held the proof in both hands that she was becoming a
celebrated personage. In one hand was a note from Mathew Brady, the pho-
tographer: "I have read with pleasure your work, A Reply to Breckinridge and
beg leave to tender you the courtesy which it has been my custom for many
years to extend to the talented. Your portrait would be an interesting addition
to my gallery." That meant the sitting would be free, enabling her to have her
own carte de visite at no cost; it also meant he considered her picture salable
to magazines and interested collectors of images of the famous. That was
satisfying, after so many years of political labor behind the scenes. She would
have to make an appointment with Brady as soon as she could afford a new
dress and a modish haircut, and when she gained back some of the weight she
had lost. She felt that at five feet four, her normal weight should be one
hundred and twenty pounds; the worry of the last months had caused her to
drop below that, and her arms and bosom were losing some of their plump-
ness.
In her other hand, she held a note marked "urgent" from Frederick
Seward, the son of, and assistant to, the Secretary of State, inviting her to a
visit that day to General Banks at his headquarters in the village of Rockville,
Maryland. She was to be downstairs at the Ebbitt House at noon and to say
nothing to anyone about the trip. Such importance was attached to it that
young Seward hoped she could cancel all other plans.
After the shattering betrayal by John Breckinridge (she vowed never again
to run after any man, even for reasons of state), these recognitions of her
growing importance buoyed her spirit. She had been disappointed in his deci-
sion to go South, but was at a total loss to understand why Breck, who so
prided himself on candor and honesty, would sneak off in the dead of night
without so much as an explanation or a farewell. She assumed he had been
too ashamed to face her and his uncle, and had taken the cowardly way out.
That put Breck in the category of Millard Fillmore, another public man who
had crept out of her life without an explanation or a thank-you. Never again.
She was glad now she had put the damning Quitman papers in her pamphlet,
which increased its newsworthiness and gave weight to the general condem-
nation of the traitorous Kentuckian. She was prepared at last to admit that
her judgment of the character of men was seriously flawed; perhaps she
would be better off without a regular male companion.
The only saving grace in that episode was that nobody in Washington knew
of her failure to persuade Breck to take a stand for the Union. On the con-
trary, because the publication of her pamphlet coincided with his act of trea-
son, her Reply was seen to be prescient, its reasoning made all the more
unassailable by the defection of its target. Moreover, her political assignment
from the Lincoln administration had never been in Kentucky, but in her
native Maryland.
Until recently, Anna had credited herself with doing fairly well in frustrat-
ing the secession movement in Maryland. Her credentials for undertaking
such an important effort were considerable: daughter and aide of the still-
popular former governor, clear lineage to Charles Carroll of Revolutionary
era fame, and, most of all, her political connection with the present governor,
Thomas Hicks. Thanks in good part to Anna Ella Carroll's ardent sponsor-
ship, Hicks had gained the American Party nomination for governor three
years ago, and the Know-Nothings had delivered for him. The pro-slavery
Hicks was not the most resolute of men, but he remembered who had put him
in office and who might make him a senator after his term expired. This
combination of gratitude and expectation kept him seemingly pro-Union in a
state where the majority of the population leaned toward the Confederacy.
Anna knew his present posture was not motived by any strong Union tie;
rather, Hicks had some vague notion of staying out of the Confederacy only
until its success might enable him to form a central confederation of border
states. That was why Lincoln was so right about resisting any secession; once
the principle was established that states could pull out, nobody could foretell
where the subdividing would stop.
Maryland was on the knife edge, much as Kentucky had been until Bishop
Polk blundered by sending his rebel troops up into Kentucky, ending Breck's
dim hope for neutrality. The strategic difference between the two slave states
was clear to her. Without Kentucky, the North could not win, and the war
would end in stalemate; but without Maryland, the North could actually lose
its capital in Washington, which would lead to intervention by England and
France and a Southern victory. The riotous plug-ugly element in Baltimore
had been forcibly suppressed by outstate Union troops, but the Maryland
legislature remained adamantly secesh, its outright rebel supporters joining
with the Peace Democrats who had carried the state of Maryland for Breck-
inridge in the presidential campaign the year before. (Breck had outpolled
Lincoln in Maryland ten to one.) That legislature wanted to convene to vote
secession, but Governor Hicks stood in the way: only he could call the legisla-
ture into session and, under pressure from Anna and her Know-Nothing
friends, had flatly refused.
This week, over the governor's protest, the legislature had called itself into
session. Governor Hicks responded by switching the place from the pro-rebel
hotbed of Baltimore to the more neutral city of Frederick, requiring the most
rebellion-minded to make a trek from Maryland's Eastern Shore. But Anna
was worried. The session was scheduled to open in two days, and if the pro-
South, anti-war majority passed a secession ordinance, the present Union
"protection" of Maryland would turn into the violence-ridden occupation of
enemy territory. She tried to think of some political lever to stop this move
but could conjure none. Lincoln had been willing to defy Justice Taney on
habeas corpus in this state, but if he wanted to prevent a vote of secession, he
would have to expand his powers far beyond any ever considered in a democ-
racy. Was Lincoln ready for such absolute repression of the will of the people
of a state? If he was, would a display of despotism only add fuel to the fires of
rebellion? Anna doubted if he had the gumption for a dictatorial coup, but
could see no other way to force Marylanders into line.
The large, empty carriage arrived with Freddy Seward driving. She stepped
in and sat with her back against his.
"First we'll pick up my father," he said. "Then we pick up the President at
the Mansion."
When the young man concentrated on steering the horses up Fourteenth
Street, she asked only, "How is the President?"
"Looks terrible. Maybe he has a chill, he keeps the fire burning in his office
on warm days. Father gave him a couple of kittens yesterday to cheer him
up."
At the Seward house on Lafayette Park, the Secretary of State climbed in
and congratulated her on the pamphlet. He asked if it was being given heavy
distribution in Maryland.
"As it happens, I received this letter from Governor Hicks this morning
about that." She was proud to hand over the communication that not only
reaffirmed her bona fides to the most powerful Cabinet member, but might
help her in a practical, pecuniary way.
" 'Send me a couple of hundred copies of your Reply to Breckinridge, ' "
William Henry Seward read aloud, holding the paper at arm's length to see,
" 'with bill of expenses for the same. I do not think it is right that you should
furnish your publications gratis any longer.' Well, my dear lady, he's right
about that. 'No money can ever pay for what you have done for the state and
the country in this terrible crisis.' Ah, yesthe terrible crisis in Maryland is
what we propose to resolve today."
He told her the plan, and the reason for her presence. They were to fetch
the President, then stop by the McClellan house to pick up the new general
and a small bodyguard of troops. "We will then drive to Georgetown Heights,
and it will be a natural and reasonable conclusion on the part of the public
and press that we are inspecting the camps and fortifications covering the
hills in the direction of Tennallytown." However, after a few brief stops at
fortifications, the official party would drive outside the military lines to the
village of Rockville and rendezvous with General Nathaniel Banks, the for-
mer governor of Massachusetts who now commanded the small force keeping
order and watching the river crossings in Annapolis, Maryland. "Once there,
we will decide to do what has to be done. Your presence, Miss Carroll, has
been requested in order to give the President, the generals, and myself the
details of the political scene in the state where you and your family have such
a benign influence."
The President came aboard looking preoccupied. Anna assumed, from a
conversation the day before at the Biairs', that the Fremont affair was causing
him no end of anguish. It seemed that Jessie Benton Fremont had ridden into
town on her high horse and sorely tried the good man's patience, posing a
Western secession threat if Lincoln interfered with Fremont's emancipation
order, and blaming everything on misunderstandings caused by the duplici-
tous Biairs. Anna knew "General Jessie" to be one of those domineering
women who made it so difficult for all women to succeed in public life;
instinctively, she sided with the Biairs and Lincoln. Young Frank, serving
under FrCmont in St. Louis, would have his hands full.
"I see the kittens were a failure," said William Henry Seward.
Lincoln brightened for a moment. "They've been climbing all over me, and
Willie loves them." That little byplay was fascinating to Anna. Seward, called
"the Premier" at the start of the Administration, and considered a challenge
to Lincoln's authority by virtue of his long preeminence in public life, was
becoming a kind of courtier. She wondered if people had overestimated
Seward or underestimated Lincoln.
The carriage stopped at the door of the headquarters of the Army of the
Potomac. Presently, General McClellan came out and took the vacant seat.
His score of troopers rode in front of and behind the carriage, with a horse-
man along either side, presumably to make it difficult for any would-be assas-
sin to get a clear shot. This was the first time Anna had felt such protection,
or the need for it, and she could not deny the thrill that accompanied it.
"General Banks will be expecting us, I reckon," the President observed to
McClellan.
"Yes, sir," the general said, "I have telegraphed him. He will meet us at his
headquarters at Rockville."
"Is that the best place for a meeting of this sort?" Seward asked.
"He will provide a quiet place for conference," the general said. "I agree,
the headquarters would not be the most private."
"I regard General Banks as one of the best men in the army," the President
said. "He makes me no trouble." Curious, thought Anna, that should be his
criterion, but understandable considering the challenge of Fremont. She knew
Banks from his Know-Nothing days a decade ago, when he was elected
Speaker of the House of Representatives, before he became a Democrat.
"I suppose," queried McClellan, "that General Dix has already received
his instructions?"
"Yes," Lincoln said. "Governor Seward went over to Baltimore a day or
two ago and spent some hours with him at Fort McHenry. So he is fully
informed."
Secretary Seward, who still preferred the title of Governor, nodded. John
Dix was a War Democrat and good friend of Anna's; he had been Secretary of
the Treasury in Buchanan's Cabinet, had been appointed major general of
volunteers and placed in secessionist Baltimore because he could be trusted.
In January, when the captain of a revenue cutter refused the Treasury Secre-
tary's order to surrender to Federal authority in New Orleans, Dix gained
some notoriety with his order: "Consider him a mutineer, and treat him
accordingly. If anyone attempts to haul down the American flag, shoot him
on the spot." Northern newspapers liked that.
"Can General Dix be counted on," asked McClellan, who did not know
him, "to take care of the members in that part of the state?"
Seward gave him a small smile. "General Dix's views on the subject of
hauling down the American flag are pretty well known. He can be depended
upon." Seward, she noted, treated George McClellan with the same slight
condescension he showed toward everyone except Lincoln. McClellan, on the
contrary, seemed respectful without being deferential; like Breck, he carried
with him the air of authority of youthful success. He was thirty-five; five years
younger than Breck, fifteen years Lincoln's junior. She had heard that the
"Young Napoleon" worshipped his young wife, and wrote to her every night
they were parted; that spoke well of him, and Anna was prepared to like the
military man on whom the nation now depended.
At Friendship Heights they held a perfunctory inspection, passing a few
troops drawn up to see the celebrated leaders. McClellan saluted, Lincoln
doffed his tall hat, Seward nodded, and the carriage continued on into Mary-
land. A half hour's ride over rutty roads took them from Tennallytown to
Rockville. They stopped at a tavern that had been made a military headquar-
ters, and General Banks started to usher them in. Rather than go inside,
where conversation could be overheard by aides and squads of soldiers,
Seward said loudly enough for onlookers, "It's a lovely day. Why don't we
meet outdoors, in that grove." He pointed to a picnic area, with chairs and
tables; nobody could approach within earshot without being seen. General
Banks acted as if he had not selected the spot beforehand. When he drew out
a pad to make notes, the President shook his head; not only was this too
private for subordinates, evidently he did not think it wise to trust any of this
to paper.
"The secessionists have not given up hope of dragging Maryland into the
Confederacy," Seward began as the six were seated. "When their legislature
meets on Monday, a move will be made to put forward an ordinance of
secession."
"They have the tickets, I take it," said Lincoln.
Seward seemed unfamiliar with the Western expression, but caught the
President's drift: "Yes, the traitors have the votes. The disunion sentiment in
Maryland is considerable, and a majority of the state legislators are prepared
to take the state out. Marylanders who now submit to Federal rule would
then be called to active revolt."
"We cannot let that happen, Nat," Lincoln said to Banks. "Washington
would soon be in rebel hands."
Anna had the impression that she and the Sewards were the outsiders in
this group. Both Banks and McClellan had been vice presidents of the Illinois
Central Railroad before the war, and lawyer Lincoln had been that railroad's
counsel. Although McClellan and Lincoln had not been closeindeed, Mc-
Clellan had traveled on the Stephen Douglas campaign train during his race
for the Senate, helping to sober up the Little Giant between debates with
Lincolnthey had learned the politics of railroading together, had spent
nights talking after days of testimony in small towns, and spoke with the
familiarity of men with shared roots. They knew each other to be successful
men outside of politics.
"What about Governor Hicks?" asked Seward's son.
The Secretary answered, mainly for the generals' benefit, "We proceed on
the thesis that Hicks is a loyal Union man." He did not repeat the suspicion
that the governor had wanted to be part of a border-state confederation with
Virginia and Kentucky, to form a third force between the United States and
the Southern Confederacy, which Anna was certain would lead to anarchy.
Thanks to the pressure of the Biairs and the Carrolls, Seward told them, and
to the direct threat of bloodshed on his state's soil, Hicks had finally been
pushed into an anti-secession position. "But Governor Hicks is unable to
control the legislature."
General Banks posed a problem facing the loyalist legislators: "The pro-
Union members of the legislature are uncertain about going to Frederick to
fight the proposed ordinance, or staying away to try to block a quorum."
"We cannot afford to take that chance," said Seward, "because the secesh
will fake a forum. I've seen that done often enough in Albany," Anna pre-
sumed that Seward was taking the lead in this because Lincoln, whose pres-
ence at the meeting was required, did not want to dirty his hands with a
matter that would not go down well with many high-minded Congressmen.
"General Dix in the eastern part of the state and, Banks, you here in the
western part, will have to round up and arrest the secessionists before they get
to the legislature."
Anna caught her breath. No wonder there was a need for absolute secrecy.
No legal justification existed, in any Federal or state constitution, for arrest-
ing legislators on their way to a session. Not even the President's inherent
war power, which she was prepared to stretch a long way, would stretch that
far.
"How will we know which is which?" asked Banks.
"The views of each disunion member have been rather loudly proclaimed,"
said Lincoln, "so there should be little difficulty separating the sheep from the
goats."
"I can give you a list," Anna added. "With addresses, and the likely road
they would take to Frederick." It struck her that Governor Hicks's action to
move the meeting across the state would make this sheep-from-goats plan
possible. The idea of arresting the lawmakers before they could vote to secede
had apparently been planned well in advance.
"Has to be done the same night, all at once, no court proceedings, above all
no notice in the press," Seward directed.
"You should expect some protest," said McClellan. "There may be com-
parisons with Cromwell."
Anna knew that all present were aware that the new commander was a
Democrat, the same as Banks and Dix, the political-military men chosen to
carry out this precedent-shattering coup. Lincoln and Seward must feel that
even War Democrats in the North would have some difficulty swallowing
this. Anna assumed that the inclusion of McClellan in the plot showed how
much Lincoln trusted the new commander, and alsoby involving all these
Democrats at the startmade difficult any subsequent criticism of dictatorial
methods. McClellan had offered no objection, and surely must be thinking of
the military problem of a Confederate Maryland interdicting his supply lines.
"To forcibly prevent a legislative body from exercising its functions," said
Seward, speaking for Lincoln, "savours of despotism. Let us grant that it
would generally be so regarded." He looked McClellan in the eye and gave
him the overriding argument: "But when, departing from its legitimate func-
tions, a legislature invites the public enemy to plunge the state into anarchy,
its dissolution becomes commendable."
Anna promptly provided a quotation from Jefferson, patron saint of Breck-
inridge and all the defenders of civil liberty: "A strict observance of the
written law is doubtless one of the highest duties of a good citizen, but it is
not the highest. The laws of necessity, of self-preservation, of saving our
country when in danger, are of higher obligation."
Seward smiled at her warmly for the first time. "I believe Mr. Jefferson said
that, Miss Carroll, after, rather than before, he became President. Great men
grow in power." He turned to Banks. "Absolute secrecy is vital. You, General
Banks, on orders of General McClellan, are to watch the movements of all
members of the legislature who are expected to respond to the summons to
Frederick. Loyal Union members are not to be interfered with. They are free
to come and go, perform their legislative duties, or stay away, just as they
please."
"And the disunion members?" asked Banks.
"They are to be quietly turned back toward their homes."
"And if they don't go quietly?"
"Then you will be forced to arrest them."
That order hung in the summer air for a moment. Banks looked at McClel-
lan, who said nothing. He looked again to Secretary Seward and said, "Gov-
ernor, you know I'm quite prepared to do this, but when I arrest the mayor of
Baltimore on his way to the legislative session, he's liable to ask about the
grounds for his arrest. What do I tell him?"
Lincoln spoke up. "The public safety renders it necessary that the grounds
of these arrests be withheld," he told Banks to say, "but at the proper time
they will be made public."
"In a few weeks or months," added Seward, "when the danger is over, or
when new legislators can be elected, we can release these men."
The generals understood. However, to Anna's surprise, Freddy Seward
popped out with the unspoken question: "But people are going to be compar-
ing President Lincoln with Oliver Cromwell in England, throwing out the
Parliament, and Napoleon throwing out the Assembly in France. I mean, it's
never been done here, and you can just hear the press writing about high-
handed usurpation. For the national military to stop a state legislature from
the lawful"
"Thank you, Freddy," said his father sharply. "This is not to be done in a
Cromwellian or a Napoleonic manner. Just the opposite, nothing spectacular.
As quietly as possible."
The President seemed to feel that the young man's point could not be
brushed aside, and some more explanation had to be offered beyond a prom-
ise to reveal the reasons at the proper time. "Of one thing the people of
Maryland may rest assured," he suggested the Marylanders be told, "that no
arrest is being made, or will be made, not based on substantial and unmistak-
able complicity with those in armed rebellion against the Government of the
United States."
"Then I'll say," said Banks, "that the general grounds for arrest are suspi-
cion of"
A shake of Lincoln's head cut him off. "In no case has an arrest been made
on mere suspicion, or through personal or partisan animosities." The lawyer-
President suggested the officers be most specific about intimating disloyalty
while putting off the presentation of evidence until some later time: "In all
cases the government is in possession of tangible and unmistakable evidence,
which will, when made public, be satisfactory to every loyal citizen."
That sounded lawyerly, but everyone at the table knew it to be untrue: no
such evidence existed in government hands at that moment, although in the
next months perhaps some could be gathered for presentation at the proper
time. The President added determinedly, "We will do everything we can to
discriminate between true and false men."
God would know his own. Banks looked to McClellan, perhaps for a direct
order; the commander of the Army of the Potomac merely nodded, in effect
passing along the verbal order of the commander in chief. That was smart:
nothing written down, nothing dramatic said. If this could be brought off
gently, with a minimum of ammunition provided to the press, the public
reaction to the clearly dictatorial action would be muted. This trick was to
make this a fait accompli with no proclamation or order for even the Confed-
eracy to make much noise about. Still, she could detect a feeling of unease
amid the spoken determination.
"President Jackson," Lincoln said, as if changing the subject, and address-
ing himself to Freddy Seward. "After the battle of New Orleans and after a
treaty of peace had been concluded, General Jackson still maintained martial
law. Since the war was over, the howl against martial law grew more furious.
A member of the Louisiana legislature denounced him in the newspaper.
General Jackson arrested him. A lawyer got a judge to order a writ of habeus
corpus. General Jackson arrested both the lawyer and the judge. When some-
body called that 'a dirty trick,' General Jackson arrested him, too."
Anna had not been aware of this precedent, or of Lincoln's apparent need
for one. The President must have been talking to Old Man Blair again about
the Jackson days.
"After holding the judge in custody a few days," Lincoln continued, "the
general sent him beyond the limits of his encampment and set him at liberty,
with an order to remain away until the peace was formally announced or the
British left the coast. After a few days, that happened, and in a few days
more, the judge called General Jackson into his court and fined him a thou-
sand dollars for having arrested him."
Lincoln rose and stretched. "The general paid the fine," he concluded,
seeming to instruct young Freddy but making his point to the generals, "and
there the matter rested for nearly thirty years. Then the Congress refunded
principal and interest to Jackson's family. The permanent right of the people
to public discussion suffered no detriment by that conduct of General Jack-
son, or its subsequent approval by the American Congress."
"General, do your duty," Seward said to Nathaniel Banks. "Not a word to
anybody who does not need to know. And nothing on paper. And after the
arrests, which you might call brief detainments You have chosen discreet
men to be guards?"
Banks smiled. "I have a Wisconsin unit for that. Swedish and German
farm boys. Not a one of them speaks English."
CHAPTER 2

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
OCTOBER 25, 1861

"Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud!"
That is the concluding line of the Tycoon's favorite poem, "Mortality," by
some anonymous Scotsman. The Prsdt has the entire four stanzas committed
to memory. I have heard him declaim them all, with great solemnity, a dozen
times. Not surprisingly, the bathos-drenched lines have stuck in my head, at
least toward the dreary end:
Yea! hope and despondency, pleasure and pain,
Are mingled together in sun-shine and rain;
And the smile and the tear, and the song and the dirge,
Still follow each other, like surge upon surge.
Nor is that all. He stands, knuckles on the table, staring at the wall, recit-
ing:
'Tis the wink of an eye, 'tis the draught of a breath,
From the blossoms of health, to the paleness of death.
From the gilded saloon, to the bier and the shroud.
Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud!
It is a terrible poem. I cannot think of a more maudlin, banal, and weepy
piece of poetry, and I speak as one who has no small ambition in the poetry
line. Yet Abraham Lincoln told a newspaper friend of his the other day that
he would give all he was worth, go into debt, to be able to write what he
called "so fine a poem as I think that is."
Why do I refrain from telling this to the Tycoon every time he draws a
deep sigh and begins to roll out the silly spirit of mortals? Because such
impertinence would hurt his feelings, lessen me in his estimation, and sully
one of his few sources of solace.
He probably knows it does not stand up to critical scrutiny because he is a
good writer himself. Unfortunately, the cognoscenti, who wrongly equate
flowery prose with good style, do not give him credit for that. My Uncle
Milton gave me a cutting from the Quincy Whig of fifteen years ago, with a
poem that Lincoln wrote about a boy he knew who went insane:
0 death! Thou awe-inspiring prince
That keepst the world in fear;
Why dost thou tear more blest ones hence,
And leave him ling'ring here?
"Awe-inspiring" may be on the trite side, but Lincoln the young poet chose
the right word in "ling'ring," and his dropping of the middle syllable, re-
quired by the rhythm, gives a nice effect on the page. A sad theme, but those
moods overtake him. On occasion he lets the wave of melancholy overwhelm
him, and when that hypo strikes, it makes any sympathetic soul miserable
just to look at him. Only Willie can pull him out of those depressions of the
spirit, and not even that sunny boy can do it right away.
The reason for these lugubrious observations is that Ned Baker is dead.
The colonel died gallantly, at the head of his troops, storming the heights at
Ball's Bluff crossing the Potomac into rebel territory in Virginia. Oregon has
lost a great senator, the army a brave officer, and the President one of his
friends. There is no denying the weight of the blow; casualty lists are always
saddening, but when the scythe cuts down someone close to you, the terror of
war comes home and sits next to you on the bed.
Mrs. Lincoln has retired to her room with only Lizzie Keckley for comfort,
the Tycoon is disconsolate, and the boys are silent. Now even Uncle Ned,
their dead brother Eddie's namesake, is gone. War is not all uniforms and
parades and strutting around waving swords.
Anger is the reaction of most others. Senator Ben Wade of the ferocious
countenance came pounding in here cursing John Breckinridge, whose recent
role as bitter opponent in debate with our fallen hero has made him more
hated than ever. That traitor senator has been reported to be in Richmond,
and the Southern newspapers say he has been offered the choice of rebel
Secretary of War or command of a brigade of Kentucky detectors in the field.
"We won't accept that bastard's resignation," Wade fumed to the mournful
Tycoon. "At the first order of business in the winter session we'll expel him
from the Senate for treason. The other senators who walked out followed
their states, and can claim immunity in that, but not Breckinridge. When the
war's over, that damn traitor will hang."
General McClellan was in the office at the time Wade roared in, and had
been explaining to the Prsdt what had happened to Colonel Baker. At Lin-
coln's nod, with Wade standing there glowering, the general reported: "We've
been sending heavy reconnaissances into Virginia, to find out the position of
the enemy. I suggested to General Stone, Colonel Baker's superior officer,
that perhaps a slight demonstration on our part might cause an enemy move-
ment that we could observe."
"A 'slight demonstration'?" said Wade in scorn. "We lost a thousand men
and the rebels lost a couple of dozen. Some goddamned slight demonstra-
tion!"
General McClellan went rigid in his chair, "I did not order General Stone
across the river. He informs me the troops under his direct command made a
careful probe, and that he did not order Colonel Baker to make a major
assault."
"So your story is that Ned Baker was rash and led his men into a trap, is
it?" When McClellan declined any intention of reaching such an extreme
conclusion, "Bluff Ben" lashed into him with what was the talk of the Jacobin
Club: "I hear different. I hear your General Stone is a disloyal Democrat who
wants to see slavery perpetuated and has had intercourse with known seces-
sionaries."
McClellan was stunned. "It's possible General Stone was unduly aggres-
sive, but that seems to show that he wanted to fight the enemy"
"That damn rebel sympathizer threw Ned Baker and his men across the
river with no way back and no reinforcements," stormed Wade. "He's one of
the pack of Democratic generals who want to lose. He sends back fugitive
slaves, he's challenged Sumner to a duel, and a lot of us have good reason to
think he's on the other side."
"The Fugitive Slave Act is the law, passed by the Congress," McClellan,
who was a Douglas Democrat, protested. Lincoln listened and said nothing.
"I say Stone killed Ned Baker and he ought to be impeached," Wade
blazed in his frustration and fury, and turned toward the President. "And if
you can't run this war any better, Lincoln, with this fellow here holding
parades with his two hundred thousand men and issuing bulletins about how
'the capital is safe' and defending traitor generals, then a joint committee of
the Congress will damn well run it for you."
That was his exit line, leaving the Young Napoleon quietly steaming.
"There is bad blood between Senator Sumner and General Stone over the
return of fugitive slaves, that's true," he said to the Prsdt, "but nobody sent
Colonel Baker and his brigade to their deaths on purpose. What kind of
officer corps can we have if every initiative that fails is called treason? No-
body is more determined to avoid unnecessary casualties than I am, Mr.
President"
"I know. Wade is upset about the tragic loss of our friend Ned, and about
my reversal of Fremont on slavery to save Kentucky. I don't like the idea of a
joint committee, witnesses, testimony, second-guessing us all." That slicing
away of his power to conduct the war would not do. "Tell me the truth about
Ned, George. Did he act rashly?"
"Colonel Baker and his men fought nobly, and I would not hesitate to
testify to that," McClellan evaded. "That would be the extent of my testi-
mony to any committee and it is true. Your friend was a brave man and a
patriot."
Lincoln gave him that level look that called for his military judgment of
what really happened at Ball's Bluff. McClellan took a deep breath and did
not equivocate: "He violated all military rules and precautions. Instead of
meeting the enemy with double their force and a good ferry behind him,
Colonel Baker was outnumbered three to one and had no means of retreat.
The result was a horrible butchery. A commander must never, never ignore
the potential need for a way out."
The Prsdt closed his eyes. After a while, he walked to the window and
looked out at the tree on the ellipse where he and his friend used to sit and
talk. The mental picture of Ned on his back, feet up against the trunk of the
tree, must remain vivid. He must have thought, too, of the colonel who was
here on the scene last April, when the capital was all but undefended, when
the President was saying "There is no North." That stalwart officer was
Stone, now a general. Did he owe him nothing?
"General, go over to the Biairs' tonight after dinner. They're on your side
in many ways." That was a veiled reference to the campaign by Montgomery
Blair and the old gentleman to replace Winfield Scott with McClellan as
General-in-Chief. Old General Scott, on the other hand, thinks McClellan is
a damned upstart trying to get his job, which is true enough, but at the same
time "Old Fuss and Feathers" is patriot enough to know he is too old and
infirm for this war. Because of McClellan's impatience to get control of the
whole army, Scott considers him an ingrate, and so has recommended that
the Prsdt follow his inclination to appoint "Old Brains," General Henry
Halleck, to be Scott's successor and the Young Napoleon's boss. Sobriquets
abound in the military, as do jealousies.
Lincoln was also alluding to the Biairs' support of McClellan's desire to
train his army rather than send it into the fray prematurely, for fear of
bringing on another Bull Run. Building up against this caution is a sentiment
that worries the Prsdt: the growing opinion of Republicans that McClellan is
dawdling, unwilling to fight, while time is on the side of the enemy. It's hard
to say right now who is right about that.
"Ben Wade and Zack Chandler will be there tonight, the old gentleman
tells me," the Prsdt said. "It would be better for you to answer their questions
privately than publicly." And to keep the Jacobin Club, which welcomed
McClellan's appointment after Bull Run, on his side. If Wade, Chandler, and
the rest of the abolitionists turn on him, especially after their darling Fremont
was slapped down, much heat will be applied to the President by Jacobins
who want to grab the reins. They cannot attack the President directly, but by
finding reasons for disappointment in his surrogate, they can diminish Lin-
coln's power to decide what is the goal of the war.
McClellan nodded understanding, and brought up a pressing matter of the
elections coming up in Maryland next week. "You will recall that the seces-
sion ordinance was not introduced last month," he said, looking toward me
as if to wish me out of the room. "The chief of our Secret Service reports that
several hundred Maryland disunionists have returned to their homes from
visits to rebel headquarters in Virginia, and may interfere with the rights of
suffrage of loyal citizens."
"What do you need?"
"Last month only sixteen legislators wouldn't listen to reason. The rest,
who were stopped by Banks, agreed to turn around and go home. This time,
considering reports to Mr. Pinkerton of secret arms shipments, there may
have to be many more arrests, especially around the polling places. For the
record, I'd like a written order from civilian authority."
"Get it from Seward," the Prsdt said. "He will authorize you to suspend
the habeas corpus to make arrests of traitors and their confederates in your
discretion." Lincoln hated to put that sort of thing in writing, but it didn't
bother Seward a whit.
McClellan said he would go from the Executive Mansion to the Seward
house immediately, then to the Biairs' after dinner. They were all within one
block.

CHAPTER 3
THE YOUNG NAPOLEON
George McClellan, who sat a horse as well as any man in the United States
Army, guided his steed to the top of a hill in Georgetown. The sun was
disappearing behind the Virginia hills across the Potomac. One of his aides,
the Cornte de Parisson of the pretender to the crown of France, a presti-
gious presence McClellan rather likedhanded him a spyglass.
On the rebel side of the river, heavy cannon emplacements threatened
Union control of river traffic. Pinkerton, interviewing deserters, prisoners of
war, and fugitive slavesas well as running his own spies behind rebel lines
was estimating Southern strength in eastern Virginia at 98,400 men. Mc-
Clellan had come to trust "Major Alien"; the little detective's warnings of
enemy troop strength did not incline a general to rashness and the kind of
hubris that led to defeats like Bull Run and Ball's Bluff.
McClellan's eye tracked his fortifications from Georgetown to Alexandria,
south of the Potomac, in an arc about fourteen miles long. Spaced a mile
apart, strongpoints with six heavy guns each defended against an attack from
that southern flank; he had established another chain of forts to the west,
across the river in Arlington; a third chain in Maryland defended the capital
from attack from the north.
He swung the eyeglass back around the hills of Washington, their sides
dotted with tents clustered around training centers. He had 152,051 men on
his rolls. After deducting for absent, sick, and under arrest, and counting out
the twelve thousand for whom arms had not yet been receivedChase had
been slow getting the moneyhe had at least a hundred thousand men ready
for action. His was the largest army ever assembled on this continent, and the
great agglomeration was beginning to resemble a fighting unit.
The general permitted himself a satisfied smile. The troops were assembled
in each area, the flag-lowering ceremony under way, honor guards marching
about, military discipline and tradition being drilled into every soldier's mind.
Three months ago, the men had been a mob; now they were the Army of the
Potomac, McClellan's army, and he was becoming as proud of its men as he
knew they were proud of the leader they called "Our George." Within a few
months, after winter quarters, he was sure these green troops would be ready
for the decisive battle that would win the war, or at least end the war with the
Union preserved.
McClellan put down the spyglass and frowned. The night before, acting on
Lincoln's suggestion, he had met with Wade and Chandler at the Biairs'
house and promised a decisive battle before the winter. That assurance of
early action had been necessary to enlist their support in the unseating of
General Scott, and the blocking of Henry Halleck as replacement in the chair
of general-in-chief.
"The name of Ball's Bluff must be wiped out," Wade had bawled, "by a
decisive victory right away."
A victory was by no means certain using green troops, McClellan had told
him honestly.
"I prefer an unsuccessful battle to further delay," the senator had said,
incredibly, "since a defeat can be repaired easily by swarming recruits."
That was dismaying. Could any military man hope to succeed under the
constant goading of such politicians? McClellan told him that he did not have
men enough for a serious assault on the 220,000 Confederate soldiers facing
him. They were behind fortifications stronger than he had observed in Sebas-
topol, when he was sent to Russia to learn about tactics used in the Crimean
War. He much preferred to have a few new recruits before a victory than a
swarm of recruits after a defeat. McClellan wanted these senators on his side
in the campaign to replace old Winfield Scott, but he could not tell them
exactly what they wanted to hear.
"What in hell is holding you back?" Zack Chandler, who was drunk as the
hour approached midnight, had demanded. "Soldiering isn't all champagne
and oyster dinners." Nellie's dinners were more elegant than the boorish
Chandler would ever appreciate. Instead of defending himself, he took the
offensive: "I am being stymied by General Scott. He is ever in my way. I am
sure he does not desire effective action."
Wade had pushed him even farther: "You're the one surrounded by nearly
two hundred thousand of your spit-and-polish paraders. You're the one issu-
ing those stupid bulletins about how 'the capital is safe.' You claim that Scott
is holding you back?"
"General Scott understands nothing and appreciates nothing," McClellan
remembered replying with some heat. "I have to fight my way against him."
That was when the Biairs had come in strongly for his cause. Montgomery
Blair, a West Pointer, said that Scott's choice of Halleck was proof of his lack
of aggressiveness. "Old Brains" was notorious in the army for never leaving
his maps to get out in the field. Wade, for all his bombast, showed himself to
be shrewder than McClellan had originally thought. He told the Biairs to
their faces that they were plotting to put "their" general, McClellan, in
charge in the East while they snatched away authority from "his" general,
Fr6mont, in the West.
That was an impressive reading of military-political affairs, McClellan had
thought, who was then even more impressed by the way the old gentleman,
Francis P. Blair, forced Wade to about-face on Cabinet influences. Senator
Wade's abolitionist ally in the Cabinet was supposedly his fellow Ohioan,
Secretary Chase, said Old Man Blair, but he had heard that Chase was plot-
ting with Ohio friends to take Wade's Senate seat the following year, because
it would provide the ambitious Chase a better springboard for the presidency
in 1864. Ben Wade would be better off, the elder Blair told him, relying on the
Biairs as his friends.
That political conniving, on top of McClellan's derogation of General
Scott, did the trick. The senators left that night with a vague promise of early
action in return for their support of McClellan as Scott's successor. To
achieve supreme command, McClellan had learned, required distasteful par-
ticipation in political dealings; once in charge, however, he was determined
never to allow partisan politics to affect his military judgment. If postponing
action until victory was likely angered Ben Wade and the radicals, so be it. It
was Lincoln's job to keep the politicians in line while he fought the war.
Followed by his personal staff of about twenty officers and orderlies, Gen-
eral McClellan made his way down from the high ground to Pennsylvania
Avenue and toward the Executive Mansion. The President had sent word that
he would be pleased to receive the general at the end of the day.
Lincoln was a rare old bird, McClellan had to admit with respect. Un-
doubtedly, just as the President had arranged, Lincoln had been besieged by
Wade and Chandler, probably with club-footed Thaddeus Stevens in tow, to
get rid of the aging Scott and replace him with the vigorous McClellan as
supreme commander. That was good generalship on Lincoln's part, in Mc-
Clellan's judgment. A wise leader sometimes tried to get the adversary to
entice him into doing what the leader wanted to do in the first place.
One of Lincoln's secretariesa young man named Hay who, McClellan
thought, should have been in uniform by nowled him in.
"Some wonderful inventions are in the works," said Lincoln. Evidently he
was going to regale him with small talk before getting to the point. "There's
this new repeating battery of rifled gun, shoots fifty balls a minute. Can you
imagine? I've ordered ten of them. If you think it's proper, would you detail a
corps of men to work on it?"
Such a marvel might be useful in a war a generation hence, thought Mc-
Clellan, but he knew Lincoln was het up about inventionshad even taken
out a patent himself for an ingenious method of lifting boats across river
damsso he promised to have someone look into the rapid-firing weapon
immediately.
"And that's not all. Up in Long Island, they've laid the keel for an ironclad
warship. I saw the inventor here myself a couple of months ago. As the girl
said when she stuck her foot in the stocking, 1 think there's something in
it.' "
McClellan dutifully smiled at the feeble attempt at humor, but he made no
comment on what was being derided in naval circles as "the cheesebox on a
raft." This war was not going to be won by naval eccentricities. The only
invention that he thought might be helpful now was the hot-air balloon, the
military application of which Lincoln, he was sure, had not yet considered. It
would be good to get up high enough to see the enemy's order of battle.
"And this week, too"Lincoln seemed to McClellan to be deliberately
avoiding the subject of military command"we've completed the transconti-
nental telegraph, the last leg from Denver to California. The war did that
would have taken years in peacetime." McClellan recognized the importance
of the telegraph east of the Mississippi, where the war was being fought, but
failed to see why it was so useful to be able to get the news from California.
"About the war, sir," McClellan said, reminding Lincoln.
"Yes. The Maryland Volunteers . . ." What did this man want to know
about a minor detachment of the Army of the Potomac? "Senator Reverdy
Johnson was in here asking that they be permitted to vote in the elections
next week in Maryland. Would you give them the time off? We need the
votes."
"It shall be done," he replied. McClellan thought that furloughing Union
supporters to vote was easier than arresting rebel supporters, but if in the
future he was going to have to send soldiers home to vote in the middle of a
battle, he was in for a long war.
"Wade and Chandler were in today. Hay here calls them the Jacobins.
They want to know why you haven't moved the army."
"Senator Wade told me last night that he so opposed delay that he would
prefer to have an unsuccessful battle. He said that a defeat could easily be
repaired by what he called the 'swarming recruits.' "
"And what did you say?"
"I told him," said McClellan, "I would rather have a few recruits before a
victory than a good many after a defeat."
"Good, good. No needless slaughter. Popular impatience is a dangerous
thing," offered Lincoln, adding, "at the same time, it's a reality. The popular
mood must be taken into account." When the general allowed himself to look
troubled at that, the President added, "At the same time, General, you must
not fight until you are ready."
"Don't let them hurry me, is all I ask."
"You'll have your own way in that matter, I assure you."
McClellan was dying to ask: In what capacity? As a field commander,
saddled with harassment from above, or as supreme commander, having to
answer only to the nation and to history? He restrained himself, of course,
but did not want to leave the matter of "hurrying" at that. Lincoln had to
understand that there would never be a problem of lack of personal bravery at
the highest level. He was prepared to lay down his life at the head of his
troops, but he was determined that it be in a well-planned, victorious engage-
ment. If he was anything in his life, he was a success. "I have everythingmy
whole lifeat stake," McClellan said earnestly. "If I fail, I will not see you
again. Or anybody."
"I have a notion to go out in the field with you," said Lincoln, with one of
his deep sighs, "and stand or fall with the battle." The general recognized
that to be a kind of standoff; physical courage was not limited to the military.
Finally Lincoln set aside his woolgathering look and assumed an air of
authority. "I have to make some changes in military command. What do you
think of General Henry Halleck?"
McClellan's heart sank; Scott's revenge. McClellan would have rid himself
of a superior officer only to have him replaced by another. "He's written a
book," he replied dully. "I don't know how much practical action he has
seen."
"I've been reading that book right hereElements of Military Art and
Science." Lincoln picked it up, hefted the tome in his huge hand, put it back
on the desk. "I'm thinking of replacing Fremont in the West with Halleck, as
the Biairs suggest. What do you think, George?"
The familiar "George" registered, along with the question, as evidence that
he was to be named General-in-Chief. "I think that's an excellent choice,"
adding, "Mr. President."
"But will Fremont hold still for it?" The question came from Lincoln's
young secretary, who McClellan considered hardly deserved the right to
speak up on such affairs of military high command, but the President did not
seem to mind. "There's talk that if President Lincoln relieves him, he might
try to set up for himself, refuse to cede his authority. Or else go out West and
organize a new nation."
Now the general saw a good reason for an interest in a transcontinental
telegraph. He also surmised that Lincoln, through his aide, was testing Mc-
Clellan's reaction to possible military challenge to control by civilians; in
times like these, a dictatorship was a real possibility.
"Fremont is a patriot," he said decisively. "He's a terrible general, and that
wrongheaded abolition move of his made it impossible for him to maintain
complete control in Missouri, maybe for the rest of the war. But he knows
that a President is the commander in chief. He will take a direct order and
step down. To do anything else would be the act of a traitor, which John
Fremont is not."
That was evidently what Lincoln wanted to hear. "I have in mind, further,
that you should succeed General Scott as General-in-Chief. That, in addition
to your command of the Army of the Potomac."
McClellan swallowed and stood erect.
"This is a vast increase of responsibility," Lincoln continued. "In addition
to your present command, the supreme command of the army will entail a
vast labor on you." He seemed to want reassurance.
"I can do it all," McClellan said with certainty.
"Well. Call on me for all the sense I have, and all the information."
McClellan understood that the Presidentan uncertain leader, feeling his
way, fearful of delegating responsibilitywanted to be sure that his advice
would be considered. "I am now in close contact with you and with the
Secretary of War," said the new General-in-Chief. "I want you to know, sir,
that I would not be in the least embarrassed by your intervention with your
ideas at any time."               ';,
"Good. Then it's done. General Scott, of course, knows." He did not say
"approves." "You'll want to talk to Wade and his friends again, maybe cool
them off a little about Fremont."
Lincoln had involved Wade, Chandler, and Stevens in the making of the
McClellan appointment, and now wanted "their" man to mollify their fury at
the replacement of Fremont. Smart politics, McClellan thought, with an edge
of contempt for it all.
"And I wouldn't spend too much of your time with the Secretary of War.
At the War Department, there's Tom Scottyou must know him from your
own railroad days"McClellan nodded; Scott had run the Pennsy when
McClellan headed the Illinois Central"and Edward Stanton, a War Demo-
crat like you, that I used to argue law cases with in the old days. Simon
Cameronwell, deal directly with me on anything you need."
McClellan nodded; he knew from Greeley's New York Tribune that Cam-
eron was Secretary of War only because Lincoln did not trust him to be
Secretary of the Treasury, the post he had been promised in return for the
support that delivered to Lincoln the Republican nomination. Politics again.
He was glad that was Lincoln's profession, not his; if Lincoln would fight off
the politicians in Washington, McClellan was certain he could defeat the
enemy in the field, at a time and place of his own choosing.

CHAPTER 4
IT FLOWS THE OTHER WAY
"Get me outa here!"
"You'll be out soon enough," Anna Can-oil told Frank Blair, visiting the
caged Congressman, now the only Union colonel in jail for insubordination, in
his large cell at the military prison in St. Louis. "Fremont is to be replaced by
Halleck in a few days, and meantime David Hunter will be in command.
He'll let you out first thing."
"Fremont is a madman," the youngest of the Blair clan gritted. "First he
gets some of my closest friends needlessly killed. Then when my newspaper
criticizes him, he closes it down. Then when I point out the corruption in
military contracts and demand a court-martial for those friends of his who
are stealing us blind, he claps me in jail."
"Maybe you shouldn't have called him an opium-eater," she suggested.
"It's the only explanation for the way he acts," he muttered, "and he said I
was a drunk. I drink all right, but I'm like your friend Breckinridge1 can
hold my booze."
She changed the subject. "I think Jessie put him up to arresting you."
"That crazy woman! You know what she once told me? She said she mod-
eled herself on the role of the Empress Josephine, who helped Napoleon
overthrow the French Directory. Thanks to her, I've been rotting here for
days, instead of fighting rebels, while that posturing maniac who thinks he's
Julius Caesar reincarnate is out losing the war!"
"It's your own fault, Frank," she told him. "You pushed him until he lost
his temper. Now the rebels are in control of large parts of this state at night.
Your damn feud was bad for the Biairs, bad for the Union cause in Missouri,
bad for the country."
He sat down on the bunk next to her, still puffy with rage, but slightly
subdued. She liked him; immature, pugnacious, emotionally volatile, even a
bit spoilt, but a brave man with the right political instincts. Moreover, the
Biairs were her allies in Maryland and Washington.
"I'll take that from you, Anna," he growled, "because you're like family.
Besides, you're the first woman they've let come in here. How did you man-
age?"
She displayed her military pass signed by Colonel Tom Scott, Assistant
Secretary of War. The credential, entitling her to a military escort, had taken
her into a dozen army camps between Washington and Missouri, along the
route of the Baltimore and Ohio, up to Chicago, then down to St. Louis. She
had been sent at Attorney General Bates's request to reconnoiter for Lincoln.
She had observed the state of troop training, studied the condition of readi-
ness of the generals, and made copious notes on the logistical support for
planned movements. Most people talked freely to her, assuming her to be
only a woman who would not understand.
"I've talked to Cump Sherman. He's John's brother, you know. He wants
you out and back in action," she said. General William Sherman's middle
name was Tecumseh, and she did not know him well enough to call him
"Cump" to his face, but she liked to show her familiarity with these fellows.
"He says that Sam Grant, in Cairo, wants you out too."
That cheered the prisoner. "I'll be surprised if Fr~mont steps down without
a fuss."
She grinned and laid a hand on his hairy arm. "He's not making it easy.
His camp is on the lockout for messengers from Washington. Fr6mont must
figure if he doesn't actually receive an order to relieve him, he can go looking
for a battle to win one of these days. I know the order has been cut, but
Lincoln's man may have to dress up like a farmer, sneak through to his tent,
and hand him his orders."
Blair roared with laughter and as quickly subsided. "But you think that
puffed-up popinjay will obey?"
"With grace and dignity," she predicted. "He'll tell all the hotheads
around him to go to work for the next commander. Give Fremont credit, he's
a patriot."
"I'll give him nothing. If Jessie is with him when the order arrives, he'll
lead a revolt."
She rose and clapped him on the shoulder. "You cool off and we'll get you
out. Strong language now can ruin your chances later." Everybody knew the
family had big plans for him.
She had an appointment at the Mercantile Library with the chief librarian,
an old friend who was the brother of the Confederate general in Tennessee.
That was where she was to research her war powers pamphlet, and, while she
was at it, to get some idea of the order of battle of the contending armies.
Before she left the cell, Anna remembered a sad chore she had to carry out
for Lizzie Keckley, the black modiste who made her dressesand Mrs. Lin-
coln'sin Washington. "What went wrong at the battle of Wilson's Creek,
Frank?"
He leaned his head into his hands and rubbed his temples, as if to blot out
the memory. "General Nat Lyon took five thousand men to Springfield to
stop a rebel force of twice that size. Fr6mont wouldn't back him up. Lyon
might have brought it off, but he got killed and his men ran. Disaster because
there were no reserves. Cost us thirteen hundred casualties, and half the state
of Missouri. Nat was my best friend."
"I'm sorry. A friend of mine's son was killed there. All she saw was his
name on the casualty listKeckley, killed in action. She asked me to find out
what I could."
He looked up. "Keckley. Big, strapping, redheaded kid. Worked around
headquarters. I remember him."
She shook her head. "Couldn't be him."
"The Keckley I recall was a freckle-faced redhead. Anyhow, tell your
friend that her son died a hero, trying to save General Lyon's life. Nobody
knows. It'll make her happy, and I'll back it up."
"What will you do when you get out, Frank?"
"Take a command with Sherman, if he'll have me, or Grant, if Halleck
doesn't run him out of the army. Congress doesn't convene for two months."
"What should the Army of the West be doing?"
"Driving right down the Mississippi Valley," the colonel-Congressman said
with no hesitation. "Take Columbus, storm Vicksburgthat's not going to be
easyand go right down to New Orleans. Cut the rebels off from guns and
ammunition coming up now through Mexico, and from Texas food. Scare
away the British and French, who might recognize the rebels if we don't
move soon. When we reduce all those Mississippi forts, the secesh will wither
away. Why are you shaking your head?"
Frank had been describing Scott's "anaconda plan" to slowly squeeze the
South into submission. That notion had already been derided in Congress and
the press for taking too long. Now General Scott was out and McClellan was
in, and the new manyounger than Frank Blair, but a born commander
was known to believe the war was to be won in the East. Anna said only,
"That relies on gunboats to reduce the Mississippi forts. You're building
gunboats every day. Have you ever been on a gunboat?"
"No. You?"
She held up her pass. "I have a date to visit the boatyard tomorrow." She
pulled his long mustache to one side and kissed his cheek. "But I'll camp in
the commanding general's office until you're released, I promise."
Outside the prison, she changed her plans and made a beeline for the
boatyard. The walk took forty minutes, but the War Department had not
provided carriage expenses, and the November air was crisp and the walk-
ways hard and dry. The pamphlet she had been asked to write on the war
powers of the President was a piece of difficult work and she would get
around to it soon enough. More troubling was the military strategy that
seemed to be taking shape. It struck her as a recipe for defeat.
Who was she, as military men suggested testily, to be "dabbling in military
affairs"? Such life-and-death matters were strictly for bewhiskered West
Pointers, for students of Napoleon like "Old Brains" Hallecknot for ama-
teurs, and least of all for ladies. But with similar condescension, offended
males often also said that the law was for learned counsel, and she had
discovered that eminent attorneysBates, for examplewould turn to her to
do legal research, to think through a legal position, to talk it over with a
lawyer or two, and then to write it in persuasive form. After a while, she had
stopped clearing matters with lawyers; in the case of the habeas corpus
memo, and the Reply to Breckinridge, and now the war powers memo, she
was on her own. The lawyers would then pick at it, change it a little, but treat
it with the reverence that the printed word commanded. They all agreed that,
had she not been a woman, she "would have made a fine lawyer." But, in fact,
she acted as a fine lawyer.
Military strategy attracted Anna Carroll for the same reason. It was not
warno blood, no privation, no braveryrather, strategy was a study of
power relationships, based on geography and logistics. Her years of experi-
ence promoting railroads steeped her in more logistics than most military
men studied in a lifetime. With Jefferson Davis and Bob Walker five years
ago, she had written tracts and presentations for the Memphis & Charleston,
showing how the financing of this cross-Southern railroadlinking Memphis
on the Mississippi with Charleston on the Atlanticcould give impetus to
the industrialization of the South and form the basis for a southern-route
transcontinental railroad. Jeff Davis had a fine mind, she judged, and had
been a good client: he had often called that railway "the spine of the South."
She knew every inch of that line, and how it supplied Atlanta, Montgomery,
Nashville, even Richmond. She wondered if any of the Union generals, most
so recently civilians, knew how important that transportation system was in
the movement of armies and supplies. Anna assumed that some did; but of
the generals she had spoken to in the past two weeks, almost all had eyes fixed
on a Mississippi campaign, down the most heavily fortified river in the world.
Never an element of surprise. Worse, the success of such a Mississippi River
campaign rested on gunboats, with which most generals had little experience.
At the shipbuilder's, Anna flashed her impressive War Department creden-
tials. The yard boss, obviously wondering why he was required to show the
construction of the latest machines of war to a lady, pointed out the two boats
in preparation. One was a wooden ship, the other partially ironclad; almost
all the guns were located forward, few aft.
"How fast are they?"
He shook his head at the stupidity of the question. "These are like barges,
lady. Not built for speed. Built to take weight, to carry heavy artillery to
match the guns of the river forts, and not to sink so quick when hit by enemy
cannonballs. The whole idea is to float slowly toward and past a river port
blazing away."
"How slow are they, then?"
"Seven knots, eight if you push it."
She nodded. "River pilots," she said. "Where do they eat?"
The amused shipyard man told her of a restaurant-bar along the wharf and
added a suggestion that she not go there alone. She agreed, thanked him, and
headed for her hotel, the Everett House. Coming down to St. Louis from
Chicago, Anna had met a river pilot's wife, a chatty, frumpy woman, who
said she would also be staying at the Everett.
Mrs. Charles Scott was her name. Why was it, Anna wondered, that so
many people in her life were named Scott? Winfield Scott, who would come
to her father's house and discuss military tactics after the Mexican War;
Thomas Scott, who had hired her for pamphleteering and some influence
with state legislators when he was with the Pennsylvania Railroad, and who
as Assistant Secretary of War had signed her pass; and now this Charles
Scott.
The river pilot's wife, gabbing amiably about the way the rebels had stolen
her husband's boat, agreed to search for him at his favorite restaurant on the
wharf. With Mrs. Scott in tow, Anna hired a carriage and headed the horses
down to the Mississippi docks.
Charles Scott did not appreciate the visit; he was quietly and privately
drinking the afternoon away. "I got nothing to tell you," he glared, "you may
be secesh." He glanced only briefly at her credentials; Anna suspected he
could not read.
"You'll be helping the Federals when they go down the river to take Vicks-
burg, won't you?"
He grunted. "Prob'ly get a cannonball down our throats. You been down-
river? Rebs are expectin' visitors."
She ordered a beer and said nothing. She was accustomed to dealing with
this sort, who resisted all questions asked, and would answer only unasked
questions. After a while, and some hard looks between husband and wife,
Mrs. Scott volunteered, "My Charlie's done some work for one of the Union
generals."
Anna made a face to indicate she didn't believe her husband was that
important.
"Grant," said the river pilot. "I work part-time for him, showing him the
forts down around Cairo, sometimes drawing fire to see where the guns are.
Commander Foote's boat, the Essex, you heard of it? Dangerous work."
"The Mississippi's current gets pretty fast down there," Anna offered.
Right or wrong, it would keep him talking.
"No," said the pilot. "Current stays pretty steady seven knots all the way
south, to Memphis, Vicksburg, New Orleans. You don't know much about
the river, ma'am."
"A gunboat floats down past those forts on a current of seven knots," she
calculated aloud. "If you put on the engines, you can add seven more knots.
That's fourteen knots passing the forts. Does anybody hit anything?"
The pilot had to laugh. "Not at that speed, the current plus the engine
speed. No, you go as slow as the river lets you when you fire your artillery
into the fort. You cut engines, or reverse engines, and slug it out."
"And what about coming back?"
"That's the problem." Long pause. Anna did not ask what the problem
was. "Gettin' back."
"If the gunboats don't reduce the fort on the way downriver, the boats
must fight the current coming back," she said. "At best, you get one or two
knots of relative speed."
"And you've been under fire from the shore batteries," the river pilot
sighed, "most likely damaged, and you can't offset the current's speed of
seven knots. So you hang there, dead in the water, and then you get carried
back by the current, floating downstream until you're captured by Johnny
Reb and spend the war in a prison camp."
"No wonder General Fremont didn't launch a big attack down the Missis-
sippi," Mrs. Scott piped up. "Pity the Big Muddy doesn't run the other way.
Then we could do our fighting and, if we didn't win, we could float back and
try again later."
"Mississippi runs south," said the river pilot with some contempt. "Rivers
have a way of doing that on this continent."
"I haven't met Sam Giant," Anna said. "Some say he drinks."
"They say I do, too," growled the pilot, "and I say the hell with them.
Grant's a fighter, if the powers that be ever give him a decent command. He's
not happy about the talk about Old Brains coming out here next month.
There's some bad blood between him and Halleck."
Anna sipped her beer and tried a new tack. "If I wanted to ship a load of
coal to Charleston, over on the Atlantic coast, from here in St. Louis, how
would I go about it?"
"Barge halfway down the Mississippi to Memphis, Tennessee, then by rail
straight across to Charleston. That's why they call that railroad the Memphis
& Charleston, lady."
"But there's a war on, Captain. Can't use the Mississippi."
Scott frowned; she was asking him to think. "There's a couple of other
rivers southeast from Paducah. You could ship the coal on the Cumberland
River to Nashville, and then overland to the Atlantic." He thought that over
and rejected it. "Nobest bet would be up the Tennessee River to Pittsburg
Landing, where it crosses the Memphis-to-Charleston line, and then use the
railroad clear across the country to Charleston Harbor."
That last formulation confused her. Anna tried to remember something
about the Tennessee River that Breckinridge had told her, but the thought
was elusive. The river ran southward on the map from Kentucky down
through Tennessee, paralleling the Mississippi River for a time, then jogged
east across northern Alabama. It offered a military strategist an alternative
way to cut the central east-west rail line of the South. But war was not all the
business of cutting enemy supply lines, it was establishing lines of your own.
If the Confederacy could keep the Mississippi closed to shipping from Mis-
souri, Ohio, and Illinois, those Union states of the West would soon bring
pressure on Lincoln to end the war. She looked for a new outlet to the sea:
"What if I want to ship through New Orleans from here?"
"You couldn't, the Mississippi's closed. Best you could do is"he stopped
for a moment, an idea forming in his mind"the same as before, take the
Tennessee River to Pittsburg Landing, right where the Tennessee joins with
Alabama and Mississippi. Then you cart the coal overland just a couple of
mileshell, I've walked it a hundred timesto the Tombigbee River, and
straight on down Alabama to Mobile on the Gulf. Just as good a port as New
Orleans."
"Navigable all the way?"
"Not by the kind of ships that work the Mississippi, but medium-sized
shipssure. There's just that little jump overland, from river to river, where
you'd have to unload and switch ships. But I thought your destination was
the Atlantic coast, not the Gulf."
"The Gulf ships sail to Europe too," said Anna Carroll, putting down a
nickel for her beer.
That night, at the Everett House, the sheets of foolscap about the war
powers of the President pushed aside on her desk, Anna traced an idea for a
troop movement down the Tennessee River. Paducah, Kentucky, at the top of
the Tennessee River, was already in Union hands. The musings of Breck in
Lexington a month before flooded back to her memory: "If the North takes
Paducah, and gets past Fort Henry, the Union forces will have a clear run down
the Tennessee River to Pittsburg Landing. "
That was why General Sidney Johnston, best of the Southern strategists,
had strengthened Fort Henry, on the river near Paducah. If the South could
not stop them there, the Union forces would be in a perfect position: Grant
and Sherman would have the choice of turning right to pick off the great
Mississippi strongpoints like Vicksburg from the rear, or turn left and march
clear across the South to the sea. That was why Kentucky had been so
crucial: if Breck had held it neutral, the North would be denied the use of the
Tennessee River. It was a lucky thing that the impatient rebel General Polk
had blundered by invading Kentucky, giving Grant the excuse to grab Padu-
cah and pose his threat to Fort Henry.
Anna was startled by a rap on her hotel door. She looked at her clock: the
time was past II P.M. Perhaps Frank Blair 33ad been freed. She called through
the bolted door to see who it was at that h~r. A slurred voice answered. Her
curiosity overcame her fear.
River pilot Scott was standing in the hallway, in a robe, looking troubled
and slightly drunk. "I have to talk to you, ma'am."
She let him in, motioning to the chair, but he did not sit down. "About
your load of coal. There's something I suppose you ought to know. My wife
says you're a good Union lady, and you even know Lincoln, so I suppose you
ought to know about it."               "
She said nothing, looking interested.
"It's not like a secret, or anything1 mean, everybody who ever worked
the rivers around here knows it and never even thinks about it."
Anna nodded.
"You were askin' about how fast the currents went, and I was tellin' you
how the gunboats couldn't get back up the Mississippi if they got shot up."
He sat down on the edge of the desk chair, blinking. "The Tennessee River?
There's one big difference about it. It flows the other way."
Anna could feel her chest constrict. "It flows north?"
"Kind of a freak. It starts in the east, and then comes up north toward us.
When the Tennessee parallels the Big Muddy, it's flowing the other way.
Toward the north."
The gunboats could get back. If disabled after engaging the shore batteries,
they would not float into enemy hands. "That's why Sidney Johnston is
building Fort Henry, near Paducah?"
"Yeah. Fort Donaldson, too, on the Cumberland. I guess he figures we'd
think of coming up the Tennessee to Pittsburg Landing one of these days.
Makes a lot of sense."
That was it, the incongruence that had been nagging her mind. "Up" the
Tennessee River current meant "down" on a map, southward.
"Maybe I better tell Grant about it," the pilot mused sleepily. "He's not
hard to get to, not like Fremont."
"Do that. But don't tell anybody else."
"It's so obvious."
"Sooner or later, it'll occur to everybody," she agreed. The important thing
for her was to be sooner, and to be the one who brought this plan to Lincoln.
"You could grab Vicksburg from the rear too," the river pilot said, other
advantages of the strategy unfolding for him. "All its fixed guns point west,
toward the Mississippi."
"And the Tennessee is navigable clear down to Pittsburg Landing?" sh
repeated, making certain.
"That's what we call that landing," said the pilot. "The Rebs down ther
call it by the name of the chapel up on the bluffShiloh."

CHAPTER
FT TTR-niTRS

Ashes of roses was the color of the silk, with a wavy, moire antique pattern.
Elizabeth Keckley was seated on the Lincolns' bed, needle plunging expertly
in and out of the material, raising the hem an inch because the President's
wife had directed that the gown show more arm and bust. Lizzie had to drop
the whole dress, which was a few hours' work, but Mrs. Lincoln was right;
she knew what looked good on her. The material was the best, from France,
the color just coming into fashion. Not even Kate Chase had been seen in it
yet.
She thought of her son again and had to stop sewing. She took the letter
from Miss Carroll out of her bag and read it once more. The letter, just
received from St. Louis on Everett House stationery, was a comfort. "I have
it from no less an authority than General Blair, who was General Lyon's
closest friend and who looked closely into the history of the action at Wil-
son's Creek on August 10, that your son, James Keckley, died a hero in the
glorious cause of the preservation of the Union." Miss Carroll's letter went on
into considerable detail about Private Keckley's heroism in holding "Bloody
Ridge" from sustained rebel attack, his succor for his dying general, and
finally his own quick and painless death. She would keep that forever. She
folded the pages into the envelope, tucked it away, and resumed her sewing.
Jim had been a strong boysix feet three, nearly as tall as Mr. Lincoln
with the red hair and green eyes of his father, the white man who raped her
twenty years ago. She knew she would have lost him, in any event, whether or
not he survived the war. Her son had been determined to pass for white. She
had seen slave families broken up and sold in her youth and was resigned to
the breakup of her tie to her only son when the time came to cast off the past.
James Keckley lived and died a free man; his mother had seen to that. She
had bought her freedom and his fourteen years before, for twelve hundred
dollars, the money borrowed from the St. Louis ladies who appreciated her
talents as a seamstress.
"Seamstress" no more; "modiste" was the word, chosen because it meant
she designed her own patterns, cut the material, and made no two dresses the
same. Lizzie Keckley was not the sort to boast, but carried with her always
the certainty that she was the best in the city of Washington at what she did.
Her select clientele agreed; Varina Davis, who had been a good customer,
made sure Mrs. Lincoln knew of Lizzie's abilities before she had to leave for
Richmond with her husband, the former senator. Mrs. Keckley opposed the
central element that the Confederacy stood for, but she was prepared to grant
the slaveholders had shown good sense in electing a gentleman like Jefferson
Davis as their President for the next six years, if the rebellion succeeded.
"Where's Mother?" Willie Lincoln, eleven, followed as usual by Tad, two
years younger, burst in the room. She liked the boys, especially the spunky
Willie, who reminded her of her own free-spirited Jim at that age. Both Willie
and Tad were spoiled by their parents, but not seriously so. They called her
"Mrs. Keckley" rather than "Lizzie" at the direction of their father, who
insisted they show respect to a free negress. The President had called her that,
too, until she suggested "Lisabeth," which she felt was a good compromise
between undue formality and disrespectful familiarity.
"Your mother is with Major French, down in the Green Room," she told
them. Mrs. Lincoln was with the Commissioner of Public Buildings, sum-
moned to help the "First Lady of the Land," as a newspaper reporter liked to
call her, solve a terrible problem. "You'd better stay away. Especially with
your face looking that way."
"What's wrong with my face?" Willie's face, with its nice hint of mischief,
was obviously unwashed. Tad's face was neither as sweet nor as sparkling; the
younger boy's head was large for his body, which was why, as a baby, he had
been called "Tad," for "tadpole." He was afflicted with a badly formed pal-
ate, causing him to speak with difficulty. Good boy, though, who worshipped
his brother. She handed Willie a hand mirror.
He looked and nodded. "Mrs. Keckley," he announced gravely, "that is a
very dirty face in the mirror. Boy ought to wash. But"he chucked the
mirror back merrily"my pony will never notice!" He ran out with a clatter,
followed by Tad.
Would William Lincoln grow up to be like his father? She judged not. A
basic cheerfulness to his character made him different from Mr. Lincoln. She
had seen the President one night come down the hall to see whose light was
on, so he could read aloud from one of Bill Nye's humorous passages, but
Abraham Lincoln seemed to her to be a melancholy man, steeped in a lifetime
of sorrows. When she was sitting on one of the hallway chairs, with the
casualty list containing Jim's name in her hand, he had come by and sat with
her saying nothing for a while. They grieved together, with no tears. Then
this ordinarily shut-mouthed man had opened his soul to her about his moth-
er's coffin, in their house for three days, and his sister's coffin when she died
in childbirth, and the time he had the hypo after a young woman he had
known died in the winter of '35. He described to her the little coffin of Eddie,
his second son, aged four, named after the man who had been killed at Ball's
Bluff. Like her, he felt what he called "the intensity of death." Death was
never far from him.
Strange man, in many ways. His eldest son, Robert, was away at Harvard;
whenever that boy came home, Lisabeth Keckley could notice the coolness
between father and son. Robert was remote"Mary's boy," in contrast with
Willie, his father's boyand seemed to resent Mr. Lincoln. She could under-
stand the jealousy of Robert for the much-adored Willie, and his anger at his
father's favoritism, but then Lisabeth had heard from one of the President's
former law partners, sitting in the waiting room one day, about Mr. Lincoln's
strange relationship to his own father. Hated him, this strange little man
claimed. When she said she didn't believe that, the lawyer said that when
Thomas Lincoln was dying, only sixty miles from Springfield, Illinois, his son
Abraham refused to go and visit him. Later on, he refused to attend the
funeral. There has to be a lot of bad blood between father and son if one
doesn't go to the other's funeral. If what the lawyer said was true, Mr. Lin-
coln knew what it was like to be the son with an anger festering against the
father; didn't he see what it was like for Robert Lincoln now?
She picked up her needle and thread and sewed until the hem was almost
finished. She could hear voices coming up the stairs: an almost tearful whine
of Mrs. Lincoln's, and the tut-tutting of Major French.
"Mr. Lincoln will not approve it! No, Willie, not nowand wash your
face! It's sixty-seven hundred dollars over." She swept into the bedroom, saw
the modiste, and barked at her, "Tell him how expensive everything is! What
do men know?"
Mrs. Keckley nodded solemnly to the harried commissioner of public
buildings, whose job she knew it was to make certain that expenditures did
not exceed appropriations. She handed the gown to Mrs. Lincoln and joined
the major in the hall while the first Lady dressed.
"It's this bill from Carryl & Brother in Philadelphia," he explained. "We
had a budget of $20,000 to refurbish the Mansion, and this comes to
$26,700."
"Didn't you tell the store what the limit was, Major?"
"Oh, they knew the limit all right. But Mrs. Lincoln kept adding items
draperies, a better grade of carpeting, repairing the chandelier in the East
Roomand the cost kept going up."
Mrs. Lincoln put her head out the door, still wriggling into her dress. "Mr.
Lincoln will never approve, Major. Go see him right now, he's just down the
hall. Tell him how common it is to overrun appropriations."
"That's not always"
"Tell him how much it costs to refurbish. He doesn't realize . . . He'll
want to pay for it out of his own pocket." Mrs. Lincoln started to cry, real
tears, not for effect. "You know, Major, he cannot afford that, he ought not to
do it. You've got to get me out of this!"
"I'll ask for an appointment."
"He's just down the hall, you can go now. Lisabeth, dear, go with him
you know what fabrics cost, how they've gone up. It's the war, the blockade,
our own blockade." She sniffed away her tears and looked at him squarely.
"Major, if you get me out of this, I will always be governed by you hence-
forth, I will not spend a cent without consulting you. Go both of you, to-
gether, pleaseright now. Don't let him know you've seen me!" She shut the
door.
The major looked down at the bill in his hand. "I'll go in if you come with
me, Mrs. Keckley. He may not go through the roof if you're there."
She accompanied him down the hall to the secretaries' office. George Nico-
lay looked up, smiled faintly, and waved them into the President's office
without asking questions. Lincoln was holding a book and comparing a map
on one page with a map spread across his desk.
"Halleck on military strategy," the President explained. "I'm trying to see
how to apply what he learned from Napoleon to our own situation in the
West. Well, Major, how go the rugs?"
"I have called, Mr. President" He began again: "I have been asked to
come over, sir, on a matter of no official concern."
"A bill?" Lincoln looked sharply at him.
"For furnishing this house," the major replied. "It's some seven thousand
dollars over the appropriation. Before I can pay it, I have to have your
approval."
The President slammed his book shut. "It can never have my approval. I'll
pay it out of my own pocket first."
"I really don't think that's necessary, sir, because many appropriations
have not been enough to"
"It would stink in the nostrils of the American people," said Mr. Lincoln,
and it troubled Mrs. Keckley to see him getting so excited, "to have it said
that the President of the United States had approved a bill overrunning an
appropriation of twenty thousand dollars forfor flub-dubs! For flub-dubs
for this damned old house, when the soldiers cannot have blankets!" She
understood now the political reason for his anger and began to wonder if she
was charging too much for Mrs. Lincoln's gowns. "Who is this furnisher,
Carryl & Brother, and how came he to be employed?"
"I don't know, sirfirst I heard of him, he brought me a large bill for
room paper. Maybe your secretary knows."
Lincoln jerked a cord sharply and the steward William Slade opened the
door. "Tell Nicolay to come here."
Both Nicolay and John Hay, the other secretary, appeared almost in-
stantly. "Nicolayhow did this, this furnishings person, get into the house in
the first place?"
"I don't know, sir."
"Who employed him?"
"Mrs. Lincoln, I suppose," John Hay volunteered. Mrs. Keckley had heard
from Mrs. Lincoln that this young man continually got her into trouble with
her husband. Mary Lincoln's suspicion was not misplaced; Mrs. Keckley had
heard the young fellow refer to the President's wife as "the Hellcat, getting
more Hell-cattical every day," which struck her as disrespectful in the ex-
treme. She liked Nicolay, and the third man, Stoddard, but not Hay. Hay had
too high an opinion of himself for Mrs. Keckley's taste; and why wasn't a
man of his age in uniform, serving at the front?
"Well, if Mrs. Lincoln is to blame, let her bear the blame," the President
almost shouted, "for I swear I won't! Where's the itemized order on this?"
Hay ran out to get the bill and brought it back, presenting it almost trium-
phantly. Lincoln looked at the offensive sheet, shaking his head, muttering
" 'Elegant grand carpet, ten thousand dollars'1 should like to know where a
carpet worth ten thousand dollars can be put."
"Probably in the East Room," suggested the major.
"A monstrous extravagance," said Lincoln. "It was all wrong to spend one
cent at such a time. I never ought to have had a cent expended. The house
was furnished well enoughbetter than any we ever lived in." It seemed to
the modiste that the President was talking to himself. "If I had not been
overwhelmed with other business, I would not have spent a nickel. What
could I do? I couldn't attend to everything. I had other things on my mind."
He looked at her and frowned. "Lisabeth, why are you here?"
She was not about to concoct a story. "Mrs. Lincoln felt, sir, that if I came
along with Major French, you might not lose your temper."
He nodded in grim understanding. "As you see, I have not lost my temper.
This war is costing two million dollars a day, and Mr. Chase tells me we have
no way of raising two million dollars a day. The nation is out of money, and I
am out of money, and my wife is buying the grandest carpet in the world.
Major1 will not approve that bill. Never. Never!" He waved them out.
"He'll have to approve the bill," the major told Nicolay and Hay. "The
carpet is perfect for the East Room, which is a very big room and needs a lot
of carpet. And he'd be crazy to pay it out of his own pocket."
Hay closed the door to the President's office. "Let it wait a few weeks," the
young man advised. "It'll keep the Hellcat pinching the pennies for a
change." Lisabeth Keckley glared at him, and he fell silent.
Nicolay had the answer. "I'll slip it in with a bunch of other items to
approve, when he's in a good mood, or on a very busy day. Just make sure,
Major, that the newspapers don't know about it."
"Flub-dubs!" She could hear the high voice of the President carry through
the thick oak door. "For flub-dubs!"

CHAPTER 6

JOHN HAY'S DIARY,
NOVEMBER 24, 1861
We won the election in Maryland, more by crook than by hook, and there are
no longer those legislators sitting in Baltimore who can command a majority
for secession. A couple of months ago, unbeknown to Nico or me or anybody,
General Nat Lyon, acting on orders from Seward and McClellan, arrested a
bunch of the pro-secesh lawmakers on their way to some Maryland mischief
in Frederick. News of this has been largely suppressed, as it troubles some of
the more fastidious defenders of democracy, but old "Bull Run" Russell of
the London Times has bewailed in print the fact that "the news that twenty-
two members of the Maryland legislature have been seized by the Federal
authorities has not produced the smallest effect here." He takes this to mean
that "all guarantees disappear in a revolution," which was the same tack
taken by the traitor Breckinridge.
Maryland, threatening to sever our communication with the rest of the
Union, is not our favorite state. The Tycoon calls it "a good state to move
from," and tells the story of a witness on a stand who, on being asked his age,
answers, "Sixty." Since it was apparent from his white beard and decrepitude
that he was much older, the judge admonished him and demanded the truth.
"Oh," said the witness, according to Lincoln, "you're thinking about that
fifteen years I spent down on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. That was so
much lost time, and it don't count." So much for the complaints from the
plug-ugly state.
Russell's writings are more than annoying. The Prsdt differentiates be-
tween the New York Timesthe "good" Timesand the London Timesthe
"bad" Timesand told Russell to his face "if the bad Times would go where
we want them, good times would be sure to follow." But the bad Times is
reporting that this is a war between the Southern yearning for independence
and the Northern desire for empire, and that sort of twisted news encourages
Her Majesty's Government to favor, perhaps even to recognize, the Confeder-
acy.
As a result, Americans are getting fed up with England. The British are
known to be plotting with the French and Spanish to take over Mexico, and
at the same time have been sending troops to Canada and mobilizing them
along our border. If the South prevails, the English would dearly like to take
a bite out of our Northern tier. Seward has been ready to declare war on them
for months, but the Tycoon, with an eye on our dwindling exchequer, keeps
saying "one war at a time."
Money is a problem in little ways too.
The great uproar about the elegant grand carpetwho can ever forget the
flub-dubs?ended in the quiet payment by the government with nobody the
wiser, and never approved by the President if anybody should ask. But the
Lincoln family, with his healthy twenty-five thousand dollars a year salary, is
not the only one with financial headaches.
I am getting fourteen hundred dollars a year, and that from the Interior
Department because there is no authorization in the funds allotted to the
President by a beneficent Congress for a second secretary. We recently hired a
third secretary, Stoddard, to open the mail, which is mainly abusive, and to
get the Hellcat out of our hair, but Nico hasn't figured out a way to pay him
yet. Fourteen hundred a year is nothing; a mere Congressman gets twice that.
It's fortunate I get invited to dinner parties all the time or I would waste
away to nothing.
Equally important, the Union is running out of money. The Tycoon was
glooming on the way to the telegraph office this morning and I made a list of
the things he complained about. Credit is gone at St. Louis now that Fr6mont
is gone. Chase, the abolitionist in the Cabinet, professes unhappiness at the
firing of Fremont but seems to be in genuine despair about the nation's over-
draft, which is twelve million dollars. The Tycoon has to cram his head full of
military strategy, so he leaves the raising of money totally to Chase, who
worries about it. I worry about never meeting his daughter, who is said to
have a dozen swains, each one of whom makes more than fourteen hundred a
year. Lincoln is thankful Chase is at Treasury and not Cameron, who is
utterly ignorant, selfish, and openly discourteous to the President, and a noto-
rious crook.
I cannot understand why the Tycoon puts up with so many personal slights
and even insults from the men who are supposedly working for him. Bates,
our esteemed Attorney General, was in here complaining that the Lincoln
administration was not an administration at all, but a separate and disjointed
pack of Cabinet officers, each one ignorant of what his colleagues are doing.
The Prsdt heard him out and promised to do better. Strange, that unconcern
with presumption. Lincoln is neither a modest nor a humble man, stoutly
resists any encroachments on his authority from any quarter. Yet when it
comes to the formal showing of respect, to the proper deference to his posi-
tion, he shrugs off social slights and even the most egregious insults. That is
paradoxical. I think he makes a mistake in his willingness to "hold McClel-
lan's horse, if need be," as he says; people assume if you let them take advan-
tage of you in little ways, you will let them have a chunk of your power.
Here in Washington, the Army of the Potomac is now marching up and
down, looking spiffier every day, and the Tycoon is beginning to get abuse for
the Jacobins here and Greeley in the Tribune in New York for appointing a
procrastinator as General-in-Chief. Wade especially is steaminghe thought
the appointment of McClellan was a promise of action. The Tycoon is torn:
he needs some successful action after Bull Run and Ball's Bluff to dissuade
the Europeans from helping the South, but he cannot afford another defeat.
He does not want to push McClellan into a disaster the way the "On to
Richmond" set pushed Scott into Bull Run.
I wish here to record what I consider a portent of evil to come. The
President, Governor Seward, and I went over to McClellan's house one night
last week. The servant at the door said the general would soon return. We
went in, and after we had waited about an hour, McC. came in and without
paying any particular attention to the porter, who told him the President was
waiting to see him, went upstairs, passing the door of the room where the
President and Secretary of State were seated.
They waited about half an hour, and sent once more a servant to tell the
general they were there, and the answer coolly came that the general had
gone to bed.
I merely record this unparalleled insolence of epaulets without comment. It
is the first indication I have yet seen of the threatened supremacy of the
military authorities.
Coming home, I spoke to the President about the matter but he seemed not
to have noticed it, specially, saying it was better at this time not to be making
points of etiquette and personal dignity.

CHAPTER 7
THE THIRTEENTH PRESIDENT
Millard Fillmore was ambivalent about obeying Anna Carroll's summons
"about gaslight, or any hour after, convenient to yourself." She wanted him
to call at her room in the American Hotel in Buffalo, just as she had so often
askeddemanded, reallythat he pay court to her in the past, at hotel
rooms in New York and Washington. She never had a proper home, where a
gentleman could drop by without engendering gossip. Although Anna had
the capacity to make life exciting, and certainly had the talent to make an
association with her politically rewarding, she never succeeded in making
anything convenient. "Always love me," her note said, "and feel for me the
interest a daughter would give you."
Some daughter; although he was old enough to be her father, their secret
liaison had illuminated his years in Washington, but all that was long over.
He reminded himself, looking at the familiar, forward-leaning handwriting,
that his curious relationship with this woman had not begun until 1853, just
after he had left the presidency and the year his first wife died. It concluded,
at least as far as he was concerned, in 1858 when he remarried in his home-
town in western New York. The breakup was as discreet as the affair itself
no thanks to the lady's unconcern about appearances, especially when it came
to visits to hotels by a man whose face was instantly recognizedbut he had
to admit that he had not handled their last farewell gracefully. In fact, when
she sent him a note in New York City on that day three years ago, asking him
to her hotel at Eighth and Broadway, he had sent the messenger back with a
curt verbal dismissal. Fillmore, just remarried, did not want to stir old pas-
sions and especially did not want anything else put in writing, and so he had
just avoided all contact with her.
That cruel snub to a longtime political supporter and devoted friend, he
now decided, had not been worthy of a man of his character. Fillmore felt
more guilt about the manner of his breaking off the affair than about the
nights of pleasure in her arms. He flicked her note with his fingers, remember-
ing how she made love eagerly, happily, insisting only on being on topshe
was tiny and he was then a powerful, big man. Still big, he thought, rubbing
the belly he'd been acquiring. He was sixty-one now, which must put Anna in
her early forties. He assumed she was as attractive and vivacious as before,
with the perfect shoulders and bosom, and the incredible habit of sitting
cross-legged on the bed after making love and insisting on talking about
politics when he felt only the inclination to stare at the ceiling. She was freer
than any woman he had knownDorothea Dix crossed his mind, but that
avid social reformer was a far cry from Anna Ella Carrolland she had given
herself to him without reservation or inhibition. Her refusal to acquiesce to
the convention of male dominance in life was matched only by her eagerness
to please in bed; he supposed there was some consistency in her sense of
freedom in both areas. "Is there anything I do that you don't like," she had
once asked him, sitting perkily cross-legged, her unforgettable breasts ex-
posed to his gaze, "or is there anything I don't do that you'd like?" That was
a crystal moment for him; her words had been sincere, well phrased, totally
free of embarrassment, innocent in their abandon. Not even considering the
political debt, he owed her more than a rude dismissal. Millard Fillmore,
thirteenth President of the United States not a decade before, now a forgotten
man, picked up a pen and responded graciously to Miss Carroll's kind invita-
tion. He would be pleased to see her in one of the hotel's public rooms.
He spotted her in the salon having a glass of wine with a gray-haired man
he did not know. He frowned; propriety was one thing, company another. She
wore a yellow suit, which set off her red-gold hair, and stirred the old yearn-
ing in him. He shook off that thought and walked to their table.
Anna's face lit with a relaxed delight that assured him this was not going to
be a difficult moment. He felt better about that, although unaccountably put
out that he should feel deprived at the lack of tension. She introduced the
man she was with: "This is Lemuel Evans, Mr. President, my friend and
escort officer." After shaking hands, the man excused himself to make travel
arrangements and took his leave.
"Escort officer? Sounds as if you're on a military mission."
"I am," she replied, as if that were a natural thing. "Captain Jones was
assigned to me by the Secretary of War. We've been in St. Louis, looking at
the river-war preparations and visiting Frank Blair. We're on our way back to
Washington now. I couldn't come through Buffalo without seeing you again."
"Is he your lover?" Fillmore didn't know what made him blurt that out.
He wished he could snatch back the jealous question.
"People sometimes ask me," she replied evenly, "if I ever had an affair with
President Buchanan. Or if I was ever the mistress of Millard Fillmore."
"What do you answer?"
"How would you prefer that I answer?"
"With an unequivocal no, of course."
She smiled, not so warmly this time. "Captain Jones, then, is not my lover.
Why did you ask, Millard? You have such an ingrained antipathy to any sort
of gossip."
Fillmore shook his head. "Envy, I suppose. Anna, I came because I have
an apology to make." She started to wave it off, but he pressed ahead: "When
your note was handed to me in New York, I was exceedingly busy, and if my
answer was not couched in polite language, I regret it and assure you that no
disrespect was intended."
"You thought I had some pecuniary favor to ask," she said, with a sad
smile, "but that was not true."
He said nothing because it was true. She always was short of money and
could be almost as much a pest about that as she was about asking for jobs for
her friends. He was glad she had some connection with the War Department
now, to help pay her bills.
She changed the subject, asking brightly: "What do you think about your
old friend Mason, being snatched off the British ship Trenfl Did you think
England will go to war if we don't give him back?"
Fillmore grunted"your old friend" hit home. Jim Mason, the Virginian
who was chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee for the three
years Fillmore had stepped up from the vice presidency to fill out Zack
Taylor's term, was author of the Fugitive Slave Act. Fillmore, over the pro-
test of the anti-slavery Whigs, signed the bill forcing the return of escaped
slaves to their owners, which cost Fillmore the Whig nomination in 1852.
That act of compromise saved the nation from a civil war, or at least post-
poned it for a decade, but it was performed at the sacrifice of his political
career. Fillmore felt entitled to feel sorry for himself about that.
Four years afterward, when the Whigs split into the anti-slavery Republi-
cans and the Know-Nothings, Anna Ella Carroll had almost singlehandedly
delivered to Millard Fillmore the nomination of the Know-Nothing Party.
He had been in Europe pretending to have no interest in a political comeback,
while Anna had been the one"with no knowledge on the part of the
world," as she discreetly put it at the timeto give him his last chance at
regaining the presidency. Which he would have done, if the damned Free-
Soilers among the Know-Nothings had not bolted to the Republican candi-
date, Fremont, thereby electing Buck and Breck. Fillmore owed this woman
so much, and had returned so little; he luxuriated in his guilt at rejecting her.
"The Trent affair is the best thing that ever happened to the South," he
said. That surprised her, which pleased him. "Mason and Slidell couldn't do
the Confederacy much good in London and Paristhe Europeans know that
Seward will declare war if they help the rebels. But this way, with the North
crowing about insulting the British, and the British sure to demand satisfac-
tion, there could be a war. And the South would benefitthe Union cannot
fight the Europeans and the South at the same time."
"I didn't think of that," she said, nodding. "You're right, of course. What a
waste, your being out of politics."
"Former presidents are nothing more than unwanted warts on the body
politic," said Fillmore, glad to be appreciated again. "If you see the Wizard in
Washington, tell him to tell Seward to avoid getting caught up in this foolish
outburst of patriotic fervor." The "Wizard" was Thurlow Weed, widely
known as the wizard of the Albany lobby, who had been Fillmore's political
mentor, and the man who introduced him to Anna. The New York boss had
more luck with Seward than with Fillmore as a candidate, though neither of
his charges ever won a presidential nomination. Fillmore suspected that Weed
and Anna Carroll, who had done business together in the past, were allies
still.
"And what about you, Anna?" He was tempted to ask if she was still
writing the anti-papacy diatribes and anti-immigration tracts that made her
the darling of the Native Americans throughout the fifties, but he guessed she
might be sensitive about that now. "What's this War Department assign-
ment?"
"We're all doing what we can," she said offhandedly. "Dorothea Dix came
down to Washington, now she's superintendent of nurses for the army."
He felt a sudden clutch of discomfort. Did Anna know about his long
association with Miss Dix? If so, why had Anna never mentioned Dorothea
throughout their years together; if not, why did Anna choose Dorothea Dix,
out of all the women in public life, as her example? Both Anna and Dorothea
had refused to return his letters, the social reformer because she felt them a
part of history, the pamphleteer because she claimed to have already "con-
signed them to the flames." He bet she had not; Anna had improperly used
one of his letters as a way of getting business for herself. He reminded himself
that he had been single at the time of their affair. "Come now, Annawhat
sent you to St. Louis with a military escort? An army pamphlet?"
"I have a plan," she said in all seriousness, "a plan to win the war." He did
his best to keep a straight face. She had a deceptively keen mind, he was
aware, and she thought like a businessman and wrote like a demagogue, but
he doubted her abilities as a military strategist. "All the preparations in the
West up to now," she said excitedly, "use the Mississippi River as the plan of
attack. The rebels know that, and they've fortified the river."
He nodded solemnly, enjoying her enthusiasm, picturing her sitting cross-
legged, naked, intensely talking politics, as they did in the old days.
"The heavy risk, and the casualties, can be avoided by using the Tennessee
River," she stated, as if practicing a presentation. "This river is navigable for
medium-sized boats to the foot of Muscle Shoals in Alabama, and is open to
navigation all the yearand the distance is only two hundred and fifty miles,
from Paducah in Kentucky, where the Tennessee meets the Ohio River, clear
down to Alabama." He nodded again; her intensity, discussing men's busi-
ness, was delicious.
"Another trouble with the Mississippi," Anna continued, taking a gulp of
wine, "is that our gunboats, if crippled, would fall prey to the enemy by being
swept downriver by the current. Now here's the best part. That trouble
doesn't exist on the Tennessee River, because its current runs North. If our
boats were crippled, they would drop back with the current and escape cap-
ture."
"Goes to the heart of the South, too, as I recall," said Fillmore, encourag-
ing her. Obviously this must have occurred to the military men on the scene,
but if Anna Carroll wanted to play military strategist, she should not be
discouraged.
"Exactly. It would cut the enemy's main east-west supply line by intersect-
ing the Charleston and Memphis railroad."
"That was the line you and Jeff Davis were promoting," he remembered,
"the southern route to California."
"It would enable us to take the Mississippi forts from the rear," she added.
"Vicksburg is impregnable from the river, but it can be taken from the east.
That's my Tennessee River plan. Aren't you excited? The war could be over
in three months."
"Strange that Fremont didn't try it," he mused. If it was so obvious, why
hadn't it been done immediately? He had no love for John Fr6mont, and even
less for Jessie, but they were no fools. They had known how to erode his
strength in 1856 with that "Free Soil, Free Men, FrCmont" slogan.
"That old windbag was too busy fighting Frank Blair. Come on, Millard
can you see anything wrong with my plan?"
Although he did not want to dampen her enthusiasm, he did not want her
to suffer pain of ridicule. "It makes excellent sense, Anna. I see only one thing
wrong with the plan. Its author."
When she did not register understanding, he explained gently: "No Presi-
dent, my dear, can afford to take military advice from a civilianpublicly,
that is. And the notion of taking military advice from a woman is ludicrous.
Not only would the military resent it, the public would laugh at it."
"That's wrong."
"I agree it's wrong, but that's life. That's the way things are in this world.
Put military strategy out of your mind, Anna. In a few weeks, or a few
months at most, a responsible generalHalleck, Grant, Shermanwill put it
forward, and then it can be made to happen."
"Months! Do you realize how many lives can be lost in months? And do
you have any idea of the carnage in store for our soldiers if they are sent
down the Mississippi?" She seemed near tears; he had never seen her so
furious. "It's so galling to hear you say that, Millardthat no military plan
can be presented by a civilian and a woman. What if it happens to be a damn
good idea?"
He backed away. "Let's assume the plan is a good one. Let's also assume
that at least one or two of the generals are already considering it. And let's
even assume Lincoln is too busy with McClellan and the Army of the Poto-
mac, and with the Trent affair and war with England, to yet apprise himself of
a Tennessee River plan. It's your responsibility to suggest it in a way that
does not embarrass him. Who's your man at the War Department? Not Cam-
eron, I hope."
"Tom Scotthe was superintendent of the Pennsy,"
"Good man. Lay out the plan to him," Fillmore advised, knowing he was
giving sound advice from his experience with the presidential office, "but not
orally. Give him a written plan, with figures in it, and navigation charts, and
mileages, and river speeds, and all the tedious detail. Sign it and date it and
mark it secret. Then see if Scott can get it to the President's attention di-
rectly."
"I could write it on the train and have it in his hands by the thirtieth."
"Do that. None of your high-flown rhetoric, thoughthis isn't the Reply to
Breckinridge. " He could see she was glad he had read the pamphlet she had
sent him. "Factual. Cold. Military. And secret."
"Yes, it's important the rebels not learn of the plan"
He shook his head; she still did not understand. "It's not the rebels learn-
ing about it that's important, Anna, it's the public learning about who sug-
gested it. Let the President give the generals the credit, if it works, and the
blame, if it fails. Believe me, Anna, I sat in that office for three long years, I
know how presidents think. Get your idea to him in a way that he can use it,
and not in a way that precludes his using it."
She cocked her head, apparently impressed but not persuaded. Perhaps she
needed to get the public credit; he could not know her private designs or
suffragist desires. He asked her if she knew Lincoln.
She nodded thoughtfully. "I've met him several times at receptions, twice
for a serious talk with Bates. He has me working on a war powers document.
Don't believe that he goes around telling funny stories all the timehe's a
serious man. But Lincoln has the same problem you had."
"Which was?"
"He's waiting for the country to lead him." Fillmore took umbrage at that
but said nothing, since people who had never been President rarely under-
stood how hard it was to do anything before the country was quite ready.
Sometimes the greatest leadership was the ability to delay, as he had done, to
the cost of his reputation as a leader. "His instincts are good," Anna contin-
ued, "crack down on the traitors, but let slavery exist where it wasbut
Lincoln is too fearful of public sentiment. He's a compromiser."
"The party threw me out because I tried to compromise," the former Presi-
dent reminded her. She was quite wrong in her estimate of Lincoln; by refus-
ing to compromise on the issue of secession, the Union President had brought
on the war. "He's either going to have to let the South go in peace, or he's
going to have to turn this into a war on slavery. There's no way to compro-
mise union or disunion, there's no middle groundand union is just not a big
enough cause to fight a war over."
"That's what John Breckinridge used to tell me."
He studied her. "You and John Breckinridge too?"
"What do you expect me to say?"
He shook his head and allowed a smile of pain to show. That must have
begun just as he was getting married in 1858. This was unfair of him; he had
rejected this woman, and now felt a twinge of jealousy at her interest in other
men.
Why had she come back through Buffalo? Not to see him growing old and
fat while she remained involved and attractive; she may have been a pest at
times, but it was not in her character to be cruel. To see him in the backwater
of life, out of the public eye, while she was still in the mainstream, in contact
with the powerful, having some minor but still measurable effect on history
some women would find that a sweet revenge, he supposed, but not Anna. He
preferred to think that she had long ago forgiven him his social slights and
pecuniary stinginess and had come to see him out of friendship and a need for
mature political guidance. That thought comforted him.
Why had he answered her summons? Why did he feel the urge for her
again, which he turned into a desire to make himself useful to her now that all
he had to offer was his judgment? Fillmore told himself that his feeling of
belatedness, of having failed to grasp an opportunity, was no mere sense of
guilt at the way he had dismissed her when he had been in a position to return
her many political and personal favors. He was not sorry for her anymore, or
embarrassed at her importunings, or irritated at her pushiness; on the con-
trary, he realized, he was sorry for himself for not having invested more of
himself in this woman, whose experience enabled her to flower in this crisis.
He had come, too, because he missed the mystery of the center, and because
he feared the loss of friendship with a woman who might no longer feel the
old yearning for him,
Before they parted, he saw no harm in finding out what warmth remained
in the embers. "Your last communication to me was a spirited one," he began.
"I know. I didn't like that remark about my being a 'Jeremy Diddler in
petticoats.' " Fillmore winced; a Jeremy Diddler was one who borrowed
money but did not pay it back, and he should never have passed along that
judgment of her made by a political enemy. "Especially since I had openly,"
she continued, "before the world, done for you what no woman ever dared to
do before for any man in America." He readily acknowledged that with a
nod; she had delivered a national convention's nomination to him. "One of
these days I may do a reminiscence," she said, looking at him levelly, "and I
have the title: Men as They Seem and as They Are."
He supposed he deserved that. "Whatever may be your opinion of me," he
said, covering her hand with his, "I shall ever rejoice in your prosperity and
fame."

CHAPTER 8
FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS A HEAD
Old beaux are the worst, Anna Carroll decided. Back in Washington after her
exhilarating trip West, with Congress beginning its second session and every-
one eager to see how Lincoln would treat the Trent affair in next week's first
annual message, she tucked the draft of her war powers pamphlet under the
sleeve of her warmest coatnot new, but it would have to doand headed
for the President's house.
She could not help wondering what the world would be like if her Ameri-
can Party had been successful, and Millard Fillmore were President today.
As an old-line Whig, he would probably have continued to straddle the slav-
ery issue and argue for the Union, much as Lincoln did, but, unlike Lincoln,
Fillmore would never have the gumption to actually fight the secession. Only
a stubborn Lincoln would insist on Union or war. If all his Cabinet but one
had advised him not to provision Fort Surnter, Fillmore would have gone
along with the majority, and the continent would be shared by two nations: a
Confederacy extending south to Panama or even farther, and a Union reach-
ing up through Canada to the Arctic. Even so, Fillmore would not have
escaped bloodshed: the Union would be at war with England now over a
claim to the vast northern territory, a matter more fundamental to the fate of
nations than the Trent issue of stopping ships at sea.
She grinned at the thought of the look on Fillmore's face when she had
casually mentioned Dorothea Dix. Anna respected the womanstrong for
prison reform, the first to show concern for better care for the feebleminded
but that torrid romance had been going on all the while Anna and Fillmore
had been keeping secret company, right through the campaign of '56, and
Anna had suspected as much. That half-strangled look on his face the other
day confirmed it. Did the ex-President write Dorothea those stiltedly passion-
ate letters too? Anna had dutifully destroyed all the nonpolitical mail; had
her older rival done as much for him? She doubted it; let him worry.
That stop in Buffalo on her way back from St. Louis had been worthwhile.
Not only had it satisfied her to see her unfaithful mentor and halfhearted
champion on the sidelines while she was in the thick of eventshe really had
treated her shabbily, after all she did for himbut she had extracted some
useful advice from him on how to deal with presidents.
She would accept half of that guidance. His suggestion to put her plan
down on paper, in an official memorial to the War Department, was sound; a
written record had permanence, and men's recollections tended to fade. She
had started writing that memorial on the train down from Buffalo, attaching
the notes on river speeds and navigability from the pilot. Fillmore's other
notion, of remaining silent about her authorship, she would never accept. If it
embarrassed the men of this Administration to accept a daring and ingenious
military strategy from a civilian, and a woman, so be it. That was their
problem, not hers.
The war powers pamphlet assigned to her by Lincoln, now in nearly final
form, would be her means of access to the presidential ear. She nodded to the
marine at the door of the President's house, went up the stairs toward Nico-
lay and Hay's office, and was struck by the sight of a long line of people in the
hallway.
"You came in time for his 'public opinion bath,' " said Hay, his mustache
slightly fuller than the one she remembered. He motioned at the crowd wait-
ing to see the Presidentfarmers, tradesmen, mothers seeking concessions
for their army sons, politicians with a variety of complaints to make or secrets
to confide. "Twice a week, the Tycoon does this. Can't stop him. Lasts three,
four hours, everybody gets five minutes and no more."
"The President has more important things to do," she said. She carried two
of the more important things under her arm.
Stoddard, the clerk opening the mail, put a word in: "The President doesn't
think so. He thinks he gets a better idea of what the people are thinking from
his public opinion bath than from the newspapers." He looked at a stack of
newspapers on his table. "Mr. Lincoln doesn't get a whole lot of satisfaction
from reading the newspapers,"
Hay was unusually solicitous: "Is there anything I can do for you in the
meantime, Miss Carroll?" There had to be a reason for that; perhaps the
President had said something nice about her. She decided she liked the boy,
and that the impression he sometimes left of arrogance was natural for any-
one in his position at his age; if he wanted to treat her with the respect and
affection customarily shown a favored aunt, that was all right with her.
"I have the war powers research he wanted," she said. "Perhaps I should
take it to the Attorney General first."
"No, the President was talking about the war power this morning. When
you returned from your sojourn in the West, I was supposed to show you a
letter from Montgomery Blair about the government's power to confiscate
slaves." He deftly extracted the letter out of a cardboard accordion file resting
alongside his desk.
She scanned the letter from Postmaster General Blair, dated November 21,
recommending that compensation be paid by the government to Union loyal-
ists whose slaves were lost because of the operations of the war. But rebels he
proposed to treat just the opposite; their land and houses would be confis-
cated to raise the money to pay the loyal Union men for their lost slaves.
Biair's purpose was plainly to induce rebels to switch sides; by doing so, they
would be paid for freeing their slaves, but by failing to switch, their slaves
would be taken away without compensation.
"Not a good idea," she stated. "Compensation, fine; confiscation, no."
Hay raised his eyebrows at her decisiveness. Not everyone dismissed a
Cabinet member's recommendation that quickly. "Why don't you just tell
that to the President? I'll slip you in between a pardon-pleader and an office-
seeker. But five minutes is all."
In a moment, as a satisfied, bemused man in overalls came out of the
President's office, a note from Lincoln in hand, Anna Carroll was ushered in,
her two documents at the ready. In five minutes, there would not be time for
both; she would have to use her ticket, the pamphlet, and hold the Tennessee
plan until later.
"My dear lady," Lincoln said, rising to greet her, waving Hay out.
"These public opinion baths tax your time," she offered.
"Gives me the atmosphere of the average of our whole people," he ex-
plained. "Every applicant for audience has to take his turn, as if waiting to be
shaved in a barbershop."
"They must be exhausting."
He shook his head no. "Though they may not be pleasant in all particulars,
the effect, as a whole, is renovating and invigorating."
She felt her allotted time slipping away and came directly to the point: "I
have a draft of the war powers pamphlet."
"You saw Judge Biair's idea?"
"You have no power to confiscate property permanently," she said flatly,
"for any reason, including treason. Blood attainder, unconstitutional."
He agreed. "But I can pay for property. Broach the idea, in your pamphlet,
of compensated emancipation. I want to pay the loyal slave statesDela-
ware, your own Maryland, Kentucky, and Missourifive hundred dollars a
head for each slave the state buys from its citizens and frees."
Before she could respond, Hay poked his head in to say that General
McClellan was there, and could he interrupt. The President nodded, handed
Anna a draft for a state compensation bill to read outside, and told her to
come back when the general had gone.
Seated outside the President's door, studying the draft of a Delaware law
with Lincoln's comments in the margin, she let herself listen to the muffled
voices. In fact, she strained to hear them, because McClellan's plans in the
East would affect her own for the Western rivers.
"If it were determined to make a forward movement of the Army of the
Potomac," Lincoln's voice was asking, "without awaiting further increase of
numbers, or better drill or discipline, how much time would be required to
actually get it in motion?"
"If the bridge trains are ready," McClellan estimated, talking more slowly,
"two, three weeksDecember fifteenth. Probably around the twenty-fifth,
Christmas."
"How many troops could join the movement from southwest of the river?"
Long pause. "Seventy thousand."
Lincoln's high voice: "How many from northeast of the river?"
McClellan's low, reluctant voice: "Thirty thousand. Thirty-three, maybe."
Taken together, she reckoned, such an advance against the rebel forces in
Virginia would be the greatest troop movement in the history of the conti-
nent.
"Suppose, then" Lincoln's voice fell, and, as far as she could make out,
he was suggesting a plan to send the Union forces already across the river
southward against the rebels, while the main Union force struck across the
Potomac below and behind the battle, cutting off the rebel line of retreat. His
idea, she presumed, was to capture the whole rebel army in Virginia, ending
the war in a stroke.
"The enemy could meet us in front with nearly equal forces," McClellan's
voice was saying, "and is anticipating just such an attack." She nodded im-
perceptibly; he was right. The attacking force had to outnumber the defend-
ers, especially crossing a river. "I have my mind actively turned toward an-
other plan of campaign."
More talk followed that she could not make out, but she hoped McClel-
lan's reluctance to make such an audacious and dangerous strike across freez-
ing water would prevail. The war could not be won in the East, at one stroke;
she was convinced that the rebels could not be defeated in their heartland but
would have to be broken from the West.
The general came out, turning smartly at the doorway and marching down
the hall past the line of admiring visitors. At Hay's nod, Anna picked up her
papers and went back in. Lincoln picked up his previous train of thought as if
his General-in-Chief had not just dashed his hopes.
"We would offer seven hundred thousand dollars to the state of Delaware,"
he said in lawyerly fashion, "payable in six percent U.S. bonds over thirty
years, for the state to purchase its slaves. All born after the passage of the act
would be born free, all slaves over the age of thirty-five would become free
right away, and all under thirty-five would become free on arriving at that
age."
"That would end slavery completely," she calculated, "by the twentieth
century."
"Even beforea cutoff in 1893, to coincide with the thirty-year payments.
If a state desires the money sooner, let it advance the date of emancipation."
"How quickly"
"Ten years. Ten payments, emancipation by 1872."
"It would be expensive," she cautioned, remembering the difficulty of buy-
ing and freeing her own slaves.
"That's why we could not finance it in less than ten years. But it would not
be expensive," he explained, "in the long run. It would cost about a third of
what it takes to support this war for a year."
Did he understand what a burden the manumitted slaves could be? "And
the freed slaves," she asked, as if sure he had thought it through, "would go
where?"
He stopped, frowning. "Orville Browning raised that point. He says there
must be a convenient place somewhere on the American continent."
She expected that. Browning was the senator appointed to fill Stephen
Douglas's seat in Illinois, and she had been writing some of his speeches. He
had asked her where the slaves could be shipped off to, and she had promised
to work on that but had not known where to start.
Lincoln's slave-purchase scheme sounded eminently practical, had all the
figures nicely lined up, and made much good sense compared to the cost of
continued war. It had one small defect, in Anna's judgment: not one of the
slave border states would accept the federal government's offer. Maryland
and Delaware, she knew, did not want a method of ending slavery gradually;
the people of those states wanted the system they had now. Lincoln was
dreaming, and she was tempted to awaken him to political reality, but she
decided against it. Let others, like McClellan, tell him what he could not do;
she wanted to be an adviser who could tell him what he could do.
"I can add some material in this war powers pamphlet on your power to
purchase property," she offered, "in the context of the absence of any power
to permanently confiscate."
He nodded and went on to the next item on his mind. When Lincoln was
pressed for time, he was systematic, no funny stories; she liked that. "You're a
friend of the Wades."
"Yes. Carolyn Wade," she added, lest Lincoln think she had any improper
interest in the radical Ohio senator, "is my best friend. I'm having dinner
there tonight."
"Good. Excellent. He's starting a committee on the conduct of the war. It
could be harmful to the presidential war power. Put in a passage, if you agree
with me, Miss Carroll, about the primacy of the Executive branch in the
conduct of military operations. He means well, I know what he's trying to do,
but we must not work at cross purposes."
She agreed. He was already looking over her shoulder at the next visitor at
the door; this was not the time to bring up the Tennessee River plan. She
extended her hand, and he enfolded it in his own. She left, thinking oddly of
the enormity of his hand, and started to make a beeline for the War Depart-
ment across the street. Before she left the Mansion, however, John Hay came
running after and caught up to her near the diplomatic entrance, where visit-
ing envoys could contemplate the cows on the ellipse behind the Mansion.
"Miss Carroll, I understand you're to see Senator Wade tonight." She nod-
ded, still walking; she had to get to Tom Scott, give him the memo on the
Tennessee plan, and get him to endorse it and pass it on to Lincoln. At that
point, John Hay's help would be important; she stopped and gave him her
Maryland plantation smile, as if she had all the time in the world. "Secretary
Chase will be at that dinner party too. Miss Carrollthey're all from Ohio,
you know,"
"I know. Both Secretary Chase and I will be able to work on Ben Wade."
That was obviously not what the young man had on his mind. He put his
hands in his pockets and sauntered with her toward the War Department. She
tried to draw him out: "I'm sure Governor Chase is loyal to the Administra-
tion, John." She used the title Chase preferred, rather than "Secretary," to
show she knew him, which was true; before seeking the nomination in 1860,
he had sought out her guidance. Although they were on different sides of the
question of emancipation, they could do political business.
"Um," said John Hay. Since he evidently could not figure out a way to
express what was on his mindunusual for him, an articulate young man
and since she could not afford to dawdle, Anna decided on directness.
"John, let's be friends," she offered. "I like you and I want to help you.
What's bothering you?"
"Kate Chase," he said instantly, relief in his voice.
She caught herself in time and did not laugh. Instead, she said seriously,
"You have good taste. Not only a lovely girl, but she is becoming a social
force in this city. Worthy of you."
He was too naive for her; she would eat him alive. On second thought, his
position would count in his favor. Kate Chase was her widowed father's
official hostess, and with the Secretary of State's wife a relative invalid, Kate
ranked as the second woman in the Administration. She had allowed herself
to become a social rival of Mrs. Lincoln, which Anna thought was a mistake,
but the girl was also known to be politically astute; through her friendship
with Lord Lyons, the British ambassador, she was educated in foreign affairs
as well. The center of attention at all the levees, the young woman rarely
spent time with young men purely for their social standing or graces, or even
to have a good time. Anna had only met Kate once, and that time briefly, but
came away impressed that her eye was solely on the furtherance of her fa-
ther's career,
Anna remembered how it was to be the good-looking young daughter of a
famous political man, and how important it was for such ambitious women to
cultivate young men on the rise who could one day be useful. John Hay,
second secretary to the President, constantly at the presidential ear, trusted as
few men in Washington, privy to everything on and in the President's desk,
capable of promoting or hindering a cause with a nod or a wink or a mo-
ment's forgetfulnessJohn Hay would be a useful man for Kate Chase to
know. For that reason, a cat could look at a king, and a young secretary could
look at the reigning social queen.
"She's a purposeful and experienced young lady," she said. "Not the sort of
giggling young thing you bowl over with your new mustache at the parties at
Counselor Earnes's." That was all the warning she would give him.
"I've seen her at receptions," he said. "She absolutely stuns me. Miss
Carrollyou're my friend now, and I have to talk to somebody about this1
must get to know her. I'm a personable fellow, a graduate of Brown, and you
have apparently heard of the way I have been cutting a wide swath through
the eligible ladies of this city. That sounds conceited, but I really need the
comfort of conceit, because Miss Chase ties my tongue and renders me a
Springfield bumpkin,"
She had a good laugh at that and squeezed his arm. "You have an ally in
me, John. I'll figure out a way to get you together, and I'll make sure she
knows how nice you are." She amended that: "How important you are."
"You're an admirable person, Miss Carroll. I know the President thinks so,
too, for what that's worth."
"Worth a lot." She became serious. "An alliance runs two ways. Right
now, I'm submitting some information to Assistant Secretary Scott. I'm sure
he'll want the President to see itit's a plan for a Western campaign. When it
gets to Mr. Lincoln, it's important that he know it came from me."
He promised he'd see to that, pumped her hand warmly, and when she
presented her cheek, kissed it with a satisfying smack. She hurried into the
War Department, determined to deliver for him, certain he would deliver for
her.
Thomas Scott was not his usual self. The head of the Pennsylvania Rail-
road, who had gone off the payroll to take the important number-two job in
the War Department, still retained his nominal position at the Pennsy; a
House committee on contracts had just denounced this arrangement as cor-
rupt, since the War Department decided on freight rates. Scott had never
before been accused of any wrongdoing; in the Cameron department, where
bribery and shady dealing were reputed to be widespread, his desk was an
island of integrity.
"I'm just trying to do a job, Anna," he complained. "And I want my job at
the Pennsy back after the war is over. Is that so wrong? Does that make me a
criminal?"
"I'm having dinner at Ben and Carolyn Wade's tonight," she assured him,
using the invitation for all it was worth. "His new committee is the only one
that counts. I'll see he knows the real story, and who's doing the work at this
department." With that nicely smoothing her way, she took her memorial
and map out of its envelope.
"Colonel"she assumed he would prefer his military salutation, since he
was under fire for being a civilian railroader benefiting his old cronies
"prepare to have your eyes opened to a glorious possibility in the West.
You've been worried about the Mississippi forts. Stop worrying."
She went to the map on his wall; it was too high for her, so she borrowed
his yardstick ruler and used it as her pointer.
He listened dully at first. After a few moments, he interrupted to dispute
her information on the speed and vulnerability of the gunboats; the new
ironclads soon to be delivered, he said, were more powerful. He wanted to
know why the Tennessee River was so essential, why not the even more easily
accessible Cumberland River, also leading south and east? As his questioning
grew more pointed, she could feel his interest increase. He was posing ques-
tions she knew he would be asked by McClellan, Lincoln, Halleck, and oth-
ers. As she answered, she decided not to hand over her memorial, and was
especially glad not to have handed it prematurely to Lincoln; she could see
holes in it now. Still, the essence of her plan was sound; most of it stood up
under close examination, improved with criticism.
Scott came from behind his desk, his own newspaper troubles set aside
now, to pinpoint Pittsburg Landing. "That's the spot, right near Corinth. It's
like a chess game, where your knight threatens two enemy pieces at once. The
rebels will have to choose to defend the rear of their Mississippi ports
Memphis and Vicksburgor to defend against a thrust eastward, right
through Atlanta to the sea. Brilliant. Better than brilliantobvious."
"Sidney Johnston doesn't have the troops to defend both," she added. She
had spent long hours in the Mercantile Library in St. Louis arguing with
rebel General Johnston's brother, the chief librarian, who rose to her bait and
explained how ingenious his rebel brother was in making his small force
appear much larger. With her war powers research leading to this informa-
tion, she felt that Fate was helping shape her Tennessee River plan. "Tom, my
plan may be obvious, but has anybody discussed using the Tennessee River
for a major strike south with you till now?"
"No," he said frankly, "and I didn't know about the current flowing the
other way. But I'm sure the rebs have thought of itthat's why they fortified
the mouth of the Tennessee and the Cumberland, with forts here and here."
He tapped Forts Henry and Donelson on the map. "And maybe General
Grant has thought about it, which may be why he moved so quickly to take
Paducah when Polk moved into Kentucky."
"Grant doesn't know about the river running the other way," she told him.
"Most of my information comes from his pilot, who was never asked about
this."
"Don't sell Grant short," Scott said, using what she vaguely recognized as
a stock speculation term. "Halleck does, and your friend Wade distrusts him
because Grant's a Democrat, and McClellan runs him down because he's not
spit and polish, and he made a mess of his life outside the army. But Grant
had good West Point training, and my guess is that he must have figured this
out already and just hasn't told anybody about it."
"A lot of good that does," Anna snapped. "If the strategy isn't set at the
top, nothing is going to happen. You know that from railroading."
He was forced to admit she was right. "Unless the information gets to
where the decisions are made, it's all a lot of talk."
"So?"
"I'm thinking," said the Assistant Secretary of War. "I can't take this to
McClellan, because he wants to forget about the West except for holding
actions, concentrating on the war in the East. He wants to win this war
personally."
And not with one quick battle, she knew, as Lincoln had suggested. "The
Cabinet?"
"Cameron's closeted with his lawyer, Stanton, the holdover from Bu-
chanan, on our addendum to the President's Message. I can't get to either of
them with anything. They probably wouldn't understand, anyway, and
Stanton's a McClellan man."
"This is awfully important, Colonel. If it's delayed in the bureaucracy for a
month or two"
"I'll take it to Lincoln. He's the commander in chief, and Bates keeps
telling him to command. Do you have any of this on paper?"
She decided not to hand over her incomplete plan; if generals could find
flaws in it, they could discredit the entire idea. She would submit it with all of
Scott's questions answered. "I'll have it in a few days. But you ought to
discuss it with the President now." She hesitated. "And be sure he knows
who thought it up."
Scott smiled. "I'll never steal your credit, Anna. I'm sure the plan must be
floating around in some other people's heads, but they're not here at the
President's elbow when it counts." He promised to take the Tennessee River
plan to Lincoln that very day. She told him to tell John Hay that it was about
what she had hinted to him. Scott nodded; she could see he was genuinely
impressed and excited, and would make her initial presentation better than
she could.
She walked briskly back to her rooms to change for dinner at the Wades'.
Anna liked the position she was in: a close friend of Carolyn and Ben just at
the time when Wade was becoming extremely important, perhaps even a
challenge, to Lincoln and his men. At the same time, she agreed with Lincoln
on the war powers, and could argue with Ben about keeping congressional
hands off those powers. She also thought Ben and his abolitionist crowd were
all wrong about trying to make this a war about slavery, and could represent
Lincoln's views on gradual compensation to them, too, better than anyone.
Anna loved both Wades, and they knew it. She could get away with almost
anything in arguing her views, and if this were witnessed by a Cabinet mem-
ber like Chase, and reported back to Lincoln, she could be in a perfect bridge-
building position. That was power, which women were traditionally denied in
political Washington. If it were accompanied by some knowledge that her
military plan was under consideration at the highest levels of the War Depart-
ment, the power to build bridges would be buttressed.
Maybe, she thought while cinching her corset, in all this new power of
hers, some way could be found to get paid enough to afford a new dress. Her
out-to-dinner dress was practically falling apart, and she did not want to take
up Lizzie Keckley's kind offer to make a new one on credit. She had to keep
up appearances; power and poverty did not mix.

CHAPTER 9
THE DOUBLE CROSS
Twenty years before, Caroline Rosekrans of New York and Connecticut mar-
ried Benjamin Franklin Wade of Ohio when she was thirty-five and he was
forty. Both had expected to spend the rest of their lives single. She was
independent-minded and admired that quality in him, especially because he
admired it in her. Although Washington called him "Ben," "Old Ben," and
"Bluff Ben"and even, after he threatened to shoot deserters at Bull Run,
"Two-Gun Ben"she called him Frank.
Carolyn Wade had not intended to become a Washington hostess, but her
"talking dinners" served her husband's political interests well and satisfied
her own appetite for intrigue. She made no effort to match the champagne-
and-oysters elegance of young Nellie McClellan's dinner parties, or to com-
pete with Kate Chase's large and sparkling levees. In contrast, dinners at the
Wades' were gatherings over simple, good food, where much political busi-
ness took place to advance the causes of the radical Republicans, and suited
the plain style and combative nature of the man who had become the driving
force of the group fighting to end slavery now.
Before her guests arrived, she showed her husband how she planned to seat
them. These were her decisions; he sometimes grumbled, but never overrode
her preferences.
"Kate Chase is to your right, Frank," she told him, "because that's proto-
col, not because you need a young girl to turn your head."
"She hates my guts," said Wade. "I split the Ohio delegation support for
her beloved papa at the convention that nominated Lincoln last year, and she
remembers."
"But you enjoy her company, all the men do."
"Sure," he said, "but I like her for a different reason. She's a real hater."
"Anna Carroll is seated to your left."
"Good. I'll have somebody to talk to if the Chase girl freezes over. Did you
see Anna's  Reply  to  Breckinridge? She wiped up the floor with that
blackhearted traitor. As soon as we're in session, I'll move to expel him from
the Senate for treason."
Carolyn Wade knew all about the lovers-and-enemies relationship of John
Breckinridge and her best friend, and did not think it was one of the items of
information her husband or anybody else had to know. "I'm sure she'll appre-
ciate that, Frank. On Anna's left is Chase."
"The Secretary of the Treasury," her husband opined, "and my esteemed
predecessor as senator from the state of Ohio, is a pious blowhard and a
pompous ass."
"Wrong," she said. Her husband was right to mistrust Chase, because he
was so constoied with ambition to be President, but mistaken about the
man's gravitas'.''He has dignity. Big difference between real dignity and pom-
posity. Deeply religious, too, probably because of all that unhappiness in his
life."
"I feel for any man who's had to bury three wives, but that doesn't make
Chase any less a pompous ass."
"He's abolition's only voice in Lincoln's Cabinet, Frank."
"That's what so goddamn galling to me! The Biairs, damn their eyes, along
with that oleaginous Seward, have cozened Lincoln over to their thinking
that slavery's not so bad, and maybe we should gradually ease it out by the
next century. Evil! And the only one to speak out against it in the highest
councils is that holier-than-thou ass of a Salmon P. Chase!"
He was shouting out of habit, she knew, not because he was angry. That
would come later, at dinner, if nobody thundered back at him, and instead
yes-butted him. He appreciated worthy opponents, despised unworthy oppo-
nents, readily offended his political alliesChase was a good exampleand
reserved a special hostility and contempt for yes-butters.
"Chase would prefer if you called him Governor."
"I have a mind to call him Salmon because it makes him furious. What the
hell kind of a name is Salmon, anyway? A fishy name for a fishy fellow."
Carolyn Wade repressed a smile and indicated the chair to her right. "Lord
Lyons, the British ambassador. Try not to start the war tonight. He's here
because he's a bachelor and a friend of Kate's." She indicated the last two
chairs: "Edwin Stanton and his wife Ellen. We never met her, but Kate Chase
particularly asked that we invite them and you said yes. She's his second wife,
a lot younger than Stanton is, I hear. Kate tells me he's a lawyer in the War
Department now, quite a comedown from Attorney General."
"Edwin Stanton may just be the slimiest man in Washington," Ben Wade
pronounced with relish. "You know why he's still got his job? Although he
was Buchanan's Attorney General, he was secretly working with us all last
winter."
She had not known that. "That's duplicity."
"Oh, he's one duplex fellow, this Stanton. Chase was his main channel to
us, though some say he had a second channel to Seward. Stanton cozied up to
the Southerners in the Buchanan Cabinet, and then told Lincoln's men the
Southern plans for secession."
That was not the story she had heard. "The Biairs think Stanton actually
supported secession," she reported, since she was the only one of the two of
them who would speak to the Biairs. "They say that Stanton actually urged
secession on the Mississippians."
Her husband shook his head vigorously. "He was just being sneaky, the
way a spy has to be. Chase is high on Stanton, of course, wants him to replace
Simon Cameron at the War Department."
"Could you support somebody like thatall slimy?"
"He's a Democrat, but he's not a crook, like Cameron." Her husband
looked uncomfortable. "Personally honest and a good executive, they say.
God knows we could use a little incorruptibility. Pity Stanton is such a
double-crosser. We'll have a chance to look him over tonight. If he's right on
slavery, and if he'll lay the whip to that two-timing son of a bitch McClellan,
I'll help push him in the War Department."
At the dinner table, her husband stuffed a napkin in his collar and got right
to the point: "Stanton, what's all this about your calling Abe Lincoln a
gorilla?"
Stanton reddened and nearly choked. "That is a canard, Senator. Some
years ago, I was chosen by the McCormick reaper company to be its counsel
in a patent infringement case, and the company thought it wise to retain local
counsel in Springfield, Illinois. Mr. Lincoln and I met very briefly in the
courtroom. I did not utilize his undoubted legal talents and was, frankly, too
busy to look at his brief, but I certainly did not snub him, as has been alleged.
Nor did I ever use the term you mentioned."
"It wasn't a gorilla!" boomed the host, as if he had only half-heard the
explanation. "It was a giraffe. You were supposed to have saidIf that gi-
raffe appears in the case, I'll throw up my brief and leave!' Not true?"
"Not at all true." Stanton looked miserable, and Carolyn Wade worried
that his wife might be moved to tears. Carolyn shot her a sympathetic glance
and leaned across the table to pat his wife's hand.
"Damnation," Wade rolled on merrily, "I was prepared to like you, Stan-
ton. If there's anything Abe Lincoln looks like more than a gorilla, it's a
giraffe."
Chase came to Stanton's social rescue. "What's got you so riled up about
Lincoln, Ben? You used to think pretty highly of him, especially at the Chi-
cago convention."
"His 'House divided' speech appealed to me."
" 'A House divided against itself cannot stand,' " Anna Carroll quoted. " 1
believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half
free.' "
"In those days," Wade said, "he sounded a lot more like an abolitionist
than he does today."
"Unfair," said Anna. "He's always been against extension of slavery, not
for abolitionand besides he wasn't courting the border states back then."
"What about our stalwart emancipator, William Seward?" Wade de-
manded. "Chaseyou remember his 'irrepressible conflict'?" The host
turned to Kate Chase, put on his most stentorian voice, and began to recite:
" It is an irrepressible conflict between opposing and enduring forces; and it
means that the United States must and will, sooner or later, become entirely a
slaveholding nation or entirely a free-labor nation.' " He looked fiercely at her
father. "Old Billy Bowlegs isn't talking that way now that he's our Prime
Minister, is he?"
"No, he's not," Chase admitted, adding, "He's not the Prime Minister,
either, though he tries to be."
"You're forgetting that Seward said 'sooner or later,' Ben," Anna Carroll
put in. "If you try to turn this into a war about slavery, the Union will lose,
and the traitors will go off setting up a nation including Mexico and Cuba."
"Bosh!" Wade sent an ostentatious glare at Anna, which Carolyn Wade did
not worry about. The two of them had been through this before at their
dinners, and it drew the others out. Her husband then turned to Stanton, who
was recovering from the gorilla and the giraffe. "You agree with Miss Carroll,
Stanton?"
All eyes swung to the lawyer with the scraggly beard. "I think the slavery
issue is becoming ever more important," he said very carefully, "in the minds
of the people who voted for Lincoln." That said nothing, thought Carolyn
Wade. Stanton had probably voted for his fellow Democrat, Douglas, or even
for Breckinridge. Now that he was in the lair of the radical Republicans, he
leaned slightly toward abolition because he so desperately wanted to please.
She wondered what he really thought.
"Well said, for a Democrat," Wade observed, not letting him get away with
the evasion. "Do you realize that out of the one hundred and twenty generals
in the United States Army, over eighty are Democrats, and Halleck out West
is sending escaped slaves back to their masters in irons? How the hell are we
going to fight a war against human slavery with generals who don't give a
damn about slavery?"
"Some Democrats think slavery is wrong," said Stanton, more firmly now,
"and some of us have been Union men in the midst of conspiracies for seces-
sion." He looked significantly at Chase, who chimed in with "Stanton's one of
us, Ben."
"Good, good," said Wade, "and what do you think of McClellan, over
there at the War Department?"
Carolyn, to give Stanton a moment to arrange his defenses, turned to Lord
Lyons and explained, "Zack Chandler and Tad Stevens and my husband all
urged Lincoln to appoint McClellan, over General Scott's objections. McClel-
lan promised he would launch an immediate offensive, and he did not."
"Five goddamn weeks practicing bugle calls," Wade muttered.
"There's been no living with him," she added to the British ambassador.
"He double-crossed us! That slavery-loving bastard double-crossed us!"
Lord Lyons spoke up for the first time. "I'm not familiar with that expres-
sion."
"It's an American horse-racing term," Kate Chase explained. "When a
corrupt jockey agrees to hold back his horse to let another horse win, he's a
'crosser'; but if he then races to win himself, breaking his agreement with the
gamblers, he's called a 'double crosser.' "
"I am astounded," said her father, who looked genuinely shocked, "at my
own daughter's familiarity with the language of venality."
"You cannot protect her from life's harsh realities," Wade told him, then
concluded to Stanton, "and one of those is that McClellan is a double-cross-
ing bastard."
"Some of us are trying to urge him to action," Stanton said. "Unfortu-
nately, Secretary Cameron lets him have his way."
"We'll soon put a stop to that," snapped Wade. "The Joint Committee on
the Conduct of the War will soon be deciding which generals lead which
armies. If they don't have their heart in the war, out they go. Only the
Congress can declare war, under the Constitution, and only the Congress can
decide how the war should be fought."
After a silence at the table, Anna Carroll put down her fork with a plunk
and said, "You're mistaken, Senator."
Carolyn Wade noted how her husband gave her his most intimidating
glower, and how Secretary Chase looked troubled at the way this little
woman seemed to be putting her head on the block for the President. "I've
been researching the war powers for the past month," Anna said, "ever since
my Breckinridge pamphlet was sent out, and I can tell you that the President,
as commander in chief, conducts the war in his own way and concludes the
peace in his own time. And on his own terms. Congress has very little to say
about it."
"The Congress raises the troops, and raises the money"
"Congress was not in session when the war began, and the President did all
thatwhich Congress later had to approve. You voted for that, Ben, remem-
ber?"
"I had no choice. At the time, I thought that Lincoln was exceeding his
power, but in a just cause"
Anna was pushing him further than Carolyn ever remembered, and she
wondered if Anna was not going too far. "It was in Lincoln's power to
suspend habeas corpus," her friend continued with animation, "it is in his
power to arrest a sitting judge who obstructs the war effort, and it's in his
power to arrest a legislature about to vote secession."
"It is not in his power to ignore the Congress," Wade told her.
"I happen to think," said Anna Carroll, "that it is in the power of the
President, as commander in chief in wartime, to arrest and imprison, though
not otherwise to punish, a member of Congress who interferes with the mili-
tary conduct of the war."
Wade's jaw dropped. Chase harrumphed and said, "That's putting it a bit
strongly, my dear lady." Stanton tried to make himself invisible and the
British ambassador allowed his expressive eyebrows to rise.
"If I did not hold your intellect in the highest regard, Anna Carroll," said
Wade finally, "and if you were not my wife's dearest friend, I would throw
you right out of here."
Anna's reaction was to laugh, quickly and heartily, joined by a nervous
Carolyn Wade and a delighted Kate Chase, which broke the tension. Lord
Lyons took that opportunity to ask if Senator Wade thought the President
had the power to stop neutral ships and seize Confederate agents. "in
effect, Senator, to take this nation into war."
"Only Congress can declare war," Wade told the Englishman, "but if En-
gland wants a war over those two rebels, she'll get it."
"Do not underestimate the unanimity of the American nation," Chase told
the ambassador, "on the Trent affair. We are not going to hand over those
rebels we took off your ship. Public sentiment will not permit it."
"Public opinion in England is equally aroused," Lord Lyons said quietly,
"and getting more so every day. The American legation was attacked and
burned, I am sorry to say. If this impasse is not resolved, our nations could
very well be at war before the New Year."
"I think that's exactly what Lord Russell wants," said Wade, blunt as ever.
"Your government wants the South to win, it's in your interest."
"Economic interests, which I grant would lead us to favor the South, do
not always lead great nations into war."
"That's not what the senator means," said Stanton. "When the Union
triumphs, it will be the greatest military power in the world. You don't want
that. You want this continent divided into two nations, neither of which will
be a threat to your sea power."
Carolyn caught the look of new respect on her husband's face; Stanton had
scored.
"Even as we speak," said Lord Lyons evenly, "the President's envoy, Mr.
Thurlow Weed, is meeting with my Foreign Office in London. I can only hope
that his instructions are not as bellicose as the sentiment around this table."
Trouble; Carolyn shot Anna a look to stop her husband from saying what
he thought about Seward's man Weed. Anna's interruption surprised her,
though, because it departed from the points they had arranged beforehand.
"Excellency, I had a long talk with Lincoln yesterday," Anna said, always
a good way to get the attention of the table. "He was working on his annual
message, which of course will give us the answer on the Trent affair, and
about which I can say nothing." Carolyn admired Anna's nerve; she knew
Anna was not privy to any information about the Message, and had been
squeezed into the President's office for a few moments.
"He takes a long view of some matters," she continued, "which is why I
think you're wrong to be so impatient with him, Ben. He envisions that the
youngest of usyou, Katewill live to see a nation of two hundred and fifty
million souls, more than all of Europe. And he says that the struggle of today
is not altogether for today but is for a vast future also. I don't know. He may
seem weak at times, but I've known a few presidents and I never heard one
talk that way."
Carolyn marveled at the way her friend dared to convey admiration, even
enthusiasm, for a President that everyone at the table had different reasons
for holding in contempt. Because Chase was careful not to offend Wade, there
was a space in the dinner conversation that needed filling, and Anna rose to
the occasion. The only person at the table perceptibly cool to Anna was Kate
Chase, who evidently did not like the way her father was raptly listening to
an articulate and attractive woman near his own age. Carolyn weighed that;
Kate was known to be passionately devoted to her father's career, perhaps
unnaturally protective of her widower father's personal life. He was a good-
looking man, Carolyn Wade thought, perhaps the most impressive-looking
leader in politics today. Wealthy, too, she assumed. She watched the way
Anna sparkled at Chase in selling her ideas, and at his fascinated reaction.
Her eyes met her husband's, and Ben Wade nodded too obviously. She
could never get him to master the art of the imperceptible nod. She an-
nounced coffee in the parlor, and invited the ladies upstairs.
"Watch out for Chase's daughter," she murmured to Anna under her
breath on the way upstairs. Anna nodded and murmured back, "Help me
interest her in a young friend of mineJohn Hay."
In front of the boudoir mirror, Carolyn asked in a normal voice, "However
does the President manage, Anna? He must have a million things on his
mind."
"He has wonderful assistants," Anna replied. "You know his secretary,
John Hay? Remarkable young man."
"I've seen him at the Earneses' parties," Carolyn chatted back, trying to
recall the face and not succeeding. She noticed that Kate Chase was trying to
appear to be not listening. "Handsome fellow, hard to take that sort seri-
ously."
"He really manages the President's office," Anna said, all seriousness. "The
senior man, Nicolay, gets the credit, but the people inside know who has the
President's ear. Keep your eye on him. Remember the name." She then mur-
mured the name.
"Who?" Kate joined the conversation, looking in the mirror, curling back a
strand of auburn hair. As Anna was small and buxom, she was tall and
lissome; she had a graceful frame with shoulders that helped her carry clothes
well, but she was too slender for the fashion.
"We were talking about a man who says good things about your father
behind his back," said Anna.
"That's a novelty."
"Secretary Seward said or wrote something not altogether complimentary
about Treasury, and John Hay spoke up to the President about it. Lincoln
was most impressed. You don't know him?"
"We must have met at a reception."
Having baited the hook, Anna changed the subject. "You know what I'd
like to do now, Carolyn? I'd like to break the iron discipline of tradition. I
would like to go into the library and talk to the men."
"Oh," said a small voice from Ellen Stanton, "I don't think that's a very
good idea."
"Miss Carrollif you do, I will too." Kate Chase looked both mischievous
and regal, a becoming combination.
Anna offered her arm solemnly, which Kate took, and they went off to take
part in whatever brandied profundities marked the post-dinner political talk.
Carolyn smiled after them: tall and short, twenty and forty, rich and poor,
but both daughters of famous and powerful men, comfortable in the proxim-
ity of power, both headstrong, cunning, and vulnerably independent. She
hoped they would be allies, for the two women had much to learn from each
other. But so did opposing generals.
When Carolyn Wade went in to pour the coffee, she was pleased to see her
library the scene of the closing of a deal. "Ohioans should stick together," her
husband was saying, which Kate must have found bitterly amusing. "You
went to Kenyon College in Gambier, Stanton? Chase's family gave that
school its start." After some college reminiscences to establish a common
bond, Wade took his coffee cup in hand and saluted Stanton: "The Joint
Committee will look to you for complete cooperation on materials, especially
telegraph cables, from pro-slavery generals."
"Unless Cameron or the President objects," amended Stanton, but in a way
that sounded to Carolyn as a promise to get around such objections.
"And I want the scalp of the rebel sympathizer under McClellan who sent
Ned Baker to his death at Ball's Bluff."
"I would want to know all about that too, Senator."
"In return, Stanton, you have our support if and when Cameron gets
booted out," said Wade, deliberately unlawyerlike. "If you make it, I would
like to put in a word right now for the continued success of Assistant Secre-
tary Scott."
"He would have my complete confidence," promised Stanton.
"And I think you and he," continued Wade, giving his deal a final squeeze,
"would do well to press a certain Tennessee River plan of Miss Carroll's. It
makes a good deal of sense to me, and I would hate to see some pro-slavery
general like 'Old Brains' out West drag a foot."
"This is something I want to look into immediately," Stanton said. Carolyn
imagined he would promise anything else Wade had in mind.
"Just don't double-cross us," said her husband ominously, "the way Mc-
Clellan double-crossed us about attacking the enemy before the winter set in.
That little popinjay is going to spend a great deal of his time on parade in
front of our committee."
Stanton wiped some coffee off his beard. "I think that would do the little
popinjay a great deal of good."
CHAPTER I
To ORGANIZE VICTORY
No matter what duplicity was necessary, no matter what hypocrisy was
called for, no matter what demeaning flattery or false promises were required
of him, Edwin McMasters Stanton was determined to become a member of
the Lincoln Cabinet. Not only a member, but the dominant member.
The Democratic lawyer had cultivated an acquaintance with Chase and
Seward after Lincoln's election, despite the grumbling of some of his fellow
Democrats who considered that a betrayal of President Buchanan. Stanton
came to the conclusion that the men Lincoln had chosen were poseurs and
dilettantes. The Biairs cared only for family power; Attorney General Bates
he knew to be a poor lawyer, Cameron at War and Welles at Navy he consid-
ered hack politicians, and Caleb Smith at Interior he dismissed as a Hoosier
joke. The war was being lost through sheer ineptitude. To save the nation,
that collection of connivers and nonentities around Lincoln needed the invig-
oration of a man with organizational genius, unparalleled stamina, and a
willingness to use power. Stanton, never devious with himself, was certain he
was that man.
As a member of Buchanan's Cabinet, Stanton had watched that well-inten-
tioned weakling temporize his way to the brink of national disaster. He had
seen Lincoln creep into Washington in a slouch hat in the dead of night, and
blunder into the ruination of all peaceful pursuits and into national bank-
ruptcy under the malign influence of the Biairs. As Stanton had told friends,
Du Chaillu, the explorer, was a fool to wander all the way to Africa in search
of the giraffe or gorilla he so easily might have found in Springfield, Illinois.
Pity that remark had been picked up; Ben Wade would probably spread it far
and wide. The only way Stanton could think of to handle such an indiscretion
was to deny categorically that he had ever made it.
Stanton had a clear idea of what it took to run the War Department in
wartime. A man was required who would be capable of prodigious physical
energy, ready to work twelve-hour days, seven days a week, driving and
browbeating and shaming subordinates to work as hard; a man with a proven
record of success, inspiring others to stretch themselves for a great goal.
Stanton had been making fifty thousand dollars a year as a lawyer, more than
any other attorney in the United States, and he was willing to toss it over for
the eight-thousand-dollar salary of a department head, a fact that demon-
strated both his past success and his dedication to his country.
Just as important, Edwin Stanton persuaded himself, the War Department
needed a man unafraid to say no to the President, and the President's wife,
and his cronies, and the other political bigwigs, on the thousands of petty
favors that added up to the sense of favoritism and corruption. In his very
first meeting as President Buchanan's Attorney General, in 1860, Stanton
recalled vividly denouncing the then Secretary of War as a fraud and a thief,
and warning the President that a move to withdraw the Union garrison at
Fort Surnter would make him guilty of treason. Once in place, Stanton had
shown he was unafraid to use his power.
What other criteria were required in one who would be the true organizer
of victory? Stanton was ready with that answer too: the man would have to be
willing to assume responsibility for internal security, and be ready to jail
disloyalists and newspapermen when their snooping bordered on spying. He
would have to understand the location of the real levers of power to seize
control of the technology of rapid communicationthe telegraph, the rail-
roads, and the river systems.
The job of general manager of a civil war was a prodigious challenge, one
never before met by any American. Its reward, he knew, was a guaranteed
unpopularity, but that did not faze him; in fact, Stanton had always delighted
in stimulating the indignation of the unworthy or the inept. He was ready for
the appointment.
The trouble was, the President was not likely to turn to Stanton because he
was not an agreeable politician. He had to be realistic about that. Therefore
the power he sought would have to be derivative; no matter how much play-
ing the courtier revolted him, he knew he would have to rule through an-
other. Although the end did not always justify the means, he was firmly
persuaded that when the end in sight was the end of America's nationhood,
any means to avert that catastrophe would do. When treason was abetted by
stupidity, venality, and petty bickering, he saw the patriot's duty as clear: to
scratch and claw and connive one's way to the place where one's personal
abilities could make the vital difference.
Stanton plotted his campaign to become Secretary of War with more metic-
ulous care, strategic sweep, and attention to tactical detail than any general
certainly any general on the Union sidehad planned a campaign in the field.
The position he now held was that of general counsel in the War Depart-
ment, a trusted adviser to Simon Cameron. Stanton's previous service in the
Buchanan Cabinet was, he was told, no longer held against him. To ingratiate
himself at first, he had sought out and befriended Seward, Lincoln's choice
for Secretary of State, immediately after the election; during the four months
of the interregnum, Stanton had provided him with the details of all the
deliberations of President Buchanan in his Cabinet. The conservative William
Seward, Stanton assumed, was the key to Lincoln: the statesman of the East
most trusted by the lawyer from the West. Then, hedging his bet on Seward,
Stanton also fed tidbits to Chase and the radical Republicans.
"I want that message now," Stanton wheezed at his secretarytension
worsened his asthma. "Go down the hall and badger Cameron's secretary
until he gives it to you. He can't fiddle with that document forever, and I
don't want him showing it to every Philadelphia politician who wanders in."
The annual message of the Secretary of War, accompanying the President's
State of the Union message to the Congress, was going to be Stanton's ticket
of admission to the Lincoln Cabinet. He intended it to result in the removal of
the bumbling Cameron and his replacement with the energetic War Democrat
now being wasted in the menial role of general counsel.
Lincoln would never remove Simon Cameron for mere stupidity, ineffi-
ciency, or laziness, Stanton was certain. Such a removal would be an admis-
sion by the President that all the congressional charges of corruption and
political favoritism in the purchase of supplies were well founded. Worse,
firing Cameron would invite Senator Wade's new Joint Committee on the
Conduct of the War to dominate the War Department.
Not that Lincoln held Cameron in high regard. On the contrary, Stanton
had been told by Thurlow Weed how the President-elect tried to wriggle out
of a promise made at the Republican convention the year before, for a Cabi-
net post to Cameron in return for the Pennsylvania votes for Lincoln. The
new President felt obligated to offer the job to Cameron, but had pleaded with
the man to turn it down. But Cameron had hungered for the glory of a job
with vast patronage power.
Stanton wanted the War portfolio too, ached for the central assignment
but not, he assured himself, for vainglory. Just the opposite. He was deter-
mined to assume the War portfolio because the nation would surely founder
without him. Only for that overriding reason would the leading lawyer in the
United States have stooped to the series of subterfuges he had been forced to
engage in over the past eighteen months.
The first stepan incredible misstep, he now admittedhad been to sup-
port Breckinridge for President because he had been far less abolitionist than
either Douglas or Lincoln, and because Stanton knew and respected the Ken-
tuckian. Then, as Lincoln's star rose, Stanton had to engage in furious back-
tracking, growing connective tissue to the pro-slavery radicals through that
foppish Massachusetts Senator, Sumner. That was followed by his passing of
private information from the Buchanan Cabinet meetings to Seward on Lin-
coln's conservative right and Chase on his abolitionist left. Little by little,
Stanton had wormed his way into the confidence of both groups supporting
the new President.
The final source of support was the most difficult for Stanton: holding on to
his original base, the pro-slavery but fiercely pro-Union Democrats. General
George McClellan was his key, a youthful mind susceptible to flattery, who
despised the politicians in power and seemed not to mind hearing Stanton
hint at the desirability of a military dictatorship in this time of trial. Stanton
could envision McClellan, if he did well in the war, running for President in
1864 as a Democrat against the Republican choiceprobably Chase, though
possibly Lincoln might try again.
That was why the elegant Stanton home had become the hiding place for
the impressionable General McClellan, the place where he could duck what
he called "browsing presidents." Stanton had put the young man in touch
with S.L.M. Barlow, the Democratic leader in New York City, who stood
ready to become Stanton's law partner if the plot to replace Cameron did not
succeed. Barlow had urged Stanton to drive a wedge into the already divided
Lincoln Cabinet, to foster the personal bickering that would widen the politi-
cal divisionsbut to keep the General out of the machinations, so as to place
young McClellan above the political battle until the time came to launch his
presidential bid. Stanton had certainly done that, meanwhile telling the politi-
cal innocent of the imbecility of Lincoln's administration.
The Young Napoleon was taking that instruction well, and showed signs of
trusting Stanton's judgment completely. Only that morning, he had come for
legal advice on the Trent affair: Lincoln had invited him to a Cabinet meeting
to discuss the imminence of the war with England, and McClellan had been
prepared to tell the President to admit that the American government was in
the wrong and to get out of the scrape without taking on a huge new military
and naval burden.
Stanton, the experienced lawyer, had promptly set the young man straight:
that the seizure of the Confederates was fully justified by all the rules of
international law, that the Union was fully in the right, and that it should be
prepared to fight in a just cause. Any other course, Stanton persuaded him,
would be seen as more Lincoln weakness and further dispirit the North.
McClellan had gone to the Cabinet meeting with his original position com-
pletely reversed.
"If you cannot get me the information I need when I need it," Stanton
shouted to his aide, "I will find someone who can!"
"Secretary Cameron is not finished with the message," Stanton's harried
helper reported from the hallway. "He would only give me the first half."
"Let me see." Stanton snatched the sheets covered with the careful long-
hand of Cameron's aide, tracked over with the Secretary's own markings,
looking for the page Stanton had appended earlier. His urgently recom-
mended insertion was not there; he assumed that his politically explosive
section about the arming of slaves had probably been moved toward the end.
Stanton's plan was straightforward in its deviousness. Since Lincoln would
never fire Cameron for toleration of corruption, or for executive ineptitude,
what was needed was a more compelling reason for dismissal. Stanton's lips
moved in the approximation of a smile when he contemplated that reason:
Lincoln had shown himself to be highly sensitive to any attempt by anyone to
wrest from him the authority to deal with the issue of slavery. The Fr6mont
episode had been most instructive; Lincoln, when aroused on that sensitive
subject, would throw a thunderbolt and be ready to take the consequences. If
Cameron were to challenge the President, as Fremont had, on the one matter
which Lincoln held closely to himself, then the way would be opened to the
dismissal of Cameron and the appointment of a new Secretary of War.
The sheets of the first part of the war message in hand, Stanton hurried to
Cameron's office. For a change, the general counsel noted wryly, the Pennsyl-
vania political leader was on the job, in his office and not seeing contractors
and office seekers and Congressmen at his home. Stanton promised himself he
would never conduct war business at home when he got the job.
"We have to get this thing to the printer," Stanton urged, "do you have the
rest? Are you having second thoughts? I hope notthe entire course of the
war hangs in the balance."
"As a matter of fact, Edwin, I am." Cameron was obviously uncomfort-
able, holding the packet of sheets in his hand lest somebody take them away
against his will, walking up and down his office, dithering. "Lincoln's not
going to like this one bit."
"Then the President will simply strike it out of your message," Stanton
said soothingly. "If you believe in arming and using captured slaves in the
army, then it is your responsibility to put it in your message. After that, the
decision is up to the President. He's a lawyer, he can read."
Cameron wavered. Stanton went on, "I'll deliver it to his secretary myself,
so the release can be co-ordinated at the Executive Mansion next week." The
President's message to Congress would have to be delivered at the opening of
the regular session, the first week in December. He assumed the President's
decision on the seizure of the rebels off the British Trent would dominate,
since defiance of England would be a good way of getting people's minds off
the misconduct of the war. The President would pay little attention to the
Secretary of War's accompanying message, at least in its preparation stage;
that was what Stanton was counting on.
"You're sure it won't go out this way without his knowledge?"
Stanton let himself look cagey. "If Lincoln cuts your confiscation para-
graph outand I doubt if he will, since he certainly agrees with the philoso-
phythen it will come to the attention of a few of our radical friends that
Simon Cameron at least tried to strike a blow against the slaveholders in
rebellion."
"Greeley's the important one," said Cameron, "the President worries
about the support of the Tribune. If Greeley knows that I'm the only one
who's fighting for abolition in the Cabinetwell, me and Chasethen he'll
have to stick with me. We can ride out this storm."
"Greeley will know," promised Stanton truthfully. He pointed to the final
pages of the draft message on Cameron's desk. "Did you put the slave-arming
paragraph in?"
"Well, I haven't decided yet." Dithering again; Stanton controlled his tem-
per. "You know, Edwin, when Fr6mont tried to emancipate the slaves out
West a couple of months ago, Lincoln humiliated him. Forced him to take it
back. He sent me out West to fire Fr6mont finally, but that would have meant
facing that hellion Jessie, so I had a messenger do it. Taking away slave
property is a card the President likes to hold close to his vest."
"Fr6mont did not submit his proclamation to Lincoln first," Stanton told
Cameron, "and you are. You've giving the President a method of carrying out
last July's Confiscation Act in a quiet way. If Lincoln doesn't want to arm the
slaves that are captured"
"He won't. He's worried about servile insurrection in Kentucky and Mis-
souri"
"Then he'll cut it out of your part of the message," Stanton assured him,
"and Greeley and the other abolitionists will know that your heart was in the
right place. If you don't keep those radicals closely behind you, Wade and
Chandler will cut you to ribbons in their Joint Committee."
The threat of a Senate investigation ended the irresolution in Cameron.
Stanton watched him poke nervously through the sheets on his desk to the
paragraph that Stanton hoped would soon cause an uproar. "If it shall be
found," the words Stanton had drafted began, "that the men who have been
held by the rebels as slaves are capable of bearing arms and performing effi-
cient military service, it is the right, and may become the duty of the govern-
ment to arm and equip them, and employ their services against the reb-
els ... "
"Arming captured slaves," urged Stanton, "will send a shiver of fear
throughout the South. Legally, Ben Butler's idea of confiscation of contra-
band is brilliant. By accepting the South's contention that slaves are property,
we are able to apply the doctrine that property seized in war is contraband
that can be seized and used against the enemy."
"Put it in," said Cameron impulsively, pressing the sheets on Stanton.
"You're a better lawyer than Batesbe ready with a legal argument in case
the Attorney General complains. Go aheadget it printed and over to the
Mansion. When Lincoln sees it in print and ready to go, he'll know it's the
right thing to do."
Stanton's first rule in the courtroom was to stop arguing when the case was
won. He nodded and walked quickly down the hallway of the War Depart-
ment building, past the telegraph office where President Lincoln spent much
of his time waiting for the results of losing battles, to his own cubicle where
his messenger was waiting.
"Print it and mail it," he ordered, hoping that would take no longer than a
few days. He added: "Send a copy to the President's secretary along with a
stack of other reports. Be sure they're all wrapped together in a big bundle
when you send them over."
As the man hurried off to the printer, Stanton stood tensely in his office,
metal-rimmed glasses in hand, squinting across the street at the President's
House, calculating his chances. He had no doubt that Lincoln would explode
at Cameron's insubordination, and would take the Pennsylvania boss's action
as the last straw. But what then? Could Stanton be sure the most important
job in the nation, short of the Presidency itself, would then be his?
He had the trusting McClellan's full support; that counted for something
with Lincoln, who wanted a War Department chief who could work in har-
mony with the army commander, and perhaps persuade him of the political
imperatives of early military action. Only the day before, McClellan had told
Stanton that Lincoln was thinking about replacing Cameron, and had asked
who would be respected by the army's chiefs. McClellan had said he put in a
word for Stanton. The attention, the flattery, the constant assurance that the
commander would have a staunch representative in the Cabinet when he was
in the fieldall was paying off.
Stanton was satisfied, also, that McClellan and his pretty wifethe two
were so blatantly in love it was embarrassinghad responded well to his
candid derogations of Lincoln. "Imbecility" was the word he had hammered
home, to McClellan's professed embarrassment; obviously neither Lincoln
nor anyone in his Cabinet was capable of organizing an army or planning
strategy. He could see that the young general agreed, though out of military
decorum he refrained from joining in criticism of the President, and the point
that so flattered the general had the added advantage of being true.
With his right flank protected, Stanton reminded himself to shore up his
left: at that awful dinner at the Wades' the night before, he had reminded
Carolyn Wade of his Ohio roots. Stanton assessed Wade to be a single-
minded, purposeful black Republican, determined to expand his power at the
expense of Lincoln.
McClellan, on Stanton's advice six weeks before, had promised Wade
prompt military action, in return for radical support of his promotion to
General-in-Chief; now Wade was pressing him to make good on the promise.
Stanton would have to appear to be on Wade's side, but not so overtly that it
would get back to McClellan, whose army was not ready for a major winter
offensive.
Stanton's weak eyes could make out, across the street, the President's
house being dusted with a cover of snow. The growing impatience with Lin-
coln, the pervasive feeling in the capital and in New York and Philadelphia
that the job of running a war was too big for him, would be Stanton's key <
power.
The radicals would direct their fire at McClellan, and McClellan and tl
Douglas Democrats would come to despise the abolitionist politicians in r<
turn; in that crossfire, Stanton would let each faction believe it could count c
him. With that established, everyone would agree the time had come for
man of strength and intellect to take charge of Lincoln's war.
Across the way, the front door of the President's house opened. Stanto
watched a short young man with a mustache come out on the porch, look i
the snow, sniff the cold air, then duck back inside. Stanton recognized Lii
coin's second secretary; on the expected inefficiency of young John Ha
rested his hopes for the quick demise of Simon Cameron as Secretary of Wa

CHAPTER 2
OF SLAVES AND GUNPOWDER
In his cubicle next to the vast office of Horace Greeley, managing editor
Charles Dana went through the President's annual message, just received in
the mail from Washington, for the third time. Nothing about the Trent. He
shook his head in wonderment and carried the sheaf of papers into Greeley's
corner office, with its grand view of Spruce and Nassau streets and the statue
of Benjamin Franklin on the corner.
The editor was poring over the Secretary of War's message, which had been
mailed separately; Dana was also surprised that his boss would turn first to
what was so obviously the less important document.
"There's no lead to the story," said Dana. "The Trent affair is not even
mentioned in the President's message."
Greeley did not look up.
"Here we are on the brink of war with England," Dana continued, "with
harbors being fortified, and the British sending troops to Canada, and Lord
Lyons about to issue an ultimatum or break off relations. And what does our
President do? In his message to Congress on the state of the Union, with the
whole world waiting, he says nothing. Nothing! It's as if Lincoln's in a world
of his own."
"Less said the better," said Greeley, still reading through the printed mes-
sage in his hands from the War Department. "Anything on war with England
from our London correspondent?"
"Marx has sent in an excellent piece, for a change." The Tribune had
arranged for a series of letters from London written by Karl Marx, a German
observer there. Marx's writing was turgid, and Dana cut it mercilessly, but
the dispatch just received on the Trent affair was filled with detail on the way
the Palmerston government and its "slavish press" had been fanning the
flames of resentment at the buccaneering Americans. "Includes this item,"
said Dana, pulling the piece out of his pocket. "General Winfield Scott, after
retiring, happened to be in Europe during all the tension. He wrote a letter to
the London papers predicting that the United States would cheerfully surren-
der the seized men if by so doing it would emancipate the commerce of the
world. Marx says it had an important effect'a beneficent reaction in public
opinion, even on the London Stock Exchange.' I didn't think Old Fuss and
Feathers was that smart."
"General Scott didn't write that letter himself," Greeley said, still not
looking up. "Thurlow Weed wrote it for him. Probably made a few bucks on
the Exchange while he was at it."
"That's unfair."
"That's Weed. I know the man, he and Seward and I were partners, and I
tell you he's a conniving Albany wirepuller. He's over there to warn the
British to forget about war, and he's probably setting up our surrender."
If Greeley despised him so, Dana figured. Weed must possess some good
qualities. "I'll give the Marx piece a good display, then."
"He helps us with German readers," said Greeley, concerned as always
with circulation; "pity he can't write in better English. And stop bothering
meI'm trying to find something in Cameron's message."
Dana bridled at the condescension. He had come to despise his boss, and
knew his job was in jeopardy. Dana was for war to prevent disunion, Greeley
was for war to stop slavery, which was enough of a disagreement, but it was
compounded by Greeley's irrational urges to make peace, which would leave
slavery in place. Lincoln was heard to say by Adams Hill, the Tribune's man
in Washington, that "Uncle Horace is with us four days out of seven." What
kind of supporter was that? Dana wished he could get a job in Washington
and shake free of this inconsistent tyrant.
To annoy the editor, Dana remained in the room. "There's one line in the
President's message that's such an obvious lie that it must have made 'Honest
Abe' gag to sign it," Dana said, wondering what it was in the Cameron
message that Uncle Horace was searching for so intently. "In the part about
the appointment of McClellan as general-in-chief replacing Scott, here's what
Lincoln says: 'The retiring chief repeatedly expressed his judgment in favor of
General McClellan for the position ...' Everybody knows that's hogwash.
General Scott hates McClellanScott wanted Halleck. Does Lincoln think
the people are going to swallow that?"
"Here it is." Greeley, ignoring Dana, suddenly became agitated, smacking
the pages on his desk in glee. "Hah! He did it. The old reprobate got away
with it. What courage!" The editor circled a paragraph in red and Dana came
around the desk to read it. "There's the lead for your story."
Dana read the buried paragraph and allowed himself to look impressed. "It
is as clearly a right of the government to arm slaves," the Secretary of War
had written, "when it may become necessary, as it is to use gunpowder taken
from the enemy."
The decision to put deadly weapons in the hands of abused former slaves,
bent on vengeance, would strike terror in the South, where so many planta-
tions were now unguarded by men. The arming of freed slaves, a precedent
sure to create a furor in the border states, was a victory for abolitionists and a
break with Lincoln's previous policy. The President had evidently decided
that the support of Republicans like Wade in the Senate and Greeley in the
press was more important than the feelings of loyal slaveholders and Demo-
crats.
That was indeed front-page news. Dana wondered who had tipped off
Greeley to look for the paragraph. Somebody in the War DepartmentTom
Scott, Edwin Stanton, perhaps Cameron himself, currying favor with the
radical Republicans? Weeks ago, Greeley had asked Dana to put together a
story puffing Stanton as a man with a future, and had been irritated at him for
not getting around to it. Perhaps James Gilmore, a correspondent assigned by
Lincoln to pass advance news to Greeley in return for favorable treatment in
the Tribune, was the source.
"Strange that the announcement should be in Cameron's message, not in
Lincoln's," Dana said to Greeley, fishing. "The South will be furious about
thisslave uprisings, rape of white women, all that." Next step would be
drafting freed blacks to fight, and full-scale abolition could not be far behind.
He thought Lincoln liked to keep these big decisions to himself.
A timid tap on the door suggested that a copyboy dared to intrude upon
the two editors.
"I cannot be interrupted," Greeley said mildly. He usually barked or
snapped that command, but he was apparently feeling very good.
"The Postmaster of New York is here, sir, and he says it is urgent, sir."
Without a moment's hesitation, Greeley rolled up the printed copy of the
Secretary of War's report, took it to his closet, stuffed it down the sleeve of a
coat hanging there, and locked the closet door. "Send the mailman in."
The postmaster, brandishing a telegram as if to ward off the evil spirits of
the press, entered and stated his business. "I have received a telegram from
Postmaster General Blair, informing me that the Secretary of War wishes to
recover all copies of the message delivered this morning and to tell you, Mr.
Greeley, that another, correct copy will be on its way tomorrow."
"I am the editor, not the mail clerk," said Greeley. "Anything else? I'm
busy."
"A copy was delivered here this morning," the postmaster insisted. "In
fact, Secretary Cameron's message was delivered along with the President's
message, which I saw on the desk just outside your office."
"Does the Secretary of War want the President's message back too?"
"No, Mr. Greeley, just his own. It's here, and I really must have it."
"The message is not in this office," Greeley statedtechnically truthfully,
Dana noted. "If you wish to undertake a search, I will leave you here"he
went to his closet door"and I will put on my coat, go to Washington, see
President Lincoln, and demand that the Postmaster of New York be fired.
No, more than thatarrested!"
The bureaucrat crumbled. "If you should find the Cameron message, Mr.
Greeley, would you please return it?"
"Leave Mr. Biair's telegram with us," said Dana, taking it from the post-
master's hand as he ushered him out. "It will serve as a reminder."
Dana took a deep breath. "Are you going to run it, Mr. Greeley? Camer-
on's message has been officially withdrawn. They'll know that you deliber-
ately disobeyed the War Department." Dana's heart began to race: Was this
treason? Or was this press freedom in the tradition of John Peter Zenger?
Horace Greeley went to the closet, fished the document out of his coat
sleeve, hefted it with a certain reverence, and handed it to his managing
editor. "Publish," he said. "And if, tomorrow, we receive a new copy of the
Cameron message with some weaselly statement substituted by Lincoln, pub-
lish the Lincoln version next to the original version. Then we shall complain
mightily about the way the President has edited Cameron a la FrCmont and
set back the cause of human freedom. I will write an editorial."
"The President will be extremely angry," Dana reminded him. "So will
Seward. Remember what they did to the Eagle, and remember how the Jour-
nal of Commerce had to toe the mark."
"Those publications supported treason. The Tribune supports freedom."
The editor, his agitation behind him, looked serene, his moon face beatific.
"The President knows that if he touched the Tribune, the Republican Party
would turn on him and demand abolition immediately or an end to the war.
Lincoln will not dare to touch the Tribune."
"You're sure?"
"You forget, my dear Dana, I gave the Republican Party its name. I made
Abraham Lincoln what he is today."
"Still, it's defiance of the government in wartime." Dana was prepared to
go to Fort Lafayette, but wanted to be sure Greeley was in the cell next to
him. "In the light of what's happened to some newspapers, it doesn't seem
quite fair."
"One person may steal a horse with impunity," Greeley quoted a favorite
proverb, "while another may be hanged for merely looking over a hedge."
Dana nodded slowly and went to the door, trying to figure out why Lincoln
would permit Cameron to do what he had fired Fremont for doing. His hand
on the doorknob, it occurred to him that the visit from the postmaster meant
that Lincoln had not known what Cameron was up to, and that Greeley's
decision to publish was the political death warrant for the Secretary of War.
"This should force Cameron to resign, Mr. Greeley. The whole world will
know how Lincoln rapped his knuckles, and if old Simon has any pride at all,
he'll quit. Is that what you want?"
"That corrupt trimmer will be replaced by someone more sincere in his
zeal for abolition. You handle the news, Charles, and I will deal with the
politics." He began stirring the papers on his desk in preparation for editorial-
izing. "By the way, I have accepted an invitation to speak to the Smithsonian
Institution in Washington on January third. When next you are in touch with
our man Gilmore, make sure he gets word to Lincoln of my appearance there.
It would be nice, especially after all the fuss that this story is sure to cause, for
the President to show his respect for the Tribune, and all it stands for, by
attending my lecture."
CHAPTER ':

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
DECEMBER 4. 1861

The message disaster wasn't Nice's fault, it was all mine.
George Nicolay may be rapidly approaching thirty, and I have come to
think of him as the elder brother I never wanted to have, but he is blameless
in this fiasko.
When sturdy Stoddard came staggering in with his armloads from the War
Department on that fateful annual message day, Nico pointed at me, and the
heap was dumped on my desk. I should have gone through it all, including
the draft message of the Secretary of War, but Cameron's message was not in
draft formon the contrary, it had already been set in type and printed, so it
seemed to me to have been already approved. Even so, that's no excuse. I
should have caught the wily Cameron's attempt to become the maker of
policy on slavery.
Not until the bundles had been sent to the Postmaster General for trans-
mission to his local postmasters, with special urgency to hand-deliver them to
the press in New York, did the Tycoon himself come across the offending
paragraph.
Big hullabalou. "This will never do! This is a question that belongs exclu-
sively to me!" He had not been so furious since Fr6mont's emancipation
proclamation; the President must think the entire war depends on the way he
handles the slavery issue.
I ran over to Seward at State who rounded up the crew for a Cabinet
meeting. Lincoln did not let his anger show at Cameron, who still commands
legions of office seekers and sticky-fingered contractors who could cause the
Administration great mischief. The Tycoon does not want Cameron doing to
him what the powerful Pennsylvanian did to his predecessors, Buchanan and
Fillmore.
Chase, who is firmly in Greeley's pocket, was the only one who stuck up
for Cameron. "I believe it was unfortunate that it came out inadvertently," he
boomed in that stentorian tone, "but we will soon have to come to the arming
of freed slaves, and it might as well be now. The nation will applaud the
Administration for this move. It might even buttress our effort to raise money
to pay for the war, which desperately needs every support it can get."
Grandma Wellesthat's what they call Father Neptune, but not to his face
gave wishy-washy backing to Cameron. Fortunately, Montgomery Blair
was adamant that any move to free slaves was premature. That was a princi-
pled stand, because all knew that his father, old Francis Blair, was close to
Cameron, and forcing the Secretary of War to eat his words publicly would
cause the Pennsylvania dealmaker great embarrassment. Judge Blair, with
Lincoln obviously on his side, carried the day. An innocuous paragraph was
written by the President and given to Cameron to substitute, and Lincoln told
Blair to retrieve all the copies with the offending policy.
That substitution turned out to be not such a good idea. I thought at the
time it showed how the Tycoon was growing more willing to take charge of
the Cabinet and let them know who is boss, but it showed just the opposite.
Uncle Horace let out a war whoop and printed both versions side by side,
embracing Cameron as the nation's savior and making Lincoln look like a
captain of a slave ship, and the rest of the press picked that up. The result is
that the Cabinet is in obvious public disarray and the President looks weaker
than ever. Add that to the "All quiet on the Potomac" news that is driving
the Jacobins wild, and you have a bleak winter scene here at the center of the
nation's miseries.
What comfort for the weary President in the midst of this mess? One ray of
sunshine is Willie, who marches into the Tycoon's office with scraps of poetry
or amusing stories that transfigure his father's normally gloomy face. I have
been dispatched to purchase a pony for the young fellow, the gift of his doting
parents, and now Willie can ride alongside Lincoln on those lonely late after-
noon forays.
The Lincoln sons differ. Robert Lincoln strikes me as an upright and solid
lad, good college material, but he and his father never seem to find words to
say to each other. Tad is afflicted with an overly large head and a cleft palate,
and is treated tenderly, with hidden sadness. Willie, the middle one, is the joy.
He is spoiled, yet cannot be really spoiled because his character is generous.
He does more for his country than a division of fresh troops, because he can
lift the spirits of the man who must lift the spirit of the nation.
The boy has a serious side that complements his sunniness. Last month, he
sent off a poem to the editor of the National Republican with a note that said:
"I enclose you my first attempt at poetry." It was published, of course, and
wrung every heart around here:
There was no patriot like Baker,
So noble and so true;
He fell as a soldier on the field,
His face to the sky of blue.
No squeamish notions filled his breast,
The Union was his theme,
"No surrender and no compromise"
His day's thought and night's dream.
For a boy not yet eleven, that is not bad. It is better poetry than I was
turning out at that age. The thought of the boy playing on the lawn that
Sunday, Baker with his feet up against the big tree talking to his father, then
Ned buttoning his uniform, kissing the boy, and going off to review the troops
with Breckinridgeand then dying at Ball's Bluff is, without being sentimen-
tal, at least bittersweet.
Another cheerer-upper is the diplomatic mail. Not the letter from France,
which supported England on the Trent matter, or the communication from
Lord Lyons the other day just short of threatening war, but some of the
arcane things. I brought a letter from the King of Siam into the President's
office. He was taking a few press cuttings out of his hat and laying them on
the desk.
"Here's good news," I chirruped, "the King of Siam has come up with a
way to help us win the war."
The Ancient of Days looked at the letter, seriously at first, then that grin
spread all over his face. "Elephants," he noted. "His Majesty is offering us
war elephants which, he says, when bred will develop into a herd of beasts
that will solve all our transportation problems." He had a good laugh, took
off his spectacles, and wiped his eyes. "John, how would I look on top of an
elephant?"
"That's more General McClellan's style, sir."
He cackled a bit and wrote a few lines for Seward to prepare as a formal
letter in reply. "I appreciate most highly Your Majesty's tender of good offices
in forwarding to the Government a stock from which a supply of elephants
might be raised on our own soil. Our political jurisdiction, however, does not
reach a latitude so low as to favor the multiplication of the elephant . . ."
A more substantial uplift to the President's spirits came with a visit from
Tom Scott. That efficient fellowa rarity at the War Department these days
brought a map of the Mississippi Valley and the first daring idea for a
military strategy we have seen in the West. The bright idea is to forget the
plan to storm the Mississippi forts, and instead to use the Tennessee River,
which I understand flows northward contrary to law.
Tom Scott's visit with a Tennessee plan of this sort had been predicted by
Miss Carroll; true to my promise, I made certain the Tycoon knew that this
remarkable lady had been the source of the plan. He told me to keep that
information under my hat, since the military does not embrace suggestions
from civilians, much less women, but he seemed interested in the idea and
dispatched Scott out West to look into its possibilities. Anything to get things
moving.
Then Ben Wade came booming in, unannounced. Colonel Scott must have
discussed the plan with him, in cooperating with the new Joint Committee
that was set up last week to cheer on antislavery generals and to nag McClel-
lan. "I understand there is a plan," the Ohioan declared, "which, if executed
with secrecy, would open the Tennessee, and save the national cause."
The Tycoon didn't want to show his hand, but did not want to get Wade's
dander up. "Bluff Ben" has a dander very easily got up. The President men-
tioned that he had the plan, he liked the notion of taking the Mississippi forts
from the rear as well as cutting the rebels' east-west railroad, but that some of
his Cabinet officers wanted to pursue the route straight down the Mississippi.
"Sounds like Bates," gruffed Wade, right on target. "What in hell does he
know about military strategy?"
"We want to be sure the views of General McClellan, and Halleck out
West, are requested and considered."
"Sure, sure," Wade muttered, "McClellan doesn't think the West is impor-
tant, and Halleck doesn't like any plan that wasn't dreamed up by Old Brains
himself. They're both Democrats, remember. They are not out to crush the
South. They get a kick out of sending fugitive slaves back into hell."
Lincoln, who I suspect privately agrees with Wade about that, would not
say as much. He is putting down an insurrection, and does not want to let this
conflict degenerate into a remorseless revolutionary struggle. His policy is to
favor gradual, compensated emancipation, acceptable to all even if it takes
until the year 1900 to complete, though he hopes for it to happen much
before that. That was the point of his annual message, which did not get a
very good reception anywhere.
"We are now in the last extremity," Wade said, and God knows that's true.
"You have to choose between adopting and at once executing a plan which
you believe to be the right one for saving the country, or deferring to those
military bastards and losing the country."
Lincoln did not need to be told that. With McClellan sitting out the winter
and the general seems now to be coming down with a feverthe pressure is
intense on Lincoln to get something going, somewhere, if not against the
South, against the damned arrogant English.
The Tycoon did not flare up at Wade; he sees him as an honest sort, heart
in the right place, and besides, that Joint Committee could cause all kinds of
trouble if Wade wanted it to. It struck me that the President was sold on the
Tennessee plan or at least some Western activity before Wade came in, and
then acted doubtful so that Wade could sell him on doing what he'd already
sent Tom Scott to suggest to Halleck and Grant to consider. That way, the
Congressat least the Jacobinswould have an investment in the plan. Just
as they originally had in McClellan. That's the Tycoon's way, to push others
out in front, and if disaster strikes, at least he is up there with company.
Everything seems to be coming to a head as this sad holiday season ap-
proaches. A sense of uncertainty pervades: War with England? Action on the
Potomac before the money runs out? A thrust in the West? A way to keep the
abolitionists from breaking up the North?
A shaft of sunlight in the gloom: coming out of the twice-a-week Cabinet
meetings, Governor Chase placed his hand on Nice's shoulder and said confi-
dently and mistakenly, "You're John Hay." My colleague dutifully denied
that, and introduced the Secretary of the Treasury to the authentic John Hay.
We have been introduced four times now; perhaps I could do something
dramatic to fix myself in his memory.
"My daughter Kate," he saidmy heart stopped"tells me she hears
what a fine job you are doing for your country. Perhaps you will accept an
invitation to come to dinner one night soon."
I almost yelled at him, "When? Name the night!" but that would have been
unrefined. How had Kate Chase come by this fine and accurate report of me?
I suspect that the good Miss Carroll had done her work. Wonderful woman;
brilliant military strategist too. Her Tennessee plan could win the war. I shall
have to buy a suit.
I saw my favorite pamphleteer this afternoon in the Senate gallery. My
mission was to carry the President's message over to the new session of
Congress, which I did with appropriate pomp and handed the Senate's copy
to the clerk, John Forney. He told me to go upstairs and watch a sadly
historic moment. In the gallery, I saw Miss Carroll and took the seat next to
her.
Like me, she was there to watch the public disgrace and well-deserved
humiliation of the most dramatically disloyal member of the United States
Senate. The chamber was unusually silent. Nothing like this had ever hap-
pened here before. The Southerners from the seceded states had left with the
respect, mixed with sadness, of their longtime colleagues in the Union. Not
one of them, not even Senator Jefferson Davis of Mississippi, was censured or
condemned by their former Senate peers. But they had followed their states
into insurrection; not so the junior senator from Kentucky. His state had
remained loyal; his was a double betrayal, of his nation and his state.
Vice President Hamlin, presiding, recognized Senator Zack Chandler of
Michigan.
"I offer the following resolution," said Chandler, weaving just a bit, "which
I ask to have considered now. 'Resolved, that John C. Breckinridge be, and is
hereby, expelled from the Senate'."
The Chair recognized the other senator from Kentucky, who had sup-
ported Breckinridge in most of his fights with Sumner and Trumbull on
habeas corpus and the like, but who remained loyal and kept his seat in the
Senate.
"I will simply state to the Senate," said Lazarus Powell of Kentucky, "that
I think Mr. Breckinridge has resigned his seat in the Senate. I have seen it so
stated in the public papers reporting an address by Mr. Breckinridge, which I
believe I have here." He fumbled with some newspapers on his desk.
"If the Senator from Kentucky will allow me," asked Lyman Trumbull of
Illinois, like Chandler a radical ally of Ben Wade's, "has he not the same kind
of evidence that Mr. Breckinridge is now in arms against the government he
had sworn to support?"
"I will merely say to the senator," Powell replied, "that this address de-
clares that he resigns his place in the Senate for the musket of a soldier."
"Then I will ask the senator," pressed Trumbull, whose bill to suppress
insurrection I recall was frustrated in the previous session, "if he has not
information of the same character as to his treason as to his resignation?"
"I have heard that Mr. Breckinridge is a brigadier general in the army of
the Confederate states," said Powell matter-of-factly, "though I do not know
the fact personally."
"Is it not a fact, sir, that he is in command of five thousand rebels who call
themselves the First Kentucky Brigade, who are occupying the city of Bowl-
ing Green?" asked Trumbull. "Is it not a fact that the rebel general, Sidney
Johnston, has been quoted in those same newspapers as saying Breckinridge
was worth an entire division to the South, because his popularity and power
of persuasion were such that he could recruit thousands more, and thereby
use great sections of Kentucky to prevent our advance into Tennessee?"
That was a rhetorical question, and Powell did not feel he had to answer it.
"I hold in my hand the address purporting to emanate from Mr. Breckin-
ridge, and signed by him. At the close he says, 'And now I hereby return the
trust to your hands.' That amounts to a declaration of resignation."
"A newspaper report is not a resignation."
"I would like the resolution to lie over," said the remaining Kentucky
senator. "I think it entirely unnecessary to go through the form of expelling a
man who is not a member of this body."
"Mr. President," Trumbull said to the Vice President, who is president of
the Senate, "I desire to have the yeas and nays, and I offer the following as a
substitute: 'Whereas John C. Breckinridge, a member of this body from the
State of Kentucky, has joined the enemies of his country, and is now in arms
against the Government he had sworn to support: Therefore, Resolved, that
the said John C. Breckinridge, the traitor, be, and is hereby, expelled from the
Senate.' "
That ringing "John C. Breckinridge, the traitor" brought the Senate to its
feet, all but Powell. Ned Baker's death had gone unavenged; this would be a
license for any general who captured Breckinridge to hang him. Vice Presi-
dent Hamlin asked Chandler if he accepted Trumbull's more stinging substi-
tute.
"Yes, sir!" shouted Chandler.
The yeas and nays were called for. Senator Powell could not vote "yea" to
expell a fellow Kentuckian, nor could he safely cast a "nay" vote to condone
treason. He voted present. The final tally to expel Breckinridge, and condemn
him as a traitor to his country, was 36 to 0.
I started to congratulate Miss Carroll, who had led the charge in print
against the Senator's pernicious ideas, but held back when I noticed tears in
her eyes. I proffered my handkerchief.
"I was remembering the moment," she said in a while, "when he stood
there as Vice President and counted the electoral votes, and declared Lincoln
to be President."
There had been talk of trouble that day by the Southerners, of demands
from the Senate floor for removal of the Union troops, but Breckinridge had
tolerated no tampering with the orderly transfer of power. He pronounced
Lincoln's victory, and his own defeat, with equanimity; I suppose that was his
finest moment in this chamber. Miss Carroll's emotion is understandable. It is
sad to see any man fall such a long way.

CHAPTER 4
'FORT GREENHOW"

Allan Pinkerton was beside himself. "Superhuman powers," he muttered.
Stogie clamped between his molars, holding his derby hat on his head against
the January wind, the head of the small military intelligence organization he
hoped would become a vast Secret Service was on his way from McClellan's
sickbed to the War Department. "Damn woman must have superhuman pow-
ers."
He had personally attended to the incarceration of Rose O'Neal Greenhow.
Pinkerton himself had turned her fashionable Sixteenth Street house, across
Lafayette Square from the Seward home, into a detention center for spies and
suspected traitors. His own men were on duty, supplemented by a thirty-man
force drawn from the Sturgis Rifles, McClellan's bodyguard. The bedrooms
had been stripped of furniture, then equipped with an easy-to-search bed,
chair, and washstand. Rose and her daughter, eight, had been confined to a
single room, with a board nailed across the door to an adjoining room and a
guard at the only entry. All visitors had been examined; unless they were high
military officials on business, they were searched before and after entry.
Even so, the "Wild Rose" was sprouting thorns. Pinkerton knew she was
managing to gather vital military information and send it to Richmond. Doc-
uments found on other captured spies showed Rose's operation to be func-
tioning still. How was this woman, confined to her room, guarded around the
clock, getting information about General McClellan's plans? How did she
manage to transmit secrets to Jefferson Davis?
The stealing and transmission of the secrets would have been bad enough
had Allan Pinkerton been the only one who knew that Rose Greenhow had
an open channel out of her prison home to the Confederate capital. But now,
thanks to the publication of her letter, the whole world knew, and his
fledgling Secret Service was being made a laughingstock.
"Laughingstock," he murmured aloud, barreling down the narrow corri-
dor of the War Department, when he had to swerve to avoid running into
Mathew Brady, who was plowing ahead with an armload of photographic
prints under his arm. Brady did not recognize him. That was strange
Pinkerton's star had risen with McClellan's; everybody who knew where the
power was recognized the head of military intelligence. "Brady! It's me, Ma-
jor Alien."
"Who?" Brady fumbled for his glasses, drew them on, peered at the detec-
tive, and said, "Ah, it's you, Pinkerton."
"How can you see to take pictures," asked Pinkerton, "if you can't recog-
nize a face two feet away?"
"I can see with my glasses on, and even better through a lens. You're
becoming notorious, Pinkerton. You'll have to come by the studio for a por-
trait."
"Call me Major Alien." Why did Brady say "notorious" rather than "fa-
mous"? Had he heard about the damnable letter Rose had written to Seward?
"I cannot let myself be photographed," Pinkerton said severely. "The nature
of my work must remain secret."
"Maybe a photograph of you with McClellan in the field, conferring in his
tent," the photographer persevered. "The front of the tent, where the flap
opens, so there'll be light."
He thought over the photographer's offer. "I suppose it would be wrong for
me to refuse to pose with my commander. We'll arrange it, if you promise not
to sell it until I give the word."
"Done. You're going to see Stanton?"
"How do you know?" Pinkerton had told nobody, not even Gardner at the
studio, that he was off to see the legal counsel to the Secretary of War.
"Seward must have jumped on Cameron, who jumped on Stanton, who's
going to jump on you," Brady warned. "That was some letter of Rose's."
Pinkerton's heart sank. "They saw her letter in the Richmond papers?"
"Worse than that," said Brady, shifting his heavy plates to his other arm.
"It's all over the New York Herald. James Gordon Bennett beat Greeley to it,
and made Rose's triumph big news. Embarrassed Seward in his home state."
The detective slumped against the wall. Rose O'Neal Greenhow, the spy
who supplied General Beauregard with the Union plans for Bull Run, and
who had been at the center of a network of at least fifty spies in the capital,
had written a letter of protest about her arrest to Secretary of State Seward.
On top of that, as if to prove that her Union guards were a pack of incompe-
tents, she smuggled a copy of her letter to the Richmond newspapers, which
printed it in full, and now the New York press was reprinting that.
"The Wild Rose writes quite a letter," Brady observed, rubbing it in. "Her
home entered without a warrant, herself arrested by you with no judicial
authority, her property seized without due process. She's demanding that
Seward cite the law all this was done under. You suppose she had legal
advice?"
"Evil genius," Pinkerton breathed.
"I want to take a picture of her," Brady said. "Can you get me a pass to get
into 'Fort Greenhow'?"
Pinkerton winced; they were calling the detention quarters "Fort Green-
how" because it was so easy to get in and out. "No!" he snapped. "Why don't
you go back in the field? Gardner is doing all the work and you get the credit
 he'll want to branch out for himself one day." Let the photographer worry
about competition. With no farewell, Pinkerton hurried to Stanton's office.
Pinkerton had good reason to be certain of Stanton's personal regard for,
and subservience to, General McClellan. The General was dining at his home
with Admiral David Porter and the Prince de Joinville. As Porter recounted
it to Pinkerton later, the sycophantic Stanton dropped by with some message
and stood at the open door of the dining room. McClellan, who saw him,
deliberately kept his visitor waiting, and finally motioned for him to come in.
The War Department counsel was kept waiting there for five long minutes,
standing while the others ate, until McClellan finally offered him some din-
ner. Stanton then sat and ate, but the general never introduced him to either
of his other two guests at the table. Pinkerton knew precisely what McClellan
had done: begrudged Stanton some status, but not enough to give him a
swelled head.
Moreover, the detective knew that Stanton had been a frequent dinner
companion of Rose O'Neal Greenhow during the Buchanan administration,
and had visited heralong with a trusted McClellan aide-de-camp, Colonel
Thomas Key, which made it all rightonly the preceding week. The lawyer
might have his own guilty memories about the Wild Rose.
With a show of casualness, the detective strolled into Stanton's office and
said, "I understand the Secretary of State has been talking to you." Put them
on the defensive, that was the way.
"You're well informed, Major Alien," said Stanton, "as always." Good
man; none of this "Pinkerton" stuff. For privacy's sake the lawyer closed the
door, which the detective appreciated. "Governor Seward is disturbed about
the Greenhow matter," Stanton continued. "Not on the legal questions she
raised in her letterhabeas corpus is suspended, and the President has given
Seward the power to seize and jail anyone for any length of time. But the
Secretary of State is troubled by the fact that she seems able to defy her
captors. Do you have any idea how she was able to smuggle the copy of the
letter to Richmond?"
"Do you have any idea," Pinkerton responded, hoping to turn the interrog-
atory table, "how often I have demanded that we stop being perfect gentle-
men to these female spies? Why should Rose be permitted to live in her own
house on Sixteenth Street, receiving a flock of visitors carrying who knows
what information, and carrying away who knows what messages?" Stanton
had been one of those visitors; Pinkerton hoped to put a little chill up his
spine.
"You're absolutely right, Major Alien. I myself visited her not long ago, to
discover some information about an old beau of hers. I noticed a certain
familiarity between the prisoner and many of the guards. And I noticed
several visitors waiting."
"You were acquainted with her?" Pinkerton had to admit that Stanton had
scored a point by volunteering the information about his visit.
"Mrs. Stanton and I"whenever a man was asked about the Wild Rose,
he prefaced his answer with "Mrs. and I""went to her home often during
the Buchanan administration. The President was a bachelor, and Rose a
widow who entertained brilliantlythey saw a great deal of each other. Her
home became a social center for Democrats of high rank."
"Many of whom became traitors," said Pinkerton ominously. "Did she
ever speak to you of John Breckinridge?"
"I saw the Senator from Kentucky there from time to time, but it was his
running mateJoe Lane, the Senator from Oregon that I suspected more.
When he was running for Vice President on Breckinridge's slate, Lane was
making a fool of himself over Rose."
That confirmed what the detective suspected. Pinkerton had confiscated a
bundle of love letters from the departed Senator Lane, along with letters
signed only "H"probably Henry Wilson, the senator that Montgomery
Blair had told him to stop investigating. Rose was well connected. Her sister
was married to Dolley Madison's nephew, and her niece was Mrs. Stephen
Douglas. Rose could reach anybody.
"I will be frank with you," Pinkerton announced. McClellan had told him
that Stanton was to be trusted, and was the general's candidate to replace the
abolition-inclined Cameron. The likelihood of that taking place had intensi-
fied a week ago, when Cameron stupidly sent out a message declaring his
policy to arm slaves, and Lincoln had humiliated him by forcing its with-
drawal. Curiously, nothing happened to Cameron afterward; Lincoln had not
moved to replace the powerful Pennsylvania political leader.
"In her present surroundings," Pinkerton said, "Mrs. Greenhow cannot be
properly isolated." That was a nice way of putting her present ability to see
and manipulate Washington's powerful. When Stanton had visited her, an
informant told Pinkerton that she had breezily asked him for legal advice on
habeas corpus. She probably used whatever he had told her in that damned
letter to Seward, but the detective saw no need to embarrass the man McClel-
lan said was his candidate for Secretary of War.
"To remedy that," asked Stanton, "what do you need to do?"
"Clap her in Old Capitol Prison." Pinkerton was blunt: "It's not a nice
place to visit. And the guards are prison guardshard men, not impression-
able young soldiers."
"It's a depressing place," said Stanton, "and she has her child with her.
How old is the girleight?"
Was Stanton about to go soft, too? The detective moved his cigar to the
other side of his mouth.
"Do it," said Stanton crisply. "Take her there yourself, today. I'll send
word to Wood, the prison warden."
"Whose authority?" He wanted the order in writing, lest Rose get ammuni-
tion for another letter, maybe to Lincoln himself next time.
"By the verbal order of the Secretary of State and the Secretary of War.
You don't need any more authority than that."
Pinkerton accepted that, rather than lose the chance to shut down "Fort
Greenhow." "She'll have no visitors, no writing paper," he promised. "I'll let
her sew her tapestries to keep from going crazy, but that's it. You can expect
complaints from powerful people that we're being cruel to a great lady and
her dear little girl."
"Send them to me." End of subject. That was goodthe high echelons
could do with a man who so evidently relished saying no. "Your estimate of
the rebel troops facing the Army of the Potomac is of special interest at this
moment. You say two hundred thousand?"
Pinkerton had a rule of thumb for estimating enemy troop strength. He
took the reports from deserters, prisoners of war, messages from Union loyal
in Southern cities, and the nose counts of his spies working behind enemy
lines in Virginia, and came up with his base estimate. Then he multiplied that
by two. He knew the estimates he offered were probably on the high side, but
better safe than sorry, and his general preferred them that way. As long as
Allan Pinkerton was estimating the strength of the enemy, the Army of the
Potomac would never go into battle against more rebels than expected.
"Two hundred thirteen thousand," he amended. "Latest information."
Round numbers sounded like guesses; he preferred more precise estimates.
The detective rose to leave, relieved that his strategy had worked. He had
not been reprimanded for permitting Rose to operate successfully despite her
incarceration. His eyes, trained to read handwriting upside-down, swept
Stanton's desk automatically; he saw a note in McClellan's fine penmanship.
"If you have a message for the general," he said smoothly, "that would
better be communicated orally"
"Yes. Tell himtell him that there are powerful forces at work to unseat
him." Stanton grew conspiratorial. "Certain senatorsyou and he know who
they areare insisting that McDowell take over the Army of the Potomac.
That would leave McClellan, as General-in-Chief, with no troops. The Presi-
dent is wavering."
"The general will appreciate your warning," Pinkerton said in the inaudi-
ble voice he used for such occasions. "And heand Iwill remember his
friends."
They clasped hands and Pinkerton darted out, glad that McClellan and he
had a trustworthy ally in the War Department.

CHAPTER 5
CALHOUN'S ROOM
"Mother, there's a man standing at the door."
Rose Greenhow always sat facing away from the open door in what used to
be her bedroom and was now her cell. The door was left open to insult her,
the guard always able to peep in. By showing only her back to the door, she
could force visitors to announce themselves. This one did not.
"Who is it, my dear? One of those Yankees who like to watch us undress?"
"It's an ugly man, with a beard and hat on and a cigar right in the middle
of his face. I don't like him." Little Rose, eight and forthright, was at her best
in the presence of Yankees. Alone with her mother, as she was all too often,
the child was irritable and unhappy, but in the presence of others she joined
with the "Wild Rose" in defiance and pride. The mother could not blame her
for the peevishness in private because she could not do without her daughter's
support against her jailers.
"Get your things together, Mrs. Greenhow," the rasping voice behind her
said. "You've sent your last letter to Richmond."
She smiled and looked over her shoulder. "It's little Pinkerton," she told
her daughter. "Isn't Pinkerton a pretty name for an ugly man?"
"Your airs and graces don't impress me, lady," the detective said. "It will
go easier for you if you tell me how you got that letter out of here."
She turned back to her tapestry-making, the varicolored threads stretched
in a circular frame in her hand, ignoring him, forcing him to walk into the
room and stand facing her. He puffed on the cigar, deliberately spreading its
odor through the room.
"You're going to be furious with yourself when I tell you," she replied, as if
on the verge of a confession. "I sent it out wrapped in one of your cigar
butts," she replied. "Remember the last time you came by? You left your
cigar behind. And everybody was so anxious to get rid of it"
"You have five minutes to pack. One suitcase for the both of you. Or else
you don't take anything."
"Are you sending us South?" her daughter asked. Rose was glad the girl
piped up with that question; she did not want to deign to ask it herself. The
purpose of her public letter, in addition to showing the Yankees how easy it
was to make fools of them, had been to force Seward to send both imprisoned
Greenhows to Richmond in an exchange. Her work in Washington was done;
if she could arrange repatriation, she could catch a ship running the blockade
and use her connections in London and Paris to encourage recognition of the
Confederacy. Mason and Slidell, snatched off the Trent, were far more of a
help to the cause in a Yankee jail than in England, which was incensed by the
insult to the British flag; she had many friends in London, bankers especially,
and could capitalize on the idiotic act of the Yankee captain. She had heard
that Thurlow Weed was there now, to smooth things over; she could stir the
English up beyond his powers to assuage, if only she could be freed.
Pinkerton waited for Rose to repeat her daughter's plaintive question. She
did not, letting him know that she regarded him as unworthy of her attention.
However, she did not want to travel without baggage. She went to the closet
and quickly packed one change of clothes for herselfalways black, as she
had taken mourning clothes for her personal signatureand several changes
for young Rose. When she finished, Pinkerton took the bag, unloaded its
contents on the bed, and went through each item carefully before putting
them back.
"You're not taking any soap?" he asked, which struck her as odd.
"There's plenty of soap in Richmond," she replied, fishing.
He grinned. "Take some. You'll thank me for it."
She ignored him. He shut the caseshe hated to leave her dressing gown
behind, but she would be damned if she would plead with this Peeping Tom
for the favor of a second caseand signaled for a guard to pick it up.
Rose wearily took up her tapestry and the balls of thread: "Am I to be
permitted to take this? You could hang it in your office as a souvenir captured
from a rebel. You could pretend you were doing honorable work."
"Take your damn sewing," the detective gruffed.
"It's not sewing, of course," she said to her daughter, disdaining direct
communication with Pinkerton. "Sewing is what we did when we took the
tablecloth and made the Stars and Bars, and hung it out the window when the
Yankees went by on parade."
"That made the men marching very angry," the girl grinned.
"Out," ordered Pinkerton.
"Wouldn't you like to take something to entertain yourself for the jour-
ney?" she asked her daughter. She had trained her what to answer, in case the
situation arose. "It's two hours on the train, and then a long buggy ride."
Little Rose went to the desk and took a pencil and a drawing pad without
hesitation. Pinkerton was not to be fooled; he grabbed them and snapped at
the guard, "Who let them have writing materials? I left strict instructions!"
"The little girl wanted to draw a picture," the guard began, and the detec-
tive cut him off with a furious gesture. Rose began to worry; if their destina-
tion was Richmond, there would be little danger to the Union in taking
writing materials.
Outside the house on Sixteenth Street, in the carriage surrounded by
mounted guards, she was concerned when they started east, up toward Capi-
tol Hill and the railroad station. The train would take them North; she was
hoping for a boat South, to Fort Monroe on the Peninsula, near the Confeder-
ate lines. Then a flag of truce and an exchange.
She looked back at her brick house in Lafayette Square. Confined for
nearly five months inside, she had almost forgotten how imposing it looked
from the outside. "Fort Greenhow"she liked that. Good times there; she
recalled the dinner parties during Buchanan's administration, with the Presi-
dent making an ostentatious exit at II P.M. so the others could leave, and
then sneaking back at midnight. She had trouble shooing out his Attorney
General, Stanton, one night, before Old Buck came back. She smiled at the
thought of Stanton's face recently, when she asked for advice on habeas
corpus; the old conspirator quickly told her what points to make while vocif-
erously denying her any aid.
The carriage left her house, and the old life, behind. She sat back and let
the memories of other men and other nights at Sixteenth Street wash across
her mind. In the 1860 campaign, only a year ago, John Breckinridge and his
running mate, Joe Lane, had stayed up talking and drinking until dawn. She
had been frustrated and angry when Breck left Senator Lane behind to sleep
with her; Lane was a lovesick ass, but Breck was her idea of a man. Rose had
heard that the drunken Zack Chandler had been the one to urge the Senate to
eject him from that body as a traitora stupid act of spite. She had been
relieved to learn that Breck, who had delayed his decision to go South longer
than he should have, had been taken into the Confederate Army at a fitting
level, second in command to Sidney Johnston in Tennessee. Johnstonshe
remembered him as Secretary of War of the Republic of Texaswas thought
by many to be the best soldier the South could boast, had been offered a
major general's commission by Lincoln, but chose to stay with Texas, which
was, by treaty, an equal to the Union. Johnston and Breckinridge would
make an undefeatable team in the West.
She missed Breck, whom she respected despite his infatuation with that
two-faced Jezebel Anna Carroll. What must Breck think of Anna now that
Lincoln had sent her pamphlet denouncing him all over the country? Served
him right for trusting Millard Fillmore's scribbling plaything, a supposed
daughter of Maryland who had impoverished herself on some fool plan to
manumit her slaves; Rose had warned him.
The carriage left the house in the distance, but the images clung: Colonel
Jordan, the Confederate officer who thought he had seduced her and then set
up the spy network around her. Young Jordan was daring, though she liked
him less when she discovered he had used his gallant talents in a similar
manner with Mrs. Phillips, a willing spy but a vulgar womanpractically a
prostitute. Different types of agents were needed for work at different levels,
she supposed; still, it was demeaning to have such a slut confined at Fort
Greenhow. She had not spoken to the woman once.
The carriage jolted along the frozen mud of Pennsylvania Avenue and
headed up the hill, turning aside frequently to avoid the carcasses of horses.
The many carcasses at first revolted Rose, then their significance pleased her:
if Lincoln couldn't have the dead horses picked up off the main street of his
capital, he must be desperately short of manpower. The guard next to her was
dressed, like the men at Sixteenth Street, in a nondescript uniform made of
shoddy, the cheap reprocessed wool that crumbled after a few washings
further proof that the Union army was in the hands of corrupt quartermasters
and contractors. If the uniforms were made of shoddy, what about the rifles
were they the quality ordered? Good points to make when she met with Jeff
Davis in Richmond; these were the little details that told much about a nation
and an army.
Coming up toward First and A, Rose could see another building that had
memories for her: the Old Capitol, built in 1815 as temporary quarters for the
House and Senate after the British burned the Capitol in the War of 1812.
When the House and Senate chambers were restored, the building at First
and A was turned into a large roominghouse, and it was therein a second-
floor room overlooking the dismal courtyardthat Rose O'Neal had nursed
the dying Senator John C. Calhoun in the last year of his life. The man she
believed to be the very spirit of nullification, the fierce protector of Southern
tradition, had inspired her to revere her section. Thanks to Calhoun, she had
come to despise all those Yankees and abolitionists who schemed to centralize
power in New York, Boston, and Washington.
Old Capitol was now a prison, primarily for prisoners of war, but also
Rose felt a chill as the carriage slowedfor deserters and soldiers of doubtful
loyalty. She took her daughter's hand.
The carriage stopped. "Your new home," said Pinkerton, lifting his cigar
out of his mouth and waving it at the dingy building, "for the rest of the war.
No mail service to Richmond, I'm afraid."
"I was fully aware of your plans," she said as haughtily as she could.
"The hell you were," said the detective. "You would have taken soap."
Inside, Rose was led to Superintendent Wood, a short, muscular man who
seemed sensible of the great honor that was being done his prison by the
addition of the lady spy who had so recently embarrassed the Secretary of
State. He signed the detective's receipt.
"She has superhuman powers," Pinkerton told the superintendent. "She is
responsible for the deaths of thousands of our soldiers. Watch her as you
watch no other prisoner."
Rose framed an acid comment about how that was the nicest thing a
Yankee had ever said about her, but she held her tongue. The prison was
frightening. Her daughter's hand clung tightly to her own.
"Stanton tells me she'll have a string of big shots at first," the smiling jailer
replied. Rose did not like the sound of "at first"; this was no place for any-
body of any repute to visit, and return visits would likely be few. Determined
not to let her feelings of terror show, she drew herself up and said, "You may
show us to our room."
"Follow me," Wood said cheerfully. She waited for him to pick up her bag.
"Oh, allow me," he said, still pleased with his new charges. She turned her
back on Pinkerton and followed him upstairs.
"This is no place for children," said Wood to her daughter.
"You have got one of the damnedest little rebels here that you ever saw,"
the little girl shot back. A surge of pride and pain brought Rose Greenhow
close to tears, but she caught hold of herself. This was going to be a long war
for mother and daughter.
On the second floor, the stench of urine and unwashed bodies assailed her
nostrils. She recognized the boardinghouse rooms, and remembered the lay-
out of the floor from all those years ago. It was like seeing, after too long, a
face remembered as friendly that had turned hostile and ugly.
They stopped before a room especially familiar to her.
"They say this is the room where old John Calhoun died," Wood said.
"Because of that, and because the window faces the courtyard and not the
street, we've selected it for you. Stanton thought that was a nice touch."
"You know Edwin Stanton?"
"I was an expert witness once," the superintendent said, "in a case he was
trying for the McCormick reaper people. Stanton owes me one. That's your
bunk, with the one over it for your daughter. The table is for writing letters,
but you won't get any paper. And a chair, all your own. Down the hall is the
lavatory. You'll have to wait until it's empty, in case you're bashful. The mess
is in Room 16"
"I know," she said dully. Room 16 had been the boardinghouse dining
room in the old days.
"Holier for a guard if any man makes advances," Wood said, she presumed
for the record. "I don't approve of that." He looked at the little girl, started
to say something, then shook his head.
"Where are the rebel prisoners?" little Rose wanted to know.
"Other sideyou won't meet them," he said. "Here is strictly for disloyals.
Come see me if you have anything to tell Pinkerton. People who help, with
information or whatever, get extra rations."
When he left, Rose could not bear to sit in the room. She took her daughter
to the mess in Room 16, and they had a cup of tepid coffee. A few of the men
sauntered over to get acquainted; she froze, and immediately scanned the
room for a protector. She spotted a heavyset, bearded man, eyes red-rimmed
and slightly drunkthat meant he had access to privilegessitting alone at
one of the tables. She did not want to leave her daughter alone, but did not
want her to hear what she was going to say. She told her to say nothing to
anyone and to stare into her cup while she made some arrangements on the
other side of the hall.
"You secesh?" she asked the bearded man, while keeping an eye on her
daughter.
"Nope." He was obviously pleased at having a woman to talk to. "I'm
from New York, the Zouaves. I got drunk one night at camp, started cussin'
out old Billy Bowlegs, and the next thing you know I was here."
"You've been charged with treason?"
"Nobody gets charged with anything. Couple months ago, Lincoln arrested
half the damn Maryland legislature. No charge, no trial, no nothing. They
just sit around. Don't see many women, though. Never a kid. What'd you
do?"
"I'm a spy." He looked impressed. She had to make a quick judgment. He
was a drinker, but not a mean man. Strong; he'd do. "Look, I don't want the
girl molested."
"I'm not a guard, lady; I'm one of the prisoners here."
"I'm in the last room on the A Street wing. Come along." She took him
back with them. He sat on the chair while she opened her valise. She wished
now she had taken the soap.
"Why you taking the stuff" out?" he asked. "There's no closet." For some
reason, that hit her as especially cruel. She drooped over the suitcase, closed
it, sat on it.
"What else should I know?"
"You don't sleep in the bunks," the man said. "There's bedbugs drive you
crazy."
"Where does one sleep?"
"On the table is best. No bugs. There's lice everywhere, nothing you can do
about them, but the bedbugs are the trouble. They like the warmth of the
bunks."
"I'll ask for another table."
"If you don't get it, try the floor, like most of us. Too cold for bugs, and
you get used to it. Use a shakedown."
She put her hand on his arm. It was a muscled arm; she knew her hand was
not the seductive hand that used to be, but it made up in experienced touch
what it had lost in unveined good looks. She caressed the biceps. "I want you
to take care of us. I'll be good to you. Here on the floor, or wherever you say,
when my girl is asleep."
"I'm in with two other men," the man said, not reacting to her offer that
once would have appealed to half the powerful men in the city. "One used to
be a government worker, just a clerk, till the Potter Committee got to him.
Accused him of being secesh, and that got his back up, and he wouldn't take
the oath, so he's here. Other guy's just a thief, but he grabbed some ammo
one night, and they put him in here."
She knew what he was getting at and did not want to face it right away.
Stupid of the Yankees, she thought: if they kept arresting men on charges like
failing to take the oath, Seward would breed thousands of Yankee-haters in
the heart of the North. After a moment, she said, "The only thing I worry
about is the girl. You take care of us, I'll take care of you."
He looked uncomfortable and rubbed his stubble beard. She breathed
deeply. "And your two friends." Protection was costly. "One at a time, same
time, makes no difference to me, but it has to be quietly." She was thinking
about ways to put a curtain around the table where her daughter would sleep.
"A deal," said the bearded man. "If you got any money, I can probably get
us some hootch."
She touched his cracked lips lightly with her fingertips. "If anybody
touches the girl, I'll put a knife in your heart."
"That's why you rebs are gonna win the war," he smiled. "I shouldn't say
that," he added, the smile disappearing. "They could put you in jail for
saying that."
She sent him on his way for the time being and took out her tapestry. With
her deal made, she felt better. The situation was not all bad for a spy. As men
came into this jail, they would be bringing information; also, as prisoners of
war entered the other wing, they would have information about the battle
zone, of interest to Richmond. Even Superintendent Wood seemed well con-
nected; Rose bet he had given false testimony in that case with Stanton, and
was blackmailing him with it today. Visitors would come, she was certain of
that, even to this dreary place: Henry Wilson, who loved punishment, could
not stay away for long, and the charming Colonel Key on McClellan's staff
who so liked to hold her hand during interrogations would surely be back.
With Rose safely in jail, presumably cut off from the outside world, they
would speak even more freely.
She sighed more in resolution than self-pity. Information would soon start
flowing in toward her. Her problem then would be to find a way of getting it
out of here, through the Federal lines; Colonel Jordan would soon help her
see to that, as he had before.
What of encoding the information, and putting it in a form not likely to be
intercepted by Pinkerton's men? She smiled at the detective's glee when he
stopped little Rose from taking pencil and paper. That had been a ruse, to let
him think he had denied her a means of putting information in a form that
could be transmitted. In fact, her communications system was held openly in
her hand: the tapestry's threads were a simple color code, memorized by
Jordan and herself. When a message was ready to be sent, she could sew the
information into an attractive fabric that would become a bookmark or
glasses holder, which could be carried without suspicion by any courier.
She put her other dress on the table and helped her daughter climb on top
to go to sleep. In the darkling cell, she sat against the wall, waiting for the
gaslight in the hall to be turned off and for the men to come. War was war
and she was not the only one who would suffer, she told herself stoutly, but
the sound of her daughter scratching her head furiously at the first attack of
lice made it hard. She wished again she had taken Pinkerton's advice about
the soap.

CHAPTER 6
GUARDING THE SACRED INSTRUMENT
"I regret calling you all in on Christmas Day," Seward was saying to the
Cabinet, "but Lord Lyons, the British Ambassador, has presented us with an
ultimatum. Either we hand over the captured rebel emissaries, Mason and
Slidell, or Great Britain will recall its diplomats and prepare for hostilities."
Simon Cameron felt uneasy. Just before this Cabinet meeting started, Lin-
coln had clapped him on the shoulder to wish him and his family a happy
Christmas. Why had he been singled out for the President's good wishes? For
the past three weeks, ever since the incident about the message, the Secretary
of War believed himself to be the recipient of special kindnesses from the man
who had so promptly repudiated his proposal to arm the freed slaves. Why
was Lincoln being so damnably polite? Despite the uproar in the press about
the disarray in the Cabinet, despite the charges of insubordination by anti-
abolition Congressmen, Simon Cameron had not been publicly or privately
reprimanded by the President for the inflammatory paragraph in the annual
message.
He was stuck with what he considered the worst job in the Cabinet. The
strutting colonels and generals who raised their own armies expected to run
their own shows. Bloodsucking contractors who saw the war as one great
opportunity to make fortunes were attached to all the procurement offices.
Every Congressman who tried to get his favorite salesman an edge, and whom
Cameron rightly refused, sought revenge by demanding an investigation into
corruption, and the press made a great fuss about that.
Fortunately, Cameron mused, he had Tom Scott of the Pennsy to handle
the business of transport, and Edwin Stanton, the Buchanan holdover, to
guide him in the intricacies of the law. Stanton's language in the message had
caused all the trouble, it was true, but Cameron was certain that was not the
general counsel's faultLincoln's inefficient secretaries had never read the
proposed draft. At least the War Department stand on arming the slaves had
earned him the new respect of Chase and Wade, and even Greeley.
Perhaps their public support of Cameron explained Lincoln's odd friendli-
ness, in circumstances that would ordinarily demand a resignation. Or per-
haps Lincoln was still worried about what effect the firing of Cameron would
have on support of the war in Pennsylvania. Or maybe Lincoln was waiting
him out.
Seward cut into his thoughts with a brisk "Simon, are you with us?"
Cameron gave him a baleful look. "Why weren't we given these documents
in advance?"
They were all looking at him. That was the damn trouble with being Secre-
tary of War when somebody threatened war: Nobody wanted to be first to say
"Surrender." Monty Blair, who had been the only one at first to resist the
jingo spirit, looked troubled. Cameron offered an emotional way out: "I have
been informed that the capture of the Trent was a plot by the British and the
rebels."
That assertion startled Lincoln and the Cabinet. Cameron sat up, rather
enjoying the role of detective. "Our man in Scotland," he told the group he
knew to be looking for excuses to hand the men over, "writes that Mason and
Slidell were seen in Havana just before the capture, talking to our Captain
Wilkes. They arranged the capture to embarrass the United States, and to
give the British reason to recognize the Confederacy and enter the war."
"Sounds like a lot of nonsense to me," Gideon Welles grumbled into his
beard. Captain Wilkes was his man, and the press had been giving the Navy
plaudits for stopping a British ship and seizing the rebel envoys.
Seward did not knock down the story. He asked permission to bring in
Senator Charles Sumner, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Commit-
tee, to speak in behalf of surrendering the men. The radical Republican from
Massachusetts, who had been savagely cane-whipped at his Senate desk by a
fanatic Southerner years before, was too florid for Cameron's taste. The Sec-
retary of War suspected that Sumner's airs did not impress the President,
though it was said that Mrs. Lincoln was taken in by them.
Senator Sumner entered, read aloud two letters from England, written by
noted friends of AmericaJohn Bright and Richard Cobdenthat attested
to the war fever sweeping the British isles at this outrage to their flag. Sumner
urged Lincoln to hand over the two captives, to avoid playing into the hands
of the pro-Southern British aristocracy. That was smart of Lincoln, Cameron
thought, to bring the chairman of Senate Foreign Relations in on this; it
would provide political cover for the public disappointment to follow.
"What do you think, gentlemen?" Lincoln did not want advice, Cameron
presumed; he wanted company in backing down.
"We don't have a leg to stand on," decided Blair. "Our seizure was illegal."
"It is gall and wormwood to me," intoned Chase. "Rather than consent to
the liberation of these men, I would sacrifice everything I possess." They all
waited for Chase to make his turnaround, because he was needed to quiet
Greeley and help dampen public sentiment for a fight with the British. "But
the technical right is undoubtedly with England," he sighed. "As contraband,
the envoys could not rightfully be taken from the neutral ship until after the
judicial condemnation of the ship itself, for receiving and carrying them."
Seward pointed out that Thurlow Weed's mission to London had been a
success, and the unexpectedly gracious tone of the British ultimatum made it
easier for the U.S. to cough up the rebel captives. He then offered a solution
that would get the nation out of a war with England without making Ameri-
cans feel like cowards, or losing the war spirit so vital in fighting the South.
"We ought to declare a moral victory," Seward suggested. "We should de-
clare that we are happy to see that England finally agrees with the United
States on the rights of neutral vessels. Just as the British have been in the
wrong for years, stopping our ships, we were in the wrong this timeand we
are men enough to admit it."
"This reply to Lord Lyons's note," said Lincoln, tapping the Seward draft
before him, "is pretty crafty. Not much on the law, but a clever way out."
"We take a stand on principle," said Seward, a man Cameron knew took
principled stands only when they were expedient, "laid down by President
Madison in his instructions to Secretary of State Monroe."
"The British want an apology," said Lincoln, "in addition to the prison-
ers."
"No apology," snapped Seward. "Captain Wilkes acted without govern-
ment authorization, and when we make that clear, the British will interpret it
as an apology. Besides, Thurlow Weed writes me that his British friends are
prepared to overlook the need for an apology. We'll just say our man was
wrong to adopt the British practice." He read the last line of his draft mes-
sage: "They will be cheerfully liberated. Your lordship will please indicate a
time and place for receiving them."
Lincoln looked relieved but unhappy. "I tried to frame an argument for the
other side," he told Seward, "but I found I could not make one that would
satisfy my own mind. That proves to me that your ground is the right one."
Cameron marveled at the way Lincoln had made Sumner and Seward the
proponents of doing what Lincoln wanted to do. The President was striking
the pose of being reluctantly dragged along. Cameron hurried to get on the
side Lincoln wanted. "My man Stanton disagrees with you on the lawhe
thinks we have every right to seize the menbut I think Chase is right, and
Seward offers us a good way out. Maybe we can spread the story of the rebel
plot far and wide, make us look a little smarter."
"Sumner, your support on this in cooling down Wade and Chandler, not to
mention Uncle Horace, would be appreciated," said Lincoln. "This is a pretty
bitter pill to swallow, but after this war is over we'll be so powerful that we
can call England to account for all the embarrassment she's inflicted on us.
Reminds me of a story."
Charles Sumner rolled his eyes upward, those of Welles and Bates glazed
over, and Chase's face took on a disapproving look, but Cameron actually
enjoyed Lincoln's stories. They were invariably on the point, not funny so
much as repeatable. The Secretary of War made a hit at dinner parties passing
them along, though they lost flavor out of political context, and he sat for-
ward to catch this one.
"I feel a good deal like the dying man in Illinois who was told he ought to
make peace with his enemies," Lincoln said. "He said the man he hated worst
of all was a fellow named Brown in the next village, and he was sent for. The
sick man began to say, in a voice as meek as Moses, that he wanted to die at
peace with all his fellow creatures, and he hoped that Brown would now
shake hands. Brown had to get out his handkerchief and wipe the gathering
tears from his eyes, and they had a regular love-feast.
"After a parting that would have softened the heart of a grindstone, Brown
had about reached the room door when the sick man rose up on his elbow
and said, 'But see here, Brown, if I should happen to get well, mind that old
grudge standsF "
Simon Cameron pounded the table and roared with laughter. The rest
smiled.
"Averting this crisis is especially welcome," said Chase, "at a moment
when we are at the brink of bankruptcy. I'm worried about meeting the army
payroll."
Seward, a war with England avoided by what he would surely tell everyone
was the diplomatic skill of his henchman and himself, tilted his chair back,
took a pinch of snuff, sneezed heartily, and said, "Chase somehow always
manages to scare his banker friends, and we muddle through."
"Six months ago," said Chase, obviously not appreciating Seward's breezi-
ness, "the public debt was ninety million. Six months from now, it will be five
hundred million. We have no way of raising that money."
"The banks?" asked Bates.
"I have coerced the state banks into lending us one hundred and fifty
million dollars. I am starting a system of national banks, despite the objection
of every governor in this land, that enables us to borrow on the faith of the
United States Government in addition to the states."
"The bankers in Philadelphia are screaming," Cameron put in. "They say
you threatened them."
"I am ashamed to say I did," Chase admitted. "When they told me there
was no more to be lent, I told them that I would print paper money until it
would wipe them all out and cost the average man one thousand dollars for a
breakfast." Chase looked embarrassed and proud at the same time.
Lincoln made a face. "What about raising the money from the public?"
"The people of this country are not accustomed to taxation," Chase said.
"Most of what revenue we have is from tariffs. That's why the end of the
Trent affair will be a blessinga British blockade would have cut off all our
customs duties."
"The public bond subscription?" That was Blair; Cameron was glad at
least one other Cabinet member was familiar with finances.
"With no victories," Chase said, "the public is unwilling to buy govern-
ment war bonds. And we need that money from public subscription to repay
the banks and roll over our short-term debt."
Lincoln leaned forward, elbows on the desk, and rubbed his head. "What
are you going to do? You're running that end of the machine." The way he
phrased it, Cameron noticed, put the question out of his kenon monetary
matters, Chase was as good as President.
"Tomorrow morning," Chase said with evident pain, "I am going to sus-
pend payment in specie. We do not have the gold and silver to pay in coin.
The nation will have to dishonor its promises."
Cameron could see what Lincoln wanted to ask next, and he asked it for
him: "What will that do?"
"That means we are asking banks, and people, to rely on paper currency,
not redeemable on demand in gold or silver. Bank notes. It's frightening."
"Napoleon did not fight his wars on hard money," said Blair, not worried
at all. "Wars are fought on paper, and the winner redeemsthe loser de-
faults."
Chase glared at the Postmaster General. "You're talking about making
paper into legal tender."
"Why not?" Blair was confident; Cameron estimated that only Chase and
Blair knew what they were talking about, but the rest of the men in the room
were uncomfortably aware that the subject under discussion must be of great
import.
"It flies in the face of the Constitution," answered Chase. "You cannot tell
a free American that he must accept a piece of paper as payment for debts
good gold and silver coin that he made as a loan. That's stealing his property.
The President here is not even willing to do that to slave owners."
"Can I make paper into legal tender?" asked Lincoln.
"Tad Stevens has a bill he's ready to introduce, giving you that power,"
Chase answered reluctantly. Lincoln looked to Blair, who nodded.
"Let him, quickly," said Lincoln. "I'll sign it."
"But it's unconstitutional," warned Chase. It seemed to Cameron that just
as Lincoln had dumped a share of the blame for backing down on the Trent
on others, Chase was being careful to place the full blame for doing the
necessary but unpopular thing about money on Lincoln.
"I have that sacred instrument here in my desk," said Lincoln slowly, "and
I am guarding it with great care." Chase shook his head in disapproval,
which seemed to nettle the President. "Chase, down in Illinois I was held to
be a pretty good lawyer, and I believe I could answer every constitutional
point you raise, but I don't feel called upon to do it."
Nobody challenged that; it struck Cameron that Lincoln grew uncharacter-
istically testy when anyone suggested he was showing less than the proper
respect for "that sacred instrument."
"Now what I want to know," said Lincoln, all business, "is whether, Con-
stitution aside, the project of issuing notes will help us pay the soldiers and
buy ammunition?"
"With the exception you make," Chase responded, "it is the only way open
to us to raise money."
"Then let's do it right away."
With a resigned look, Chase nodded. "I will do my best to put it into
immediate and practical operation. You know I think it is wrong."
"It will not help public confidence," the Postmaster General told the Trea-
sury Secretary, "if you do it with a long face." Blair had him there, Cameron
noted; Chase could not back into this, blaming Lincolnnot if he was to be
seen as running that end of the machine.
"From this moment on," Chase said to the President, ignoring Blair but
accepting the wisdom of his point, "in public or private, you will never hear
from me any opposition on this subject."
The emergency Cabinet meeting broke up on that conciliatory note. Merry
Christmases were exchanged and Blair said lightly, "Chase, you're a God-
fearing man. Putting In God We Trust' on the coinage was your idea. What's
to be the new motto for your paper money?"
Chase took that question seriously, and frowned in thought. Lincoln smiled
and offered a suggestion: "Remember Peter and John? 'Silver and gold have I
none, but such as I have give I thee.' "
Even Chase had a laugh at that. Cameron fancied himself as astute a judge
of political horseflesh as anyone, and he had to say to himself that of all the
men in the room, the most "presidential" was Chase: although a little on the
stiff side, a serious man, a man of substance, even of majesty, and one whom
people could trust on great affairs. Blair was too quickly decisive to be Presi-
dent, too much the peremptory executive, unwilling to let the people lead him
until he could lead the people. Cameron thought Lincoln was good at mis-
leading people into thinking they were leading him, but lacked Chase's pres-
ence and gravity. Seward, who had seemed only recently the first among
equals, now seemed to the Pennsylvania politician to be slightly diminished
almost in Lincoln's shadow, instead of vice versa as everyone had assumed
would be the case.
The Secretary of War took his time putting on his coat and wasted some
more time, as the others left, putting together the papers Seward had strewn
about. Alone with the President, he let Lincoln have the chance to mention
the aborted move to arm the slaves, but Lincoln was ardently determined to
play out his waiting game, and said nothing but friendly banalities.
"I don't know," said Cameron finally, "whether this job is the best one for
my particular talents. If, at some propitious time, you should wish to make a
change at the War Department, I would not be averse to another assign-
ment."
Lincoln nodded solemnly. "Who would you recommend to replace you?"
Cameron thought about Tom Scottloyal, efficient, honest, deeply knowl-
edgeable about the operations of the army, but lacking in political experience,
devoid of the necessary deviousness required of a major participant in power.
"Stanton. He's obnoxious in some ways, and he's a bit of a courtier and
flatterer, but he's a prodigious organizer. You may not like him, but you can
rely on him."
The President said he would think about it, and murmured something that
Cameron could not catch about a "major embassy." To show he was on top
of his job, the Secretary of War took a crumpled letter out of his coat pocket.
"Something about one of our generals is bothering me." Cameron said
ominously.
"McClellan? I've heard he is confined to bed. Is it the typhoid?"
"That's a troublesome prospect too, but I'm concerned about one of our
men out West." He showed Lincoln the covering note from William Bross,
editor of the Chicago Tribune, and an attached letter to the editor com-
plaining about the Union general in Cairo, Illinois: "He was perfectly inebri-
ate under a flag of truce with the rebels," the letter read. "Until we can secure
pure men in habits and men without secesh wives with their own little slaves
to wait upon them, which is a fact here in this camp with Mrs. Grant, our
country is lost."
"Bross would not knowingly misrepresent," said Lincoln, who apparently
knew and trusted the Illinois newspaperman. "General Grant was appointed
chiefly on the recommendation of Congressman Washbume. Perhaps we
should consult him."
"I'll look into it immediately." Cameron had heard the same rumor, froir
other sources, that Sam Grant was a drunkard.
"The generals in the West are going to be tested scon," Lincoln pressed
"perhaps very soon. Put my mind at ease on this."
His son Willie appeared, carrying one of the Seward pussycats by the napf
of her neck, and the look of concern on the President's face was transformed
into a smile of mock concern.
The chief executive must have a lot on his mind this Christmas Day,
Cameron mused, stepping out on the porch of the Mansion into the bracing
winter air. Avoiding one war while keeping up the national spirit for anothel
war; finding the way to finance unprecedented expenditures by sticking thf
sacred instrument into the hole in the keel; pushing a possibly feverish gen-
eral into action and worrying if he was pushing a drunken general into othei
action; and replacing his Secretary of War with an untried man.
The Paris and London embassies were in unfriendly territory, Cameron
thought. Perhaps he could become ambassador to Spain or Germany. Oi
Russia, where our Minister, Cassius Clay of Kentucky, had allowed himseU
to become involved in a love affair with a ballerina, which would ordinarily
have been ignored except that the girl was the mistress of the Tsar. That
absolute monarch not long ago had freed the Russian serfs; Cameron allowed
himself to wonder if the Tsar's War Minister had stimulated that historic act
by suggesting they be armed.

CHAPTER 7
TURNING BACK THE CLOCK
"Read this!"
Never before had the Secretary of War come to Thomas Scott's rooms at
night, pounding on the door, flinging himself into a chair as if the war had
been lost. Simon Cameron brandished a Sheet of paper, demanding that Scott
read it, but not giving him the opportunity.
They were all Pennsylvanians: Scott, the railroad man trying to run the
War Department under Cameron; his guest that evening, A. K. McClure,
politician and journalist; and Scott's boss at the War Department, Cameron, a
personal friend but longtime political adversary of McClure.
Cameron, the paper trembling in his hand, turned to McClure. "This is
more than a political affair. This is personal degradation." The Secretary of
War started to sob. Scott did not know what to do. He fetched a brandy,
which Cameron swallowed, crying, "A personal affront, a shameful business
God, he's ruined me!"
McClure reached over and took the sheet of paper from Cameron's hand.
He read it aloud to Scott, the Assistant Secretary: "It's in Lincoln's hand. 'To
Simon Cameron. Dear Mr. Secretary: I have this day nominated Hon. Edwin
B. Stanton to be Secretary of War and you to be Minister Plenipotentiary to
Russia. Very truly yours, A. Lincoln.' "
That started Cameron off again in a fresh outbreak of sobbing. "Can you
imagine," he choked, "anything so insulting? Like a pail of ice water, as if he
believes all those lies about me. There hasn't been a Cabinet dismissal like this
evernever, never. I'm finished, and all I ever did was to get Lincoln the
nomination. If it weren't for me, Seward would be President today, and what
do I get? This!"
Scott took the paper from McClure and looked at the President's handwrit-
ing: it was indeed a curt and cruel dismissal. Scott found that curious; if
Lincoln had been so icily furious with Cameron for last month's insubordina-
tion on the arming of slaves, why hadn't he fired him then? On the other
hand, if Lincoln wanted to make an example out of Cameron, affronting the
Secretary's new abolitionist friends and pleasing the anti-corruption crusad-
ers, why give him the Russian post?
Scott drew McClure aside, hoping that Cameron, left alone for a moment,
would compose himself. "This makes no sense," Scott told the publisher.
"Lincoln isn't like this, unless he has a reason. And I don't think he has a
reason."
"It's a terrible letter," McClure agreed. "I've opposed Simon in politics
the truth is, Colonel, I think the man's a thief, and I told Lincoln that before
the appointment. But when it comes to the patronage, Lincoln is the most
political animal alive."
"Do you think Cameron deserves this?"
McClure hesitated. "I've been told by one of my reporters that Thurlow
Weed gets five percent of all contracts his friends get at the War Department,
and he kicks back half of that to Simon. Is that true?"
"No. I'm right there and I would know. There's surely corruption down
the line, but it doesn't go to Simon." Scott felt that the man who had resigned
a Senate seat to take this job was being given a raw deal. He was the wrong
man to be Secretary of War, but his removal had to be handled in a way that
would not reflect discredit on him for the rest of his life.
"Look, I've always fought him, but I'm not a killer," McClure said. "This
cold dismissal finishes him. It will be taken as saying that all the accusations
of fraud are true."
Cameron came in to them for solace. "He's been so nice to me all month,"
Cameron protested. "Lincoln knows I hinted that I'd accept another post. I
made it easy for him. I could have made it very difficult. Why? Why?"
Scott cut the wailing short. "Who gave you this letter? How was it deliv-
ered?"
"Chase gave it to me, in a sealed envelope. Said Lincoln asked him to
deliver it, and he did not know what was in it."
"Chase doesn't lie," observed McClure. "He thinks he's God, and God
isn't the lying sort."
Scott began to figure a way to back the train away from the wreckage. It
was midnight, too late to go to the White House, but he had an idea. "I'll see
Lincoln first thing in the morning," he told Cameron. "You start writing a
letter of resignation as if nothing had happened. Pretend this letter never was
delivered, that you received the kind of letter that you deserve instead."
Scott presented himself at the White House next morning before Nicolay or
Hay was in the office. Lincoln was in the hallway of the second floor, in
dressing gown and carpet slippers, carrying a cup of tea. Seeing Scott's ex-
pression, he put on a defensive look: "What have I done wrong?"
"The letter you sent to Cameronthrough Chasedeeply distressed the
Secretary of War, sir. I cannot believe you intended to be cruel to a loyal
supporter."
"I did not," the President said immediately. "Did it come out that way? I
had my mind on something else."
"He showed it to McClure and me. It reads like a slap in the face. When
the papers get it, they'll ruin him in Pennsylvania." Scott paused before add-
ing, "Where he still has friends."
Lincoln closed his eyes and shook his head. "I just wrote it out, signed and
sealed it, and gave it to Chase to give him. I shouldn't do that. I forget what I
wrote."
Scott showed him his letter. Lincoln looked at it bleakly, nodding as he
gulped his tea. "I didn't mean it to sound the way it does."
"But it's retrievable, sir."
"How do you retrieve the irretrievable?" Lincoln wanted to know. "This
letter was delivered by Chase's hand. Simon got it. If he's sore, and I guess
old Simon has a right to be, he can cause all kinds of trouble. I don't want
half of Pennsylvania all riled up against me."
"No, Mr. President. I didn't think you did."
"And the truth is," said the distraught Lincoln, "I cozied him along for a
month so nobody would think I had eased him out because of corruption,
which nobody has proved, or that message business."
"Let's just turn back the clock," suggested Scott. "The letter you wrote,
you never wrote. Why don't you sit down now and write a more cordial note,
one more in your usual style, and date it two days ago, January II?"
The President thought about that. He looked at his letter, tore it up, and
wrote instead: "As you have more than once expressed a desire for a change
of position, I can now gratify you consistently with my view of the public
interest. I therefore propose nominating you to the Senate next Monday as
minister to Russia. Very sincerely, your friend, A. Lincoln."
Scott read that, nodded, then handed Lincoln another letter: "Now here's
his reply to that, dated yesterday." Cameron's letter, written with Scott and
McClure late the night before, acknowledged "the kind and generous tone" of
the President's letter, adding, "I thank you for the expression of your confi-
dence in my ability, patriotism, and fidelity to public trust."
"Getting a little thick there," said Lincoln, over his spectacles.
"I propose you make it even thicker," said the railroader. "Give him an-
other, private letter, that he can show at the court of the Czar, in case any-
body needs to know how he stands with you."
"He could use a letter like that in Pennsylvania," Lincoln said, quickly
grasping the harmless subterfuge, "but I write it with no political intentjust
to help him with the Czar."
"Exactly. Instead of having an unnecessary political enemy, you'll have a
lifelong ally. And you will have righted an unintentional wrong." Scott added
that last because it was not for a former superintendent of the Pennsylvania
Railroad to tell the President of the United States how to play politics.
Lincoln grinned and nearly went overboard on the next backdated letter:
"I have been only unwilling to consent to a change at a time and under
circumstances which might give occasion to misconstruction . . . you bear
with you the assurance of my undiminished confidence, of my affectionate
esteem . . ." It went on like that. This encomium, Scott noted to himself,
was about the man who had been forced down Lincoln's throat at the conven-
tion, who had failed him in office, and who was now being shipped as far
away as possible to keep him from causing more trouble. And it was all
backdated, part of a grand political charade. But a white lie or two was for
the best, Scott assumed, if it undid harm.
"That smooths out the track," said Scott. "The passengers will never be
able to hear the noise."
"I like the way you turned back the clock," said Lincoln with what seemed
to Scott to be genuine admiration. "I wish we could do that on so many
things."
This approval emboldened Scott: now was the moment for Lincoln to cut
the rest of the deadwood out of his Cabinet, including Bates at Justice and
Caleb Smith at Interior. "Sir, it's generally talked about, in the press and all
over, that the Cabinet is in disarray. I'm a manager and a businessman, and
in a case like that I'd try to solve more than one problem at a time."
He did not have to draw a diagram. Not only were Bates and Smith dead
weight, but Seward and Chase were at each other's throats, with Blair against
both. Disarray was a mild wordthe Cabinet had not been so rent with
dissension since Jackson's day. Now was the time, with the nation displeased
with the administration and the war, for the President to reshuffle the whole
deck.
"There was a farmer, in the far West," Lincoln began, his drawl deepening
for the story, "whose fields were infested with skunks. So he set a trap and
caught nine. He killed the first, but that made such an infernal stink that he
thought he'd better let the rest go."
Scott laughed dutifully, disappointed at the answer, and made to leave.
Lincoln clopped down the hall in his carpet slippers, limping a little, com-
plaining about his corns, and put his hand on the railroader's shoulder.
"You'll have to live with Stanton for a while, Scott, so it's good for you to
know what happened here. Chase is certain that Stanton got the job on
Chase's recommendation. Seward is just as sure that I took Seward's advice,
because he's been pushing for Stanton with nobody else knowing. Most im-
portant, McClellan wants Stanton, even goes to ground in Stanton's house,
which none of the others know. And in the Senate, Wade and Chandler want
Stanton too. Stanton is everybody's manespecially McClellan'sand so
he's my choice, too. I need somebody that everyone thinks he has a piece of."
Scott shook his head; at least Lincoln recognized his Cabinet problem, and
instead of cleaning house, hoped to find a catalyst for it. But Scott had come
to know the devious Stanton well from working alongside him, and could see
the underside of the man's ability to get all factions to recommend him. Scott
also knew he could not work under him for more than a few months. Obse-
quious to superiors and tyrannical to subordinates, Stanton was a man whose
personal honesty was exceeded only by a coldly impersonal duplicity. But
Scott saw no use in objecting; the President's decision had been made, and
Lincoln was delighted with himself for making it seem to each faction that hi
was following its advice.
"It draws the Cabinet together for the first time, at a crucial time," Lincoli
said. "I need that now. The people are impatient; Chase has no money and h
tells me he can raise no more; the General of the Army has typhoid fever. Th
bottom is out of the tub."
Scott felt the giant hand squeeze and release his shoulder. He left for th<
War Department across the street, glad that his backdating chicanery hat
served some national purpose. He had saved Lincoln from a minor blundel
with Cameron; as in the Trent affair, Lincoln was prepared to be surprisingly
flexible in order to avoid big and little wars that would detract from his mail
purpose. Everything, in strategy and in the tactics of finding men who coulc
best help him, was subsidiary to his central idea of being the glue for th<
Union, of using any means to achieve one great end. The railroader wonderec
if he should have put forward his fears about Stanton.

CHAPTER 8
"LITTLE MAC"
George McClellan pulled back the coverlet, put his legs over the side of the
bed and felt his feet touch the carpet. He pushed up with his strong arms and
came to attention. The room seemed to move around him, the face of Colonel
Key became a blur, and he had to lower himself to a seated position on the
bed. He closed his eyes and tried rising again.
"Are you sure you're ready for this, General?" Thomas Key, a dependable
older man, looked worried. "The doctor says you're too weak to receive
visitors. The fever has taken a great deal of strength out of you."
A moment before, Key had told him that Lincoln had sent word that
Edwin Stanton had been named Secretary of War, and that Stanton was
downstairs to pay his respects.
"I'll see Stanton." That appointment was good news. Simon Cameron had
not interfered in the conduct of the war, and for that reason McClellan had
not joined the chorus of those seeking to oust him, but Cameron's recent
flirtation with abolition had been disturbing. None of that with Stanton, he
had been assured. Stanton would trust the general-in-chief's judgment in
conducting the war, and McClellan wanted to welcome him.
"You wouldn't want to pass out right in front of him, General," Key's
voice said. "You haven't let anyone in the Administration know the extent of
the fever's effect."
Of course notthe impatient fools would try to replace him. The typhoid
had struck him as Christmas had come on, and the doctors said it might have
another week to run. The fever killed the weak, but those with strong consti-
tutions could shake it after four or five weeks. Lincoln, he knew, was worried
to the point of alarm, but the disease would run its course soon enough, and
no time was being wasted: the recruits needed the training in the new equip-
ment. Basic training could not be rushed.
The general remained standing on this try, and glared at his chief aide.
Key's iron-gray head became less of a blur. McClellan felt for the chair near
the bed and began to dress; he had already been shaved. He asked his aide
what day this was; Key said "Sunday." Then he added "Sunday, the twelfth
of January." McClellan frowned; his closest men were not sure he was aware
what month it was.
The general took his time; Stanton would wait. With his jacket on, though
still unbuttoned, he sent Key to get the Secretary-designate.
This was good news, he repeated to himself, waiting, the perspiration be-
ginning to run under his blouse. Cameron could no longer be of help in
calming the radical politicians, who wanted another battle immediately no
matter what the cost. Stanton, who was understanding and judicial, despite
his rude private attacks on the President, could better keep them at bay until
McClellan was ready to unveil his grand strategy.
Stanton arrived, did not dwell long on concerns about the feverMcClel-
lan appreciated thatand announced that Lincoln had sent his name to the
Senate for confirmation as Secretary of War.
"I have come, General, to confer with you as to my acceptance of this
post."
McClellan asked what reason would stop him from accepting it.
"It would involve very great personal sacrifices on my part," he said. "The
only possible inducement would be that I might have it in my power to aid
you in the work of putting down the rebellion." At McClellan's nod, he went
on: "I am ready to devote all my time, intellect, and energy to your assis-
tance. If you wish me to accept I will do so, but only on your account. I have
come to ascertain your wishes and will act accordingly."
"Accept the position," McClellan told him. He could see Stanton's face
nodding. "I'll be myself again in a week, don't worry. It will be good to work
together with you."
"Your improving health will not come as good news to your many ene-
mies," said Stanton confidentially. "Even as we speak, they are counting on
your death, and are already dividing among themselves your military goods
and chattels."
When McClellan did not react quickly enough, Colonel Key asked for him,
"In what way? Who? Where?" The general was glad Key was at his side.
"Two blocks from this spot."
McClellan's home was on the corner of Fifteenth and H; two blocks meant
the White House.
"The radicals are representing to the President that you are the only person
who knows the exact condition of the Army," Stanton said. "They have
persuaded him that your malady may terminate fatally, and if so, it would
cause great confusion and alarm. For that reason, they have caused a secret
examination to take place today, this morning, of your leading commanders."
In the face of this challenge, McClellan felt a surge of anger; his mind
became clearer. "Who have been summoned?"
"Franklin, because he knows most of your plans," Stanton answered,
"Meigs, the quartermaster, and lrvin McDowell."
"I'm certain that General Franklin has been loyal to me."
"You're right, General. That's where I've been getting the information
about Lincoln's meetings on your army, sir. He wants you to know that
General McDowell"
"That idiot almost lost the war at Bull Run." After that disaster, into
which McDowell had permitted himself to be pushed by the political judg-
ment of Lincoln and the unpardonable concurrence of General Scott, lrvin
McDowell had been demoted. Now, McClellan assumed, this lickspittle gen-
eral was trying to snatch back his command. He was probably telling Lincoln
exactly what he wanted to hear.
"McDowell," continued Stanton, "is being consulted by Lincoln, Chase,
and Seward. He's still under your command, but he's being asked what he
would do if he were in your place."
"Lincoln has no excuse for undermining my authority that way." Then
McClellan had a second thought: "Actually, he has a justificationhe came
by here the other night and I wouldn't see him. The guard told him I was
sleeping." That was unfortunate; once before McClellan had sent the Presi-
dent and his young secretary, Hay, away without an audience, but that was to
show them he was not at the President's beck and call. Other times he had
taken refuge in Stanton's house to avoid the prowling President. This time he
had been ill, not yet recovered from the critical period of the typhoid, which
gave Lincoln the excuse to talk to other generals in his command about the
Army of the Potomac. McClellan wished now that he had not insulted Lin-
coln by not seeing him the first time, but that was past.
"Yesterday Lincoln said to McDowell and Franklin"Stanton lowered his
voice and McClellan had to lean forward, which made his head hurt"that if
you weren't doing anything with your army in Virginia, he'd like to borrow it
for a while."
"He used those words?"
"That's what Lincoln said. He's fairly distraught, I hear, what with the
money problem, and the general depression over this Trent backdown, and
the noise from the abolitionists in his own party."
"He's weak," said McClellan, swaying for a moment, regaining his balance
by force of will. "Lincoln means well, but your assessment of him, I fear, is
correcthe is putty in their hands. Hand me my sash."
Key buttoned his commander's jacket, draping the red sash over his shoul-
der and down across the decorations,
"Lincoln promised two months ago he would not hurry me," McClellan
recalled. "He said he would help me move the Army at my own pace. Now
he's showing panic in the face of political pressure, as you said he would."
"McDowell's a purely political general," Stanton agreed, "and a Republi-
can. Wade wants him back. When slaves in Virginia come into the lines,
McDowell frees them."
McClellan was relieved to have the astute lawyer's services available to him
amidst the gaggle of geese that made up Lincoln's Cabinet. "Fugitive slaves,
not working for hostile forces, should be returned to their owners," McClel-
lan said firmly. "That was my order."
Which reminded the general of the singers. He turned to Key. "Did Gen-
eral McDowell let those damned singers come back?"
A bunch of young radicals calling themselves "the Hutchinson Family
Singers," who entertained the Union troops, had been singing an abolitionist
song composed by the poet Whittier, and McClellan had ordered them off all
military bases. That had started a row with Wade and Chandler in the Con-
gress: those abolitionists claimed that his expulsion of the radical singers was
further proof McClellan was a "slave-catching general," out to prolong the
war by not fighting it, until the North tired of the struggle.
"No sir, Fitz-John Porter has seen to it the singers will not be allowed near
our men again."
McClellan regarded himself in the mirror, squaring his shoulders further.
He hardly resembled his old self; he had lost twenty pounds and his face was
unnaturally sallow, which was why Nellie had to fight back tears when she
looked at him. He wished he had a shirt with a narrower collar to hide the
weight loss. "What other mischief is McDowell up to?"
"He has recommended a general movement of the Army of the Potomac
south and west toward Manassas," Stanton replied. "In your absence, he
proposes to engage the rebels there, drive down to Richmond. Good railroad
lines to supply a siege."
"Bull Run all over again!" McClellan exploded, then made a successful
effort at controlling himself. McDowell, who was probably glorying in this
"examination" he had to submit to, was not all that bad a soldier in the field,
but had no grasp of strategy. To undertake an offensive against an enemy with
superior numbersover 200,000 to McClellan's  115,000, according to
Pinkerton's estimatesin heavily wooded Virginia, as the worst cold of win-
ter set in, was to invite another disaster. And to lose such a battle near the
Union capital would tempt the victorious Confederates to seize Washington,
as Beauregard should have done, the first time the Union was routed at
Manassas.
Thinking ahead to the examination of his generals, especially Franklin, by
the Lincoln Cabinet, McClellan was suddenly chilled by the possibility of the
leakage of the most important military secret of all.
"Has anyone mentioned a plan about a different approach to Richmond?"
"Wellsort of, General." Stanton looked troubled. "General Franklin first
said nothing should be done until you were consulted. Then, to head off the
adoption of McDowell's offensive from Manassas, he told Lincoln there was
another way."
"Did he say anything about the York River?"
"He mentioned it in passing, but that's what they are planning to ask him
about today."
"Damn." McClellan had a brilliant strategy in mind, one that would avoid
the high casualties of a grinding, yard-by-yard attack through Virginia. He
envisioned putting the Army of the Potomac on the Potomacon the river,
in gunboats and other vessels, sailing silently down the Potomac to the Ches-
apeake, then up the York River to a landing point within short striking
distance of Richmond. By such a daring maneuver, he could cut off the
Confederate force at Yorktown and capture their entire garrison on the Pen-
insula. This plan would enable the Union forces to outflank Richmond's
imposing fortifications and take the city from the rear. The plan was stun-
ning, bold and imaginative, a raid on a vast scale worthy of a Napoleon.
There was risk: the presence of a Confederate army at Manassas would
scare the politicians in Washington, since the capital would be relatively un-
defended, but he was certain that the Confederates at Manassas would be
forced to withdraw when they heard that the decisive battle of the war was to
be fought at Richmond. The Peninsula plan had the element of surprise, sure
to be vitiated if the entire Cabinet and the political generals were let in on the
secret. Lincoln would have to be informed; the others had no need to know.
"I have not been asked to be at the examination," Stanton was saying.
"Do I have a single defender in this cabal?"
"Blair, perhaps, but he's slippery," said Stanton. "It's most important that
I be confirmed immediately, without any hearings, so I can work with you in
averting another disaster."
McClellan would have to pass the word to the more sensible senators, who
were in the majority in the Senate, to confirm Stanton immediately.
Blair was the only West Pointer in the lot, McClellan noted. It sickened
him to think that the others were willing to see his great army, which he had
almost brought up to fighting condition, cut to pieces, driven to rout and
permanent defeat just to satisfy the impatience of a few abolitionist rabble-
rousers. They had all kowtowed to McClellan only three months ago, when
that army was in a shambles and no one else could rally them; now that the
army was nearly in condition, almost up to strength, the same crowd was
trying to grab the army and ruin it again. Feverish or not, McClellan would
not permit that.
"You may have trouble with Chase," said Stanton. "He's been spending a
lot of time with Wade and Chandler on that Joint Committee. They're after
your hide."
"Not ChaseI've neutralized him." In early December, before the fever
struck him down, the general had heard that Chase needed an infusion of
confidence. McClellan undertook the necessary bolstering that helped that
profoundly truthful man persuade New York and Philadelphia bankers to
support the government with loans. Chase had been properly honored by the
general's confidence when McClellan gave him the outline of his plan for a
Peninsula campaign, seizing Richmond from the rear. He had sworn Chase to
secrecy; as far as McClellan knew, that oath had been honored, but the
Treasury Secretary was still a member of the radical crowd. McDowell would
be "his" general, beholden to Chase for his return; McClellan assumed that
one reason Stanton was alerting him to this White House meeting was to
avert such a diminution of the power of the new Secretary of War.
McClellan could not afford to let his command authority be further under-
cut, or his plan spilled before the politicians. "Colonel, tell my groom to
saddle Kentuck."
"I have a carriage right outside, General"
"I can ride." If George Brinton McClellan could walk, he could ride. His
problem was getting down the stairs, not climbing on his horse. Leaning on
Key's arm, he maneuvered his way downstairs, stopping every few steps to
slow the spinning, Stanton following behind. His army would fight for him; it
would not fight for McDowell or the other politicians. He had whipped it into
shape; the officers and men of the Army of the Potomac trusted him; he
would not see them led to slaughter.
A cheer went up from his bodyguardtwenty mounted menas their
leader emerged from the house for the first time in too long. He smiled, then
frowned them to attention.
Kentuck was brought forward; it made McClellan feel better to stroke the
steed's neck, then to heave himself into the comfortable saddle he had de-
signed. Astride his horse, he was relieved to find that his dizziness and weak-
ness had passed. The general was prepared to defend his army from the
insidious flanking movement of the politicians.
Montgomery Blair, picking his way across the frozen mud of Pennsylvania
Avenue from his own house to the President's on that Sunday morning, was
hailed by Thomas Scott, the Assistant Secretary of War.
"I'll be representing the War Department at this meeting," Scott told him.
"Cameron is out and Stanton is not yet in."
"And McClellan is out, it seems, and McDowell is not yet back in," Blair
replied. He trusted Scottprofessional, straightforward, no political ambi-
tionand would have advised Lincoln to put him at the head of the depart-
ment instead of the treacherous Stanton. He found it troubling that Lincoln
would not consult the Biairs on such a momentous decision. His father was
certain the Stanton appointment was Seward's doing, and boded ill for the
country.
"Stanton's going to be my new boss," Scott said cheerlessly, leaning into
the January wind. "I hear you had some harsh things to say about him."
Only that he was a liar and a traitor, Blair thought, saying instead, "I hope
I'm wrong. But he bears watching." It occurred to the Postmaster General
that Lincoln, in selecting men as different as McClellan and Stanton to con-
duct the war, was prepared to make a great many personality allowances in
order to get an effective army in the field. But perhaps the selection of Stanton
meant the end of McClellan.
"Stanton's a hard worker, though, and decisive. God knows we need that."
Scott pointed to a large van, drawn up to the side of the War Department
across the street. "His appointment became public today, he doesn't take
office till next week after the Senate approves, and he's already got his hands
on the telegraph service."
The head of the postal service did not know that. "He just grabbed it?"
"Right out of McClellan's headquarters, before anybody could say boo.
He's going to concentrate all the nation's telegraph service into one room
adjacent to his office. Nobody in the Union will be able to send a wire without
Stanton seeing it. He'll know what generals in the field are telling each other,
as well as what they are reporting to us."
"Cabinet members" he left the rest unsaid.
Scott shot him a wry smile. "If your brother in Missouri sends you a
telegram, even in code, Stanton gets it first. Those are the orders."
Dangerous; control of communications was power. Blair would have to be
careful Stanton did not poach on his preserve of the U.S. mail. "I imagine
that telegraph office will be where Lincoln will be spending a lot of time," he
noted. Stanton was doubly smart: proximity to power was also power.
In the Cabinet Room, Blair took his regular seat as Lincoln motioned Scott
to the place left empty by the hapless Cameron. Seward and Chase were
there, but not Welles or Smith or Bates; for some reason, Lincoln wanted this
meeting small and unofficial. Three generals awaited interrogation, McDow-
ell alone looking confident.
Montgomery Blair was ambivalent about lrvin McDowell. Six months be-
fore, the Biairs had joined in the urging of McDowell into action across the
Potomac, and under that pressure the general did not hesitate. In retrospect,
he should have hesitated; military commanders have an obligation to resist
unsound civilian orders. Blair was angry at himself for being impatient, an-
grier at McDowell for not saving them all from that impatience. They were
all guilty for Bull Run, but McDowell was guiltier than any.
Blair wondered why he had been invited to this stealthy replacement of
McClellan. Presumably, Lincoln wanted a Blair present in these meetings as a
counter to Chase and Seward, both of whom had already lost faith in McClel-
lan: Chase had been persuaded that McClellan was a "slave-catcher" who did
not want to pursue the war vigorously, and Seward was convinced that the
commander was on the verge of death and would not soon be ready for
action. But Blair felt uncomfortable at being therehe did not savor being
part of a cabal operating behind a commanding general's back. McDowell,
standing at a map on the wall, was pointing out how the rebels in Virginia
could be attacked without jeopardizing Washington.
"What do you think, Judge?" Lincoln wanted an opinion from Blair about
McDowell's plan to move in the next week, as Lincoln and the othersand
the countrywanted the army to do.
"Before Judge Blair gives us the benefit of his military experience," Secre-
tary Seward interrupted, "let me tell you something about enemy strength.
An Englishman whom I consider reliable has just come to me from Rich-
mond, Manassas, and Centreville. A military man. He said the rebel forces
were in excellent conditionwell shod, clothed, and fedand that he esti-
mated their number at one hundred thousand."
"One hundred thousand?" That was a surprise to Lincoln, who had been
assured by McClellan, Pinkerton, and all the generals in the Army of the
Potomac that the Confederate Army in Virginia numbered over two hundred
thousand. "If that's true, we outnumber the enemy by three to two."
"If it's true," said Blair. "I think we are safer, and wiser, going by the
Pinkerton estimate than by the unverified judgment of a single Englishman."
"Going by McClellan's estimate, then, what do you think?" Lincolna
trifle more nervous and impatient than usual, Blair thoughtwanted a firm
opinion.
"I fear it may be Bull Run all over again," Blair said, to the open dismay of
the men around the table, only General Franklin excluded. Blair began to
explain why, and stopped abruptly.
General McDowell, face reddening, was staring toward the doorway. All
eyes followed his to the form of a gaunt but resolute George McClellan.
"Little Mac," the uninvited man, was present and would have to be ac-
counted for.
Lincoln rose, went to the doorway, and clasped McClellan's hand. "Are
you sure your health permits?" he asked in what seemed to Blair genuine
solicitude. "We could not wait."
McClellan said nothing, just took his place at the Cabinet table and looked
sourly at McDowell standing at the map of Virginia.
"I am presenting this plan at the President's direct order," explained Mc-
Dowell to the general-in-chief, a note of apology or chagrin in his voice.
McClellan remained impassive. McDowell, clearing his throat and looking
for a glass of water, hesitated before going on. But at Lincoln's urging, he laid
out hisand Lincoln'splan for striking directly at the enemy strength
across the Potomac, twenty miles from Washington, and then driving down
toward Richmond. With his superior military officer now present, McDowell
went into order-of-battle detail, stressing the logistical support of two railroad
lines that could supply a train to enable the Army to lay siege to Richmond.
When the man at the map finished reviewing the plan, the President looked
to McClellan for a response. The general did not respond. Blair thought that
wise; his silence made everybody in the room nervous. McClellan was not
without his high cards in this poker game. If the Young Napoleon blew up
and stalked out, he could take a large part of his army with himsuch was
the control he had over his men.
"In my opinion," the unhappy McDowell concluded, "we will succeed, by
repeated blows, in crushing out the force in our front, even if it is our equal in
numbers and strength."
Blair believed that judgment to be militarily unsound; with equal forces,
the dug-in defense in home territory had the great advantage. Although the
new breech-loading rifles made it possible for attackers to reload rapidly, that
increased firepower had been more than offset by the rifling of the musket
barrelsthe defense could now shoot a ball three times as far and with more
accuracy. When defenders were shooting at men coming across an open field,
the difference between a two-hundred-yard range and a five-hundred-yard
range was the difference between defeat and victory.
"And in my opinion," McDowell concluded, "the time is ripe for such an
attack." He was no longer looking toward Lincoln, but seeking some assur-
ance from his commanding general.
After a long pause, McClellan said only, "You're entitled to have any
opinion you please." He added nothing to that. If he wanted to show scorn
for his subordinate's attempt to curry favor with civilians to dislodge him
from command, Blair thought he had succeeded.
The silence became painful. "I made this presentation," McDowell said
lamely, "because of the critical nature of your illness."
"I have regained my health. This examination may now cease."
Chase leaned over toward Lincoln, whispered something, and then spoke
up. "The purpose of this meeting is to determine the military plans in detail,
for our approval or disapproval. General McClellan, proceed."
McClellan slowly shook his head. "The purpose you express is entirely new
to me. I do not recognize the Secretary of the Treasury in any way as my
official superior, and I deny your right to question me on the military affairs
in my charge."
Chase leaned his head forward and his big voice filled the room. "I want to
ask you a direct question, General. I speak as one with the responsibility to
raise the money to finance this armywhich, by the way, is not your army,
but the United States's army. My question is this: What do you intend doing
with the Army of the Potomac, and when do you intend doing it?"
"The President and the Secretary of War alone have the right to interrogate
me."
Chase set his face hard, turned and whispered to the President again.
After a moment Lincoln said, "General Franklin here says there might be
another approach to Richmond, by water down the Potomac. Perhaps he will
make that more specific for us."
General Franklin was most uncomfortable. "I raised that possibility only
because I knew it was in General McClellan's mind. If the general-in-chief
wishes to discuss it, he's here."
Again McClellan said nothing. Blair, on McClellan's side in this unex-
pected confrontation, wished he would lay out his plan for a bold water-and-
land assault on Richmond by way of the James River. The idea struck him as
infinitely more effective, and far less costly in casualties, than a grinding
overland campaign beginning at Manassas. But the young general remained
mute.
Lincoln filled the silence with some nervous talk about details of the Mc-
Dowell plan, but Blair felt for the first time that the President was not in
charge of the meeting. Lincoln's voice ran on and dribbled to a stop.
"The case is so clear," said McClellan finally, "that a blind man could see
it. First, I need to know how many additional forces are to be placed under
my command in a general advance."
Blair knew what he was getting at. Lincoln had held back some forces from
McClellan's Army of the Potomac, putting them under Generals Burnside
and Butler, who operated best alone, and whose presence in the vicinity gave
the capital's residents more confidence. McClellan, under attack by his politi-
cal foes, was defending his position by taking the offense, using the occasion
to gather more forces under his direct command.
Lincoln temporized, and Blair assumed the President did not want to make
a decision or a promise to McClellan without knowing whether the general
was going to adopt the plan to strike through Manassas and on to Richmond.
Seward fidgeted in his chair. Tom Scott was hunched forward, arms on the
table, apparently amazed that the management of the war had come to this
impasse.
Blair managed to catch McClellan's eye and shook his head imperceptibly
to warn him about insubordination. The general could not stand mute, not if
the President wanted him to speak.
"I would like," said the general-in-chief, "to see some diversionary action
in the West. Kentucky. Or Missouri." That, Blair knew, was something, but
not good enough. McClellan closed his eyes for a moment, as if to steady
himself, and then said what was on his mind: "I am very unwilling to reveal
my plans to this gathering. In military matters, the fewer people who know
about them, the better."
"I am the Secretary of the Treasury, responsible for financing the war,"
said Chase. "This is the Secretary of State, and the Postmaster General is
here because of his military background. Here, at the head of the table, is the
President of the United States. Which one of us do you think should not be
trusted with knowledge of your plans?"
"I will reveal my plans," said McClellan coolly, "and thereby endanger the
security of my army, only if I receive a direct order to do so. A written
order."
"If that is your decision," warned Chase, "you are a ruined man." He
resumed his private talking to the President.
Blair thought McClellan had overstepped; Chase thus abused would be his
implacable enemy, and the demand for a direct order, especially in writing,
was an insult to the President. The Quartermaster General, Meigs, drew his
chair around to McClellan's and spoke to him quietly and urgently. Blair
could not hear their conversation clearly, but Meigs was saying something
about being "not respectful" and McClellan was murmuring, "Can't keep a
secret . . . I don't want my plans in the Tribune tomorrow morning."
Eyes swung to the only man in the room capable of giving the order to
force McClellan's hand. Blair knew that Lincoln needed a way out: he had
been embarrassed by McClellan's unexpected presence in a series of meetings
that had been intended to goad him to action or take over his command. Now
Chase and McClellan had put it up to the President: Who was in charge of
the army? Blair considered interrupting to deflect the challenge, but then
decided to see how Lincoln would handle it.
"Well, General," said Lincoln after the caucusing, "I think you had better
tell us what your plans are."
"Sir, if you have any confidence in me, you will not find it necessary to
entrust my designs to the judgment of others. If your confidence is so slight as
to require that my opinions be fortified by those of other persons, it would be
wiser to replace me with someone"he looked toward lrvin McDowell
"fully possessing your confidence."
Tom Scott broke that tension with a practical note, spoken in a friendly
way to a fellow former railroad executive. "George, everybody in this room
knows in general terms about your Peninsula idea. It's no big secret here."
"My point exactly," said McClellan. "The President knows the direction of
my thinking, and so does the Secretary of the Treasury. Why should it be
necessary to set forth details that would soon be spread all over Washington
and become known to the enemy?"
Seward stood up, buttoned his coat, and said almost merrily, "Well, Mr.
President, I think the meeting had better break up. We're not likely to make
much out of General McClellan." Blair looked at the man with a mixture of
amazement and disgust: it was all a game to him.
"Wait a moment," Lincoln said to Seward, who promptly sat down. "Gen-
eral, answer me this. Do you have, in your own mind, some particular time
fixed when a movement will be commenced?"
When the general just stared at him, the President amended his question.
"I am not asking you to reveal what that time is, but I want to know if you
have a fixed time in your mind."
"I have."
"Then," rejoined the President, trying to look as if he had asserted his
authority, "I shall adjourn the meeting."
Score one for the Young Napoleon, thought Blair. As all rose, Blair noticed
that McClellan, who was next to him at the table, staggered. Casually, Blair
put an arm around the general's shoulders, as if in a collegial way, but sup-
porting him under his arm. The general's body was trembling. Blair engaged
him in idle conversation, doing most of the talking, and helped him through
the front door of the President's house and onto his horse, urging him to
hurry home. Rivulets of sweat were pouring down his face, and the cold air
would not do him any good.
Blair and Scott stopped at the corner of Seventeenth and Pennsylvania,
puffing vapors into the air. "Judge, there's something we can do to help the
President," Scott said. "He and McClellan are going to be arguing for weeks
over which route to take to Richmond. That's what Little Mac wants, to
delay till spring, when he thinks his men will be in shape."
"That's too late."
"Right," said Scott. "If we don't win, we lose. Now at today's meeting, you
remember Little Mac said he wanted a Western diversion. I have a plan in
hand that may turn out to be much more than that. The idea is to ignore the
fortified Mississippi River; instead, to send a force to Ohio to take Forts
Henry and Donelson, and then invade the South down the Tennessee River."
Blair knew all about the Tennessee planAnna Carroll had gone over it
with the Biairs, and probably others, asking them to press for its adoption
with Lincoln. He had not; Miss Carroll was a persuasive pamphleteer with
wide-ranging political connections, but it struck him as absurd to consider
any woman to be a military strategist. "You think it makes sense?"
"It makes a lot more sense to me," said Scott, "than McClellan's notion of
leaving Washington undefended while he sails down the river and up the
Peninsula to Richmond."
Blair did not agreehe preferred taking Richmond by maneuver, before
defenses could be constructedbut Scott had a point: a Western diversion
was a worthy idea. "Then urge it on Halleck out thereor on his generals,
Grant and Sherman," Blair said. "We need some success soon."
"It needs more serious backing than mine," Scott hinted, Blair caught his
meaning.
"If it's your judgment that the Tennessee plan has merit, I'll talk to the
President. Meanwhile, you plant it in Stanton's head and make it his idea. I
don't think Halleck out West will like it, but McClellan won't objectit takes
the pressure off him."
Scott agreed. "You'll never believe who came up with the Tennessee plan
first. Of course, the idea is obviousthe only thing is, nobody else put it
before the President."
"Don't underestimate the daughters of Maryland, Colonel."
Scott grinned. "Don't send any telegrams you don't want Stanton to read."
They parted, Scott to the War Department, Blair across the street to his
house. Anna Carroll had helped get Frank Blair out of jail when Fremont lost
his temper; the Biairs would help her press her plan, now that a sensible
fellow like Scott had judged it to be sound. The focus of attention out West
would give McClellan a month or two, which he needed, and would prevent
another McDowell blunder at Bull Run.
Little Mac was much abused by the radical faction these days, and Blair
feared his challenge to Chase today would worsen the enmity. McClellan
surely had the confidence of his men, who would follow him to hell, but the
problem was that he was reluctant to lead them there. A cautious man
necessarily so, considering that another major military blunder could lose the
war for the Unionbut with one noticeable drawback: vanity, which com-
bined with political ambition, could lead to trouble. As his conduct at today's
meeting showed, McClellan combined personal courage with congenital stub-
bornness. He showed he could storm a citadel and take the high ground, but
Elair wished he had shown the maturity to win over the men he had forced to
back away. The general had every right to be furious at the way Lincoln had
gone around him to his field commanders, but had no right to treat the
President and Chase as his equals. Blair charitably attributed that lack of
judgment to the fact that the man was fighting for his position while conceal-
ing a raging fever.
At least McClellan was accepted throughout the nation for what he was: a
first-class military man, top of his class at the Point, author of a brilliant
report on the Crimean War and its lessons for the U.S. Army, and a leader
capable of inspiring the kind of devotion that common soldiers reposited only
in a Napoleon. He was "the man of the hour" because no other military man
came a close second. Blair hoped the generals out West, now under "Old
Brains" Halleck, were as soldierly. One of them, Sam Grant, was a West
Pointer, but it was widely reported he drank, and had been pushed out of the
army for cause; on top of that, he was a failure in civilian life. The other,
William Sherman, had been a successful enough banker in California, ran a
military academy in Louisiana, and was sustained politically by his brother in
the U.S. Senate; but Sherman had not shown much leadership under Mc-
Dowell at Bull Run; he had an obsession about the press, and the reporters
were fond of hinting in print that he was slightly deranged. Not much of a
group to rest the fate of a nation on, especially with Halleck known to be a
jealous, small-minded man with a minimum of battlefield experience.
The Union generals were up against Sidney Johnston, the former Secretary
of War of the Republic of Texas, and thought by most West Pointers, Blair
included, to be the best all-round soldier in America. Like Robert Lee, whom
Blair thought overrated, Sidney Johnston had been offered high command of
the Union armies by Lincoln, but he had turned down the offer as Winfield
Scott's second-in-command and chosen instead the Confederate Western
command. As expected, Sidney Johnston had easily trounced Fremont, and
was now fighting Halleck's superior forces to a standstill. If the war did not
end soon, Blair feared that Albert Sidney Johnston would be named supreme
commander of the Southern forces, and his theories of the "offensive defen-
sive" in modern warfare would be devastating to the kind of invasion Lincoln
had in mind.
Blair knocked the dirty snow off his boots on the stand outside his door
and pulled out his key. At that moment a man with a sack on his back came
up to the door and asked, "Is this number 1601?" Blair said it was. "You
ought to put the number on the door, mister, it'll make it easier for us. We've
begun regular delivery of the mail."
"You mean," Blair smiled, "we don't have to pick it up at the post office
anymore?"
"That's right," said the postman, handing over a couple of letters. "You
may want to put a box out here for it; they have them in the stores now."
Postmaster General Blair nodded, took the letters and went inside. The
war was stalemated, the Northern spirit was sagging, the Union general was
sick and refused to admit it, the Cabinet was divided and would soon be
afflicted with a manipulative War Secretary, and the President was not sure of
himself. But amidst it all the nation had instituted mail service right to the
addressee's door, and on a daily basis. Not a major event in a country in such
straits, but some little progress that made Blair feel his long days were not for
naught.

CHAPTER 9
A NOSE SLIGHTLY PUG
The brick Chase mansion on Sixth and E looked imposing to John Hay. He
flipped the brass knocker and waited in the cold, turning his fur hat over in
his hands, his thoughts of the tense session with McClellan fading in anticipa-
tion of a private meeting with the most adored and envied young woman in
Washington. He reminded himself not to let his ill feelings about Mrs. Lin-
coln show to her younger social rivalno "Her Satanic Majesty" cracks in
Miss Chase's presence. Not even "La Reine," as Nicolay called her; only
"Mrs. Lincoln," or at most, with the slightest shade of irony, "Madame."
This long-sought rendezvous had been arranged, of all places, at the Smith-
sonian Institution after that terrible blowhard speech by Horace Greeley. The
President was in attendance, sitting on the platform showing the greatest
respect to the editor of the New York Tribune. That hot-and-cold patriot who,
Hay remembered, had been willing to surrender the cause of the Union after
Bull Run, was at his abolitionist peak as Stanton came to power. "By condon-
ing slavery," the editor had publicly wagged a finger at Lincoln, "we cherish
the viper which has its fangs now fastened in the national breast."
After the lecture, Hay had gone up to the platform to have the President
introduce him to the famed editor, who might be an inconsistent political
supporter but who could one day help a fledgling poet. Lincoln was explain-
ing to Greeley that he hoped his plan of compensated, gradual emancipation
could be presented to the border states persuasively, not menacingly, and the
editor was shaking his head, no.
"What a wonderful man," Hay had heard spoken behind him, and turned
to look at the most level set of challenging gray-green eyes that had ever set
his loins contracting.
"I have felt that about the President," Hay responded, "ever since I went
to work for him."
"Him, too," was all she said. He had seized his chance to invite her to
Willard's for a glass of champagne, and she countered with an invitation to
tea at the Chase house. The date had been postponed twiceboth times by
herbut the time had come.
He lifted and released the cold brass knocker again.
She opened the door herself, which surprised him; two servants were in the
background. His poet's heart leaped at her guarded smile and the incredible,
fresh beauty that she wore so casually, then as suddenly sank when he real-
ized she was too tall. Maybe she was wearing higher heels especially for this
occasionor perhaps, the crazy thought struck him, he was getting shorter.
"I'm overdressed for our meeting," she said easily, reaching for his arm
and drawing him in. She was in a stiff white silk gown with a sprig ofjasmine
on the shoulder. "We have guests coming at eight, and I didn't want to take
time from our tea to dress."
He liked that. Why didn't she invite him for dinner?
"You're invited to stay, of course," she said, "if you like a dreary group of
bankers from Philadelphia." Good; such a gathering would not show him in
his best light, and it would be gauche to appear too eager. He declined, saying
the President expected him back for some early evening work.
"Tea, or sherry, or whiskey?"
He would have preferred a hot cup of teahe had walked from the White
House, ten blocks across the frozen mudbut that would not have been
manly. He told the butler he would have whiskey.
"Bourbon and branch water for two," she ordered, saying confidentially to
him, "It gets my color upbetter than using rouge." Hay liked her quick
intimacy. "That was some confrontation with the Young Napoleon," she said,
cutting quickly to the core of his life. "Father said McClellan acted abomina-
bly. How could he do that? Does Little Mac think he's going to be dictator?"
She was going a little fast for him. Hay had been outside the Cabinet Room
all weekend, overhearing what he could of the secret examination, and then
he and Nicolay had talked it over afterward with Lincoln. Lincoln said he
had thought McClellanwhose surprising arrival, Hay knew, had embar-
rassed the President terriblyhad acted like a man.
With Kate looking right at him, expecting an intelligent answer, Hay
stalled. "Do you think we need a dictator?"
"Might not be such a bad idea," she said offhandedly. "That's what the
Romans did when the nation was in danger. But not McClellan. He dithers
too much to be a dictator."
"His men swear by him. Wasn't for him, we wouldn't have an army at all."
That was the defense Lincoln put forward to others, even when privately
upset with the general's refusal to grasp the political damage of military
delay, or when the general-in-chief failed to take the commander in chief fully
into his confidence. Lincoln liked to hear the fine details of military plans,
down to regimental placements and types of bridges; it gave him the sense
that the planner was serious.
"Do you always say the safe thing, Mr. Hay?"
That shaft went home; he had been saying the safe thing ever since he
finished his studies at Brown, certainly since he had come to the District of
Columbia. Working in the President's mansion put a young man in the safe-
thing habit.
"I do not know you well enough," he replied, "to say the unsafe. I am,
after all, the keeper of the President's conscience."
She affected a deep sigh; in her tight dress her breasts, not large, became
noticeable for a moment. Hay had come to Washington at twenty-two, a
virginmaybe. The maybe was the girl in Springfield who claimed he had
penetrated her during their passionate farewell, but he could not be certain
that she was not just being kind. In a year in the nation's capital, with ready
access to the maidens at counselor Earnes's parties, and with the power
drawn from his proximity to the President to appear mysterious and secre-
tive, John Hay had cut a swath. He liked the phrase. He wished desperately
he could engage in swath-cutting with Kate Chase and knew the first step
required him to say something daring but not indiscreet.
She leaned forward and put both hands on his knees, a movement that he
had never experienced before. "How old are you, John Hay?"
"Twenty-three," he said. He almost added "and a half," but that might not
be taken as humorous.
"Almost my age. We are, both of us, very young to be doing what we're
doing. I am the hostess and political confidante of the Secretary of the Trea-
sury, the man who represents the most enlightened and progressive elements
of the Republican Party. You are the private secretary of the most powerful
man in the nation, if he only knew how to use his power."
"He knows," Hay interrupted, to say something daring, "but he has to
maneuver the country ahead of him." How could he tell her what he really
knew of Lincoln? Not the Honest Abe of the cartoons, or the timorous pro-
crastinator of today's meeting in the Cabinet roombut the detached, remote
man, hiding in his melancholia, supremely confident of his own destiny and
privately a bit amused by the "great men" with whom he had surrounded
himself, Kate Chase's father emphatically included. Lincoln cultivated his
modest nature and mocked all pretension, but Hay thought it absurd to call
him a modest man. No great man was ever modest. Lincoln's easygoing
intellectual arrogance and unconscious assumption of superiority confounded
men like Chase and Sumner, but the patent-leather, kid-glove set knew no
more of Lincoln than an owl knew of a comet blazing into its blinking eyes.
Kate Chase, who inspired him to such stunning images, was obviously
trying to knife through his defenses. "Look, John Hay, you and I are in the
same boat. I want to be your friend and your ally. We could help each other.
Am I being too direct? Do you prefer women who wait for you to take the
lead?"
"No," he said truthfully, "I like straight dealing. I admire that." The
"admire" was betterwhy couldn't he be as quick with the right words in his
conversation as in his diary?
"You're not accustomed to it," she teased. "You like the fluttering eye-
lashes of those girls at the Earneses', the pouting and the wide eyes and the
giggling. I don't giggle."
"Never?"
That stopped her. "I suppose I giggle when I'm tickled," she said seriously,
"but I don't waste a lot of time flirting or making small talk. If that sort of
thing is what you're looking for"
"Everything I tell you," he assured her, beginning to enjoy himself, "will
be pregnant with meaning. Unfortunately, you already know all the state
secrets I know."
"You're being silly. Here's your drink." She was a touch on the serious
side, but perhaps her earnestness would be leavened with time. "Why do you
call Mrs. Lincoln 'the Hellcat?' "
She had waited until he was in the middle of his first swallow of bourbon
and he almost coughed it up. "Who said I said that?"
"Let's never ask each other a question like that, Johnwe both hear a
great deal. I don't expect you to admit what you said about Mrs. Lincoln, but
it shows you have good judgment."
Must have been Stoddard, the third secretary, who tattled; the damned
little clerk was always buttering up the Hellcat. Hay made a mental note to
watch what he said around Stoddard, and to warn Nico to do the same. "In
my youthful exuberance" he began, and Kate cut him off.
"She's a disgrace and we both know it. My heart goes out to the President,
encumbered with a Southern sympathizer in the midst of a rebellion." That
was putting in plain words what people only hinted at: Mrs. Lincoln's South-
ern relatives, enlisted in the Confederate Army, were a source of embarrass-
ment more profound than her inclination to go into debt on wardrobe and
furnishings and "flub-dubs," as all the carpets were now called. "I trust you,
John Hay. I wouldn't say something like that to anybody else."
He began to feel a bit manipulated; there was such a thing as being too
direct about being direct. Yet she could be a valuable ally, and perhaps he and
she could bridge some gaps between Chase and Lincolnon compensation
for slave owners, for exampleand being allies could lead to becoming
friends, which in turn could lead to becoming who-knew-what. Could he
hope to compete with a man of the world like Lord Lyons? More to the point,
could he trust a woman of the radical world like Kate Chase? He decided to
set a small trap to see if she would tell him the truth on a more substantive
matter.
"You were wrong about McClellan in the meeting today," he confided. "It
was important that he take charge. That's what generals are for. His alterna-
tive plan is worth thinking about." Hay was fishing; did she know about the
Peninsula plan, the inland sea route that would avoid the casualties of a direct
strike through Manassas?
"My father had to drag it out of him," Kate said. "Was Lincoln told before
this of a Peninsula plan?"
"Of course," said Hay, and slipped the test question in naturally. "Did
your father know?"
"No, today was the first he knew of it. And it was important he know,
because he would have to finance the purchase of the extra barges."
Kate Chase was lying. He was surprised; she lied as easily as sipping bour-
bon. Chase had known of McClellan's plans as early as a month ago, back
when Wade and Chandler and the other radicals were still high on McClellan.
That was certain: Montgomery Blair had come back to the Mansion that
afternoon to tell the President how he had helped the feverish and trembling
McClellan onto his horse, and to pass on the information that McClellan was
furious at Chase for pretending he had not been informed a month before of
McClellan's Peninsula plan. Chase was following the abolitionist signals to
dump Little Mac, who was insufficiently anti-slavery, even if it required con-
cealing his foreknowledge of McClellan's plans. And Kate lied about it with
the greatest of ease. Some ally.
"What does your father think of the Peninsula plan?"
"I don't know," she lied again. "He hasn't had a chance to think about it."
Or to talk it over again with Ben Wade and perhaps Horace Greeley. "I can
tell you a plan he won't like, however. Anna Carrolldo you know her, the
little woman who writes for money?has been in to see Father several times
about some notion she has to send an army down the Tennessee River."
Hay feigned ignorance; Assistant Secretary Scott had been espousing Miss
Carroll's idea, complete with memorials and maps, for more than a month.
Considering McClellan's new interest in a Western diversion, Lincoln was
coming around to the idea, if General Halleck in the West, along with his two
unreliable commanders, Grant and Sherman, could be sold on it.
"It's all a plot by the Biairs," Kate said, "to take the pressure off McClel-
lan. If they can focus attention on the WestMissouri, where the Blair family
is powerfulthat will let McNapoleon sit here all winter. They pay Anna
Carroll's room bill at the Ebbitt Houseshe's not to be trusted."
He had not yet heard the "McNapoleon" derogation; it was cutting. "And
yet I have heard your father praising Miss Carroll to the President," Hay
said. Secretary Chase liked Miss Carroll, he knewwas this not-to-be-trusted
view really the Treasury Secretary's, or was it the result of some jealousy or
possessiveness on the part of his daughter? On the other hand, could some-
thing be going on between the ultra-dignified and ostentatiously pious Salmon
P. Chase and the passionate little pamphleteer? If so, did Kate consider it a
threat of some kind?
Hay put in another barb, just for fun: "Miss Carroll just came back from
an assignment in St. Louis, probably about the plan you're talking about. I
don't know what it is about hermost of the men in the Cabinet really like
her. The President, too. And they say Buchanan, and Fillmore"
"She must have been attractive when young," Kate said coolly. "Until very
recently, she was a slave owner. She and Rose O'Neal Greenhow used to go
to the same parties."
"Now there's a rebel," said Hay, pleased to be able to change the subject,
"with the courage of her convictions. The Wild Rose drove poor Pinkerton
crazy and she's still stirring up trouble at the Old Capitol Prison. Smuggled a
letter out to the Richmond newspapers complaining to Seward about her
treatment and there's been hell to pay."
"They ought to hang hershe's a spy." Hay assumed that Kate felt
roughly the same about Anna Carroll. All these powerful women were some-
what on the severe and unforgiving side.
"Brady, the photographer, wants to take a picture of Mrs. Greenhow and
her daughter in prison," he offered. "Kind of before-and-after. The President
will send him over to Stanton." It was good for Kate to understand that he
knew what the President would do.
"Edwin Stanton will let him," she said with certainty. "I suspect Rose may
have something on Stanton. What do you think of our new Secretary of
War?"
Both Chase and Seward thought they were the sole sponsor of Stanton;
that was one of Lincoln's tricks. Instead of responding, Hay looked at his
watch, which had stoppedhe had misplaced the key.
"I'm glad we made this alliance," he said, extending his hand. To his
surprise, she put her hands on his shoulders, looked him straight in the eyes
about the same level as hers, unfortunatelythen placed her cheek next to
his for a moment in a kind of kiss. Her nose, he had heard, was slightly
inclined to pug; up close, it was deliciously tilted and fit her face as few noses
he had ever observed.
"I don't know whether I'll invite you to a soMe conversable or a matin6e
dansante," she seemed to be ruminating aloud. Hay liked the afternoon danc-
ing parties that were in vogue, with drapes drawn and candles lit, but ever
since Daniel Webster had declared a perfect dinner to be the highest consum-
mation of civilization, most serious men said they preferred the smaller eve-
ning dinners.
"Invite me to both."
She laughed easily. "I'll see you at the Hellcat's big musicale," she said.
He frowned; that party, the Hellcat's surprise bid for social dominance,
had not only not been announced, it was not even bruited about; that ranked
with the Peninsula plan and the Tennessee plan in the level of secrecy around
the President's house. In the past, the White House entertaining had been
dinner parties known for their intimacy, Daniel Webster style; it was Mrs.
Lincoln's notion that tickets should be issued to seven hundred guests for a
musical grande levee, adding a note of culture to the proceedings.
"It will be an innovation," he heard himself saying, "complete with a
President's March, and a polka composed by Francis Scala himself."
"Mrs. Lincoln's polka," Kate breathed. "Everyone will be so pleased. And
a guest list of a thousand."
"Seven hundred." He began to think that was why he had been invited for
a glass of bourbon, and lest she pry more out of him, he mock-saluted and
bade her farewell. The thought raced through his mind that he would like to
tear the clothes off this scheming belle, and then leave herdisheveled red
hair cascading down naked shouldersto await her dinner guests. With that
heartening thought firmly in mind, he stepped out onto the frozen mud and
skipped and whistled his way back to the President's house.

CHAPTER 10
THE TEXAS RANGER

"Your son is not in the Tennessee Volunteers," Simon Buckner told him. "At
least not under his own name."
General Breckinridge nodded his thanks. Buckner and he carried the same
rank of brigadier, but he readily acknowledged the short, sturdy man facing
him in the Bowling Green headquarters building to be the more professional
soldier. Not yet forty, Simon Bolivar Buckner had taught philosophy at West
Point, distinguished himself in the Mexican War, quit the army to make a
fortune in Chicago real estate, and returned to Kentucky to take charge of its
militia and to work with Breckinridge to keep their home state neutral. When
the Confederates under General "Bishop" Polk moved across Kentucky's
borderBreckinridge winced at the thought of how that well-meaning cleric
gave the Federals under Sam Grant the opportunity to grab strategic Paducah
Kentucky's neutrality ended, and Buckner had to choose which side's com-
mission to accept. The young namesake of "El Libertador" chose to report to
General Albert Sidney Johnston, commanding the Confederate forces in the
West.
"We know of a Margaret Elizabeth Breckinridge," Buckner continued,
eager to be helpful to the worried father, "with the Sanitary Commission
traveling with the Union Army near St. Louis."
"My Uncle Bob's granddaughter. I didn't know she was a nurse." Breck
ached at the memory of the comely, intense face of cousin Maggie at family
weddings and funerals. Cabell, when he was eight or ten, headstrong and
rebellious to his parents, would follow after Margaret Elizabeth doing what-
ever she asked. She was the sort to involve herself passionately in the war, as
were her three unclestwo of whom went South and one Northand her
father, who went North. Breck knew that the preacher Breckinridge, with his
offspring on opposite sides and the potential of fratricide in battle more than
an abstraction, must be undergoing the tortures he often told his parishioners
were reserved for the damned. "How did we get that information, Simon?"
Buckner had made a face at the mention of Robert Breckinridge, who had
done as much as any Kentuckian to keep that slave state in the Union. "We're
all in each other's pockets in Missouri," Buckner replied; "no secrets up
there. The general's cousin runs the mercantile library in St. Louis."
That was one reason Sidney Johnston had been able to intimidate the new
Union commander, Henry Halleck. Johnston anticipated Federal troop
movements and feinted at the Union strongholds. He placed stories in the
Louisville Courier about the way his ranks were being swelled by recruitment,
and how General Beauregard was coming to join his command at the head of
20,000 fresh troops. That was a palpable lie, but Beauregard was passing
through and his presence was useful for the rumor factory. Johnston's bluff
and bravado kept two stronger Union forces off balance.
"I'll keep an eye out for your boy," Buckner said. "Hell, at sixteen, he's
bound to brag to somebody that his father got a million votes for President."
"Which cut into Douglas's vote and helped elect Lincoln," Breckinridge
said ruefully. "I never thought old Abe would be so hell-bent for war." He
recalled in some bitterness how inflexible Lincoln had been, in their White
House talks, about peaceful secession.
"Button up," said Buckner, rising and reaching for his tunic. "We're to see
the general at ten sharp."
"Is Sidney all that Jeff Davis cracks him up to be?" The new General
Breckinridge, who did not know Sidney Johnston well, had learned to be
skeptical about men with big reputations. Born in Kentucky and trained at
West Point, Johnston had become a legend in the American officer corps: he
had enlisted as a private in the army of the Republic of Texas and rose to be
its Secretary of War. After annexation, the states'-rights Southerner in John-
ston led to an angry falling-out with General Sam Houston, an ardent Union
Democrat. But at the outbreak of the Mexican War, General Zack Taylor had
chosen Johnston to head the Texas Volunteers, an outfit that gained a reputa-
tion for valor and mobility.
Before secession, Johnston was colonel, and Robert Lee lieutenant colonel,
of what Breck had heard was the best cavalry regiment in the U.S. Army. In
April of 1861, General Winfield Scott had offered Albert Sidney Johnston the
post of second-in-command of all Union land forces; like the Virginian Lee,
the Texan Johnston sadly turned Scott down, choosing to go with his state
rather than his country. Jefferson Davis, a close friend of both men, kept Lee
in the east and sent Johnston west. In Richmond, Breck had heard it said that
choice was made because the defense of the Southwest without an adequate
army was infinitely more difficult, and Davis considered Johnston to be the
most skillful general on the American continent.
"He's the best we have," Buckner snapped, "the best anyone has, and you
should not call him Sidney. He's not a general like you and me, he's 'the
General.' You know how the Yankee newspapers try to compare McClellan to
Napoleon? Well, Albert Sidney Johnston has the sort of mind and character
that put him in rank with Napoleon. Daring but calculating at the same time.
More of a Texan than a Kentuckian."
They walked down the hall of the large Bowling Green headquarters build-
ing to the commanding general's suite. In the anteroom, Breckinridge saw a
familiar face: Walter Haldeman, editor of the on-the-run Louisville Courier,
which was being printed in Confederate-held Bowling Green.
Haldeman pretended to be impressed by the star on his fellow escapee's
collar, fingering it reverently. Buttoning the top button on Breckinridge's
tunic, lest the new general be dressed imperfectly at his first meeting with the
real General, the publisher told his two Kentucky compatriots, "Sidney's
thinking about pulling out of Kentucky. Don't you let him. Your whole
Kentucky Brigade will desert, and I'll have to close down the only voice for
our cause on the border."
Breck thanked Haldeman for the warning. He remembered to express his
appreciation for the favorable stories in the Courier about his appointment
not everyone in Confederate headquarters thought latecomers deserved high
rankand followed Buckner into his first encounter with the hope of the
Confederate Army.
Not as tall as I am, thought Breck, extending a hand rather than saluting,
but tall enough and ramrod-straight. Silver-haired at fifty-eight, booted for
his morning ride on Fire-eater (it occurred to Breck that generals named their
horses for qualities they wanted to exhibit or wished they had), Sidney John-
ston exuded what Breck had to admit was a command presence, without the
pomp or mysticism of a Fr6mont, even though his Utah explorations rivaled
those of the Pathmaker. A commanding figure, surely, but not a political
commander: Americans seemed to prefer the pretensions of humility of a
Lincoln or the dazzle of a Douglas to the crisp authority of military men like
the Texan before him.
"I admired your eloquent statement," the general said to him, "about ex-
changing the term in the Senate for the musket of a soldier." After Breck's
pleased nod, Johnston added a barb: "Took you long enough in Richmond to
find that musket."
"You know how it is to deal with Judah Benjamin," Breck replied. As
Johnston would know, that was an allusion to the Confederate Secretary of
War's reluctance to part with any weapons for the Western theater. Judah
Benjamin in Richmond had rebuked General Johnston for accepting the en-
listments of "one-year men," rather than those who would agree to sign up
for the duration, and had refused to provide the short-termers with any weap-
ons. Since he had arrived in Bowling Green, Breck had quickly sided with
Johnston in the dispute with Benjamin, who seemed incapable of badgering
the Southern manufacturers or blockade-runners into providing enough small
arms. In such a fix, any general would accept a man who walked into camp
with a gun on his shoulder for any length of time he would sign up. Theoreti-
cally the Secretary of War was correct, but in the field, the general needed
recruits.
"We're going to send you on some skirmishes with a small force to get you
blooded, Breckinridge," said the commander, getting right to the point, "and
if you hold up the way Simon here promises, the Army of the West can use
you." Breck took a breath to make a proper response, but Sidney Johnston
went on: "In our particular fix, the qualities of a politician can be of great use.
We need generals who can make us appear much more than we are." He
waved them to seats and strode to the wall map.
"Halleck's up over here," he said, pointing to Illinois, "thinking about
coming down the Mississippi River and cutting us off from Texas and the
world. He's got, say, twenty-five thousand troops under Grant and Sherman
and Smith." He tapped the center of the map, near Kentucky. "Don Carlos
Buell is in the middle, with 20,000 men, with orders to come down the
Cumberland Gap and take Nashville and join up with Halleck's army." He
waved at the East. "And McClellan's over there in the sector of least conse-
quence at the moment."
"Why is the war in Virginia inconsequential, General?" (Breck agreed that
"Sidney" would be out of place.)
"McClellan won't try an overland winter offensivethe Union Army isn't
ready. And the Confederate advantage is in defense, so we won't move. But
since they're near the capitals, Washington and Richmond, the War Depart-
ment of each country gives it the most attention and the most weapons."
He returned to the West. "The basic problem with our army," he took a
breath, "is that we don't have an army. We have to position our small force
I have fewer than 22,000 at present, Simon, as you knowbetween the Union
force under Halleck and Grant in Illinois and their force under Buell in
Kentucky. We are required to fight defensively, along a four hundred and
thirty-mile front, never committing all our forces to one area or the other.
That is how to defend an area; however, it is not how to win a war."
Breck could see the logic in that; if Johnston attacked either Union force,
the other would be free to knife southward. Jeff Davis's strategy was to delay
the war in the West and concentrate on the East: if the South could invade
Pennsylvania and Maryland, perhaps the Yankees would become war-weary
and Lincoln would lose his source of men and money. As a politician, Breck
could count the numbersnearly twenty million in the North against eight
million whites in the Southbut it was felt that one well-trained Confederate
soldier, experienced with a rifle and defending his way of life, was worth a
dozen city boys drafted into the army in the North to fight in an alien land, or
to fight for somebody else's freedom. The commanding general seemed to
want to be questioned about his last remark, so Breck obliged: "How do we
win the war?"
"With a surprise attack on a large concentration of their troops. Territory
is unimportant. We have to defeat the Union Army."
"Where?"
Johnston hesitated, then decided not to answer. "For the moment I have to
keep moving between Halleck and Buell until Richmond realizes that the
West is where the war will be won or lost, and sends us an army."
"Are you confident, General," Breck asked, "that our forts along the Mis-
sissippi are secure?" Simon Buckner shot him a warning glance; Breck was
not being properly reverential.
Johnston, smiling, put his fancily booted feet on the desk. "I pray for the
day that 'Old Brains' puts his troops on a flotilla and floats down within
range of our shore batteries. Don't tell me about the success of Allied iron-
clads against the Russians in the Crimea1 read McClellan's report from
there, but I assure you our placed guns could destroy a flotilla with ease. We
could defeat the Union on the Mississippi."
Breck pointed to the map. "There are a couple of other rivers into the
South." Buckner started to interrupt, but Johnston motioned him silent and
looked to Breck to continue. "The Cumberland, and the Tennessee."
"Obvious, isn't it?" Johnston seemed pleased at the question. "If I were the
Union commander, I would strike down the Tennesseeit flows northward,
as you know, which would turn their gunboats into a real threatdown
toward Alabama." His hand dropped from Kentucky to Tennessee. "We
would have to fall back to avoid being captured, abandoning Nashville with-
out a fight."
Nashville, Tennessee, was the Confederacy's central supply depot in the
West, and a strongpoint indispensable to a defense against invasion, and here
was the South's commander suggesting that the Union could take it by ma-
neuver.
Breck asked the inescapable question: "If it's so obvious a strategy, why
haven't they adopted it?"
"Ah. One reason could be that they have not thought of it yet, because
Halleck is so mesmerized with the Mississippi."
"That can't last," Buckner put in.
"Agreed. I know you Kentuckians were furious at Bishop Polk for violat-
ing your precious neutrality by grabbing Columbus, but the one hundred and
twenty big guns in that city effectively close off the Mississippi. That forces
Halleck to look elsewhere. My cousin in St. Louis, the librarian, reports that
a woman carrying a pass from Secretary Stanton himself has spent a week in
his library, studying maps and currents of the Tennessee River."
Breck's heart sank. "They know what to do," he said dully. "Lincoln
knows exactly what to do." If Halleck, the general who wrote the book on
military strategy, had not already comprehended the South's vulnerability,
surely Anna Carroll would be calling it to Lincoln's attention.
"To discourage them, we've built a couple of forts," said Johnston, "at the
place the two rivers separate from the Mississippi. HereHenry and Donel-
son."
"Fort Henry is a joke," said Buckner instantly. "It is in a swamp and the
batteries will never fire effectively. At Fort Donelson, we have a chanceand
if we turn them back there at the Cumberland, the likelihood is that they
won't have the strength to come down the Tennessee."
Johnston did not agree. "Donelson was built to discourage an attack. It
was not built to resist an attack by any capable general."
"Don't count it out," pressed Buckner, eager to defend Kentucky. "If you
commit troops to its defense, we can hurt the Yankees and scare them off.
They don't know our vulnerability. If we can beat them at Fort Donelson,
they'll forget the Tennessee River and go back to trying the Mississippi, and
we can punish them forever."
"It would take a pretty bad general to fail to take Donelson," said John-
ston, who apparently knew exactly how to take it.
"We can rely on bad Union generals," said Buckner. "Halleck won't take
the fieldhe's never left his armchair. That leaves three possibilities. One is
Sherman, who taught school in Louisiana and has his job only because his
brother is a senator. The New York papers say he's unstable, even crazy, gets
terrible moods. No reason to think he can carry off a sustained campaign."
"But there's Baldy Smith," said Johnston, ticking off a second brigadier
under Halleck, "West Point. I had him under me in Utah, and he moved and
maneuvered his men so fast we never had to shoot a Mormon. Hell of a
soldier."
"Agreed," said Buckner, "but Halleck has him under Sam Grant. The
likeliest choice to lead the attack on Donelson is Grant, and if he's the one,
we can beat him."
"You know him? They say he drinks, but that may be jealous talk."
"I more than know him, I've been saddled with him as a friend all my life,"
Buckner told him eagerly. "We were in the same class at West Point. The man
has failure written all over him. He does drinkthat is why he was cashiered.
He tried to go into business in Cairo and that failed. He was selling firewood
on the streets of St. Louis only a couple of years ago, wearing his army
overcoat to try to keep warmpitiful. He came to me and borrowed two
hundred dollars to keep his family alive. If it hadn't been for this war, and
some political pull that got him back in the army, Sam Grant would be
destitute."
"Did he ever pay you back?" Johnston wanted to know.
"No, but if he'd had the money he would have. He's honestas I say, he's
my friendbut it's just that he's a born failure. I'll never see that money; I
consider the loan pure charity."
Breck recalled that Sam Grant had led a small force down the Mississippi
on a raid a month before. "How did he conduct himself at Belmont, Simon?"
"He stumbled into a fight, let his men run wild, took a lot of unnecessary
casualties, and just made it back to his boat in time. Grant was the last to
board, and he showed his bravery with that, but he botched the operation and
Halleck was furious with him."
"Sounds like he fights, though," Johnston offered. "Not all of them are
ready to spill blood."
"He'll take terrible casualties because he's afraid to be a failure again,"
Buckner said. "Believe me: Sam Grant is not a general, he's a butcher. He's
afraid to retreat, and he doesn't have the courage to admit failure by surren-
deringhe could sacrifice a whole army."
That settled it for Johnston. "The men we have in charge of Forts Henry
and Donelson are not military men," he said. "Floyd and Pillow, a couple of
politicians. I'll send you there, Simon, with a detachment of four thousand
men and Nat Forrest's cavalry. That'll be fourteen thousand total, all I can
afford, against at least forty thousand, plus their navy. I hope you're right
about Grant, and you're not facing Baldy Smith."
That was encouraging to Breck. At least the South would put up a fight for
Kentucky, justifying the faith of those Kentuckians who were branded trai-
tors for their decision to stand with the South. Buckner had put his case on
the quality of generalship, which carried weight with West Pointers, but it
seemed to John Breckinridge, the newest general, that the man with the best
military credentials in America was reluctantly agreeing to defend an area he
believed to be ultimately indefensible. Breck reminded himself that most of
his own choices in the past year had been between the lesser of evils.
Johnston's assessment of the Confederate generals now at Donelson had
been guarded but was on the right track: General Floyd was known to every-
one in the Buck-and-Breck administration to be a rascal as Secretary of War
in the Buchanan Cabinet, and General Gideon Pillow was an equally bad
appointment: in the Mexican War, Breck had been Pillow's lawyer in a dis-
pute with Winfield Scott, and had come to have a high regard for Scott and a
low opinion of his client. Simon Buckner would be the only real soldier on the
scene at Donelson, and he would not be in command.
"Hold the fort, Simon," were his instructions from Johnston, "but if that is
not possible, hold your force intact and a route out open. Go now, and
entrench. Do not lose a moment. Work all night. If you must withdraw, we'll
meet in Nashville."
General Johnston sent Buckner out to give the editor, Haldeman, a story
about reinforcements on the way to him through Georgia, to mislead the
Union commands in St. Louis and Ohio. The newspaper would probably be
read avidly by Lincoln and Stanton in Washington. Breck found it curious
about Stanton's being named Secretary of War; his reports on that man were
contradictory. In the Buchanan Cabinet, Stanton had talked for the Union
but had secretly consorted with some secessionists; in the election of 1860
Stanton had voted for Breckinridge, telling friends it was the only hope of
preserving the Union. What had inspired Lincoln to pick Stanton for the
most important post in the Cabinet? Ruthlessness and the capacity for guile,
Breck supposed, along with sheer, fierce impatience with anyone who stood in
his way. Those were exactly the qualitiesand qualities they became in war-
timelacking in his counterpart, Judah Benjamin, who could not find the
guns for Sidney Johnston's troops.
The general crossed his arms and looked hard at Breck, who assumed that
Johnston's arrangement for the two of them to be alone meant talk of politics.
"I didn't vote for you, Breckinridge," he announced.
"You voted for Bell," Breck guessed.
"You say that because you saw what you assume to be my slave outside. I
manumitted Randolph years ago. No, I never voted for anybody other than
Zack Taylor, and that because he was my friend."
Now Johnston was in his bailiwick and Breck no longer felt in the least
intimidated. "You say that to show how nonpolitical you are, General, but I
happen to know you were approached in 1858 to run for President by the
same Democrats who later came to me."
"I said no." The question implicit in that was: Why didn't you say no, too?
"I'm a political man, not a military man," said Breck, "so I said yes. I
thought I could prevent this war. I was mistaken."
"I should have voted for you, then, but I didn't know if you could make up
your mind," said the Texan. "This is going to be the worst kind of war. A
seven-year war, unless we can swallow up their army."
Johnston made statements designed to trigger questions, as if testing his
visitor's attention. Breck made up his mind not to play that game, and re-
mained silent.
"Let me tell you about generalship, young man." Johnston sat on the edge
of his desk, arms still half locked, at ease. "You've been senator and Vice
President, you're well aware what leadership isthe ability to speak on the
stump, to appear trustworthy, to play one faction against another. All that
will be useful to you now, but it's not generalship."
Breck was vaguely aware of that; he also knew that Johnston's lack of
political finesse in Richmond had cost him command of the main forces in the
East and might be the cause of his exaggeration of the strategic importance of
the West. He awaited the generalship lesson.
"The nature of war is changing. The seizure of territory is insignificant
that is settled afterward. What counts now is the destruction of the enemy's
army, the removal of the enemy population's will to fight, and ultimately its
ability to fight. By your expression, Breckinridge, I take it you think that is
barbaric."
When his listener did not react, Sidney Johnston went on. "Lincoln and
Stanton want General McClellan to go and 'take' Richmond, but they're
fearful that with the Union Army off on that expedition, Lee or Jackson will
'take' Washington, so they won't give the Little Mac all the troops he needs.
The same fencing-match philosophy afflicts President Davis and General Lee.
Each side is fighting battles for territory, hoping the other side will get tired.
That's the way it was in the old days, and the side that was less exhausted
won."
He rose from his chair to pace, which reminded Breck of Lincoln, who
hated to talk while seated. "But a revolutionary war, which is what this is, is
a war of a whole nation against a whole nation, and that takes a different kind
of fighting. The enemy army must be gathered, enticed to fight to a decision,
and destroyed or captured. Remember, when you hear criticism of us for
losing vast territoriesno battle is 'won' if the enemy is not destroyed or
captured."
"I'm told, Generaland you should be aware of the criticism in Richmond
that you are the one avoiding battle."
"Of course. Because if I massed my ill-armed little force against two larger
Union armies, where each soldier has a rifled musket, I would lose. My
'Army of the West' as we grandly call it, would be destroyed, and the war
would be over. I must husband my resources, wait for a moment and a place
to surprise the enemy when we are on a nearly equal footing, and then strike
with everything. No quarter."
"Where will that be?"
"I know precisely where the great battle of this war will take place," said
Johnston slowly, "and when you cross over from politician to general, you
will know too. Frankly, it should not be hard to figure out."
Breck refused to take the test and asked about the war in the East. John-
ston relaxed, uncrossed his arms and walked to the window, his boots sound-
ing sharply on the uncarpeted floor. "McClellan hates to take casualties, so
he'll probably slip down the Potomac by boat and try to strike at Richmond
up the Peninsula, up the James and York rivers. Frankly, that's what I would
donot to take Richmond, which means nothing, but to cut off the Army of
Virginia and destroy it."
"How do we counter that move, if he makes it?" Breck had not thought of
that approach, but suspected that McClellan, a trained strategist, had.
"If Bobby Lee remembers what I taught him, he'll advise Jeff Davis to
resist the screaming from his nervous Cabinet to come scurrying down to
defend Richmond, and to strike immediately at Washington instead."
"I thought you said that territory, capitals, mean nothing."
"You're learning, but Lincoln won't. At the slightest threat to his capital,
he will hold back the troops McClellan needs to smash our army in front of
Richmond. All that chess-playing will mean nothing, because the object is not
to take the king, but to wipe out the other side of the board. The war will go
on until a general takes charge who understands the need to destroy armies."
He turned to face his student. "If I shock you, it is because I want to change
you from a leader of people to a leader of troops. We deal in death."
"This is your business, General," Breck sighed; "I'll try to learn it." He
asked himself whether a willingness to accept huge casualties, to order death
and mutilation to your enemy and your own troops as well, was really at the
core of generalship. If so, the South, outnumbered nearly three to one, was
doomed. He sensed a contradiction in what Johnston had said about U. S.
Grant, and asked the general directly: "If Grant is the butcher that Simon
Buckner says he is, why do you hope for Grant at Fort Donelson?"
"Time is not on our side. With a Grant, we could win decisively. The worst
that can happen is that we lose, and run away. I suppose we have to try to
defend the rivers from those forts; we cannot fall back without any show of
resistance, and you can never tell in battlegenerals do stupid things. But
that battle is not likely to be decisive. Buckner does not have the instinct for
destruction."
"Nor do 1. Who does?"
"On our side? I do. Bobby Lee, Braxton Bragg. Here in my command. Pat
Cleburne, the Irishman. Not Joe Johnston, not Beauregard, certainlythat
little Creole already lost his opportunity to destroy the Union Army after
Bull Run. On their side, it's hard to say. McClellan is the best they have, but
he fights battles, not wars. Grant, maybe, from what Buckner says of him.
Certainly not Halleck."
General Breckinridge, staring at the map, thought he had figured it out.
Restraining his excitement, drawling to display calm, he said, "I hope to have
the honor of being one of your commanders, sir, at the Battle of Corinth."
"Close." General Sidney Johnston smiled at him warmly for the first time,
and Breck could feel why this man inspired such confidence in his com-
manders and respect from political superiors. "You grasp the strategy of an
offensive defense, but not the tactical detail.
"Here. This is not a matter I want you to discuss with Simon Buckner,
because I do not want his morale to suffer in any way. Let us assume Fort
Henry falls, as it must, and he cannot hold Donelson, which is probable. He
is then to march his men to Nashville, joining our retrograde movement."
"You mean a retreat South."
"Thank you for that, Breckinridge; I should not flinch from the hard word
'retreat.' With the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers in their hands, we can-
not hold Nashville or Bowling Green, or we would soon be cut off from
behind. We will have to fall back, back, back."
"My God, General, you are talking about giving up the rest of Kentucky
and all of Tennessee." The enormity of the unfolding trauma of defeat, only
hinted at by the publisher Haldeman, struck him with force. What about his
brigade of Kentuckians? How would they react to retreat from their native
soil, without so much as a fight? What had they enlisted for, if not to defend
their statecould he keep them from deserting?
What about all the Tennessee troops, the backbone of the western army,
such as it was? The newspapers would be calling for Johnston's scalp, his
replacement with a fighting general, as would all the sponsors of General
Beauregard in Richmond. Jeff Davis was Johnston's friend, and liked to say
to critics, "If Albert Sidney Johnston is no general, then we have no gener-
als," but not even the President's support was bottomless, given the resistance
from the governors of Georgia and South Carolina building against his cen-
tralization of authority.
"I have pondered this step well," said the general. "It is a step that no man
would take if he did not know he was right." When Breck shook his head he
added, "I anticipate a popular clamor. But the clamor of today is converted
into the praises of tomorrow by a single great success."
Breck kept shaking his head, not so much in disagreement as wonderment.
Lincoln liked to say that if the end brought him out right, all would be well,
but that if it brought him out wrong, ten angels swearing he was right would
make no difference. Johnston here was saying the same thing, that the end
would justify all, but both men were betting that public support would stay
with them through terrible trials, until they could show how right they were.
But that was not the way of democracies. No political or military leadernot
Lincoln, not Johnstoncould long afford to defy public sentiment.
"Assume that their plan is to use the Tennessee River from up here at the
Kentucky line," the general was explaining, "come down through all of Ten-
nessee and aim for Corinth, in Mississippi just over the Tennessee line. That's
where they want to cut the Memphis to Charleston railway. Then they can
strike west to Memphis and down the Mississippi to Vicksburg and Port
Hudson."
That prospect seemed dreary to Breck, but Johnston saw it differently.
"The deeper they penetrate, the more triumphant they feel, and the more
vulnerable they become. Our object is to destroy Grant's army before it can
bejoined by Buell's army, and then to destroy Buell's army. Destroy. Obliter-
ate. Kill 'em all, except those who surrender. The shock to the North of the
loss of a hundred thousand men, just when victory seemed assured, will end
the war."
Breck got up to examine the point on the map that was the place where
passengers on boats debarked to go to Corinth, Mississippi, before the Ten-
nessee River veered east.
"We hit them just after they debark, with the river to their back, from the
heights overlooking Pittsburg Landing," said Johnston. "They give up or
drown. Then Buell comes to the rescue with his army, and we do the same to
them."
The general was coldly certain of the intelligence of his adversary, of the
inexorability of the campaign, and of the victory of the defense over a force
twice its size. He was the only man Breck had met in the past year who knew
how to win a war. How much depended on circumstance, how much on the
wisdom of his strategy, how much on the human element? Did one man, on
either side, count that much in a clash of huge armies?
Breck put his finger on the spot of the river landing.
"That's it, exactly," said Sidney Johnston, "where the great battle of the
southwest will be fought, and the war won."
The engineer who drew up the map had written the name of a local
landmark above the location of the landing. Breck squinted and read aloud,
"Shiloh Church."
"I want you with me there, Breck."
"God willing, I'll be there, General."
Walter Haldeman, the Courier's publisher, read with distaste a copy of his
competition, the Louisville Journal, while he waited for General Breckin-
ridge. That pro-Union sheet was especially abusive of certain members of one
famous Kentucky family: it was noted that Robert Breckinridge, son of the
loyal reverend, had been appointed captain in one of the six regiments making
up the brigade commanded by his cousin, John C., "the only senator to be
expelled as a traitor." The story noted that the Reverend Robert had dis-
owned his son, denounced him for his treason, and the writerHaldeman
knew him, a liar and a cheatgratuitously added that John C. had been
observed drunk on the streets of Richmond after receiving his general's com-
mission from Jeff Davis. That was below the belt; Haldeman knew Breck to
enjoy a glass of bourbon as much as any man, but not to be a drunkard by
any means. Now the Kentuckian would have to be especially careful about
every drink he took in public, lest his reputation grow as the Southern coun-
terpart to Sam Grant's.
Breck came out of Sidney Johnston's office with the look of most men who
spent time with the man reputed to be the best soldier in America: inspired,
uplifted, determined. He was dressed in his "Kentucky jeans," a blue-jacketed
departure from the Confederate butternut gray, but each brigade could
choose its uniform. The publisher noted that Breck, who had been clean-
shaven as senator and as Vice President, was now growing a mustache.
Haldeman threw the paper aside. "Are we going to defend Kentucky?
Simon Buckner wants me to write that Beauregard brought reinforcements. I
will, of course, but"
"Sidney took what you said to heart. Grant will have a fight on his hands
at Fort Donelson."
The publisher felt the surge of pride that came with influencing great
events; he was certain that one day soon his exiled Courier would be pub-
lished in Louisville again, and he looked forward to front-paging a story
about the demise of the Journal.
"You ought to know something that's bothering the men in B company,
second regiment," the publisher told the general.
"Cousin Bob's company?"
Haldeman nodded. "He ordered a private to sweep out the captain's tent,
and the privateyou know how these Kentucky kids arehe told the cap-
tain to go to hell. So the captain put him in the regimental guardhouse.
Troops are sore about that."
"Damn!" The general pulled off his slouch hat and slapped it against his
knee. Haldeman followed him out of the headquarters building into the frigid
February air. Breck took his horse from the orderly, mounted, and whipped
the horse with his hat, the publisher riding hard on his own mount to keep
up.
At Company B, the general dismounted and stormed into his cousin's tent.
The facts of the incident were as Haldeman had described.
"But he told me to go to hell, John," the captain said, "what was I going to
do? There's such a thing as discipline."
"When you can't get a private to volunteer to sweep out your tent," the
general told him, "you do it yourself. There are no menials in the Kentucky
Brigade."
"Do you sweep out your own tent?"
"Damn right I do! Kentuckians are gentlemen, and neither you nor I have
the right to command any one of them to do a menial service. Now you come
with me to the guardhouse and apologize to the soldier you have insulted, or
so help me, Captain Breck, you'll take his place in that cell."
The three men marched about a hundred yards to the large tent that served
as a guardhouse. Haldeman and the general waited outside while the captain
went in to fetch the rebellious rebel.
The prisoner, a boy having difficulty getting his jacket buttoned, appeared
soon and saluted, holding the salute.
"I told the private my command was out of order," the captain said, "and
released him."
"You mustn't go around telling your officers to go to hell," said General
Breckinridge to the boy. "If you think an order is wrong, argue about it with
respect." He returned the salute and the soldier scampered off. Haldeman was
sure the boy's story would spread quickly through the brigade, endearing the
general to his men as never before. The fact that the general had not hesitated
to embarrass his own kinsman in protecting the dignity of Kentuckians would
add piquancy to the telling.
"Cousin Bob, I'm sorry I had to do that, but these men are especially
touchy these days, and recruiting"
The captain cut him off. "Forget that. There's a kid in that tent, the bunk
next to the private from my company, came in two days ago from Tennessee.
Got throwed in the guardhouse for stealing a farmer's fence rail to use as
firewood. Stay right here."
Breck's cousin ducked back into the tent and appeared a moment later with
a tall, good-looking boy who bore a striking resemblance to the general.
"Thank you, Cousin Bob. Hello, Father."
After what seemed to Haldeman to be a heartbreaking pause, the general
said, "You call him Captain, and me General. This is the Confederate Army."
"Yes, sir."
"You're familiar with the regulations about stealing the property of the
people of this area, your fellow Kentuckians, whose lives and property you
are in the service of protecting?"
"Now I am. It was cold, sir."
"You ever want to get out of that guardhouse?" The boy nodded vigor-
ously. "Then what I would do," said his father, "is to volunteer, of your own
free will, to sweep out the tent of the captain here every day for a month. And
to do any latrine digging or any other menial task that no man in this brigade,
including you, is required to do."
"I volunteer, General."
When the general found it difficult to say anything more, Captain Breckin-
ridge said, "You can go back to your quarters now, Cabell. The regulation is
against taking whole fence rails. Pieces of fence rail, however, can be used for
firewood. Soldiers around here know that two halves of a fence rail are con-
sidered pieces."
The boy turned, turned back, saluted clumsily, and grunted when his fa-
ther grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him close. Haldeman walked
off with Captain Breckinridge, who apparently was profoundly moved by the
reunion. It occurred to the publisher that the men Breck called "Uncle Bob"
and "Cousin Bob"Robert Breckinridge, father and sonwere on different
sides of the war and were not likely to embrace again.

CHAPTER II
NERVE CENTER

Anna Carroll was startled at the change of scene in the offices of the Secretary
of War. Two weeks before, with Cameron in charge, the place had been nearly
deserted most of the time, as the politician from Pennsylvania preferred to do
his confidential army business at home, in private. Today a crowd of a hun-
dred people was jammed into Stanton's reception room, spilling out into the
hallway in front of the newly installed telegraph office.
It made no sense, Anna decided, to try to see the Secretary on a matter so
secret as the Tennessee plan in front of that mob. Instead of trying to elbow
her way in, she walked authoritatively into the telegraph office across the hall,
asked for the officer in charge, and used Tom Scott's name to make an ac-
quaintance.
"The chief of the telegraph service is over in the Secretary of War's office,"
said a sallow young man in front of a machine feeding paper out, "along with
everybody else."
"That means you're in charge," she replied, looking impressed. "You're
very young to have such a responsible position."
"I'm Homer Bates," he said, pleased, "and I've seen your name in a couple
of messages, Miss Carroll."
"About what?"
"I'm not at liberty to say, but they were to St. Louis. A lot of this work is
very secret. It's no wonder that Secretary Stanton moved us over here from
the McClellan headquarters first thing."
"You're at the nerve center of the entire war," she told him.
Bates nodded delightedly. "The President himself came in last night. He
calls me Homer. You can, too, if you like."
A chatty young fellow to be at the nerve center, she thought. "What a
complicated machine," she said. "Does it take many years to learn telegra-
phy?"
Homer Bates shook his head, trying to be modest. "You have to have a
knack for it. The fast fist. And then you have to learn the ciphers. The
message about you yesterday," he volunteered suddenly, "was from Scott to
Old Brains in St. Louis. He wanted to know about the progress of the iron-
clad gunboats for your Tennessee plan."
She did not ask directly about the reply. "Can replies come back the same
day on the machine?"
"Oh, within an hour sometimes. When a telegraph tent is near a general's
tent, the message can go back and forth in minutes." Because he did not
volunteer any information about a reply about the gunboats from General
Halleck, she assumed no reply was received. Rather than arouse his suspicion
that he was being cultivated as a source, Anna chatted briefly about her own
war work, letting the young man know of her closeness to Senator Wade,
chairman of the Committee on the Conduct of the War, and exaggerating her
own acquaintance with the President. At the proper moment she turned the
conversation to his career.
Her new friend Homer responded like a grateful puppy. In the return of
confidence that flowed from her interest, she gleaned a couple of curious bits
of information: that if one Cabinet minister communicated with another over
the wire by secret code, Stanton had left standing orders that the message be
deciphered and communicated to him. And that was not the most intimate
intrusion: whenever General McClellan telegraphed his wife from the front,
Stanton was to know the contents of the dispatch immediately, endearments
and all.
"There's a side entrance to the Secretary's reception room," he told her.
"Shall I slip you in?"
She nodded eagerly and gave him her most conspiratorial smile: Homer
was a young man she would make it a point to know better. "Why does he
have so many people in at once?"
"Efficiency. He can go through two hundred people in a day that way. You
should see him make decisions, Miss Carroll, it's amazing. And best of all, it's
in public viewno secret deals with contractors. They say that was the trou-
ble with his predecessor," he confided, "but I don't know that for a fact."
"The place does seem changed."
"Like day and night, the old-timers tell me, Miss Carroll. No more 'impro-
vised war'; somebody's finally organizing a victory. Go ahead, see for your-
self." He pushed open the connecting door and slipped her inside.
Edwin Stanton was standing behind a high desk at the end of the large
room. His scraggly beard, with its white streak down the middle, pointed
toward his chest as he peered angrily over his steel-rimmed spectacles at the
crowd.
"Step forward," he said to one after another; "state your business."
Soldiers were recognized first; enlisted men received more courtesy than of-
ficers from the gruff Secretary, but even they were dealt with summarily. A
well-dressed man stepped forward bearing what he said was a card from
President Lincoln's wife and asked for a commissary's appointment.
Stanton's temper flared; he tore the card in half and threw the pieces up in the
air.
"The fact that you bring me such a card would prevent me from giving you
any appointment," Stanton snapped, loudly enough for all to hear. "Politics
no longer have any place in army appointments. Out!"
Anna watched a parade of favor seekers pass through; almost all were
rudely turned down and went away angry. Occasionally a request would
make sense to Stanton, and he would tug a cord hanging from the ceiling. A
messenger would run in, be given a slip of paper in Stanton's writing, and run
out. Sometimes the messenger ducked across the hall to the telegraph office to
get quick action in the field.
Senator Ben Wade strode in, spotted Anna on the side of the room, and
motioned her over. "Hell of a way to do business, isn't it?" he boomed admir-
ingly.
Stanton's demeanor immediately changed at the sight of the senator. He
hurried out from behind his desk to make an exception by greeting him.
"Give us five minutes in private," Wade said to him, adding for all to hear,
"it's not about a damn contract."
Wade pulled Anna along with him to the window facing the Executive
Mansion and said to the Secretary, "Her business first, Stanton. Remember,
this little woman damn near saved Maryland for us all by herself." Stanton
nodded and looked squarely at her.
She had to be brief. "Two items. The first is to press my Tennessee plan."
She did not mention Colonel Scott's support since Scott was out West, on a
final tour of the battlefronts, and was soon to be replaced by someone person-
ally close to the new Secretary, possibly Stanton's brother-in-law. "My report
shows the best time to move on Donelson and down into Tennessee is now, in
February. Johnston would have to split his forces in half to defend"
"I know all about the Tennessee plan, my dear lady," said Stanton, "but
that's entirely up to General Halleck. Frankly, what's happening out West is
not at the center of our concerns at the moment. The first thing is to get
McClellan moving right here." He turned to Wade. "I went around McClel-
lan to his ten division commanders and asked them about a move right away
against the rebels at Manassas. You know what we have? Ten generals afraid
to fight."
She bit her lip; he did not understand that the war could be won, and at
infinitely less cost, in the West. No time to argue it now; he would turn
against the plan if she nagged him.
Wade picked up the slap at McClellan. "That's what you and I think about
McNapoleon, but what about Lincoln? Is he still defending that slave-catch-
er's delays?"
"You will be pleased to learn," Stanton whispered, "that I had a heart-to-
heart with the President this morning about the general's protracted inactiv-
ity. He agrees! My opinion of Lincoln, I must say, has risen considerably."
"Not such a dumb gorilla, now that he agrees with you," Wade said, not
quietly enough.
Stanton looked horrified for a moment, then took his visitors into his confi-
dence: "I mentioned to Lincoln a way to get our general-in-chief away from
his elegant dinners and out into the field. A special war order directly from
the Presidentnever been done before, I think. I'm letting him work on it by
himself, because it would be wrong for me to confront McClellan directly so
soon. But your committee will be pleased, Senator."
Anna saw an opening and spoke up. "My second point is to urge you to
take control of actions against the seditionists."
Seward had been heavy-handed with the arrests of dissenters, she explained
quickly, and the Peace Democrats were making a big issue of it in New York
and Baltimore. Stanton's seizure of the telegraph office, and the way he was
reading everyone's messages, told Anna that the new War Secretary had
power ambitions; such a switch of Cabinet authority on arbitrary arrests
would fit into Stanton's mode of operation, and she wanted him to be aware
that her influence with the Biairs and Wade might make it easier for him to
extend his power. She assumed he wanted the suggestion to come from some-
one other than himself, and pamphleteer Anna Ella Carroll was known and
well regarded in the President's circle for her war powers study. In return,
she figured, Stanton might press for her Tennessee plan, and ultimately would
help her gain the recognition that should flow to its author.
"It might be a good idea for me to start with a general amnesty," Stanton
said slowly, showing that he had already been thinking about moving into
Seward's domain. "Ask for an oath not to talk treason, and empty out the
jails. Later, if we need to tighten up on the press or the copperheads, this act
of amnesty would demonstrate our fairness. What do you think, Ben?"
"Hold on to the worst ones, like the Wild Rose," Wade replied, "and as for
that traitor of a general who killed my friend Ned Baker, throw the key
away."
Stanton nodded eagerly. "I'd want your advice on that. Miss Carroll, your
thought about seditionists has merit, as of course all your thoughts do."
"Look, here's my business," Wade stated. "I want a commission for your
nephew."
"Impossible. Precisely because he is my nephew."
"But for God's sake, man, he qualifies, and he's a friend of mine. It's a
hardship to place him on any worse ground because he's related to you.
You're being absurd."
"I'm being the Secretary of War, and the answer is no." Bluff Ben began to
redden; Anna knew the senator must have assured the young man he could
deliver the commission. "Before you make life miserable for me before your
committee," Stanton said, "look at this."
He took an envelope out of his inside pocket. On the back, in Lincoln's
handwriting, was this message: "Benjamin Tappan wishes to be a lieutenant
in the regular army; and if the Secretary of War knows no objection to him
except that he is a relative of his, let him be appointed on my responsibility."
The Secretary of War pointed to a notation below, in his own writing: "The
Secretary of War declines to make the appointment desired by his nephew
Benjamin Tappan because it would be a violation of a rule made by the
Secretary against appointments to the regular army except by promotion for
meritorious service from the ranks of the regular service."
Wade shook his head and quoted Scripture: "Stand not next to me, for I am
holier than thou."
"I have to be. I have the hardest job in the world, and I cannot afford to let
any taint of influence touch me. Or touch Lincoln. As a matter of fact, as
soon as I clear this mob out of the reception room, I will go across the street
to let Mrs. Lincoln know that she has overstepped the bounds of propriety
several times this week."
Wade looked at Anna and shrugged. "We better get out of here before he
throws us out."
Stanton took her hand and bid her the most gracious farewell: "I know all
you have done for your country, my dear lady. You are doing great work,
even if it makes others famous." She assumed at first he was referring to her
war powers memorandum for the Attorney General, but then wondered if he
meant that Halleck would be jealous about anyone else getting credit for her
Tennessee River plan.
A man in an officer's uniform appeared at the office door. "I am the arsenal
officer, Mr. Secretary, and I am in receipt of your telegram ordering heavy
guns to Harpers Ferry."
"I sent that telegram yesterday," Stanton growled, motioning for Anna and
Wade to stay and hear.
"It was not convenient, sir," said the officer, "to dispatch those guns yes-
terday. It was Sunday. But if you think it is at all urgent, I will attend to it at
once this morning."
Stanton bit off his words: "I ordered you to send those guns out yesterday,
which I was well aware was Sunday. When you did not do so, I went down to
the arsenal at the hour it opened, helped to drag those infernal guns out
myself. I went with them in the wagons to the railway. I made certain they
were on the midnight train to Harpers Ferry."
The officer listened to this bureaucratic heresy with his mouth open.
"The guns are at this moment in place facing a rebel attack," Stanton
continued with relish, "and you, sir, are no longer in the service of the United
States Government. Out. Out!"
Stanton, obviously pleased with himself, took Anna's hand and squeezed it
firmly in farewell. She led Wade out past the thunderstruck quartermaster,
briefly introduced the senator to the telegraph operator across the hall"my
friend, Homer Bates, who is doing vital and secret work," a description she
knew would mightily satisfy the young manand walked out the Seven-
teenth Street exit of the War Department.
"Stanton enjoys his new power," said Wade.
"He wallows in it." She amended that at once: "Certainly Mr. Lincoln
needed a man like that"she searched for the word"that fierce, to get
some energy in the prosecution of the war."
"Old Abe needs him, all right," boomed Wade. "The question all of us are
asking isdoes Stanton need Lincoln?"
CHAPTER 12
JOHN HAY'S DIARY
JANUARY 27, 1862
"The little black terrier," as Judge Blair calls Stanton with no little contempt,
came barreling in this afternoon demanding to see the Hellcat. I could not
resist the prospect of a confrontation between the indefatigable new Secretary
of War and the quite fatigable Mrs. Lincoln, and took him to the family
quarters myself.
Lizzie Keckley, who must have been fitting Madame for some outrageously
expensive outfit, came to the bedroom door. I said, somewhat merrily, "Liz-
zie, would you tell Mrs. Lincoln that the Secretary of War attends her plea-
sure." When that brought a puzzled frown to her handsome black face, I
amended it to plain English: "Mr. Stanton here would like to see her."
Lizzie looked him in the eye and then nodded, closing the door in our
faces. There is a remarkable composure in that statuesque woman, who seems
freed not just from slavery but from any lingering attitude of servitude;
frankly, I would as soon visit a smallpox hospital as cross the fearsome Stan-
ton, but Lizzie treats him like just another enemy of her friend and customer.
In a moment, Her Satanic Majesty appeared, took us into the yellow oval
sitting room, and motioned for Stanton to sit down. He did not.
"I have in my heart the one single object of overcoming the rebellion,"
went his little speech, "and restoring the authority of the government in time
to save the nation from the horrible gulf of bankruptcy." Did he know about
the money she was spending? That remark took the hard look out of her face
and put a trace of fear there. "I must also restore the integrity of the Depart-
ment of War, which has been in the clutch of the most corrupt politics.
Favoritism and nepotism have been rife." As she caught the drift of his
complaintnot money, but meddlingshe seemed to relax a little.
An interruption: Willie came running through the room in his pajamas,
face flushed, evidently on his way to the kitchen. "Go to bed," his mother
ordered. "You have a fever; you mustn't run around that way or you'll catch
your death."
"But I'm thirsty, and I've been in my room all day, and I'm getting better."
He cast an eye on Stanton, standing in the middle of the room, hand injacket,
midway through his prepared presentation. "Hello, sirdid you just grow
that beard? It's not very bushy yet."
At last, Edwin McMasters Stanton, organizer of victory and scourge of
timorous generals, met someone he could not intimidate. William Lincoln
"Willie" is not longer suitable, in my eyes, for such a brave ladbugged his
mother and beat a path to his room, leaving Stanton touching his wispy beard
with some embarrassment and groping for a way to resume his remonstrance.
"Favoritism is the enemy of public trust," he intoned, sounding a little like
the pious Chase, "and without realizing it, madam, you have allowed yourself
to be used by unscrupulous people. Twice this week, men have come to me
with your card asking for favors, and now one has presented a letter from
you, on Executive Mansion stationery, with a formal request for an army
commission. I have said no. I will continue to say no. This interference with
my office must stop."
"You are entirely right, Mr. Secretary."
"You have a duty to your nation and to your husband" He stopped,
evidently unprepared for her immediate surrender.
"I thank you for reminding me of it," she said humbly, giving the lie to my
sobriquet of Hellcat. I never saw her so much the pussycat; perhaps the
Tycoon had spoken to her about his inability to prevent the new Secretary of
War from exacting terrible vengeance for any interference.
"I will never trouble you again with improper requests," she said in fare-
well. She returned to her room clothed in dignity, which is at least less
expensive than some of her other raiment, leaving Stanton, Lizzie, and me
standing there.
What makes the former Hellcat so devoid of claws, so mild, even penitent?
I suppose it is the result of those accusations of spendthriftiness flying all over
town. The other accusationof harboring secret Southern sympathiesis
beneath contempt, probably based on her having all those relatives in the
Confederate Army. But the charge of foolish and tasteless ostentation in
wartime holds water. Stoddard has got her visiting hospitals to improve her
reputation, but the press remains hopelessly down on her. Kate Chase never
visits hospitals, and also spends money like water, and the press treats her
like an angel. Perhaps it helps to look like an angel.
The Hellcat must feel guilty about the big levee planned for next week. Six
hundred people invited to the first musicale to be held in the Mansion in
years. I deposited the Prsdt's January salary check for $2,000 the other day,
and that's not going to cover the half of it. She didn't invite the press
Stoddard was remissand everybody else not invited is predicting it will be a
great bore. Ben Wade sent back his invitation with a furious note demanding
to know if the President's wife was aware there was a Civil War on. As a
result, it will be a sit-down musicale, the first "ball" ever held without danc-
ing. I fear we are in for a disaster of a party, and the same fear is moderating
the Hellcat's behavior.
The War Secretary, his speech delivered and Madam in full retreat, started
to cough. Little coughs at first, then big wheezes into his handkerchief, shak-
ing his glasses off his face. He had great difficulty catching his breath. Lizzie
eased him into a chair and ran to the pantry around the corner for a glass of
water. I picked up his spectacles and tried to pat him on the back, which he
resisted.
"Asthma," he choked to me. I didn't know what to do except look sympa-
thetic. Lizzie came back with water and a jar of honey and ministered to him
until his coughing fit passed. As he was recovering, I introduced them.
"Lizzie, this is Secretary of War Stanton. Mr. Secretary, this is Lizzie
Keckley, Mrs. Lincoln's modiste."
"I'm grateful to you, Mrs. Keckley." That made me feel small; by ostenta-
tiously giving a negress a proper honorific, he was reducing me in her eyes.
Then he startled us both by asking her an odd question: "Do you think
negroes should be enlisted in the army?"
I had to step into the silence that followed. "Mrs. Keckley's son did not
appear to be black, Mr. Stanton. He enlisted and was killed at Bloody Ridge
last summer."
"A hero," she added, reaching in her dress for a wrinkled envelope. "Miss
Carroll wrote me the details."
Stanton read it through and was visibly moved. By that I mean there were
tears in his eyes. I excused myself to fix some tea in the pantry. I am not an
eavesdropper by nature, but the conversation was clearly audible and is the
sort of thing I should transcribe.
"Do you have other children, Mrs. Keckley?"
"No, the one was killed was all I had."
"Your husband?"
"Gone long ago."
Pause. "I am no stranger to the death of loved ones, my good woman. I lost
one daughter in the cradle. I kept her ashes in my room for a year. Another
died in her teens. My dear wife died a few years ago; I've since taken another.
My elder son is in college in Ohio. He wants to join the army. I cannot
interfere but I dread the day."
"The President's son at Harvard, Robert, wants to join up," she said, "but
Mrs. Lincoln won't let him."
"Not only that," Stanton was saying, caught up in his account of death and
woe in his own family, "but my infant, not two months old, has been afflicted
with the most terrible sores since his vaccination. I fear for its life, and my
dear young wife is always at his bedside, and I cannot get home because of
the demands of this job. I tell no one of this."
"Are you a religious man, Mr. Stanton?"
"I am, profoundly."
"I will pray for you," Lizzie promised. "It is good, in a way, that you and
death are no strangers. There is so much death ahead in your war." She took
a breath and I could hear her exhale. "Mr. Lincoln sometimes reads the
Bible, but he finds no comfort in religion. He lost a young boy, years ago.
Name was Eddie, after Senator Baker, who was killed last year. Nobody
around here can pull him out of it when the hypo gets to him, except maybe
Willie. Mr. Lincoln is no stranger to death either, Mr. Stanton. I suppose we
all have a kinship in that."
Long pause, Stanton having trouble with his breathing. Then: "I am in
favor of abolition, Mrs. Keckley. I look forward to the day when the Presi-
dent agrees."
"He wants to set my people free," she said, "but he thinks it would be best
if we were sent away."
"Colonization," he said, getting official again. "First compensated emanci-
pation, then colonization, perhaps in Haiti or Panama or some other conge-
nial climate. That will be hard to sell to the Congress."
"I don't want to go. Even with all the troubles, I want to stay here. I
bought my freedom, I want to be free to stay."
"Colonization would be voluntary, Mrs. Keckley. Nobody would be forced
to leave."
"I know you mean that, but things happen. No white man in the North is
going to want a free nigger taking his job. I've seen that."
"Mrs. Keckley, rest assured I am on your side. So is Governor Chase. I
wish I could say as much for the rest of them. As for McClellan, he's pro-
slavery clear through." After a pause, he pressed that home. "Be sure Mrs.
Lincoln knows thatshe could be influential. We have to get rid of him."
Since Stanton was back to his old tricks, I reentered with my tea in hand
and reminded him about the Prsdt's big activity of the dayWar Order No.
I, a better reason for Mars to visit the Prsdt's house than to bawl out the
Hellcat or commiserate with her modiste.
Stanton huffed his way down the hall of the Mansion, me following a
respectable three paces behind, working his dander up again before seeing the
Tycoon. The War Order should have been the first order of business, but the
black terrier had a different order on his mind. Lincoln wanted to let certain
prisoners of war, who had taken the loyalty oath and wanted to join the
Union ranks, enlistand to credit that enlistment to the quota for certain
districts that had special political significance. The Prsdt had to think of his
support in key districts that could not be pushed too hard.
Lincoln was lying on the couch. "You got my prisoner-of-war order, Stan-
ton?"
Stanton shook his head. "You must know, Lincoln, your order cannot be
executed."
That brought the Prsdt to his feet, the long, roundabout way, and in a tone
I can only call unusually peremptory for him, replied, "Mr. Secretary, I
reckon you'll have to execute the order."
"Mr. President, I cannot do it. The order is an improper one, and I cannot
execute it."
In a manner that forbade all further dispute, President Lincoln said: "Mr.
Secretary, it will have to be done."
Stanton stood stock still for a moment, then walked to my office outside
and said to Stoddard, who was sitting there, "Go across the street and tell
Provost General Fry to execute the order I have been holding on prisoner-of-
war enlistments. Tell him I gave him a verbal order to do it immediately,
watch him do it, and then come back here and tell me it was done."
Then Jupiter and Mars got down to the business of the day. The Tycoon
opened a drawer and pulled out a sheet of paper. (I'm glad he didn't take it
out of his hat, as he does with so many other papers. There is something un-
presidential about filing your papers in your hat.)
"General War Order Number One," he said. "See what you think. I have
to get the armies moving. McClellan's got the slows."
For the past two weeks, ever since that terrible meeting with the stubborn
McClellan and his craven generals in the Cabinet Room, the Prsdt has been
at his wit's end. The country demands action, the press is critical, the Con-
gress is driven by Wade's committee to grab control of the war, and all we
hear is "all quiet on the Potomac." He remembers what McClellan did in
protecting Washington from capture after Bull Run, and the Prsdt is not one
to forget a favorand I think he genuinely likes the insufferable Young Na-
poleon, despite the slightsbut the South is getting stronger every day and
the war is slipping away. That's why he appointed Stanton, I think: The
President wanted someone he respected to tell him to do what he wanted to
do all alongwhich was to rescind that promise to McClellan to let him fight
the war without political pressure.
Stanton read aloud: " 'Ordered that the 22nd day of February, 1862, be the
day for a general movement of the Land and Naval forces of the United
States against the insurgent forces.' " He looked up. "Why Washington's
birthday?"
"It has a certain significance," Lincoln said. "The President is commander
in chief."
"The order is good as far as it goes," said Stanton. "Our generals out West
might take it seriously, but it doesn't light any fires under McClellan."
The Tycoon was disappointed; I know he had set great store by that order
and deliberately associated himself with General Washington in its timing.
"It's a General War Order, pronouncing military policy. I'll follow it in a few
days with specific orders to McClellan to engage the enemy at Manassas and
seize the railroad there."
"That's more like it," Stanton replied. "Be sure and put in that he should
leave enough troops in Washington for the defense of the capital. A direct,
written order should flush him out." He was fairly rubbing his hands at the
thought of the generals out-generaled, then looked up sharply. "You're not
still thinking of taking field command yourself, are you?"
Lincoln shrugged that off; I knew the thought had crossed his mind weeks
ago, and if matters reach a desperate state, he well might. Still, the Tycoon
was reluctant to place his military judgmentor Stanton'sabove that of
men steeped in military affairs all their lives. He was coming to understand
military strategy, but errors in tactics could cost God knows how many lives.
"You were pretty high on McClellan a month ago, Mars"the Prsdt liked
to call Stanton "Mars," which he did to his face, but he never called Welles
"Father Neptune" except in private"what do you think of him now?"
"I'm afraid he's afraid to fight. We have had no war, we have not even been
playing war."
Lincoln looked pained. Stanton went on, "Besides which, he is a pompous,
overbearing, power-hungry, arrogant conniver. God! I don't know why we
should have to put up with this!"
Stanton ranted on for a while, then picked up his copy of the order from
Stoddard and charged out to work all night or whatever he does. (Actually,
I'm told he goes shopping. Three mornings a week, very early, before going to
the Department, he visits the city market to shop for vegetables, meats, every-
thing. A manservant pays for his purchases and carries the packages home.
Strange form of relaxation for a man.)
I sense a chilling side to Stanton. He will stop at nothing, except a direct
order from the Prsdt, and I suppose we're lucky to have such an energetic
and brilliant man at the helm of the war machine, to mix a metaphor. He is
not someone I want to cross; one of these days I may want a commission
myself, because it may not be good for my career to spend this war as a
civilian, even here in the White House. Young men not in uniform get suspi-
cious looks in Washington1 know how Robert Lincoln must feeland I
suspect that even Kate Chase wonders about my courage. I will have to
puzzle out where Duty lies, here or in the field. More fun here. There may be
no dancing at the musicale next week, but all of glittering Washington will be
there, including Kate, and I would hate to read about it coming in from a
cold and lonely patrol.
After Stanton had hustled out, I told the Tycoon about his interview with
Madam, which rather pleased him. I said he had hired an opinionated, impol-
itic, and highly excitable man as his Secretary of War.
Reminded him, etc. "Some Westerners had a Methodist preacher who got
himself all worked up," said the Prsdt, "hellfire-and-brimstone, exhorting
them at the top of his lungs, jumping up and down in the pulpit. Finally they
came up with a solution to the fervent preachingthey put bricks in his
pockets. We may have to do that with old Mars, but I guess we'll let him
jump awhile first."

CHAPTER 13
THE BALL WITH NO DANCING
Kate Chase descended the stairway in their home, ten blocks from the Execu-
tive Mansion, looking as dazzling as she knew how. Her dress, bought for the
occasion at A. Stewart in Philadelphia, was caf6-au-lait lace; she intended the
buttons high to her neck to de-emphasize her lack of bosom and call attention
to her graceful neck. The hoop in her skirt was smaller than the fashion, but
she had asked for it that way because she wanted to move closer to people.
Kate Chase went to parties not to be an island but ametropolis, not to be
circled by admirers but to extend her father's network of influence.
As she neared the bottom of the stairs, she could hear her father speaking
sternly to Jay Cooke, the financier, in the library. "If they can't come up with
fifty million this week, I'll print paper money until it costs a thousand dollars
to buy breakfast!"
He used that threat often, but rarely to Mr. Cooke, the Philadelphian he
had chosen to be chief financier of the war. Jay Cooke was a man Kate
admireddynamic, shrewd, unafraid to admit to his financial ambitions
and he would, she was sure, be helpful in raising the money for a future Chase
presidential campaign. The ball gown she was wearing had been purchased
through Cookeactually by Cooke, since he had been thoughtful enough not
to send the bill. That was a small confidence the two of them did not feel the
need to share with her father. The Secretary of the Treasury was almost
ostentatiously stiff about accepting favors from anyone, setting a standard for
Stanton to follow, but Kate, who did the Chase family bookkeeping, was
more aware than her father of the low state of their funds at the moment. The
Chases were almost as broke as the country, which struck her as fitting.
Perhaps, if the nation's affairs reached a state where it cost a thousand dollars
for breakfast, it would be easier to pay off their overdue bills.
"You mustn't use that tone of voice to Mr. Cooke, Father," she said,
entering modestly, deliberately not sweeping in as her younger sister would.
"I'm sure he's doing his best."
"You ought to listen to her, Chase," Cooke said. The banker looked at her
with obvious delight: "Look at her, too. Wish my daughter looked like that."
Cooke was forty, like an uncle to her, and because he was not a beau, she felt
she could accept the gown.
"Stanton wrote a draft for two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to Indi-
ana's militia today, my dear," her father told her, "and the United States
Treasury doesn't have the money to cover it. To use the vernacular of the
banking system, that check will bounce as if made of rubber. I am hoping our
friend Jay will pass on to his banker friends the urgency of the nation's need
for a loan."
"Rest assured I shall drive home that point," Cooke said, still looking at
the girl in the gown he had secretly bought for her, "And also the fact that
you now have the ability to print United States notes, thanks to the Legal
Tender Act."
"That too, I suppose," Chase said heavily, in the tone she recognized from
their Sundays in church when he was called upon to accept the inevitable. "I
am ashamed to be associated with that betrayal of the public trust."
Kate took his arm and drew him down for a kiss. He really did lose sleep
over the country's danger. She took the arm of both men and pleased them by
saying no woman in Washington had handsomer escorts to the ball.
Mary Todd Lincoln pulled the sleeves down a little farther, helping the
dress accentuate her fine shoulders and breasts. She had chosen white satin
overlaid with black lace, and a flounce of black lace on one shoulder. Nobody
wore black and white these daysthis was the year for pinks and shades of
purplebut because Queen Victoria's consort, Prince Albert, had recently
died, and because Thurlow Weed had written that the Prince had been so
influential in averting a war with Britain, Mary thought it would be appropri-
ate for at least part of the wardrobe of the President's lady to acknowledge
the British Government's official mourning. She made a mental note to tell
that to Mr. Russell, the awful London Times man, and to Lord Lyons, the
nice ambassador. That is, if she could find Lyons at the party; he was a
bachelor and would probably be giving his attention to Kate Chase, like the
rest of them.
"Whew!" her husband exclaimed, "our cat has a long tail tonight." Lin-
coln, in his plain black suit, raised his eyebrows at her dress's elegant train,
and then at the near-bareness of his wife's bosom. She did not deign to reply.
"Mother, it is my opinion, if some of that tail was nearer the head, it would
be in better style."
What did Abraham Lincoln know about style? It was all she could do to
get him to keep his shoes on in the daytime. The residue of the Todd family's
disapproval of her match lingered even now: they were all convinced she had
married beneath her station. She had seen strength and dignity where others
had seen awkwardness and boorishness, and tonight, at her first White House
grande lev6e, she would show all the Todds and their friends, North and
South, that she had been right in her choice, and she would show the world
that her husband had the foremost lady in the nation on his arm.
"I have arranged for Lisabeth to stay in Willie's room this evening," she
said, examining in the mirror the striking headdress of natural white roses in
her hair. Willie's fever had not abated; she remembered her lost Eddie, and
she worried. Willie, more than any of them, was the joy of her life;
Abraham's too. Taddie was loved in a different way; he was to be protected.
She hoped he would not catch Willie's fever, but could not keep the boys
apart.
"Maybe we should have called this party off," he said, the melancholy look
crossing his face.
"Not at the last minute. Washington society hates me enough as it is." The
idea for a great reception like this, a musicale and midnight supper, had been
her break with tradition: up to now, entertaining at the Executive Mansion
had been limited to small dinners, or to huge receptions open to all comers on
New Year's Day or the Fourth of July. Here was Mary Todd Lincoln's inno-
vation, an invited grand reception with music, which would have been a ball
had it not been for the war and Ben Wade's nasty letter. The ladies of Wash-
ingtonthose matrons remaining after the leaders of Southern society had
been forced out of townwere waiting for Mrs. Lincoln to prove their gossip
right. They said she was a Western bumpkin, wife of a man amusingly
cartooned as a baboon, incapable of entertaining in high style. She would
show them; she had redecorated the Mansionat too great expense, perhaps,
but with great tasteand her parties would prove that she was as elegant as
any of them. She would be a conscientious mother, too, visiting Willie fre-
quently through the evening.
"Well, Mother, who must I talk to tonightshall it be Mrs. Douglas?" She
knew he enjoyed the company of the widow of his former political rival.
"That deceitful woman! No, you shall not listen to her flattery." Addie
Douglas, with her syrupy voice and languorous eyes, told him everything he
wanted to hear. Mary Lincoln pinned a diamond brooch on the sleeve oppo-
site the flounce of lace, and nodded; that went well with the pearl bracelet.
Were the diamond earrings too much? She thought not.
"What do you say to Miss Chase?" he asked, she thought mischievously.
"She is too young and handsome to practice deceit."
"You know well enough, Mr. Lincoln, that I do not approve of your flirta-
tions with silly women, just as if you were a beardless boy, fresh from
school."
He was trying to get his huge hand into a white glove, with an expression
of mock gravity. "I insist I must talk to somebody," he said, pushing her
patience further. "I can't stand around like a simpleton and say nothing."
"Anybody you like, just not Mrs. Douglas or Miss Chase. I detest them
both." She did not want to hear the next day that the daughter of the Secre-
tary of the Treasury had captivated the President. This was to be Mary
Lincoln's night, the center stage shared with nobody else.
"Very well, Mother. Now that we have settled the question to your satisfac-
tion"he proffered his arm, which she took, "we will go downstairs."
Robert Lincoln, home from Harvard, waited for his parents to come out so
that he could walk downstairs with them. It was hard to get a minute to talk,
what with the concern about Willie and the preparations for the big party. On
the subject troubling him, the eldest son was eager to speak to both parents
together: talking to Father alone was hard, and he could never pry a decision
out of Mother alone. Getting them together was not easy; he could not go to
them early in the morning, because they never slept in the same room, and
lately his father had taken to sleeping with Taddie on the end of his bed.
Robert repressed the tug of jealousy; that sort of intimacy had never been
shown to him.
"I have to tell you an incident that happened on the way down from
Cambridge," he began, hoping to break the ice.
"Have you looked in on your brother?" his father said. "Willie's not been
well."
"I will." Always Willie. "Mother, you look lovely. Anyway, I was buying
my sleeping car reservations from the conductor on the platform just where
you board the train in Boston. There's a space between the platform and the
train, do you know? The crowd started to push, and I guess I wasn't looking,
and I stepped into that crack and started to drop. Really, I was helpless. Then
I could feel my coat collar grabbed and somebody pulled me up out of dan-
ger. You know who the man who saved me was? It was Edwin Booth, the
famous actor."
"I've seen him perform," said his father. "You should send him a note.
Look in on Willie now, he needs cheering up."
Time was slipping away; they were at the stairs leading to the crowded
party. Robert breathed deep and blurted it all at once: "Now that I have you
both here, I want to talk to you about joining the army. Sixteen of my
classmates at Harvard have volunteered, and at age twenty it just isn't seemly
for anyone, especially me, to be in college during a war. If I"
"Not now," said his father, irritated.
"I couldn't bear it," said his mother. "I know you're being manly and
noble, my darling, and I want you to do what you think is best, but I'm so
frightened you may never come back to us."
"Father?"
"This is not the time."
It was never the time. Coming into public view at the beginning of a big
reception was hardly the best time for a discussion of his future, Robert
granted, but he had no alternative. There was no good time to bring this up:
Father was still angry with him for asking if his roommate could have a
commission, to the point of threatening to pull him out of college if Robert
sought political favor for anyone again. He had been ashamed of himself later
for that, but unashamed about wanting to serve in the army and not wanting
to be called a shirker. Mother was a worrier and had always been overly
protective, but Father should be on his side about this. He followed a few
steps behind them into the public eye, trying to conceal his disappointment by
making his face a mask.
The new Secretary of War knew that the way to suborn a newspaper editor
was to take him into his confidence. Charles Dana was the key to Horace
Greeley, who controlledor at least, in Stanton's opinion, had an inordinate
effect uponLincoln's attitudes on slavery and the use of negroes as soldiers.
With the backing of Greeley's Tribune, Stanton would not have to worry
about Bennett's irksome Herald or bother with Raymond's stolidly loyal
Times.
"I want you to know how grateful I am for your editorial column upon my
appointment," he told Dana, "but you must be carefulpraise makes me
vulnerable to jealousy." He looked over toward George McClellan, who was
holding forth to a group of officers. He was pale, but obviously on the mend.
"You have enemies," Dana told him, "and some of them have ways to
reach Greeley."
Stanton sensed an opening: perhaps Greeley had a less than enthusiastic
supporter in his own chief lieutenant. "As soon as I get the machinery of this
office working," he assured the editor, "I shall move. First I have to get the
rats cleared out and the rat holes stopped."
"We hear the Army of the Potomac is going to sit out the winter," Dana
told him. He was correctly informed.
"This army has got to fight or run away," Stanton promised. "While men
are striving nobly in the West, the champagne and oysters on the Potomac
must be stopped." That was a direct slap at the elegant parties McClellan
liked to attend, and an indirect derogation of tonight's affair, as much as
Stanton dared.
"I hear that there is movement out West, even as we speak," said the
editor. "Our correspondent reports that Admiral Foote and General Grant
are already moving boats and men toward the forts protecting the Tennessee
River."
"You haven't printed that yet, have you?" Stanton was alarmed; perhaps
Halleck and the command out West was taking Lincoln's General War Order
No. I seriously. Why hadn't Stanton been informed? Why should newspaper-
men know more about the conduct of the war than the Secretary of War?
"Dana, you appear to me to be a patriot and I shall take you into my trust.
Tomorrow I intend to take an action that will have every newspaper in the
country furious at me."
"Censorship," said Dana, not surprised. "About time."
Stanton was thunderstruck. Whose side was Dana on, that of the press or
the government?
"Greeley and Raymond won't like it," Dana went on. "James Gordon
Bennett will be especially angry because he has the best men in the field. But I
think you're rightthe rebels should not learn our plans by just reading our
newspapers. I figured that was what you had in mind by taking over the
telegraph lines."
"Dana, if you can calm Greeley down on this, you will be doing the cause
of the war a great service."
"I may have my troubles with Greeley," Dana said circumspectly. Stanton
wondered what he was getting atwas there more than minor friction at the
Tribune? Could Dana be used now, perhaps be detached from journalism and
then used by the government in another capacity?
"Whatever troubles you have in keeping Greeley aggressive," Stanton said
with care, "and whatever your patriotism costs you in your career, that will
be carefully considered here." As Dana nodded, Stanton decided to make the
offer more specific. "One day you might want to serve your country here,
right across the street. At the propitious moment, say the word."
Dana nodded again. Stanton felt sure he had him.
"Cloth is hot."
Elizabeth Keckley removed the wet cloth from Willie's brow, immersed it
in the pan of cool water, wrung it out, and replaced it on the fevered forehead
of the President's middle son. The bilious fever, which had lasted for over a
month, had wasted the boy, and showed no signs of abating. It should have
passed by now, she calculated; it was probably the same fever that struck
General McClellan, and he was up and around. Some people were better able
to throw it off than others.
"My pony?"
"He's fine. Your father and Tad go over to the stable every night." That
was no story; Lincoln and his youngest son made sure Willie's pony was
taken care of, and reported to Willie that the animal missed him.
The modiste sat silently in the dark, listening to the boy's breathing and the
sounds of the party below. Twice tonight the President had come in, said a
few words of comfort to his son, felt his hot hand, and returned to his guests.
Mrs. Lincoln had come in briefly with her son Robert; in the shaft of light
spilling from the open hall door Lizzie could see Willie smile at his older
brother. It was said that Robert favored his mother, and it was trtie that his
face resembled hers, but he had his father's remoteness. Willie had his fa-
ther's swings in mood, from inexplicable sadness to sudden laughter and the
urge to share the humor with everybody, and in her judgment was the one
through whom Lincoln saw his spirit living on.
The party below was not a good idea, the negro woman decided. Mrs.
Lincoln had staked too much on it, and in her mind had irrationally linked
the ball, which could not be canceled, and her son's fever, which no bed rest
or cool bath could long control. Mrs. Lincoln seemed to her friend the mo-
diste always on the edge of breaking. She could not join in the general hatred
of the South, where her relatives lived, but she was a loyal enough Unionist
with no desire to protect slavery. She was worried almost to distraction about
Willie, having lost one boy to illness already, and refused to let Robert go
near danger. President Lincoln was in a fix about that, Mrs. Keckley knew,
torn between the boy's desire to enlist and his wife's need for him not to
enlist. Besides, there was the talk of favoritism, keeping the boy out of uni-
form. Lincoln, she felt sure, would put up with the criticism and Robert's
pleading in order to keep his wife from losing her mind.
Was "losing her mind" too strong? Lizzie Keckley thought no; Mrs. Lin-
coln was a good woman in more trouble, with more pressing down on her,
than anybody knew. She dipped the cloth in the pan and wrung it out again.
"The wallpaper was worth it," Major French said to George Nicolay, who
was helping himself to the champagne punch in the Japanese bowl at the
center of the State Dining Room.
"Sixty-seven hundred dollars' worth?"
"It comes all the way from Paris," the major argued, hoping to win an ally
close to the President. The walls were really beautiful, French was certain, far
nicer than the Executive Mansion had ever seen, a mark of good taste directly
attributable to Mrs. Lincoln. The new carpet, too, and the silver service; why
should the palace of the American President be a shabby place, ridiculed by
the European diplomats? "It's going into an appropriation for sundry civil
expenses." The Congress had better go along, the major thoughteight hun-
dred dollars of the advance for the wallpaper had come out of his own pocket.
That was when Mr. Lincoln flatly refused to pay for what he kept calling
"flub-dubs."
"Who laid out this feast?" Nicolay asked. The musicale portion of the
evening had ended, and when the doors of the East Room were opened, the
guests were led to a giant punch bowl in the central hall. Waiters passed
through the crowd dispensing what French had been told were "finger sand-
wiches." He quickly admonished Nicolay to ignore the sandwiches and save
his appetite for the display of exotic foods served at the midnight supper.
"Maillard's of New York. Come through here." Major French had ordered
a ton of game: partridge, pheasant, and venison were laid out on the tables of
the State Dining Room, along with the usual ham and turkey and duck. On a
table of dressed game, the confectioner had created a sugar model of Fort
Surnter. Plunk in the middle of the venison, a model of the frigate Union was
in full sail on a stand supported by cherubs and draped in the flag. Charlotte
russes ran out of a sugar beehive, and water nymphs made of nougat sup-
ported a fountain. Nothing like that, Major French was certain, had ever
graced the Mansion before.
"My God, what's that?" breathed Nicolay.
French smiled proudly. "That's Fort Pickens, done to exact scale, and
stuffed with quail eggs. Wait till you try a quail egg, Nicolay. Put your hand
right through the front of the fort."
The President's first secretary declined. "Good thing you didn't send to
Paris for the food," said Nicolay, breaking a piece of nougat off one of the
parapets of Fort Surnter. The fellow was obviously a Philistine when it came
to elegant parties. French knew that the presidential secretary's younger col-
league, Hay, was more socially adept, and hoped he would be suitably im-
pressed.
"You see that fillet of beef over there? It's called Chateaubriand, the su-
preme achievement of the gastronomic art," Major French instructed him.
"I've already heard this function compared to the Duchess of Richmond's
ball in Brussels."
"I read about that ball," nodded Nicolay, swallowing the nougat and head-
ing to the Chateaubriand table before the crowd, "in the history books. Night
before Waterloo."
Lord Lyons, the British Ambassador, waited his turn to greet the Presi-
dent's Lady. An American senator was ahead of him.
"I just met your son, Mrs. Lincoln," he heard the senator say sourly.
"Fine, strapping lad. He should be in uniform."
"He wants to go, Senator Harris, but I just cannot bear the thought at the
moment."
The senator said pointedly, "My only son is in the army."
She looked stunned and Lyons rescued her. "I note that part of your gown
is black, Mrs. Lincoln," he interrupted, easing the senator out of the way,
"and I will include that in my report to Her Majesty. I know Queen Victoria
will be grateful for your most appropriate expression of condolence." The
President's wife quickly recovered her composure, and Lincoln looked re-
lieved.
The ruddy, hearty Englishman, cheeks fringed with whiskers, had come to
respect Lincoln during the Trent affair. Lyons was no longer as certain as
some of his countrymen, including the Foreign Secretary, that the South
would win its independence.
General McClellan had done a remarkable job in rebuilding a defeated
army in a short time, according to the military experts Lyons trusted most.
Moreover, the British Ambassador had learned from one of McClellan's
more impetuous aides that the General-in-Chief had just sent a force under
General Burnside to seize Roanoke Island, which gave the Federals a first-
rate base off North Carolina to enforce the blockade. Lyons had also heard
from some Southern friends that seizure of the offshore island provided a clue
to McClellan's intentions: he might be planning to approach Richmond by
water, maneuvering the Confederates out of their positions near Washington.
In addition, McClellan had authorized Halleck and Grant to begin operations
against the forts guarding the Tennessee River in the West.
Some heard only the foolish complaints of the press and the radicals in
Congress, but Lord Lyons also listened to the well-considered worries of the
Southerners as well. With McClellan gathering his forces for a surprise at-
tack, and refusing to be bounded by amateurs into a premature midwinter
advance, Her Majesty's envoy now considered British neutrality a wiser
course than intervention, Southern cotton or no.
Having done his diplomatic duty to the Lincolns, the bachelor British
envoy went in search of his favorite Washingtonian. Most of the evening,
Kate Chase had resisted holding a small levee of her own, preferring to dart
in and out of conversations, but now she was surrounded by admirers, includ-
ing Sprague, the Governor of Rhode Island, inebriated as usual, as well as
Congressman Roscoe Conkling from New York, an officer from Ohio named
Garfield, and one of Mr. Lincoln's younger secretaries. Lord Lyons sighed
and joined the group.
Anna Carroll took Salmon Chase aside. "I must see you a moment in
private."
"For you, my dear lady, I am always available." He was such a fine-looking
man, a tower of strength; she thought it a pity about his unwavering, some-
times excessive, dignity. The Wades insisted that Chase was the only man in
the Cabinet of presidential stature, a political assessment that included and
then rejected Seward; Anna was inclined to agree. Chase looked and moved
like a Presidentmore so than Lincoln, surely. He was surrounded by an
aura of probity, almost nobility. She shared in the general trust of Chase, and
saw an opportunity to do a favor for him.
"This is none of my business," she began, pleased at the way he inclined his
majestic head down to hear her low voice, "but I noticed when you came in
and greeted the Lincolns, your daughter said something that was less than
kind to the President's wife."
He winced. "Kate is headstrong. I didn't hear what was said, I was talking
to the President."
"I overheard it," she said, "Kate said somethinga little too sweetly, if
you ask meabout Mrs. Lincoln being far more experienced than she, and
the President's wife took it as a reflection on her age."
"Ah." He looked helpless; Anna was glad she had spoken up.
"Here's what you should tell your daughter," she said, presenting the solu-
tion immediately after staling the problem, which she liked to do. "The Lin-
colns' son, William, is upstairs with a fever. It may be the same typhoid fever
that killed Prince Albert, and almost killed General McClellan. Mrs. Lincoln
is upset, worried sick, trying not to show it."
"My God. And my daughter was"
"It's not something that Kate would have said, I'm sure, if she had known
about the boy." She put her hand on his arm and took a deep breath, showing
her concern and her bosom. "Tell her to go back to Mrs. Lincoln and offer
her sympathy. Be good for the both of them."
"I'll do that immediately. Miss Can-oil"
"Anna."
"Anna, I know better than most what it is to be in fear of losing a loved
one." Anna was aware that he had lost three wives and five of his seven
children to disease; death was a frequent visitor to this strong, magnetic,
probably lonely man. "I will be certain that my daughter expresses the pro-
found understanding of the Chase family. She and I are in your debt."
Anna squeezed his arm and sent him on his way. Why did he make her
think of Breck? Probably because of his height and deep voice, and the pull of
his personality. She found herself afflicted by the thought of Breck for a
moment, until Brady, the photographer, came up to her. He peered at her
through thick spectacles, recognized her face, and urged her to drop into his
shop for a portrait soon. She begged off for the moment; a photographic
portrait required a new dress and she would have to make a decision about
the length of her hair.
It was after I A.M. and the party was at its peaksurely a first, Anna
figured, for this early-retiring Southern city. She was flushed with its excite-
ment: People were doing business, diplomats were doing each other in, gener-
als were taking the opportunity to mend fences with politicians, and social
Washington had to be impressed with the ability of the Lincolns to entertain
royally even in the midst of war. Everyone had gasped at the display of viands
in the banquet hall. Anna judged that the big party ws not a lapse of taste, but
an expression of Union confidence in a dark time; the Wades had been wrong
to stay away.
She looked for Stanton; before dinner was served, she had seen him talking
intently to the man from the Tribune, but the Secretary of War had appar-
ently slipped out while the party was in full swing.
Anna guessed that he would have gone across the street to the War Depart-
ment before going home; Stanton was the sort who would like it to be known
that he had been too busy with official cares to partake of the midnight feast.
He would also wonder what he had missed. She seized the opportunity: in a
moment, she was in the kitchen with Major French, putting together a basket
of game and delicious victuals from Maillard's for the Secretary of War. She
also obtained a small package of cakes and nougat icing for young Homer
Bates and whoever else might be in the telegraph office at this hour, listening
to the sounds of revelry across the street.
Anna was convinced that the moment had come for the Union Army in the
West to strike. The Tennessee River was at high water and Fort Henry was
probably half inundated, and Federal gunboats under Admiral Foote were
out of the boatyards and in operation at last. Was anybody following her
plan? Tom Scott was out there, on a survey for Stantonsurely he would be
urging the movement on the generals in the field, telegraphing his recommen-
dations back to the War Department.
She drew her cape around herone day, when she received recognition
and recompense, she would be able to afford furgripped the basket in her
ungloved hand and scurried across the street to the building that she hoped
had become the nerve center of the war.
"My dear lady, you are like a visiting angel," Stanton said, pleased that
someone would report his selfless presence at his post. He was also glad to
have the food. His wife, at home with their ailing infant, would want to know
about the party; at least he would have something to give her from there
without the indignity of asking Major French, surely a wastrel and probably a
thief, for a packet to bring home. "Take the cakes to Eckert and his men
across the hall right away, they'll bless you for it. And come right back."
Even as the President's wife was stuffing her guests with expensive game,
the War Secretary knew that the navy had undertaken to reduce Fort Henry.
That rebel installation at the head of the Tennessee River was under attack by
some of Halleck's command under Congressman Washburne's prot6g6, Gen-
eral Grant. Halleck was worried about Grant: unstable. If he took Fort Henry
and continued on to the seriously defended Fort Donelson, Grant could get
himself cut off and be forced to surrender fifteen thousand men. The Union
could not afford another defeat, and Stanton's spotless reputation as orga-
nizer of victory would be immediately besmirched. Was it worth the effort?
Assistant Secretary Scott was all for the movement. Scott was a sound
executive and honest, but a Pennsylvania Cameron man; he would have to go.
Only men absolutely beholden to Stanton could work at the top echelons of
the War Department. This little lady who claimed to have conceived the idea
was urging it on all and sundry, and her closeness to Wade meant that Stan-
ton would show her at least the courtesy of consideration. Stanton had re-
solved to leave that military decision to Halleck; if it failed, he could fire
Halleck, court-martial Grant, and blame the defeat on the navy. The West
was not important anyway; this war would be settled in the East, if ever he
could get McClellan to move. The caution he saw as an asset in Halleck was a
liability in McClellan. He, too, would have to go; Stanton would put in his
own man to run the war in the field. He thought of how he had been forced to
stand like a beggar at McClellan's dinner table, awaiting the great general's
notice, and the memory of that studied slight made him burn.
"You will be pleased to learn," he told Miss Carroll on her return, "that all
political prisoners arrested under authority of the Secretary of State will be
released upon taking a loyalty oath." That would display Union confidence
and appeal to Democrats who had been making a fuss about civil liberties.
"Spies, too?"
"John Dix will determine who will or will not be exempted," he replied. He
could count on Dix, a Democrat who had served with him in the Buchanan
Cabinet, to make certain Rose Greenhow would be properly oathed and sent
South before she made any more trouble.
"And if habeas corpus requires suspension again?"
She was an astute little woman. "Extraordinary arrests will hereafter be
made," he smiled, "under the direction of the military authorities alone."
Seward was out of it, his prisoners given amnesty; now the power was
Stanton's.
"Good," the little woman said. "A war power belongs in the war office."
He impulsively pushed a stack of deciphered cables toward her, withhold-
ing only the one expressing Halleck's concerns about Grant's "bad habits" to
McClellan. "Senator Wade will be interested to know that the Tennessee
River campaign that you and he suggested is under way."
Let her think it was all her idea; that would involve Wade, protecting
Stanton from criticism from the Joint Committee if the attack on Forts Henry
and Donelson failed. If it succeeded, credit would devolve on Halleck and the
generals in the West, and of course on the new Secretary of War.
"The purpose of this war is to attack, pursue, and destroy a rebellious
enemy," he said. He was certain that George Brinton McClellan was no
destroyer; the general probably harbored some notions of a negotiated peace
after some good days on a battlefield, which made McClellan more of an
enemy to the Union cause than any rebel soldier. He would have to be bro-
ken, his place taken by a general of Stanton's choosing.
The parading around was over; he would make heroes of the generals who
accepted the need for mutual slaughter. The North could afford the lives, the
South could not. After Miss Carroll left, Stanton wrapped up the expensive
food and took it home to his wife.
CHAPTER I
UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER
Sam Grant, hatless, blue uniform blouse unbuttoned despite the unexpected
cold, sat on a keg on the snow-covered bank of the Cumberland River to
watch the navy's gunboats attack Fort Donelson.
He answered to the name "Sam" because that was what they had called
him"Uncle Sam"at the military academy, thanks to his initials, U. S.
Some clerk had mixed up his name on his West Point application, changing
Hiram Ulysses to Ulysses Simpson, and he never bothered to correct it:
U.S.G. got him called "Sam," and H.U.G. would have earned him "Hug" so
he let it alone.
If he failed in this expedition, Grant knew, he would be a failure for the
rest of his life, just as he had been a failure in everything up to now. Only a
remote political connectionhis Galena, Illinois, Congressman, Elihu Wash-
bumehad given him this second chance; there would be no third. Grant
was sorry he had not been able to get to see George McClellan when the
"Young Napoleon" had a command in the West. He was acquainted with
Mac from the Military AcademyGrant had been in his fourth year at the
Point when McClellan was in his firstand Grant still thought he would
make a fine cavalry brigade commander in Mac's Army of the Potomac.
No gunboats yet in sight. He took out a knife and began to whittle a stick.
Attacking Forts Henry and Donelson this way was sensible, because it
seemed plain enough to him that the way to break the back of the rebellion in
the West was to take men on gunboats down toward Corinth via the Tennes-
see River, outflanking the forts on the Mississippi. But last month, when he
went to General Halleck with the plan, "Old Brains" just stared at him as if
Grant were drunk or crazy. Wouldn't respond at all, just treated the idea with
contempt.
Was Grant's plan so preposterous? He didn't think so, but Halleck had
written the book on strategy, and Grant had to wonder about his own mili-
tary judgment. All he had ever done was to fight in Mexicocreditably; that
was the high point of his life, in retrospectbut he took no real satisfaction in
that either, because it was an unjust war: a strong nation had fought a weak
one just to grab some territory. Grant thought the nation was paying now in
blood and treasure for the sin of that conquest of Mexico.
No matter; this was a good war and he felt comfortable in it. He disagreed
with all the harangues in the public press about this being a war against
slavery. His inclination was to whip the rebellion into submission, preserving
all property rights, and if the South could not be beaten in any other way
than a war against slavery, only then let it come to that legitimately. If
slavery had to go in order to keep the Union in existence, then let slavery go;
that was his position. But Grant thought that Greeleyand the rest of the
press trying to whip up an anti-slavery warwere as great enemies to their
country as if they were open and avowed secessionists.
Grant thought Lincoln had the war goals about right: defeat the rebs, save
the Union, let slavery take care of itself. Grant himself had not been eligible
to vote in the last election, having just moved to Galena, Illinois, which was
just as well because he had pledged his support to the Democrat Douglas.
That election was essentially Breckinridge versus Lincoln, minority rights
against majority rule; he was glad Lincoln had won. Lincoln's War Order No.
I was aimed mainly at McClellan in the East, where the war would be de-
cided, but Grant took that as his license to go hunting, and without really
asking permission from Halleck, had plotted with Admiral Foote to grab Fort
Henry.
That ill-situated fort had been easy pickings. Strange bird, Footean old
salt sailing little ironclad gunboats on fresh water, fulminating all the time
about the two worst evils in the world, slavery and whiskey. Grant was not
fighting this war for the slaveshis wife, Julia, used to own some when she
lived in style, before she became the wife of a born failureand he was
certainly not fighting this war to exorcise Demon Rum. Old Foote was a
hellfire preacher, though, and even got the navy to cancel the traditional rum
ration, which cost him more than a few sailors.
The river navy didn't need a full complement to take Fort Henry; at high
tide, the Tennessee flooded half the fort's batteries and the place was practi-
cally defenseless. With the advantage of the river's freak northward current,
the river fleet leveled the fort. After two hours of shelling from the gunboats
enough time for most of the fort's defenders to slip out and head for Donel-
son twelve miles awaythe rebel commander climbed into a boat, was rowed
out to Foote's Carondelet, and asked for terms. Foote framed a pretty ringing
response, Grant thoughtno terms at all, just "unconditional surrender."
Grant squinted into the mist and made out four gunboats steaming around
the point, and heard the guns of Donelson roar. Fort Donelson was not Fort
Henry: 128-pounders had been placed high atop its bluffs, and were now
firing down at the sloping iron sides of Foote's fleet. The sides of the boats
were angled to make shots aimed at the same level carom off, but the cannons
high on the bluff fired down, the balls slamming into the gunships head-on,
shuddering them on impact, the clang of iron ball on iron armor echoing in
the frozen hills around.
Foote kept coming, blazing back at the fort, his boats supported far behind,
by long-range artillery from wooden ships too fragile to risk the batteries on
the bluff. On the bluff, one rebel 128-pounder fell silent, hit by naval fire or
spiked by its own crew, but at 500 yards the fire from the fort's short-range,
32-pound carronades was devastating to the Union fleet. Grant watched the
fort's cannonballs rip the armor off the ships like shucking corn, and the
admiral's flagship took a solid shot that tore away the pilothouse.
Grant wondered whether that last shot had killed Foote. The Carondelet
took advantage of the river's northward flow and drifted back to safety. The
other three ships in the ironclad fleet limped after her. As Fort Henry had
shown what ironclad gunboats could do, Fort Donelson had shown what they
could not do.
"Siege," Grant said aloud. He had 24,000 men, not enough to storm a
garrison of 18,000. He needed a three-to-one advantage to storm a fort suc-
cessfully, according to the book, even if he was willing to take heavy casual-
ties. He took out a pencil and began writing a message to Halleck: "I fear the
result of an attempt to carry the place by storm with raw troops." Halleck
would like that; Old Brains always wanted to be careful. Still, Grant's supe-
rior officer had to be pleased with last week's capture of Henry, and was
probably claiming great credit for himself in telegrams to Stanton and Mc-
Clellan. Grant would have to write a lette-i- to Congressman Washburne, in
hopes he could show it to Lincoln.
"I feel great confidence in ultimately reducing the place," Grant wrote in
the pad on his knee. No bravado; it was true. Grant had been informed that
his opposition at Donelson was badly led. The fort commander, General
Floyd, had been Secretary of War in Buchanan's Cabinet and was run out of
Washington for stealing Union stores. Floyd was all politician, no soldier, and
he would rely for guidance on his deputy, Gideon Pillow. General Pillow was
a walking military disaster, Grant recalledflamboyant, foolishly eager for
combat, a braggart who had been censured for laying claim to exploits not his
own in Mexico. With Pillow running the rebel show, and notorious for failing
to reconnoiter, Grant was certain that any Union force, no matter how small,
could march up to within gunshot range of any entrenchments Pillow was
given to hold.
Grant tried to figure out why rebel General Sidney Johnston had not come
to take personal command; that seemed a mistake. Against a first-class mili-
tary mind like Johnston's, this would be a tough campaign, perhaps impossi-
ble, but he was certain Floyd and Pillow would panic under siege. The
weather was on the rebel side, Grant acknowledged, mounting his horse to
see whether Foote was alive. Ten-degree cold was harder on the attacker than
on the dug-in defender, especially when the Union men had discarded their
overcoats two days before, when the weather appeared summery. Grant was
aware that he and his men were exposed, and Halleck was warning that a
swift move by the rebels in Bowling Green could cut them off. Too much
depended on Foote's gunboats.
Private J. Cabell Breckinridge, a proud member of the Second Kentucky
Brigade just assigned to join in the defense of Donelson, considered himself
lucky. Sweeping out tents and boiling the lice out of clothes, his major activi-
ties in Bowling Green headquarters, was not the sort of war he had in mind.
He had joined the only rebel unit from a state still in the Union last year,
when he was sixteen, but he was big, and had lied about his age and used his
middle name for his last. Cabell had seen action at Mill Creek and escaped
with his life from that disaster, having shown his comrades that he would not
run under fire. His gun didn't go off during a charge but that wasn't his fault,
and he was almost shot by a Mississippi outfit that mistook his Kentucky
jeans for a blue Yankee uniform.
He knew his mother and father had been upset with him for running away
to fight, especially when his father was still engaged in a hopeless effort to
hold the Union together in the Senate. Now that his father was a general in
the Confederate Army, Cabell was determined not to serve too close to him.
Being the son of top brass troubled him: in school, he had always been
"Senator Breckinridge's son," and then "Vice President Breckinridge's son."
He was better off fighting this war without that burden.
Nor did his father, for all his political experience, seem to understand what
this fight was really about. Throughout his early teens, Cabell had listened to
tedious lectures from his father about the danger of disunion. Compromise
was sheer foolishness, and the Vice President should have known it; Cabell
could have told him he would lose the election for President, but it was not a
son's place to say that to his father.
Cabell's way of thinking, supponed by all his young friends in Lexington,
was that the Northern abolitionists were out to strike at the power and the
way of life of the South. They were not content to limit the territorial expan-
sion of slavery, as Lincoln and other moderates pretended, but were deter-
mined to disrupt Southern life. Toward that selfish end, the abolitionists in-
tended to incite servile insurrectionswith all the rape and murder of whites
that entailedwith offers of "freedom" to chattel property who were far
better off under the paternal hand of their masters than they would be in the
grip of Northern factory owners. The real intent of the abolitionists, Cabell
was certain, was not to save the Little Eva of Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel,
but to enslave the whites of the South.
Cabell felt lucky, too, because he was sent north to fight at Donelson rather
than south to get all fixed to retreat from Kentucky. What was wrong with
General Johnston, anyway? The greatest general of the Confederacy was for-
ever falling back. The sergeants said these retreats were a trap for the Yan-
kees, to be followed by some glorious battle that would decide the war. He
hoped so; the soldier life had been exciting these past few months, except for
those scary moments at Mill Creek, but he'd just as soon go back to school
soon. He imagined the envious faces of the boys when he would tell of his
personal experiences in the War for Southern Independence.
His best luck had been to be chosen as General Buckner's orderly. It
happened back in Bowling Green when the corporal sent a detail to the
general's tent to pack up headquarters equipment. Buckner looked at Private
Cabell, looked closer, and asked, "Your unit coming with me to Donelson?"
Cabell said yes, and he sure would like to get out of sweep-up duty to a
fighting job. "You look like a Breckinridge," Buckner said. Cabell could not
deny it, because Buckner had been a frequent guest at family gatherings. The
general then assigned him on the spot to be his orderly, working with a
Kentucky corporal, which was not quite the front-line duty he had in mind
but was better than his current condition. They had marched into Donelson a
few hours ago and heard the booming of the guns on the river.
"We whupped 'em," the corporal said gleefully, chucking a handful of
coals into the stove. "Same damn Yankee ships that pounded Fort Henry
down last week. This place be a tougher nut to crack, you bet. You see those
entrenchments? How'd you like to be a Yankee on the other side of them,
comin' up the hill?"
"Rather be this side," Cabell replied, "if our guns work."
In the morning the corporal was less cheerful, reporting to the general that
Yankee troops had invested the area close to the fortifications during the
night. Buckner was coldly furious; Cabell followed the general over to the
command bunker where he confronted Generals Floyd and Pillow.
"Where were your pickets?" Buckner demanded, as if he were not the
junior officer present. "The Federals should have paid for every yard outside
the lines. We had a clear field of fire. Now they're on top of us and you
haven't fired a shot."
"It was ten degrees last night," Pillow said glumly, "and the pickets were
inside celebrating the victory."
When Buckner cursed, Floyd said, "I don't like your attitude, General. I
am in command here and you are insubordinate." Cabell, standing at atten-
tion back in the corner, wondered if this was how general officers usually ran
their councils of war.
"Begging your pardon, General Floyd," Buckner said through tight lips,
"but what is your plan?"
The politician turned to his companion. "Pillow?"
"Our plan is to hold this place for three days," said the swarthy general,
"protecting Johnston's general withdrawal from Kentucky. Then we'll cut
our way out and join him in Tennessee."
"During the siege, we can inflict heavy casualties on the assaulting troops,"
Floyd added, not too sure of himself, "and then really smash them when we
cut our way out. Grant will be in no shape to pursue."
Buckner shook his head but said nothing. Cabell hoped the other generals
knew what they were talking about; this "council of war" didn't seem like
much of a meeting to him.
Grant's wounded were freezing to death. The general surveyed his three-
mile line around the fort and was less confident than his telegram to Halleck
had suggested. For three days his assaults had been inconclusive; the heavy
snow covered each day's casualties, giving him the feeling that he was fighting
a new battle every day.
From his command post in Mrs. Crisp's boardinghouse, where only the
kitchen was heated, the general waited for the pressure to cause one side or
another to crack. Flag-officer Foote was alive, although injured, and kept a
steady bombardment on the fort from a distance. Halleck had sent in several
thousand reinforcements, all he said he could spare.
A messenger appeared with a rebel knapsack in his hand. "The enemy is
attacking McClemand's position, sir, and in force. We took some prisoners
and they were all wearing these. Seems the rebs expect their offensive to last."
Grant opened the rebel knapsack to find provisions for three days. More
food than ammunition. That meant this attack was no foray; these rebels
were trying to escape, to break the siege. It could be that the whole army at
Donelson was trying to cut its way out.
"The one who attacks now will be victorious," Grant told the other officers
in the kitchen, "and the enemy will have to be in a hurry if he gets ahead of
me."
He hurried outside, climbed on his horse and rode hard on the icy road to
McClemand's division, finding men standing in groups, leaderless and con-
fused. "Fill your cartridge boxes, quick, and get into line," he called, "the
enemy is trying to escape."
General McClernand came up and began a long-winded explanation of his
ideas about withdrawing out of the range of Confederate fire. Grant knew
that McClernand had strong political connections in Illinois that reached into
Lincoln's White House, but he could not permit the man's dawdling to cost
him the garrison at Donelson.
"That road must be recovered before night," he told McClernand, control-
ling his anger. "I will go to see Baldy Smith now. At the sound of your fire, he
will support you with an attack on his side."
Grant sent a courier to Admiral Foote asking the gunboats to make a lot of
noise. He rode to Baldy Smith, an old regular army man who had been his
teacher at West Point, to tell him to counterattack immediately. He watched
Smith lead his men to breach the rebel entrenchments and lodge themselves
on a ridge where artillery could fire into the fort. In that way the defenses
could soon be broken. No escape; Grant had the rebels where he wanted
them. The trick, he knew almost instinctively, was to hit hard when everyone
was exhausted, when nobody wanted to hit or be hit. Your enemy never had
to know how weak or demoralized your men were; you had to be the one less
disgusted and disheartened by war.
Cabell stood guard, at General Buckner's order, at the door of the Confed-
erate generals' council. It was two in the morning. A white-faced Floyd
asked, "What is best now to be done?"
"We'll fight 'em to the death," vowed General Pillow dramatically. Cabell
frowned as he overheard that. In the heat of the attempt to break out a few
hours before, when Buckner wanted to press the attack, it had been Pillow,
now talking so tough, who had folded at the first sign of Union resistance and
insisted they return to the fort. Victory had been so closethe soldiers knew
it; for no reason, it seemed, the officers had given back the field so hard won.
"No, not now, not anymore," said Buckner wearily. "Their troops are
fresh, our men are exhausted. Grant will attack at daylight and I will not be
able to hold my position half an hour."
"Yes, you can!" Pillow shouted.
"The Second Kentucky is as good a regiment as we have in the service,"
said Buckner in a tired voice, and Cabell silently agreed. "An hour ago,
before I could rally and form them, I had to take at least twenty men by the
shoulders and pull them into line."
"We can still cut our way out," insisted Pillow; "fight the Yankees to their
death."
"Where the hell were you a couple of hours ago?" Buckner said bitterly.
"Another attempt would cost us three quarters of our men. No commander
has that right."
"I will never surrender. I will die first." It struck Cabell that Pillow seemed
eager to show a fierceness in council that he had not shown in the field.
"I cannot and will not surrender," said Floyd. "But I confess personal
reasons control me." Cabell and everybody in the fort knew what Floyd's
personal fears were: the Federals would probably try him for treason and
hang him. Why wasn't Sidney Johnston here, in command where and when it
counted? Cabell had heard from the corporal that Johnston would never have
folded yesterday.
"If the command of the army is turned over to me," Buckner said, "I will
surrender the army and share its fate."
"If I place you in command," asked Floyd, "will you allow me to get out?"
"I will," said Buckner.
"Then, sir, I turn over the command to General Pillow."
General Pillow immediately blurted, "I pass it."
"I assume it," said Buckner dutifully. "Give me pen and ink and paper and
send for a bugler. I will ask for terms."
The cavalry colonel in the corner, Nathan Bedford Forrest, spoke out.
"There's more fight in my men than you suppose. I will take out my com-
mand, no matter what the cost."
"You don't have the right to sacrifice five hundred men," said Buckner.
"I'll ask for volunteers," growled Colonel Forrest. Cabell had heard of
Forrest, a slave trader and all-around fearsome fellow.
"Let him cut his way out if he wants," said Pillow to Buckner. "Floyd and
I will go with him, unless the steamer is safer."
"There's no need to surrender," Forrest insisted. "I just sent two men up
the bank of the river and they didn't run into any Federal forces."
"The Federals' campfires are all lit," said Buckner.
"Those are old campfires. There's a high wind," reported Forrest, "so
they're blazing. You could walk two thirds of this garrison out to fight again,
and they'd never run into a Federal soldier."
Buckner was weary. "Colonel Forrest, take the cavalry out with you, those
who choose to go. And take Floyd and Pillow. I assure you, Colonel, I do not
look forward to spending the rest of the war in a prison camp, but I am in
command here."
"You know Grant; he's an old friend of yours," said Forrest. "Do you
suppose he would surrender, in your shoes?"
"Maybe Grant would sacrifice his army if he were in my shoes right now,"
Buckner replied evenly, "but I am a soldier, not a butcher. I will not give up
the lives of fifteen thousand men so that one or two thousand can escape."
"I came to fight, not to surrender," Forrest said. Cabell liked that attitude.
He assessed Floyd as a coward, Pillow as someone notio be trusted, Buckner
as honorableat least he would go to prison camp with his menbut as an
officer and a gentleman, too much the gentleman and not enough the officer.
Forrest, however, knew what this war was about. Cabell could claim no
knowledge of military tactics, but it occurred to him that neither could the
trio of generals here. Common sense suggested that the South did not have
enough men in uniform to be able to surrender a whole army. Besides, you
could never tell in a battlestrange things happened; maybe the defenders
could cut their way out without huge casualties, or even drive off the attack-
ers.
Cabell, standing rigidly at the door, wondered what his father would do in
these circumstances? He liked to think that General Breckinridge would
fight; but Father had a habit of trying the peaceful way. Cabell would fight, if
he had his way. Now, for the first time, the prospect of surrender's personal
effect occurred to him: the rest of Private Cabell's war would be spent in a
Yankee prison.
Grant showed Buckner's letter asking for terms to Baldy Smith. "It's not
Floyd or Pillow in command, it's Simon Bolivar Buckner," Grant said. Could
Buckner have been in charge all along? If so, Grant would never have taken
the chances he had; he'd thought he was fighting a couple of amateurs.
Maybe Floyd and Pillow were just sticking Buckner with the humiliation.
Grant remembered when Buckner had lent him the two hundred dollars
when he was down and out. "What should I say?"
"No terms to armed rebels," barked old soldier Smith. "Tell them what
Foote told them: immediate and unconditional surrender."
That was a good way of putting it. Ben Butler had demanded "full capitu-
lation" when he took Fort Hatteras in North Carolina last summer, but
Foote's phrase sounded more final. Laboriously, with papers spread out on
the kitchen table, Grant wrote the note to his old acquaintance from West
Point: "No terms except unconditional and immediate surrender can be ac-
cepted. I propose to move immediately upon your works." Two "im-
mediates" sounded awkward, but no mind, it was written. He added a closing
which he hoped Buckner would realize was meant for him: "I am, sir, very
respectfully, your obedient servant, U. S. Grant, Brigadier General, Com-
manding."
In the telegraph office at the War Department, Homer Bates looked up to
see the President come in. The telegrapher was handed a message to send
from Lincoln to General Halleck: "You have Fort Donelson safe, unless
Grant shall be overwhelmed from outside. Our success or failure at Fort
Donelson is vastly important, and I beg you to put your soul into the effort."
"How is your boy, sir?" Everyone in government knew of the President's
worry about his son Willie.
"I fear for him, Bates. I had another boy, Eddie, who had that same raspy
sound in his throat the last night. You'll send this right away?"
"The bastard," said Buckner: Grant, a failure in civilian life, was a failure
in military honor. No great or inspired generalship had earned Grant this
victory, Buckner was certain; it had been plain perseverance and luck in the
face of floundering and cowardice by the two politicians skulking aboard a
steamer leaving the dock at that very moment.
Reluctantly, Buckner wrote his reply: "The distribution of the forces under
my command, incident to an unexpected change of commanders, and the
overwhelming force under your command, compel me, notwithstanding the
brilliant success of the Confederate arms yesterday, to accept the ungenerous
and unchivalrous terms which you propose." He believed that duty and
honor required this first surrender of a Confederate army; the alternative,
with Grant, was prolonged butchery.
Buckner looked at the Breckinridge boy. "Orderly, take this to the messen-
ger for General Grant."
"Yes, sir. After that, can I make a break with Colonel Forrest? He's letting
every cavalryman take a foot soldier on the same horse."
Buckner was torn. He had told General Breckinridge he would look out for
his boy and not let him do anything foolish. Surrender, prison, perhaps ulti-
mate exchangenone of that was foolish, dreary though it would surely be
and, with the disease in the Federal camps, not devoid of danger. On the
other hand, perhaps Forrest was right and the campfires were misleading; it
would be foolish to give up. Buckner had already made his choice, protecting
the lives entrusted to him; he could not make it for Breck's boy, who knew
what he wanted to do.
"Take my horse, Breckinridge," he told the boy; "I won't be needing it.
You ride, don't you? All right, take my horse to Colonel Forrest and tell him
I ordered you to follow him out of here with as many as he can safely
manage."
"I'm grateful to you, sir."
"You're sure that's what you want? A lot of men will be killed trying to
break out. It is in no way dishonorable to remain for the surrender."
"I'll make a run for it with the cavalry."
"Report to General Breckinridge when you can," nodded Buckner. He was
childless, but hoped one day to have a son as courageous. "Tell him I tried to
keep my word."

CHAPTER 2
ENFORCED ANONYMITY
Anna Carroll wished Thurlow Weed would get back from Europe. She
needed writing assignments from railroad or banking interests that would pay
her enough to dine at Willard's once in a while. The government payment for
the war powers pamphlet was shamefully low$1,200, including printing
and the attack on Breckinridge had brought even less, although she had
supplemented the meager fee with a kickback from the printer. The interest
on the loan she had taken to help pay for the slaves she had bought and freed
last year was a constant worry.
When so much of importance cried out to be done, it was exasperating to
have to think about subsistence. She started to admit to herself there might be
something to be said for getting married, but then remembered Fillmore and
his complaints about a lack of pension to ex-presidents. She was better off
poor and free than half-poor and compromised.
Chase, a widower and obviously wealthy, would be something elsea man
to discuss great issues with, to share the play of power. She remembered Kate
and put it out of her mind. She was not about to compete with a child.
A crowd had gathered around the newsstand in front of Willard's. She
waited until the jostling let upno small woman could compete in a crowd
and then bought a paper. The Intelligencer headline made her catch her
breath: "REBEL ARMY CAPTURED!" She gulped down the details of the Union
victory in the West: nearly twenty thousand rebels taken, the first crushing
defeat of Confederate arms, the heroism of the gunboats under Admiral
Foote, and especially the emergence of a victorious general, U. S.for "Un-
conditional Surrender"Grant. The strategic significance of the capture of
the mouth of the Tennessee and Cumberland was beyond the ken of the
correspondents in the field, but columns of praise appeared for Grant, extol-
ling the ease with which he had routed the rebels. Scorn was heaped on the
traitors Floyd and Pillow, slinking away from their command to avoid jus-
tice.
Anna felt a surge of triumph, vindication of all she had been through to
persuade obstinate men of the wisdom of her strategy. Her Tennessee plan
was in operation. The success of her river strategy's first stage, even to the
inundation of Fort Henry's guns at high tide, was evidence of what imagina-
tion and daring could do to transform the war. Let the commanders in the
East issue their ridiculous bulletins of "All Quiet on the Potomac"; now the
Army of the West was on the march, or on the boats, cutting into the heart of
the South.
Who would share this moment with her? The Wades, who had helped her
press the plan with Lincoln, were all involved with what seemed to Anna
inconsequential domestic affairs: the Homestead Act, selling up to 160 acres
of Western land to settlers for $2.50 an acre, and the bill that Wade and Justin
Morrill of Vermont had been pushing to give away public land to agricultural
and vocational colleges. It irritated her that Ben Wade would take time away
from the prosecution of the war to provide for federal aid to hardscrabble
farmers and visionary educators.
Tom Scott was the one who had placed her memo of November 30 before
Lincoln, and again before Stanton after that scary man had taken over the
War Department. Scott was the friend for her to see and savor this moment
with; Anna guessed he would be at the office now, after supper. He was near
the telegraph office as well; Lincoln or Stanton might be there.
She hurried the three blocks across Washington's frozen mud past the
President's house to the War Department. Discipline had broken down at the
telegraph office; the mood in that usually somber place was frenzied delight.
Someone had broken out champagne; Grant's name, along with that of Hal-
leck's, was toasted time and again. Messengers on their way to the President,
clutching telegrams from Halleck, were stopping to read them in the halls to
everyone who came by. Stanton was not on the scene.
Curiously, Tom Scott was not especially excited. He sat alone in his office,
tossing the contents of his desk into a packing crate.
"Tom, it workedmy plan, it worked!"
"You have a right to be very proud, Anna."
"What's all this?" She pointed to the crates. "You're being sent out West
again? Another report?"
"No, I'm going home. War's over for me." He seemed relieved. "Glad to
leave on a note of victory."
"Stanton?"
Scott nodded. "He's a wild man. I can't work for him."
Anna's heart sank. Tom Scott was one of the few who knew her part in
conceiving and detailing the Tennessee plan, and one of the few men close to
the President that she trusted. It occurred to her that Scott, as a railroader,
would be a source of consultant fees again, but that was not as important as
ensuring that her plan was carried out clear down to the rail junction at
Corinth, as well as getting her fair recognition as its author.
"You can't go. Lincoln knows you. You brought him down here past the
assassins in Baltimore"
"Stanton, the 'organizer of victory,' wants his own man."
"Who?"
"His brother-in-law for the time being, but I suspect the one he has in mind
is the newspaperman Dana, Horace Greeley's right arm. Stanton and Dana
have been exchanging secret messages for months."
That was why Stanton was so quickly welcomed by the radicals, despite the
initial belief that he was a Seward man; the Tribune in New York always took
Stanton's side. The switch of assistants made political sense, Anna quickly
figured; she kicked herself for not having cultivated Dana at the recent White
House reception.
She knew Scott well enough to put her own concerns to him directly.
"Look, Tom, you're my best friend here. Who else knows how hard I worked
to get this campaign in the West under way?"
"Stanton," Scott said mildly, "and the kid in the telegraph room. Maybe
Halleck, maybe not. Maybe Grant."
"What do you mean, 'Maybe Grant'? He has to have the plan, and my
name is on the memorandum to Lincoln about it. I spoke at length with
Grant's river pilot in Cairo"
Scott shook his head slowly. "You're no stranger to politics, Anna. Every-
body's fighting for credit for this win at Donelson. Last month, Old Brains
Halleck brushed me offwhen I went over it with him, pretended I was stupid.
Then when Grant came up with the same idea1 mean, basically, it jumps
out at you when you look at the map1 hear Halleck threw him out of his
office."
Anna gave him an icy look. "It didn't jump out at anybody until Novem-
ber, when I wrote it all down."
"It was your plan, Anna, but I'm telling you not to count on credit." He
stopped packing and looked directly at her. "Halleck despises Grant, thinks
he's a drunk. He only grudgingly gave Grant permission to help the navy
move on the forts when Lincoln sent the general order. Now Old Brains is
out to grab all the credit for Donelsonwants Lincoln and McClellan to
name him commander in the West over Buell's army too."
She concluded that Scott did not grasp the pressure of public sentiment.
"All the papers are making Grant the hero. Halleck wasn't near the action.
He never gets off hisout of his chair."
"McClellan may agree with Halleck. Little Mac doesn't want any big he-
roes making him look like number two. He knows Halleck is no threat."
"Ah, Miss Carroll." The rasping voice was Stanton's. "It's fitting that you
are here. Colonel Scott, would you try to bring some order to this chaos in the
halls? Must I be present at every moment? Come with me, dear lady." He led
the way to his office and motioned her to a chair beside his desk.
"Congratulations, Mr. Secretary," she took the lead, "on a great victory.
We would never have turned the tide in the West were it not for your leader-
ship. I believe this is the turning point of the war."
"It was your plan, Miss Carroll," he said. She relaxed a bit; that was
gratifying. When Stanton went on to say, "You will see how the Tennessee
River strategy develops exactly as you worked it out," she sighed in relief.
She should have known better than to panic at the suggestion of a man, even
an old friend like Scott, who was bitter about being replaced. With Stanton's
acknowledgment, as well as that of Chairman Wade of the Committee on the
Conduct of the War, proper credit to the woman who had put forward the
plan to invade the South down the Tennessee River was assured. A place in
history was hers, as well as financial security, and beyond that, greater respect
for women generally. Not to mention a quicker end to the war. She smiled at
Stanton, she hoped modestly.
"I want to ask you for a further contribution to your country," Stanton
said, pulling at the white part of his beard. Another assignment? "I want you
to keep secret the planning of the Tennessee and Cumberland action. Com-
pletely secret."
She said nothing.
"For the time being," the Secretary of War continued, "we must give the
credit where it is not quite dueeither to Halleck or Grant, depending on
which one best suits the President's and the nation's interests. Say nothing,
my dear lady."
"Why?"
"First, because the plan is hardly begun, and it should remain a secret until
we take control in Corinth and cut the Memphis to Charleston railroad. And
secondly"he walked to the window"how shall I put this? The nation
needs military heroes. It would hardly do if any of the conception of this
strategy were attributed to a civilian."
By "a civilian," he meant "a woman." She swallowed and remained silent.
"Let the military men be seen as the great geniuses. We all know that the
character and strategy of this war will come from here, in the War Depart-
ment, and not from the officers in the field. Certainly not from our spit-and-
polish General-in-Chief. I have great difficulties with McClellan, my dear
lady. I need your help with him."
She decided quickly she had no alternative but to go along; when it suited
Stanton to diminish Halleck or Grant, she might get recognition. "I know
how to keep a secret, Secretary Stanton. Trust me, as I trust you." She added,
for insurance, "And Senator Wade."
"Create your own writing assignments," Stanton said grandly, "for which
there will be proper recompense, of course. I'll arrange that with Scott."
He pulled the cord that summoned an aide and sent for the departing
Assistant Secretary of War. "Miss Carroll will continue to submit military
studies," he snapped, "and you will arrange for approval of expenses for time
and travel. Do that before you go, will you, Scott? And where is my amnesty
order?"
"It's the President's executive order," Scott corrected him. "I sent it across
the street."
Stanton's irritation showed. "All political prisoners will be released," he
told Anna, "when they subscribe to a parole that they will give no further aid
and comfort to the enemy. What sort of a reaction to this act of conciliation
do you suppose we can expect in the press?"
"The Peace Democrats will see it as an act of mercy long overdue," she
said, "but the black Republicans will think Lincoln is going soft."
"If I tap that bell over there," Stanton said mildly, "I can send anybody in
the country to a place where they will never hear the dogs bark. We are not
going soft on traitors, Miss Carroll, and I would be grateful if you would get
that word to your many influential friends."
"What about the captain of the slave ship, sentenced to be hanged?" The
abolitionists in New York were eager to hang their first slave-ship captain.
"Nathaniel Gordon hangs tomorrow," Stanton said, relishing the words.
"No clemency from here."
"Rose Greenhow?"
Stanton frowned. "I would like to get rid of her presence one way or the
other. In jail, she made an ass of Seward, and she is driving Pinkerton crazy.
Devilish woman. Will she sign a parole?"
"She'd die first," Anna told him. Rose O'Neal Greenhow was not the type
of person to promise to spend the war doing nothing for the Confederacy.
"We'll put her on trial, then." Stanton looked uncomfortable at that pros-
pect. "I just wish I had a spy like her working for us in Richmond."
On their way out of the War Department, Scott and Carroll met a dis-
traught John Hay hurrying in to see Stanton.
"Isn't it exciting," Anna began, setting aside Stanton's request for her
silence, "just as we hoped in that plan I wrote back in November"
"Is Stanton upstairs?"
Scott said yes.
"Get him to disperse the crowds outside, making all that noise," ordered
Hay, "and for God's sake, shut up that band on Pennsylvania Avenue."
"Come on, now, Hay, this is their first real victory."
"Willie just died."
Anna winced. "How is the President taking it?"
"He came staggering into our office," said Hay, "and said, 'He's gone, my
boy is actually gone,' and burst into tears. Never saw him so upset."
"And the boy's mother?"
"She let out a long wail," said the secretary, "that was as terrifying a sound
as I've ever heard. And there's no stopping her hysterics. Scott, for God's
sake, get some soldiers and make them stop that noise outside, will you?"
CHAPTER 2

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
FEBRUARY 28, 1862

A passage in the opening of the new Dickens novel describes the mood of the
Mansion this week. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times . . .
the spring of hope . . . the winter of despair."
We barely had time to savor the great news of the capture of the rebel army
at Donelson when a blanket of gloom descended with the death of Willie. At
one point, all I could hear was the sound of revelry outside and the screams of
the Hellcat down the hall.
Thank God for Lizzie Keckley. If it weren't for her calming effect on the
Prsdt's wife, Madame's hysteria would never let up. Maybe it's because of
Lizzie's recent loss of her own son, or the fact that she suffered through
slavery, or some inner source of strength that makes itself felt in a mystic way
whatever it is, the Hellcat clings to Lizzie and sobs and cries for hours on
end until she passes out.
Willie's body lay in state in the Green Room downstairs, and thousands of
people trooped through. Mrs. Lincoln could not leave her bed even for the
funeral. That was just as well, because too many of the visitors made snide
comments about the way she threw a splendid ball when her boy lay dying.
Unfair; why do they hate her so, even now? I've never been her champion,
and fear that her state of mind is becoming another great burden for the
Prsdt, but she's not evil.
They buried Willie in the Carroll family vault at Oak Hill cemetery. Sena-
tor Orville Browning, the Lincoln family's closest friend now that Ned Baker
is gone, made the funeral arrangements. Browning spoke to Anna Carroll
about the proper place to bury the boy and she put him in touch with her
remote Washington kin, and that solved the interment problem.
Then we all had another scare when Tad came down with a fever, and the
Prsdt sat in his room one terrible night, but it wasn't the typhoid that struck
Willie, and Tad is better now. He has taken to sleeping regularly in his
father's bed.
This paralysis cannot go on. Too much is pressing in. I have urgent re-
quests for appointments with Senator Wade, who wants to reprimand Gener-
als Halleck and McClellan for allowing slaveholders to search for fugitive
slaves on army posts, and with Senator Sumner, who wants to know if Lin-
coln will oppose a bill abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia. The
radical Republicans are going too fast, and forgetting the plan Lincoln and
old Blair worked out for paying states to gradually buy slaves their freedom.
I think I'll try to get Lizzie to get the Prsdt to focus on this. He cannot
grieve for his boy or fret about his wife's temporary derangement for long.
This is not the only house in the nation draped in mourning.
CHAPTER 4
SOURCE OF STRENGTH
"Madam Elizabeth," Mr. Lincoln said, "I want to bring Mother here by the
window."
Lizzie Keckley did not think that was such a good idea. She put her arm
behind Mary Lincoln's back, supporting her weight as she helped the Presi-
dent's wife out of bed. The modiste could feel her uncontrollable trembling.
After one of her hysterical fits, screams piercing the Mansion walls, the poor
woman would lie shaking for about a half hour.
"Mother, do you see that large white building on the hill yonder?"
Mary Lincoln looked and her trembling increased.
"Try and control your grief," the President said sternly. He pointed to a
white building that Keckley knew to be the lunatic asylum. "Control your
grief, or it will drive you mad, and we may have to send you there."
That was a terrifying threat. The modiste thought Mr. Lincoln was cruelly
wrong to remind his wife of the insanity in her family and where that distrac-
tion was likely to put her. At the same time, Mrs. Lincoln's black friend
could see how badly the President wanted to force a limit to his wife's un-
healthy reaction to the loss of their beloved Willie.
Mrs. Lincoln had to pull herself together. The Mansion could not long
continue to be draped in black. Nor could the President's wife be permitted to
reach out to spiritualists, because they could not bring the boy back. Mrs.
Keckley, a religious woman, would have no truck with the conjurers. Last
night, Mrs. Lincoln had arranged a seance with a spiritualist and had all but
physically dragged her husband along. That troubled the modiste: the Presi-
dent of the United States should not be sitting at a seance, listening to thuds
and whispers in the darkness, even to humor his wife who refused to accept
God's will in the reality of her loss.
After that strange session, and after Mrs. Lincoln had sobbed for an hour
before collapsing in exhaustion, Mrs. Keckley made ready to leave the bed-
room. The President motioned for her to sit in one of the chairs near the bed.
"It's a wonder you're not exhausted, Madam Elizabeth. I don't see how you
do it."
She did not mention that she would spend much of the remainder of the
night sewing in her room. The dress orders had to be filled, the needed money
to be earned. She was now supporting six jobless black freedmen who were
wondering if freedom meant the freedom to starve. Mr. Lincoln did not want
to be alone, obviously, and people at sad times like this had a way of unbur-
dening their souls to her. She never knew why; she rarely asked a question.
She assumed that because she did not seek confidences, peopleimportant
white people, especiallyconfided in her.
The President started to speak of his dead boy. When he came to the words
"Willie was too good for this world," the tall man hunched forward and
broke into sobs. She let him cry silently for a while, then rose and stroked his
head. The hair was stiff, uncombed, unwashed. He leaned his forehead
against her hip, took some deep breaths, and tried to compose himself. She
saw him fumbling in his pocket for a handkerchief that was not there. She
went to the bureau and brought back the piece of white cloth and he wiped
his eyes and blew his nose. She also handed him her Bible.
When he could talk again, he told her that he did not read the Bible often,
but when he did, he found the most interest in the Book of Job. She found
that curious: in all of Scripture, she found the story of Job, with his defiant
questioning of God, to be almost blasphemous. Job kept demanding to know
why the wicked could triumph and the good die young if God was just, until
God finally had to tell Job to stop bothering Him.
The melancholy man wondered aloud if he had been unkind to point out
the asylum to his wife. The modiste was glad he felt bad about that. He
admitted to his own lifelong experience with "the hypo," those moods of deep
melancholy that gripped him for days on end, when he could not think
straight, hardly work at all. The first time the hypo struck, he told her, was
after the death of a young girl he knew in New Salem. Brain fever. He had
been a boarder at Rutledge's Tavern, and the girl was engaged to another
man in Salem, but she was nineteen and dear to him. The inexplicable cutting
short of her life recalled to his mind the death of his mother, Nancy Hanks
Lincolnhe remembered her withered features and want of teethand his
sister Sarah's death in childbirth at twenty-one, she who had mothered him as
well.
Ever since, he told the black freedwoman, obviously taking some comfort
in the telling, he had suffered periods in which a dark cloud overtook him and
all he could think of was death and loss and emptiness, and, of late, rivers of
the blood of war. That was why he had to force himself and his wife to shake
off the corrosive sadness surrounding the loss of their favorite child.
He said all this with his head in his huge hands, looking down at the floor
in the darkness, alternating stretches of revelation with periods of silence. She
struck a match and lit a lamp.
He looked up. "There is a poem that expresses my feelings," he said. He
proceeded to recite verses that ended with the line, "Why Should the Spirit of
Mortal Be Proud?" It took five minutes, and he recited with an actor's ex-
pression. She liked the poem. It spoke of humility in a proud way.
He changed the subject, seeming a bit perkier after the recitation. "I'm not
the only one around here who gets this way."
One night in the telegraph office, he related, Secretary of War Stanton had
told him that he had been inconsolable after the death of a baby daughter,
and could not leave his dead wife's grave for a month. Further, Stanton had
told Lincoln about his brother's committing suicide, and his own morbid
desire to do the same when he heard the news. Yet Stanton was a strong man
and a successful lawyer, Lincoln told her, the best in the country. The hypo
grabs a person sometimes for days, even weeks, but it goes away by itself, or is
driven away in time by a force of will. He insisted it was not a sign of
weakness, citing Stanton as his evidence.
She did not see the similarity but said nothing. She had heard that Stanton
flew off the handle, even went into the most terrible rages, and then could cry
like a child, but his despair was not like Lincoln's. The President, she had
observed, could be seized by gloom, remembering how death was so much a
part of his life, and it was a weakness, all right, but never a cause for panic.
Stanton, she had observed, was brilliant and all, but he lived at the edge of
panic, as if he were never sure he would remain in control. She judged that
there was great sadness in Lincoln, but real fear and rage in Stanton, who
reminded her a bit of her late husband.
"I saw a slave in chains once," the President said, "when I was sailing
down the Ohio with Josh Speed. There were twelve slaves on the river
steamer, all chained together like so many fish upon a trotline. I asked about
them. They were from Kentucky, my home state, torn from family and
friends on their way to the Deep South."
"The life is different there," said Elizabeth Keckley. "In Virginia I had a
kind master, never beat me except when I was bad. Then times got bad and
he sold me South."
"How old were you?"
"Eighteen. Were there any girls on the chain you saw?"
"No," Lincoln said, looking into the past, closing his eyes, "all young men.
One had a fiddle, and he played while the others sang and danced, as well as
they could in the chains, and joked and played card games. I suppose God
tempers the wind to the shorn lamb."
"That means?"
"He renders the worst of the human condition tolerable, while He permits
the best to be no better than tolerable." He looked over at the sleeping form
of his troubled wife. "I still think of that spectacle," he said; "it's a torment to
me. Slavery has the power of making me miserable."
"No, God does not always temper the wind," said the black woman. That
one look at the men in chains was this man's only exposure to the reality of
slavery. How could he have any idea what it was like? He had seen the blacks
on the river joke and dance, and assumed they were happy. Why did he
believe that blacks had some special protection from God that numbed their
misery?
She had never spoken of her youth to any man, black or white, but here
and now, in the midst of his anguish, she felt it had a place and was the time.
And maybe she had been called upon to help him feel the way it was.
"The wife of my new master in Carolina thought I was uppity. I did my
work and more, but I wouldn't cringe and scrape, and she complained about
my stubborn pride. So one day he called me in and told me to take down my
dress and said he was going to flog me."
She could see that man's face as clearly as Lincoln's. "I said no, not with-
out a reason. He got a rope and tied my hands behind me. I fought as hard as
I could and he tore the dress from my back." She could not stop telling it now
if she wanted to. "Then he picked up a rawhide and began to beat me. He'd
nerve himself for a blow and then smash down on my flesh, cut my skin1
could feel the blood running down into my skirt. I didn't scream. I stood like
a statue."
She drew herself tall. "When he finished, I asked him what I had done
wrong, and he picked up a chair and hit me over the head with that.
"Next day he sent for me again, and I saw he was prepared with a new rope
and a new cowhide. I told him I was ready to die but he could not conquer
me. In the fight with him, I bit his finger, and he hit me with a heavy stick
until I was dizzy. A couple days later Mr. Bingham again tried to conquer
me, and we struggled and I caught it in the head again, but when I woke up
he was crying. As I lay there bleeding, I saw that my suffering had subdued
his hard heart. He asked my forgiveness. He said he would never hit me
again, and he kept his word."
"Thank God," said Lincoln.
"That was not the worst," she continued. "I was young and considered
fair, and I was sold to a man who had evil designs on me. One day he bid me
take down my clothes, and I refused. He tied me, too, but this time tried to
have his way with my body, and I fought and scratched him. Then he beat
the backs of my legs with a horsewhip until I couldn't move for a week. I still
have those marks, and I have walked slowly ever since." She had heard her
customers say that her walk gave her dignity; if she walked any faster, she
would be in pain.
"The next time he came at me, I did not have the strength left to defend
myself. He took me that way whenever he wanted for four years. That was
the real suffering, worse than the beatings, knowing I was a toy he could play
with whenever he wanted. Mr. Lincoln, it's like not being a person. That's
what a slave isnot a human being anymore. Just an animal that's used to
give a mean mistress satisfaction or to give a master pleasure."
She was breathing heavily and put her hand on her chest to catch her
breath. Once it started to come out there was no stopping. "Finally he
stopped having me when he saw I was to become a mother. I brought a boy
into the world, and if he suffered humiliation because he was the son of a
slave, it was not my fault. My boy looked white. He got his freedom when I
bought mine. And then, passing for white, he joined the Union Army."
"Where is he now?" asked the President.
"Safe in his grave," she replied. "Miss Carroll found out all about the
battle that killed him, and wrote me he died a hero." She patted the letter in
her bosom but did not take it out. "That's why I can feel for Mrs. Lincoln.
When your boy dies, it makes you feel like there is nothing to stand on,
nothing comes after you, all your life's been a waste."
"No, no, never a waste," said Lincoln. They sat in silence for a long time.
Had she struck the right note? Had she made him see that the political
subject he had debated about all his life was more than a mere matter of right
and wrong? She was vaguely dissatisfied; the pride that burned inside her, so
harshly beaten down for so long, was important for him to understand. The
moment would not come again, and nobody who was black might ever have
the chance to make him know the living hell of slavery.
"It is not just the cruelty," she added. "It's the no hope. Do you know
Senator Davis?"
"I never met Jeff Davis."
"I made all Mrs. Davis's dresses. I lived in their home for a while. He is a
fine man, kind, in many ways like you." Not quite trueMr. Davis was
distant; she could never have had a talk like this with him. "Not so easy to
talk to, maybe, but a good man. He'd never raise his hand to a black man, not
cruel in any way. But he doesn't know what it is like to have no hope, to
never be yourself." She felt inadequate, disappointed because of her inability
to show that slavery was infinitely more cruel to the mind than to the body.
Maybe it was better to appeal on the basis of the pain of the lash; anybody
could testify to that. The need for dignity was hard to explain to anyone who
had always been free.
"You're a good judge of people, Madam Elizabeth," Lincoln's voice was
stronger now. "What sort is Jeff Davis? If you lived in their house"
"A gentleman," she said. "Honorable. God-fearing." She thought about it.
"Strong," she added. "He sticks with the people he trusts. It don't matter
what people say or what the papers write, he'll do what he thinks is right.
Even if it's wrong." She thought of the Davises' many kindnesses, and wanted
to end on a note of special truth. "He's not a man who hates anybody. I can't
hate him."
They sat for a long time in silence. Mrs. Lincoln's breathing was labored,
but she was not crying out as on other nights. The President seemed to fall
asleep in his chair, and she moved quietly to the door.
As she left, she heard him say, partly to her, more to himself, "I'll see
Wade and Sumner tomorrow, but I cannot do what they want about abolition
in the District. Too soon. It's too soon."

CHAPTER5
EDGE OF THE CROWBAR
George Nicolay let his assistant, Hay, have the day off to see his secret
ladylove. Nicolay, at thirty, was six years Hay's senior, and had for years
been in awe of the young man's talent, joie de vivre, and self-confidence.
They had met in Pittsfield, an Illinois prairie village where the fatherless
Nicolay had been eking out a living as a printer's devil on the Pike County
Free Press and the well-to-do Hay had been preparing to go to Brown College
back East. Nicolay had hoped to join his younger friend at the college, but
had neither the money for the expensive school nor the physical stamina for
the trip. Instead, the newspaper and the local political headquarters became
the Bavarian-born Nicolay's college, and his introduction to the lawyer and
politician Abraham Lincoln.
As Nicolay studied law at night, he ran Lincoln's political errands, pro-
vided him with election tabulations, and made himself useful: when Lincoln
needed to make his peace with the Know-Nothings in 1860, it was Nicolay he
sent to their leader in Terre Haute with the written instructions, explicit in
their vagueness, "tell him my motto is 'Fairness to all' but commit me to
nothing." By that time Hay was back from college and found a job on the
Biairs' newspaper, and then, through his Uncle Milton, to Lincoln's inner
circle in Springfield, where Nicolay welcomed his only real friend's high
spirits and his help.
On occasion, Nicolay felt about Hay the way Robert Lincoln probably used
to feel about Willie: envy at his natural charm and his easy intimacy with
Lincoln, tempered by affection engendered by the irresistible youngster. Hay
never challenged Nicolay's preeminence in the officepartly, Nicolay sus-
pected, because he did not want the heavy responsibility. Hay had a mischie-
vous streak and a sense of fun which put him in special tune with Lincoln in
an area where Nicolay could never hope to compete: it was Hay, not the first
assistant, that Lincoln sought out at night, carpet slippers flapping, to swap
funny stories.
If there was anything that worried Nicolay about his junior partner, it was
Hay's ease at manipulation: he had a genius for jollying people along, and an
immature way of shaping the facts to fit his positions. They had agreed to join
in the writing of a history of the Lincoln administration; Nicolay felt the
responsibility of writing history with accuracy, and worried that Hay would
use the chance to get even with those who had stood in Lincoln's way. He
hoped his assistant was keeping his diary with fidelity, but doubted it.
Nicolay, who had always been sickly, worried about the way Hay, who had
always been robust, abused his health. How could anyone, he asked himself,
stagger home at 3 A.M. and be ready for a day's work at nine? In addition to
the usual carousing, Hay had been putting in eighteen-hour days in the two
weeks since the tumultuous period of the grande lev6e, the victory at Fort
Donelson, and the death of Willie. He also showed the mooning signs of
falling in love. Nicolay, faithful to his Therena at home in Illinois, took
vicarious pleasure in Hay's romantic escapades, as did Lincoln, but Nicolay
noted that he seemed flushed this morning, and ordered him to bed; the
young man accepted and gratefully collapsed.
Nicolay sent his second assistant, the studious Stoddard, to fetch Ben
Wade, whose chairmanship of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the
War was rapidly making him the most important man in Congress. Nicolay
considered that to be a remarkable achievement for a leader of what was,
after all, only a minority faction of abolitionists.
"What in hell do you mean, 'too soon'?" roared the senator as soon as he
and the President squared off.
Nicolay knew that Lincoln would take no offense at the bluster, because
that was the way the fellow addressed everybody.
"The time is not yet ripe," said Lincoln, on his feet, walking around the
office as usual.
"You've been saying 'too soon, too soon,' since the day after Bull Run."
Wade mocked. "Remember? Chandler and Sumner and I were in here telling
you that you should proclaim emancipation or, at the very least, announce
that the end of slavery was the supreme object of this war. But all you
pleaded then was 'Kentucky, Kentucky.' Now we have Kentucky. After
Donelson surrendered, Sidney Johnston skedaddled out of Kentucky, and
Nashville, Tennessee, is about to fall in our lap. You don't have your old
border-state excuse anymore."
"Abolition is too big a lick," said Lincoln. "We're recruiting soldiers in
Kentucky, and in Maryland and Missouri, and while they'll fight for the
Union, they won't join up to fight for abolition. Most people are for 'the
Union as it was'with slavery where it is, but no extension into the territo-
ries. Ben, slavery cannot exist for long if all the new states are free states, you
know that."
"What you lack, Lincoln, is backbone." Nicolay, in the back of the room,
wondered if Lincoln's temper would flare at that. It did not; evidently the
President was aware of that charge and preferred to have it buried directly at
him than spoken behind his back. "You know this war is about slavery.
You're afraid to admit it."
"I'm going to name Senator Andrew Johnson to be military governor of
Tennessee," the President said coolly, showing some backbone by deliberately
offending the radical Republicans: Johnson was a War Democrat and a native
Tennessean who would attract support in that newly liberated state. Wade
and his crowdwhich, Nicolay noted, now had two Cabinet members in its
ranks, with Stanton joining Chasehad demanded an abolitionist in that
post.
"We'll fight him in the Senate," said Wade. "And to show we mean busi-
ness, we'll pass a confiscation bill. Not symbolic, like last year, but one with
teeth in it."
"That's not needed," said Lincoln quickly.
"Every rebel is an outlaw," boomed Wade, rising and sinking on his toes as
he did on the Senate floor. "I am for inflicting all the consequences of defeat
on a fallen foe that started an unjust war. I am for confiscating the property
of rebelstaking every slave from every damn rebel, thereby making the
slave owners pay the cost of this rebellion."
"What good will that do? A confiscation bill would only hurt us in the
border states and make the South fight all the harder."
"God! You must be listening to Seward again, and the Biairs. Not even a
galvanic battery could inspire any action in your Cabinet."
"We didn't go into the war to put down slavery," Lincoln said, giving not
an inch, "but to put the flag back."
"Times have changed."
Lincoln did not agree. "To act differently at this moment would, I have no
doubt, not only weaken our cause but smack of bad faith. Your thunderbolt
will keep."
Wade seated himself, which Nicolay took as the prelude to dickering. A
confiscation act was too extreme to have any hope of passage; Wade had just
thrown that out to open the negotiation.
"You can expect to see a fugitive-slave bill on your desk soon," Wade
predicted, putting forward a step toward abolition that had wider appeal, "to
keep your damned pro-slavery Democratic generals like McClellan and Hal-
leck from turning over slaves that are running away from rebel owners. Try to
veto that."
Nicolay knew that Lincoln did not want to face the need to veto that, and
the President's attitude became more conciliatory.
"Just last night," he said, a shadow of sadness crossing his face, "I began to
think that this terrible war was a great movement by God to end slavery. And
that the man would be a fool who should stand in the way." Wade waited for
more. "The other day I was telling Sumner that the only difference between
him and me on this subject is a difference of a month or six weeks in time."
"He told me you said that," Wade shot back. "Only it wasn't the other day,
it was a month or six weeks ago." A telling point, Nicolay conceded.
"Too big a lick right now. But how's this" Lincoln reached in his drawer
and came up with a few lines in his handwriting scrawled on a piece of paper.
He handed it to Senator Wade.
The Ohioan squinted at it and read aloud: "I recommend the adoption of a
Joint Resolution by your honorable bodies: 'Resolved that the United States
ought to cooperate with any state which may adopt gradual abolishment of
slavery, giving to such state pecuniary aid, to be used by such state in its
discretion to compensate for the evils public and private, produced by such a
change of system.' " Wade read it again silently, lips moving.
"It's the initiation of emancipation," Nicolay dared to put in.
"Thin milk-and-water gruel," snorted Wade, shooting the young man a
withering glance, but holding on to the paper. "It would take a hundred years
your way."
"In my judgment," said the President carefully, "gradual and not sudden
emancipation is better for all. Not all the slave states will undertake it, but as
the loyal slave states doKentucky, for exampleit will become apparent to
the Deep South that no hope exists for border states to join the Confederacy
when peace comes."
"This is the best you can do?" asked Wade, dissatisfied but apparently
unwilling to let this first, tentative move by the President toward abolition go
unsupported.
"It is a start," said Lincoln.
The senator passed the paper back, motioning to Lincoln to make a
change. "I don't know why you say 'abolishment' when you mean 'aboli-
tion.' " Nicolay was surprised that Wade caught that; Lincoln deliberately
had sought to avoid the more incendiary word. "And you don't mean 'evils,'
you mean 'inconveniences.' No move toward freedom can be evil."
Lincoln acknowledged that the latter was true and made the change. Wade
was not one to be taken into camp by minor adjustments, however, and made
to leave with a firm, "It's not enough. You cannot buy your way out of
slavery, and you know it. This is just a palliative."
When Lincoln did not contradict him, but just looked quizzical, Wade
made a suggestion: "Abolish slavery just in the District of Columbia. No
states-rights argument works here, Lincolnthis is a federal city. Now, that
would be a start."
"I once introduced a bill to that effect when I was a Congressman in the
forties," the President said mildly, in what Nicolay knew to be his horse-
trading voice. "It hasn't been expedient to put it forward recently, but my
opinion hasn't changed."
"I'll go for your waste-of-time resolution to pay off the border-state slave
owners," offered Wade, "if you'll send us a bill rooting out the evil in the
District."
"I won't send it to you," Lincoln countered, "but if you pass one and send
it to me, I'll sign it. Provided it includes compensation to the owners."
"That's a bargain," snapped Wade, going up to Lincoln and pumping his
hand once to put a seal on it. "We'll pass your thin gruel, and mark my
words, the loyal slave states will laugh at you. The border states people won't
sell their slavesthey like the damnable institution. But we'll put the fear of
God in those bastards by freeing the slaves in the District."
"You initiate abolishment in the District, I'll sign it," said Lincoln, "but it
has to include compensation. And my resolution about gradual emancipation
comes first."
"Done." He went to the door. "Remember, Lincoln"a Parthian shot
"the word is abolition!"
A week later, with Lincoln's proposed joint resolution sent to Congress,
followed by a March 6 message on gradual emancipation issued by the Presi-
dentbut with the second step of abolishing slavery in the District not yet
takenNicolay ushered in Henry Raymond, editor of the New York Times,
whose closeness to William Seward and Thurlow Weed was well known after
their falling-out with Horace Greeley. Raymond had been summoned by
Lincoln; the Times was not as influential as Greeley's Tribune, and neither
had the circulation of Bennett's Herald, but it was one of the only three eight-
page dailies in the United States and had been a loyal supporter of Lincoln.
"I'm just reading some of the New York journals, Henry," Lincoln began.
Actually, Nicolay had been reading those newspapers to him that morning,
starting out with the praise, as Lincoln liked, but including later some of the
criticism. Nicolay had noted the surprise defection of the Times and the
President would have none of that.
"Here's the Tribune, the World, the Evening Post"Lincoln pushed them
all forward"all have written excellent editorials about my message on grad-
ual, compensated emancipation."
"I've seen those, sir, yes," said Raymond. "I think I know what you're
getting at."
"And here's the New York Times, the one paper I thought I could count
on, saying that my proposal is 'well intentioned, but must fail on the score of
expense.' Did you write this?"
"Actually, it was done by one of my editors." The editor squirmed. "If you
figure slaves at four hundred dollars a head, and that there must be at least
three or four million slaves, you get into astronomical numbers."
"Have you stopped to figure," said Lincoln severely, "that less than one
half-day's cost of this war would pay for all the slaves in Delaware, at four
hundred dollars a head? That eighty-seven days' cost of this war would pay
for all in Delaware, Maryland, District of Columbia, Kentucky, and Missouri
at the same price?"
"I hadn't looked at it that way, Mr. President."
"Were those states to take the step I suggest, do you doubt that it would
shorten the war more than eighty-seven days, and thus be an actual saving of
expense?"
"You're absolutely right, Mr. Lincoln."
"Think about it, then, and let there be another article in the Times. "
"I will telegraph my office to sustain your message without qualifications or
cavil, sir." Nicolay was glad that Lincoln had not had to put on greater
pressure, which he had readily available. Stanton had just issued an order
putting military censorship into effect, forbidding publication of intelligence
about military operations on pain of losing all access to the telegraph.
Lincoln put his arm around the editor, who had state political ambitions of
his own, and walked him to the door. "It is important that the Times be on
the right side of this."
"I regard your message as a masterpiece of practical wisdom," said Ray-
mond as he disappeared down the hall, "and of sound policy."
Nicolay smiled; the editor had felt the heat and seen the light.
"Nicolay," Lincoln said, "what's the commotion out there?"
Running toward him was one of Stanton's new assistants.
Nicolay took the message, a dispatch from General Wool in Fort Monroe
in Hampton Roads. That was the port where the Union fleet was massing to
help McClellan begin his Peninsula campaign to take Richmond by the water
route. Nicolay saw its urgency and hurried to Lincoln, who read the telegram
aloud:
" The Merrimack is loose. It has sunk the Cumberland, compelled the
Congress to surrender, and forced the Minnesota aground. No wooden ship
can stop the iron monster.' "

CHAPTER 6
TIN CAN ON A SHINGLE
"Father Neptune" (Navy Secretary Gideon Welles knew that was what Lin-
coln called him behind his back) arrived at the Cabinet room in time to watch
a panic stricken "Mars" (the Secretary of War, whom Welles was quickly
coming to despise) make a spectacle of himself.
"Calamitous!" cried Stanton, refusing to sit at the table with Lincoln,
Seward, General-in-Chief McClellan, and Welles, choosing instead to pace
like a caged lion. No, "caged lion" implied a creature of courage; in this case,
not even "cornered rat" was apt. The Secretary of War, in Welles's judgment,
was a man seized by fear, and his loss of nerve was rattling the President.
Welles had never been more certain that his own resistance to Stanton's reach
for control of the entire war was wise; the navy was the equal of the army in
every traditional respect, and Stanton was dangerously wrong to try to treat
the United States Navy as some sort of appendage to the War Department's
power. The only victory the Union could claim in the war was the naval
victory at Forts Henry and Donelson by Admiral Foote, despite the attempt
by Stanton to grab the credit for Halleck and Grant.
"Do you realize what the rebel navy has done?" Stanton was hollering at
him. "They've broken the blockade!"
Taking his seat solemnly, the Navy Secretary said, "Such a judgment is
premature."
Stanton rolled his eyes heavenward. "What good is your precious navy
with this iron crocodile swallowing up its ships? Look at these telegraphic
messages from your own man down there in Hampton Roads, for God's sake
any ship that comes near the Memmack is doomed! The Cumberland,
sunk. The Congress, the Minnesota and the St. Lawrence, run aground and
helpless."
"I am as aware as you of our losses."
"That floating battery will destroy, seriatim, every naval vessel we have,"
Stanton went on, to Welles's mounting disgust. "The blockade of the South is
finished; guns and munitions will start flowing in from Englandwho knows,
this may mean Britain will recognize the Confederacy. How do you like
that?"
"There is no cause for panic," Welles said slowly. He was resolved to
maintain his calm, if only to offset Stanton's flailing of arms and corrosive
despair, but he could not set aside the possibility that there was genuine cause
for alarm. Perhaps the mauling of the Union fleet by the rebel ironclad meant
that every great wooden ship of the line in all the world's navies was obsolete.
Certainly there had been tragic losses down in Hampton Roads. When
Welles learned of the sinking of the Cumberland an hour before, he stopped
on his way to the Mansion at Saint John's Church, where he knew Commo-
dore Joseph Smith would be attending services. Smith's son was captain of
the ship rammed and sunk by "the monster." When Welles told him of the
way the battle had gone, the wooden ship helplessly bouncing shot off the
impervious hull of the Merrimach the commodore had said, "Then Joe is
dead." Welles suspected that was true. It made him especially angry at the
shrill Stanton's contempt for his service.
Obviously the President needed the steadying of someone, because
Stanton's outburst evidently shook him; Lincoln was looking out the window
down the Potomac, cracking his knuckles nervously, as if expecting to see the
Memmack appear any moment.
"What do we know of the Memmack?" the worried Lincoln asked the
Navy Secretary.
"She was one of our ships that was sunk in Hampton Roads, near Norfolk,
last year," Welles replied. "The Confederates refloated her, pumped out the
mud, renamed her the Virginia, and cut her hull down to the water's edge.
Then they covered her over, down to two feet below the waterline, with two-
inch overlapping armor plate. Ten guns, mostly nine-inch smoothbores. An
iron ram-beak on her prow."
"If you knew so much about her, why didn't you tell me?" Stanton de-
manded. "Maybe General McClellan here would have sent some soldiers into
their base to do something about it. Something! Anything!"
"Pinkerton tells me," said McClellan, "that you had a spy in their naval
yard, Mr. Welles."
"Yes, we've known about this," said the Navy Secretary, "and we have sent
an ironclad of our own to engage her. Ours is a much smaller vessel, and it
must be slowly towed in heavy seas or it will capsize, but"
"Oh, God," wailed Stanton, "you mean that little boat they call the 'tin can
on a shingle'or the 'cheesebox on a raff? How many guns?"
"The Monitor has only two guns in its turret," Welles admitted, "and we
are not certain she is seaworthy. But the President encouraged us to press on
with her construction. The contractors have disappointed us with their de-
lays."
"Pipe dreams," said Stanton, pacing again. "That monster can come
steaming up the Potomac any time it likesdo you realize that while you're
sitting there, this very mansion could be under fire from the Memmack? A
cannonball or a shell could be crashing through this Cabinet room before
night falls!"
There was silence. Lincoln asked, "Is there danger of that, Welles?"
"The Memmack has a 22-foot draft because the armor makes it so heavy. I
do not think she would be able to pass the shallow portion of the Potomac at
Kettle Bottom Shoals."
"You don't think," Stanton derided, "that's not enough. What do you
know?"
"In a sense, I would welcome her appearance in the Potomac," Welles
replied, "because that would give the navy an opportunity to destroy her. I
believe General McClellan also has some shore batteries in position."
"He doesn't understand," Stanton said to Lincoln, as if Welles were a
backward child who had just failed his lesson, "that shells just bounce off the
sides of the Merrimack. "
"Every shot that hits is felt," Welles countered, not certain about how
many direct hits could be taken by the first ironclad ship of the line in
America.
"That's nice, so we sit here and do nothing," Stanton taunted. "McClellan,
get somebody over to the Navy Yard and commandeer every canal barge you
can lay your hands on. Load them with rocks, gravel, whatever is heavy, and
get the navy to take them down to those shoals and sink them there. Maybe
we can block the monster before it gets here."
That was a naval operation, and General McClellan had the decency, in
Welles's eyes, to say, "That's a naval matter, isn't it?"
"If that unsinkable battery of guns is allowed the run of Norfolk-Newport
News-Hampton Roads area," Stanton rasped, "then it's good-bye to your
beloved movement down the Potomac to the Peninsula and then to Rich-
mond. That rebel monster will sink every troop transport you have, and there
is nothing we can do to stop her. You'll have to change your plans in a hurry
and go overland, through Manassas."
"No, that's the bloodiest way," said McClellan quickly. More directly con-
cerned with his own operation in jeopardy, he looked at Welles. "With your
permission, I'd be happy to confer with your commander at the Navy
Yard"
"I'm going down to the Navy Yard," said Lincoln, rising. "I want to see
what Admiral Dahigren says. Is there any danger to New York and Philadel-
phia, Welles?"
"The Merrimack is capable of reaching New York and shelling the city,"
the Navy Secretary admitted dutifully, "but in that case she would hardly be
on duty to sink our troop transports in Chesapeake Bay. There can only be
one danger at a time."
"You're blind, blind," Stanton said savagely. Still pacing, he proceeded to
cross-examine Welles as he would a hostile witness, using sarcasm and deri-
sion to discredit the witness just as he had done as a famous litigator. Welles
stood his ground, giving factual answers as far as he knew them, refusing to
be stampeded.
Apparently exasperated at the iciness of his witness, Stanton resorted to
shouting. "Do you have any idea what would happen if the Merrimack stood
in New York Harbor and demanded that the city surrender and pay millions
of dollars to save itself? New York would give up in one minute! Every New
York regiment would be pulled out of the war, and every New York bank
would stop lending us money, and we couldn't pay anybody and the whole
damned army would desert!"
He slumped in a chair, exhausted, until another apprehension took over.
"What if she goes out to sea and attacks Annapolis and destroys all our
stores? There go all our supplies!"
Senator Orville Browning walked in the room at that point, paying a social
Sunday morning call, and Welles was glad the President seized that opportu-
nity to get out of the roomful of acrimonious advisers. Lincoln reached for his
hat, told Browning to come along, and left for the Navy Yard without asking
any of his Cabinet to accompany him.
Secretary of State Seward, who had been silent through all Stanton's ti-
rades, put in after the President left: "This really could be quite serious,
Welles. If the Memmack comes upriver and reduces the public buildings in
the nation's capital, or forces New York to pay tributeor even makes possi-
ble an end to the blockade, which it seems to have done alreadythen we
may see foreign intervention on the side of the South."
"Let's see what the Monitor can do," Welles maintained. He was confident
that Commander Dahigren at the Navy Yard, an ordnance expert highly
regarded by Lincoln, would not do anything to put the service in a role
subservient to the army. Lincoln often entrusted the details of army plans to
Dahigren, who would pass them on to the Navy Secretary, which was the
only way Welles could find out what the War Department was doing. In
return, Welles had planned an expedition to take the port of New Orleans
with a naval force without informing Stanton. Let him find out about that
operation from Lincoln.
Welles was not as confident as he made himself appear. Perhaps the small,
untried craft could do little or nothing to stop the carnage in Hampton
Roads; perhaps it would be rammed and sunk as soon as it tried to give battle;
worse, perhaps the Monitor would sink before it even reached the scene.
Aware of these dire possibilities, the Navy Secretary could only hope for the
best, but he was certain that hair-tearing would do no good. Stanton, the
Navy Secretary was certain, was a tyrant to those beneath him and obsequi-
ous to those above him, and Welles was his equal in rank. He would not serve
the country or his President by permitting Stanton to bullyrag him.
Welles had assumed the rebels would take the Memmack on a trial run,
enabling Union spies to calculate its seaworthiness and speed, but the trial
run turned out to be a surprise attack. The ship, he knew, was under the
command of Commodore Franklin Buchanan, an excellent sailor, the founder
and first superintendent of the Naval Academy at Annapolis, and the fact
that the Confederacy entrusted this command to him demonstrated the seri-
ousness of their endeavor. Several newspapers, especially Frank Leslie's Illus-
trated Weekly, had reported the rebel work on the raised ship and wondered
why the Union had no similar iron-cladding going on. Welles had sent a
message only the other day to the Brooklyn yard, where the Monitor was
being rushed to complete its trials, countermanding the order to hurry down
to Hampton Bays and ordering her instead to the Potomac for the defense of
Washington, which the President always considered paramount. Evidently
Welles's message had arrived too late, and the "tin can on a shingle" of
designer Ericsson was on its way to the battle scene.
"Ram," said Stanton, lurching out of his chair to resume his pacing. "If
our shells bounce off her armor, the Merrimack could still be rammed and
sunk, the way she rammed the Cumberland. "
"We have no ship with an iron prow and rammer," Welles began, but
Stanton interrupted with "Then build an iron rammer on the front of the
biggest, heaviest ship you have! Do it today!"
When Welles looked disdainful, Seward put in, "Maybe there's merit in
that suggestion, Mr. Secretary. We have to try."
"I have already ordered the Vanderbilt be fitted with such equipment," said
Welles.
"Where is it?" A flicker of hope showed in Stanton's face.
"It will be ready in two weeks."
"Two weeks!" Stanton repeated, with the same sarcasm he had used for
"two guns" on the Monitor. He went to the door. "I have to warn the gover-
nors. I've imposed tight military censorship on everything coming out of Fort
Monroe, and we're the only outsiders who know of the Memmack's ram-
page. Now the damned telegraph lines are down and we can't find out any-
thing ourselves. But I'm going to tell our coastal cities to get ready to defend
themselves. Maybe they can place obstructions at the mouth of their harbors.
We cannot just sit here and do nothing!"
He ran out to the telegraph office, to send, Welles was sure, terrified and
terrifying messages to the governors of coastal states and to the mayors of
Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and Boston.
Two tense hours later, Lincoln returned from the Navy Yard looking
dispirited. "I have frightful news," he said, relating some more details he had
picked up of the Memmack's rampage. "Dahigren doesn't know any more
about what to do than we do," he reported. "While I was there, the com-
mander received an order from Stanton to load sixty barges and sink them at
Kettle Bottom Shoals, to block the passage up the Potomac."
"I know," Welles said. "Dahigren has since sent me a message asking if
Stanton's order was by my authority. I told him no."
General McClellan nodded agreement. "Blocking the river would isolate us
from Hampton Roads," he said sensibly, "but it would also isolate our opera-
tions in and around Richmond from support from here."
"First let's see what the Monitor can do," repeated Welles, gambling on an
unproved vessel in an unknown type of war. He hoped that his animosity
toward Stanton had not affected his naval judgment. He was a Connecticut
newspaper editor, and had never claimed to be an expert in naval warfare.
But if the age of the wooden warships was ended, there were no experts in
naval warfare.
Lincoln, caught in the crossfire of conflicting military advice, temporized.
"I'll tell Dahigren to get the barges and load them up," said the President,
"but not to sink them on the shoals unless he sees the Merrimack approach-
ing."
"I trust that will come out of the army's budget," said Welles.
Lincoln opened his mouth to say something, then shut it, closed his eyes
and nodded.
Jack Worden felt sick. He had joined the United States Navy at sixteen,
served twenty-eight years waiting for action, but when the war started he had
been captured on land trying to run secret dispatches. He had spent seven
months in a rebel prison, was exchanged, and on his return to duty as a
lieutenant was given a ship to command that no senior officer wanted: the
small experimental ironclad Monitor.
One week after it was commissioned at Brooklyn, a tug started dragging it
down to Chesapeake Bay. Sitting low in the water, the low-slung craft did not
hold up well in rough seas. Water cascaded down the blower pipes into the
engine room; for forty-eight hours the sixty-man crew was hand-pumping
water and trying to keep the vessel afloat.
Nobody had slept during the two days and nights of that ordeal, but that
was a fight with the elements that sailors had to expect. What sickened
Worden now was the sight at Hampton Roads as the Monitor was dragged
around Cape Henry.
Carnage had overtaken the Union Navy. He could see the remains of the
ruined Cumberland, the Congress and the crippled Minnesota run aground
and sitting prey for the marauding Memmack in the morning. Hundreds of
sailors were dead and dying, burning in the hulks or drowned trying to swim
away. Worden climbed out the top of the turret down to the iron deck, nearly
at sea level, and looked for the largest ship afloat. That was the frigate Roa-
noke. It had sent out a boat to bring him aboard.
The captain of the Roanoke, John Marston, tried to express the horror of
the day and could not. "We couldn't run," he said a few times. "The Cumber-
land gave her a broadside, and we could see the shots bouncing off the ar-
mor."
"Damage her at all?" Even an ironclad, Worden had been warned, could
feel the impact of a shell.
"Maybe a little. When the Memmack rammed the Cumberland and sank
her, the iron rammer broke off, so she can't do that again."
"Captain Smith?" Worden knew him.
"Dead; shell blew his head off. They never had a chance. And then when
she ran the Congress aground and started raking her," Marston reported,
"the Congress gunners may have knocked out a couple of guns through the
Merrimack's portholes. But she's a deadly machine. The navy will never be
the same. It's not fair this way."
"The Memmack can't hurt the Monitor, " Worden told him with more
confidence than he felt. He might be David facing Goliath, but this time
Goliath had an advantage in the number of slingshots. Luckily, the Mer-
rimack's ram was broken; that meant the Monitor could move in close and
slug it out.
The captain of the wooden frigate looked over the rail toward Worden's
little ship and did not seem impressed. "You the only ironclad coming? Don't
we have a ship the size of theirs?"
Worden ignored that. "Where will the Memmack attack tomorrow morn-
ing?"
"At the Minnesota, ready for the kill," the pilot said with certainty. "She's
stuck aground and can't move. She can't fight the monster off, and the Min-
nesota won't strike her flag."
Worden decided to slip alongside the Minnesota to await the attack. He had
no concern about running aground; the Monitor drew only ten feet of water
and could maneuver anywhere. A large wave might sink her, but she was
undeniably maneuverable, and Ericsson's invention of a revolving turret
made it possible to fire its 11-inch guns in any direction at any time. Lying
alongside the crippled Minnesota, he would surprise the Merrimack.
Marston then surprised him by saying he had a packet of orders to deliver
to the captain of the Monitor from the Secretary of the Navy. Worden took
the packet, started to read, and could not believe his eyes. Gideon Welles was
ordering him up the Potomac to defend Washington.
According to the orders, the commander of naval forces in Hampton
Roadsthat was now Captain Marstonhad been directed by the Secretary
of the Navy not to let the experimental ship engage the Merrimack "except
for some pressing emergency." Worden shook his head: Here, with the United
States Navy half destroyed, on the verge of total destruction, the only ship
that might save the day was being ordered away from the scene of battle
why? Worden knew the answer: because the politicians in Washington were
fearful of an attack on the capital.
"The Secretary could not have given this order," said Worden, "knowing
what's going on down here." One of the messages had been sent to Brooklyn
to stop the tug from taking the Monitor down to Hampton Roads, and appar-
ently arrived hours after Worden had left. He was thankful for that.
"You might want to decide that a 'pressing emergency' may exist," said
Marston. "The Minnesota is about to be destroyed with all its sailors aboard.
So you might feel your duty is to ignore the secretary's orders and fight it out
here. But it's up to you."
Twenty-eight years in the navy. These were the first orders Worden had
ever received, or was ever likely to receive, from the secretary himself. What
was the course of duty? Maybe Gideon Welles had learned something about
the weakness of the Monitor, or some hidden strength of the Merrimack, that
Worden did not know; maybe grand strategic purpose lay behind the order,
unbeknownst to the men on the firing line. On the other hand, maybe some
people at headquarters were panicked at the prospect of the "monster" mov-
ing north; if so, the place to stop the Merrimack was here and now. If it could
not stop the slaughter of the men on the Minnesota here at Hampton Roads,
the Monitor would not be able to stop the capture of Washington by the
Merrimack steaming up the Potomac.
He felt the need to write a brief farewell to his wife. Marston took him into
his cabin and waited. Worden sealed it, handed it to Marston to deliver if
Worden were killed and Marston were not. "A pressing emergency causes me
to disregard the secretary's orders," he said, in case of a court-martial.
"I agree," said the commander of what was left of the Union fleet.
At 7:30 A.M First Officer Greene took his eye from the sighting hole in the
Monitor turret to announce, "It's coming. And Jesus, it does look like an iron
crocodile."
Worden looked and swallowed: the U.S.S. Merrimack, renamed the C.S.S.
Virginia, was an immensely ugly ship, black, smokestacks billowing, stubby
guns poking out of holes in the sides, moving like a turtle on land with none
of a turtle's grace in the water. Before the black ship could draw within range
of the Minnesota, Worden took the Monitor out to make his challenge.
The Monitor fired first, slamming its ISO-pound solid cannonballs into the
railroad iron on the side of the Merrimack. Worden looked for signs of dam-
age; he could see none, and wished that Commander Dahigren and his
damned Bureau of Ordnance had allowed designer Ericsson to use a powder
charge twice as strong. But if ever a ship could look surprised, that was the
appearance of the Confederate ironclad, slowing, turning, trying to lower the
level of its guns to point at the small annoyance in its way.
A blast from ten guns roared at Worden, who stepped back from the peep-
hole to receive damage. The Merrimack, expecting to meet the wooden Min-
nesota, had brought explosive shells, which banged harmlessly against the
round armored turret and low deck of the Monitor; Worden was glad his
enemy had not loaded up with solid cannonballs, which his ship could proba-
bly have taken but which might have caused more damage.
"Return fire," he commanded; "fire at will."
The two ships poured shot at each other, neither appearing to do damage.
The Merrimack captain, frustrated at the ineffectiveness of his shells, and
despite the absence of an iron ram, attempted a ramming maneuver. But the
big ship was ponderous; Worden easily turned aside his hull and let the giant
slip by, blazing at the rear as it passed, trying for a lucky hit in its steering
mechanism. He circled his opponent, pounding away like a cooper with a
hammer going round a cask. Worden did not know if any ship, even an
ironclad, could take so many direct hits from solid shot without being pro-
foundly damaged; even the few explosive shells that hit the Monitor caused
screw heads to fly off and spin about the inside of his ship.
A new danger: Worden saw the Merrimack come alongside with intent to
board. If an enemy force could land on top of his ship, they could stop up the
chimney and, armed with crowbars, pry open the hatch. Or they could set
rags afire and drop them down the air vents, or pour water in. Here, in a new
era of naval war, the rebels were trying a technique as old as any fighting at
sea. Worden gave them encouragement: he let them come temptingly close,
then he slipped quickly away.
The fight went on for four hours, neither adversary gaining an advantage,
with the obsolete wooden warships far in the distance, looking on, daring no
intervention in a battle of ironclads. The Monitor's sailors, stripped to the
waist, were blackened by powder.
"Aim near the waterline," Worden told First Officer Greene, "if we can get
two shots on top of each other, we can break through the armor and sink
her." The Monitor was delivering two shots every six minutes, but never two
near the same spot on the Merrimack.
"She's closing in again," said his first officer, at the peephole, "slower this
time. Having engine trouble."
"Let me see." Worden stepped up to the sighting tube and was surprised to
see the black armor of the Merrimack not ten yards away. He started to draw
back from the viewer but not quickly enough: a 9-inch shell fired point-blank
exploded against his turret, and it was as if fire were pouring through the
peephole. Blinded, his beard afire, Worden screamed in agony, rubbing his
hands against his beard, smearing his blood against the burning gunpowder.
"Sheer offi" he yelled.
When he could feel a wet towel being applied to his seared facehe hoped
he had not been unconscious longWorden croaked out the word, "Dam-
age?"
"That last shot lifted our turret a few inches," said Greene's voice, "and we
made it to the shallows. The Merrimack crew is cheering as if their ship won
the battle, but we're seaworthy. Shall I take her out again?"
"No," said Worden, hoping he would see again, "not unless she's moving
on the Minnesota. Did we save the Minnesota?"
"Yes. The Merrimack is out of range, and the ebb tide is running. The
Minnesota is safe," said his exec.
The three hundred sailors aboard the Minnesota were saved from execu-
tion. Worden counted that a fair day's work, even if not a victory. With the
Merrimack parading up and down, Southerners might claim triumph over the
smaller craft, which had retreated out of range to shallow water, but the
Monitor's job had been to stop the Merrimack, not sink her. The Minnesota
was saved. The blockade of the Southern ports was still on.
"She's pulling away," reported Greene. "I think she's headed back toward
Norfolk. Should I follow her out? Make it look more like we were chasing her
home? I hate to think the rebs will claim a victory."
"Let her be; she might turn on us and we're not in such good shape,"
Worden said before he passed out.
The surface under Worden was solid and soft, not pitching; he was on land.
His face was in bandages, a wet cloth across his eyes. A woman's voice said,
"President Lincoln is here to visit you," and removed the cloth. Worden's
vision was clouded, but he was not blind. He thanked God for that. He could
see the outline of the bearded face at his bedside, and he struggled up to lean
on an elbow in a kind of attention.
"You do me great honor," he whispered to the commander in chief.
"Not so," said the voice, higher-pitched than he would have imagined. "It
is you who honor me and your country."
"Where is my ship?"
"Where you left it, at Newport News," said President Lincoln. "I told the
Secretary of the Navy there was too much danger to your vessel to send it
after the Merrimack. "
"Good," said Worden. "Don't let them go skylarking up to Norfolk, un-
less"he reached for the phrase"there's a pressing emergency."
"I'll tell him that. You should know that the Merrimack caused us great
anxiety in Washington. Even now, we have a fleet of barges at Kettle Bottom
Shoals, just in case she makes a run north."
"She couldn't do it with those engines," Worden told him. "Underneath
the iron, it's just an old, raised, wooden ship." He wondered if Lincoln had
known of the order to bring the Monitor up to Washington rather than engage
the Merrimack, but it was not for him to ask.
"Then 'Stanton's navy'that's what they're calling it," said Lincoln, "and
Mars doesn't think it is very funnywill have little to do. Welles was opposed
to the scheme of sinking the barges in the shallows, and it seems Neptune was
right."
Lincoln sat on the edge of the bed. "Stanton's navy will be as useless as the
paps of a man to a suckling child. There may be some show to amuse th
child, but they are good for nothing for service."
Worden's bandages kept him from smiling, so he said "Heh-heh."
He felt his hand taken in a pair of big hands. "I'm recommending that yoi
be promoted to captain. You're a brave man."
"I wish I'd given you a real victory."
"When we don't lose, we win," said the President. "When they don't win
they lose. So you could call this a victory."

CHAPTER 7
COST OF LIVTNC

At the request of the cook, Kate Chase went to the tradesman's entrance of
the imposing brick house on Sixth and E to have a chat with the greengrocer.
She knew what was on his mind. The ten thousand dollars her father had
borrowed from Hiram Bamey for personal expenses had run out. The Secre-
tary of the Treasury did not want to borrow further from his own appointee,
the Collector of the Port of New York, but the real estate slump made it
impossible to sell the Chase house in Columbus, Ohio. That left the Chases
short on cash, with barely enough to pay the staff of six needed to maintain
the Washington mansion in the style demanded by a Treasury Secretary, and
Kate had to contend with irate tradesmen. She was becoming good at it; a
natural bent toward imperiousness helped.
"What seems to be the matter?" she asked.
"It's my bill, ma'am." The greengrocer was nervous. "It's past due for
three months now, and I would never trouble you"
"I should hope not. I put your bills aside because I noticed your prices
have become outrageous." She went on the attack. "The lettuce that cost five
cents a head when we came here last year is now eight cents. You're charging
nearly twice as much for potatoes. Explain that, if you please."
"It costs me more, ma'am. I don't grow it myself, the farmers who sell it to
me can get more selling it to the army, so they raised their prices to me."
"Profiteering," she said sternly.
"Not me!" The tradesman obviously knew who Chase was, and Kate knew
he must be worried about what an angry government official could do to his
business. When she reminded him that her father was personally occupied
with keeping the Memmack from shelling the food stores near the docks, he
hastily apologized for bothering her; backing away, he hoped she would get
around to his bill when it suited her.
She told the cook that Secretary Chase would be going to New York today,
and that she wanted a dinner for only four: Colonel James Garfield, a dark-
eyed Ohio legislator who now commanded a regiment here, and his homely
wife, and John Hay. Colonel Garfield, her father judged, had a good future in
Ohio politics and could be helpful against the Wade Ohio forces at the 1864
presidential convention; Kate agreed, enjoyed a flirtation with him, and had
made him her confidant. She had already arranged for the colonel to send the
Garfields' regrets at the last minute, to leave her alone with Hay. It was time,
she decided after the ball at the Executive Mansion, where the young man
had cut quite a figure, for them to be alone together.
In the breakfast room, her father was staring glumly at the two-day-old
New York Tribune. The Treasury Secretary looked up at her, smiled bravely,
kissed her extended cheek, and announced, "I fear we cannot pay our bills."
She concealed her alarm; had any of the tradesmen reached him directly?
The keeping of the Chase household books was her responsibility, which she
took seriously. The servants had been admonished never to let a complaining
supplier of any kind see Secretary Chase. If he saw how deeply in the red they
were, he would either sell his property in Ohio at distress prices, a prospect
intolerable to Kate, or would cut back on their style of living in Washington,
which would be unseemly for a potential President.
"Has anyone complained, Father?"
"Horace Greeley, for one," he replied.
That puzzled her. They did not subscribe to the New York Tribune; her
father brought it home from the office.
"Here is what he says," he said, shaking the paper: " 'The Treasury has
been virtually empty for a month; at least one hundred millions of dollars are
this moment due to people who need their pay and ought to have it; among
them are thousands of volunteers who have suffered and dared for thirteen
dollars a month'that's how much a private soldier receives in pay, my dear
'and whose families are suffering for the two, three, four, and even five
months' pay which the country promised them and of which they have not
yet received one cent.' "
"What a terrible thing to publish." She sighed in relief. It was the Treasury
of the United States that could not pay the bills.
"The terrible part is, Greeley's right," Chase said. "The Treasury is empty.
It's bad enough that I cannot pay the soldiers in the field, which is terrible for
morale. But I cannot pay the government's suppliers and contractors."
"Pay them with your new paper money."
"Yes, the infamous Legal Tender Act enables me to do that. But the new
green paper won't be ready until April. Payment in gold and silver coin was
suspended at the beginning of the year, and my demand notes were not
declared legal tender until last week." He leaned back in his chair, awed at
the financial crisis over which he was presiding. "That means for three
months no lawful money has been circulating."
She sat down and spooned some honey onto a piece of toast. "What do
people do? How do people manage without money?"
"That's the amazing thing," her father said. "Bank checks and notes are
being accepted by people, despite the fact the notes and checks are not good
for gold, and no paper money yet exists. By all rights there should be a panic,
but there's not. Everybody seems to think I'll straighten it all out in a little
while."
"They have faith in you," she said, meaning it, "and so do 1."
"So does Lincolntoo much at times. He doesn't want to bother his head
with any of these monumental problems and leaves it entirely to me. For
example, he doesn't know the first thing about gold."
"Gold doesn't seem to be so important now, does it?"
"True," he said. "We don't need gold because people know we don't need
gold. We're mining plenty in California. And because of the war and the
tariff, we're not buying from overseas, while we're still selling to Europe. That
means no gold is going overseas, and there's no panic. You only need gold
when you need golddoes that make sense?"
"Confidence is everything," she replied. Garfield had explained that to her.
"But what's worrying you?"
"First, I cannot pay the current bills. Second, the printing of paper money,
untied to gold, will surely lead to the inflation of the currency."
She remembered his reference to thousand-dollar breakfasts in his talk with
Jay Cooke. "Wouldn't the war bring the inflation even with gold coins in
use?"
He looked at her in surprise turning to admiration. "I do not know the
answer to that, my dear. And the fact that I do not is another reason to
worry. However, yours is a profound question. I will put it to the bankers in
New York."
She changed the subject. "Father, whose picture will appear on the paper
money?"
"I'm being given the honor of appearing on the thousand-dollar-bill. The
President will appear on the lower-denomination notes." He paused at her
frown. "Do you think that will cause criticism?"
"I think it's a mistake," she decided. "Let Lincoln have the honor of being
on the big bills, the ones the banks use. Your face should be on the ones and
fives and tens, the money people will use every day. Think of 1864."
"I try not to think about the next presidential election," he said immedi-
ately, and then caught her skeptical look. "Of course you're right, Kate. We'll
give the President the honor of being on the big notes. I'll be in the people's
pockets."
"No President since Jackson has been reelected," she said, warming to her
favorite subject, "and Lincoln will not even be renominated."
"Don't be so sure," he said. "We underestimated him last time, Seward and
1. If Lincoln and McClellan go along this way, taking their time on fighting
the war, avoiding the abolition of slavery, then there is a good chance we'll
have peace next yearthe Union preserved, slavery intact in the South. And
then Lincoln would be unbeatable."
"That would be a disaster."
"Stanton's my only ally in the Cabinet," he said, examining political assets
and liabilities with her, as they often did, "and he's a War Democrat. Among
the Republicans, the Biairs despise me as I do them. Seward is now com-
pletely in Lincoln's pocketan amazing transformation of that man. If Lin-
coln cannot win the Republican nomination, he and Thurlow Weed will con-
nive to deliver the nomination to Seward."
Kate went to the window, arms crossed, thinking. She stared at the half-
built monument to Washington. Why was Lincoln protecting McClellan, who
was so notoriously pro-slavery? Why did Lincoln not side with Wade and the
Republican radicals in the abolition cause?
Because, she concluded, Lincoln wanted to occupy the middle ground and
stay where majority opinion was likely to be: "the Union as it was," reunited,
with slavery allowed to continue in the South but prohibited extension into
new states, combined with a freedom-purchase scheme buying freedom for
negroes in the South over the next thirty or forty years. Smart reelection
politics, staying in the midstream of the majority.
What would be an effective way to head that off? She had discussed that
with both Garfield and Roscoe Conkling, a New York Congressman and
would-be beau. First, it would be necessary to break off Lincoln's support
from War Democrats; that meant a wedge had to be driven between Lincoln
and McClellan. General McClellan had to go; Stanton, a War Democrat
himself, would be the man to bring McClellan down, which would cost Lin-
coln the support of conservatives and soldiers, who adored the Young Napo-
leon. It was also important to crush McClellan before he won the war, which
would catapult him into the presidency.
Next, her father would have to be sure that he, and not Lincoln, received
the credit for the smashing of slavery. Slavery was not the issue in the whole
North, but slavery was the central issue in the Republican Party, and that
was the group that was to deliver the nomination. Alongside Wade in the
Senate and Stevens in the House, Chaseand not Lincolncould be identi-
fied as the leader of the anti-slavery cause in the Executive Branch.
The political course became obvious: to use pro-slavery McClellan to dis-
credit Lincoln in Republican eyes. Stanton was an ally in this, along with
Republican radicals Wade and Greeley; conservatives Seward and the Biairs
were the enemy.
Despite the niggling money worries, despite the dangers of the untested
legal tender, she was more than ever convinced that Salmon Portland Chase's
day as President would not be denied. Kate Chase would be a worthy "first
Lady of the land," in the phrase Russell of the London Times was applying to
Mary Lincoln. Kate knew she could be the best first Lady yet, bringing style
and elegance, intellect and youth, to a place that had been occupied by a
series of frumpy old wives or simpering presidential daughters. The nation
deserved more.
And it would be fun. The war would be over, the gaiety returned, no more
dreary restraints on great levees and sparkling balls. She would give the
nation a presidential house it needed after the tragic years, helping to lift the
spirit of her countrymen. When the moment came for her to wed, she would
have the grandest wedding Washington had ever seen, turning the East Room
into a bower of white flowers. Not least of all, there would be no more money
worries; presidents, Kate assumed, had great secret sources of funds, and first
Ladies did not have to deal with bill collectors.
FHAPT R R

JOHN HAY'S DIAR~
MARCH 15. 1862

Everybody except Father Neptune looks a little sheepish this week. Nobody
wants to talk about the way Stanton treated the attack of the Merrimack as
the end of the world, and frankly, the way the Tycoon kept getting up to look
out the window for the oncoming iron monster was nothing he can be proud
about, either. In retrospect, our reaction was alarmiste, but at the time,
frankly, the situation was pretty scary.
One result of the success of the Monitor is the new respect everyone is
paying what seemed up to now to be crackbrained schemes. Pinkerton has a
woman spy down in Richmond who reports that the rebels are working on a
sub-marine, a ship that goes under water and shoots projectiles they call
torpedoes. That seemed a pipe dream, but after the Merrimack, who knows
what the rebels have up their sleeves? Our ordnance is working on a gun
wheel proposed by Mr. Gatling that fires God knows how many rounds a
minute and would give a two-man crew the firing power of a company. Then
there is a plan for the use of hot-air balloons for reconnaissance, but since
General Fitz-John Porter, McClellan's favorite, almost got blown into the
enemy camp trying one out, there's been a go-slow on balloon ascensions.
The other result of the scare is that the Ancient of Days is personally going
to make damn well certain that the nation's capital is not left undefended.
Just as the Monitor was told not to go skylarking after the Merrimack in
Norfolk, the troops needed to defend Washington are not going to be sent
skylarking down to Richmond. No matter what McClellan wants or says he
needs.
The Prsdt has split his difference with Little Napoleon. He has grudgingly
approved McC's plan to sail down the Potomac and Chesapeake Bay to the
Peninsula between the James and York rivers and to attack Richmond from
the east. At the same time, he has removed McClellan's title as General-in-
Chief and set up a board of Republican generals, in four army corps nomi-
nally under him, to watch what Little Mac does.
The fig leaf offered Little Mac for his removal as overall commander of the
war is that he will now be too busy in the field, as head of the Army of the
Potomac, taking Richmond, to direct the war in the West. Actually, it's a
trade: McClellan gets his way and can invade the South the easy way, by
water, and Lincoln punishes him for dawdling throughout the winter by
taking away his cherished title.
What makes the Prsdt uncomfortable about the Peninsula expedition is
that it leaves Washington relatively naked of defenders. On the overland route
to Richmond, via Bull Run, we would at all times have our army between the
rebels and our capital. Let all the generals talk about the wisdom of this river
maneuver, Lincoln still remembers how it was here in Washington only a year
ago, cut off from the North"There is no North"and even how it was
right after the debacle at Bull Run. No more of that.
So, instead of giving McClellan all the men he wants for a swing down the
river, the Prsdt will send General McDowell, no fan of McClellan's, by the
direct route overland toward Richmond with another armythat way, there
will be a defending army between the rebels and Washington at all times. If
this leaves Little Mac believing he is being pushed into battle with one hand
tied behind his back, so be it. He wasn't here when a cavalry foray could have
captured the President and Cabinet.
Some funny business is going on between Halleck and Grant out West.
Courtesy of Mars, who monitors all the messages between generals, I have a
telegram from Halleck to McClellan that reads: "A rumor has reached me
that since the taking of Fort Donelson General Grant has resumed his former
bad habits." That means drunkenness. "If so, it will account for his neglect of
my oft-repeated orders. I do not deem it advisable to arrest him at present,
but have placed General Smith in command of the expedition up the Tennes-
see." Mac then replied to the effect that if Grant is drunk, arrest him.
Jealous military backstabbing is what Grant's patron saint, Congressman
Washbume, has been insisting is at the root of the rumors, and he has been in
with his assurances that all the stuff about drinking is slander. Hence Halleck
was given overall command in the West, but Grant was singled out for pro-
motion to major general. Lincoln likes Grant because "he fights," which is his
tacit way of goading the Young Napoleon, who takes his time preparing to
execute some grand maneuver. But hell would be to pay if Grant goes into
battle with a sword in one hand and a bottle in another.
Old Man Blair, who backs McClellan, told me that Lincoln is learning how
to use certain unpopular people as criticism-absorbersthat's why he has
Stanton, to be the hated disciplinarian while Lincoln signs the pardons. Is the
Tycoon really that devious? A year ago, I would not have thought so; now, I
don't know.
I have a rendezvous tonight. I shall not reveal the identity of my compan-
ion lest this diary fall into enemy hands. But how can a man be simultane-
ously smitten and distrustful? All my life, through all my conquests, tri-
umphs, glories, spoils, I have assumed that love and trust, like liberty and
union, were one and inseparable. Now the one I love most is the one I trust
least. Strange. Is she like McClellan, or will she fight?

CHAPTER 9
HAYLOFT

"The Garfields could not come," she told him at the door. "We're dining
alone."
John Hay professed a look of alarm.
"The house is full of servants," she added. "Your honor will not be endan-
gered."
"Send them all home," he said bravely.
"They live here."
"Ah. I brought you these," he said, handing her a bouquet of violets
wrapped in a government document. "They're done up in the Legal Tender
Act."
"You're thoughtful, Mr. Hay."
"If you'll be legal, I'll be tender."
"Now you're out of prepared remarks."
"True. From here on, I'm on my own. Did that moment really happen after
the ball?"
Kate Chase knew she was going to enjoy the evening. Mainly on impulse,
only partly with calculation, on the night of the ball, a freakishly warm
winter evening, she had accepted his invitation to a stroll in the small garden
behind the President's house and told him he was an exciting man and kissed
him. That was not the sort of thing she usually did, but John Hay was a man
not quite a man; a youth, reallyquite different from the men who es-
corted her or trailed after her. He was a poet who traipsed through tropes, as
he put it, at the center of power. She liked the way he asserted, rather than
admitted, his pretensions as a poet. He was also a fountain of good conversa-
tion, a source of inside information, and a channel to the mind of her father's
present superior but ultimate adversary. Time flirting with this young man
was not wasted.
And he was attractive. Roscoe Conkling, the Congressman from New York,
was a package of ambition and purposefulness who wanted too much from
her; Governor Sprague had all the money she would ever need, spoiled her
outrageously, followed her around like a puppy, and ran out of things to say;
Lord Lyons never ran out of things to say, stimulated her mind elegantly, but
was nobody to dare anything with. Those men were her father's contemporar-
ies; Hay was the only young man she found to stir more than one interest. She
tried to think of him as a useful diversion, but John was more than a little
diverting.
After their intimate dinner, over coffee, she said, "Now all the girls you
dazzle at Counselor Earnes's parties get to this moment and say, 'Tell me
about Mr. Lincoln. What is he really like?' What do you tell them?"
"As cunning as Seward, as incorruptible as Stanton, as honorable as Chase,
as wily as Weed, as funny as Petroleum V. Nasby"
"Honorable?" The comparison with Chase was the interesting one to her.
It was curious that John should pick that one trait, perhaps playing the
innocent, using the word "honorable" maliciously, as Marc Antony had
about Brutus. Why not "wise" or "efficient" or "ambitious"? Did he suspect
the beginnings of the radical move within the party to replace Lincoln?
"Nothing wrong with honor," he said. "I think of your father as laden with
probity. Reverent. Self-disciplined, principled . . ." She waited. ". . . a lit-
tle on the stuffy side, which hurts him with the voters, but a great appointed
official."
"He won his race for governor." She wanted to kick herself for being on
the defensive. "Why do you worship Lincoln so?"
"I revere him," said the young man lightly. "Worship is not the word.
Worship is the word for the way men, especially older men, feel about you."
She would not let him turn the conversation back to her. "What makes you
revere him?"
"He's a poet, like me, only better than I am. That surprises you? Good, I
enjoy surprising you, Kate Chase. So few of your wide coterie do."
Oh, this young man was good at ending his statements with an arrow
pointing to a discussion of one's weaknesses. "Lincoln a poet?" she scoffed.
"Come, now."
"Not the way he thinks," he admitted. "He thinks poetry is 'Why Should
the Spirit of Mortal Be Proud?' God, if I hear that gloomy, sentimental pap
once more, I may regurgitate all over his carpet slippers. Nor is it Shake-
spearehe does a pretty fair Maebeth seeing Banquo's ghost. No, Lincoln's
poetry is imagery. He talks in phrases that call up pictures."
She gave him her skeptical look.
"The other day, when McClellan asked for more troops again," he ex-
plained, "the Tycoon said that sending men to McClellan was like trying to
shovel fleas across the floor: a lot of them get lost on the way."
"That's poetry?"
"Of course. Metaphor; most specifically, simile. It's as if I were to equate
your eyes or your hair to something in nature."
"Not fleas, I hope."
"Not limpid pools,' either. Nothing is trite about you, and you're like me
you have a lust for originality." He looked at her directly, saying nothing
for a moment, thinking, she assumed, of an appropriate simile. Sure enough,
he said, "Your eyes flash bright and cold, like icicles in the sun."
He impressed her with that, and she did not try to hide it. Bright and cold
was the way she tried to appear, and the way she feared she might really turn
out to be. She thought about his figure of speech for a moment, then asked,
"What happens to an icicle in the sun?"
"It melts."
Time to break the contact off. "I'd like to take a walk in the fresh air."
"It's a lovely night," he agreed. "Except for a little freezing rain, which is
hardening the mud underfoot. We could pretend there are stars in the sky. Do
you have galoshes?"
"What I really mean is, I'd like to take you to my room." She had not
meant to say that but was glad it was out. She wanted to hold him close, and
needed also to shut him up. He had the good grace to follow her upstairs in
silence.
She closed the door behind them. The gas lamp on the street outside was
the only illumination, and they let their eyes become accustomed to the dark-
ness in the room.
Her young man stood in silence, not knowing what to do next. She gently
pushed him into a chair and sat across from him on the edge of the bed. Kate
had been planning this interlude of intimacy all day, but she had not known
how she would feel. She had taken men to her room before for moments of
almost-abandonmentexperienced men, aroused but never out of control
who had shown her how to satisfy their desires by hand, without risking the
dangers of a loss of virginity. She liked to play at passion, to feel their hands
explore her, but knew where to draw the line; she would never let the possibil-
ity of pregnancy endanger her future.
But never had she teased a man of her own age in this room in this house,
and never felt such a yearning to open herself completely. For all John's
pretenses of experience, and his reputation with the young ladies, and the
availability of local prostitutes, she could not be sure that he was not a virgin
himself.
"Something is troubling you, Kate."
She changed her mind. "I want to hold you and kiss you, John Hay," she
said. "That's all. Will you understand?" She slipped out of her dress; still
covered neck to knee with underclothes, she sat on his lap. He was hard,
which pleased her, but he did not put her hand on him and she would not
make the first advance. Innocent sparking would suffice; if their time to love
ever came, she did not want him to think of her as wanton or brazen.
He smelled youngno tobacco, no liquor, good teeth. "Legal tender," she
whispered, and they kissed for a long time. He was surprisingly gentle and
did not grope at her. When he grew up, she decided, he would be quite a man.
"You can touch me, if it pleases you," she said, and he obediently put his
hand on her breast. "I don't have much of a bosom. Always envied women
like Anna Carroll or Rose Greenhow, even Mary Lincoln."
He exhaled. "You just went past three very different women, each of whom
would dearly love to be as beautiful and as young as you."
"Not Anna. Do you suppose she's interested in my father?" She noted he
was concentrating on cupping her breast and did not hear the question. "I
think she is. They have a lot to talk about, the way we do. That's important. I
can't let her get close to him," she said, going on more than she usually did.
"He needs to focus all his energies on being a great man. We're a team, my
father and 1."
"Can you be on more than one team at a time?"
"No," she said firmly, and softened it to "not likely. We're too much
alike." She kissed him long and hard on the mouth, darting her tongue be-
tween his lips, and then quickly moved off his lap, pushing him back in the
chair, sitting on the edge of the bed again. "By that I mean we both want to
go to the top. You want to be1 don't know, a senator or Cabinet member
one day, maybe a poet besides. I want to be the most important woman in the
country. We can't do that together. You and I can watch each other, and help
each other, but we have to go our own way."
"You've thought about this too much," he said. "Remember how you feel.
Don't deny your feelings."
"I don't, that's why we're here."
"We can't go to my place," he said mournfully; "the President lives there."
She laughed. "We'll continue to be acquaintances in public, and we'll see
each other like this in private, and after a while it may be difficult for me to
want to stop you. But I trust you to remember, John, we go our own way. We
pledge each other nothing." She had not meant to be this honest with him,
but she could not help herself. She trusted in him not to believe her.
He rose, took her in his arms, and held her tightly for a long moment. She
responded, safe in the farewell embrace, with pressure of her thighs against
him.
"You're a bit too tall," he observed. He was right; she slipped out of her
shoes instantly and they were exactly the same height. "Major Garfield says
you have a pug nose, and he's wrong. You have a nice nose."
He kissed her again, toe to toe, hip to hip, mouth to mouth, perfect fit. She
was certain she could make love to him beautifully, better than with anyone
else she knew, experienced men like Conkling and Garfield or fumblers like
Sprague.
"The important thing to have is a kindred soul in an alien world," he said,
in a more serious tone. "Strangers are everywhere. Don't foreclose the future,
Kate." He was mistaken; he would be hurt. She had warned him.
She pulled away, slipped on her unrumpled dress, and led him out of the
bedroom. She liked the way his face was flushed and knew she looked at least
as excited.
After she sent him out into the freezing rain in his galoshes, Kate looked at
herself in the hallway mirror with some satisfaction. The violets in the Legal
Tender Act were lying on the table, and she arranged them in a small vase;
her father would like the thought. She turned her head to fix her hair, catch-
ing what she could of her profile out of the corner of her eye. Garfield was
right about the pug nose, but some men found it attractive.

CHAPTER 10
THE FAMILY LINE
"The important thing in life is to know who you're for," Francis P. Blair
instructed his sons and daughter, gathered in conclave at the estate in Silver
Spring. "Right now we're for McClellan. That's because we're about the only
ones around who are loyal to Lincoln."
Frank, whose mustache his father thought was getting out of hand,
frowned at the seeming anomaly. "But Lincoln is always complaining about
McClellan. Says he's got the slows. Took away his title of General-in-Chief
and let him read about it in the newspapers. I don't think they're close,
Father."
"That's for public consumption," said Monty, supporting the elder Biair's
viewpoint. "In the Cabinet meetings, Lincoln backs up McClellan most of the
time. Chase and Stanton are out to stab him in the back, and Welles and Bates
are leaning their way. Only Lincoln remembers it was McClellan who saved
the army after Bull Run."
"Make no mistake," the old man told Frank, who had had trouble grasping
the finer points of political machinations since he was a boy, "McClellan is
not personally loyal to Lincoln, the way we are. He wants to set up for
himselfas dictator maybe, or surely as Democratic candidate in sixty-four."
"If Stanton doesn't beat him to that," Monty put in.
Lizzie waved that off. "Stanton couldn't get elected assistant paymaster,"
she pointed out, as her father nodded vigorously. "Chase is the one fixing to
grab the Republican nomination away from Lincoln, with the help of Horace
Greeley. But right now, McClellan is useful to Lincoln because he's the only
general the President has got that the army will follow. And Lincoln must
know that the radicals out to get McClellan are also out to get Lincoln."
"He knows, all right," added her father. "I told him."
Frank, frowning, thought about that. "Why are the Biairs for Lincoln?"
The elder Blair started to express his exasperation and then reminded him-
self that what Frank lacked in political sagacity, he made up for in personal
likability. He was the only likable Blair, the only one with voter appeal,
except for daughter Lizzie, but a woman was not electable to anything.
"Good question, son. We're for Lincoln, first, because he's for us and he's
shown it. And second, because he knows what is best for the country. The
time is comingJefferson foresaw this, and I could never get Jackson to see it
when the extermination or deportation of the African race from among us
will be inevitable."
"Don't say deportation, Father," Lizzie cautioned. "We say colonization."
"She's right." Monty sounded judicial. " 'Colonization' implies that it is
voluntary. You cannot deport four million people against their will."
"Of course not. Stop trying to teach an old man how to suck eggs." The
elder Blair respected his older son's judgment, and was glad he had been able
to place him in the Cabinet, protecting family interests, but "the Judge"
tended to forget who had taught him all he knew. "It's Lincoln's plan, which
I've been helping him work out for the past year, to buy back the slaves from
their owners. Then, when they see how horrible the caste system will be here,
with whites treating blacks like dirt, the Africans will want to find a congenial
place to go. Liberia, maybe, but most won't want to go back to Africa. Haiti
is betterhot climate, not far away. Best of all, Panama. Vast deposits of
coal."
"Here comes the vision," Lizzie smiled at him. He would take that irrever-
ence from her.
"The blacks could be the advance agents of American empire," he de-
claimed, largely for Frank's benefit. "The Southerners, not the firebrands but
cousin John Breckinridge and the smart ones, know all about the importance
of Central America. They'll take it over if the South wins this warand so
should we when we do. It's my plan to populate Central America with our
four million blacks, speaking English, not Spanish, and friendly to usde-
pendent on us, in a lot of ways. We'll do in Central America and the Carib-
bean what the British have done in India. The colored race will be happy
down there, and we'll have far more power in the world."
"They're not going to want to go," said Frank. "They like it here. It's hot
as hell down there, snakes, jungles"
"They will prefer colonization soon enough," the elder Blair said with
confidence. "Look at the irreconcilable castes in Spainthe Spaniards and
the Moors are an abhorrent mixture in the same peninsula. Mixing does not
work, and slavery is a vicious institution that imbues a brother's hand in a
brother's blood. That means we have to find a good place for negroes to go."
He strove to make it simple, easy to remember. "Compensation, followed by
colonization, that's the ticketan end to slavery and an end to the caste
problem. Buy 'em up and ship 'em out."
Frank, hungry as always, cut a piece of cheese from the elegant service
before them and looked up at his brother Monty. "How did your get-together
in the President's office with the border state Congressmen go? They tell me it
was a flop."
"Frank is right about that, Father. I turned out all the men from Kentucky
and Maryland who could respond to Lincoln's compensation offer. The Presi-
dent argued with them, reasoned with them, finally beseeched them. I never
saw him work so hard on a delegation."
"And they turned him down flat," said Frank. "Nobody in the loyal slave
states wants to sell slaves. If the North wins, the value of slaves in the border
states will go up, and if the South wins, the notes of the federal government
paying for the slaves will be worthless. So the slave owners loyal to the Union
are sitting tight and shouting down the abolitionists. Wade and Stevens and
the rest of the radicals make a lot of noise, but the sentiment of the majority
in Congress is against abolition. I knowI'm right there on the floor every
day."
"Damn fools," said old Blair. "They'll wind up without their money and
without their slaves."
"If compensated emancipation is such a losing proposition, Father," said
Lizzie, "why are you and Lincoln pressing it so hard? According to Monty,
the President was begging them to accept. He could get turned downhumil-
iated, even. And you always used to say, when you know you can't win, back
off before you lose."
Blair smiled cannily. At least, after he died, his brain would go on calculat-
ing and conniving inside her skull. "Lays the groundwork. The President
made them the offer in good faith, it's their choice. Later on, the border states
won't be able to blame Lincoln if all the slaves are freed by amendment. Next
step is emancipation here in the District."
"Henry Wilson's bill. I'm for it, right?" Frank, who alternated between
serving in Congress and serving as an officer in the field, when he wasn't in
jail for insubordination, had a grasp on the voting basics. The old man nod-
ded, yes.
Which reminded the elder Blair; he took his watch out of his pocket and
consulted it. "I'm expecting Miss Carroll in a few minutes," he announced.
"She turned out to be right about that Tennessee River plan of hers, contrary
to what you thought, Monty. The Donelson victory is the only thing that's
given the banks confidence in the new greenbacks. She knows her railroads,
something most generals don't seem to understand." He did not add that she
was on his payroll; some things the boys did not need to know. She did good
writing work cheaply and he liked her. "Montgomery, what have you been
doing, besides failing to deliver the border states to their own salvation?"
"The Post Office department is turning around," reported his elder son
with some pride. "Lost six million dollars last year, should break even next
year. And that's without collecting anything from the receiver of letters."
"You're on the lockout for fraud?" the old man said sharply. The enemies
of the Biairs would like to find some small thievery to blacken the family
name.
"We're using a new indelible ink on cancellation to cut out the fraudulent
reuse of stamps," Monty assured him, "and I've started a money order sys-
tem to stop the theft of money in the mail. Here's the exciting part: we're
sorting the mail on the railroad cars on its way to delivery. Saves two days,
and"
The elder Blair shrugged all that off and let his natural testiness show. "It's
nice that you're running the department, but you're in Lincoln's Cabinet for
bigger things than delivering the damn mail."
"It's a big job in itself, Father," Monty protested, and then shut up. The
elder Blair wished his older son would understand that Postmasters General
were not supposed to fuss with the mail; if that became their job, they would
lose Cabinet rank.
"Think first about winning the war and getting Frank, here, elected Presi-
dent," the old man told him. "And about helping Lincoln in that snakepit of
a Cabinet."
"Sometimes I wish Lincoln were more like your old friend Jackson," said
Frank, who liked things clear and direct.
"Not the time for a Jackson," snapped his father, "time for a Lincoln. Man
who can get together a group of men who all think they're his betters and
make them work for him. Man who can accept insults without rancor, tack
this way and that because he knows his destination."
He looked hard at his younger son, who knew it was a test.
"And that destination is"Frank took a guess"abolition?"
"No, dammit! Get it through your thick skull that it's Union, Union,
Union. Slavery is a side issue, Frankif abolition helps him, he'll use it; if it
binders him, he won't!"
"Try not to get too excited, Father," said Lizzie. "Frank needs to know
when that train is going to leave the station, so he can be in position to jump
on. If he jumps too soon, he'll never be President."
The elder Blair stomped around the room and sat down. He took a few
deep breaths. If only Lizzie were a man. He explained patiently: "Learn from
Lincoln, who never gets too far ahead of public sentiment. He knows he can't
do a thing about slavery in the loyal statesit would take a constitutional
amendment to take away a loyal citizen's property. Abolition can be used as a
device to hurt the traitors, Frank, and to satisfy the Northern radicalsbut
never anything to make some sort of moral crusade out of in the border
states, where national elections are won."
"So do we ever become abolitionists?"
"Not soon," said his father. "Never say a word in favor of slavery, Frank,
but don't join up with the radicals. They're against us and for Fr6mont, and
now Chase. That crowd hates us, always will. That's why the Biairs are for
McClellanhe'll make it possible for Lincoln to reunite this country."
The elder Blair walked out to his gardens, one of the beauties of Silver
Spring. Now that March was here and summer approached, Lincoln would
begin to spend weekends at the Soldiers' Home, on high ground west of the
Mansion, and would visit the Biairs more often. The President, the old man
knew, liked to handle the fine books in the library and to partake of the
delicious breakfasts on the terrace and the sense of gracious solitude of the
grounds of the Blair estate. Silver Spring was a good place for reflection, and
the solidity and grace of his physical establishment counted for something in
Biair's influence with this and other presidents.
The old man plucked a few rose blooms from the top of their stems until he
had a handful of colors, and returned to the house to float them in a silvel
dish. His wife liked to see that when she came in from riding.

CHAPTER II
IN DURANCE VILE

Alexander Gardner was mystified. His boss, Mathew Brady, had been trying
to arrange to take a photograph of Rose O'Neal Greenhow in Old Capitol
Prison for months. Allan Pinkerton, the Secret Service chief who had made it
possible for photographers to pass through to the front lines of McClellan's
battles, such as they were, had resolutely refused permission for Brady to see
her. Obviously, with the Wild Rose still smuggling mail and messages out of
the tightest security the Union could contrive, Pinkerton wanted to block
further publicity for the figure that the Southern newspapers had so drama-
tized.
Yet when Gardner had mentioned to Charles Dana, the former Tribune
editor who was Stanton's new assistant, that he hoped to pose Mrs. Green-
how and her daughter, word came back the same day that he would be issued
a pass to Old Capitol Prison. That was an unexpected turn of fortune; it was
the first time Gardner had seen what a personal political connection could do
in business.
Brady would not like it. The assistant hurried about Brady's studio, getting
together the cameras and plates he would need inside the prison. Up to now,
all the connections had been Brady's; the famous photographer catered to the
celebrated, gave too many free sittings to the political great, and used those
associations to cadge passes to the scenes of war. Gardner, the inside man,
knew nobody; Brady saw to it that all the credit for photographs taken by
Gardner and the others went to the owner of the gallery, and nobody raised
his eyebrows in recognition when Gardner's name was mentioned. Only
Mathew Brady was to be famous. The Scotsman thought that was unfair; he
knew Brady could ill afford to pay a decent wage, since the gallery was not
making money, and the least the boss could do was to let recognition fall on
his fellow workers. He suspected that Brady did not want a competitor.
But now Alexander Gardner, who did not make friends easily, had a con-
nection to a man in power. Charles Dana was famous as a newspaper editor,
but Gardner had met him a dozen years before when both were young ideal-
ists trying to live by the socialist teachings of the Utopian Welshman Robert
Owen. Gardner had made two trips to America from his native Glasgow,
where Owens's dream first took hold, and brought over members of his work-
ingmen's reform party to found a settlement called Clydesdale, in Iowa, on
the Mississippi River.
The thought of the tragedy of Clydesdale made him rest the heavy plates
on a counter and lower his head. "Galloping consumption" had been the
name of the disease that crushed that community, the cause of the death of so
many of the sturdy Scot families that Gardner had accompanied to America.
Gardner had gone home to Scotland on his final round trip to gather up his
family and bring them with him to the American oasis of education and
opportunity, and instead had found death and devastation. He had hurried
them back to New York City and, using his knowledge of chemistry, had
applied for employment with Brady. The famous photographer looked at
Gardner's pictures of Iowa's Indians, questioned him about his knowledge of
bookkeeping, and hired him. Gardner set aside his dream of being a business-
man in a community interested in the welfare and education of all, and
became a photographer. He was not sorry; photography was not a good
business, but it was an interesting occupation.
Brady was out of the gallery and in the field, across the Potomac, leading
Tim O'Sullivan and Gardner's younger brother James in shooting the fortifi-
cations that the rebels had recently abandoned. Washington was agog about
the embarrassing discovery that some of those dread fortifications were
"Quaker guns"big logs set up to resemble cannonthat had fooled and
terrified the McClellan commanders for a year. That would make an eye-
popping picture, published as a woodcut in Harper's Weekly or Frank Leslie's
Illustrated Newspaper, and perhaps sour Brady's relations for a while with
Pinkerton, who had been taken in by the rebel trick. Gardner had to give his
boss credit: when a picture cried out to be made, Brady stopped at nothing to
make it.
His employer's absence, Dana's intercession, and Stanton's sudden ap-
proval gave Gardner the chance to enter the prison alone. Since Brady had
been getting credit in the magazines for all the pictures Gardner and the
other assistants were taking, the young Scot felt no twinge of conscience at
grabbing the opportunity; the name on the picture would be Brady's anyway.
Maybe, one day, he would ask for the copyright in lieu of salary; his time
would come. Gardner did not know quite how to tell Brady, but he had heard
from the President's junior secretary that Mr. Lincoln preferred the young
Scot's work to that of the famous photographer; Lincoln had taken to show-
ing up at the studio when Gardner, not Brady, was behind the lens.
He left Foons, the free black, in charge of the gallery with instructions to
clean out and straighten out the Indian headdresses and leather outfits stored
for their visits. Whenever the Indian chiefs came to Washington to meet with
the Great White Father, they tried to look like white men, in jackets and
pants, but Brady insisted they be photographed in full-feathered regalia be-
cause nobody would buy a picture of an Indian without feathers. It meant a
dozen outfits had to be kept on hand, which cluttered up the studio.
He drove the small wagon up to the Old Capitol alone. Gardner first
stopped to take an exterior view of the prison, a place of historic and photo-
graphic interest. Whitewash coated the lower floor, presumably to silhouette
anyone making furtive entry or exit. The upper two stories were dreary black,
windows heavily draped to prevent prisoners from signaling to passersby.
Gardner placed a wet colloidal negative in the camera) estimated a thirty-
second exposure in the strong early April daylight, and quickly removed the
slide that allowed light to spill onto the glass. That one exposure would have
to do; Brady rarely approved taking only one shot of any scene, but Gardner
wanted to save his negatives for his primary subject.
Waiting in the lobby of the prison for a Lieutenant Nelson to approve his
pass, amidst slovenly guards and a noisome atmosphere of filth and decrep-
itude, Gardner let his mind dwell on his personal dream: to leave Brady, the
showman-promoter-pioneer of photography, to start a business with his
brother James. Unlike Brady, who was obsessed with controlling the photo-
graphic coverage of the war, and kept talking of some grandiose mission to
record history and advance the art of photography, Gardner would have a
bookkeeper to collect his receivables and pay his bills. In a month or two he
could have enough business to hire Tim O'Sullivan, the assistant who was
probably the best picture taker of them all, and who also chafed under the
"Photo by Brady" credit on all his work.
Gardner shifted his foot to crush a roach marching near his bench. Of the
one thousand photographers working in the United States, Brady's name was
the only one widely known, and the nearsighted pioneer was evidently deter-
mined to dominate the field for as long as he lived. Gardner could not accept
that; he credited Brady with the vision to make photography a part of the
war, and not a mere collection of cartes de visite by the wealthy, but he would
not credit Brady with the pictures Alexander Gardner took. Not for long.
"The superintendent wants to see you," said a burly lieutenant. Equipment
in his arms, Gardner went into the office on the ground floor marked "Super-
intendent Wood."
"I don't know how you got this pass," said Wood, a short man hunched
over a desk, examining the War Department credential, "and I don't think it
is a good idea."
"Secretary Stanton signed it himself," Gardner said helpfully. He did not
know Stanton's reason either; it hardly seemed in the interests of the govern-
ment to permit photographs of this pesthole.
"She can do anything," Wood said, as if to himself. "She can arrange for
her own protectionwe found a loaded gun in her cell a week ago. She can
write a note and get a senator to visit herHenry Wilson was in here this
morning. And now she can get Stanton to turn this prison into a photography
studio."
"I'll only be an hour or so."
"God knows what's next. I have her in solitary confinement, with her
daughter, and you know what she did? She ripped up a plank in the closet
and has been handing the girl down to the rebel prisoners of war on the floor
below. They feed the kid because the captured soldiers have better food than
the prisoners of state."
"If you know about the closet, why don't you seal it up?"
The superintendent glared. "I'm not cruel, no matter what she tells you. It
means I have to search every one of those fellows every night to make sure
she's not slipping out messages that way. Her little girl is sick, too, but the
hifalutin Mrs. Greenhow won't let the prison doctor near her. Hates him,
calls him a poisoner, gets him all upset. 'The Wild Rose' is more trouble than
any dozen prisoners in this jail."
"Does she know I'm coming to her cell?" Gardner especially wanted her to
pose in the room in which she was confined, to show the contrast between her
surroundings as a queen of society and now.
"You're not getting near that floor. I'll clear the niggers out of the court-
yard, and you can do your work against a wall. Your wall's being washed
right now. You turn your camera on anything else and I'll arrest you as a spy
and you can spend the rest of the war taking pictures of Rose."
Gardner was taken through the lobby by the lieutenant, past a room with
triple-deck bunks cramming thirty people into a space for four, and noticed
the main activity of the inmates was tracking and burning vermin. He had not
been inside fifteen minutes and he wanted to take a bath.
"What are their crimes?" he asked mildly. Gardner was a reformer at
heart, and even now, his dream of a socialist settlement gone, he found time
to work with the philanthropist Amos Kendall in his school for the deaf,
dumb, and blind. He held no brief for traitors; still, there seemed to be many
more "prisoners of state" than he expected.
"Speaking out against the President," the lieutenant listed the farrago of
crimes, "publishing incitement to desertion. Suspicion of treason. Brokering
draft substitutions."
"Wasn't there an amnesty declared a month ago?"
The lieutenant smiled grimly. "Yeah, we had no room for any more, had to
clear a bunch out. But that's just Mr. Stanton getting rid of Mr. Seward's
arrests. He'll cram this place with his own before long. You know the Green-
how woman?"
"No, we've never met. I've been out in the field working for the army." The
photographer thought it was a good idea to reaffirm his loyalty.
"Impossible bitch. We gave her a few candles and some matches to burn a
few of the graybacks off her walls," said the lieutenant. "You know what she
did? The night the Merrimack was causing all that fuss, she took down the
window drape and burned a candle in the window. When a guard on the
street warned her he'd shoot it out, she lit all the candles at once, made a
bloody celebration, singing 'Dixie' and all. She had her door bolted and we
had to break it to blow out the damn candles."
Gardner liked the woman already. One of his photo subjects last month,
General John Dix, who had been Treasury Secretary under Buchanan, knew
Rose well and had described her to him: black hair, white skin, flashing dark
eyes, a look of hauteur or passion depending on her mood, and above all,
according to General Dix, a talent for beguilement. Powerful effect on men.
Gardner suspected that Dix had been one of her many lovers. Would such a
woman's qualities be capturable on film?
In the prison courtyard, he set up a chair with a headrest in back so that
she could hold a pose for thirty seconds without movement. The child would
be a problemkids were hard to hold stillbut he wanted her in the photo-
graph too. He got behind his camera, threw the cloth over his head, and
looked through the lens at the chair.
Behind him a woman's imperious voice said, "I would like to know why
Mr. Mathew Brady could not come himself."
Gardner turned to look at the ravaged remains of what might once have
been a handsome face. Rose Greenhow's eyes were haggard, skin pocked with
insect bites and gray-pale, the mouth set in a hard line. Her hair, obviously
unwashed but tied back tightly, was turning iron-gray. She was dressed in
mourning, as Gardner was told she always dressed, in memory of a baby
daughter who had died the year before; that recent loss was why, he sup-
posed, she could not part with her eight-year-old.
"I am Alexander Gardner, manager of the Brady gallery." He presented
his only credential: "I have photographed President Lincoln twice, at his
request."
"That's no recommendation," she said. "Have you photographed a gen-
tleman? Or a statesman?"
"General Scott?" No reaction. He thought fast. "Secretary Stanton?" He
racked his brains for a rebel. "Senator Breckinridge?"
Her face softened. "I saw the photograph that was John Breckinridge's
carte de visits. You did that? It said 'Photo by Brady.' "
"They all say that. I took the picture."
"General Breckinridge is a great man. Do you know where he is right
now?"
"In the Western theater, I understand, with General Sidney Johnston." He
had read that the traitor senator was on the run clear down to Alabama, and
that Halleck had reinstated Grant to go deep into the Southwest with General
Sherman to finish off what was left of the rebel army down there.
She nodded in approval, introduced her daughter, and took a seat in the
chair in front of the camera. He hoped it would not be insulting to offer her a
chance to improve her looks for history: "Here is a comb and hand mirror,
ma'am, if you want to straighten your daughter's hair just a bit."
She took the mirror, looked at herself, and put it down in pain. She sighed,
picked it up again, and did what she could with herself, then handed both to
her daughter. He explained the posing requirements and looked through the
lens. The white wall in the background was too bright; the cleanup squad had
done its job too well. He moved the chair over toward a window, which broke
up the background. As he was doing this, she asked idly if he had been
photographing in the field recently.
"Yes, only yesterday, just across the Potomac at Winchester."
"General McDowell? A nice fellow, if an incompetent. I knew him some
years ago"
"No, General Banks."
"McDowell wouldn't pose? He's usually so vain"
"He and his men are well past Manassas, ma'am. Brady's down there with
them."
"Your employer likes to be in the thick of action."
"The main action will be down in the Peninsula," he said, and then shut
up. He had been telling her the disposition of some of the Union forces, which
she might be able to put together with reports from incoming rebel prisoners.
He reminded himself she was a spy capable of getting information out of the
prison. He said, "Hold it nowbreathe deep, hold your breath while I count
to thirty, don't move an eyelash" He let the light into the aperture and
waited for the image to impress itself on the colloid. "One more," he said.
"Without the child."
"Don't hurry," she said. "This is the first time they've let us into the
courtyard. We haven't felt sunshine on our cheeks in over a month."
"That's terrible," he said. But was she telling the truth? He decided she
was; their pallid faces showed uninterrupted indoor incarceration.
"You're from Scotland?" Since his accent was unmistakable, Gardner fig-
ured it was safe to say yes. "I have many friends in England," Rose Green-
how chatted. "They're just waiting the proper moment to enter the war on
the side of the Confederacy. Have you photographed Lord Lyons, the British
Ambassador?"
"No."
"He told me he met with Mr. Seward one day, and the Yankee Secretary of
State said the most remarkable thing to him." In her dramatic voice, she
mimicked Seward: " 'My Lord, I can touch a bell on my right hand, and
order the arrest of a citizen of Ohio. I can touch the bell again, and order the
arrest of a citizen of New York. Can the Queen of England, in her dominions,
do as much?' "
Gardner had heard about that boast; the Peace Democrats had made much
of it months before, when they were trying to whip up sentiment against
arbitrary arrests. The photographer busied himself with his equipment, aware
he was under close scrutiny by the guards across the courtyard, but not
hurrying with the actual picture taking. He wanted to let the little girl and
her mother have as much fresh air as his visit allowed.
"Perhaps you are wondering," she said, "why I permit our picture to be
taken."
"Historical record," he offered.
"My purpose is to shame all my friends here in Washington, and my rela-
tives, too, who fear to visit or to help me. I know how I look, Mr. Gardner. I
used to be a famous beauty, and I am one no longer."
"We have artists who will touch up the negative," he assured her, not
knowing what to say. "We enhance the reality as a matter of course, much as
portrait painters emphasize the more positive"
"Let your camera tell the truth," she told him. "No artist's brush. Promise
me not to touch out a wrinkle of care, or to put a smile where there is a look
of hardship. I want people North and South to know what life is like in this
hellhole, how the proud and mighty Yankees can devote time and energy to
breaking the spirit of one woman. But they will never break me, Mr. Gard-
ner."
"Or me," added her daughter. Gardner had a son, fourteen, a sensitive boy
who did not want to look at the war pictures. He had a fleeting and depress-
ing thought about what life would be like with him in a rebel jail.
"The person who arranged for your pass," Rose Greenhow said, changing
the subject, "did he say anything about our release? Or about a trial?"
"No," Gardner said promptly. But why had the approval for the photo-
graph come through so suddenly? And through Stanton, not through Mc-
Clellan or Pinkerton? He suspected there could be a difference of opinion
between Stanton and McClellan about releasing the mother and daughter.
"To tell the truth, I've heard rumors of a trial. Maybe if you confessed and
signed a parole of honor, they'd release you to go South."
She set her mouth. "I would never give the tyrants that satisfaction. If
Stanton's man asks you, tell him that. In fact, tell him that whether he asks
you or not. Would you do that for us?"
That was none of his business. "Hold itbreathe deep, listen to my count
for thirty, press your head back against the rest" He let in the light. She
held her expression: dignity, determination, disdain, resignation, the faintest
touch of hope. He could hardly wait to get the plate into the wagon, back to
the gallery and into the darkroom.

CHAPTER 12
WHITE RABBITS
Lincoln rolled off the office couch and stood up. He had been allowing him-
self to think about the inevitability of this war, and that was never profitable.
Was this, as Seward had once said, an "irrepressible conflict," with great
subterranean strains and pressures building up for a century that necessitated
some terrible earthquake, or could a wise President have averted the war,
keeping the Union intact with compromises? He had not given the matter
deep thought at the time, when events led him to the decisions that had
seemed so painfully plain, but nowthousands of deaths later, with the kill-
ing just beginning in earnesthe found himself examining paths not taken.
But at a time that Union armies, East and West, were finally on the move,
such second-thinking was weakening, enthralling; he put all that out of his
mind and walked to the door.
His hand on the doorknob to his secretaries' room, Lincoln stopped; a
mental picture of Willie hanging on that doorknob, swinging the door open,
suddenly afflicted him. He shut his eyes and waited for the memory to shud-
der past. Through the oak door, he could hear the voices of Hay and Stod-
dard.
"The Hellcat is in a 'state of mind' about the steward's salary," Hay was
saying. "Her Satanic Majesty thinks she will blackguard me into giving her
the money, and I won't."
Lincoln winced, then smiled, at "Her Satanic Majesty." Hay had a nice
sense of exaggeration.
"Isn't that properly Nicolay's decision?" Stoddard asked.
"Nico is off to see the fair Therena back home," said Hay. Lincoln nodded
to himself; he had sent Nicolay west to check up on the rumors about Grant's
drinking and Halleck's desire to arrest him, and to test the local political
waters on the idea of using Treasury funds to buy up all the slaves. He did not
trust the opinions in the newspapers to accurately reflect the public senti-
ment. Apparently Nicolay had told nobody, not even his assistant, about his
mission; that was sensible. Lincoln loved Hay as he wished he could love his
son Robert, but he trusted Nicolay. He turned the doorknob noisily and
entered with his customary "What news?"
"Hill Lamon seems to be taking his title as marshal too seriously," Hay
said promptly. "Surprised us all by indicting Horace Greeley criminally for
libel. Says he's going to New York to arrest him and bring him to jail down
here."
Lincoln did not need that added burden. Ward Hill Lamon was not the
smartest of his old Illinois friends, but he was intensely loyal and a strong
physical presence to have around; accordingly, Lincoln had appointed him
U.S. Marshal for the District of Columbia, which paid the salary of the
President's bodyguard.
At Lincoln's pained expression, Hay said, "His best friends cannot per-
suade him to drop it. I triedhe's my cousinbut Hill says it's a point of
honor." Hill could be marvelously stubborn. Lincoln would have to pass
word to the judge that the President would not be offended if he threw out the
case.
"On top of that, sir," Stoddard added, "Secretary Stanton has arrested a
New York Tribune correspondent in the field, and he's tapping the wire of the
Tribune to see what other reports are being sent over the telegraph by report-
ers who learn too much about military movements."
Neither Hill Lamon, in his foolish pride, nor Edwin Stanton, in all his
fierce caginess, seemed to understand how much store Lincoln set in the
power of Uncle Horace. He would have to talk to Stanton about that; perhaps
it was a case of his new assistant, Dana, getting even with his old boss at the
Tribune. That harassment would have to stop; let an example be set with
other newspapers, not the Tribune.
Lincoln had just written a letter to Greeley saying he was in favor of urging
compensated emancipation "persuasively, not menacingly" upon the South.
It was not that he expected Greeley's support, or even the editor's acquies-
cence in keeping the focus of the war on preserving the Union rather than on
freeing the slaves. His object was to use Uncle Horace as a foil in assuring the
border states, and the conservative majority in his Republican Party, that A.
Lincoln had not suddenly become an abolitionist. If emancipation should
then be needed as a weapon, a military device, the world would know that
was his legitimate reason to break the compact on slavery made by the na-
tion's founders. If abolishment became needed to coerce the South or invigo-
rate the North, such an extreme action could best be taken by a President
who did not seem to want to free the slaves on moral or sentimental grounds.
The appearance of military necessity was central; reluctance rather than fer-
vor would have to be the posture. He would conceal his anti-slavery feelings.
He would have to argue with Greeley, gently and publicly, putting distance
between himself and Wade's radical crowd, but not an unbridgeable distance.
He might have to accede to some of the abolitionists' wishes one day, to serve
his own larger purpose. An approach to the molding of public sentiment
began to shape in his mind, making use of a respectful disagreement with
Greeley. First, this harassment of the Tribune with libel suits and threats of
arrest would have to be stopped.
"Stod, the President has had enough troubling news," Hay announced.
"Get the box."
At Hay's direction, Stoddard went over to the corner of the room and lifted
a large cardboard box with holes poked in it. The secretaries trooped into the
President's office and placed the box on the table with the maps.
Lincoln heard scurrying inside and lifted the lid. Two white rabbits, pink
noses twitching rapidly, looked at him in terror.
"Get Tad, quick," he told Stoddard. Grinning, he lifted the rabbits, one in
each hand, out of the box and set them on the floor. They scampered under
the desk. When Tad walked in, Lincoln told the boy to look for a present
somewhere in the room. In a moment, Tad had both white rabbits in his arms
and a look of sweet wonderment on his face. The secretaries left and the
President, his son, and the rabbits had a great romp.
That respite from care lasted until Stanton came in, and the rabbits almost
escaped between his legs. The Secretary of War stopped, looked, started to say
something, then clamped his mouth shut in disapproval. Lincoln was tempted
to put one of the rabbits in Stanton's arms, but held himself back; Mars might
drop the creature. He told Tad to put them in the box and wrote a quick note
to the sender: "Thank you in behalf of my little son for your present of White
Rabbits. He is very pleased with them." That was an understatement. He
wondered if they were a male and a female. At a nod, the boy lugged the big
box out of the office, to take them to his mother, who Lincoln hoped would
not be too surprised.
"Everybody thinks he's a great military strategist," said Stanton, bran-
dishing a copy of the Tribune. "Here's Greeley with one of his pompous
editorials, which he calls 'The Expected Blow.' "
"And where does Uncle Horace expect the blow?" Lincoln inquired.
"Not in the East, of course, where all the troops are and the action is. The
great military mind thinks we should be on our guard for a great secessionist
offensive in the West."
Lincoln frowned. Halleck and Grant had the rebel general, Sidney John-
ston, on the run in the West, pursuing the Tennessee River plan that Lincoln
had recommended. What was Greeley's cause for concern?
"A lot of alarmist talk," Stanton assured him. "I read the wires from the
Tribune man in the field who is with Grant's troops on the Tennessee River.
The correspondent foresees a new Bull Run disaster ahead, and that talk
could hamper our enlistments, especially in New York. I've censored the
dispatch, of course. Wish I could suppress the damned editorial."
Lincoln inquired whether Grant knew about the rumors.
"Of course, and it's the usual thing that frightens only generals like Mc-
Clellan." Stanton handed him a copy of a telegram from Grant near Pittsburg
Landing to Halleck at headquarters. Grant had wired: "I have scarcely the
faintest idea of an attack being made upon us, but will be prepared should
such a thing take place."
"Good man, Grant," said Stanton. "Steady, fearlessnot like the Little
Napoleon, seeing hordes of secesh behind every tree."
Lincoln knew that Stanton had countersigned McClellan's direction to
Halleck to arrest Grant if he resumed the habits that had caused him to quit
the army years before. That was the natural response of the army leadership
to one of its generalsin this case, Halleckwho needed support on a matter
of discipline in the field. Grant was a man Lincoln had heard was experienced
in personal failure, having once been reduced to selling firewood. McClellan,
on the contrary, was experienced in success, as manager of a large railroad.
Lincoln needed, above all, a man who would bring success to Union arms.
Caution, however, which was McClellan's hallmark, was not always the
route to success. "I hear he fights," was all he said to Stanton about Grant.
"Congress has passed the bill freeing the slaves in the District of Colum-
bia," Stanton said suddenly. "You'll sign it?"
"I understand it purchases the slaves from loyal citizens for no more than
three hundred dollars a head," he corrected the lawyer. "I want to think
about it." Wade had promised to pass a Joint Resolution first, putting forward
Lincoln's plan for gradual, compensated emancipation, which the radicals
hated to swallow.
"The Joint Resolution you asked about is on your desk," said John Hay,
reading his mind, "unless the rabbits ate it."
"Then I will sign the bill," Lincoln told Stanton. Senator Wade had been as
good as his word; with his conservative price met, the President allowed
himself to be drawn a radical step forward. He picked up a treaty, forcing his
attention toward an agreement with the Potowatomi Indians of Kansas, hop-
ing General McClellan would be bold and General Grant would be careful.

CHAPTER 13
THE IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT
"You're a political man, Breck, " said Sidney Johnston. "Did this war have to
happen? Could it have been avoided?"
On the eve of battle, the general liked to think large thoughts, of the sweeps
of history rather than the worries of the morrow. The notion of Henry V in
Shakespeare's play, walking incognito among his men before striking the
French at Agincourt, appealed to the Texan, but he chose instead to spend the
evening before the decisive battle jousting with the most political of his subor-
dinates.
"This is the most unnecessary war of the century," Breckinridge replied,
hunched forward on a cot in the tent, bourbon in hand. That was the reaction
Johnston expected from the disappointed peacemaker. Wrong, of course, but
challenging.
He had come to like Breckinridge more than any of his other commanders,
not because he was the best soldierHardee was more dependable, ran a
disciplined headquartersbut because the Kentuckian's mind, like his own,
delved into the roots of the war. Breck was the classic example of the right
man in the wrong place at the wrong time. Hardee was stolid, "Bishop" Polk
too gregarious, Bragg a martinet subject to debilitating headaches, and Beau-
regard a temperamental tactician with no notion of grand designs. Pat
Clebume, the fierce and funny Irishman, was a talented general with the most
potential and, if the war dragged on, would be his candidate for commander
in the West when the time came for Johnston to step up to supreme com-
mand.
Breckinridge, though, was his choice for mutual rumination just before a
major event, and Johnston believed the attack at Pittsburg Landing would be
the turning point in the war. He thought of Breck as an honorable politician
with his fundaments eroded, through no fault of his owna good man who
had not slipped his moorings as much as one whose moorings had slipped
him. He worked hard, drank harder but not on duty, obeyed orders and
inspired his "Orphan Brigade" of homeless Kentuckians to resist the tempta-
tion to desert. Johnston counted him among those generals who was doing his
duty but not fulfilling himself in the warcaught up in neither the spirit of
the South's revolution nor the cause of his own advancement.
"Seward once called it 'an irrepressible conflict between opposing and en-
during forces,' " Breck went on, "and he was dead wrong. No reason these
sectional differences could not have been compromised, as they always were
by our forefathers. We were driven into this war by foolish, irrational, hot-
headed men."
"Lincoln's fault?"
"Partly. His speech a few years agothat the Union could not endure half
slave and half free, that it had to become all one or all the othertalk like
that helped bring on the war. But Lincoln wasn't the only one. It was the
fault of the whole blundering generation, Southerners definitely included."
The Texan drew him further on. "You don't think the issue of slavery was
that important, then."
"It became important, when demagoguesabolitionists and Republicans,
mainly, followed by the firebrand Southernerswhipped up the public into a
frenzy about it."
"Um. But one section thinks that slavery is immoral, cruel, un-Christian,
and the other thinks not," Johnston mused. "Pretty basic difference on a
matter that stirs emotions."
Breck rose and stood in the center of the tent, holding the pole, in an
attitude that Johnston assumed was a vestige of his Senate days. "That same
difference existed between Virginia and Massachusetts during the American
Revolution. Same difference in the Jackson days, when Calhoun nullified.
Same deep split later on, when we defeated the Wilmot Proviso and passed
the Missouri Compromise and worked out the Chittenden resolution. The
issue of slavery did not change, but the nature of the men who dealt with that
issue changed for the worse. Peaceful men were shunted aside, and the would-
be warriors took over."
"Issue wouldn't go away, though, would it? Kept coming back, getting
more divisive."
"That's where you're wrong," Breckinridge pounced. "Slavery was a dying
issue, because slavery had reached its natural limits. You can't raise cotton
profitably in the South without slavery, but you cannot grow cotton up North
or out West."
Johnston let himself be pushed back further. "The whole fight about the
extension of slavery into the territories, then, the subject of the Lincoln-
Douglas debates"
"All a false issue!" Breckinridge boomed. "Slavery, and cotton, had already
reached its natural frontier. Stephen Douglas was rightpopular sovereignty
would have killed slavery in the territories, because the West is free soil in its
nature. Slavery would have stayed in the South, and ultimately died there."
"Why?" He put out skirmishers. "My family had slaves, first in Kentucky,
then in Texas, pretty far west. Made good money for us."
"The institution of slavery ultimately must crumble in the South because it
is wrong and makes good people morally sick." Breckinridge appeared abso-
lutely certain of his position, and though a border state man, without any
doubt about his ability to read the mind of the South. "Forget all that senti-
mental pap in Uncle Tom's Cabin, the stories of torture that inflamed the
North. Sure, discipline is necessary sometimes, but nobody with any sense
really abuses his slaves, because you don't destroy your own property or
encourage it to run away. But the fact is, keeping people in slavery is wrong,
corrupting to the soul, no matter how well you treat them. Didn't you feel
guilty about having slaves?"
Johnston nodded yes, urging Breckinridge to commit the reserves of his
argument.
"Washington did, too, and Jefferson. Manumission was a growing move-
ment until all this happened, and public opinion was shifting against the
ownership of human beings, because the great majority of Southerners do not
own slaves. Our peculiar institution would have steadily disappeared if the
blunderers hadn't taken over, if the fanatics up North hadn't whipped up the
zealots down South."
"Let's assume you're right. Say that slavery would not have extended into
the West, and it would have died out in the South," Johnston posited. "Still,
that's a long time to wait. Four million people would be living in slavery for
at least two generations. That's a lot of broken families, a lot of whipping, a
lot of rape, a lot of misery, you must agree. Your preacher uncle would call it
a mountain of evil."
Breckinridge let go the center pole and leaned forward, resting his big
hands on his knees. "You don't think what we're going to do tomorrow is
evil? If all goes as you've planned it, we're going to send our boys into their
camp to stick our bayonets into sleeping Americans. You don't want merely
victory in the battle, you want the utter destruction of Grant's army, followed
by the annihilation a day later of Buell's army. How many deadtwenty,
thirty thousand?"
"That should do it," said Johnston coolly. It could come to that; war was
death.
"Multiply that a hundred times, to get an idea of the evil of this war. How
many dead will both sides count if this war drags onhalf a million men?
That's one dead soldier for every six slaves to be freed. Killing innocent
young men is evil, too, General. You not only snuff out their lives, but you
deny life to the children they would have had. You don't eradicate evil by
committing a greater evil."
Johnston admired the passion and conviction in his argument, and held up
his palm in a motion to sit down.
"I disagree. I do not see this war as the blunder of a generation of agitators,
as you do." The general, who considered himself more a man of decision than
of oratory, liked to make his points march in quiet order. "I do not think this
conflict could have been avoided by leaders of goodwill. Even if you Demo-
crats had not split in 1860 and John Breckinridge had been elected President,
this war would have come."
"I watched Buchanan try to keep the peace," Breckinridge broke in, "and
he did, though everything started to unravel toward the end. I would have
kept the nation together and let the slavery issue cool down, and the war fever
would have died. It's a damn tragedy we got Lincoln and war."
Johnston hoped to open the other man's mind a crack to another point of
view, perhaps to lessen his bitterness in having been denied a chance to save
his countrymen from their holocaust of lives. The general knew that his
friend Jeff Davis had in the back of his mind the appointment of Breckinridge
as his Secretary of War. The replacement of Judah Benjamin with the Ken-
tuckian who understood the vast military opportunity in the West would
make life in the field much more productive for Albert Sidney Johnston. If
Breck could be made to see the inevitability of the struggle, perhaps he would
find it a worthier cause for his unique political talent. As a general, Breckin-
ridge was offering the Confederacy his life, but was by no means giving his all.
"This is not, as you would have it, an accidental or unnecessary war, the
work of fanatics," Johnston observed. "Jeff Davis had it right: there has been
for a generation a persistent and organized system of hostile measures devised
by Northern Congressmen to strike down the tenure of property in slaves.
Breck, that amounts to thousands of millions of dollars. No people anywhere,
ever in history, voluntarily gave up near that value of property."
His companion, apparently remembering the decorum of floor debate, held
his fire.
"Your specific assumptions about the mind of the South are inaccurate,"
Johnston told him. "Manumission has been steadily decreasing, not increas-
ing, because slavery is more profitable than ever. The proof of that is easy:
you know that the price of slaves is rising."
"There are voices"
The general shook his head. "No Southern antislavery movement exists
that I know of, and nobody in the South is calling for making the rape of a
black woman a crime. And if you think the people of the South were led
unwilling into secession by a few noisy politicians, come to Texas. We're the
only state that held a referendum on that. The people voted three to one to
secede."
"You're saying that the divisions are deep-seated," the Kentuckian ac-
knowledged, "and I don't deny that. But these disagreements existed in 1830,
and in 1850, and we didn't start killing each other."
"Our people have grown apart in that time, from competing sections into
two opposing nations," Johnston answered. "Different customs, different
ways of doing business, and a wholly different idea about what is right and
wrong. The North has come to see the South as the world's last outpost of the
most degrading economic system invented, threatening free labor everywhere.
And the South, as we know, has come to see the North as aggressive and
domineering, the masters of capital seeking to plunder the tillers of the soil.
We see the abolition radicals demanding huge, wrenching changes in South-
ern society at no cost to them."
"It's only the leaders of each side who are convinced of their rectitude,"
Breckinridge argued, "and those blundering politicians cannot see how the
two economies complement each other. United, we can compete with the
world; divided, both sections will be exploited by the world. That's why the
British want us apart."
In danger of being outflanked, the general launched his central attack:
"More important, each side, each very different culture, is persuaded that the
other is in fundamental antagonism. It is much different from a generation
ago, or from Calhoun's time. You're quite mistaken, Breck, about this desire
to disengage being the product of a few rabble-rousers and newspaper editors.
The two peoples have grown apart, and one side or the other must dominate.
With two strong-minded male dogs in the same house, only one can be top
dog. That's the way of the world."
It was Johnston's turn to rise and hold the center pole. "If the South is not
to be subjugated, it must go its own way. In life, in war, in national destinies,
timing is everything, as you will see in battle tomorrow. A century ago, it was
natural and right for these colonies to separate from England; today, it has
become just as natural for these two sections that don't belong together to
separate again."
"Rather than plunge the country into war," Breckinridge said, "I was
prepared to accept that proposition. But Lincoln wouldn't hear of it."
"Of course not, neither would I," said Johnston, enjoying the look of puz-
zlement on his adversary's face. "To resist that separation is natural, too.
Lincoln is doing what I would do, refusing to recognize the natural division,
insisting that we fight for our freedom as Americans did a century ago. No
national leader worthy of his calling can stand by and watch the dismember-
ment of his country. War was inevitable, irrepressible. It was Lincoln's duty
to force the South to fight, and the South's duty to take up the challenge."
Breck held his ground. "It was his duty, back in the campaign, to run for
President in such a way as to be able to hold the country together without
war. He failed to do that."
General Johnston pressed his point: "These are great tides, huge and fun-
damental moral and economic forces, Senator Breckinridge,"he purposely
used the political, not the military, title"and there comes a time in a na-
tion's history when fundamental debate turns from the political forum to the
military field."
"I have heard that pernicious argument expressed another way, General,
by Mr. Lincoln. He says that if you have an elephant on a string and the
elephant wants to run, better let him run. He puts it more colorfully than you
do, but both of you are wrong. The elephant of destruction must be stopped
at any cost. War is never right, enormous bloodshed is never justified, unless a
nation is resisting invasion." Breck stopped, took a swallow of bourbon, and
added glumly, "and now the South is resisting invasion. That is why I am
down here, not up there. But sometimes I wish I were still in the middle,
where my poor Kentucky tried to be, trying to stop this waste of American
lives."
Johnston felt a surge of frustration at having a better position but, facing a
more experienced opponent, not being able to win the argument. He tried his
own metaphor: "Have you ever seen a huge logjam, Breckinridge, a river
clogged impossibly, the logs backing up forever? The only way you can get
the river flowing is by blowing up a section with a huge charge of gunpowder.
We have come to the moment when only a violent shock can save us."
Breckinridge rose to face him; Johnston was tall, but his guest was about
three inches taller. "I suppose that is why you are a general, Sidney Johnston,
and I am a politician, and always will be. To me, violence is always failure.
Rage is the mask of weakness. No war was ever worth its cost."
"The War of Independence was," Johnston countered immediately. "For
the South, if we win, we will have made a nation by spilling the blood it
always seems to take, and this war of independence will be well worth the
cost." The General thought about it from the other side, as good generals
always tried to do. "And for the Union, if Grant and Sherman are not sur-
prised tomorrow and we are defeated, this war will bring an end to the fissure
that has weakened this nation in the world. Not all wars are worth the cost, I
will agree to thatbut this one is."
The general expressed confidence in Breckinridge as a soldier, and told him
that as commander of the reserve division, he and his Kentuckians would be
committed to the hottest sector at the most critical moment. The subordinate
general saluted and retired.
Johnston sat on his cot for a few more moments, thinking about Sam Grant
and "Cump" Shermaninexperienced, overconfident young commanders,
his military juniors in every wayand about the peaceful independence that
would follow victory. His final thought as he let sleep overtake him was that
the smell of the peach blossoms on this April night was deliciously overpow-
ering.

CHAPTER 14

AMERICAN WATERLOO:
SHILOH
"Where'd you leam to make Kentucky ashcakes, rich boy?"
Cabell did not take offense, but he could never figure out why his buddies
assumed he came from a slave-owning family. Maybe it was the way he
talked, more Lexington than upcountry, the big words he sometimes used
that he'd unconsciously picked up from his old man.
He mixed the cornmeal with some water, pinched on some salt, and
wrapped the mixture in the cabbage leaves. He had staked out a cabbage
patch for some rabbits, shot two, and brought back both the meat and the
makings. His buddy Albin put the pieces of rabbit on a spit and rotated them
over the fire until Cabell put the ashcakes in the embers to cook.
"Learned how at Donelson," he told his new friend.
"S'pose a big battle's shapin' up? Folks comin' in from all over. Never seen
so many generals. Breckinridge from up home, even Sidney Johnston hisself."
Johnston hisself. Cabell was down on Johnston: the general was a retreater.
He was the highest-ranking field commander in the Confederate Army, and it
was surely an honor to be near him, but after Donelson, nobody but Jeff
Davis rated Johnston a big hero. The Kentuckians were especially bitter,
because he had given up Kentucky without a fight. Tennesseeans remembered
how he'd abandoned Nashville after the fall of Donelson, moving back South,
worried about the Yankee boats using the Tennessee River to get behind him.
Fortunately, Cabell was with Forrest and his Tennesseeans, who'd fought
their way out of Donelson (well, they really walked, but would have fought if
they had run into any of Grant's troops) and struggled to get supplies out of
Nashville after General Pillow had run out of there. When crowds began
looting the Confederate stores, Forrest's men, on horses, had to charge a
jeering mob to get ammunition stores aboard the last train South. They high-
tailed it out of Nashville before Yankee general Don Carlos Buell arrived, and
spent the next two weeks raiding, harassing Buell, keeping track of his move-
ments. Cabell knew that one of Forrest's forays yielded prisoners who re-
vealed Buell's plans: to march overland through Tennessee to join Grant and
Sherman at or near Pittsburg Landing. The goal after that, so the prisoners
said, was to march twenty miles from the Landingon the west side of the
Tennessee River where Tennessee's border meets Alabama and Mississippi
to Corinth. That would cut the Memphis-to-Charleston railway. Corinth was
the railhead where the Yankees figured Johnston would stand and fight.
Cabell enjoyed the riding and reconnaissance. He thrilled at killing himself
a Yank, which gave him a kind of eerie feeling: the man in blue was two
hundred yards away, just a tiny figure at the end of a gun barrel, and Cabell
could see him drop clean. The young soldier doubted that it would be much
fun to kill anybody nearer; he would hate to see the look on the other fellow's
face up close.
Should he report to his father, now that both of them were in the same
area? Cabell loved his old man, missed him, and wanted to see him soonbut
not yet. He knew that John Breckinridge would bring him to headquarters,
take care of him, make sure he didn't get himself killed. Maybe later. It would
be a nice surprise.
Albin was a Kentucky boy, a member of the "Orphan Brigade," so called
because they were a Kentucky bunch fighting for the South while their state
was still in the Union. Cabell and Albin were thrown together on picket duty,
as Forrest's cavalry and Breckinridge's infantry were melded into lockouts.
The first indication that a passel of Nationals were near came with the
rabbits. Not the one on the spit, but the ones running in the thick underbrush
from the sounds of people. Albin and he threw dirt on the firepity about
dinnerand took positions behind shallow entrenchments they had dug ear-
lier. Must be a lot of rabbits in these woods, Cabell thought, what with the
Tennessee River rising in the spring, pushing back its banks and flooding the
countryside. Nice place, too; peach trees and dogwoods in blossom, birds
chirping away, not many people around. Albin whistled to the picket on his
left, and Cabell alerted the man to his right.
Five Yanks, fairly close together, came crashing through the woods not
thirty yards from them, and Albin opened fire. Cabell shot at a face he could
see and missed. It would take him two minutes to load and fire again if he
hurried. He bit off the cartridge cap, poured the powder into the breech, and
pushed the ball in with the ramrod. By the time Cabell was ready to fire
again, four of the Yankees had fled to a clump of trees for shelter; the fifth,
Albin's target, was holding one arm up in the air to surrender. He had taken a
shot in the other arm. Cabell was surprised at the way the Yankee was
dressed: not in Union blue, but in the same jeans material that the Kentucki-
ans in the Orphan Brigade wore. Hard to tell Yank and rebel apart. The men
in the clump of trees were not shooting, in order that their comrade surren-
dering in no-man's-land could be safely received. He came forward, pain on
his face, and Cabell heard Albin let out a holier.
"Linwood, is that you?"
"Albin?"
"Come on ahead, Linwood, you silly-ass fool, you coulda got yourself
killed. Nobody shoot him, he's my brother."
Cabell had heard of this happening but thought it was just newspaper talk.
But it should not be so surprising among Kentuckians; he thought of his
cousin Margaret, a nurse for the Federals on one of their hospital ships, and
Uncle Bob's sons split two and two.
Albin was embarrassed to have taken his brother prisoner. "You take him
back to Colonel Forrest, Cabell, like he told us. See he gets his arm fixed up.
I'll stay here." As Cabell started to take the prisoner to the rear,  Albin
resumed his position and aimed at the sound of gunfire that began again. The
prisoner wheeled around and yelled, "Hold on, Albin, don't shoot at those
trees, that's Father!"
Linwood turned out to be a useful capture. "I ain't gonna tell your people a
thang," he announced, but he was willing to chat with Cabell on their way to
Colonel Forrest. "Grant must have, oh, 'bout twenty, twenty-five thousand
troops here. Six, seven more up on Crump's Landing under General Wal-
lace."
"Any more on the way?"
Linwood grew cagey. "You're here from Corinth, aren't you? How come
you're over this close to the river?"
"We got lost. You know Albin."
"Lucky thang he never lamed to shoot."
"You ever see General Grant himself?"
"Naw, he doesn't even camp here. Sleeps warm and dry up in a house
seven miles upriver. Sherman's the one in charge here. Mean little runt,
nervous. Grant sets a big store by him, though. Gonna hit you folks hard in
Corinth, after Buell's army gets here."
"Buell won't be here for a week," said Cabell, fishing.
"What you talkin' about? He's two days away at the most. Twenty thou-
sand men. You better start runnin'."
General Breckinridge was afflicted with "the Tennessee quickstep." He
vowed not to swallow any more water in this area, but if thirsty would turn to
reliably sanitary whiskey.
He lay on his back on a blanket in the late afternoon sun, knees up to
reduce the pain in his belly. Standing at the edge of the blanket was Colonel
Forrest, the blunt cavalryman assigned to Breckinridge's Reserve Corps. For-
rest was reporting what he had learned from his pickets, one of whom had
brought in a talkative prisoner. Listening around the blanket's edges were
General Sidney Johnston and his chief lieutenants: "Bishop" Polk, Braxton
Bragg, and the hero of Fort Surnter and Bull Run, General P.G.T. Beaure-
gard. "Old Bory" had been sent by Jeff Davis to inspirit the army under
Sidney Johnston's much criticized command. This meeting, Breckinridge as-
sumed, was a kind of council of war. Since it was his first, he wished he could
comfortably stand; there was some ignominy in being flat on his back with
the Tennessee quickstep.
"There's twenty-five thousand Federals with Sherman this side of the Ten-
nessee River," reported Forrest, "plus Lew Wallace's bunch six miles away,
with seven thousand or so."
"Where is Buell's army?" Johnston asked. The Federal plan had become
apparent: to have Buell's army of 40,000 join Grant's army of 35,000 men at
Pittsburg Landing, and then march together to smash the Confederate forces
expected to defend the railhead at Corinth.
"Buell's advance guard is just t'other side of the river," Forrest said. "Main
body is two days' march away."
"Why so slow?" Johnston asked.
Breckinridge could have told him: to march troops through wet terrain in
the first week of April was damnably slow work. His Kentuckians, among the
fastest marchers in the army, had lost a day slogging over washed-out roads,
laying logs in mud to haul guns. The rest of the Confederate forces, coming
up from New Orleans and down from Murfreesboro, had also been delayed.
The Johnston plan had been to surprise Grant with an attack this morning,
but there had been no getting the Confederate force assembled in time.
"Cap'n Morgan's been driving Buell's army crazy," Forrest told Johnston
proudly. "Cavalry harassing 'em, slowing 'em down." Breckinridge remem-
bered John Morgan as a hot-tempered young fellow who took too many
chances, and was glad he'd found an outlet for his wildness as a cavalry raider
in this campaign. Delaying Buell's force was crucial: if those 40,000 bluecoats
were to arrive before Johnston's attack on Grant's army was complete, the
combined Federals would outnumber the Confederates two to one.
"Do you think Grant knows we're here, Forrest?"
"I don't think so, leastways not in force. He's spending his nights in Savan-
nah instead of with his men this side of the river."
Breckinridge wondered how Forrest had learned that. More to the point
was the import of the information: Was Grant drinking again? Why wasn't he
with his troops? Did he have a woman up there? Grant must be unhappy
about Halleck's stern treatment of him after Donelsonthe rebuff and tem-
porary relief from command had been in the newspapersbut could any
general be so confident not to need to be encamped with his own army?
Perhaps Grant was trying to emulate "Old Brains" Halleck in staying far
from the scene of action, or perhaps he wanted his friend Sherman to be in
sole command of his men.
"I don't believe it," said Beauregard. "How could Grant not know that our
force of forty thousand men is not two miles away? Our men are mostly
green, and they haven't been exactly quiet, shooting rabbits for food. Grant
knows we're here, all right."
"Why does he go upriver to sleep?" Johnston asked. Forrest had brought in
a puzzling piece of information.
"He's left Major General Sherman in charge, right in the middle of things
at the Shiloh church," Beauregard said testily, his voice constricted. "Sher-
man's not a lunatic, as the newspapers claim. He's probably got his men
entrenched up to their eyeballs, waiting for us. It's a trap."
"My men had a fairly rough skirmish with the Nationals about noontime,"
General Polk, the Episcopal bishop, put in. "They've got to know they're not
alone here. I would agree that we lack the element of surprise. Even so, I say
we should attack."
"We'll be slaughtered," insisted Beauregard. Breckinridge was surprised at
his reaction: caution was Johnston's reputation, not Beauregard's. "Look."
The short Creole drew with a stick in the mud. "Put yourself in Grant and
Sherman's shoes. You've established a camp with twenty-five thousand men
this side of the river, with men and supplies coming in from a good landing
behind you. On your right flank, to the North, you have Snake Creek
unfordable, natural protection. On your left flank, Lick Creek, also flowing
into the Tennessee River, also a natural barrier to attack. Water on three
sides. That leaves one simple line of defense, here, facing us to the West.
Sidney, I think it utterly inconceivable that Grant not order his men to
entrench along that line until Buell's men arrive. It's plain common sense.
That gives him an unassailable position."
"If he has dug in. If he knows we're here." Johnston weighed the alterna-
tive. "What is it you recommend, Bory?"
Beauregard coughed, coughed again, spit out some phlegm; Breckinridge
hoped his chest infection had not debilitated him. "I recommend we give our
exhausted men a rest tonightmost marched through the night last night,
you know. Then we slip back to Corinth in the morning and get busy building
defenses. When Buell gets here day after tomorrow, if that soon, he'll have to
cross to this side of the river in boats. That will give us time to get ready.
When Grant and Buell attack us in Corinth, we'll be in position behind
barricades. Grant will keep coming at usthat's his way, I hearand we will
be able to wear down and destroy his army."
"Thank you, General." Johnston looked down at Breckinridge. "Your
corps ready to move? The reserves will have to do some fast marching, right
or left of the line, no telling which."
Breckinridge rolled to one side and struggled to his feet. "My men are
amply provisioned, they can move. Kentucky men want to fight right here."
If another retreat should be ordered, this time to Corinth, he didn't know
how much of his force would melt away and go home.
"Gentlemen," said Johnston, "we attack at daylight tomorrow." He made
a fist. "I intend to hammer 'em. We're going to hammer 'em hard."
Beauregard shook his head in disbelief, then quickly nodded, accepting the
decision of his superior. The other generals went with him back to their
commands to prepare for the onslaught in the morning. Johnston walked
slowly down the muddy road with Breckinridge.
"I would fight them if they were a million," Johnston, wanting to talk, told
him. "They can present no greater front between those two creeks than we
can. The more they crowd in there, the worse we can make it for them."
"Horatius at the bridge," said Breckinridge, hoping he had his Greek his-
tory right. He was concerned, now that he was to go into his first major
battle, that he knew so little of classical military tactics. He assumed that was
why he had been placed in charge of the Reserve Corps, which would be the
last to engage.
"I am not going to string my army out on a line," Johnston explained. "I
will use Napoleon's order of battleline each corps behind the other and hit
the enemy in waves."
That was total offensive commitment, a form of near-suicidal assault that
Breckinridge doubted had yet been tried in this war. If the Federals were
surprised, their army would suffer terrible casualties; if Grant was not sur-
prised, but had his men entrenched and waiting, the loss of Confederate life
would be horrendous.
Johnston caught Breckinridge's worried expression. "You'll do fine, Breck.
Just control your own men, rally them when they fall back, and lead them
back to take whatever position you see is important. Late in the attack, when
everybody wants to regroup and rest, don't let them. That is the critical
moment, and victory will go to the side that keeps hammering. God! The
South can win this war tomorrow."
When Breckinridge did not respond to his elation, Johnston said, "Don't
you see what's at stake here? Forty thousand men all we have here nowis
all the Confederacy has been able to scrape up to fight in the West. In two
days Grant's army will be double ours in size, and if we retreat to Corinth
he'll drive us out of there or kill us all. But at this moment we face Grant
with a force no bigger than our own, and with his back to the river, hemmed
in. We can stick that demand of 'unconditional surrender' down his throat,
and when he refuses, destroy them all."
"Surely he'd surrender in that case"
"Why should he? I wouldn't. In his shoes, I'd fight like hell till Buell came
and saved what was left." When Breckinridge shuddered, his commander
added: "Breck, don't be a McClellan. Don't be a Beauregard or a Buckner,
arranging always to fight another day, under circumstances that will reduce
your losses. Never forget: war is not tactics. War is death."
In the silence that followed, Johnston reached up and tore a small branch
off a peach tree. He sniffed at the blossoms. "Grant understands that. I made
a mistake about Fort Donelson; I should have been there myself and I would
have beaten him there. This Tennessee River is the key to the war, don't you
see? If we fail here, they'll cut our railroad west to east at Corinth and there
goes our lifeline. If we fail here, 'Old Brains' will know the next stepto send
Grant to attack our Mississippi forts from the rear, and take Memphis and
finally Vicksburg. That's the end of the war for us."
"You paint a black picture."
Johnston shook his head and grinned. "Ah, but if I smash Grant and
Sherman herenot just defeat them, but obliterate the Union Army, that's
the important thingthen I can reverse the course of the war."
"A victory would do great things for morale in Richmond," Breckinridge
agreed, recalling the demands for Johnston's scalp, and Jeff Davis's persistent
refusals to remove the man he insisted was his best commander.
"Forget morale. Bull Run boosted our morale so high it almost ruined us.
Destruction or capture of armies is all that counts. Territory is unimportant;
we'll go back to Nashville and clear on up to Fort Donelson whenever we
want, if we destroy Grant's army now." Johnston stopped; Breck used that
moment to lean forward and take the pressure off his cramping stomach.
"Tomorrow, our aim is not merely to win a battle; we're out to win a war
against a population four times our size. When they are made to see how
costly war can be, the people of the North will desert Lincoln. If we lose"
he shrugged.
"McClellan in the East will have clear sailing," Breck finished for him.
"Either that, or Grant will grind the South into sausage."
They walked on into the gathering darkness. The commanding general
seemed reluctant to let his political general go until he understood his strat-
egy. Perhaps, Breckinridge reasoned, Johnston was apologizing in advance
for heavy casualties.
"McClellan is the most brilliant organizer and tactician on either side,"
Johnston continued, "but when it comes to the strategy of destruction, Lin-
coln is right and McClellan is wrong. The Union should be fighting overland
to Richmondnot to take Richmond, but to attack and destroy our army.
Grant must know that. He's a crude tacticianand we see here right now
that he's a stupid general not to anticipate an attackbut he knows that war
is death."
He looked hard at his junior officer, obviously eager to get through to the
born civilian decked out in a general's uniform. Breck had been impressed
with Beauregard's reservations at the council of war, and was uncertain about
Johnston's wisdom in counting on surprise.
Johnston pressed: "Robert Lee understands. He was my regimental deputy
in Texas, and before I left to put down the Mormon Rebellion, I drilled it into
himdestroy armies, destroy the other side's will to fight. He's not as skilled
in the field as McClellan, and he drives you crazy with all his talk about God,
but at least Lee's not in love with his army, the way McClellan seems to be. A
general has to spend livesthat's what an army is for."
Breckinridge straightened and said without enthusiasm, "We're ready. I'm
ready."
"Mark my words, we'll decide the War Between the States on this field
tomorrow." Johnston looked at the sky, where stars had begun to show, and
at the hundreds of pup tents in the fields, the woods, and the bloom-laden
orchards nearby. With less certainty, he added, "I only wish we had been
ready to hammer 'em today."
William Tecumseh Sherman sat with Grant at the kitchen table. They were
in the home that Grant had commandeered to await Buell's arrival, to join
forces for the march on Corinth.
"Getting dark. I better get upriver," Sherman said, reminding himself that
"upriver" meant "south" on the Tennessee. "Why are you smoking those
stogies all the time? You never used to smoke cigars."
Grant looked at the end of his cigar, pleased. "Somebody sent me a couple
of boxes after Donelson. Not bad. Takes my mind off my leg."
Sherman, who lived with teeth clenched on a cigar butt, sympathized with
his fellow general: Grant had been riding in the rain a few nights before, and
his horse stumbled and fell on his rider's leg. Grant's ankle swelled; the
surgeon had to cut the boot off and put him on crutches. That accident came
on top of the genuinely foul mood he had been in following Halleck's unac-
countable irritation after the Donelson victory.
"I think I'm going to tuck it in, Cump. After Corinth, I'm going to ask for
leave to go home."
Sherman had been afraid of that. "Why? War's just getting started."
"I'm just in the way here," Grant said, disquieted. "I've endured it as long
as I can, but I can't put up with all this stuff any more." He went to the
kitchen cabinet and pulled out a bottle of whiskey and two glasses. "Halleck
says I'm drinking again. Want a shot?"
Sherman nodded. He could hold his liquor better than Grant. Two stiff
shots and Grant's voice slurred; that, in his friend Sherman's view, and not an
excessive intake of alcohol, explained his growing reputation for drunkenness.
"McClellan sends word to put me under arrest. Why? Because I went up to
Nashville and that was supposed to be outside my command, and I didn't
report in to Halleck. Can you imagine that? Arrested?"
"Halleck was worried you'd be promoted over him."
"Maybe notOld Brains claims it was McClellan's doing. I don't know.
Nothing I do ever goes right." He moved his foot, winced, and swallowed the
whiskey, pouring another shot. Sherman signaled no more for himself. He
would have stopped Grant, but the whiskey was the best medicine for the
throbbing pain in his foot.
"Donelson went right. 'Unconditional Surrender' Grant."
"You know what was good about that?" Grant cheered up for a moment.
"I had a chance to pay Buckner back what I owed him. Part of it, anywaya
hundred and fifty, I still owe him fifty. When I took Simon aside after the
surrender and handed him the money, he couldn't believe it."
"You were a little rough on Buck. That 'unconditional surrender' demand
appealed to the damned newspaper writers, but it humiliated the rebel gen-
eral, a West Pointer and a gentleman who had not deserved such treatment."
"You know why I asked for surrender in such a hurry? Because I was
afraid that Halleck would do something to change my plans, pulling me back
before I could take the fort."
That made Sherman feel better; such insulting behavior, especially to a
friend and benefactor, hardly seemed like Sam Grant.
"Since then," said Grant, reverting to gloom, "they've all been after me
you must hear the talk."
Sherman held up a hand for silence; a courier was at the kitchen door. "Sir,
should the men be ordered to entrench?"
"No need." Some regimental commander always wanted to show how he
could run his command by the book.
"General Prentiss says"
"Tell him we'll be out of here in a day or two," Sherman snapped. "There's
no sense wearing out the men digging holes in the ground when what they
need is sleep. Besides, we're on the offensive, let's not take the edge off that
spirit." He waved him off.
"Help me put this foot up," said Grant. Sherman lifted the bandaged foot
onto the kitchen table. Grant had another slow sip of the same glass of
whiskey; Sherman was glad he was making it last, and it seemed to be reliev-
ing the pain. "Old Brains will be coming down here to take personal com-
mand next week, for the attack on Corinth."
"The Ohio regiment keeps reporting reb skirmishers at Pittsburg Land-
ing."
"There will be no fight at Pittsburg Landing," Grant assured him. "We will
have to go to Corinth, where the rebels are fortified." He took a deep drag on
the cigar, the way a neophyte cigar smoker does, and coughed it out. "After
that, he won't want me around, not the way the newspaper scribblers are
after me. Let Halleck be the heroI'm going to St. Louis."
"You got business in St. Louis?"
"Not a bit."
Sherman scratched his head hard. He kept his red hair short to avoid
cooties in the field. He wanted to keep his friend, who had never been a
success in business, from going back to work with his no-good father Jesse.
Sherman had heard that Grant's father was doing some shady business right
now with the Jew peddlers following the army, perhaps peddling his supposed
influence with his son; since Sam Grant could not bring himself to castigate
his father, he often directed his private fury against all Jew peddlers. Sherman
understood; Grant had come to feel about Jews the way Sherman felt about
newspaper correspondents. Quitting the army would be a mistake for Grant;
it was his only chance for improving his lot in life.
"Sam, a couple months ago I felt the same way. The damn papers were
saying I was a lunatic, remember? Just for telling Buell I needed two hundred
thousand men, and for taking off after that pain-in-the-ass correspondent?
They weren't going to put me in jail, like younothing so respectable. I was
set for the loony bin."
He steamed again, just thinking about it: the writer who signed his dis-
patches "Agate" had called him a monomaniac, and the New York Times
reported he had been relieved six months ago for a mental disorder. That had
led McClellan to dispatch his aide, Colonel Thomas Key to examine Sher-
man, and the distraught general was certain that Key had reported his mind
was too unsteady for command; how else would Assistant Secretary Scott
have come to the conclusion that Sherman was "gone in the head"?
To make his point, Sherman fished in his wallet for the crowning clipping,
from Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper: "Here, Sam, listen to this: 'Gen-
eral Sherman, who lately commanded in Kentucky, is said to be insane. It is
charitable to think so.' My wife and children, my brother the senator, must
have been so ashamed. I tell you the truth, I thought about killing myself."
But suicide was the route of a madman, and he did not want to give the
damned scribblers the satisfaction. He had been transferred west, and Grant
had given him another chance at command. He owed this man the same stout
support he had received from him.
"Well, time passes;" he told Grant. "Things change. Here I am, back in
high feather again. It was a good thing I didn't kick it all in. I was thinking
about it, though, like you now."
Another man at the doorway. "Colonel Appier, sir, wants to be sure the
general knows that his Ohio Regiment has been fired upon by what appeared
to be a picket line of men in butternut clothes."
"Tell Colonel Appier," Sherman exploded, "to take his goddamn regiment
back to Ohio! There's no enemy nearer than Corinth." The man left.
Sherman rose to return upriver to camp. "You think they'll be ready for us
in Corinth?"
"They know we're coming," said Grant. "Sidney Johnston has to make a
stand somewhere, and he might as well fight for that railroad line. We'll lick
'em. Halleck will be made general-in-chief."
"If that happens, you'd wind up top commander in the West. Lincoln will
stick by a fighter, and that's you." Sherman, seeking a command post, had
met Lincoln once, early in the war. The interview had gone badly, and it
caused Sherman pain to think about it, knowing that the President probably
gave credence now to all the stories about Sherman's being unstable. It was
better for Grant, who never made much of a first impression, never to have
met Lincoln. His deeds would speak better than he could. "I'll see you tomor-
row," Sherman told him. "Rest your foot and come over for Sunday lunch."
He poured Grant a last drink, and took the bottle with him. No sense letting
more stories get around. Grant leaned forward, took the bottle back, and
handed Sherman one of his gift cigars.
The steamer Tigress took about forty-five minutes for the trip to Pittsburg
Landing; it was dark when Sherman docked. He slept well, hoping he had
talked Grantnot a cultured man, but a good soldierinto staying in the
army. Sherman thought of himself as more intelligent than Grant, and he
knew more about war, military history, strategy, and grand tactics than
Grant did; he was Grant's superior in organization, supply, and administra-
tion. But his friend had one quality that Sherman knew he lacked himself: he
did not give a damn about what the enemy did when out of his sight. Sher-
man tended to march one way and countermarch the other, trying to out-
smart what he thought were the enemy's shifting movements; Grant held his
ground, issued his orders, and never got nervous. Sherman determined to
emulate that resolute quality in the battle at Corinth.
Next morning, stepping outside the Shiloh meetinghouse soon after dawn,
the banker-lawyer-educator turned general was struck by the beauty of the
scene: peach trees in full bloom on what the early light promised to be a fine
April Sunday. Shiloh, Sherman knew, was the biblical site of the Ark of the
Covenant; odd that such a place would turn out to be a conquering general's
headquarters.
Odder to him, though, was the sudden proliferation of rabbits and squir-
rels. They were scampering across the meetinghouse clearing, always the
same direction, west to east, by the score. Curious; rabbits did not act that
way in his boyhood home in Ohio, or at the Louisiana military academy on
the Red River, where he had been superintendent when the war came. Maybe
the small animals in this neck of the woods migrated in the mornings to the
Tennessee River for a drink. Sherman watched a deer blink at the sunrise,
then dart across the clearing with the rabbits. The general shook his head in
amused wonderment, and went back to his headquarters in the church for a
good breakfast.
About 7:30 A.M. on the morning of April 6, Grant limped off the boat onto
Pittsburg Landing. He had hastened to the Tigress as soon as he heard the
thunder of cannon.
For the better part of an hour, chugging up the river, he was heartsick at
the realization that the Southerners had not waited for him to choose the
place and time of attack. He had grown so accustomed to Sidney Johnston's
skillful retreating that he had forgotten that the man was, like him, a fighter.
He recalled Sherman's contempt at entrenchment, and his own tacit approval
of the failure to anticipate an attack. The grim Grant estimated Johnston's
strength at eighty thousand men, and supposed the firing was a flank attack at
the Union soldiers under Wallace at Crump's Landing. He was almost certain
it could not be a direct, frontal assault by the whole Confederate Army on his
main camp. That was something he might do, but not Johnston.
A newspaperman who had clambered aboard the Tigress at Crump's Land-
ing asked to see Grant; it was Whitelaw Reid of the Cincinnati Gazette, the
"Agate" who had made Sherman out to be a maniac. Grant declined, expect-
ing nothing good to be reported about the forthcoming battle, and having no
credible answer about why he was not with the troops.
As the boat pulled up to Pittsburg Landing, Grant could see the stream of
Union deserters and stragglers coming down the hill in the first sign of a rout.
The sound of a major battle was unmistakable. Rifle fire, shots mingled with
screams, the boom of artillery; the smell of smoke and powder; the dismaying
sight of the frightened green troops huddling for cover near the landing,
hoping for a boat to take them away from the savage surprise attack.
Grant proceeded to do the immediate job at the scene at the dock. The men
up front taking the attack on the heights would need ammunition; he orga-
nized an ammunition train to supply cartridges from the warehouse near the
landing. Hobbling over quickly to a confused-looking colonel standing by, he
said, "I am General Grant. Get that detachment over there to arrest the
stragglers and organize them into a reserve. Then move them up the hill."
His foot pulsing pain, Grant was assisted onto a horse, and sent an aide
downriver to order Lew Wallace, on nearby Crump's Landing, to bring his
seven thousand men immediately to the defense of the main body of troops.
He sent a message to Buell, whose army was still some forty miles away,
estimating the attacking force at one hundred thousand and urging him to
hurry. He ordered Buell's advance division across the river into the fight,
regretting the casual way he had let them stay up near Savannah the night
before, but the time for feeling guilty was not now. He rode up the bluff for
the camp of his second-in-command, Sherman.
He was encouraged to see his friend cool under the withering fire. When
asked how he was doing, the embattled Sherman, biting his own cigar, said,
"Not bad," and asked only for more ammunition. Grant moved on, glad that
Sherman did not need him. He looked for General Prentiss, an argumentative
sort who had crossed Grant on matters of seniority throughout their army
careers. His division of raw troops was in the center of the line and taking the
most punishment, slowly falling back toward a defensible patch of woods.
"You'll have to hold them here at all costs," Grant told Prentiss. He re-
peated, "At all costs." Prentiss nodded; Grant could not trust him in army
politics, but figured the man was enough of a soldier to understand the need
to take whatever losses were necessary to hang on to a key position.
Grant looked up through the trees; what sounded like rain was bullets
ripping through leaves. He wanted a place that would enable him to observe
more of the battlefield, but no commanding view was available. He rode with
six members of his staff along the sagging Union line, buoyed by the thrill of
battle and troubled at the wholesale defections from ranksmen were run-
ning away faster than they could be rounded up and thrown back into line.
He halted in an exposed position.
"General, we must leave this place," said one of his staff. "It isn't necessary
to stay here. If we do, we'll all be dead in five minutes."
"I guess so," Grant told him, and slowly moved away. His Union force was
in great trouble; the attackers were inflicting more casualties than they were
taking, reversing the usual casualty rate in battle. Should have dug in. John-
ston had twice as many men, Grant figured, and could push him back into the
river by nightfall. Grant would never surrender, but faced the prospect of
losing his entire army. He had the feeling of being in a slugfest, where finesse
didn't count and no military orders would be carried out on either side. Both
his flanks were falling back, exposing Prentiss and his men in the center. He
rode back and told Prentiss to hold on, not to fall back in any attempt to
straighten the line, but to fight it out in what the soldiers were calling the
"Hornets' Nest."
General Buell arrived on his horse, without his army: hearing the can-
nonade, he had taken a steamer upriver, and was shocked at the five thousand
Union stragglers cowering at the landing.
"My men are a hard day's march away," Grant heard Buell say. "We can
cover your retreat, if you can get across the river."
"I still think we can win," said Grant, but when he saw the disbelief in
Buell's face, he added: "Bring your artillery up fast to cover a bridge of boats
in case we need it." Grant went back up to the front to view what he could of
the carnage: a rebel battery had been pulled alongside the Union line, turning
its flank, and was pouring canister into the line of bluecoats, who were
screaming and dying, or screaming and running. Grant knew he had no good
reason for the confidence he showed to Buell. He might need that line of
boats across the river.
Breckinridge could not believe this pandemonium was an organized battle;
it was more like a swarm of individual fights, with no military tactics involved
and no understanding of what was happening outside your own small world
of fire. He received an order from Johnston to bring his Reserve Corps to the
left; they marched forward and toward the left. Another order came to cancel
the previous movement, the reserves were needed more on the right; picking
their way through the bodies of fallen Federals, they traversed the brigades to
the right. The constant booming made it hard to think.
A Federal battery on his left roared out at his men, cutting down three
soldiers and giving the others their first sight of comrades falling. A minute
later the gun roared again, this time with canister decimating the ranks of
Kentuckians moving forward in line. The Confederate line broke; Breckin-
ridge thought it might be smarter to let the men move forward their own way,
not in line, but he remembered the tactic book that stressed the power of men
moving shoulder-to-shoulder. He yelled at the men to form a line, but they
didn't listen; he rode to his left, to General Bragg, and asked for help against
the Union cannon.
"I'm too heavily engaged," shouted Bragg; "charge it yourself."
Breckinridge rode back to his brigade, pulled together a single company of
Kentuckians, pointed to the high ground where the flashing and booming had
been coming from, and dismounted. The white faces looking at him, he
sensed, could be moved to take or destroy the gun.
General Breckinridge had never ordered a charge before. He pointed
ahead, drew his sword, and yelled "Charge!" Nobody moved. Breckinridge
said quietly to one lieutenant, "Follow me, then," and the two of them ran
forward into a ravine, then up the hill. He looked back at men walking
forward. "Kentucky!" he yelled at the top of his lungs, and that word trig-
gered itmore than a hundred men broke into a run, with rebel yells, and
passed him in the charge up the hill.
When they arrived, breathless, at the crest, they found no gun. The Federal
battery had already retreated. Everybody around him looked pleased; nobody
was dead, and they had charged on command as soldiers should. Behind the
ridge was what was left of an enemy camp, which the Kentuckians invested
to find a dozen wounded and a dazed medical officer. Breckinridge waved his
men forward; the hundred on the ridge passed the signal to the three thou-
sand behind. Facing sporadic resistance, the Reserve Corps moved forward
three quarters of a mile. The battle could be won, and maybe the war, he
found himself thinking, breathing the smoke. He mounted his horse to get a
better look over the brush.
Abrupt stop. Heavy fire was coming from a Federal line along a sunken
wagon trail running across their front. The Union men had taken advantage
of a strong natural barrier and were fighting back a regiment of men in gray.
Breckinridge sucked in his breath; bodies were everywhere, lying in grotesque
positions, and some of the wounded were trying to crawl back toward him. A
general officer on a horse approached. It was General Johnston, excited,
flushed, radiating confidence; Breckinridge felt better seeing him.
"Charge the Hornets' Nest," Johnston ordered, "that's the center of the
Union line. I'll bring up another brigade to support you. Get the Tennessee-
ans in line with the Kentuckians."
Breckinridge, more certain of his ability to lead troops now, ordered his
captains to form for a general charge on the center of the Federal line. He ran
forward to get a better lookthe haze of smoke hung low in the woods under
the midday sun, and it was hard to make out the lineand saw, twenty yards
in front of him, a boy pitch his shotgun ahead of him and fall. A tall boy, in
Kentucky jeans. Breckinridge, taken by the irrational notion that it might be
Cabell, ran forward and turned the body over. The boy's face was shot away,
but a silver tooth gleamed in what was left of the mouth. Cabell had no false
tooth.
The Kentuckians went in, were bloodily repulsed, and Breckinridge called
for the Tennesseeans. Those green troops would stand behind trees and shoot
long-range, but would not be ordered into running over the bodies against a
withering fire from the wagon trail. Breckinridge was stymied; would it not be
better to slip around this pocket of resistance? He rode along the line looking
for General Johnston.
"No," said Johnston firmly, "we take 'em or kill 'em." Isham Harris, the
former Governor of Tennessee, was with him; the general directed him to go
with Breckinridge to get the Tennesseeans to break the line.
Harris managed to get his fellow Volunteers into line, but neither he nor
Breckinridge could mount a charge. The carnage was sickening; the number
of dead near the Hornets' Nest presented a sight to discourage any but fanatic
soldiers, and the Tennesseeans were no fanatics. For two hours Breckinridge
poured shell and shot into the redoubt; a captured Federal battery was turned
on the Union soldiers but they would not give, nor did their ammunition give
out. Breckinridge felt dull inside; the headiness was gone. The business of
facing and dealing death numbed him.
He went back to Sidney Johnston and said he could not get the brigade to
charge into certain death. "I think you can," Johnston replied, and Breckin-
ridge shot back, "I tried, I failed. Why don't we go around them?"
"I'll help you," said Johnston. "Be calm, Breckyou'll see, we'll water our
horses in the Tennessee River tonight."
"My men need rest. They're exhausted."
"No rest until we win this battle, and we must win it today." Johnston was
relentless, to Breck inhuman. "Beauregard is sick, he's in Sherman's head-
quarters in Shiloh church, out of action. Sherman and Grant have their backs
to the river. I want that Hornets' Nest to surrender. That will start the
surrender of the rest of the Union Army. Come on!"
Johnston rode to the front of the 45th Tennessee Regiment, exhorting the
men along the line to fix bayonets and ready themselves. He stationed Breck-
inridge at the left of the line, took the right himself, raised his sword and
spurred his horse into the enemy front. "Charge them, Tennessee, charge!"
Breckinridge shouted, breathed deep and rode forward into what he assumed
would be his death. It was a noble cause, sort of. It was his free choice, and it
was time; he was with his people and one way or another it would lead
toward the conclusion of the war.
Four thousand reluctant Southerners moved ahead in a ragged line, sweep-
ing down a short slope that gave them momentum, through a ravine and into
the Hornets' Nest. Breckinridge's horse fell and he continued on foot, shout-
ing at the top of his lungs, waving his sword like a crazy man, as the Confed-
erates overran the Union front line and broke through to a scene more heart-
stopping than any the Kentuckian had yet seen. Bodies were lying on top of
one another; over nearly an acre, it was impossible to walk across the forest
floor without treading on human flesh.
A gray-faced Union officer introduced himself as General Prentiss and
announced he was prepared to surrender.
Johnston rode over, his horse picking its way through the dead. "How
many do you have?"
"I had a force of five thousand. We may have a couple thousand left. I was
ordered by Grant to hold at all costs. All costs." Prentiss had a mariner's
beard, red-rimmed eyes; blood ran down his hand. His division had stopped
the Confederate advance for four hours.
"Send a message to Grant that you've surrendered," said Johnston quickly.
"Leave a burial detail. March your men to my rear. And don't be dispirited,
General, we'll swap you for Simon Buckner."
Breckinridge noticed a red stain on Johnston's leg, just above his boot.
"You're wounded, General."
"Just a nick. Press on here, Breckinridge, straight through to the Landing.
No rest. Win today." Johnston spotted a lieutenant nearby taking a briar pipe
out of the knapsack of a dead Union officer. "None of that!" he called out,
and the officer hurriedly dropped the pipe. Johnston spurred his horse over to
the subaltern and said, "We're not here for plunder." He leaned down and
picked up a tin cup from the table used by Sherman's staff. "Let this be my
share of the spoils today."
He rode out of the center of killing, his horse shying from a stream that
was running thickly red, then plunged ahead, splattering the nearby leaves
with the mixture of water and gore. Breckinridge retched and sank to his
knees; Prentiss helped him up.
Sidney Johnston knew the day was won, his reputation repaired, the cause
of the South rejuvenated. Grant might fight on all afternoon, then try to get
some of his men across the river that night. Probably the seven thousand
from up on Crump's Landing, which never did get to the fighting on time,
would cut its way back across the river, too, but Grant's army was no more.
Twenty-five, perhaps thirty thousand men killed, wounded, captured: that
would be a shattering blow to the North, especially to families in Ohio,
Illinois, Iowa. They would learn the meaning of Lincoln's invasion of the
Southnot parades, not newspaper dispatches, but death. The pressure to let
the South secede in peace would become intense.
And the captured equipment. Johnston's army had been fighting with a
ragtag collection of old muskets, ancient imports, and hunting gunsfew of
the new rifles and Mini6 balls. He reached down to his leg, where a Mini6 ball
had penetrated his boot; no pain, but his foot was squishing in the shoe. He
would have to have it seen to, during a lull. But there must not be a lull
delay worked for Grant, with Buell's army on the way.
This was exactly as he had planned: to beat the Union armies in detail.
First this army, with the stores Johnston needed so badly to equip his troops;
then Buell's army across the river, the same size as his, but leaderless and
demoralized. That would be the real test, Johnston thought, knowing how
Beauregard would insist that the men needed rest. Bragg and Breckinridge,
too, thinking of the comfort of their men, would counsel remaining in posi-
tion on Pittsburg Landing. But these generals did not understand the new
meaning of war: the side that rose from exhaustion to fight on was the side
that won, and the defeated army that is allowed to escape is the army that
ultimately defeats you.
Johnston would take his tired men across the Tennessee River, confront
Buell's forty thousandequally tired from their days of forced marching
whip them, and capture their equipment, too. With that, he would return up
through Tennessee to Kentucky, restoring those states to the Confederacy.
With Kentucky in handboth Davis and Lincoln knew how important that
state wasJohnston would link forces with his longtime subordinate, Robert
Lee, and defeat McClellan. End of the war. The prospect was dizzying. Jeff
Davis had already hinted that he wanted Johnston to succeed to the presi-
dency of the Confederacy; that would be worthwhile, the general thought, but
for only one term. After that, back to California.
Johnston, suddenly unexpectedly weak, felt a twinge of guilt. He had done
nothing for the wounded among the thousands of Union prisoners. Using his
souvenir tin cup rather than his sword as a pointera nice touch, he thought;
that was how to direct a battlehe ordered his staff surgeon to the rear to
arrange for care of the prisoners. "And after that, Doctor, check General
Beauregard in his ambulance cothe's burning with fever." The surgeon
rode off to the captured headquarters. Johnston, his throat suddenly dry,
thought of lying down a moment himself. No Federal artillery could be seen;
Johnston guessed that Grant had drawn the guns back to the bluffs for a final
stand. Grant would not need boats or pontoons for more than ten thousand
men, because he would not have ten thousand left.
"Your horse has been shot," Governor Harris told him. "Blood running
down its flank." Johnston looked over and felt terribly dizzy. "General, it's
not your horse," said the governor, alarmed; "that's you that's bleeding."
Johnston held out his hands toward the blurring face and collapsed into the
arms of his friend. He felt himself slowly lowered to the ground and his boot
being pulled off, filled with blood. It had not hurt at all. It was a minor
wound, he should have had it seen to; he was angry with himself as con-
sciousness slipped away and the cup rolled out of his hand.
Breckinridge, with Bragg's help, helped Beauregard out of the ambulance
and into the Shiloh meetinghouse, which had been Sherman's headquarters
until its capture that morning. When his coughing subsided, the ranking
officer sat up to hear the news.
"General Johnston is dead," Breckinridge told him. "Bled to death. Any-
body could have saved him with a tourniquet, but nobody knew what to do
and he'd sent the surgeon away."
"I assume command," Beauregard said immediately. "What is the situa-
tion?"
"We cannot get half our men up on the line," said Bragg angrily, "but
Grant's in worse shape. A third of his force is on the Landing trying to get
out. He's setting up an artillery semicircle, backed up by his gunboats on the
river."
"Our infantry?"
"Slowly advancing, as we have all day. Polk says he can turn the left
flank."
"Don't drive them into the Landing," said Beauregard sensibly. "Don't let
them get to the Landing. Keep Sidney's death a secret. How much more
daylight?"
"It's four o'clock," said Breckinridge. "More than three hours. We're win-
ning, Bory."
"The battle might as well go on, then." That struck Breck as a curious
thing for a general to say. The little Creole went into a coughing spasm but
would not return to the ambulance.
One man could not make all that difference, Breckinridge told himself.
This battle was not in the hands of the generals, but was up to the sergeants,
who would win or lose the thousands of life-and-death engagements all along
the front. The South's officers had no more than a vague idea of what was
going on, only that the general movement was forward. Units had drifted
apart. Some men deserted, others mingled with unfamiliar units.
Breckinridge found his Orphan Brigade swarming through a warehouse of
enemy supplies, throwing away their old guns for the Union weapons, putting
on leather shoes, stuffing rations into their knapsacks. The Kentuckians were
delighted, refreshed, ready for the victorious finish of the fight. He led them
to a small glade and gave them a brief talk about the plan to carry through to
the river tonight, saying nothing about Johnston's death. In a few minutes, at
5:30, Breckinridge was given an additional division of Folk's corps, as Bragg,
acting on Beauregard's authority, ordered a general advance.
Breck took his troops striking down the main road to the Landing, pursu-
ing the Federals hard, reaching a commanding hill less than a mile from the
river. He felt himself at the foremost point of the Southern attack, the most
advanced Confederate thrust of the day, and found that position exhilarating.
He could see, four hundred yards down the road, a clump of Federal flags
behind a semicircle of artillery pieces that were blazing away at Bragg's men.
He thought he could make out Grant and another generalstubbly red hair
to the left rear of the big guns. The combined batteries were not heavily
defended by infantry. Backs to the river's wall.
An artillery captain right behind him was ordering his gun unlimbered to
return the shelling from the Union batteries. The nearby booming of the
battery, and the river shelling from the gunboatsaimed over the heads of
the Union men into Confederate ranksshowed how heavily Grant de-
pended on his artillery for a last-ditch defense.
"Hold your fire," Breckinridge shouted to the artillery officer. "I'm going
to charge those batteries."
"If you're going to charge," came the reply, "now's the time."
Breckinridge ordered his men into line for the final assault. About six
thousand of his men would run at the Union guns from an angle, with fewer
than half the semicircled guns able to shoot directly at the charge. He sent
word to Bragg, somewhere on his right, that he was going in, but could not be
sure the messenger would reach Bragg. It was a tremendous gamble to take
on his own responsibility, and if he was wrong he would live in shame the rest
of his life, but thereless than 500 yards away, a ten-minute chargewere
the heart and brains of the Union Army of the West.
A courier came up with an order from Beauregard. "Break off all engage-
ments and retire to shelter and safety. Prepare for engagement at daylight."
"This is a mistake," Breckinridge said. "Stay in position." He rode hard to
the Shiloh church a mile away. Bragg was already there, arguing with Beau-
regard.
"Our troops are tired and disorganized," Beauregard was saying, shaking
his head. "Darkness is close at hand. We cannot hope to finish now. The men
need food and rest."
"We still have over an hour of daylight," Bragg urged. "So what if we're
not in order? The enemy is worse off."
"What about Buell's army across the river?" Breckinridge asked. "If that
swarm of Yankees gets here tomorrow, we could lose everything."
"We have information that they are still more than a day's march away,"
Beauregard replied. That was wishful thinking. Breckinridge knew that part
of Buell's army was the Kentucky Federal infantry, with Bill Nelson of Mays-
ville in charge. Nelson, an old friend, was the type to close quickly on a fight;
he could get here to help the Union sooner than that.
"Your information could be wrong," Breckinridge began.
"So could yours," snapped Beauregard. "And I am in command."
"Nobody disputes that, General," Breckinridge argued, "but Sidney John-
ston said only this morning that the side that keeps fighting past exhaustion
will win. He said this is not the normal kind of war, we could demand more
of men"
"General Johnston is dead." Beauregard did not seem overly saddened at
the fact. "I thought a battle at this time and at this place would be a mistake,
and I said so. Since the battle was in progress, and it is not good to quit the
field at midday, I permitted it to continue. At least a third of our army is
wandering about the field, plundering Union supplies, and your Kentuckians
are among the worst offenders, Breckinridge. Get them in hand. Tomorrow,
rested and reformed, we can defeat the Federals."
"We got here fust with the most," said a voice in the back of Sherman's
captured headquarters. Colonel Forrest, who had no right to speak in a gener-
als' council, said, "We oughta beat 'em now."
"Thank you for your advice," said Beauregard icily. "Stand down and
bivouac where you are. As it happens, I expect reinforcement tomorrow from
General Van Dom to the west. Be ready for an attack at daylight."
Sherman was satisfied with himself, though mostly in negatives. He had not
panicked; he had not gone crazy; he had not made a mistake after his initial,
unforgivable failure to entrench; he had comported himself honorably in the
hottest fire, four horses shot from under him.
Now, midnight, was the time to retreat from the field of defeat in good
order. The night was filled with the sound of gunfire from the Union
riverboats, lobbing cannonballs over the precarious Federal position into the
enemy camp. Buell's army was arriving on the other side of the river. Led by
Nelson's division of Union Kentuckians, it would form a potent force to
restrain the victorious rebels if they chose to try to cross the river in pursuit
of the defeated Federals.
Sherman assumed he and Grant would have plenty of explaining to do at
having been taken by surprise, and the terrible casualties of half-awake men
bayoneted in their tents would evoke a great outcry in some newspapers, but
to Sherman the escape of the main body of the Union Army was the impor-
tant thing. They would fight again another day.
A storm had rolled in from the west, pouring rain on the blood, thunder
adding to the noise of the river guns. Sherman looked for Grant at the log
house near the Landing that was headquarters, but that large room was filled
with groaning wounded.
He was directed to a large tree on the hill overlooking the Landing, where
Grant was standing, water dripping from his hat, in the warm rain. He was
holding a lantern, resting his weight on his good foot, staring at the steamers
bringing Buell's troops over to the Landing.
Sherman was moved by a sudden instinct not to ask about the details of
what he had assumed until that moment would be the night's retreat across
the makeshift bridges. "Been a devil of a day, Grant, hasn't it?"
"Yes." Grant took the wet, unlit cigar out of his mouth and repeated, "Yes.
Lick 'em tomorrow, though." He put the dripping cigar back and chomped
hard on it. No despair showed in his face; doggedness was the expression. He
was not going to run. If Sidney Johnston was going to come after him, so be
it; it occurred to Sherman that the rebel commander should have followed up
his advantage tonight, because Grant was determined put up a hell of a battle
the next day. It was a stupendous gamble, risking the loss of the entire army
on what Sidney Johnston liked to call "the iron dice of war"; Sherman hoped
Grant knew what he was doing.
Sherman watched the incoming troops with Grant for a while, then started
back up to his command post to get ready to counterattack on Monday
morning. He stopped when he thought he heard Grant talking to him. He
went back and heard Grant muttering to himself, "Not beaten by a damn
sight."
Cabell hoped he would never have to live through a day like Monday at
Shiloh again. Nobody had slept the night before, what with the rain and the
thunder, and the guns on the river and shells in camp, and the bodies all
around, some dead, others wishing they were. He got up more tired than he
had lain down.
The day started all wrong, with the Federals firing and yelling and coming
back through the peach orchard. Now he knew how the Union soldiers had
felt the morning before, surprised by an attack. Nobody was giving any or-
ders, so Cabell picked up his things and started to head back away from the
firing with a bunch of others. He suspected that was wrong, and stopped to
look for an officer. Colonel Forrest had taken the horses to the rear for the
night, and Cabell was with a group of twenty cavalrymen without their
mounts.
They tried not to step on the dead on the way to the rear. Coming forward
the day before, the bodies had all been Federals, and he had rushed past them
in his enthusiasm, but now he could see that over one in three was a Confed-
erate. Would they have a chance to come back and bury them? Did anybody
care?
"Stay behind trees or walk low," Albin called to him; "those are Kentucki-
ans. Crittenden's men, and they can shoot."
Cabel remembered Thomas Crittenden, old Senator Crittenden's son, as
one of his father's closest friends, who had been in their house a hundred
times. He used to bring Cabell a birthday present every year. The scouting
knife, the one on his belt, was a gift from the Crittendens.
Cabell moved faster toward the rear, broke into a run. Yesterday they had
walked over this mile of woods firing every three minutes, paying a terrible
enough cost in blood, and now he was racing back over it trying not to step
on anybody. He had heard Sidney Johnston was dead and couldn't be blamed
for the retreat. Who was calling for the retreat, he wondered, Beauregard?
Bragg? His father?
Ahead of him, a large tree hit by the Union battery back near the river
collapsed on the running soldiers. Cabell stopped to pull a comrade out from
under the branches and then hurried on. Nobody was going the other way;
nobody was stopping the retreat. There did not appear to be any officers
around. How could a battle turn so completely? Was yesterday a complete
waste of time and blood? He wished he were on a horse. This was not what he
had joined up for.
"You men, stop! Turn around, reform behind that big tree that fell." It was
Colonel Forrest on his horse, and Cabell suddenly felt ashamed. Unhesitat-
ingly he whipped around and took a position behind the tree trunk, hurriedly
reloading his Union rifle with the Union Mini6 balls he had taken at the
warehouse near Shiloh church. Others in gray came up beside him, and he
felt better. He had to be careful not to shoot his own men running toward
him, and it was hard to distinguish the Confederates in Kentucky jeans from
the Federals. What would his father say to his panic of a moment before? Was
his father still alive? He presumed so; the troops heard about it when a
general was killed. He wished now he had looked in on his father, because if
the Federals overran this position, Cabell and all the others would be buried
in a mass grave and nobody in his family would know if he was alive or dead.
Proving bravery and independence no longer seemed so important to Cabell.
The sweet victory of yesterday had soured to awful disaster today, and this
was a good time to be near kin.
They were coming, Crittenden's Union Kentuckians, through the forest in
a ragged linehundreds of them, surely followed by thousands more of
Buell's army from across the river. They must have poured in overnight.
He took aim at one man striding forward fifty yards away, hoped the
charge in his gun hadn't been too damp, and pulled the trigger. The cartridge
worked and the man dropped. He started to reload but knew he had no
chance to be ready with another shot before the Federals were upon him. He
looked behind him; Forrest was there, urging more men into the line. Were
they stopping them? Was it disaster everywhere? All he could know was that
the battle, the war, was this line of men coming at him, one officer pushing
them forward, one officer keeping him in line.
He could see the expression on the face of the man in blue coming directly
at him, pulling away the branches, gleam of bayonet on the end of a gun that
was as unloaded as his own. The man was going to stick the knife in him if he
didn't do something. Cabell took his own gun by the barrel and tried to
smash the butt over the man's head. He missed, crashing it onto the soldier's
shoulder and knocking him down.
He could hear the scream of Albin to his left as a bayonet reached him.
Cabell pulled his scouting knife from his belt and leaped on the man who had
charged him, stabbed him five, six times, left the bloody knife in him and
turned to recover his gun. He was crying, and his pants were wet. This was
not how it was yesterday, or how it was supposed to be. He vomited on his
victim, shook his head, found his ramrod and started to reload. He looked for
the next man coming at him, but the Union charge had failed. Did Forrest
expect him to leave the tree trunk and go after the Federals? He didn't want
to leave the tree. He wanted to stay right where he was for the rest of the war.
"Fall back on the horses," Forrest was calling, and he was glad to be able
to turn and run back without being a coward in retreat. War was better on a
horse.
The day was lost, General Breckinridge knew, as he had known it would be
from the moment of decision the evening before. As Beauregard had not
known the time to strike the day before, Bragg had not known when to stop
striking after the reinforced Union turned the tide: the little martinet had sent
Pat Clebume's brigade into the Union center on what was surely a suicide
mission. Clebume, the Irishman who had lost two thirds of his brigade the
day before, had objected to a charge without support and into a position
where he would be outflanked; told to obey the order by the implacable
Bragg, Clebume had plunged in, losing most of the rest of his command for
no good reason.
As Breck saw it, victory at Shiloh died with Sidney Johnston, who foolishly
failed to take care of a minor wound. With his death died the hopes of
defeating the Union Army in detail, recapturing Tennessee and Kentucky,
smashing the Tennessee plan, retaking Donelson, and making the defeat of
the Confederacy difficult if not impossible. For one glorious moment the
possibility of victory in the war had been within grasp; now all that remained
was the long avoidance of defeat. Breckinridge was heartsick, not only at the
human carnage around him, but also at the lost chance of soon ending the
bloodletting. The simple, obvious Tennessee River plan had worked; at Cor-
inth in a few days, Grant's advancing army would cut the Memphis-to-
Charleston railroad, an artery as important to the heart of the South as the
artery on Sidney Johnston's leg cut by the Minie ball was to the Battle of
Shiloh.
Time now to prolong the agonies of both nations. As soon as it became
apparent that Van Dorn was not coming to help him at Shiloh, Beauregard
fled with the remainder of his army toward Corinth. Artillery was being
abandoned along the road. The tables of the previous day had been turned: a
determined push by Grant would now destroy or capture the bulk of the
defeated Southern army, and the benumbed Breckinridge could see no reason
for Grant not to press his advantage.
The Kentuckian, with his Orphan Brigade and Forrest's cavalry, was as-
signed the rear guard. The brigade of Tennesseeans that he had personally led
for the past two days had suffered such casualties as had never before been
seen in war on this continent. The men remaining hoped for the exhaustion of
the Federal forces to save them; little else stood between Grant and the
annihilation of the less than thirty thousand Southern troops left of the more
than forty thousand that had surprised their enemy at Shiloh.
Breckinridge was prepared to sacrifice the rear guard to save that army,
which was what he supposed rear guards were for. He was prepared, too, to
be killed or capturedkilled, he thought, might be better than tried for trea-
son, since the Senate had already branded him a traitor.
"I told that idiot Frenchy twice't, goddammit," Forrest was saying, "that
we should either attack last night or pull the hell out. I sent scouts dressed in
Federal overcoats down to the landing last night as Buell's army began to
cross. That was the moment to hit or to run,"
"What did you do with that information?" Breck asked dully.
"Couldn't find Bory all night. His headquarters at the church he made into
a hospital, and he didn't set up a headquarters of his own. Couldn't find his
tent. Two o'clock in the morning I knew we would face two armies instead of
one, and I had no commander to tell it to."
Breckinridge did not want to hear more of what could have been; he dis-
cussed with Forrest the best place for a series of delaying skirmishes and
retreats, to be followed by a last stand before the infuriated Sherman
pounced.
"Hell with that," growled Forrest. "Let's hit him from the flank. Sherman
thinks we're all running."
Breckinridge pondered that. Grant, like Sidney Johnston, understood that
a victory was nothing without the destruction of the enemy army. His deputy,
Sherman, in hot pursuit of the beaten Southerners, had shown he could be
taken by surprise.
"Do you have enough men to hit him hard along Lick Creek?"
"Couple hundred Texas Rangers, Morgan's cavalry and my own. Maybe a
thousand men."
Not many to string out on a line in defense, but potent if concentrated in an
attack. Sudden punishment might discourage Sherman from following fur-
ther, at least overnight. Forty-eight hours before, Breckinridge would have
hesitated before ordering a thousand men to undertake what might be a
suicidal charge, but now daring was all they had in the way of strategy. His
rearguard infantry was worn out and might throw down their guns after the
first volley.
"Hit them at dusk," he said. "I'll make a lot of noise with the artillery we
have. Make it look like a full-scale counterattack. After the first strike, get
some of your men off their horses to act like infantry. I'll move on their
skirmishers from here."
Breckinridge waited while Forrest went into action. The massed Union
infantry could make mincemeat out of cavalry, outnumbering them twenty to
one, but not at any one point. Concentration of numbers in a salient made the
difference"fust with the most," as Forrest liked to say. At dusk, when he
heard the rebel yells and the firing, Breckinridge opened with his few artillery
pieces and sent a thousand men on foot into the oncoming Federal skirmish-
ers.
Waiting, lantern in hand, in the middle of the road of retreat, he hoped
Tom Crittenden and Bill Nelson would live through all this. He thought
about his son, who might be anywhere on the road to Corinth, if he was not
dead on the field.
Two cavalrymen brought Forrest back in a stretcher on a cart. Breckin-
ridge shined the lantern on the figure. The colonel, his face twisted in pain,
gritted, "We turned the bastard around," before passing out.
"He has a ball in his back," a voice said in the darkness. "He overran the
charge, went right into the enemy infantry's second line. Shot his way out
with a pistol before they got him, but he stayed on his horse."
Forrest was the last casualty of Shiloh, Breck hoped, the last blood shed on
the bloodiest day that the American continent had ever seen. "And what
about Sherman?"
"He's digging in for the night," a second man said. "Building entrench-
ments. Learned his lesson, I guess. They won't be coming after us."
The voice of the second man was deeper than he remembered but was
familiar. He lifted the lantern to look into the bleak, dust-caked face of his
son. He slowly put down the light, and the two men leaned on each other for
a long moment in the middle of the road.
CHAPTER 15
JOHN HAY'S DIARY
APRIL 10, 1862
"I tell you, Lincoln, the nation demands that Grant not only be relieved of
command, but dismissed from the army!"
Those were the words I heard emanating from the Cabinet Room half past
midnight last night, as I was creeping back from my rendezvous at the house
on Sixth Street.
The piping voice was recognizable as that of Alexander K. McClure, the
Pennsylvania politician. He is one of the handful of menOld Man Blair,
David Davis, Leonard Swett, Hill Lamonwho can say almost anything to
Lincoln, and the Tycoon will never take it amiss because he trusts them
absolutely. He had been right about Simon Cameron from the start, too; good
judgment. One of us.
Tonight McClure has been inveighing against the man everyone is calling
"the butcher of Pittsburg Landing," who only recently was known as "the
hero of Fort Donelson."
The papers have dubbed the battle of Shiloh "the American Waterloo,"
because it has become known as a battle with only villains, no heroes, unless
you count Don Carlos Buell, whose rescuing troops arrived in time to keep
the secesh from applying the coup de grace to Grant's reeling army. Horace
Greeley, whose Tribune had so aptly warned of an expected rebel blow in the
West, now looks as astute as Grant and Sherman look foolish.
Our side took thirteen thousand casualties, the rebels maybe half that, and
Grant was as wrong about rebel strength across the Tennessee River as Mc-
Clellan has been about the rebels across the Potomac. Our man in the West
was overconfident, while our man in the East has been underconfident.
I brought a pot of tea and a couple of cups into the Prsdt and McClure and
tried to act as if I'd been assiduously on duty all evening. Lincoln was sitting
in front of the fire, his feet in carpet slippers up against the marble mantel,
looking as morose as only he can, while McClure was pacing back and forth.
I don't know why those two chose the Cabinet Room; perhaps the Prsdt
wants a change of scene from his office.
"You know I have nothing against Grant," the Pennsylvania pol said. "I've
never met the man. Neither have you, so there can be nothing personal. But I
tell you, Lincoln, the clamor for his dismissal is unprecedented in all Ameri-
can history."
Lincoln grunted to show he was listening. People who do not know him
take that grunt for assent, but it means only "keep talking."
"Have you read the dispatches from the Cincinnati Gazette's Whitelaw
Reid?" The Prsdt had; I clipped them for his agonized perusal all last week.
Every paper in the country had picked up and printed those damning dis-
patches, none with more vitriolic accompaniment than Bennett's New York
Herald, the big supporter of Breckinridge for President two years ago. Reid,
who styles himself "Agate," was on the scene at Pittsburg Landing, and
described the bloodletting in the tents of the Union Army when it was taken
by surprise. Blamed Grant for all the bunglingnot Sherman, who turns out
not to be crazy after all, but rather brave under fire.
Those "Agate" articles, taken up and resonated by the other papers, have
started all the stories about Grant's drinking again. Winners can drink, as we
learned after Fort Donelson, but generals who are surprised and who take the
worst casualties in anybody's memory have to be cold sober. Grant wasn't in
camp where he belonged, that is certain; I wonder if he was drunk, or with a
lady. So must the Prsdt wonder. The most noble and patriotic of men suc-
cumb to temptation at times, as I can testify.
"He's been denounced as incompetent by the public journals of every
party," McClure went on. "He's been repudiated in the Congress by every
leader without regard to political faith."
"Not by Elihu Washbume," Lincoln interposed. He picked up a marked
copy of the Globe, with Congressman Washburne's impassioned defense of his
constituent and protege: "Listen: 'There is no more temperate man in the
army than General Grant. He never indulges in the use of intoxicating liquors
at all.' Man knows him better than you or me."
"You believe that, Lincoln?"
"Washbume says that Falsehood will travel from Maine to Georgia while
Truth is still putting on its boots. What he says about rumors is true enough."
"His hometown Congressman defends him," conceded McClure. "But
Washburne's the one who has been pushing Grant for yearsgetting his
commission, assuring you that the stories about his drinking are not true.
'Never indulges'hogwash! Everybody else in the Congress and the country
is furious with a general too besotted to tell his troops to entrench."
"You think that hurts the Administration, McClure."
"I think the universal revulsion with Grant hurts you, Mr. President. If
you try to sustain Grant," McClure said very slowly, "I am convinced you
will not be able to sustain yourself. And I'm not the only one with your
interest at heart who thinks that way; there's Swett and Lamon"
"I know, I know." Both had spoken to him about the way Grant's unpopu-
larity would rub off on Lincoln, and how the storm of protest needed some
sacrifice to permit it to abate.
"It's your interest we're thinking about, yours and the country's." When
Lincoln stared at the fire without response, McClure added, "I don't have
any pet general who might benefit by Grant's overthrow. But I do know that
the tide of resentment is so overwhelming that you must yield to it or go
down with him."
Lincoln shifted his feet and continued to stare at the fire. I went outside
and continued hearing McClure's voice making excellent sense. "You above
all, Lincoln, are the one man who never allows himself to appear as wantonly
defying public sentiment." True; I had not known anyone else was walking
around with that insight. "Yet that is what you are doing in this instance.
Why? You owe Grant nothing. Why should you associate yourself with his
unpopularity? Let the bereaved mothers hate him, not hate you."
Long silence.
"We've been through a long winter of terrible strain with McClellan and
the Army of the Potomac," the Tycoon remarked at last, which struck me as
off the point. He was agitated; McClure had shaken him. "In the East, nearly
every day brings some new and perplexing military complication. And from
the day that Grant started on this Southern expedition until now, we've had
little else than jarring and confusion among the generals in the West." He did
not go into detail about Halleck's getting McClellan to order the arrest of
Grant; his visitor didn't know the half of it.
"All right, if I'm oppressing you, I'll drop it," said McClure.
"No, no, you have no ax to grind in this." If his visitor that night had been
Father Blair, who is prejudiced in favor of McClellan, the Prsdt's distress
would not have been so acute. But McClure is a straight shooter, his main
concern the ability of Lincoln to lead the North. In the phrase I have heard
him use a hundred times, Lincoln called for a specific recommendation:
"What, then, is to be done?"
"Remove Grant at once. He's been cashiered beforethis time do it based
on his reckless exposure of his army and be done with it. That will put you on
the side of the people who are justifiably angry, and you will ride out the
storm."
In the ensuing silence, and to help McClure make his point, I took in the
New York newspapers; the two men looked at the front-page lists of casual-
ties.
"This is only New York," McClure said, "which did not bear the brunt.
Believe me, when those casualty lists are finally posted in Ohio and Illinois
and Iowa, where the losses were worst, there is going to be a wave of fury the
likes of which you've never seen."
The Prsdt's feet came down from the mantel and hit the floor. That was
usually indicative of a decision.
In a strained, pained voice, with an earnestness I have never heard before,
Lincoln said to McClure, "I can't spare this man; he fights."
Wisely, McClure shut up. The nearest I can explain this apparent willing-
ness to go down with Grant's ship is this: Lincoln had spent the winter trying
to get McClellan off his bemedaled butt, and he was not about to join in the
bedevilment of a general who was willing to engage in battle.
"But you're right about not defying public sentiment, McClure," Lincoln
added after a while. "I cannot do nothing."
"Maybe a reprimand"
"No." Here was to come, I could tell, a plot from the master of indirection.
"A reprimand would not satisfy his critics and would destroy Grant. The
object is to remove him from command temporarily, which would appease his
critics, until such time as he can do battle again. And to do that in a way that
does not insult or demean Grant as a military officer."
So that was why he had made "Old Brains" Halleck the overall com-
mander in the West a few weeks ago. I began to see the plan in the Prsdt's
mind; we were both far ahead of the normally astute McClure.
"I have ordered Halleck to leave St. Louis and go to Pittsburg Landing,"
Lincoln continued.
"That means he will automatically supersede Grant as commander of the
army there," said McClure, comprehending, "That should take some of the
pressure off. The trick is to remove Grant from command right now. The
people demand that."
"At the same time, there is no insult to Grant in Halleck's joining the army
in the field," said Lincoln. "It could be that the public anger will subside with
another in command. Perhaps General Grant is being unjustly accused, and
this odium will be lifted, or perhaps another event will occupy the public
mind." He turned that thought over in his head, adding, "If need be, to give
him confidence, I could publicly appoint Grant second in command."
"That is what he would be anyway," said the logical McClure, "with Hal-
leck there."
"Nobody has ever appointed anybody second in command," I put in.
"Whoever is next in line down the chain of command is that automatically."
"I know that, John. But an official appointment would be encouraging,"
said the Prsdt, "and would tell the people in the armywhere there is plenty
of politics, McClurethat I'm behind him."
"That's a fairly sagacious way of handling it," McClure allowed, "if you
feel you cannot spare him."
"He fights," the Tycoon repeated. Evidently that has become a more im-
portant quality in a general than anyone realizes. We cannot know for certain
if Grant is a drunk, or an incompetent, or worse; all Lincoln can be sure of is
that the man inflicts terrible punishment, and anyone who does that for him
must be protected at all costs.
When McClure had left after one in the morningthey had been talking, I
guess, for over two hours1 told the Prsdt I knew how he could return
Grant to field command, since Halleck was an armchair general.
"It will be easy," I said. "You have just removed McClellan as General-in-
Chief." Ostensibly that had been done to free Little Mac for his field cam-
paign around the Peninsula to Richmond, but in reality it had been to mollify
the radicals who wanted McClellan fired entirely for failing to show the
proper abolitionist fervor. "After the hubbub over Grant subsides," went my
analysis, "you bring Halleck back to Washington and make him General-in-
Chief. At that point, second-in-command Grant gets his army back."
"You're too young a man to think like that," said the Tycoon, pleased at
my precocity, the deviousness learned at his knee. "I might not do that at all,
especially if McClellan wins a great victory in the Peninsula. But such a series
of moves," he granted, "would appease public sentiment, and at the same
time give me a general out West who fights."
CHAPTER I
MUCH LIKE TREASON
George McClellan was in good spirits. A few moments before, at 7:30 A.M.,
he had received word that the President wanted to see him alone, immedi-
ately. No need to keep Lincoln waiting; he swallowed one piece of toast,
gulped his tea, and checked his uniform in the full-length hall mirror. His
aide, Lieutenant Custer, was holding his overcoat at the front door but the
general motioned him to wait. He bounded up the stairs to the nursery.
Nellie was feeding the baby, and the sight of his robust, sleepy-eyed son at
the breast of the woman he loved moved him to silently thank God for his
good fortune. She motioned for him to come in and lifted her face. He kissed
her lips with all the tenderness in his heartnone of this cheek-kissing so
common to husbands and wives in this sink of iniquity of a cityand stopped
as he drew back because the baby had taken hold of one of his tunic buttons.
The general smiled at his son's demanding nature: one of his small hands
grasped at his mother's nipple and the other at his father's button. He pried
the fingers loose, nuzzled the back of his wife's graceful neck, and slipped out.
"You want to get a haircut, Custer," he told his aide, a youth too much
taken with his long blond locks. They walked in a brisk cadence to the
President's house three blocks from the McClellan home. His staff insisted
that the general not walk the streets of the capital alone at any time, and he
had acceded to this wish; Pinkerton had information that McClellan was a
likely target for an assassination attempt. At the door of the President's
house, he shed his overcoat and handed it to Custer, instructing him to be
ready with horses when the interview with Lincoln was over.
He was pleased that Stanton would not be present. The Secretary of War
had managed to prevent frequent personal interviews between the President
and the commander of the Army of the Potomac. McClellan was certain he
could deal with Lincoln far better without the double-dealing Stanton's inhib-
iting presence; perhaps Lincoln was awakening to that as well. The President
was not a bad sort, in the general's judgment, but he was too easily influ-
enced.
Lincoln did not rise from his chair, as he customarily did, nor did he look
his general-in-chief in the eye. That, thought McClellan, augured ill. He did
not like something in the President's manner; it seemed to be that of a man
about to do something of which he was ashamed.
"I wish to talk to you about a very ugly matter."
McClellan took his seat and entrenched for the assault. "What is that?"
Lincoln hesitated, fiddling with the spectacles in his hands.
"On ugly matters," said the general briskly, "the sooner and more directly
such things are approached, the better. Speak frankly."
"I suggested a movement that would make the capital safer," Lincoln
began. McClellan suspected what was coming: an unfair criticism of his move
across the Potomac to open the Baltimore and Ohio railroad. The plan had
been to bring canalboats through the locks at Harpers Ferry and to use them
as a pontoon bridge to enable McClellan's force to cross the river. Everyone
from the President on down had agreed to the brilliance of the planned
maneuver, which would have saved the months it would take to construct a
permanent bridge. Unfortunately, nobody had measured the width of the
canal locks, and it turned out that the canalboats were six inches too wide. He
could not fault the army engineers, who had relied on the assurances of
experienced railroad employees. The operation had to be abandoned, stimu-
lating criticism that no activity was under way against the rebel forces.
"The Harpers Ferry episode?" McClellan said, urging Lincoln on.
"Why in tarnation," Lincoln demanded, "couldn't you have known
whether a boat would go through that lift-lock before spending a million
dollars getting them there?"
"I am not a naval officer, and had to rely"
"Neither am I," Lincoln said with more asperity than McClellan had seen
before, "but it seems to me that if I wished to know whether a boat would go
through a hole or lock, common sense would teach me to go and measure it. I
am almost despairing at these results. Everything seems to fail."
"I explained the matter in detail to the Secretary of War"
The President was not finished. "The impression is daily gaining ground
that you do not intend to do anything." He looked directly at his guest for the
first time that morning. "You know what Chase said about the fiasco at the
lock? He said your heralded expedition died of lockjaw."
"I'm sure you enjoyed that joke, Mr. Lincoln." This President was known
for crude witticisms at the most serious moments.
"Well, we don't get many jokes out of Chase. But really, how could you let
this happen? The country is crying out for action, for movement against an
enemy sitting comfortably a few miles from Washington, and the reports all
say 'All quiet on the Potomac.' " When the general decided not to dignify
that with a response, Lincoln went on. "Well, George, I will say this: for
organizing an army, for preparing an army for the field, for fighting a defen-
sive campaign, I will back you against any general of modern times. I don't
know but of ancient times, either. But I begin to believe that you will never
get ready to go forward."
With the President's tirade tapering off, the general felt the time ripe for a
response. "I have been deceived," he stated.
"What and who has been deceiving you?"
"Two weeks ago, I sent you a memorandum explaining what happened at
Harpers Ferry. Did you receive it?"
"No." Lincoln's puzzlement seemed sincere.
"Stanton assured me he would give it to you personally. He told me, a day
or two afterward, that he had done so, and that you were entirely satisfied
with my conduct. He desired me not to mention the subject to you. I was
foolish enough to believe him."
"Maybe it's here in my papers," the President murmured.
"We are moving on Winchester independently of the bridge, and in such
force that may cause the Confederates to withdraw from the Potomac
heights, where their big guns endanger the boats moving our troops down for
the Peninsula campaign against Richmond." McClellan let that sink in, hop-
ing the President would comprehend the military situation. "The purpose of
the move was to take Winchester, not to build a bridge of canalboats."
"I wish you would tell me these things," Lincoln said irritably. "I would be
better able to sustain you if you would take me into your confidence."
"I tried to, and your Secretary of War intercepted my communication."
"You say the rebels may pull back from the Potomac embattlements? That
would be good news, well received."
Unfortunately, Lincoln was obsessed with the safety of Washington, D.C.;
he could not understand, the general felt, the dictum of Swiss General An-
toine Henri Jornini: that an offensive was the best defense. But McClellan
assumed it would serve no useful purpose to argue with a civilian about fears
that had no military rationale. Lincoln did not grasp the strategy that would
draw the enemy troops southward and out of striking distance of the capital.
The President remained fearful, and could be satisfied only by the presence of
nearby Union troops; no military man could ever talk him out of it. There-
fore, the general would leave a token force behind to allay those fears while
he maneuvered the main Confederate strength away from Washington with
his attack on Richmond from the east, up the peninsula formed by the York
and James rivers.
Why would Lincoln and Stanton never admit to the brilliance of his bold
maneuver? A Peninsula campaign would minimize casualties. Perhaps they
were willing to grind up the army in a step-by-step overland battle only to
make the politicians feel secure in Washington; he was not.
"I hope I have disposed of what you called 'an ugly matter,' " said McClel-
lan in a gesture of conciliation.
"No, that's not the half of it." The President took a deep breath, more of a
sigh, and plunged in. "It has been represented to me that your plan of cam-
paign was conceived with traitorous intent."
McClellan was too thunderstruck to answer. Traitor? Could the President
be serious?
"I've been told that your plan, by removing defenders from Washington, is
intended to give over the capital to the enemy." Lincoln met McClellan's
stare for a moment and added, "It does look to me much like treason."
The general rose out of his chair. "Take that back, Lincoln. Damn your
eyes, take it back! Nobody can mention my name in the same breath with the
word 'treason.' "
That shook the President, who backed away from endorsing the charge.
"It's not my idea," said Lincoln, much agitated, rising to face the general
across his desk, "I'm just repeating to you what has been represented to me."
"And you believe that abominable slander."
"No, no, I don't believe a word of it." A moment before, he had been
saying it sounded much like treason to him. "It is what others are saying, and
you should know about it."
"What others? Stanton? Wade? I demand to know."
"Men like that, I shouldn't say exactly who," he evaded. "But I don't
believe them."
"Then you ought to damn well watch your language. You gave me the
distinct impression that you believe those slanders to be well founded."
"Then I was wrong and I apologize." The President sat down again. "It is
not my purpose to impugn your motives, only to give you an idea of the depth
of feeling that exists about leaving Washington defenseless"
McClellan could not get over it. "Treason!" He paced to the window and
back and laid his hand on Lincoln's desk. "I'll tell you about treason. It is in
the minds of those men who don't want me to succeed. My plan is bold and
brilliant and will win a smashing victory and end the war in a month. But
that's not what your Stanton wants, or what Wade wants, or what Chase
wants. That cabal doesn't want me to win this war this spring, because they
want to launch a crusade against slavery. They don't want the South to sue
for peace terms; they want the South crushed and bloodied and punished for
what they think is some great national sin that only blood can expiate." He
jabbed his finger at the President's chest. "Your radical Republican friends
want a long war, Lincoln, with plenty of casualties on both sides, and they're
poisoning your mind about me to get their way."
"No, you're all wrong," Lincoln said, in a soothing voice. "Please sit down.
I can understand how you feel, but don't start impugning their motives."
"I'm fighting a two-front war," added McClellan with relish, his enemies
on the run; "the rebels on the one side, and the abolitionists and other scoun-
drels on the other."
"You have it all upside down," the President said. "Ben Wade and Zack
Chandler and the committee are not calling for inaction. They, and I, are
urging you to actto get the army, your army, fighting the enemy. We all
want the war over with as soon as you can finish it."
"No. You don't understand. They want hand-to-hand combat between here
and Richmond, at an exorbitant cost in lives," said McClellan, now deter-
mined to make the most of the President's indiscretion in passing along the
gossip of his malicious aides. "We do not have to destroy our army or the
Southern army to win this war. Follow my plan. Trust me, as you promised
you would. Jeff Davis will be in flight from Richmond in a month, and the
secession will be over."
It was Lincoln's turn to walk around his office. "I will follow your Penin-
sula plan," he said finally, "on this condition: that you leave such force at
Manassas as shall make it entirely certain that the enemy shall not repossess
himself of that position. We cannot let him sack Washington."
"Done," agreed McClellan. In his mind, the small force under General
Banks in Virginia was adequate, backed up by the Washington constabulary
behind the solid entrenchments that McClellan had built. He needed every
other man he could musterat least a hundred and fifty thousandto face
the horde that Pinkerton had informed him the Confederates had assembled
to defend Richmond.
"You are sure," said Lincoln, still doubtful, "the roads down there in the
Peninsula near Richmond are passable this time of year?"
"I am," said the general. Pity that Lincoln never made a clean decision, but
accompanied it with hedges and doubts.
"You were sure about the canalboats fitting through the locks," said the
President sorrowfully and, the general felt, unnecessarily. "But let me not
discourage you. Be bold. Bring us victories."
Riding back to his house, McClellan said nothing to his escort of officers.
Custer started to make conversation, but a nod cut him short. The general,
seething, was determined not to show his emotions to anyone. Any display of
irritation after a visit to the Mansion would start rumors buzzing that he was
in disfavor with Lincoln.
"Major Alien seems to want a word with you, sir," Custer said, pointing to
Pinkerton pacing in front of the McClellan home. The scowling detective,
under his derby hat and with the cigar sticking out of his face, cut an almost
comic figure, but McClellan valued him. His reports of enemy strength justi-
fied a caution that many of the firebrands around Lincoln did not feel.
Pinkerton signaled not to dismount; McClellan tensed his legs around the
horse's flanks and leaned down to get his message.
"Couple of men in your parlor, General, waiting to see you," the detective
whispered urgently. "Came unannounced; I'd avoid 'em."
"Why not just send them away, then?"
Pinkerton shook his head. "One is Femando Wood, the Mayor of New
York. Used to be head of Tammany Hall and not a man to be trusted, in my
opinion, sir. The other is Horatio Seymour, used to be governor, may run for
governor again. These two are very big Peace Democrats."
"Ah." McClellan straightened in his saddle, thinking about that. Wood, he
had heard, was a wild man who talked of having New York City secede from
the Union. Seymour was another matter: respectable, a proven vote-getter,
andaccording to Seward, a former Governor of New York, who ought to
knowa man who had become a concern to Lincoln men in New York. If
Seymour and his Peace Democrats took New York's governorship in the fall,
they would put a stop to recruitment in the Union's biggest state.
"I don't think you should talk to them," Pinkerton murmured, his voice at
his peak pitch, slightly above his whisper. "Rather, you should not be seen
talking to them. Feed right into the cabal's hands, giving them evidence about
what they call your 'disloyalty.' "
McClellan nodded, Lincoln's repetition of the slander of his "traitorous
intent" fresh in mind. He guessed that Seymour and the rest of the loyal
political opposition were worried about McClellan's being replaced by a radi-
cal; if that took place, then the abolitionists would be in control of both the
Cabinet and the army, with no hope for a negotiated peace.
It struck McClellan as not beyond the realm of possibility that Seymour
might also be carrying a message from New York Democrats about a presi-
dential nomination of McClellan in 1864. That was two long years away; it
was much too soon to give an indication about, or even think about, a future
in politics. But perhaps it would be a good idea to find out what support there
was in the North for a negotiated peace on the basis of "the Union as it was"
preserving the Union and limiting slavery to the Southern states.
"I'm going on to camp," he announced. "Tell Seymour, and only Seymour,
that it is always a good idea for a former governor to visit men of his state
serving in the army here. If he comes to camp and drops by my tent, it would
be most natural for me to see him."
Pinkerton smiled and winked. McClellan wished he wouldn't do that; it
made the general feel part of some conspiracy. He had already given the lie to
that, to Lincoln's face. Curiously, the election of Democrats in New York
might even strengthen Lincoln's hand in dealing with the likes of Wade and
Stanton and Chase, who were dragging him toward a fight-to-the-finish aboli-
tion policy. Abolition might well bring the armies of England and France on
to the field against the Union, and New Yorkers had to worry about an
invasion by British forces in Canada. In all his expressed concern for border
states, Lincoln forgot that New York was a border state too.
He twitched the bridle lightly, and Kentuck responded; the saddle was his
own design, much more comfortable for the animal than the formal saddles of
the past; the McClellan saddle was being adopted throughout the U.S. Army.
In the general's mind, cruelty was always unnecessary, and the prolongation
of the war was beyond cruelty, it was savagery. He would see Seymour in
private and listen to what he had to say.
He hoped the New Yorker would not broach the "dictator" idea that
young Custer kept bringing up, because that struck him as unseemly at the
moment; still, the notion of the ancient Roman solution helped soothe the
rankling in his breast at the thought of Lincoln's giving credence to the
charge of "traitorous intent." What kind of commander-in-chief would coun-
tenance such slander against the man who had already saved the Union from
sure defeat, and was on the verge of a great campaign to subdue the enemy?
Why couldn't the man back up his military leaders when they came under
political fire?

CHAPTER 2
LADY MINE

"The President is an idiot."
She shook her head, no; it was wrong for George to talk that way.
"I went to the White House directly after tea," her husband continued,
poking a long match into the wadded newspaper under the fire logs, "where I
found the Original Gorilla about as intelligent as ever." His hand holding the
match was shaking, he was so angry. "What a specimen to be at the head of
our affairs now!"
"What did he say that upset you so?"
George McClellan watched the fire start, not answering her right away.
"Oh, I was of course much edified by his anecdotes, ever apropos, and ever
unworthy of one holding his high position. I suppose he's honest and he
means well."
Ellen Marcy McClellan did not press him. Whatever had passed between
Lincoln and her husband must have been so odious that he considered it
would hurt her too much to relate. George confided almost everything to her,
as she to him, holding back only out of kindness.
"I have a lot of scamps to deal with," he said, "unscrupulous and false.
They throw whatever blame there is on my shoulders." He rose and watched
the flames leap up. "I do not intend to be sacrificed by such people. It is
perfectly sickening to see the fate of the nation in such hands."
"God's will," she reminded him.
"I trust that the all-wise Creator, in His own good time, will return us to
His favor. I trust there is a limit to His wrath, and that ere long, we will begin
to experience His mercy."
She knew George McClellan was a God-fearing man, a profound believer
determined to observe the Sabbath even in planning battles, who struggled
against his tendency to let bitterness spill over.
"But it is terrible to stand by and see the cowardice of the President," he
continued, "and the vileness of Seward. Welles is an old woman and Bates an
old fool. The only man of courage in the Cabinet is Blair, and I don't alto-
gether fancy him."
"Remember, you were wrong about Stanton."
"I was at first, and I should have listened to you. You saw through that
viper from the start." He put his hands on her shoulders and looked directly
at her with that sudden burst of boyish respect that never failed to move her.
"Who am I wrong about now?"
"The President. He's been through the fires with the loss of his boy," she
told him, "you should allow for that. Stanton is poisoning his mind against
you all the time. Lincoln makes mistakes, and he reads one book and thinks
that makes him a general, but he's not an idiot, and you must stop calling him
a gorilla. Somebody will hear."
"That was Stanton's description, remember, when that conniver was ingra-
tiating himself with us. With me." He brightened a bit, as usual after the
bouts of bitterness at the forces arrayed against him on his own side. George
liked to denounce his foes with fierce words, she knew, and to exaggerate the
cabals and conspiracies of politicians that were constantly being formed to
frustrate him and to sacrifice his beloved troops. But he was not one who
hated those who stood in his way, and was always ready to repair relations
with people angry with him. Powell Hill, for example. "All right. I am sure I
will win in the end in spite of all the rascality. History will present a sad
record of these traitors who are willing to sacrifice the country and its army
for personal spite and personal aims. The people will soon understand the
whole matter, and thenwoe betide the guilty ones."
He announced that he was going upstairs to play with the baby, a good sign
that the pain of his interview with the President was wearing off. She re-
mained at the fireplace, thinking about, of all people, "L'il Powell"Am-
brose Powell Hill, the dashing Virginian who had, in the most tempestuous
period of her unmarried life, taken her away from Captain George McClel-
lan.
"Miss Nellie," as the youthful set in Washington had called her six years
ago, had been seeing "Little Mac" with some regularity. Her army father
approved, especially since the widely respected captain intended to resign
from the army and pursue a lucrative career as an executive with the Illinois
Central. George duly proposed, but she rebufied him because she had fallen
under the spell of his close friend, the moody, vulnerable, attractive Lieuten-
ant Hill, then with the Coast Survey Office in Washington.
Powell and Nellie became engaged. Her father, at his post in Laredo,
Texas, was not merely disappointed, but furious. She would not forget his
letter: "Abandon all communication with Mr. Hill. If you do not comply
with my wishes in this respect, I fear my ardent affection would turn to hate.
Choose between me and him."
She fought for Hill, who was able to show her father a worth of ten thou-
sand dollars, but then her mother came to her with a rumor that the young
man was afflicted with a social disease. When Nellie told this to her young
man, he wanted to fight a duel with whoever started the canard, and even her
father sided with the wronged young man on this issue, but by this time her
parents' concernand the steady, forgiving, loving presence of Captain Mc-
Clellanhad bred second thoughts. Powell was afflicted with sick headaches
and sometimes disappeared for days at a time, when she most needed him.
She broke the engagement, to her father's relief, and resumed seeing the
faithful George, with Powell angry at what he must have felt was betrayal by
both of them.
George wrote a beautiful letter to Powell when Nellie accepted his pro-
posal, and the rejected suitor could not resist McClellan's frankness and ea-
gerness to repair a shattered friendship. "My ticket is Douglas for President
and McClellan for Secretary of War," Powell replied in 1860, reporting that
he, too, had marriedthe lovely sister of their mutual friend, John Hunt
Morgan, in Lexington, Kentucky, and over the objections of her parents.
The two men in her life were now warm friends again, but George was
taking the Army of the Potomac into action against the Army of Virginia,
which included a division under General A. P. Hill. Powell's commander was
Joseph E. Johnstonnot Sidney Johnston, who had just been killed at Shiloh,
but George's lifelong friend who addressed his letters "Beloved McC." She
felt heartsick about the fate that pitted her husband against two of his closest
friends in army life. Like Roman gladiators, they were pledged to kill each
other but were not required to hate each other.
The orderly entered to say that Francis Preston Blair was at the front door.
She sent the soldier to fetch George and greeted the old man warmly; he
would not stay, just wanted to deliver a message to the general before he
began his expedition.
"I was just telling Nellie," George said as he welcomed Blair, "that your
son's was the only courageous voice in the Cabinet."
"Welles isn't bad," Father Blair replied. "Sounds like an old woman, but
stands up to Stanton, that damned two-face. Look, I'm here for a reason."
The wizened face squinted its eyes at the general. "There is a prodigious cry
of 'On to Richmond' among the carpet knights of our city, who will not be
shedding their own blood to get there."
"I am aware of their zeal," said her husband.
"I am one of those who wish to see you lead a triumph in the capital of the
Old Dominion," said the old man, "but am not so eager as to befoul it by
hurrying on too fast."
"You're the first one to say that," said Nellie. "Everybody else, from the
President on down, is berating my husband for not storming Richmond in the
dead of winter, or when the roads were a mess of mud."
"The veterans of Waterloo filled the trenches of General Jackson with their
bodies and their blood," said the old man, a living link to the military heroes
of earlier generations. "If you can accomplish your objective of reaching
Richmond by a slower process than storming redoubts and batteries in earth-
works, the country will applaud the achievement. It will give success to its
arms with the greatest parsimony of the blood of its children."
"I'll be satisfied with bloodless victories, my venerable friend."
"The envious Charles Lee denounced his superior, General Washington, as
gifted too much with that 'rascally virtue prudence. ' Exert it and deserve his
fame."
Blair hunched his cape around him and left without a farewell. Nellie could
see how welcome the rare words of caution had been to her husband. She
took his arm at the doorway and watched the carriage draw away. On the
morrow, her husband and her fatherGeneral Marcy was now George Mc-
Clellan's chief of staffwould leave on a daring campaign on boats down the
Potomac to the James River, and on to the battle of Richmond. An army wife
and daughter, who had done her duty to her father and been rewarded by a
wonderful marriage to a good and loving man, she knew better than to tell
her husband to be careful or to avoid enemy fire. She was glad that his goal
was the victory that would lead to a negotiated peace, and was not destruc-
tion of an enemy and subjugation of people who were friends.
"I will not fight for the abolitionists," he said, moved by Biair's visit, "but
when I think of some of the features of slavery I cannot help shuddering. Try
to realize, Nellie, that at the will of some brutal master, you and I might be
separated forever." She tightened her grasp on his arm; in the separation that
was the lot of soldiers and their wives in war, there was at least hope of
return. "Slavery is horrible, Nellie. I do think that some of the rights of
humanity ought to be secured to the negroes. There should be no power to
separate families, and the right of marriage ought to be secured to them."
She led him upstairs to see the child and to spend the last night together
before a long string of lonely nights. He would write every flight without fail,
as he had in the field before, and she would save his letters for her memories
and for history, but she was as worried as any wife of any soldier in the
departing Army of the Potomac.
"Some generals, in the field," he said, "like to sleep in houses." He might
be thinking of Grant, sleeping in comfort as his men were attacked. "I prefer
a tent. Next time I sleep in a real bed in a house, lady mine, it will be right
here."

CHAPTER 3
SOME LAWFUL PURPOSE
Thurlow Weed liked the idea that he could add to his longtime sobriquet
"Wizard of the Lobby'" the self-mocking phrase "international wirepuller."
He was no longer a mere Albany publisher and lobby agent; fresh from six
months in England and France as Lincoln's personal emissary, Weed was
satisfied that he had put a lifetime's experience in political maneuvering to
work in a noble cause of averting what some feared would become "a war of
the world."
He took the roomiest overstuffed chair in the Secretary of State's office and
sank his large bulk into it. "William Henry," he said to Seward, his longtime
political partner from New York, "I am proud to say that I have served my
country well."
"Our ambassador to London agrees. Henry Adams says you are the only
unofficial envoy who did a job of work for us."
"That Trent affair made it touch and go." Weed shook his white mane at
the recollection. "England was ready to go to war. Troops ready to sail for
Canada, ships ready to break the blockade of Southern ports, such as it is.
Perfect opportunity for Lord Russell, the old bastard, to whip up public
sentiment to do what he really wants to docome into the war on the side of
the South and reestablish the cotton trade."
"As soon as I received your lettersyou must have written every day, old
fellow1 shifted my position. As the President said, 'one war at a time.' "
"Lincoln getting any better at it?"
"We underestimated him, Thurlow."
Weed nodded ruefully; at Weed's urging, Seward had started out a year ago
with a memorandum suggesting that he be made de facto prime minister,
with Lincoln more or less of a figurehead, but the President slapped him
down skillfully. Lincoln, with all his homespun posturing, was no bumpkin
when it came to accumulating and defending his power.
"Lincoln is growing in the job, I'm glad to say," Seward said. "Leaves
diplomatic affairs completely to me. Puts up with the most terrible abuse
from Stanton and McClellanI'd never stand for such impertinencebut he
says he'd hold McClellan's horse for him if he brought back victories. I
suppose that takes a certain inner strength."
Weed frowned; his partner apparently did not understand the political sub-
tleties in the prosecution of the war. Perhaps Seward was too close to the
center to see the whole.
"McClellan is launching his campaign with an eye to ultimate reunion," he
explained to the Secretary of State. "That is what infuriates the radicals, who
want only destruction of the Southsubjugation, abolition, conquest."
"We are, after all, engaged in a war, Thurlow. A general must smite the
foe."
His friend really did not understand. "Wars come to an end. How they are
ended is central to who governs the nation in the peace that follows." Enough
of abstraction: to the patronage, the stuff of politics that both of them thor-
oughly understood. "Lincoln has unwisely given the job of Collector of the
Port of New York to a Greeley man. That means twelve hundred jobs, all of
which contribute a part of their salaries to the radical faction. That money,
and those votes, will go to further the cause of abolition and conquest. I need
hardly tell you whom that strengthens for the next national campaign."
"Chase."
Weed nodded. "At the same time, Lincoln is putting all other patronage in
New York through me and mine."
"That's his way," Seward said, "Balance, counterbalancedoes it all the
time."
"That is not always wise. The radicals will never settle for balance with
conservatives like thee and me. They want it all."
"Fear not, Lincoln will never succumb to that. I am here."
Weed, who had made the arrangements that put Seward where he was,
nodded thankfully but made his point: "The next canvass will be won not by
the radical Republicans, nor by the peace wing of the Democrats, but by a
convergence of the center, a Union party. That is where we must make sure
Lincoln is. That is where we must be. If the abolitionists take over our party,
and demand a fight to the finish, we must abandon them for a standard-bearer
who can reunite the nation."
"You think the next few presidents will be generals."
Weed nodded; it was a kind way of indicating that the Seward quest was
over for good. The slogan "vote as you shot" was already being bruited about;
military service would be a must, and generals who took good care of their
troops and did not treat the opposition cruelly would be sought after by all
political parties. "That is why so many DemocratsSeymour, Wood, Sam
Barloware looking at McClellan, who seems to understand that the task is
to end the rebellion and restore the Union, not to conquer and occupy a
hostile region."
"He had better not try to make peace on his own," Seward warned. "Lin-
coln is very jealous of his prerogatives and refuses to show weakness in any
way. And I think he understands the political necessities, Thurlow, which is
why you have been summoned."
"Yes. What do you make of this?" Weed leaned forward and tossed a
telegram onto the Secretary's desk. All it said was: "Thurlow Weed, Albany.
Can you be here tomorrow morning? Answer. Nicolay."
"I know what it is about," Seward said curtly, and said no more. Curious.
Seward had few secrets from Weed.
"Of course, I hurried down here on the train last night, arrived at six this
morning, came straight here. I suppose," Weed said, fishing, "Lincoln wants a
report on my conversations with the Due de Morny at the French court. I
told him we would soon seize some of the cotton areas of the South ourselves,
and would be able to supply some cotton."
"That, too." Seward did not look comfortable. "It's primarily a money
matter."
Weed felt a twinge of conscience; was his perfectly legal speculation in the
markets over there, based on his inside Trent information, known here? Weed
had made a small fortune in England on this trip, and at no expense to the
American war effort; how and when those well-deserved earnings were accu-
mulated was nobody's business but his own.
"Tell me what I should know, William. There are no secrets between us."
"Connecticut politics, I think," said Seward. "There's a problem in Hart-
ford that requires money, quietly raised, quickly produced, no questions
asked. I told Lincoln to see you about it."
That made Weed cautious. "I would rather do it through you, as always,
Governor."
"Better this way. Let Lincoln be beholden to you directly; it might help in
that balance of patronage in New York you were talking about."
Weed nodded and heaved himself out of the chair. Good for Seward, to let
him deal directly with the President on a delicate matter. Patronage in New
York State ought really to be weaned away from the venal Hiram Barney,
Collector of the Port so close to Chase and Stanton, and this would be help-
ful. Weed was less bashful at pressing for returns for favors rendered than
Seward. Credit Lincoln with being shrewd about patronage; probably old
man Blair, who all but invented the game in Andrew Jackson's day, had been
tutoring him.
"Your London sojourn achieved great results, Thurlow," Seward said in
parting, "with the English press. For the first time since this war began, they
printed your letters, and others, explaining the Northern point of view.
How'd you do it?"
"Bribery!" boomed Weed cheerfully. "The money you gave me to suborn
the journalists was well invested."
"Don't tell Lincoln about that," cautioned Seward. "Let him credit your
powers of persuasion."
Weed laughed and pounded his frail friend on the back. Weed never told
him about his previous experience with Lincoln on the subject of expenses.
He took himself off to the President's house.
A short, mustachioed young fellow rose to greet him, and seemed surprised
when the senior secretary, Nicolay, who had sent the telegram summoning
Weed, abruptly took him into Lincoln's office and shut the door. The place
was cluttered, the furniture old and the upholstery faded; evidently it had
escaped Mrs. Lincoln's extensive redecoration. Weed noted that the dark
green wallpaper did not show the dirt, however, and the green rug showed no
sign of wear. Maps covered the walls; bundles of papers, mail, and newspa-
pers littered the tables, and two large wicker wastebaskets held the refuse. A
working office, suitably unpretentious. Nicolay left the room, closing the
door, and Weed was alone with Lincoln.
"Weed, what effect would abolishment have on the English Government?"
That startled him; was that really in the forefront of Lincoln's mind these
days? Or did the President want to begin with a respectable subject? The New
Yorker was prepared with an answer.
"The English Government wants the South to win the war. Then it would
have a supplier of cotton for its mills, and a weakened North as an industrial
competitor."
"I know that. You didn't answer the question."
"I am just getting started, Lincoln," Weed told him. "Only one thing keeps
the English Government from extending diplomatic recognition to the South.
That is the sentiment of the English workingman, who sees human slavery to
be a moral abomination and, probably, a threat to his job. Nothing else keeps
England neutral."
"There's that to be said for the prospect of abolition, then." Lincoln, after
six months, seemed to Weed more careworn, yet more direct; no funny stories
to begin.
"Weed, we're in a tight place," the President said briskly. "Some money for
a legitimate war purpose is needed immediately. There is no appropriation
from which it can be lawfully taken." Lincoln cleared his throat and moved
some items around on his desk. "In this perplexity the Secretary of War
suggested that you should be sent for. Can you help us to fifteen thousand
dollars?"
"Yes, sir." Weed was not shocked; in May of 1860, when he visited Lincoln
in Springfield after the man from Illinois had won the nomination, he had
made a contribution to Lincoln's campaign that the victor probably deposited
in his personal bank account. Men in public life needed money, as Weed well
knew, all the more when they were honest. Few friends could be trusted to
raise and give funds discreetly, and he was pleased that Lincoln thought of
him that way. "But as you say you need the money immediately, the matter
could be hastened by giving me two lines to that effect."
He made a scribbling motion with his fingers. None of his big-money
friends in New York would give that sort of money to Weed without some
kind of indication that it would be passed on directly to Lincoln. But with
any sort of note from Lincoln, even an obscure one, Weed's solicitation would
be buttressed; most of the top money men in New York would be honored to
be the President's benefactor in a secret donation. The fact that Weed had
been chosen as the trusted intermediary would be especially useful in foiling
some of Greeley's plots with Hiram Barney at the Port office.
Lincoln turned to his desk, hesitated, then took out a sheet of stationery
with "Executive Mansion" printed on the top. His pen scratched across the
paper.
What did the President need fifteen thousand dollars for? That was a lot of
money, five times the yearly salary of a Congressman, well over half a year's
presidential salary. And why had Lincoln tried to tie it to a war purpose, one
suggested by Secretary Stanton, when Seward had told him it was for a
political purpose, and suggested by him? Had Mrs. Lincoln gone overboard
on expenses? Was the President in debt? On the other hand, was it legitimate
politicspayoffs required in Connecticut that would help the Republicans
turn back the Peace Democrats? That would be quasi-legitimate war purpose,
growing out of a purely political purpose. Or was the money needed to help
the War Democrats like Stanton repel the onslaught of the copperheads like
Clem Vallandigham?
Weed, the discreet soldier, asked no questions; if Lincoln had wanted him
to know, he would have told him. The Albany editor showed absolutely no
hesitancy, which would have troubled the asker, as if Weed might have had
some ethical compunctions. He blandly watched the President fold the sheet
of notepaper and search for an envelopeobviously Lincoln did not want this
matter examined by his secretaries. After some awkward clerical groping
about, the President stuffed the note into an envelope and handed it to Weed.
They shook hands cordiallythe publisher always marveled how his own
large hand seemed lost in Lincoln'sand Weed hurried for the train to New
York.
Aboard the train, he took out the President's cryptic note, read it and
shook his head in political admiration; Lincoln had used the perfect degree of
circumspection, and was just specific enough without being embarrassingly
specific. Under the letterhead of "Executive Mansion, Washington," the note
read: "Mr. T. Weed: Dear Sir: The matters I spoke to you about are impor-
tant, & I hope you will not neglect them. A. Lincoln."
His carriage driver had rarely been so busy, skipping lunch, taking him
through the rainy streets to different offices near the financial center all after-
noon. By 3 P.M. Weed had visited sixteen prominent New York businessmen.
Each had been suitably impressed by Weed's solicitation when backed up by
the President's urgent note. Each man who gave one thousand dollars
Aspinwall, Vanderbilt, A. T. Stewart, and the resthad signed his name at
the bottom of Lincoln's note. The last man, Russell Sturgis, could only get up
five hundred dollars, and so he added Henry Hubbell for another five hun-
dred; Weed thought it would have been tidier for fifteen men to have given a
thousand apiece, but time was of the essence, so he lumped the final two
together as joint donors of a thousand.
By that evening, fifteen thousand dollars in banknotes, including some of
the new greenbacksthe bills with Mr. Lincoln's face on them, not the low-
denomination bills with Chase's picture, which Weed thought might not have
set well, and which would have made too bulky a packagewas on its way to
John Nicolay at the Executive Mansion, ready for deposit or transfer first
thing the next morning. Weed did not write a covering note; Weed always
believed that prompt action spoke louder than well-drafted letters, and the
less put on paper about these matters, the better.
He held on to the discreet note written in the President's hand, counter-
signed with the names of each of the contributors. Perhaps he would mention
their names to the President, as he had faithfully promised each, perhaps not;
he would think about that. The document was valuable in itself; it occurred to
Weed that he would hold on to the page of autographs of eminent men for
some years and then, long after it could stimulate any controversy, offer it for
sale for the benefit of some meritorious charity.

CHAPTER 4

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
APRIL 9, 1862
Stanton came in this morning in the highest dudgeon, fuming about McClel-
lan, who has finally taken his army out of Washington and landed it on the
Virginia peninsula near Richmond. Mars was brandishing one of Mr. Brady's
photographs.
"Will you look at this? These are the fearsome 'guns' that have been intimi-
dating our intrepid commander," he sputtered. "This is what has been point-
ing at us across the Potomac."
The Prsdt looked, first with great dismay, then with a sad smile. He let me
look. Brady had captured the scene of the "Quaker guns"logs rolled into
position by the canny rebels and made to look like cannon.
"Wooden guns," fulminated the Secy of War, pacing, "and who knows how
much of the vaunted rebel army of two hundred thousand, supposedly men-
acing us all winter, was a figment of Pinkerton's imagination."
"Their strength was exaggerated," the Prsdt allowed, "but still, a rebel
army was there." He never liked to let Stanton heap abuse on McClellan
without some reproof.
"If that blathering incompetent had attacked when I ordered him to,"
snapped Stanton, referring to the Prsdt's War Order, "we would have been in
Richmond a month ago. Right through Manassas. None of this brilliant
maneuvering around Chesapeake Bay, boats, all that complicated tactical
folderol."
Lincoln, of course, agreed wholeheartedly, but put forward McClellan's
excuse: "It's supposed to reduce casualties."
"Mark my word, Lincoln, now that he's down on the Peninsula in force
with one hundred thousand men, facing half that numberMcClellan will do
the same as he did all winter here in Washington. He'll find excuses to dig in.
He'll call for more men. He'll blame the weather. He'll never fight."
"Well, he's in the field at last."
"But he's not in earnest," Stanton insisted. "He cannot emancipate himself
from the influence of Jeff Davis. I fear he is not willing to do anything
calculated greatly to damage the cause of secession."
Lincoln does not go that far. "When I took leave of him at the wharf in
Alexandria, he shed tears when speaking of the cruel imputations upon his
loyalty."
Stanton then produced his evidence of intended delay, in the form of a
telegraph message from the front. "Listen: 'The enemy are in our front in
large force and being reinforced daily. I beg that you will reconsider the order
detaching the first corps from my command.' It's the same old story."
Lincoln sighed in what I suspect was reluctant agreement. "Let's send him
a message." He wrote it out: "I think you better break the enemy's line from
Yorktown to Warwick River, at once. They will probably use time as advanta-
geously as you can." Stanton looked at it, nodded, and went to send it himself
before I had a chance to fix the grammar.
Later that day, Postmaster General Blair came in. The Prsdt was glad to
see him; all three Biairs, father and two sons, were at work on a speech, to be
given by Frank on the floor of Congress, promoting gradual, compensated
abolition, followed by colonization. At a time when the radicals were claim-
ing the Prsdt had "no policy," Lincoln wanted some powerful voices in the
Congress (and Frank is chairman of the House Military Committee) to ring
out with his policy.
Lincoln does not want to spell out his buy-them-and-colonize-them policy
all by himself, without support. His object is to prevent loyal slaveholders
from becoming rebels. Monty Blair goes even further: he thinks that plenty of
white Southerners who own no slaves are secretly loyal, and are ready for a
peace within the Union if no attack is made on the South's peculiar institu-
tion.
"I'm concerned about your treatment of General McClellan," the Postmas-
ter General said. The Biairs are good eggs, but they do tend to take up the
cause of the Little Napoleon, "He read about being relieved of his overall
command in the newspapers. Perhaps you should have discussed it with him
before he went into the Peninsula campaign."
Easy to say. I would hate to be the one to tell the rank-sensitive McClellan
to his face that he was being demoted; he may not fight the enemy in the field,
but he fights him gloriously in the office.
"Did you see this?" The Tycoon picked up the Brady photograph of the
Quaker guns and handed it to him. "That's the sort of thing that was worry-
ing McClellan for months, delaying any action. Wooden guns!"
"There were plenty of real guns, too, as we discovered at Bull Run," Blair
came back. "I hope you won't get caught up in this anti-McClellan hysteria,
Mr. President. The radicals are after him in full cry because the general
returns fugitive slaves, which happens to be the law of the land. And he says
openly that this is a war to save the Union and not to abolish slaverywhich
is your position too. The abolitionists can't get at you directly, at least not
easily, so they direct their fire at you through McClellan."
To be fair, which I in no way intend to be, that is true enough; Ben Wade
had demanded a meeting with the Prsdt before his Joint Committee on the
Conduct of the War, and the Tycoon defused that constitutional challenge by
inviting them over to the Mansion the other night. All we heard were com-
plaints about McClellan and the Democratic generals, and demands that
Washington be defended by Republican, anti-slavery generals. The Prsdt qui-
eted Wade & Co. a bit by giving General Fr6mont, the old blowhard, a
command in Tennessee, which infuriated the Biairs.
It was at this moment that a messenger came in from the telegraph office in
Stanton's domain with Little Mac's reply to Lincoln's suggestion to move.
The Tycoon told me to read it aloud to both of them.
"He says, 'My entire force for duty amounts to about eighty-five thousand
men. Since my arrangements were made for this campaign, at least fifty thou-
sand men have been taken from my command.' "
"Is that true?" Blair interrupted.
"By Stanton's count, McClellan has one hundred and eight thousand men.
There's a discrepancy of twenty-three thousand men. Like shoveling fleas,"
Lincoln added, which must have struck Blair as mysterious.
"And did you take fifty thousand from his command?" Blair asked. "My
God, that's more than a third of his force."
"Finish reading," Lincoln told me.
" 'Here is to be fought the great battle that is to decide the existing contest,'
the general says. 1 shall do all in my power to carry the enemy's works, but
to do this I require the whole of McDowell's First Corps.' "
The Prsdt laid his hand across his forehead. "That's George McClellan for
you. His dispatches complaining that he is not properly sustained, while they
do not offend me, do pain me very much."
"If he started the campaign with those troops assured to him" Blair, the
former West Pointer, began, but the Tycoon cut him short.
"After he embarked on his expedition," said the exasperated Lincoln, "I
ascertained that less than twenty thousand unorganized men, without a single
field battery, was all that was left here to defend Washington."
The Prsdt was speaking slowly, and I could tell he was more than a little
angry. The defense of McClellan that he had shown to Stanton was absent in
his discourse with Blair. "This presentedor would present, if I let McDow-
ell go with McClellana great temptation to the enemy to turn back from
the Rappahannock and sack Washington." He did not have to tell Blair what
the capture of the federal capital might mean: recognition of the Confederacy
by France and Britain, a sinking of the national spirit of the North, pressure
for peace with secession.
"As soon as McClellan moved toward the Peninsula," Blair pointed out,
"the Virginians were forced to leave the vicinity of Washington, to fall back to
be available for a defense of Richmond. His plan is masterly, and it has been
working. I would hate for you to deny him the capacity to bring it off."
"My explicit order," said the Prsdt, in his most executive tone, "was that
Washington should be left secure. That order was disobeyed."
"Neglected, perhaps. Or interpreted in a way that seems disobedient to you
but not to him."
"Neglected, then." Lincoln is not one to turn aside a gentler word. "That
was what drove me to detain McDowell's corps. Do you really think, Judge,
that I should permit this city to be entirely open, except what resistance can
be offered by twenty thousand disorganized troops, the dregs of the army?"
"But we have another thirty-five thousand with Banks in the Shenandoah
Valley," Blair reminded him. "McClellan must have considered them part of
the defense of Washington, which they are."
"That's not here." The Prsdt must have been thinking of the time, only a
year ago, when the city was helpless and he used to say that it seemed there
was no North.
Blair hesitated. "To commit the full force would be a risk. There is another
risk, howeverof not giving your main commander the troops he needs for
victory. If he fails, we're in great trouble. If McClellan's army is destroyed,
nothing can stop the rebels from moving North again and taking Washington.
They would outnumber McDowell and the dregs, as you call them."
"There is that danger," Lincoln conceded, "but I cannot believe that a
soldier of McClellan's caliber would lose an entire army. I reckon he would
retreat in better order than any man alive." Lincoln picked at the mole on his
cheek. "No. I will not gamble with the capital. Fifty-five thousand men must .
stay here, as Stanton says all the army corps commanders agree with me is
needed. And McClellan, down there, must move."
"You have given him an excuse for delay."
"No. I always insisted," the Prsdt reminded the Blair family representative,
"that going down by Chesapeake Bay in search of a field, instead of fighting
at or near Manassas, was only shifting, and not surmounting, a difficulty. We
would find the same enemy and the same entrenchments at either place. The
country will note that the delay is the same."
I stepped forward to ask if he had a reply to McClellan's complaint, to be
sent to the general near Yorktown, where his troops had landed and were
standing around. It is disgraceful to think how the little squad of rebels at
Yorktown keeps him at bay.
The Prsdt dictated to me: "It is time for you to strike a blow. It is indis-
pensable to you that you strike a blow. / am powerless to help this." He
stopped to remark to Blair: "George must understand the pressures here.
Fortunately, he thinks in personal terms." He continued dictating: "I have
never written you in greater kindness of feeling than now, nor with a fuller
purpose to sustain you, so far in my most anxious judgment I consistently
can. But you must act." He laid great emphasis on the last four words.
After reading it back to him, I could not help vouchsafing, "Little Napo-
leon ought to get the point."
"Too much so, you think?" the Prsdt, suddenly more solicitous, asked
Blair. "Perhaps you should write him a letter. Make my case to him as you
made his case to me, Judge. You'll do it far better than I can. Tell him that
what disturbs me is his lack of confidence."
Blair smiled. "I'll do it, and hope you can find some extra troops some-
where to reinforce him. Perhaps strip Fremont's command, which won't be
doing anything."
"Or I'll send McDowell's corps, all forty thousand men, if I think Wash-
ington is safe. But tell George to do what he can with what he has."
"I wish he had taken Frank with him," said Blair. "My brother volun-
teered for a field command on the Peninsula, but McClellan turned him
down."
"Try Grant, if Frank wants to fight," said Lincoln. "We'll miss him in
Congress, but I can understand."
I took the but-you-must-act missive over to the telegrapher across the
street, a nice chap named Bates who is terrified of Stanton and insisted on
showing it to Mars before putting it in cipher.
The Secretary of War glared at my writing on the piece of paper and
sniffed, "Kid gloves." The message seemed fairly bareknuckled to me, and I
said so, but the Secretary of War is a stern fellow.
"I have discovered who McClellan's evil genius is," he said with the certi-
tude of a man who reads all the messages. "Colonel Thomas Key, the former
judge and Democratic legislator in Ohio, now his judge-advocate and confi-
dant, and" this added darkly, "Democratic political adviser. Key has a
brother here in the War Department, too." He quickly added that not all
Democrats were suspect, that he was a Democrat himself, and that he had
great faith in General John Dix, who had served with him in the Buchanan
Cabinet. "I'm trusting Dix with the Rose Greenhow problem," he added,
presumably to try, hang, or exchange her. "But not all Democratic generals
can be trusted."
I know this is a strange and possibly disloyal thought, but I cannot get it
out of my head that Stanton would be displeased by a McC victory. Perhaps
because of his sick, probably dying baby, covered horribly with skin erup-
tions, and the terrible toll the impending tragedy is taking on his young wife,
Stanton is undergoing some kind of spiritual transformation. He has com-
menced church attendance, implores divine aid at the drop of a hat, and
identifies the Union with morality and the secesh as the embodiment of evil.
He fears that McC is maneuvering more with an eye to reunion and reconcili-
ation than fighting for victory, and would exploit his popularity to drain the
final peace of its moral content.
That is the only reason I can find for Stanton's Order No. 33 this week to
stop all recruiting, to reassign all recruiting officers, and to sell the recruiting
office property to the highest bidder. Overconfidence? I think not; Stanton is
sending McClellan and his political backers the message that no more troops
will be available to him, which must feed McC's delusions that the Adminis-
tration is planning to abandon his army by refusing to reinforce it.
That is where Stanton and Lincoln are so different; the Prsdt may be
exasperated by the insolence of epaulets, but would be the first to wave his tall
hat at McNapoleon if he came back at the head of a victory parade. Mars,
contrariwise, would sulk if the wrong man turned out to be the hero.
CHAPTER 5
FOR SERVICES RENDERED
"The President paid you a very handsome compliment in the Cabinet meet-
ing," Attorney General Bates told Anna Carroll over lunch at Willard's.
They had a window table looking out at the purple-and-white magnolia blos-
soms. "Said how useful you were to the country."
She beamed at him; Edward Bates was not much of a lawyer, but he was a
dear man who never missed an opportunity to report anything good said
about her in high places. She had buttressed him in her War Powers of the
President pamphlet and took care never to upstage him; she knew the Mis-
souri politician appreciated that.
"Please go on," she said. "What brought my name into the highest council
of state?" She had already been alerted to the subject of the discussion: at
Father Biair's suggestion, Lincoln had asked her to write an analysis of the
prospects for colonization of freed negroes. After consultation with the
Biairs, she had dismissed Liberia and Haiti as likely homes for former slaves,
pressing instead the virtues and opportunities of Panama.
It was not the climate that caused her to reject Africa and choose instead
the strip of land that connefcted North and South America. The reason was
purely imperial: Anna was aware of the elder Biair's secret design for an
American empire in Central America, ruled by friendly blacks. To disguise
that purpose, she directed her argument to the economic opportunity pre-
sented by the likely presence of coal. Since the narrow strip of land separated
the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, ports on each coast of Panama, with a rail
link, might save transportation costs and transform the backward area into a
valuable land.
"The memorial you wrote to him on colonization, of course," said Bates.
"Lincoln handed the paper with your views on colonization, and on the
proper place to initiate the colony, to Secretary Smith. The President said you
had given him a better insight into the whole problem than anyone."
Caleb Smith, the Secretary of the Interior, was a man Anna considered a
political zero, but he did have something to say about railroads in the West,
and Anna thought he would be a useful politician to know. What better way
to approach a Cabinet officer than to have the President himself make the
appointment?
"He told Smith that you thought the Interior Department the proper
agency to look after the matter," Bates added, consulting the large Willard
menu, "and advised the Secretary to get into communication with you." He
paused. "The fish is always good here. Caleb Smith was happy about your
recommendation; nobody pays much attention to him."
"Any reaction from Treasury?"
"Chase agreed, but said deportation had to be voluntary."
Listening to him, she flicked her eyes around the dining room, hoping the
right people would see her with a Cabinet officer, even if only the Attorney
General. Thurlow Weed was in his accustomed corner table, with a couple of
New York Tribune men, Adams Hill and the new correspondent, a dapper
young man named George Smalley. Adele Douglas, accompanied by some
young man, caught her eye; Anna nodded, as if to confirm that both were
doing well that day, and wondered if she had summoned up the courage to
visit her cousin Rose Greenhow in jail.
"My dear lady," Bates was saying, "what else are you doing for your
country?"
She told him of her latest work for the War Department. It had been six
weeks since the Army of the Potomac had embarked on its Peninsula cam-
paign, two weeks since the fall of the rebel stronghold of Yorktown, where Joe
Johnston had withdrawn without a fight after McClellan finally managed to
place his siege guns into position. Despite all the press attention being paid to
McClellan's drive on Richmondand the panic that had gripped Washington
the week before when Stonewall Jackson roared up the Shenandoah and
successfully diverted McDowell's corps from the attack on RichmondAnna
was determined to get across the need for a vigorous follow-up to Shiloh in
the West.
"Nobody is thinking of what we should be doing now that Halleck has
taken Corinth," she said, warming to her favorite subject. "Beauregard will
probably send a large rebel column into Texas, where wheat and beef abound,
to hold that country for subsistence of the South. We should stop him with
gunboats on the Yazoo River, and by moving quickly on Vicksburg. We can
cut off rebel commerce at Vicksburg, and their army will wither on the vine."
.Bates biinked at this outburst of military strategy; it was evidently not his
subject. "Are you as optimistic as the Cabinet is? Even Lincoln, who is not as
enthusiastic as Stanton, thinks the war can be ended this summer. That's why
he is concentrating on compensated emancipationif peace negotiations de-
velop, the sale of slaves might be the answer for a great many Southerners.
Pay the states to buy and free many of the slaves and send them home, or to
wherever." He peered at the menu. "Of all the fish, the rockfish is best."
"I'm a Marylander, Generalwe have rockfish and crabs all the time. I
think I'll have the roast beef." She Was hungry; this was her first Willard's
meal in longer than she cared to remember.
Here she was, discussing high military policy, listening to compliments
from the President in Cabinet relayed by the President's own legal adviser,
but without the money to buy an elegant dinner. The few dollars from the
elder Blair went for rent; her bill to the War Department for the Tennessee
plan, as well as her bill approved by Tom Scott for her War Powers pamphlet,
was languishing in some bureaucratic limbo. She had laid out the last of her
money for printer's bills, distributing her pro-Lincoln pamphlets to Congress-
men and editors. Anna was broke and tired of it. She ordered enough lunch
for a famished soldier.
"I take it, Miss Carroll," Bates said, "you approved of the President's
message countermanding the emancipation order of General Hunter."
"No," she said, "it should have been much stronger. Lincoln was almost
apologetic about it. When any general takes it into his head to free the slaves
Fr6mont, Hunter, whoeverhe ought to be fired forthwith."
The waiter brought an appetizer of fried oysters, a Willard's specialty, and
she dug in as she spoke. "Mistake number one was signing the D.C. emanci-
pation bill; I wrote the President about that last month. Yes, I know he
proposed it twenty years ago and couldn't go back on that, but it only whet-
ted abolitionist appetites. Mistake number two will come when he signs the
bill abolishing slavery in the territories"
"But that's Republican dogma, the issue of the debates with Douglas"
"The message to the South will be clear," she reminded him. "The aboli-
tionists are on the march in the Congress. The Congress is taking power away
from the President. The next step is total confiscation."
The Attorney General tucked his napkin under his beard and shook his
head, no. He was not what she considered politically alert.
"Don't you see? If we let the abolitionists make slavery the issue, my dear
General, the war will go on and on. Only the ultras, North and South, want
to talk slavery, because they want a fight to the finish."
"I don't know . . . 'unconditional surrender' did a lot for Grant, at least
until that unfortunate episode at Shiloh."
"That phrase was a mistake." The man really did need educating. "Do we
really want the South to fight to the last man? The worst traitors in Rich-
mond are delighted with the radicals up herethe abolitionists in the North
are putting the fear of slave uprisings in the South. That's what holds the
Confederacy together."
"You have strong feelings, then, about the Confiscation bill." Now he was
getting to the point. The nice news about the President's compliment, the
indirect probing, the good foodhe was leaving half his oysters, but she
could not very well switch plates with himall were leading to a new assign-
ment. Provided her responses were in line with Lincoln's thinking.
"The Confiscation bill is a constitutional abomination," she stated.
It was his turn to beam. "The President thinks so too, and has asked me to
begin thinking about a veto message."
She raised her eyebrows and tilted her head. Lincoln had not yet vetoed
any act of Congress; this veto of confiscation would create a furor, set back
abolition, encourage the Blair conservatives, enhance Unionist sentiment in
the South.
"I was thinking," Bates suggested, "just as in the war powers controversy,
it would be good if you were to do a pamphlet first, for wide distribution, that
would lay the groundwork for others to support the Lincoln position."
She assumed he meant he needed her to do the legal research for him, put it
in the form of a persuasive brief, and anticipate the opposing arguments.
Then he could tell the President, who was a far better lawyer than his Attor-
ney General, what the most vulnerable legal points of the proposed Act
would be. Anna decided immediately to do it, but felt she could get away
with adding a condition. "It would be useful to get some preliminary thinking
from the President on this," she said, as if thinking it over. "I don't mind
taking on Senator Sumner, but before getting into an argument with Ben and
Caroline Wade . . ." She let her reservation dangle.
"Come to the Executive Mansion this afternoon at five," he said. "We have
an appointment with Mr. Lincoln. Here is a copy of the Confiscation bill, as
proposed by Senator Trumbull."
Anna knew she would have only three hours to run up to the Library of
Congress to see what Judge Story had written about penalties for treason and
bills of attainder. She finished her brandied peach pie and left him in the
restaurant. The lobby of Willard's was hectic with the confluence of contrac-
tors and government officials, officers and ladies, Washington society and
visitors from the big cities. Willard's was where Lincoln had stayed before his
Inauguration, meeting his new Cabinet members in Parlor 6. The hotel was
authentically American in the way it permitted a noisy milling-around in its
large public rooms; British visitors, accustomed to quiet dignity in their ho-
tels, hated it. She spotted Orville Browning, a Senator from Illinois, an inti-
mate of Lincoln's, for whom she had helped make arrangements for the
burial of Willie in the Carroll family mortuary. He was a good old friend, a
practical man, and she needed some fast, practical advice.
"Orville, I have an appointment with the President and the Attorney Gen-
eral at five. You have to help me."
"You want your friend Tom Scott to be appointed Collector of the Port of
New Orleans." The Senator smiled. "Wade told me. I'll do everything I can."
"No1 mean yes, that too, but this is personal. Come over in the corner."
She showed him a thick dossier: the memorandum of the Tennessee plan, the
War Powers pamphlet, the Reply to Breckinridge pamphlet, assorted assign-
ments done for the War and Justice departments. She showed him bills, ex-
pense accounts for her trip West, invoices from typesetters and printers, and
time sheets detailing her own long hours researching and writing for the past
year. "I have a commitment to be paid five thousand dollars for the War
Powers alone from the Assistant Secretary of War, who is cleaning out his
desk as we speak. Orville, how much should I ask for?"
Senator Browning flipped through the documents and offered some coun-
sel: "You're right to go to the top on this, because it was all done for Lincoln
or at his request. But don't ask for pay for yourselfthat embarrasses every-
body. Ask for an appropriation for the distribution of millions of these pam-
phlets. They are obviously war expenses, and nobody doubts that printing
costs money. Ask for, say, fifty thousand dollars for everythingdistribution
and printing and preparation of these, and maybe your next one too."
Fifty thousand seemed like a lot. "Will you back me up on that?"
"You hand these to the President in person. Afterward I'll avail myself of
the opportunity to converse with him about it." He looked around the room.
"Compared to the sums being discussed all over this room at this moment,
it's not such a significant amount. And it has been money well spent."
"I'll do it. By the way, where do you stand on the Confiscation bill?"
"I'm with the Presidentagainst such a punitive measure. But if the war
takes a turn for the worse, and McClellan fails to take Richmond, Trumbull
and Wade and Sumner will get it passed."
After two hours of burrowing through books on treason at the library near
the Capitol, Anna Ella Carroll presented herself at the Pennsylvania Avenue
entrance of the President's house.
John Hay met her at the top of the stairs. "Bates won't be with you," he
said with a grin. "The President wants his legal counsel undiluted."
The central hall, which used to be jammed with office seekers and visitors,
was empty; she was glad Lincoln had finally stopped seeing people all day
long.
Lincoln was cordial; he took her hand, led her to a chair, and then
stretched his lanky frame out on the couch. From her petite perspective, he
seemed a grotesquely long man. "Good news from the West," he said. "Mem-
phis is ours. I'm thinking of bringing Halleck back here."
That meant Grant would be in command in the West. "Send Grant after
Vicksburg next," she said. "That controls the Mississippi now."
He frowned, got up, went to a map on the table, peered down, nodded,
came back and sat down behind his desk. "The Confiscation bill. I'm told you
don't like it."
"It would give the South a new incentive to fight," she said. "By unconsti-
tutional means, it takes everything away from every rebel, even Southerners
who may not want to be rebels. It is an invitation to more war."
"When you extinguish hope, you create desperation," Lincoln agreed. "We
would be wise to leave misguided men some motive for returning to the
Union. But why do you say it's unconstitutional?"
"This is nothing more than a bill of attainder," she said, non-lawyer to
lawyer, "an act of punishment by the Legislature, usurping the powers of the
courts. Do you know what Sumner and Tad Stevens want to do? They're not
content with the abolition of slavery; they want to take the land from all the
rebels and break it up and give it to what Sumner calls the poor and the
homeless."
"Well, why not?" Lincoln, she knew, was bailing her, as in a courtroom.
"The Constitution is why not. Sumner knows that if he tries rebels the
lawful way, in courts, local juries will never convict neighbors as traitors. So
he ignores due process and treats the South as a conquered foreign province."
"Where is it in the Constitution"
"Right here." She reached for the copy of Jefferson's Manual on his desk,
flipped quickly to a familiar passage, and read: " 'The Congress shall have
power to declare punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall
work corruption of blood or forfeiture, except during the life of the person
attainted.' "
"Wonderful old English language," said Lincoln.
"Despots have a habit of accusing a man of treason in order to get his
property," she said with satisfying certitude, having just researched the sub-
ject. "To make certain that no accusation of treason could be made to gain
plunder from the victim, the authors of the Constitution absolutely prohibited
the confiscation of the estate of the traitor to the government, leaving it free
to pass to his heirs."
"And the bill is ex post facto law to boot," said the President, who was
evidently familiar with the forfeiture prohibition. "I could never sign such a
bill."
"You have refused to permit secession. That means you do not recognize
the Confederacy as a foreign country. That means all the Southerners are still
citizens of the United States."
"Exactly," said Lincoln.
"When a nation cannot protect any portion of its territory, the inhabitants
must yield obedience to the de facto government, the rebel government," she
explained. "The nation cannot hold the local people responsible, as individu-
als, for any act they may commit while under the pressure of a usurping
power. Neither the Congress nor the President can punish Southerners as a
class, by legislative or executive fiat."
He nodded agreement.
"Only individual acts can be punished," she said, "after due process in
courts, because the people of the South have all the protection of United
States citizenship. And no property can be taken away from a traitor's fam-
ily."
"You've been talking about real estate, land," said Lincoln. "That's the
meaning of the English law in this country, as I see it. But what about slaves?
Since they're considered property, it was Ben Butler's idea to seize them as
contraband of war. Would you say they can be taken away by the Congress?
Or by the President?"
"No," she said with finality. "Not unless you amend the Constitution to do
it. The Constitution specifically acknowledges slavery as it stands, you know
that."
"Well, I don't know about that. Under the war power, and last year's sort
of mild Confiscation Act, we can seize a rebel's munitions, and any slaves he
uses for war purposes. I reckon a field hand harvesting food that ultimately
feeds soldiers is serving a war purpose." He was arguing in favor of the bill,
searching out her arguments against.
"But this bill is much more sweeping," she countered. "You can justify
confiscating property that is being used against you in warwe've been doing
that for a year. But this bill means total abolition of slavery as an institution.
Listen." She read a portion of the bill she had underlined. " 'All slaves of
persons who shall hereafter be engaged in rebellion against the United States,
or who shall in any way give aid thereto . . . shall be forever free.' That's
emancipation, plain and simple."
"You skipped a line," he said.
True, but she had deliberately left out insignificant words. Anna felt less
certain in the presence of a real lawyer. She went back and read the words she
had left out: " 'or who shall in any way give aid thereto being within anyplace
occupied by rebel forces and afterwards occupied by the forces of the United
States shall be forever free.' What's your point?"
"That Confiscation bill would free the slaves only in those areas controlled
by the rebels, which we take, and not the slaves in the loyal border states,"
Lincoln pointed out. "It frees only their slaves, not ours; it does not abolish
the institution."
"Trumbull framed it that way to pick up some border-state votes for confis-
cation," she said, "but he won't. The border-state Congressmenand I know,
I'm from Marylandall recognize this for what it is. Abolition."
"Read the fine print, Miss Carroll," the President replied, instructing her
in the legal argument. "You're a good lawyer, though you don't claim to be.
The section on confiscation is imperfectly drawn. No procedure is specified as
to how emancipation is to be effected. It is not enforceable legislation."
She gave him a hard look, turning from legalisms to politics. "It tells the
South that if they lose the war, slavery is finished. It would be proof that the
hotheads and firebrands have been right all along, that this is not a war 'for
the Union' at all, but a war to abolish slavery." The thought struck her that
Bates might be wrong, and Lincoln was not merely seeking arguments to help
him veto the bill. "Are you seriously thinking of signing this?"
"It might not pass," said Lincoln, avoiding a decision until the last mo-
ment, a habit of every President she ever met, "and if it does, I want to have a
veto ready. Here." He made a smaller decision. "Do a pamphlet, Miss Car-
roll, along the lines of your Reply to Breckinridge. Only this time aim it at
some of our more radical friendsor, rather, their overly enthusiastic ideas."
"Not Wade," she said. "Perhaps A Reply to Sumner. I could do it in a
week, show you the draft, and have it printed and in every Congressman's
hands by the first of July. All the newspapers, too."
"Leave out the slavery part," he directed. "Concentrate on the unconstitu-
tionality of a bill of attainder, and ex post facto." He rose slowly.
"There's something else," she said, "while I'm here." He sat again, not
hurrying her. "I hate to bring this up to you, but nobody else seems to
understand. You were a practicing lawyer; you'll know what I mean. It's
about money."
He looked surprised and not amused. She began by explaining how she had
been the one to create the Tennessee River plan, which caused him to frown.
That was a mistake, she realized, making it look as if she were putting a price
on the plan itself.
"Isn't this something you want to discuss with Stanton?"
She had not made her deal with Stanton, only a part of it with Assistant
Secretary Scott, who would soon be gone. The crispness of her presentation,
which she had written out beforehand, wilted in her embarrassment, but she
was bound to see it through. She read aloud from her memorandum. She
listed the items she had been working on, her time expended, the expenses of
travel; the more she read, the more irritated he looked and the more nervous
she became.
"And how much is it you want?" he interrupted.
She forgot the approach Orville Browning had recommended about putting
her work together with a printing and distribution project and remembered
only the fee: "Fifty thousand dollars."
He looked at her as if she had gone out of her mind. "Did you sayfifty
thousand dollars?"
She swallowed and nodded.
"Your proposition," he said, rising to his feet, "is the most outrageous one
ever made to any government on earth."
"We differ, sir, on the value of intellectual labor."
"Fifty thousand dollars!" Lincoln took his tall hat off the corner of the
desk and threw it on the floor. "Fifty!"
She looked at the black hat rolling on the green carpet. She took a deep
breath, forced back her tears, and said, "If that is too high, the error is not
mine, but that of friends of yours and the country. I will not bother you about
this further. I do not think you comprehend me."
"I reckon I comprehend only too well."
She could say no more about it. She brushed past young Hay on the way
out and went back to her flat to be alone.
CHAPTER 6
NOT BY STRATEGY ALONE
Lincoln retrieved his hat from the floor and threw it on the couch. Steaming,
he sat on his desk, facing the Pennsylvania Avenue window. Fifty thousand
dollars. That was two years' salary for the President of the United States. For
a pitiful fifteen thousand dollars, he had been forced to all but sell his soul to
Thurlow Weed, and that for no personal profit. He still had to pay for Moth-
er's flub-dubs out of his own pocket. The disproportion of it all galled him.
Miss Carroll was usefulshe shored up Bates on the law, and had helped
keep the wavering Governor of Maryland in linebut such a display of greed
was intolerable.
He stiffened his arms, hands flat on the desktop, and slid forward to rest his
feet on the floor. The pain in his toes caused him to sit on the desk again. He
reached down to undo the laces, pulled off the shoes and kneaded the ball of
his right foot below the aching corns. Seward, who had the same problem,
said that a man grew to bear the steady throbbing. Maybe so, but Seward was
a much smaller man, and not so much weight rested on his feet. One of the
worst things about the nagging pain was that the ailment was considered so
common as to be ludicrous, and corn sufferers found that their wincing drew
smiles. The only respite came when all the weight or pressure was removed,
and he resolved to do less walking and to wear slippers instead of shoes, no
matter what his wife said.
In his stocking feet, he went over to the map on the table. McClellan, like
Lincoln a Westerner, thought he was going to win by strategy, and the army
officers took on the same notion. They had no idea that the war had to be
carried on, and put through, by tough, hard fighting; that it would hurt
somebody; that no headway could be made while the delusion of bloodless
strategic advance lasted.
Lincoln hoped that all that kept McClellan from smashing the enemy
head-on was a natural excess of caution, or a regard for the lives of his men,
or a belief that one man's military genius could determine what happened in
the fiery trial of war. If that were all, the President as commander in chief
could put up with it, urging him on, passing along the pressure from the
radicals in ameliorated form.
But what, he asked himself, if the delays were caused by more than innate
caution, more than a reluctance to face the need for butchery, more than the
dictates of all the books on strategy? What if George McClellan held a differ-
ent view of the purpose of the war?
No, that was not the central question. Of course George saw the war
differentlyhe was a Stephen Douglas Democrat, and according to Mars was
under the political influence of his closest staff aide, Colonel Thomas Key, a
leading Ohio Democratic politician. They were not quite Peace Democrats,
but these politicians in uniform, who saw eye to eye with so many of the
professional officer corps out of West Point, were prepared to offer their
friends and classmates of the South "pop sov"extension of slavery into the
West, as if the election of 1860 had not settled all that once and for all. The
people had spoken; never mind that he was a minority President, he had been
elected on the square, and he would be damned before he would reward the
secession leaders with the sort of victory they could not gain at the polls.
McClellan and all the believers in compromise could hold their beliefsit
was a free country; that did not bother him. The issue boiled down to this:
could the Democratic generals and the officer corps impose their view of a
negotiated peace on the elected leadership of the nation? Put more bluntly,
was George taking orders about the way the war was to be fought, or had he
set up shop for himself?
Lincoln would not let himself be rushed into a conclusion about this. One
reason for restraint was that he had nobody of stature to replace McClellan at
the head of an army that loved "Little Mac"; another was that he knew
George to be a patriot and a good soldier, who had proved his loyalty and
ability after the Bull Run debacle. Others, like Chase and Stanton, were quick
to forget; Lincoln prided himself on remembering those who had stuck by
him in the Union's darkest hour.
And yetrumors had reached him that some of the officers dreamed of
dictatorship. He had heard, too, of approaches made to McClellan by Demo-
crats in New York about heading their party in the election after the war.
That sort of talk would be very tempting to an ambitious young man, and
George was no less ambitious than Lincoln had been at age thirty-five.
It occurred to him that most of his time was taken up with keeping his
friends and potential rivals from nibbling away the little actual power he had.
Inside the Cabinet, that nibbling had begun right at the start with Seward's
attempt to establish himself as Premier, and now Chase was beginning to
complain that the Cabinet did not have enough authority. Lincoln had struck
a balance of power between Chase and Stanton on one hand, Blair and
Seward on the other; he wondered how long that would last.
In the Congress, the conservative Republicans still outnumbered the radi-
cals, but Ben Wade and Thaddeus Stevens were gaining strength, and would
probably press the slavery issue to seize control of the war from the Executive
branch. He saw that as a serious threat to the central idea of representative
government: nobody believed more strongly than Lincoln that the secession
had to be crushed and the South defeated decisively enough to stamp out any
idea of secession to the latest generation, but he also was persuaded that the
Southern states had to be drawn back into the Union and not treated as a
conquered province by the abolitionists after surrender. That was why his
reelection, in the Andy Jackson style, was so necessarywhy he would gladly
use the furlough power to help put the soldier vote in the Republican column,
why he would employ Thurlow Weed to squeeze funds from financiers.
The Cabinet, the Congress, the military: he had struck a precarious balance
of forces within the first two, leaving himself the master; now he had to apply
the same technique to the military, and needed to find a general to counter-
balance a successful McClellan.
The President stretched out on the couch and thought about that. After
Shiloh, Grant would not do, at least for a long while. Halleck had been
named General-in-Chief, but he was more a buffer than a balancer; there was
a lack of magnetism to the man that would likely cause him to be dominated
in the commanding presence of McClellan. John Pope, the hero of Island No.
Ten out West, was a possibility; Chase and Stanton were high on him. Most
likely, Lincoln judged, the best man was McDowell, a good Republican who
was not really to blame for Bull Run.
The trouble with McDowell was that he sided with McClellan on the most
troublesome area of disagreement between the President and his foremost
field commander. As Lincoln saw it, the trick was not so much taking Rich-
mond, it was taking the capital of the Confederacy without losing the capital
of the Union.
George could not get it through his head that the city of Washington had to
be defended from a raid and a sacking at all costs. The capture of the federal
city, even for a short while, would dishearten the North and bring the foreign
powers in on the side of the South. That was why a sizable Union armythe
forty thousand under McDowellhad to remain between the rebels and
Washington. If such an interposition meant that the strategy of McClellan to
take Richmond by water would come to naught because of a division of
Union forces, so be it.
Incredibly, however, McDowell agreed with McClellan, a man he despised,
on this central decision. To the President's dismay, McDowell had argued
that it was foolish to allow the enemy to paralyze his large force with a small
one under Stonewall Jackson in the Shenandoah Valley. Both Union generals
agreed that the threat to Washington was minimal, that the North should not
be deterred by a feint, that the only way to take Richmond was to combine
the Union forces for an assault. Washington, they assured him, would be safe
because the rebels would need every available man to save Richmond. Sure.
You and I know the dog won't bite, but does the dog know he won't bite?
Nicolay knocked and put his head in to say that a group of Congressmen,
Wade included, was expected soon to be present for the signing of the Home-
stead Act. Lincoln sat up, nodded, and began to fit his tender toes into his
shoes.
If McClellan was so cautious, the thought struck him, why was he being so
bold about stripping the capital to throw everything against Richmond?
Could there be something to that charge of treasonous intent that Stanton
had made? Lincoln put that distasteful thought out of his mind, remembering
the convincing reaction of the general when the charge was put to him in a
friendly way.
No; George wanted to win, but to win the least costly way, covering him-
self with glory but not with blood. He probably thought that if the enemy in
Richmond saw themselves impossibly outnumbered, they would withdraw
without a fight, much as they had done recently at Yorktown. Lincoln
thought the opposite, that Jefferson Davis would fight for every street in
Richmond, just as he would in Davis's shoes.
He decided, tentatively, to send McDowell's army to connect with McClel-
lan's forces to close on the rebel capital. To withhold the power that might
make the difference would be a terrible display of timidity. But he would send
them overland, keeping one Union army between Stonewall Jackson and
Washington. If that took longerwhich it would, in this spring's unprece-
dented downpours of rainGeorge would not really mind. He was in no
hurry to attack.
Lincoln rose to meet the congressional delegation that had enacted legisia
tion to give 160 acres of land out West to anyone who would settle it for fiv(
years. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, silently cursing all corns
McClellan was his chosen general, and Lincoln was stuck with a plan ol
action his man favored. But he could not help thinking that the rebels would
never be whipped by strategic moves, only by the crudest kind of bloodlet-
ting. He would support his general so long as he acted as a general, but woulc
withdraw that support, no matter what the cost, if ever the military leadel
presumed to act like a President.

CHAPTER 7
THE GATES OF RICHMOND
Mathew Brady's "Whatizzit Wagon" was stuck in the Virginia mud.
He had loaded it with the ingredients for collodionguncotton, sulphuric
ether, alcoholand the necessary chemical excitants, along with a covered
vat of silver nitrate solution in which to bathe each plate before loading it into
the camera. With Alexander Gardner's help, and ignoring his assistant's com-
plaints about being left behind to tend to the studio, Brady had packed the
camera securely under the wagon seat. He had then overseen the wagon's
loading onto a gunboat at the Navy Yard in Washington, and followed the
water path of McClellan's army down the Potomac to the peninsula leading
to Richmond.
The photographer, his wagon, and his horse had disembarked at Yorktown,
recently surrendered by the slowly retreating rebels. He soon caught up to the
Union Army, only to get his wagon bogged down axle-deep near the tents of
McClellan's headquarters, next to a sign reading "Richmond, six miles." He
cocked his head forward past Foons, the black man driving, and peered
around; from the looks of the caissons and the curses of nearby artillerymen,
it seemed to Brady that the same mud that stopped his Whatizzit Wagon had
stopped the heavy cannons of the Army of the Potomac.
"We thought you'd never get here," said Pinkerton. The detective's boots
made sucking sounds as he rocked back and forth in the mud. "The general's
been asking about you. Too busy making money in the nation's capital?"
Brady wiped his hands on his well-smudged white linen smock, put his
eyeglasses onhis eyesight, sadly, was getting steadily worseand regarded
the detective. Pinkerton, under a derby hat and flicking ashes from a cigar,
looked especially smug on this warm, rainy morning in late May.
"Don't talk to me about money," the photographer snapped back. "This
war is ruining the Brady Gallery. As soon as I pay Gardner his back wages,
the man will quit. That's why I won't pay him."
"I see you managed to get your man Gardner in to see Rose Greenhow in
the Old Capitol Prison," Pinkerton said, in an offhand way that Brady
thought was too casual by half. "How'd you manage that?"
That touched a sore nerve. Brady decided to cross up Pinkerton by telling
the truth: "Gardner did that on his own, last month when I was in the field."
"But weren't the Wild Rose and her sniveling litle brat supposed to be your
subjects? You'd been after me to get to them since last September."
"I was a little irritated with Gardner about that," Brady admitted. More
than a little; he had taken a historic picture, one of great human interest.
"But he said that all of a sudden, Stanton gave him a pass."
Pinkerton smashed his fist in his palm. "I figured it was Stanton. He's
trying to pull a fast one." Brady waited for the detective to tell the rest. "The
Douglas widow got to him, I think, or Senator Wilson. Stanton wants to ship
her back to Jeff Davis, get her out of our hair. But I won't let him. McClellan
will personally object."
"What's it to McClellan if they let her go?"
"It matters to me. My best spy, Timothy Webster, was caught in Rich-
mond. They're going to hang him. But maybe we can swap him for Rose." He
pointed his cigar in the general direction of Richmond. "I want the damned
secesh to know that if they hang our spy, we'll hang that spying bitch of
theirs."
Brady shuddered; although Pinkerton sometimes gave the impression of
being a caricature of a secret agent, it could not be denied that the man dealt
in a grisly business. The photographer had learned, however, that he gained
an advantage over the detective by refusing to take him seriously. If Pinker-
ton did not intimidate you, you intimidated him.
"Well, Gardner got his photograph," Brady gloomed, "and he'll probably
sell a lot of them when he sets up for himself. He'll probably steal Timmy
O'Sullivan as wellthirty-five dollars a week isn't good enough for him. That
leaves me with the likes of Foons." He waved toward A. B. Foons, a freed
negro who drove the wagon. Foons took fairly good pictures, too, but Brady
was loath to admit to anyone that a good number of his photographs were the
product of a camera operated by a black man. Magazines wanted the war
pictures as the factual basis for their engravings, although everyone else with
money to spend on images wanted little portraits on cartes de visite. Brady
had popularized them but thought they were cheapening the art of photogra-
phy.
"We're making history here," Pinkerton said expansively. "By sheer bril-
liant generalship, this army has been brought within shouting distance of
Richmond with hardly any casualties."
"That's good," said Brady. He was not looking forward to taking more
images of rows of dead bodies.
"That's strategy," said Pinkerton. "We bring up the artillerytakes a
whiledig in to protect the guns, lay siege, and the rebs fall back toward
Richmond. If we had gone Lincoln's way, overland from Manassas, frontal
assaults all the way, there's no telling how many men we would have lost.
Strategy, not butchery, that's McClellan's way."
Pinkerton ordered a few soldiers to assist Foons in freeing the Whatizzit
Wagon and led the photographer to the telegraph tent. "We're in constant
touch with Washington," he announced, then added in a worried voice,
"what's the mood up there? We cannot trust what they tell us."
"I'll tell you, Pinkerton" Brady began, but the detective winced and cut
him off.
"Alien," he whispered.
"I try not to be familiar," Brady said, "by using first names, Allan, but if
you"
"Major E. J. Alien. That's what I go by, you know that."
"How is changing your name going to help your business after the war?"
"Never mind that, dammit, don't you realize this is a war zone? Secesh
everywhere."
"Seems pretty quiet, actually."
"If you start with that 'all quiet on the Potomac' stuff, Brady," the detec-
tive gritted through his cigar, "I'll see to it that your contraption over there
never gets out of the mud."
"The feeling in Washington is that we're winning the war," said Brady
quickly. "Admiral Farragut and General Butler took New Orleans. Halleck
finally used Grant's army to take Corinth. General Hunter captured Fort
Pulaski down the coast, near the mouth of the Savannah. But as for McClel-
lanpeople are saying McClellan has the slows."
"I am aware of that figure of speech, Mr. Brady," said a deep voice at the
entrance to the tent. George Brinton McClellan, silhouetted by the light be-
hind him, a hand resting on the sword at his side, looked to the squinting
Brady to be positively Napoleonic. " 'The slows' seems to be Mr. Lincoln's
favorite expression. And yet here, with the spires of the enemy capital in
sight, the decisive battle of the war is about to be fought."
"My report of the Washington mood is accurate, General," Brady told
him, "I mean no disrespect, but you're expected to take Richmond any day
now, reinforcements or not." Another thought, triggered by the general's
words about the spires of the enemy capital, stirred his imagination. "Can
you see Richmond from some high point around here?"
"Yes, from Mechanicsville. But soon as General McDowell's army arrives
forty thousand men, promised by the President to be here tomorrowyou,
Mr. Brady, will be able to capture scenes inside Richmond."
"Will the city be put to the torch?" He wondered if a huge conflagration
would provide enough light for a picture. Brady had not had much luck with
nighttime photography.
McClellan glared. "Of course notwe're not barbarians. The object of this
war, sir, is not to destroy the people and the homes of the South, but to
reunite the Union. I think the President would agree, though much depends
on who talks to him last." He turned to Pinkerton. "Any word from prison-
ers on enemy strength, Captain Alien?"
"Major Alien, sir. General Lee has one hundred and eighty thousand men
to defend Richmond," said Pinkerton without hesitation. "During our assault
on the city, General Jackson can be expected to move down from the Shenan-
doah with thirty-five thousand more."
"I have a hundred thousand men present for duty," McClellan told Brady.
"You can see how important it is for McDowell's army to join me."
Brady discounted Pinkerton's estimates, which everybody knew had
proved high in the past, and figured it would be a pretty even fight if both
McDowell and Jackson arrived on schedule. Across the tent, a telegraph key
started to chatter.
"If you were a military man," said McClellan, "you would be asking me
why I have my army straddling both sides of this confounded Chickahominy
River."
Brady went along: "Why is that, sir?"
"The position is terrible. We are extraordinarily vulnerable. But I have no
other choice." He pulled at his mustache in irritation. "The great military
minds up in Washington have ordered me to extend my right wing to the
north of Richmond, so as to hook up with McDowell's left wing when he
marches down from Manassas. On a map, it looks logical; but here on the
ground, as anyone can see, it incurs a senseless risk. Nobody thought this
stream would swell into a river."
"It hasn't rained this way down here for twenty years," Pinkerton added.
Brady heard the telegraph chatter. After a moment, the operator took a
message to the cipher man; while it was being decoded, McClellan waited
silently.
"Maybe this will be news of McDowell's arrival," Brady said hopefully. He
could pose "the two Mc's" right here; it was common knowledge that they
were rivals, and the picture of the two on the eve of a great victory would be
historic.
The message was handed to McClellan. He read it once, blanched, and
crumpled the paper in his hand. "It's from Lincoln. He has stopped McDow-
ell and turned him around to help Banks go chasing after Jackson near Wash-
ington."
"Lincoln lost his nerve," said Pinkerton.
McClellan's face, at first unnaturally pale, began to redden. "Heaven save a
country governed by such counsels!"
"The President is said to be concerned," Brady said cautiously, "that
Stonewall Jackson might run up the Valley and sack Washington while we're
all down here."
"That imbecile cannot get it through his head that the entire purpose of
Jackson's movement is to make Lincoln panic and do exactly what he is
doing." The photographer biinked at that insubordination. "He is falling into
Jackson's trap!" the general choked. "Lincoln is denying me the means to
take Richmond and end the war."
The general fumed, paced about for a couple of minutes, then checked his
anger long enough to dictate a message to the President: "The object of
Jackson's movement is to prevent reinforcements being sent to me. All the
information from balloons, deserters, prisoners, and contrabands agrees"
Pinkerton nodded vigorously"that the mass of the rebel troops are still in
the immediate vicinity of Richmond, ready to defend it."
Brady presumed that Lincoln and Stanton were at the telegraph office in
the War Department. Although McClellan had often been accused of not
keeping Lincoln informed of his plans, Brady observed that the telegraph link
between the President and the field was remarkably close on this campaign.
In a few moments, the President wired back a description of the havoc
Jackson and his "foot cavalry" were wreaking on the Union forces in the
Shenan~oah. The message from Lincoln added: "If McDowell's force was
now beyond our reach we should be entirely helpless. Apprehensions of some-
thing like this, and no unwillingness to sustain you, has always been my
reason for withholding McDowell's forces from you. Please understand this,
and do the best you can with the forces you have."
"Idiots! Imbeciles!" McClellan shouted. He checked his outrage, stared at
the ground for a moment, then asked, "Where's Lieutenant Custer?" His
aide-de-camp with the flowing blond mustache appeared immediately. "Arm-
strong, you're always spoiling for action: take a detachment of cavalry across
the Chickahominy at New Bridge. Draw fire, see if you can find out where
they plan to come at us."
"The stream is still rising, sir"
"I know that, but I know Joe Johnstonhe will attack my force on the
Richmond side as soon as he learns that Jackson's feint has succeeded and my
reinforcements are not coming."
The telegraph operator showed him a communication from McDowell for-
warded through the War Department. "Even McDowell!" the distraught gen-
eral cried. "Look"he showed Brady"the good Republican, the radicals'
pet, even lrvin McDowell thinks Lincoln is sending him on a wild-goose
chase after Jackson. He calls Lincoln's order 'a crushing blow to us all.' Give
him credit for being a military manMcDowell is enough of a general to
know a feint when he sees one. But there's such panic in Washington that
they won't even listen to him!"
Brady was astounded at the persistence and ferocity of McClellan in argu-
ing with his commander in chief. The next message sent by McClellan to
Lincoln contained more than a hint of future recrimination: "A desperate
battle is before us; if any regiments of good troops remain unemployed it will
be an irreparable fault committed."
Lincoln fired back: "I think the time is near when you must either attack
Richmond or give up the job and come to the defense of Washington."
That sharp riposte stung the general; with ridicule in his voice, he read
aloud the President's parting request: "Can you get near enough to throw
shells into the city?"
No pleading by McClellan could induce Lincoln to grant him the reinforc-
ing army he was certain was needed to take Richmond. Brady, knowing
Lincoln to be a photographic subject who resisted directions to pose from the
camera operator (only Gardner could wheedle him into assuming a less for-
mal expression), tried to envision the furor on the other end of the telegraph
line. The radicals were all insisting, certainly, that McClellan was a traitor
willing to expose Washington to captureor a coward unwilling to take the
offensive against Richmond with the army on hand. Brady was no military
man, but he had learned enough in the past year about military tactics to
know that no general now tried to attack entrenched positions without at
least equal numbers, and most insisted on a three-to-two edge.
Moreover, Brady had quickly learned that nobody here on the scene imag-
ined that McDowell had the remotest chance of catching Stonewall Jackson
that harsh, lemon-sucking "bay'nets and grape" religious fanatic who
whipped his rebel troops into a frenzy of quickstep marching. If Lincoln was
wrong and McClellan right, the President's military misjudgment could cost
the Union tens of thousands of livesperhaps years of war.
"He is doing his best to sacrifice this army," McClellan said bitterly. Brady
wished he were not there to hear such near-traitorous remarks, in case of a
court-martial. "It is perfectly sickening to deal with such people. If Lincoln
wants to storm Richmond with half an army, let him come and do it him-
self."
The general then took command of his disappointment. "Pinkerton, round
up the staff for a picture in front of the headquarters tent. Mr. Brady, remem-
ber this as a moment of calm at the front during another panic back at the
Executive Mansion." McClellan buttoned his tunic, ruminating aloud, "I
witnessed that same cowardice in Washington not long ago when the Mem-
mack attacked us. Stanton and Lincoln lost their minds. But last week I
outflanked the rebels at Norfolk and forced them to scuttle the Merrimack
so much for hysteria in high places."
In a controlled voice, he gave orders for his army to defend itself as best it
could in its exposed position straddling the swollen stream. Brady noticed
that McClellan, at work in his profession, appeared to know the exact dispo-
sition of his troops and their capabilities. When he was not embittered and
insubordinate, the general seemed to Brady to be a confident commander.
"You really think," Pinkerton said, in a less than military way, "that Joe
Johnston will stop falling back, and attack us?"
"He will because, for the first time, he's been given the chance." McClellan
explained concisely how the Confederate commander had been forced to re-
treat steadily, unable to attack the inexorably advancing guns because the
Union forces were constantly entrenched, and unable to hold his line because
the superior artillery pounded him back. As in a chess match, Joe Johnston
had no choice but to give up ground or he would lose his army. But now, with
the Union force separated by the swollen stream in anticipation of linkage
with an army that Lincoln had suddenly decided not to send, the rebel com-
mander would surely see the Union vulnerability and launch an attack.
"Unless, of course," Brady said, overstepping himself but unable to stop,
"you attack first." By risking all, McClellan might win; of course, if he lost,
taking huge casualties in a vain assault at a superior force, the rebel army
could then walk up to Washington relatively unopposed and end the war.
Brady was glad the decision was not his.
McClellan shook his head slowly. "I dare not risk this army; I intend to
make a sure thing of the capture of Richmond. And I will do it in my own
time."
He turned to another aide, whose short gray hair contrasted with the slim,
tall Ouster's blond ringlets, and said crisply, "The mission you suggested is
approved." To Brady, the general said, "I want you to copy a detailed map of
an area north of the James River, in case I have to make a change of base."
That would have to be some maneuver, swinging a hundred-thousand-man
army through the mud and across a river, around to a position that still
menaced Richmond but was defensible and well supplied from the North.
The civilian Brady could sense the danger of having an army destroyed in the
middle of such a move.
The photographer had an assignment. He went outside the headquarters
tent to see if he should set up his camera; the rain had stopped, but it was still
too dark for clear pictures. He handed the map back to Pinkerton for safe-
keeping, arranging to take the picture of it midmorning of the next day. A
photographer's ability to copy a map exactly made him welcome to generals
in the field; certainly vanity played a part in most officers' willingness to pu<
up with a civilian at headquarters, but the map-duplicating ability provided
the military reason.
"You might want to look at the captured guns," Pinkerton called after him:
"they're real guns." Evidently the detective recalled the Brady photographs
of the "Quaker guns," logs made up to look like cannon, after the rebels
abandoned the Potomac defenses. The photographer noted that people in
government never forgot an embarrassment.
The older aide, who introduced himself as Colonel Key, approached him
with a Brady carte de visite. "Do you recognize this man? This was taken in
your studio."
Brady examined the picture and nodded. "Howell Cobb, of Georgia. I took
that in my Broadway gallery about ten years ago, when he was Speaker of the
House. There's a later picture, too, I think Gardner took in my Washington
studio, when Cobb was Buchanan's Secretary of the Treasury."
Colonel Key nodded his thanks. "I want to be sure I'm dealing with the
right man."
That struck Brady as curious. Howell Cobb had quit Buchanan to go South
and organize the first congress of the Confederacy. He was very nearly se-
lected to hold the post given to Jeff Davis, and was now a general in the rebel
army. Brady handed back the old carte de visite and asked no questions.

CHAPTER 8
SUBMISSION AND AMNESTY
"Jeb Stuart's cavalry rode all the way around us, clear around the whole
damn Army of the Potomac."
Colonel Thomas Key, moving at a slow trot toward his rendezvous with
the Confederate representative near Mechanicsville, nodded silently to Lieu-
tenant George Armstrong Custer, chief of the cavalry unit accompanying
him.
"Colonel, do you have any idea what that cavalry ride does for the rebel
army, even their infantry?"
"Gives their spirit a boost," Key allowed. "And I suppose it told them
something about our weakness to the north. But now we know they know."
"Sir, it means that their new general, Lee, made us look like a pack of fools.
We can't deny it was an act of courage." The young man was evidently
heartsick. "Where was our cavalry?"
"It wasn't commanded by Lieutenant Custer," the colonel grinned at the
rider at his side. Never let the blond ringlets fool you, Key told himself, the
impetuous boy was also a brave man. On his first combat assignment, leading
a small force of cavalry on a reconnaissance mission across the Chickahominy
north of McClellan's headquarters, Custer had been first across the stream,
first to open fire at enemy skirmishers, and last to leave the field. His probing
helped alert the Federal forces to the attack by rebels at Seven Pines, south of
the swollen stream. That short engagement was hailed by McClellan as a
victory for the North because the attack was repelled; it was notable for the
wounding of rebel General Joe Johnston, and his replacement by Robert Lee
commanding the Army of Northern Virginia.
Key was ready to forgive Custer his record of having been graduated last in
his West Point class the year before. Needed now was courage in cavalrymen,
such as that shown by the rebel Jeb Stuart in his swing clear around the
Union Army. Custer, in his baptism of fire, had proved he possessed that
requisite combination of recklessness, cunning, and luck; he would become a
good cavalry leader, if he didn't get himself killed before he turned twenty-
three.
The colonel could understand why George McClellan wanted the young
man at his side as one of the aides-de-camp: he was from an Ohio family,
suitably worshipful of the commander, and would carry out any order in the
heat of battle. McClellan's other aidesthe Prince de Joinville and the
Cornte de Parisadded panache and international depth to the headquarters
staff, although the presence of titled Frenchmen around the general was much
derided by the radicals in Congress. McClellan also was fortunate to have
Nellie Marcy McClellan's father, a regular army veteran, as chief of staff, and
Key was realisticto have Thomas Key, an experienced Ohio Democratic
political leader and judge, as his adviser on matters political. Such counsel
was indispensable to a future President. Key saw McClellan as following in
the footsteps of Washington, Jackson, and "Tippecanoe" Harrison: "vote as
you shot" was a slogan with wide appeal to veterans, and veterans would cast
the largest bloc of votes in the election of 1864.
"Pinkerton says that General Lee sent his son and his nephew to ride with
Stuart," said Custer gloomily. "That was a show of contempt for us, and a
display of faith by Lee. They're not calling him the 'King of Spades' or
'Evacuating Lee' anymore."
Key knew that General Lee, though a personal favorite of Jeff Davis, was
unpopular with troops, perhaps because he forced them to do "nigger work"
entrenching and building barricades. His record in the first year of this war
had been undistinguished. Would he be maneuvered out of Richmond, as Joe
Johnston would, when McClellan's big siege guns drew close enough to shell
the city to smithereens? Or would he throw his troops against the well-
entrenched Federals first, taking fearsome casualties and risking the war on a
single battle?
"I'm afraid Mac was too kindhearted about the rest of Lee's family," said
the colonel. Lee's wife and daughter had been cut off from the rebel forces
when Union troops overran the Lee family home, White House, and had
requested permission to return to Richmond. Against Key's better judgment,
McClellan ordered the women passed through, with a display of cordiality to
the rebel officer escorting them, an old army friend. That sort of chumminess
with the enemy did not set well with the radicals in Washington; the courtesy
was a political mistake, giving ammunition to those who suspected McClellan
of being a secret rebel sympathizer. But Mac would not think twice about
reuniting the Lee family, perhaps because he was naturally gallant, more
likely because he missed his own wife and child a bit too extravagantly.
"No, we're not at war with women and children," said Custer. "The gen-
eral was right about that. It's just that" he fiddled with his reins, appar-
ently uncomfortable at what he was about to say. "We did spend a hell of a lot
of time in front of Yorktown. I sometimes wish we'd get on with the war."
The colonel shot him a sharp glance and laid down the policy: "The Mc-
Clellan plan was to turn Yorktown immediately by the movement of
McDowell's corps on the north bank of the York river. Lincoln's vacillation
destroyed that plan, forced us to spend a month on the Peninsula uselessly,
and kept us from taking Richmond in May."
"Yes, Colonel."
"Before General McClellan was absent from the intrigues of Washington
for forty-eight hours," Key continued slowly, so that the young man would
never forget if the Peninsula campaign was not successful, "his largest corps,
commanded by his second-in-command McDowell, containing more than one
forth of his army, assigned to a service which was vital to the success of his
campaign, was detached from his command without consultation with him
and without his knowledge. That was the first great crime of this war, and we
can only hope that the nation will not be punished brutally for it."
He spurred to a gallop and his escort followed. Ouster's doubts nettled him;
Key had heard from his younger brother John, a major who worked in the
War Department, that Stanton wanted this expedition to fail, and would do
all in his power to see that the war was won another way by another, more
radical general. The President's loss of patience, shown in his telegraph mes-
sages, was not so much the product of the slow advance as of the constant
badgering from the radicals around him.
Key did not fool himself about McClellan, who erred, when he did, always
on the side of caution. Such a general might not always win, but he rarely lost
a battle, and such avoidance of mistakes won wars. Stanton's hatred was not
irrational: McClellan's conduct of the war matched his political aim in the
war, which was quite different from Lincoln's. McClellan wanted peaceful
reunion, and it was hard for Key to tell now exactly what Lincoln wanted
perhaps total victory, with slavery abolished and the South occupied, break-
ing every promise he had made. Accordingly, McClellan sought to maneuver
the rebels to surrender, by superior strategy while Lincoln wanted to blud-
geon the rebels until they collapsed with some great lesson learned. Yet the
two men, Lincoln and McClellan, were both sides of the same preserve-the-
Union coin, and Key thought the combination promised a compromise in the
war's goals.
The mud had hardened under the mid-June sun; it was not yet dry enough
for the horsemen to raise dust, but the improving condition of the roads
augured well for the movement of heavy artillery. At Gaines's gristmill, the
riders passed men of the 16th New York picking and shucking ears of corn on
that sunny Sunday morning. The work was for their own dinner; in an army
led by George McClellan, the Sabbath was observed.
"There's Richmond!" Custer shouted, pointing to the spires visible through
the trees. Down a long slope, the road led for five miles into the city. The land
alongside the road was studded with thick mounds of earth protecting can-
non; Lee, the King of Spades, had been at work. They rode into Mechanics-
ville, a country crossroads of a town turned into an army camp, garrisoned by
the 4th New Jersey Volunteers, overlooking the swamped bed of the Chicka-
hominy.
Key drew to a halt, brought out a white cloth that would serve as a flag,
and knotted it to a broom handle. Feeling an exhilarating tightness in his
chestthis could be a turning point in the nation's history, and much might
depend on Thomas Key's political sensethe colonel told Custer and the
escort to wait where they stood. He guided his horse down to the broken
bridge agreed upon as the meeting site, dismounted, and planted his white
flag in front of a shanty a few feet from the Union side. He ordered the two
Union pickets inside to leave.
As he watched, a figure approached, carrying a white flag. His face soon
was recognizable as the man in Mathew Brady's carte de visite, with a heavy
brown beard added. General Howell Cobb paused for his escort to lay a plank
across the hole in the bridge, then walked to the shanty alone.
Cobb and Key shook hands and went inside. Before their talk could begin,
it was interrupted by a knock and the opening of the shack door.
"Colonel Simpson, Fourth New Jersey, charge of pickets," the oflicer an-
nounced. Key had not made advance arrangements with the local com-
mander, hoping to lessen the possibility of an advance report to Washington
that might trigger an order canceling his plans; he counted on his headquar-
ters cavalry escort to be evidence of his credentials.
"Colonel Key, of General McClellan's staff," he said to the New Jersey
man. "I am here holding a conversation with General Howell Cobb. Permit
me to introduce you."
The colonel in charge of pickets peered at the face of the Confederate
general and surprised him by asking, "The former Secretary of the Trea-
sury?"
"Yes." Cobb smiled. "I once held that position in the United States Gov-
ernment."
"I used to see you in Washington, where I had business with your office.
You've become so metamorphosed by that beard, I'd hardly know you."
"We all seem to be fighting under masked faces," said Cobb, which Key
thought a singular thing to say, as if the Southern leader doubted the sincerity
of the men espousing the issues behind the war.
"We are discussing an exchange of prisoners," Key told the inquiring of-
ficer, who plainly did not like being surprised by a truce parley on his watch,
"under the authority of General Dix." The name of the Union general in
charge of prisoner exchanges satisfied him, and the picket colonel withdrew.
"Dix succeeded me at Treasury," Cobb observed affably. "Fine man, good
Democrat. Better than most in that woebegone Buchanan Cabinet."
"President Buchanan wanted you to run for the Democratic nomination to
succeed him, didn't he?" Key had studied Cobb's background: fighter against
the Calhoun secessionists in 1849, compromise Speaker of the House, pro-
Union Governor of Georgia, a Southerner who left the Union with a heavy
heart to organize the Confederacy. Admired and trusted by many old friends
in Washington, and now stationed with the rebel leaders in Richmond,
Howell Cobb was the perfect man with whom to explore peace negotiations.
"Buck was for any Democrat who could beat Stephen Douglas. Breckin-
ridge had the better chance, so we both backed him." He shook his beard.
"Seems like so long ago. What's on your mind? Not just prisoners, I take it."
"Permanent peace."
"You could have that within half an hour," Cobb replied instantly. "Take
your army and go home."
Key carefully disclaimed any representation of an official character, pre-
tending to be holding a private conversation after a discussion of prisoner
exchange; for the record, Cobb did the same, noting that it would then be
possible for each of them to report the entire conversation to the commanding
generals. His heart beating fast, Key then went to the heart of the matter:
with a Union army within six miles of the rebel capital, under what circum-
stances would the South agree to a cessation of hostilities?
"A treaty of peace could be agreed on at once," said Cobb more formally,
"but reunion? Only by subjugation or extermination of the South. Your inva-
sion has created in the Southern mind such feelings of animosity, such a spirit
of resistance, that reunion could only be effected by permanent military occu-
pation."
"Your statement surprises and grieves me, sir." Key had not expected a
more forthcoming response; they had to feel their way, neither showing weak-
ness. "I had hoped that you, at least, would be impressed by a sense of the
hopelessness of the struggle. The contest is unequal: the North has the greater
numbers, wealth, credit and resources of all kinds. The border states, on
which you based such hope, have established their loyalty. Union sentiment
still exists throughout the South"
"Stop there," Cobb said. "Outside the foreign element in New Orleans, no
Union sentiment is left anywhere in the planting region of the South. The
slaves have never been so tractable as now. The military strength of the
Confederacy is unbroken, and you have not the power to force entrance into
Richmond."
"You will fight to hold Richmond? The city will be destroyed."
"Personally, I am opposed to defending the town," said Cobb with frank-
ness that surprised Key, "but my superiors are determined to do so. But what
does it mean if you take Richmond, and every other major city in the South?
You would gain nothingorganized military resistance will never be sup-
pressed. You would be compelled to hold the country by occupation, and
every military position would be surrounded and harassed by a hostile popu-
lation."
Key refused to accept that. "I do not believe the free white citizens of the
South are opposed to the United States Government. I believe secession is the
scheme of a class of men who arrogated to themselves superior social position
in order to grasp and hold political power." It had not been his intention to
get this hard this quickly, but Key plunged ahead. "If your view of the future
holds, we will have to disorganize the condition of society that gives rise to
that class of men, and to raise up an order of laboring men and middle-class
white men who would be loyal to the Union."
"You will never, damn your eyes, find men in any of the seceding states
who will be made into a loyal class."
"Then we will find some to move there on our invitation."
"You've made my point, Colonel Key. You can only reunify by military
occupation, which, believe me, will be a bloody business for a generation."
Stymied, Key drew a deep breath and tried again. "Sir. Your intelligent
people know that they are fighting their friends. Neither the President, the
Army nor the people of the loyal states have any wish to subjugate the
Southern states or diminish their constitutional rights."
"Really? Talk to John Breckinridge."
"Our soldiers exhibit little animosity toward yours," Key pressed on. "On
both sides, the men fight only because it is their duty. On what grounds can
you justify continuance of this bloodletting between brothers?"
"The election of a sectional President, whose views on slavery were known
to be objectionable to the whole South," snapped Cobb. "How about those for
grounds?"
"But the slavery question has been settled! It is abolished in the District
and excluded from the territories. As an element of dissension, slavery cannot
again enter into our national politics." Key could sense interest in his inter-
locutor and developed the position. "The President has never gone beyond
this in any expression of his views. He has always recognized the obligation of
the constitutional provision as to fugitive slaves, and that slavery within and
between the slave states is beyond congressional intervention."
"Our papers say Lincoln is preparing a declaration of radical views on
slavery," the Georgian observed, apparently looking for some common
ground.
"Toleration of slavery where it exists is the political creed of the great body
of the Republican Party. No political organization in the North of respectable
numbers would propose violation of the Constitution on slavery."
Cobb thought about that. "Judgethat is, Colonel Key," he said, appear-
ing to slip, "I have every respect for the three centers of political power you
have referred to: the President, the Army, and the people of the North.
Speaking just as a reasonable man, and with the clear understanding that no
official representation is being made or considered, do you have a specific
suggestion in mind?"
"Submission and amnesty," Key said, having discussed the proposal with
General McClellan. "Proclamations to that effect by Mr. Davis and Mr.
Lincoln would be sustained by the great mass of the whole nation."
Cobb sighed. "No Confederate leader could openly advocate such a posi-
tion and continue to live. The moment he uttered it, he would be slain." He
rose to go. "The South cannot now return to the Union without degradation.
The blood that has been shed has washed out all feelings of brotherhood. We
must now become independent or conquered."
At the broken bridge, Cobb remarked to Key on the world of difference
between Union generals: how Butler in New Orleans offended every notion of
Southern womanhood with his abusive orders, and how McClellan had gra-
ciously offered his protection to the wife and daughter of General Lee. Key
replied he was glad to be serving under McClellan.
Although Lieutenant Custer was dying to know what had gone on in the
shanty, Key told him nothing on the ride back to headquarters. Alone with
the general, he summarized the meeting that had shaken his confidence in
their ability to shape the peace: "First, the rebels are in great force at Rich-
mond, and mean to fight a general battle in defense of it."
"I shall make the first battle mainly an artillery combat, push them in upon
Richmond, then bring up my heavy guns, shell the city, and carry it by
assault."
Key nodded, hoping the rebels would wait until the Army of the Potomac
was ready. "Second, the Confederate leaders do not have the power to control
the secession movement they launched," he reported, thinking of Cobb's pre-
diction of death to any leader who proposed submission and amnesty. "Fi-
nally, there is little hope of peace and reconstruction so long as the rebels
have a large army in the field anywhere."
McClellan nodded grimly. "You assured him of my views on abolition?
That they should have no fears of loss of property?"
Key surprised himself with his next conclusion: "In particular states, I now
think it may be necessary to destroy the class that created this rebellionand
the only way to do that will be to destroy the institution of slavery."
The general looked puzzledKey had never spoken with such pessimism
beforethen shook his head. "That kind of talk, or any such declaration by
Lincoln, would make peace negotiations impossible. Never forget, Judge, our
goal is to force a settlement of this conflict in a way that reunites the nation.
Let's see what they say after we take Richmond. Write a report of your
meeting and I'll send it to Stanton to give the President."
"I don't think that would be such a good idea," said Key. Did McClellan
fully realize what they had done, in approaching the Confederacy about peace
terms without prior approval from the President? Lincoln had not hesitated
to humiliate Generals Hunter and Fr6mont for overreaching his authority in
declaring captured slaves "forever free" and prolonging the war; what would
he do to a general and his aide-de-camp for overreaching in the other direc-
tion?
"I am not in the least ashamed of trying to end this war without further
bloodshed," said the general. "Nor can the President legitimately object. I
must save the country, and cannot respect anything that stands in the way.
Write your report, Judge. I'll make sure Stanton shows it to Lincoln."

CHAPTER 9
ROSF. ON TRTAT.

General John Dix considered this assignment the most odious since the arrest
of the Maryland legislators on their way to Frederick to vote for secession. He
was to preside at a "commission hearing"an official but extralegal trial
designed to extract from Rose O'Neal Greenhow, his longtime close friend, a
confession of treason.
Secretary Stanton, with whom Dix had served in the Buchanan Cabinet
Stanton Attorney General, Dix at Treasuryhad made the stakes clear.
"McClellan and that idiot detective Pinkerton, who has created whole ar-
mies of nonexistent rebels," Stanton had told him, waving his spectacles in
agitation, "want to hold her hostage for one of Pinkerton's spies caught in
Richmond. If they do hang the Pinkerton man, I don't want to have to hang
Rose. I would prefer to ship her down to her traitor friends in Richmond."
"She would have a lot to say about a great many important people, stand-
ing there on the gallows," Dix agreed, and was not surprised when Stanton
shuddered at both ends of that grisly thought.
"But she has to cooperate," Stanton had said. "I'm leaving that to you.
You knew her as well as I didor do. Mrs. Stanton and I were no strangers
to her home." Dix suspected that Mrs. Stanton, like Mrs. Dix, had rarely
accompanied her husband to Rose's salon in the old days. "Get her to con-
fess, Dix, and if that fails, at least to promise not to engage in further anti-
Union activity. Get something from her, anything, that will give me an argu-
ment against McClellan. We don't want to keep her, we don't want to hang
her."
Extracting a face-saving confession from the Wild Rose would not be easy.
Dix knew the time urgency as well as Stanton; Pinkerton and Colonel
Thomas Key of McClellan's staff had come up from headquarters in the
Peninsula to urge Dix, as the man in charge of prisoner exchanges, to inter-
cede with Richmond for the life of Timothy Webster, sentenced to hang as a
spy in Richmond. That was a major request, since prisoner exchanges, except
for high officers or political figures, were frowned on by Lincoln: the North
had more men to spare than the South. But Colonel Key was persuasive in
showing how Webster's case was unique, and Dix, concerned about pressure
that would surely come to hang Rose Greenhow in retaliation for any ex-
treme punishment meted out to Pinkerton's man, sought the approval of the
President and his Cabinet.
Stanton had pushed through the plea to avert future agitation from Pinker-
ton and radicals alike to hang Rose; accordingly, Dix had sent a message to
the rebels that leniency toward Pinkerton's man would be matched in dealing
with Confederate spies caught in the North. Now, if the rebels would be
reasonable, and if the undefeated Rose would come down off her high horse,
John Dix could carry out his government's wishes and his own. Two big
"ifs."
Rose's trial, called a hearing, was held in one of the elegant old houses of
Washington, now converted to government use. The irony of the setting was
not lost on Dix: Rose and heand Buck and Breck, and the Stantons and the
Cobbshad attended many parties in this mansion, home of a former Cali-
fornia senator, where secession had been a topic of heated after-dinner debate
among friends. He'd had his share of arguments here with Rose and others,
but always as members of a civilized society distressed by the chasm opening
between them.
Now a soldier stood guard where a black butler had once greeted guests.
Other men in uniform lounged and talked idly in rooms that had once spar-
kled with laughter, good wine, and better conversation. He noticed that the
furnishings were showing signs of wear; a long velvet drape had been re-
moved to let in more light, revealing paint scars on the walls.
Dix sat at a table with Edwards Pierrepont, a civil judge and ardent aboli-
tionist present for appearance's sake, and a court reporter. He sent for Mrs.
Greenhow, who had been held in a room upstairs. When she appeared, Dix's
heart sank: she was dressed in ruffled black, still in mourning, a lace snood
holding graying hair in place, her face haggard but set in defiance. The Wild
Rose had changed almost as much as their world had. He stood and looked at
her in sadness.
"Gentlemen, resume your seats," she said. "I recognize the embarrassment
of your position. This is a mimic court, and I shall answer or not, according
to my own discretion."
Dix wanted the record to show that no special treatment had been granted
the accused, nor any acquiescence given to her rebellious statements.
"Madam, you are charged with treason."
"I deny it, sir, most emphatically." She sat straight in the wooden chair,
looking at him squarely. "You are the minister of a President who has vio-
lated the Constitution, destroyed the personal rights of every citizen, and
inaugurated and provoked revolution."
"You are charged with providing military information to the enemy in
wartime," Dix said, not to be put on the defensive. He held up a letter to a
Confederate officer that had been seized in her home, which detailed the
disposition of troops quartered around Washington. Dix knew it to be accu-
rate, down to the exact location of his headquarters on the Maryland side.
"Do you deny writing this?"
She examined the document and tossed it back on the table. "That is not
my writing. Guests come to my house; they may leave things behind. I cannot
be held responsible."
"The charge," Judge Pierrepont put in, "is not that you wrote this in your
hand, but that you caused it to be transmitted through your agency to a rebel
general."
"I am nobody's agent," she said firmly, evading the question. She looked at
the man taking notes and demanded to know why he was there. "Is this to be
given to the newspapers? Am I to be made a spectacle of?"
Dix knew she was hoping these proceedings would be made public, and a
spectacle was precisely what she wanted to be. He ached to be able to tell her
she did not understand the danger she was in, that her defiance might make
headlines but might also hang her.
"Your testimony is being taken down for the War Department," he said,
"and may be used in convicting you of treason. Do you understand that?"
Dix was no pettifogging lawyer; when arresting rebel sympathizers on Elec-
tion Day six months before, he had felt no qualms in declaring the reason for
his action "to prevent the ballot-boxes from being polluted by treasonable
votes," but today's use of the military power to coerce a prisoner, even a spy,
distressed him.
Rose seemed to sense that. "How pleasant a duty you gentlemen have to
perform."
"The evidence is incontrovertible, madam," Dix told her, "that you have
been holding communication with the enemy. It is here in front of me, stacks
of it." Pinkerton had intercepted most, though not all, of her mail.
"If it were true," she said, admitting nothing, "you could not be surprised
at it. I am a Southern woman. Everyone I have known and respected has been
driven from this city by a ruthless despotism. It would be natural for me to be
in touch with those you call the enemy."
"How is it, madam, in spite of the vigilance exercised over you, that you
have managed to communicate with the enemy?"
"That is my secret, sir. If it be any satisfaction to you to know it, I shall, in
the next forty-eight hours, make a report to my government at Richmond of
this farcical trial for treason."
Judge Pierrepont interrupted his questioning. "Thousands of young men
lost their lives as a result of the information you supplied to those in armed
rebellion. There is no more serious offense in law, Mrs. Greenhow. This trial
today is no farce."
"The South has caused no loss of life, sir. The South seceded from this
Union peaceably. All we want is our independence from the tyranny of aboli-
tionists, who have told us we cannot continue under the Constitution as it
was. We are declaring our independence just as our grandfathers did when
English tyranny became unbearable."
She leaned forward, speaking slowly as if repeating an explanation she had
given her young daughter. "We are not invading the North; the North is
invading the South. We are not pillaging your cities; you are pillaging ours.
We want to be left alone; you want to conquer and destroy. The blood of
soldiers at Bull Run is on your hands, gentlemen, not on mine."
"Do not assume a position of high morality, madam," Judge Pierrepont
shot back. "The South wants to break the compact that binds this nation for
the most reprehensible of reasonsto preserve and extend human slavery,
which is the most degrading cause any group of selfish zealots ever fought
for."
"There you are," Rose said triumphantly, "the basis of the attack on the
Southnot to 'preserve the Union,' as you keep pretending, but to abolish
our way of life. What do you know, sir, about the treatment of Africans in the
South? You believe those horror stories that Mrs. Stowe writes to sell her
books. Our colored servants are well cared forwe have good reason to care
for them, they are valuable property. What do you offer them?"
"Freedom," said the judge.
Dix wished Pierrepont had not allowed himself to be drawn into this. Their
job was not to get Rose angry or get her to incriminate herself; their purpose
was to work out an arrangement that would give the government some satis-
faction with her penitence, and to grant the clemency that would send her
into exile.
"With white Southern men at the front," Rose flashed, the familiar throaty
power returning to her voice, "you offer black slaves the temptation to rise up
and attack women and children. Do you have any idea of the horror and
carnage your talk of 'freedom' is sure to bring on?"
Dix held up his hand, but he knew there was no stopping her short of
physical restraint.
"And if you should conquer us, which God forbid, what will you do with
your four million Africans? Will you take them into your Northern cities,
welcome them, let them have the jobs that white workers want and need? No
your kindly abolitionists will be the first to try to ship them off somewhere,
back to Africa, down to the hell of Santo Domingo. Or you'll try to hold
them in the South, uncared for, incapable of fending for themselves, ruining
their lives just as you want to crush out the honor of every Southerner."
"Don't talk to us about honor" Pierrepont began, but Rose stood up and
stared him down.
"That's your 'freedom,' " she flung at him. "Freedom to starve, or freedom
to be driven away from home and loved ones. Why do you suppose the vast
majority of blacks in the South support our armies, and turn a deaf ear to the
blandishments of abolitionists? Because they know they are better off with us
than with your 'freedom.' "
"How can you, a mother, tolerate a slave auction that tears families apart,
treats children like animals"
"Lies! Have you ever seen the way slave families live, and are bred, in the
South? You're the one who will break up families, driving the women into
poorhouses and brothels, the men from city to city looking for jobs you'll
never let them have. Don't talk to me about familieswith Lincoln's inva-
sion, you've broken up more homes in a few months than happened in a
hundred years of slavery!"
"I don't think we can settle that argument here, Rose," Dix said wearily.
After a long silence marked by Pierrepont's angry stare and Rose's labored
breathing, he approached the central point.
"I would like to be able to recommend clemency, if proper admission is
made and penitence is shown." He could see her hackles rising and hurried
on, setting aside the requirement for a penitence that would never come. "If
we were to offer you the opportunity to go South, would you be willing to
sign a confession and declaration that you will undertake no further disloyal
acts against this government?"
"I have never been disloyal to the Constitution of the United States," Rose
Greenhow said. "I will sign nothing that admits to having been a traitor."
"It's called a 'parole of honor,' " Dix tried, modifying and prettifying the
offer. "Confederate soldiers, to be exchanged, sign a parole of honor not to
fight again"
"I will not swear an oath knowing I will violate it. When I am free of the
cruel and inhuman imprisonment inflicted upon me, I will do all in my power
to help the Confederate states gain their lawful independence."
Dix slumped back in his chair; the stubborn woman was putting her neck
in a noose.
Judge Pierrepont turned to Dix, and signaled the stenographer to stop
taking notes. "General, you know this woman. Why don't you talk to her
privately?"
Dix took Rose to a room upstairs. "For God's sake, Rose, you're killing
yourself. And you're ruining your daughter's life. Be sensible"
She sat down and looked at him, chest beginning to heave, hot tears in her
eyes.
"You think I want to stay in that hellhole? Do you know what it's like? Do
you have any idea what I have to go through just to keep their filthy hands off
my darling girl?"
Dix gave her his handkerchief and walked around the room as she com-
posed herself. After a while, she said, "I'm not a martyr. I want to get out. I
just cannot sign anything that makes a mockery of everything I believe in. I
will not let you defeat me."
"Rose, this is me, John Dix, remember? I'm not trying to defeat you."
"I don't mean you, John, you're a good and kind man. I mean Stanton and
Pinkerton."
"Stanton is trying to help you."
"Watch out for him, John, he's not like you, he's an evil man. I know him,
better than you do, better than most people. There is something wrong in his
headno, not like Henry Wilson, but wrong in another wayhe has always
frightened me. A man like him should never be in power."
"For whatever reason, I assure you he's trying to get you out. Others want
to hang you, Rose. I mean that. Hang you."
Her figure sagged in her chair. He was sorry he had to put the fear of
execution in her, but it was better that she know the danger she faced.
"I don't want to die," she said. "And I can't take much more of that jail,
John. The prisoner who protected me at nights was killed by a sentry last
week. For no reasonhe was standing by the window, singing, and they shot
him dead. Then they took the lock off my door."
"Sign a parole, Rose."
"No!" She flared and then relented. "How can I get out without signing
anything?"
He picked that up. "Will you go South immediately? Will you"he
reached for a way to put it delicately"continue to be discreet about those
who tried to help you?"
She nodded. "Just don't make me sign anything or promise anything."
"You're not making it easy, Rose." He sought some opening. "If not a
confession, some expression of regret at the loss of life"
She seemed not to hear him. "Remember this house, John? The parties, the
people. Only a year or so ago."
"That whole world is gone."
"Christmas last year, before the war, I walked around this very room,
candle in hand, caroling. I walk around the prison room now, with a candle,
burning the bugs off the walls." She stood up. "General Dix, I must return to
my daughter. I will admit to no treason but I am willing to leave my home,
this center of tyranny, at the earliest moment. If they cannot get me out right
away, tell Stanton and Wilson and my pretty niece Addie Douglas to come
and visit me in the prison. It intimidates the superintendent."
"You're not helping me to help you, Mrs. Greenhow." Dix had to add, "I
cannot find it in myself to threaten you, but believe me, you're in danger. I
don't want to see a woman like you on the gallows."
"Used to be quite a belle," she smiled, touching his cheek and leading the
way downstairs.
At the foot of the stairs, before reentering the drawing room being used as
a courtroom, she shook his hand formally and used that moment to say: "I
will never swear to stop fighting for the Confederacy. If you can send me
South without your damned parole, I will go. Whatever you do, I suggest you
move quickly."
Dix started to say he could imagine how terrible prison life was for a
woman and daughter, but Rose waved that aside. "A new prisoner came in
this morning," she whispered, "captured in a skirmish on the Peninsula. He
was in Richmond a few days ago. Pinkerton's man Webster, who was trying
to find out the Confederate troop strength, was hanged as a spy."

CHAPTER 10

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
JUNE 19, 1862
An auspicious if unnoticed day: the Prsdt signed the bill abolishing slavery in
the U.S. territories. I took the document in to him when the messenger from
the Congress arrived, and the Tycoon looked at it and shook his head and
said nothing.
He must have thought back to all the debates with Stephen Douglas over
"popular sovereignty," or the so-called right of new states to adopt slavery,
versus "no extension," the position that lost Lincoln the '58 senatorial elec-
tion in Illinois. Everyone agrees now that it won him a national position in
the Republican party, but we did not do any celebrating at the time.
He used a good figure of speech in those days, equating slavery with a
snake. If a snake were in the bed with children, he could not strike at it; but it
made no sense to put a snake in a bed with children. That is, he could not
abolish slavery in the South, where it already existed, but we should prevent
its spread to new states in the West.
So today he signed it quietly, and now the argument is over: "pop sov" is
deadno snakes in the territories. Thanks to the war, the argument has now
become whether to strike the snake in the bed with the children of the South.
Senator Sumner came in, not to say thanks for taking this step, but to make
a case for reconsecrating the Fourth of July with a presidential declaration of
general emancipation.
"Too big a lick now," said the Tycoon.
"It is a time for big licks," Sumner insisted. "People in the North are losing
heart about an endless war for no higher moral aim than to stick together. Do
it, Lincoln!"
Lincoln told him: "I would do it if I were not afraid that half the officers
would fling down their arms."
Exit Sumner with his usual dramatic tossing of the locks. He doesn't real-
ize that we have just had a communication from one of McClellan's politi-
cian-officers, a Colonel Key, in which he proudly recounts his unauthorized
attempt to make peace on the basis of the Democrats' "Union as it was."
This fellow Key, who they say is McClellan's "evil genius," has the audac-
ity, or gallagain, the insolence of epauletsto write of the sources of power
in this republic as "the President, the Army, and the people." That's
McNapoleon and his coterie for you. The Prsdt told Stanton to answer coldly
that such peace discussions were not the business of the army.
A sinking sensation is being felt all around. The euphoria of this spring,
with Grant on the march in the West and McClellan finally on the way to
Richmond, has given way to a vast disillusionment. Shiloh was a bloody
standoff, followed by Halleck's mile-a-day creep into Corinth and the escape
of Beauregard's army. Now Little Mac is encamped in front of Richmond,
demanding reinforcements before he will budge, trying to make peace instead
of war. Meanwhile, a rebel army under Stonewall Jackson has been scaring
Washington half to death, and the Tycoon cannot release McDowell's army
to play McClellan's game,
So the feeling has set in that the war may not be over this summer after all.
Pessimism pervades. The only action taken so far against General Lee has
been to seize his house across the river here in Arlington, which he inherited
from General Washington's son. We have turned it into a Union hospital.
Stanton came in around noontime, with Senators Wade and Chandler in
tow, to belabor the Tycoon about the man who is failing to take the rebel
capital.
"McClellan, the damn traitor," said Ben Wade, "refuses to assault Rich-
mond. Instead, he's trying to strip Washington of defenses so Jackson can
grab and sack this city."
"Damn right," said Chandler. "And the chairman of the Democratic com-
mittee up in New York has been sending McClellan telegrams."
"McClellan is being urged to disregard interference by the Administration
in army matters," said Stanton, who gets to read private telegrams, "and to
act on his own judgment. Said he would be sustained by the people of the
North, tired of having military affairs directed by civilians in Washington."
"A man isn't responsible for messages that are sent to him," Lincoln said
mildly, having received quite a few about Wade himself.
"We need a general who will fight rebels," said Wade, "and who will fight
slavery."
"Who do you have in mind?"
Instead of saying "anybody," to which Lincoln always replies, "I must
have somebody," Wade said, "John Pope. Hero of the capture of Island Num-
ber Ten." That victory was mainly the navy's. "With Halleck at Corinth in
the West. A proven fighter, and a hater of slavery."
"I like his dispatches," said Chandler. "Datelines say, 'Headquarters in the
saddle.' Man on the move, action, all that."
The Prsdt chewed that over. "If Pope's headquarters arein the saddle,"
said Lincoln, "then he's got his hindquarters where his headquarters ought to
be."
Nobody laughed but me; the joke wasn't original, but I thought it was
pretty funny.
"There has to be an end to this kid-glove warfare," said Wade. "We're
going to give you a new Confiscation Act that will strike some fear in traitor
hearts. And a Militia Act to enroll negroes for any war service in which they
may be competent, and that means as soldiers."
The Tycoon countered with his litany: abolition had to be gradual, even if
it took until 1900, though better much sooner; accompanied by due compen-
sation; and finally, joined to a scheme of colonization.
"That's what you say," replied Wade, "and that's what your man Brown-
ing keeps haranguing us with in the Senate. But the notion that you and you
alone will decide the issue is illegitimate and unconstitutional. The Congress
will decide how and when the slaves will be freed."
When the senators marched out, Zack Chandler weaving a little, Stanton
suggested that arming negroes might not be a bad idea. "General Hunter was
doing itwithout my knowledge, of course."
Somehow that little disclaimer made me suspect that Stanton knew before-
hand of Hunter's intent to free the Africans in his area. Does the Tycoon
suspect this also? He seems like such a trusting soul, but that is what he wants
to seem like.
"How is your sick baby?" Lincoln asked Stanton.
"Not getting better."
The Tycoon never ceases to amaze me. Here is the Secretary of War as
much as advertising that he was lying about not knowing about Hunter's
embarrassing proclamation freeing the slaves; and there is Lincoln, who had
to write an order countermanding that military proclamation so as to keep
the issue tightly in his own hands, inquiring about a matter weighing on
Stanton's mind, the illness of his baby.
Which reminds me: Tad is not sleeping on the couch in the office during
the evenings anymore, to be carried off to bed when the Tycoon finishes,
because the family is now spending the summer in the Soldiers' Home. Cooler
there than here in the District, where the miasma from Foggy Bottom reaches
into everybody's brain during the summer.
That move to Silver Spring led to another problem: everyone grumpily
accepted the Hellcat's prohibition against the Marine Band performing at the
White House during her mourning for Willie, but now that she is away, she
still insists the band not play. The locals objected, as well they might, and I
suggested a compromise: having the band give evening concerts in Lafayette
Park across the avenue. The first Lady grumbled, but her husband did not
want to have her even less popular than she is with the people. So the band
will play.
After Stanton left, Bates came bumbling along with what he described to
me as a draft of a pamphlet by Miss Carroll denouncing the Confiscation bill
that Wade, Chandler & Co. seemed determined to place on our desks.
I was glad to hear that: she was in here last week, saw the Tycoon, and
went past me in departing like the proverbial bat out of hell. He was more
than a little upset himself; probably spoke to her the way he did to Jessie
FrCmont, another woman not easily beaten down. One thing about the Ty-
coon, he is not courtly when it domes to women; to put a good face on it, as
one day I will be called on to do, he treats them like the equals of men.
At any rate, Miss Carroll's draft means that Bates will not have to cook up
a veto message by himself, which the Prsdt was worried about. He needs a
persuasive argument, not a dusty legal tome. I mean, if the army's officer
corps is going to make the decisions about enlisting slaves (McClellan against,
Hunter for), and our most illustrious warrior turns out to be a political peace-
maker, and the Congress is going to arrogate emancipation policy to itself,
then what's a President for?
The Attorney General came out with a note from Lincoln addressed to
Miss Carroll; Bates wrote a covering note and asked me to dispatch the letter
immediately.
I read it. "Dear Miss Carroll," the Prsdt wrote, "Like everything else that
comes from you, I have read the address to Maryland with a great deal of
pleasure and interest. It is just what is needed now, and you were the one to
do it."
That should cool her ire. She can wave the Prsdt's praise around and pick
up some railroad pamphleteering business, I hope. The nation needs her, and
more to the point, on a matter that I am too pressed to go into now, I need
her, too.
CHAPTER II
COUNTERATTACK

Breckinridge hefted his traveling bag and stepped off the train at Richmond, a
city without a unified train depot. Instead of a union station, five individual
lines each had a small siding to discharge riders. Breck had heard one passen-
ger say ruefully that the only agreement between the lines was that one train
left before the competition's arrived, which made connections impossible.
He looked in vain for a carriage to take him to the Fenlon Hotel near the
Executive Mansion. It was shift-for-yourself in the besieged capital. General
Breckinridge supposed that every military wagon had been pressed into ser-
vice supplying the city's defenders four miles east, and he set out on foot. The
city was familiar to him, but war had changed Richmond drastically: pedes-
trians were hurrying, dust permeated clothes and lungs, and the charming
prewar town had acquired an ugly look of transience as war more than dou-
bled its population.
Jefferson Davis had sent for him but had not given any reason. Breck knew
the President of the Confederate States from their years of service together in
the U.S. Senate, and thought more highly of his character than of his political
skill. Not only did Davis lack the common touch, but he could not spellbind a
crowd from a stump; in private, his cadaverous face made him seem more
severe than he was. But the Kentuckian considered Davis a loyal ally who
would not desert friends when political fortunes changed or when the press
turned vicious. Breckinridge remembered the Davis reaction to complaints
that the retreating Sidney Johnston was no general: "If Sidney Johnston is
not a general, then we have no generals."
Shifting his bag to his other arm, stepping around a dead horse in the street
both capitals had those rotting landmarks in common, he notedBreck
recalled Davis's kindnesses to Anna Carroll when that woman was starting to
develop her connections in the railroad industry. Breckinridge hoped she was
gaining the recognition she sought; he knew the Tennessee River plan had
been all too successful.
In the ten weeks since Shiloh, Breckinridge had developed a curious leth-
argy, rooted in his unhappy conviction that the South was going to lose the
war. The loss of his own life in it did not seem so earthshaking to him;
because of this, and because he became angrily resentful of the death of men
who served under his command, the Kentuckian took more chances under
fire than a wise general should. That had gained him a reputation for personal
bravery at Shiloh and on the slow retreat to Corinth, and had earned him the
promotion that he supposed brought him to Richmond.
He was careful not to let his numbness toward personal survival infect his
son; Breck was ready at any time to make a deal with the God of war to meet
a Minie ball anywhere if he could be assured that Cabell would live through
the war. After the boy's escape from Donelson, Breck assigned him to be his
aide-de-camp, determined to let him see the action that would satisfy him
without gettting himself killed.
Now the Orphan Brigade of Kentuckians, the only brigade of volunteers
from a state that had not seceded from the Union, was to join in the fight to
deny the use of the Mississippi River to the Federal forces. Memphis had
fallen; Island No. 10 had fallen; New Orleans had surrendered without a
fight. Only the guns of Vicksburg remained as an obstacle to the Federal
seizure of the great western waterway. He belonged with them in Vicksburg
now, but President Davis wanted him in Richmond for a few days, ostensibly
to personally award him the stars of a major general. No other politician had
received such a promotion.
A sergeant driving what had once been an elegant carriage but was now a
makeshift ambulance spotted the brigadier's star on his uniform, saluted, and
invited him up. "Where from, sir?"
"Out West." He shielded his eyes from the dust. When the sergeant said
Richmond was his home, Breckinridge put an odd question to him: "Why do
you suppose we make our capital so close to the front? Wouldn't the Confed-
eracy have been better off in Montgomery, or Atlanta?"
The sergeant chewed that over, as if being tested on a matter of strategy.
He answered, "Works both ways. Concentrating our forces here keeps the
Yankees worried about Washington. Besides, if we lost the Iron Works yon-
der, and the iron mills all around here, ifd all be over quick. Lose Richmond,
lose the war."
Breckinridge shook his head. "That's not what I hear. I hear that Robert
Lee said he would be willing to swap queens."
"You mean, run up and grab Washington while McClellan takes Rich-
mond?" The sergeant laughed. "That's what we say to scare Lincoln. Works,
toohe's split the Yankee army, and that's why McClellan has to creep up on
us, slow-like."
"What do you hear from the front?"
"McClellan's been sittin' tight for three weeks, sir, ever since we hit him on
the Chicahominy. Slick bastard, he maneuvered himself out of that when I
thought we had 'em."
His sentence was punctuated by the sound of cannon fire. "Hear that?
That's them on the move again, but tomorrow we're fixin' to go after 'em.
You know General Lee? Took over for Joe Johnston when he got wounded?"
"I haven't met him yet." All Breck knew about Robert Lee was from a
mutual friend who said Lee had voted for him in 1860. That was a start. But
so had "Beast" Ben Butler, the Yankee general now occupying New Orleans;
politicians from Kentucky often attracted a wide range of support.
"Now we can gamble on holding Richmond with a small force, y'see, like
Magruder did at Yorktown, while the rest of the army moves out and takes
McClellan by surprise. We'll do it, now that Stonewall Jackson's back. Here's
your hotel, general."
Some surprise, if every sergeant knew about it; Breck hoped he would find
out from President Davis if Lee intended to put up a fight inside the city or
evacuate before McClellan's artillery came within range. It would be a des-
perate gamble, almost suicidal, for Lee to attack well-entrenched superior
forces covered by artillery and commanded by an experienced officer like
McClellan.
Breckinridge thanked the driver and checked into the hotel. He spent a
long time in the deep bathtub, soaking his bones in the cool water after
months in the field and a morning in the Richmond heat. He brushed his gray
uniform, glad he'd left his Kentucky blue jeans uniform behind; blue showed
the dust, and he did look more like a Confederate general in gray and gold.
Ready to do political or military business, he walked down the street to the
Mansion.
"It's as if the Government of the United States anticipates the failure of
McClellan's expedition," JeffDavis told him right out. The Confederate Pres-
ident, who had lost weight since Breckinridge had seen him the preceding
October, struck Breck as strangely optimistic for a man whose capital was
under siege. "Lincoln has just created a new army under John Pope.
McDowell's Corps, Banks' and Fremont's men, are now under Popeand all
denied to McClellan! You know, we owe a great deal to Thomas Jackson."
Breckinridge knew that the erratic Jackson"Stonewall" of Bull Run
famehad been giving the Yankees fits in the Shenandoah Valley. "His diver-
sion is working? But I heard Jackson was back here in Richmond"
"Just arrived, but the Federals don't know that yet. Lincoln is evidently
panic-stricken," Davis said. "If McDowell's forty-five thousand Federals
were added to McClellan's army, we would be hopelessly outnumbered here,
while still unable to mount a serious attack on Washington. On the likelihood
of the two Union armies joining here, I prepared to evacuate the capital. The
gold and the archives have been loaded on railroad cars."
Breck was surprised at Lincoln's military timidity. The radical press in the
North was calling McClellan overcautious, but in fact his Peninsula strategy
was daringonly Lincoln's fears, his strategic hesitancy, and his interference
with his general kept the Union forces from forcing the Confederacy out of its
capital.
"Our spies in Washington say McClellan thinks we have two hundred
thousand men here," Davis added. "In truth, we will have less than eighty-
five thousand, including Jackson's men."
"We have a new general."
"I want you to meet Robert Lee, Breck. He reminds me, in a way, of
Sidney Johnston. What a tragedy his loss has been."
Breckinridge nodded and did not ask why he had been summoned. Having
dealt with President Buchanan for four years, and to some extent with Lin-
coln only last year, he had come to know that presidents get to the point in
their own time.
"What about Beauregard?" Davis wanted to know.
"You were wise to relieve him. Bory is a sick man, and his spirit is broken
he cost us the victory at Shiloh. I'm not too sure Braxton Bragg was a wise
choicehe's a martinet, and the last thing our men need is spit and polish."
"What do they say out West about Lincoln's new favorite, John Pope?"
"I think he's a lot of talk. Grant and Sherman are butchers, but at least
they're quiet about it. Halleck showed himself to be no general at all1 had a
rear guard of five thousand men, and made Halleck fairly crawl to Corinth.
We held him to less than a mile a day."
"You distinguished yourself, Breck, and now you're both a military and
political leader. The Senate confirmed your nomination as major general in
three days, record time."
Judah Benjamin walked in without knocking; Davis and he evidently had
that sort of relationship. The soft-spoken man had been the Confederacy's
first Attorney General, then stepped in as Secretary of War when Davis's first
choice had turned out to be almost as bad as Lincoln's Cameron; Benjamin
now served as Secretary of State.
"Let me tell you how the war is going, General," Benjamin said after the
amenities. "We're broke. We cannot replace equipment. We've suffered enor-
mous losses in the West, and the enemy is at our throat here." He smiled. "I
think we're going to win."
Breckinridge began to wonder if he had been wrong to dismiss the informa-
tion from the sergeant. Was a counterattack actually in the works? An air of
expectancy and urgency was everywhere; military couriers were bustling
about and all the traffic was headed east and north. It seemed that everyone
in Richmond knew about the movement and was heartened by the prospect
of seizing the initiative.
Breckinridge knew Benjamin from the mid-fifties, when they had served in
the Congress together. He admired the ease with which the Jew, born in the
West Indies, dealt with Davis, the Baptist turned Episcopalian from Ken-
tucky. The controversial politician was no stranger to attack: years before,
while Benjamin was representing Louisiana in the U.S. Senate, Ben Wade had
characterized him as "an Israelite with Egyptian principles" because of his
defense of slavery.
"Our greatest mistake," the urbane lawyer was saying, "a really mon-
strous mistakewas to think we could force England and France into recog-
nizing the Confederacy with our cotton embargo last year." Judah Benjamin
looked at Davis, who had been blamed for the mistake. "As a result, we
reduced cotton production from five million bales to five hundred thousand.
Having a cotton bonfire was considered the patriotic thing to do."
Breck was surprised by the admission that the economic distress of the
Confederacy was a self-inflicted wound. Like most, he assumed that the Yan-
kee blockade was to blame for the shortages of money and equipment.
"What about the Yankee blockade?"
The smile that usually played around Benjamin's lips disappeared. "Purely
paper. The United States Navy had three ships to blockade a thirty-five-
hundred-mile coast. No, it wasn't the Lincoln blockade that crippled our
economyit was our own foolish embargo."
"Explain to me, then," said Breckinridge, "how we're going to win." He
was not swept up in the counterattack euphoria.
"Assume for the moment," said Benjamin, more to Davis than to him,
"that General Lee, with Lincoln's help, is able to lift the siege of Richmond.
Now make a second assumption. Let us say that General Lee is able to drive
McClellan all the way back down the Peninsula to where he originally
landed, cutting his army to pieces as he retreats. That would lead to the
Union Army's capitulation."
Breckinridge remembered how close Sidney Johnston had come to demol-
ishing the enemy army at Shiloh, nearly driving Grant's force into a river. If
the Confederate counterattack here was successfulifthen it might be pos-
sible for Lee to destroy McClellan's hundred thousand in retreat from Rich-
mond. If McClellan were forced to retreat, he would have to be a military
genius to shift his base in a flank march while under attack; it was unlikely
that he could remain anywhere near Richmond in some secure position, still
able to menace the capital and tie down Lee's army. Unable to change base
and set up a secure line of supply, went the Confederate hope, McClellan
would be forced to surrender to save his army from slaughter.
"Such an event would shatter Northern morale, which expects victory any
day," Benjamin continued. "I can read Greeley's headline now'Erring sis-
ters, depart in peace.' The pressure on Lincoln to stop the killing and settle
the war would be irresistible."
"Lincoln is a harder man than you think," said Breckinridge, recalling his
talks in the President's house in Washington.
"The only thing holding back recognition by England," said Benjamin, "is
the anti-slavery sentiment among the working people, and a smashing Con-
federate victory at Richmond now would vitiate that sentiment."
Breckinridge was amazed at the way intelligent, ordinarily realistic politi-
cians could build a towering house of cards on a single premise: that their
untried general, with an outnumbered army, could assault the enemy in his
works and not only lift the siege of Richmond, but destroy or capture the
entire Federal expedition. All their dreams were based on that hope. If that
could be done, then it would follow that the British would recognize the
government at Richmond, and trade and loans would flow and the war would
be sustained until the North gave up hope of conquest.
"It's important for my purposes for Breck to meet Lee," said Davis, rising
and picking up his hat. "Come along. I visit him at the front every day."
"This may not be the best day," Benjamin offered.
"Nonsense. He seeks my military judgment." Davis was a West Pointer,
Breck knew, and that sort always thought of themselves as soldiers first.
"Unlike his predecessor, Robert Lee shares everything with me."
That told Breck something about the command structure: Joe Johnston,
probably like George McClellan, did not like the civilian authority to know
everything; apparently Lee felt it necessary to take Jeff Davis into his confi-
dence.
Nine Mile Road, leading to General Lee's headquarters near the front, was
clogged with wagons and soldiers moving up for the offensive. The troops,
glad to be out of their bulwarks and trenches, delighted at not having to fall
back and wait for the Yankee artillery onslaught, shouted and waved at them.
Other politicians and civilians quickly joined the President's party, and by the
time they approached the headquarters after a brief ride, the group had swol-
len to thirty.
"Our main force, under Powell Hill," Davis explained, "is to strike at the
Union troops under Porter north of the Chickahominy. Jackson's troops will
move down at the same time to threaten McClellan's supply line. Lee thinks
that McClellan, to avoid being cut off so far from home, will fall back."
"What if he doesn't?" The obvious occurred to Breck. "What if his force
south of the Chickahominy just walks into Richmond? You don't have that
many defenders left."
"I know that," said Davis, elated. "It's a great chance we're taking. But if
McClellan makes that move, Lee assures me that those of us defending the
city will just have to hang on a few hours until he gets back. I'm not Lincoln,
I'll take that chance." In a few moments, he added, "McClellan's an engineer,
so is Lee. He thinks McClellan will worry about logistics first."
On that judgment Lee apparently was ready to gamble the capital. Breckin-
ridge noted that Lee's headquarters was hardly a model of military efficiency.
Eight pole tents, pitched with their backs to a stake fence, were situated on
rocky ground. Three wagons were drawn up in front of the tents, and unteth-
ered horses wandered about the field. Breckinridge looked for sentries or at
least aides-de-camp; none were visible. A large farmhouse stood nearby, the
obvious choice for a general's residence, but Lee, evidently determined to set
an example of respecting civilian property, lived in a tent.
As a politician, Breckinridge was curious about the touted and deprecated
son of "Light-Horse Harry" Lee, the Revolutionary hero who died a debt-
ridden exile. The South's new commander was a soldier who had distin-
guished himself as a captain in the Mexican War under Winfield Scott, but
that was a lifetime ago; what had he done since to justify his growing reputa-
tion? Yet Scott had offered him command of the Union Army; Jeff Davis,
after watching Lee flail about with no special distinction in the opening
months of the war in western Virginia, brought him in to be his personal
military adviser and nowwith Sidney Johnston dead, Joe Johnston injured,
and Beauregard sick and discreditedto be defender of Richmond.
Why such trust in the man? To some, the aura of trust was created by Lee's
marriage to the granddaughter of George Washington's adopted son. They
lived in a good Washington family home in Arlington; to them, Lee had
become the living spirit of Washington. Breckinridge, who had profited from
his own distinguished lineage, granted that Lee had a fine background for a
military leader of a new American revolution, but his record in battle so far
was nothing to justify all the faith placed in him now.
The general, a severe look in his eyes, rode toward them, drew up, and
saluted frigidly. He pointed to the entourage with Davis.
"Mr. President," Lee asked, "who is all this army and what is it doing
here?"
Davis looked around at his crowd of followers. "It is not my army, Gen-
eral."
"It is certainly not my army, Mr. President, and this is no place for it."
Davis appeared stunned. "Well, General, if I withdraw, perhaps they will
follow me."
The President turned his mount. Breckinridge, like the others, turned to
follow him, but Lee caught the eye of the man with two shiny new stars on
both shoulders and beckoned him to come with him. Breck assumed that
getting to know Lee was what the President wanted him to do, and trailed
Lee's white horse to the headquarters tent.
Lee's tent looked like the othersthere was safety in anonymity, Breckin-
ridge supposed. The commander offered Breckinridge a firm, gentle hand,
and covered it over with his other hand as he looked into his caller's eyes.
Breckinridge, three inches taller than Lee, looked downward at a man older
than he expected. His graying hair and stiff white beard and, more than that,
his gravity and bearing gave the impression of a man who had long passed his
mid-fifties.
"You were with Sidney Johnston at Pittsburg Landing," said Robert Lee.
"A good man and a great soldier. He must have been an inspiration to you, as
he was to me."
Lee struck Breckinridge as wholly different from Johnstonserene instead
of vital, dignified rather than dashing. "Had he lived," the Kentuckian
agreed, "we would not have lost to Grant at Shiloh."
"What sort of general is Grant?" Lee asked. "Our paths never crossed in
the army."
"Sloppy. No interest in maneuver. Willing to take impossible losses. A
butcher. That was the word Sidney Johnston used about himbutcher,"
"The opposite of McClellan," Lee observed. He looked toward the front.
"A careful general, inexorable in his advance. To his credit, he cares about his
troops. They all have shoes." He sighed and said, "I mean no disrespect to
our War Department, but it is disconcerting, after a fight, to watch our men
remove the shoes of the dead."
Breck said he had been shown Lee's General War Order No. 75, and asked
about the plan of attack.
"My object is to draw McClellan out of his works to defend his line of
communications. Ultimately, the object is to disrupt his prearrangements and
thereby change the character of the war."
"But if Porter's division holds, and McClellan then moves on Richmond?"
Breckinridge had become expert in the movement of reserve corps.
Lee shook his head. "I'm depending on him to follow the pattern he has
set. McClellan is overcautious and Lincoln is overanxious, and between them
we should be able to save this city. That, and the spirit of our men, and the
help of Providence."
"We have had some trouble with discipline in the West," said Breckinridge.
How did Lee handle the deserter problem? Bragg was shooting too many of
his men.
"Our men have a certain natural aggressiveness that is a military asset,"
Lee said. "Discipline is not the problem. When men are defending their
homes, the job of a leader is to give them a sense of direction and unity. These
are Virginians, fighting for their native land. They do not need drill. They
need a sense of unconquerability."
That stopped and impressed Breckinridge; he had not heard this approach
from the generals he worked with.
"They say you put a great deal of faith in your commanders," Breckinridge
offered, thinking of how Halleck had hamstrung Grant and Sherman.
"My interference in battle would do more harm than good," Lee replied. "I
have to rely on my brigade and division commanders. I think and work with
all my power to bring the troops to the right place at the right time; then I
have done my duty. As soon as I order them forward into battle, I leave my
army in the hands of God."
More, Breckinridge said to himself, in the hands of his division com-
manders. If Stonewall Jackson's "foot cavalry" did not strike at precisely the
right moment tomorrow at the Union supply lines, the battle could turn into
a disaster. Lee's hands-off philosophy of battle sounded good, but Breck re-
membered how Sidney Johnston had saved the Tennessee Brigade by person-
ally leading a charge. Then he thought of how the battle was lost by the
absence of a general who had exposed himself unnecessarily.
Breck sought to ascertain Lee's political views. "It looks as if Lincoln is
moving toward abolition," Breckinridge said. "You heard about the Confisca-
tion Act? What effect"
"If the slaves of the South were mine," said Lee fervently, "I would surren-
der them all without a struggle, to end this war." He caught himself. "But
that is a political matter. I must not wander into politics, a subject I carefully
avoid. And you, Breckinridgewhat brings you East?"
"I wish I knew. President Davis sent for me without a word of explana-
tion." He shrugged. "I should get back with my Orphan Brigade, where I
belong. Frankly, General, I wish I could be as optimistic as Secretary Benja-
min, or even as"he searched for the word"serene as you. But since Shi-
loh, something has gone out of me. I thank God I found my son. I fear there
is not much more good that will come out of this war."
"Nearly a hundred years ago," said Lee, standing erect and looking over
the wagons toward stacked arms, "there was a day of remarkable gloom and
darkness, a day still known in Connecticut as 'the Dark Day'a day when
the light of the sun was slowly extinguished as if by an eclipse."
Breckinridge had to lean forward to hear.
"The legislature of Connecticut was in session," Lee continued, "and as its
members saw the unexpected and unaccountable darkness coming on, they
shared in the general awe and terror. It was supposed by many that the Day
of Judgment had come. Someone moved an adjournment."
Lee signaled to an aide for his horse, Traveller, and went on with his story.
"There arose an old Puritan legislator, Davenport of Stamford, who said that
if the Last Day had come, he desired to be found at his place doing his duty,
and therefore moved that candles be brought in, so that the House could
proceed with its work.
"There was quietness in that man's mind," Lee concluded. "The quietness
of heavenly wisdom and inflexible willingness to do present duty. You will do
your duty, General Breckinridge; you cannot do more. You should never wish
to do less."
The horse was brought around, not shying at the sudden sound of artillery
in the distance, and Lee swung easily into the saddle. A rider came in to say
that A. P. Hill had engaged the enemy at Mechanicsville, but Jackson's
troops were not yet in place.
"Are we going to win?" Breckinridge asked.
"I'm not concerned with results," said Lee surprisingly. "God's will ought
to be our aim. I'm contented that His designs should be accomplished and not
mine. I hope we meet again, Breckinridge. I'd like to have the chance to vote
for you again."
The Kentuckian did not move for a moment or two after the Virginian left.
The man's words seemed unduly reverent in a military camp, but Lee's voice
resonated with sincerity, and brought to the chaos of war a certain quietude
and certainty. This general would not agonize over decisions. Breckinridge
found himself concluding that there was indeed something of General Wash-
ington about Leethe leader in battle and yet above the battle, with the
remoteness that created a sense of mystery; sure of himself and his destiny
and unshakable in his fundamentalist faith. Not fierce or fanatic, the way they
said Jackson was, but secure, perhaps too secure for a man whose decisions
determined the death of thousands. He deserved the aura that was forming
around him; despite a concern about Lee's detachment, Breck felt some of his
own listlessness lift.
Now all Lee had to do was win; only winners become heroes, and fathers of
countries. For the first time since his arguments with the implacable Lincoln,
Breckinridge felt the stirrings of hope. He knew a good deal about the quali-
ties of leadership, and the man he had just met was a leader.
The army of the new nationand Benjamin had pointed out that the
British leader, Gladstone, had told Parliament that the Confederacy had in-
deed "made a nation"was not led only by the dashing Johnston, the faint-
hearted Beauregard, the bullheaded Bragg, the acquiescent Buckner, the
reckless Morgan, the doubting Breckinridge. The man selected to conduct the
war had what the Quakers liked to call peace at his center.
Breck found President Davis not far from headquarters, watching the
troops come up to the line, giving them awkward words of encouragement.
He did not seem put out by the dismissal from the field by his commander,
nor had he left the field. Breckinridge remarked on the essential goodness of
character that General Lee impressed on him.
"Unusually calm and well-balanced judgment," added Davis, "and he is
instinctively averse to retiring from his enemy. He may turn out to be a great
general, though he tends to think only of this army in Virginia rather than the
total war."
"I like the way he calls it the Army of Northern Virginia," observed Breck.
He advertised his intent to carry the war to Yankee territory in the name of
his army, which seemed a paradox in a man who so exemplified humility.
Together in the carriage on the road back to the capital, passing tobacco
warehouses that had been converted to hospitals, Davis came around to the
reason for his summons. "You're doing well in the field, Breck, but your
talent is that of political leader. I'm having difficulty finding a suitable Secre-
tary of War. Judah upset everybody last year, and now George Randolph has
been trying to act without taking me into his confidence."
Here it was: Life in the capital, at the "heart of Secessia," as the Federals
called it, with a return to the political life on the grand scale. But Secretary of
War in the Davis Cabinet was a winless proposition: Jeff Davis was his own
Secretary of War, as three men in the past two years had discovered. Now the
military judgment was also in the hands of a general who, if he beat McClel-
lan, would soon be General-in-Chief. To be War Minister in Richmond would
be the same as being Vice President in Buchanan's Cabinet in Washingtona
man waiting to profit when something terrible happened. He knew that Jeff
Davis did not want, and could not abide, a Stanton, or anyone else who
would try to take charge; Lincoln was willing to put up with a great deal to
get an efficient organizer, and Jefferson Davis was not.
"I'll try to make a good suggestion, Mr. President. It's an important post.
Not for me, of course"
"Why 'of course'?"
Breckinridge could not say his reason for denial was that he wanted to get
lost in the army, or that he wanted only to protect his boy until it was over
and then to quit politics forever, or that he wanted no part of being a figure-
head in an administration that had a President acting as Secretary of War.
He said instead, "I'll do my duty, whatever it is. I'll never wish to do less.
But I think my duty is in the field." He added an afterthought: "I have a plan
to recapture Baton Rouge, which should take some of the pressure off Vicks-
burg."
Davis sighed. "I'll stick with Randolph awhile. Jefferson's grandson, you
know. Let's discuss Baton Rouge when we get back." They drove in silence
for a time. "If I need you here, Breck"
Breckinridge remembered Lee's departing words, and replied, "I'll do my
duty."
CHAPTER 12
THE NEWSPAPER WAR
Adams Hill, second in command of the New York Tribune's Washington
office, was well aware that he was no favorite of Horace Greeley. Scrawny,
nervous, nearsighted, the newsman was unable to turn out the soaring prose
or biting political commentary that Greeley expected his Washington corre-
spondents to mix into their news reports.
Instead, the studious Hill cultivated his acquaintance with men like young
Stoddard, third secretary at the Mansion; General Grant's sponsor, Wash-
burne, in the House; McClellan's advocates, Thomas Key at headquarters
and his brother John in the War Department; Count Gurowski, a Seward-
hating translator at the State Department; the innocent Homer Bates at the
telegraph office, and the conspiratorial Sumner in the Senate. These were
among his wellsprings of information, and while the reporter could not please
the boss with readable copy, he could provide the newspaper with the stuff of
newssometimes, even better, the background on which news judgments
could later be made.
Senator Sumner, only a few days before, had told Hill about his talk with
the President, urging him to make July 4, 1862, Emancipation Day, and the
Lincoln answer, "too big a lick." The reporter had passed that on by letter to
New York in strictest confidence, knowing it would be of great interest to
Greeley. He included, for verisimilitude, Sumner's characterization of Lin-
coln's idea that such a decree of freedom would be a brutum fulmen. Hill
enjoyed adding that the Latin phrase meant "futile threat." That was not
dramatic copy, worthy of initials of the reporter added to the end of the story,
but it was "inside" stuff. Hill's concession to the need for drama in newspa-
pering was in setting aside a small room in the Tribune's cramped quarters in
Washington for what he told the managing editor was "secret copying of
documents and stolen interviews."
Hill dreaded Greeley. He dealt only with Sydney Gay, who had replaced
Charles Dana as the Tribune's managing editor, and never with Greeley him-
self. Hill reported only what happened, or what he had learned was about to
happenbut never what should be happening, as the top editor wished. In
addition, he had offended Uncle Horace, who had a habit of treating the word
"news" as plural. When Greeley once telegraphed, "What are the news?" Hill
had innocently cabled back, "Not a new." Since then, Hill had been dealing
only with Gay.
With Sam Wilkeson, chief of the Tribune's Washington office, off to the
Peninsula with McClellan's troops, Hill was in charge of the office. Wilkeson
was the star reporter whose initials almost always appeared at the end of his
stories, and he liked to call the office "the Washington bureau," but Hill,
behind his back, thought of it as the office. When Wilkeson wired from the
field demanding another man on the battle scene to match the competition
Henry Raymond of the Times was down there himself with six reporters, and
Bennett's Herald team outnumbered them allAdams Hill took a chance,
hired a clerk in the Auditor's Office of the War Department who was aching
to be a war correspondent, bought him a bay horse, and sent him down to
help out.
"The last assistant you sent," Wilkeson had cabled from the front on a dull
news day in June, "came to me with his lifeless drawling whine about the
impossibility of getting accommodations and buying forage for his horse.
Enough! This work needs first-class men: men of physical courage, intelli-
gence, tact, patience, endurance, DEVOTION."
The new man was doing better: Charles Page went into action on June 27
at Mechanicsville, dodging Mini6 balls with notebook in hand, teaming up
with the artist for Harper's Weekly, Winslow Homer, to give the color that
Greeley liked while Wilkeson filed the news of McClellan's victory, or defeat,
or whatever was happeningit was hard for Hill to tell.
Hill, reading copies of the telegrams his newest reporter was sending on to
Gay in New York, liked Page's eye and ear. "There are both cheers and
yells," the young man had written, "for our men cheer and their men yell. "
That was perceptive; Hill had never seen that observation about the shouting
qualities of each side made before, and he hoped the editors in New York
would not cut it out. Another line of Page's that impressed Hill was this
macabre report: "During the stampede to the rear, for a moment the atten-
tion of hundreds was attracted to a horse galloping around carrying a man's
leg in the stirrupthe left leg, booted and spurred. It was a splendid horse,
gaily caparisoned." Hill admired that, since he could not write that kind of
copy himself, and urged Gay to run the young reporter's initials after his
dispatches.
The trouble was, that was the last dispatch anybody had received out of the
Peninsula. Hill wished Page had put a little more news in the story: which
army was stampeding to the rear, Union or rebel? That was the trouble with
new men, they tended to get wrapped up in the gory details without bothering
to mention who was winning.
The telegraph wire from Fort Monroe had been cut; for two solid days,
nobodynot even Stanton's War Departmenthad any word from the front.
The city of Washington was ready to root in its garbage cans for news. The
President was said to be having fits, and worse, Greeley kept sending mes-
sages to Hill through Gay to find out what was happening to General Mc-
Clellan. Had Richmond finally fallen? Was it time for the great celebration?
Not a new.
At last the telegraph in the Tribune's Washington office on that night of
June 29 clacked with a message from Baltimore. Hill hurried to the machine;
the message was from C. C. Fulton, editor of the Baltimore American, and an
agent for the Associated Press, who sometimes went into the field himself.
Hill read each word as an editor's advisory came over the wire:
"I am writing for the American a detailed account of events before Rich-
mond and on the Peninsula during the last four days . . ."
Fulton had the story: Hill felt his heart palpitating and closed his eyes for a
few moments, taking deep breaths, relieved that Fulton was writing for the
AP and not one of the Tribune's competitors. Greeley did not like to rely on
the service set up by all the newspapers, but he did not demand that heads
roll as he did whenever the Tribune was beaten by Raymond's Times or
Bennett's Herald.
".  .  . including facts obtained from Washington," Fulton continued, "hav-
ing been sent for by special train to communicate with the President. If you
desire it, I will send it to you. It should make four or five thousand words."
The AP agent added a sentence to make every Northern heart not only cheer,
but yell: "We have the grandest military triumph over the enemy, and Rich-
mond must fall."
That was a first-class scoop. Not only had Fulton been the first to return
from the fighting with the story, but the Presidentas much in the dark
about developments as anybodyhad apparently sent a special train for the
AP's man to report to him directly about the battle. Now the reporter had
two storiesthe victory of McClellan at Richmond, and the only firsthand
account of the reaction of President Lincoln.
Hill fidgeted, waiting for Fulton's accounts to come over the ticker. No
story emerged. Hours passed, Hill staring at the machine.
Finally, the machine chattered: "The Secretary of War decides that nothing
can be telegraphed relative to affairs on the Peninsula. Have tried our best to
get it off."
That was ominous; why should Stanton suddenly impose censorship on
this story? McClellan's Richmond campaign was to be a grand triumph,
according to Fulton; was his first flash mistaken? Had anything happened at
the front since Fulton's return to Baltimore that made his conclusion mislead-
ing?
A copy of a telegram to the President from the AP agent came in that
made Hill's jaw drop: "Sir1 find myself under arrest and on my way to Fort
McHenry. I appeal to you for a hearing and prompt release. Respectfully,
C. C. Fulton."
With that troubling development weighing on his mind, Hill hurried over
to the War Department and went straight to Stanton's telegraph office. He
spotted Homer Bates running down the hall and stopped him.
"Why was Fulton arrested? What's happening on the Peninsula?"
"Our line is still out, we don't know," said the distraught young man.
"And I'm not supposed to say anything about Fulton. You better ask Colonel
Sanford about him. The colonel is the one who saw the President."
Hill went looking for Sanford, superintendent of the military telegraph,
and found him surrounded by the competition. The colonel posted a telegram
he had sent to Fulton that Hill copied: "Your arrest was not made for pub-
lishing the statement, but upon your statement that you were preparing a
detailed account of facts obtained from Washington. This is regarded by the
President and the War Department as a flagrant violation of confidence. Pub-
lication of such facts is a high military crime."
"Is this order from Stanton," Hill asked, "or from Lincoln?"
"I am authorized to send it," the colonel replied carefully.
"On whose authority?"
"The highest."
Hill took that to mean that Lincoln himself wanted the editor jailed. The
Tribune man hustled across the street and found Stoddard, the third secre-
tary, working in the President's outer office with Nicolay and Hay. Hill mo-
tioned urgently for him to come outside into the hallway.
"Why did Lincoln arrest the man with the news? For God's sake, Fulton is
the only Union-screaming editor in Baltimore."
"The President hit the ceiling when Stanton showed him that message,"
Stoddard said, looking over his shoulder. "Lincoln didn't talk to Fulton to
give him an interview, he talked to him to find out what was going on. So
when Fulton sent that telegram about facts obtained from Washington, he
told Stanton to clap him in jail."
"Was Fulton's story about what he saw on the Peninsula wrong?" That was
what counted, not the arrest of a newspaperman. "Does Lincoln have con-
trary news?"
Stoddard, nervous, grew circumspect. "Stanton thinks Fulton got his news
from McClellan, and left before the battle was over."
"Well, are we advancing on Richmond, or what?"
"We started to, and took some strongpoint at a place called Oak Grove, but
then there was something about a counterattack. McClellan thinks Jackson's
army has come down from the valley and threatens his rear." Once Stoddard
started talking, as Hill knew, he could not stop. "Before the line went out,
McClellan had been demanding reinforcements to get him out of a dangerous
position."
"So will he get them? McDowell is just standing around"
"No, the President can't send themI'm getting up an order right now,
calling for three hundred thousand more three-year men. We just don't have
the troops. Can't tell you any more. Stay out of jail yourself."
Hill knew he had one big story, about the call-up of more men, which
would come as a blow to Northern hopes after Stanton had stopped recruit-
ment earlier. But the demand from New York, the starvation for news every-
where, was for word about what had happened to McClellan's big push on
Richmond.
Hill had a hunch that Stanton had more than a hunch that the general was
retreating. He ducked back over to the War Department and found telegra-
pher Bates having a cup of coffee downstairs.
"Your Colonel Sanford is an idiot," he told the earnest young man, "arrest-
ing the only loyal editor in Maryland. That is a blunder he will pay for the
rest of his life. Going to cause a hell of a stink in Baltimore. I'll bet Sanford
did it on his own."
Bates did not rise to the bait. Sipping his coffee, he said only, "The colonel
is a good man. Saved McClellan from being tried for treason."
"Go on. How so?"
Bates took out a telegram. "You won't print this?"
"Promise."
"Here's the telegram we got from McClellan a half hour ago, just as the
wire came back on from Fort Monroe," said Bates, who would not let Hill
read it for himself. "Says, 1 have seen too many dead and wounded comrades
to feel otherwise than that the government has not sustained this army. If you
do not do so now, the game is lost.' "
"He's in retreat," Hill said.
"Sure, but listen to this," said the telegrapher, "coming from a general to
his commander in chief: If I save this army now, I tell you plainly that I owe
no thanks to you or any person in Washington. You have done your best to
sacrifice this army.' "
"McClellan sent that to the President?" Such insubordination was hard to
imagine, unless it came from a man overwhelmed by bitter disappointment.
"What did the President reply?"
"The President doesn't know about the last two lines," Bates confided.
"Colonel Sanford said it was infamous and treasonable, and was meant to
reach the public as a means of shifting the blame for defeat. So the colonel
just cut those two lines out. We never gave it to the cipher operator, and
nobody knows, and you better not say or you'll be in the jugheap too."
Hill did not let the story of the insubordinate lines sidetrack him, since
everybody knew what McClellan thought of Lincoln; the big news was what
was happening in the Peninsula battle. "What did the President reply?"
Bates felt in his pocket and took out the cipher. " 'Save your army, at all
events. Will send reinforcements as fast as we can. We protected Washington
and the enemy concentrated on you. Had we stripped Washington, he would
have been upon us.' That's all Lincoln sent1 wonder what he would have
said if he'd known what McClellan accused him of."
"Yes, that's pretty mild," Hill said, to reassure the telegrapher. "No news.
Maybe you can give me a story someday."
"Sorry," the young man said. "I have to keep these confidences, or I'll get
in trouble." He went for more coffee.
Hill had the guidance he could give to New York, although he could not
put it in a news story: McClellan in defeat, Lincoln promising reinforcements
to help save the army from annihilation. He decided to ignore the part about
McClellan's insubordination, because he did not want to wind up as Fulton's
cellmate, or dry up a source in Bates.
The Tribune man checked upstairs at the telegraph office, and was shown
the official statement from Stanton: "Nothing has been received to warrant
the belief of any serious disaster." That confirmed it: the use of the adjective
"serious" meant that there had been a little, non-serious disaster, which
would likely turn out to be pretty damned serious.
He hurried back to the Tribune office to get off what he could that would
get past Stanton's telegraph censorship, and to await a copy of the report
from Wilkeson in the field to New Yorkor from young Page, if he had not
panicked and run. Hill scribbled a private note to Gay and sent it up to New
York by overnight train, informing him that no matter what anybody else was
saying, or any newspaper was headlining, this was "the bluest day since Bull
Run."
In the Tribune building on the corner of Nassau and Spruce streets in New
York, Sydney Gay did not know which way to go with the Peninsula story.
For two days, fragmentary reports from the front had been contradictory;
nobody knew what was really going on. Apparently this was not one grand
battle, but a series of daily battles that might last a week.
He would not ask Greeley for his judgment; when Charles Dana left to
become Stanton's spy in the West, Gay had made it clear that the news
operation on the Tribune was to be his own. Greeley, as editor-in-chief, had
the right to criticize, but the "managing" editorDana's original titlewas
in charge of the news operation of the paper. That left Greeley time to write
editorials, to travel and lecture and politick.
At the moment the old man was closeted with James Gilmore, a shadowy
character with a close connection to Lincolnprobably through Robert
Walker, the railroad man. Gay suspected that Gilmore was the go-between
for both Greeley and Lincoln, with the President trying to influence public
sentiment and the editor trying to influence public policy. Better Gilmore, a
writer, than Thurlow Weed, Gay thought. Getting in bed with the likes of
Weed led to no good; Greeley had once prevailed on Weed to pass a law
requiring the placement of state banking department statements in one paper,
which became a nice source of advertising income until the political world
turned, Weed and Greeley fell out, and a new banking commissioner steered
the money to Greeley's former assistant, Henry Raymond at the Times.
Gay looked out the window, to draw his daily inspiration from the statue
of Ben Franklin. A crowd was gathering on the Nassau Street side of the
building, reading the latest newsless bulletins in the Tribune window, waiting
for the casualty lists. It was nearing the moment to make his decision on the
front-page headline and to put the paper to bed.
The early edition of the Times was already out, spread on Gay's desk.
Henry Raymond had whipped his correspondent Bill Church, still lame from
a leg wound a month before, into a report on a series of battles near Rich-
mond that covered the entire front page. To judge from the account in the
Times, which Gay studied again, McClellan had backed into a great victory.
"General McClellan and his staff all agree," the Times story ran, "that the
present position of our army is far more advantageous as a base of operations
against Richmond than that hitherto occupied." That was putting a good face
on a retreat; Harrison's Landing, where McClellan's army now rested, was on
the bank of the James River, about ten miles farther from Richmond than at
the start of the fighting. "In spite of all that the army peddlers and other
skedaddling croakers have to say, the terrific battle which has been raging for
the past week has exhibited the most masterly strategy on the part of McClel-
lan and bravery in himself, his officers and men."
Maybe so. Gay took a hard look at the competition's headline: "Immense
Losses on Both Sides/Gen. McClellan Safe and Confident in his New Posi-
tion." He assumed that the Herald, which was anti-Lincoln and had been
hinting at a McClellan run for the presidency, would be similarly positive.
Raymond was being patriotic and letting that color his dispatches, and James
Gordon Bennett's Herald would be partisan but would come out the same
way.
Against the weight of that opinion molding, Gay had to place the message
from Adams Hill about the bluest day since Bull Run and the ominous tip
about the new call-up of troops. Tomorrow was the Fourth of July; the people
of the North needed a lift. Could the Tribune carry a wet-blanket story while
the other papers were hailing McClellan's victory? The editor wondered how
much to trust the judgment of Adams Hill, who was nowhere near the scene
of the fighting.
"Do we have a good night or anything from Wilkeson?" Gay asked the
copy boy, and was told no, the correspondent had not filed, nor had the
assistant, Page. Gay could use an AP story and fill with a rewrite of the
Times, hailing a costly victory, but Adams Hill's pessimistic judgment
nagged.
The chief of his telegraph room burst in. "It's like a dam is breaking. This
fellow Page is filing three days of dispatches that were held up by McClellan
or Stanton. Going to be eight thousand words, too much to use, and he's still
writing."
"Headquarters reports, or eyewitness?"
"He was right in the thick of it, and the first page of the first reportthat
was five days agois about McClellan's retreat, the burning of stores, panic
among the Pennsylvanian regiments"
He would go directly against the play of the story in the competition.
"Bring it to me, page by page," Gay said. "We're going to run it all, seriatim.
As soon as I get his most recent dispatch, I'll write the headlines for the
whole paper."
"We have a Washington dispatch, too," said the telegrapher. "From Hill,
passing along a War Department statement that we beat the enemy badly.
That doesn't seem to fit with what Page is sending us from the field."
The managing editor paused: Maybe Page had seen a losing skirmish and
extrapolated it into a false story of the battle; the Tribune had to be careful.
"Anything else from Fort Monroe? If Page could file, so could others."
"An Associated Press story dated last night, saying we lost twenty thou-
sand men."
"And the rebel losses?"
"Don't know yet."
Gay winced; almost as bad as Shiloh, and without Shiloh's tail-end re-
demption. "We'll lead with the AP figures and the War Department claims."
That would take care of the Fourth of July spirit, and keep Stanton from
getting after Greeley. "Then run all of Page."
The makeup man shook his head. "That would take the whole front page,
and a jump. And the kid hasn't stopped writing."
"Set it all," said Gay. "Give me half the first column for headlines." He
would play the story down the middle, between the government claims and
the truth, in direct defiance of the Herald and the Times. He had a responsi-
bility not to cause panic in the North, and would balance the stark, bad news
with brave statements of the damage inflicted on the enemy.
As they brought in Page's copy and the AP reports, Sidney Gay wrote the
headlines: "From General McClellan's Army. The Enemy Still Press On. Our
Gunboats Repulse Them. The Rebels Retreat in Disorder. Remarkable En-
durance of Our Troops. Our Right Wing Swung Round Thirty Miles. 185,000
Rebels Against 95,000 Union Troops. Great Slaughter on Both Sides. The
Work of Evacuation."
He paused at one page of copy by Page from the landing on the James
River, seventeen miles below Richmond, to which McClellan had retreated.
"Huddled among the wagons were 10,000 stragglers"that would tell any
reader of the extent of the Union disaster"for the credit of the nation be it
said that four fifths of them were wounded, sick, or utterly exhausted, and
could not have stirred but for the dread of the tobacco warehouses of the
South." Those were the hellhole hospitals and prisons. Page's copy went on in
the style Greeley was looking for, and in this case, that Gay agreed was
needed: "The confusion of this herd of men and mules, wagons and wounded,
men on horse, men on foot, men by the roadside, men perched on wagons,
men searching for water, men famishing for food, men lame and bleeding,
men with ghostly eyes looking out between bloody bandages that hid the face
turn to some vivid account of the most pitiful part of Napoleon's retreat
from Russia, and fill out the picturethe grim, gaunt, bloody picture of war
in its most terrible features."
Gay swallowed, and at the bottom of the four days' dispatches added the
reporter's initials: C. A. P.
CHAPTER 13
JOHN HAY'S DIARY
JULY 4, 1862
McClellan has failed. Lee has lifted the siege of Richmond, and our army has
scurried for shelter beneath the naval guns on the James River. The Tycoon
and all here are heartsick.
The largest army ever assembled on the North American continent, over
100,000 men, better equipped than any army in the history of the world,
trained and drilled and practiced to a fare-thee-well, has been turned away
from the gates of Richmond by a ragtag army of rebels who attacked and
outfought the Union forces over seven grueling days, took our new guns and
stole the shoes off our dead.
The Young Napoleon's apologists are talking about "a change of base" and
"a strategic withdrawal," claiming the greatest shift of base in the history of
warfare. Some of the papers are loyally swallowing that, but the fact is that
McClellan retreated and Lee advanced. With all Mac's brilliant maneuvering
and everybody agrees it was brilliant, saving the army and all thatRobert
Lee drove him away from his object: the enemy capital.
Now Pinkerton and Key and that bunch are putting out the word it was all
Lincoln's fault. How those lickspittles to a popinjay can claim a victory in
retreat, and in the next breath put the blame on the Tycoon for McClellan's
own cowardly failing to storm Richmond is hard to grasp.
General Randolph Marcy, McClellan's chief of staff and father-in-law (we
don't know which title makes him more important) came in this morning
from the front to beg for more reinforcements. He does not realize that only
yesterday I took a message from Lincoln over to the telegraph office to Gov-
ernor Morgan of New York asking for more troops in a hurry: "If I had
50,000 additional troops here now," the Prsdt pleaded, "I believe I could
substantially close the war in two weeks. But time is every-thing." The defeat
on the Peninsula, coming so soon after Stanton's confident ending of all
recruitment, embarrasses us terribly.
"Unless you give us more men, and soon," Marcy told the Prsdt, who has
not been sleeping the past few nights and looks terrible, "I would not be
astonished if the army were obliged to capitulate."
"General," Lincoln said, as coldly furious as I've ever seen him, " 'capitu-
late' is not a word to be used in connection with our army."
When McNapoleon's father-in-law apologized, the Prsdt told him, "I re-
peat what I have twice before said to your commander: 'save the army, at all
events.' Is that clear?"
"Yes, sir. But you have at least fifty thousand men you do not need in this
area, and with that number the general can retrieve our fortunes. Sent at
once, they would enable us to resume the offensive."
"You surely labor under some gross mistake of fact," the Tycoon said. "I
have not seventy-five thousand men east of the mountains. The idea of send-
ing you fifty thousand is simply absurd."
Marcy could not challenge that without being insubordinate. He lowered
his head and looked miserable.
Lincoln then relented and said, "If in the general's frequent mention of
responsibility, he has the impression that I blame him for not doing more
than he can, please be relieved of such impression." That was a mild reaction
to an offensive telegraph message from the front. "I only beg than in like
manner, he will not ask impossibilities of me."
"We recognize, Mr. President, that you have ordered some reinforcements
sent to us from Bumside and Hunter," Marcy responded in kind, "and Gen-
eral McClellan will do the best he can with the force he has."
"I do not see how I can send you another man within a month," Lincoln
told Marcy, the cold edge gone from his voice now that the dread word
"capitulation"which would mean the loss of the war, and charges of trea-
sonwas no longer in the air. "Under these circumstances the defensive, for
the present, must be your only care. Save the armyfirst where you are, if
you can; and secondly by removal, if you must. But I repeatsave the army,
at all events."
McClellan's man said he thought they could stay put with safety, pending
reinforcements for a new assault on Richmond. Marcy also offered the Presi-
dent the cold comfort that in the seven days of battles, Confederate casualties
had outnumbered our own significantlytwenty thousand to fifteen thousand
was his guess. That was because Lee was doing the attacking. (Ordinarily,
such a terrifying exchange was exactly what Lincoln wanted; engagements
that bled the South would bring the war to an end, considering our over
three-to-one advantage in population. McClellan did not want to exchange
heavy casualties, but was forced to; Lincoln was ready to trade the suffering
though he would never admit it publicly, and yet is unsatisfied with the result.
I see an irony there.)
To cheer up McClellan, whose latest dispatches have been almost incoher-
ent with grief, Lincoln handed Marcy a copy of a telegraph message just
received from one of our people in Fredericksburg, where the Richmond
Examiner is still distributed. "It censures the confederate generals severely,"
the President said, "for failing to capture General McClellan and his army.
And here, he'll like this: the rebel paper pronounces McClellan's whole move-
ment a 'masterpiece of strategy'."
As Marcy took his leave to return to the front, the Prsdt added a post-
script: "If, at any time, you feel able to take the offensive, you are not re-
strained from doing so."
In the midst of this misery, we had a caller on the other great topic on
everyone's lips these days, the Confiscation bill. Miss Anna Ella Carroll ar-
rived with a great sheaf of papers under her arm, to discover Lincoln half
under the desk, rubbing some blacking on his boots. He had gone out looking
for a newspaper early that morning, and the mud of Pennsylvania Avenue has
a special way of clinging to leather.
"Why, Mr. President," she said, ostensibly shocked, "do you black your
own boots?"
"Whose boots did you think I blacked?" Lincoln shot back.
Miss Carroll was in the process of writing a pamphlet entitled "A Reply to
Sumner"she likes titles like thatdemolishing his position on the Confisca-
tion bill, with no little encouragement from us. Nico and I knew it was this
lady's research and legal arguments that were the basis of the Attorney Gen-
eral's withdrawal from the world for the past few days, to sweat over a veto
messageLincoln's first, but the decision to veto is not final.
"Thank you for your note," were her first words to the Tycoon. "I inter-
preted it as an apology."
"I shouldn't wonder," he replied. (I have often wondered about that fre-
quent locution of his: what does "I shouldn't wonder" mean? He uses it
whenever he wants to make a noise that sounds like a response but is not, and
it is for the listener to read whatever he wants into it.) He motioned her to a
chair, which is more than he ever did for Jessie Fr6mont.
"I'm here to urge you to veto the Confiscation bill. It will be passed any
day now, I'm told on good authority"
"Wade?"
"Yes."
"Then he has the tickets. This setback of our army on the Peninsula will
help him."
"If you sign that abolition bill," she declared, giving "confiscation" its real
name, "it will be as if you added fifty thousand men or more to the rebel
army."
"Tell me why," the Prsdt asked. "Sumner was just in here telling me it
would reinvigorate the North, put the war on a high moral plane"
"Rubbish. It will unite the South as it has not been united before, and will
protract the struggle indefinitely. That means the European powers will rec-
ognize the Souththey must, they need the cottonin which event, the
ocean will swarm with rebel privateers. France will help Mexico regain
Texas"
"Seward is sending money, quietly, to Benito Juarez," Lincoln said
quickly, referring to the revolutionary who was giving fits to the Emperor of
Mexico. "We want Maximilian off balance."
"Mr. President, I wonder if you realize that Senator Sumner"she pro-
nounced his name to give the impression she thought he was an oleaginous
blowhard"is telling one and all that he has been assured by you that you
will act out the will of the abolitionists."
"He's saying that, is he?"
"You have to do something to antagonize the abolitionists. A veto here
would give heart to the moderates."
She is a purposeful woman, Miss Carroll, and she has the good of the Prsdt
and the Union at heart. Lincoln is unhappy with this Confiscation bill, and
with the way the Congress is trying to snatch back the war power to free the
slaves, but he is not in a strong position these days. He may have to throw
McClellan to the Jacobin wolves, or else sign their cherished Confiscation
bill.
"I understand your reasons for signing the D.C. emancipation," she con-
ceded. "You have been in favor of that since you came to Congress as a Henry
Clay Whig. As for signing the bill for abolition in the territories, you took
that side in your debates with Douglas."
The Prsdt nodded; he is always pleased when somebody remembers his
record on slavery.
"But now you have to tack the other way," she said. "Otherwise, you will
change the whole moral tone of the waraway from preservation of the
Union, and toward the subjugation of the Southern states. I cannot believe
you intend to destroy the social system of the South, to go back on your
pledged word and the platform of the Republican Party."
"Circumstances change," he said, but not decisivelyjust keeping the door
open.
"You would make Davis and his co-traitors look like patriots struggling for
constitutional liberty against a revengeful government. If you approved Con-
fiscation, you would make yourself look like George the Third."
"Hold on, now"
"Where in the world are you going to send four million Africans?" Now
she had him on the weak point. "You know that on no other condition than
colonization can they be made free. If you free them and leave them in the
South, you will confer no benefit on them, but incalculable injury."
I asked what she meant by that. "John, you're from Illinois. You know
there aren't a quarter million blacks in the entire North, a population of
nineteen million. Not one person in a hundred in the North is black, because
the North won't have themand if abolition came, the South would never be
able to afford to hire them."
She stood up, dropping a few of her papers, which I retrieved. "The blacks
are human beings, and they may be docile now, but they won't starve in
silencethey'll riot and rebel. And Abraham Lincoln and the Confiscation
Act will be blamed rightly." She let that sink in, and it did. "But by your
veto, the Republic may yet be saved."
"You make a case, Miss Carroll." His face took on that melancholy look. I
am concerned that the losses in the Peninsula, the dashing of his hopes to end
the war quickly, have put him in danger of getting an attack of the hypo.
"I'm to see the border state Congressmen next week, to try again on gradual,
compensated emancipation, which you and I favor. Perhaps we can get our
radical friends to change the worst parts of the bill, so I won't have to use the
veto."
"That is all I ask. Either a clear veto, which the Senate will surely sustain,
or some threat from you to get the bill moderated, which would be seen as a
defeat for the radicals. Or as John Hay calls them, the Jacobins."
I thought it would be a good time to put in an argument for Miss Carroll to
shoot down. "There's some logic to confiscation," I offered. "It was General
Ben Butler's idea, and it was ingenious. He said that he was already empow-
ered to seize the enemy's ammunition, uniforms, food, every bit of military
property. Then he said that the enemy considered its slaves to be property,
too, and he happily agreedso he could seize them too. And since he wasn't
in the slaveholding business, he could set them free."
"Slaves used by rebels to build fortifications or carry weapons are legiti-
mate contraband of war," Miss Carroll said, ready for that. "But this bill goes
further. This reaches behind the lines, into civilian areas, using powers to take
away property. No Congress or no executive has ever claimed that power on
this continent."
"I liked your war powers pamphlet," Lincoln put in. "A little expensive,"
he could not resist adding.
"But there are limits to the war powers," she said with some passion. "Just
as there are limits to war. It is one thing to destroy the enemy on the battle-
field, or even to strike behind the lines at his military supplies. It is something
else entirely to treat his civilian population as if it were part of the army.
That's what this unbridled confiscation does; that's what abolition does. If all
slaves are contraband of war, how about all other property? How about food
are you prepared to burn farms, on the theory that some of the food goes to
rebel soldiers? Are you ready to call for a slave uprising, with murder and
pillage? Are you prepared to shell hospitals, set fire to entire cities, deliber-
ately kill women, children"
Lincoln was shaking his head; such totality of war was uncivilized, un-
thinkable. He would never let it come to that.
She pressed her point. "That's what this bill is a long step towarda kind
of war the world has never seennot just armies against armies, but a nation
against a nation. Are you prepared to take this Union into such an orgy of
destruction?"
With a look of pain, Lincoln rose to his feet. He managed a wan smile:
"Say, Miss Carroll, do you work over Ben Wade and Zack Chandler like this?
I hope so."
"They are both patriots, and my close friends," she replied seriously, "but
they are hopelessly wrong. Their radical policy would destroy the Union.
Your current policy will save it."
This time, on the way out, she took my arm and we walked down the stairs
together. She was thoughtful, probably going over in her head all the things
she did not say. We who have the Prsdt's ear all day long forget that others
must make each moment count.
"I hope he doesn't think I'm in favor of slavery," she said. "I'm not."
I assured her he knew about her manumission of her own slaves, and the
financial sacrifices she made to pay for that purchase of freedom for others.
"I wasn't too pushy, was I?" Fascinating, the sudden change in her; in
Lincoln's office she was totally in control of her arguments; afterward, self-
doubt takes over and she responds to all compliments and reassurances with
"I hope so." Frankly, I like her better this way. I told her I could not abide
pushy women, and she immediately smiled and said, "You're having your
troubles with Kate."
"How do you know?"
"The governor told me."
Aha. It's no longer "Secretary Chase"; it's "the governor."
"Be careful, John. She may be using you."
"I wish she'd try," I said. "One day she can't get enough of me, the next
month she won't see me, she's too busy with her drunken Governor of Rhode
Island, or Roscoe Conkling in the House. Both in their mid-thirties, old
men."
"The governor tells mein absolute confidencethat she's genuinely at-
tracted to you, John. He says her affection for you is causing her great diffi-
culty."
"You believe that?"
"I believe what he tells me." She paused. "I don't know that I believe what
she tells him. Well, go after Kate, if it's important to you. But remember, her
loyalty runs to Chase, not to Lincoln; don't get caught in a conflict of loy-
alty." When I said that could never happen, she added, still with that beguil-
ingly doubtful expression, "I suppose that goes for me, too."
I returned to the office upstairs two steps at a time. Nico was fretting,
looking for me. It seems that Lincoln does not like this business of dealing
with McClellan through intermediaries, and cannot abide this warring-by-
telegraph, which makes a record but no progress.
He has decided to sail down to Harrison's Landing, the new base on the
James River, Stanton in tow, to survey the military situation for himself. It is
intolerable that McClellan's 100,000 could have been stopped by a force of
fifty it's size. If need be, he will confront the general whose political ambition,
or lack of soldierly heart, has lengthened the war. Either he will reinforce the
man and approve a new offensive to take Richmond from there, or he will tell
him to pack up his army and its vast herd of cattle and come back to Wash-
ington, where a more sensible campaign can be once again launched, this time
without gambling the loss of Washington. Such a campaign would be com-
manded by John Pope, he of the portable headquarters, not by George Mc-
Clellan, who in avoiding decisive defeat gives up the hope of great victory.
I was going over the details of the trip with Hill Lamon, the marshal-
bodyguard, when the Tycoon came out of the inner office. Thank God, with a
physical movement in store, his haggard aspect and gloomy demeanor had
been replaced by his reminds-me-of-a-story look.
"Seems to me McClellan was wandering around and got lost," he said.
"He's been hollering for help ever since he went southwants somebody to
come to his deliverance and get him out of the place he's got into.
"He reminds me of the Illinois man who visited the state penitentiary. He
wandered everywhere on the tour and got separated from his friends and
couldn't find his way out. He came to a place where he saw a convict behind
the bars of his cell door, and he said to the convict, 'Say! How do you get out
of this place?' "

CHAPTER 14
HELL OF A FIZZLE

Edwin Stanton felt secure: Harrison's Landing, a tiny river port on the James
less than twenty miles from Richmond, was now fortified by the presence of a
hundred thousand Federal troops, under the further protection of naval bat-
teries. The USS Ariel had conveyed the presidential party down the Potomac
first to Fort Monroe and a visit with General Dix, and overnight to the estate
that had been the property of President William Henry Harrison. Now this
site of great Virginia plantations had become the impregnable fortress of the
Army of the Potomac, with abundant bathing and recreational facilities; a
good place for weary soldiers to rest after a hellish week of fighting, and as
good a place as any, in Stanton's view, for Lincoln to decide to rid himself of
the scoundrel-general who stood in the way of an aggressive prosecution of
the war against the slavocracy.
The Secretary of War made it a point to see McClellan privately before the
general and the President met alone. Stanton did not want McClellan worry-
ing Lincoln with tales of the perfidy of his War Secretary. He assumed it
would be typical of the whining McClellan to complain that Stanton had kept
vital messages from the President or had otherwise undercut or demoralized
generals in the field.
"I meant to send a personal message to you by General Marcy," Stanton
told McClellan, "but I was in the country that morning." The War Secretary
put on his most mournful expression. "I wanted to be with Mrs. Stanton to
see one of our children dying."
The general, who had been cool, was instantly sympathetic. "I trust your
baby's illness may not prove fatal."
Stanton felt a rush of emotion that added sincerity to what he was about to
say. "In this brief moment, I can only say that there is no cause in my heart
for the cloud between us."
As he said the words, Stanton almost believed them himself; that had
happened to him before juries, when he was suddenly swept away in the
emotion of pressing his client's case. "That cloud of suspicion was raised by
wicked men for their own base purposes. No man had a truer friend, General,
than I have been to you."
McClellan was taken aback. "When you were appointed, I considered you
my intimate friend and confidential adviser."
"I was and am."
"But your concurrence in withholding a large portion of my force," said
the general, still puzzled, "which spelled the difference between victory and
defeat, led me to believe your mind was warped by a bitter personal prejudice
against me."
"Wholly untrue," Stanton assured him. "I have been ready to make any
sacrifice to aid you. I have been praying to Almighty God to deliver you and
your army from all peril." His own words brought tears to his eyes.
"Well, I'm relieved. Obviously I've been mistaken about your real feelings.
As you used to say, together we can save the country."
Stanton, choked up, nodded vigorously. The general would believe any-
thing; no wonder he had been so easily fooled by Lee, unless it was McClel-
lan's own traitorous inclinations that stopped him short of Richmond.
"Last summer," McClellan said in a confidential tone, "you and I talked
over the way the war should be fought, and the ends to be achieved. I have
put those views on paper, in a confidential letter to the President. I cannot
show it to anyone, but I am sure the President will discuss it with you. My
critics might say it goes somewhat beyond my purview as a general, but we
cannot disconnect military means from political goals."
"On to victory," Stanton said, grasping the general's strong arm and
squeezing it hard. For a moment, he felt a wave of genuine affection for the
beleaguered soldier. That wave receded when Stanton considered how the
deployment of this huge army in this backwater left Washington undefended
from assault by the bulk of the Confederate Army. McClellan would be
finished soon, if Stanton had his way and Lincoln could see the light; the right
general to win the war was John Pope.
Together, they joined the President for a review of ten thousand of McClel-
lan's men: hardy, healthy, well-equipped soldiers, who Stanton thought must
be amused at the sight of Lincoln's long legs dangling from a horse in con-
trast to their general's impeccable bearing. Stanton did not like military re-
views; he thought the men should be fighting rather than parading.
Lincoln, ever the politician in Stanton's eyes, could not resist dismounting,
climbing up on a rail fence, and addressing the troops.
"Be of good cheer," he called out in his high, piercing stump-voice, "all is
well. You have, like heroes, endured, and fought, and conquered. Yes, I say
conquered; for though apparently checked once, you conquered afterward
and secured the position of your choice. You shall be strengthened and re-
warded. God bless you all!"
Stanton supposed that hogwash went down well; Lincoln needed to say
something to compete for the love this army displayed toward its conserva-
tive commander. Then the Washington group got down to what Stanton
considered the business of the visit: preparing the way for a transfer of the
army from this spot back to the fortifications around Washington.
In a meeting with McClellan and his staffincluding the "Dukes and
Princes," several foreign-born dignitaries the Young Napoleon liked to have
near himLincoln, notebook in hand, closely questioned the military men on
the army's current position. "What amount of force have you now?"
"About eighty thousand," said the general.
"What is likely to be your condition as to health in this camp?"
"Better than any since we left for the Peninsula," McClellan reported
stoutly; Stanton knew he wanted to stay in this spot to fight again.
"Where is the enemy now?"
"About five miles from here. No force in our vicinitythey suffered terri-
ble losses in their last attack."
"If you desired, could you remove the army safely?" That was the crucial
question; if Lincoln ordered McClellan to remove his army from the Penin-
sula, that would be the end of the campaign, and the general's career would
be finished. Stanton knew that Pope, a favorite of Chase and Wade, was
prepared to take over McClellan's army and add it to his own force near
Washington.
"It would be a delicate and very difficult matter," McClellan told the
President, putting on him the danger of an attack during an evacuation.
"Is the army secure in its present position?"
"Perfectly so, in my judgment," McClellan said. "Gentlemen, do you
agree?"
Most of the other generals, even two of the anti-slavery men that Stanton
had put in McClellan's camp, agreed. One of the generals, Fitz-John Porter,
whom Stanton considered a McClellan sycophant, added, "Not only are we
secure, but we are ready to move forward on Richmond."
"With adequate reinforcements," the commanding general added.
Lincoln, making notes, made no decision, and it became apparent that the
President intended to take under advisement whether to order an end to the
campaign.
"Right here, in front of Richmond," McClellan argued, "this is where we
can win the war. My army is ready to fight. We have punished the enemy in
the Seven Days and shown that Lee and Jackson can be beaten. It would be a
terrible mistake to remove the army, a tremendous blow to morale."
"Move the army and ruin the country," added Porter. Stanton made a
mental note to cashier him the moment McClellan was out of the way.
McClellan asked to see the President in private; the generals left but Stan-
ton stayed.
"Mr. President, my private letter to you is in your hand, but let me tell you
and the Secretary what is uppermost in my mind." He looked at Stanton, who
made an effort to return his glance with some sympathy.
"We are not fighting a war looking to the subjugation of any state. This
should be a war against armed forces, not civilian populations."
Lincoln listened, noncommittal.
"Neither confiscation of property, nor political executions, nor forcible
abolition of slavery should be contemplated."
Stanton was secretly delighted at the general's presumption; this was cer-
tain to offend the President. Ben Butler's iron rule in New Orleans, John
Pope's somewhat excessive order aimed at rebel guerrillas, and David Hunt-
er's emancipation were what McClellan obviously had in mind; this was one
general criticizing what other military officers were doing, but that was Lin-
coln's prerogative, not his.
"All private property taken for military use should be paid or receipted
for," McClellan went on; "pillage and waste should be treated as high crimes;
military arrests should not be tolerated except in places where actual hostili-
ties exist."
Stanton suppressed a smile; McClellan was proposing a kid-gloves war,
implicitly criticizing the "abuses" that congressional Democrats so often de-
cried. He was writing the 1864 Democratic platform, and Lincoln would see
through that in a minute.
"I mean this respectfully, sir. I believe you understand the impact the
political climate has on the raising and holding of troops."
"By my count," said Lincoln, "nearly fifty thousand of your men have
simply disappeared."
"Morale affects defections." McClellan took a deep breath. "Sir, I am con-
vinced that a declaration of radical views, especially upon slavery, would
rapidly disintegrate our present armies."
Stanton glowered, but in fact could hardly contain his glee; he was per-
suaded that the general had, in that last statement, ended his military career.
"You need a General-in-Chief who possesses your confidence," McClellan
concluded. "I do not ask for that place for myself. I am willing to serve you in
such position as you may assign me, and I will do so as faithfully as ever
subordinate served superior."
The President said only "All right," and the meeting was over.
On the boat back to Washington, Stanton played on Lincoln's considerable
pride. How dare this young upstart, who could not mount an offensive
against an inferior force, tell the civilian leadership of the nation what the
policy should be on slavery!
The political threat was real. Stanton had recently been in touch with
Samuel Barlow, the Democratic leader in New York. No longer was Stanton
being thought of as a potential Democratic candidate in 1864; he had been
informed politely that George McClellan, whose views on "the Union as it
was" were closer to the thinking of most Democrats of all factions, was the
likely candidate.
Worse, with Lincoln's compromising approach, there was always the
chance that the President might bring the popular Nathaniel Banks in to head
the War Department, or worse yet, bring McClellan into the Cabinet in
Stanton's place, as a uniformed Secretary of War. Little Mac might not be
much of a fighter, but he was indisputably the nation's best army organizer.
And Stanton was accumulating enemies, particularly in the Blair-Seward set;
he had to beat them or be beaten.
The Secretary of War leaned on the railing of the gunboat and studied the
Potomac shore. Passing Kettle Bottom Shoals he could see the canalboats
loaded with stone, waiting to be sunk to prevent the Memmacksince scut-
tledfrom coming upriver. That was an unwelcome reminder of Stanton's
overreaction to the rebel threat; why didn't some idiot send the canalboats
back where they belonged?
"They call them 'Stanton's navy,' " said the President, standing alongside.
"Very funny. I wonder if you have grasped the degree of insubordination
we have just witnessed?"
"He did get a little into our business," Lincoln allowed.
"That letter he gave you, supposedly private. I know all about it; there are
copies everywhere. It's the future Democratic platform."
Lincoln looked perturbed at that. Stanton's accusation was untrueMc-
Clellan apparently intended to keep the letter privatebut Stanton exploited
the opening. "He doesn't want to stay down there to take Richmond; he'll
never attack Richmond unless we send him the whole population of the
North. He only wants to be down there with all the troops who love him to
expose Washington to Lee's attack." The Secretary of War decided to go all
the way. "It is in McClellan's interest for us to lose the war. He's either a
coward or a traitor, and I don't think he's a coward."
"That's a lot to say." Lincoln was playing what he liked to call "shut-pan,"
and Stanton hated that. "This letter is platform-ish. You think we ought to
bring the army back?"
"Under John Pope," Stanton promised, "that army will fight. And take
Richmond without jeopardizing Washington."
Lincoln said he wanted to hear what General Burnside had to say: they
would dine with him on the steamer back to Washington that afternoon. A
long silence, then, "Reminds me of a story."
Stanton closed his eyes in pain; another one of those interminable, unfunny
anecdotes that required the listener to laugh heartily at the conclusion and
tell the world of its pertinence and profundity.
Lincoln launched into a dreary tale of an Illinois blacksmith who heated a
piece of soft iron in a forge and tried to make it into a claw hammer. But the
iron wasn't small enough, so he heated it again and tried to make an ax, but
that didn't workStanton became convinced that the story would never end
so the blacksmith took a forgeful of coal, pumped the bellows and made a
tremendous blast, bringing the iron to white heat, and then lifted it high with
a tongs and threw the glowing iron into a tub of water, exclaiming, "If I can't
make anything else out of you, I'll make a hell of a fizzle, anyway!"
Since Lincoln's point was that McClellan had made a great fizzle of the
Peninsula campaign, Stanton drew his lips back and made chuckling noises.
He was ready and willing to play the courtier, to contort his face at anything
that cast derision on the soldier he had come to despise with heart and soul.
A terrible scraping noise roared through the gunboat, soon followed by
gongs and bells) followed by a red-faced captain explaining that they had
misjudged the depth of the shoals and were aground. Told that they would be
delayed two hours until the tide lifted the ship off the river bottom, Stanton
growled, "Damned navy."
Lincoln reacted quite differently; capriciously, he said that it was a hot day
and a perfect time for a swim. He borrowed the captain's bathing suit and led
a small detachment down the boat's side into the fresh water. Stanton re-
mained at the rail, sweltering but clothed in dignity, frowning at the sight of
the incredibly lanky Chief Executive splashing and cavorting at a time of
grievous difficulty.
Then it struck the War Secretary that Lincoln was acting like a man who
had put a decision behind him and didn't want to think about it anymore.
Stanton wished he could be sure that the President's decision was to dump
McClellan and bring the army back to Washington.
George McClellan, with the presidential party gone, sat down at his desk
late that night and took pen in hand to confide his thoughts about Lincoln's
visit to Nellie.
"His Excellency was here and found the army anything but demoralized or
dispiritedin excellent spirits." Lincoln and Stanton wanted to find an army
beaten and at bay, McClellan was certain, to remove at once back to Wash-
ington to begin all over again with a more savage and abolitionist com-
mander. But this was a newly confident and battle-tested army, which took
the worst the rebels could throw at them; an army that was victorious at
Malvern Hill, the final battle of the Seven Days, and would be ready to take
Richmond soon with a modest number of reinforcements.
"I do not know to what extent he has profited by his visit," the general
wrote the woman he loved, "not much, I fear, for he really seems quite
incapable of rising to the magnitude of this crisis. I enclose a copy of a letter I
handed to him. Preserve it carefully."
He was proud of that letter, so closely reasoned beforehand with Thomas
Key, but written mostly by himself. True, it was political, but the talk of the
officers and men of his army was political, and if they believed the Union
cause had been replaced by abolition, the effect on moralethe desertions en
massewould have a most military result. McClellan was glad he had added
a point urging the manumission of slaves in the border states, after proper
compensation. The slavery interests would not like that, but it made good
political and military sense for the government to buy slaves in loyal states to
employ for war work.
Strange, how Lincoln had not reacted at all to the letter, couched in the
most respectful terms. He had said only "All right" and put it in his pocket.
Perhaps he was ultrasensitive to his political prerogatives. That was the mark
of a small man and an insecure leader.
"I did not like the President's manner," he wrote. "It seemed that of a man
about to do something of which he was much ashamed." It reminded him of
that day when Lincoln all but accused him of treason. "I do not know what
pretty trick the administration will play next. A few days will show it, and I
do not much care what the result will be. I feel that I have always done
enough to prove in history that I am a general, and that the causes of my
want of success are so apparent that no one except the Chandler Committee
can blame me hereafter."
That was untrue, and Nellie would know it. "I have not done splendidly at
all," he admitted, looking at the words he had written and knowing them, as
Nellie would, to be the truth. "I have only tried to do my duty and God has
helped me, or rather He has helped my army and our country and we are
safe."
But why had God denied him victory? An answer came to him and he
hurried to share it with his wife. "I think I begin to see His wise purpose in all
this. If I had succeeded in taking Richmond now, the fanatics of the North
might have been too powerful, and reunion would be impossible."
Colonel Key pulled back the flap of the tentMcClellan, after his pledge
to Nellie, would not sleep in the large brick houseand entered, followed by
Lieutenant Custer. The young lieutenant clutched a sheaf of papers.
"General," the young man said tightly, "we have commenced receiving
letters from the North urging you to march on Washington and assume the
government."
"Put those away," Colonel Key told him, annoyed, "they're from a bunch
of troublemakers. General, you should know what I have heard from people
around Secretary Stanton."
Key's brother worked at the War Department. McClellan motioned for
Custer to put the letters on the table, where he would look them over at his
leisure for his amusement, and said to Key, "His attitude seemed to change
toward me. Perhaps the illness of his child"
"He has said that your private letter was an act of insubordination, a
political platform from which you intend to oppose the President."
The general controlled his anger for a moment; then, among his closest
aides, he let it out. "That man is the most unmitigated scoundrel I ever knew,
heard of or read of. I do not wish to be irreverent, gentlemen, but had our
Secretary of War lived at the time of the Savior, Judas Iscariot would have
remained a respected member of the fraternity of the apostles, and the rascal-
ity of Edwin M. Stanton would have caused Judas to have raised his arms in
holy horror and unaffected wonder!"
That explosion was not like him, but it made him feel better. With awe on
the face of young Custer at the display of irreverence and insubordination,
McClellan went on, "I hate to think that humanity could sink so low. He has
deceived me oncetwice; he never will again. Enough of the creatureit
makes me sick to think of him! Faugh!"
His aides bid him good night and left. The general of the largest army ever
assembled on the North American continent thought for a moment of Mar-
shal Jornini, the great military tactician whose works were studied by both
Lee and himself. Jornini, McClellan judged, had turned out to be mistaken in
his scorn of earthworksa not very good soldier, well dug in, backed by
some artillery, and armed with a gun with a rifled musket, could hold off
three times his numberbut Jornini was surely right about the nature of war.
Battles were to be fought by soldiers against soldiers, commanded by profes-
sionalsnot fought by a people against a people, with hatreds whipped up by
bloodthirsty politicians.
He had done the best he could with the army at his command. Though he
had no faith in this administration, he had served it honestly. Now he sus-
pected Lincoln would deprive him of the means of winning and then dismiss
him for failing to attack.
He was convinced that history would judge McClellan right and Lincoln
wrong, that here was where the great battle would have to be fought, not all
the way overland from Washington through ninety miles of hostile territory.
Perhapsthe thought crossed his mind for the first timehe should have
taken the President more into his confidence from the start, won his support
away from Stanton and Chase and the other radicals. If he had built political
earthworks in his rear, perhaps God would not have had to deny him the
capture of Richmond while the radicals held sway in Washington.
Now it was up to the President, to win the war or to extend it, until some
other general with Lincoln's trust put forward McClellan's plan. It was up to
Lincoln to resist the pressure for abolition that would make peaceful reunion
impossible; at least he had been warned of its effect on the army. McClellan
would have to think about writing his financier friend Aspinwall for a job in
industry, and passing the word through Key to Horatio Seymour and Fer-
nando Wood about his interest in Democratic affairs.
He picked up the pen. "In this weary world, I have seen but little happiness
save what I have enjoyed with you," he wrote Nell, finding his greatest com-
fort in his correspondence. "So the baby has more teeth! When will she begin
to say a word or two? I suppose when I come back home I will find her
handling a knife and fork . . ."

CHAPTER 15
FIRST DRAFT
Homer Bates gave up his desk to Major Eckert, who had given up his larger
desk in the telegraph office to the President, just returned from a visit to the
Richmond front. Bates was familiar with the regular procedure for a presi-
dential visit: when Mr. Lincoln chose to spend time near the flow of cables,
the desk under the Maltese Cross on the wall, with a chair at one of the
windows that looked out on Pennsylvania Avenue, was made available to Mr.
Lincoln.
But the presidential presence in the telegraph office was expected only
when a battle was imminent or under way. Bates, working on his ciphers on a
makeshift desk in his lap, knew of no major engagement going on at the
moment. In Kentucky, rebel cavalry raider John Hunt Morgan was causing
trouble, as he often did. A flurry of cables had gone back and forth when
Lincoln appointed Halleck General-in-Chief, putting Grant in command out
West and subordinating both Pope and McClellan in the East to "Old
Brains," but no urgent military activity had taken place since the end of the
Seven Days' battles. That was over a week ago.
Lincoln asked Eckert for paper. The major procured some foolscap and
handed it to him, along with a small barrel-pen made by Gillot, such as were
supplied to cipher operators. Lincoln had begun these visits to work on some
writing project just after the Seven Days, before he went down to see McClel-
lan at Harrison's Landing. The President had explained then that he was
interrupted too often at the White Housethat's what people had taken to
calling the Mansionand he thought the telegraph office would be a good
place to work undisturbed, without being out of touch.
Bates watched him look out the window for a while. Lincoln then put pen
to paper, not writing much at once. He would think a bit, put down a line or
two, then sit quietly for a few minutes. Apparently he was in no hurry to
finish this particular piece of writing, which Bates presumed was some mes-
sage to Congress.
The key began clattering. When the fresh dispatch had been received and
deciphered, the young operator took it over to the President: Nathan Bedford
Forrest and his rebel raiders had captured a Union garrison at Murfreesboro,
near Nashville. General Lee was reported by one of Pinkerton's men to be
moving some of his men away from Richmond and up the valley toward
Washington; that could be trouble.
Stoddard, the President's third secretary, who was a man Bates called a
friend, came from across the street to get Mr. Lincoln's signature on an act
carrying into effect a treaty made with Great Britain for the suppression of
the African slave trade. The President signed the measure and went back to
looking out the window; Bates assumed the act just signed into law could not
have been all that historic.
What struck Bates as an overly long message moved on the wire from
General Pope, announcing to his new troops, "I have come to you from the
West where we have always seen the backs of our enemies." That would not
sit so well, in the telegraph operator's judgment, with the Union's Eastern
soldiers. "I hear constantly of lines of retreat' and of 'bases of supplies',"
went Pope's odd greeting. "Let us discard such ideas. Success and glory are in
the advance, disaster and shame lurk in the rear."
Bates grinned; he suspected that Stanton himself might have written that
bombastic message, to take a poke at McClellan, and the unintended result
would be that Pope was going to be a laughingstock among the men. Bates
thought of showing the Stanton-Pope pronouncement to the President but
decided against it; Mr. Lincoln came to the telegraph office to work on his
writing, not to be interrupted with minor business.
"Big spiderweb," said the President idly.
The major had left for a moment, so Bates answered. "You noticed, sir.
That's an institution of the cipher room." The large web stretched from the
lintel of the portico to the side of the outer windowsill. "Please don't open
that window," he told the President, "you'll destroy the web. In a while, you
may get to see Major Eckert's lieutenants."
Lincoln put down his pen and looked closely. "Where are they?"
"The lieutenants will soon report and pay their respects. They always do."
In a few moments, a large spider appeared at the crossroads of the web and
tapped several times on the strands. That brought five or six other, smaller
spidersthe lieutenantsout from different directions.
"There seems to be a great confabulation taking place," reported Lincoln
delightedly. "Now they're all going back. How often do they do this?"
"Now and then," said Bates.
Lincoln went back to work for a while, writing a line or two. The major
returned with some work for Bates to get started on, which he promptly did.
It felt good working in the same room as the President. After a half hour or
so, Lincoln looked at the clock on the wall and rose. Eckert was back and
stood at attention, but Bates remained seated because his lap was full.
"Take charge of this," the President said to the major, handing him the
single sheet of paper. "Put it with the others, and don't let anyone see it." He
added he had more to do on it, but was not pressed for time.
"With pleasure, sir. I won't even read it myself."
"Well, I should be glad to know that no one will see it," Lincoln said
mildly, "although there is no objection to your looking at it, Major, or you,
Bates. Keep it locked up until I call for it tomorrow."
"I'll lock it here in the safe, Mr. Lincoln. Either Bates or I will have the
key. One or the other of us is always here, or sleeping down the hall."
"Good. I have to go see some border-state Congressmen, now. Judge Biair's
got them all lined up in the office, and I have to sell them my way of think-
ing."
"Compensated emancipation," Bates piped up. "Four hundred dollars a
head."
"That's the best way," the President nodded, with that sad smile that made
Bates feel he was family. "I do not speak of emancipation at once, but of a
decision at once to emancipate gradually."
"Where you going to put 'em all, sir?" Bates asked. "That's what my folks
always ask."
"Room in South America for colonization," the President replied, as if
practicing his lines for the border-state men, "can be obtained cheaply, and in
abundance. And when numbers shall be large enough to be company and
encouragement for one another, the freed people will not be so reluctant to
gO.))
He made it sound so simple; Bates assumed that if the President said so,
that was the way it would be.
Lincoln bent down and tapped lightly at the window in farewell to Eckert's
lieutenants.
"That's the best way," he repeated. "But not the only way."
CHAPTER I
SMALL CHANGE

"Do you have change for a dollar, Father? I want to pay the boy for the
Intelligencer. "
"Not you too, Kate," Chase muttered in irritation. "I've had enough of
that today."
His daughter looked at him in genuine surprise. "What do you mean?"
Chase instantly felt guilty at his reaction. Kate, despite the education he
had given her in the finances of government, could have no inkling of what
the failure of McClellan's Peninsula campaign had done to the value of gov-
ernment paper; suddenly everyone was demanding payment in specie. As
confidence in a Northern victory ebbed, the price of gold and silver had
spurted upward, and the value of the greenback against gold declined. The
silver in coins was now worth more than the face value of the coin, which was
why small change seemingly disappeared.
"Tell the boy to come back when you owe him a dollar," the Secretary of
the Treasury said, "and then pay him with a greenback. The whole country is
out of small change."
She sent the boy away and returned. "What are you going to do about it?"
"The first thing is to issue paper bills for ten cents, a quarter, and a half
dollar."
She looked at him quizzically. "Ten-cent bills?"
"We'll call them stamps, but people won't use them to stick on letters;
they'll use them for change. We'll make them directly convertible to green-
backs."
He watched his official hostessno longer his little girlthink that over,
and waited for the inevitable question.
"Why won't people use them for stamps, Father?"
"No glue on the back," he said triumphantly. That had been one of the
more practical ideas to come out of the Treasury staff.
His daughter looked dubious, and Chase could not blame her; the Treasury
Secretary himself did not like the idea of paper change, but it was either that
temporary expedient or coining zinc and other cheap metals, which would
make the nation seem permanently penniless.
"That's the easy part of my problem," he told her. "The hard part is
paying the new soldiers. I had the accounts more or less current after we went
to paper money. We were all set to win the war this summer; Stanton stopped
recruiting. Now it looks like a longer war, the President has called for three
hundred thousand men, and I can't find the money to pay them."
"Raise taxes?"
He gave her a stern look; she was not putting to good use the long hours he
had spent explaining finance to her. "The people are paying three percent of
theii income to taxes already. I went along with the tax on incomes last year
as a war measure, but it would be madness to be associated with raising it
further."
"Youll have to borrow it, then."
He swallowed. "Yes." He did not like to consider the possibility of failing
to sell the government's bonds. "Either borrow, or issue more greenbacks."
"But that would lead to inflation of the currency, panic, collapse" She
was smiling. That was what he had said a year before. Kate had an unfortu-
nate ability to remember everything a man said, and a tendency to turn it
back at him, which he suspected would not help her in life.
"I've been surprised by the success of the greenbacks," he admitted. "I
thought people would act sensibly1 expected them to use the greenbacks,
which draw no interest, to buy government bonds, which pay six percent.
Instead, they just hold on to the greenbacks." He shook his head in wonder-
ment at the ignorance of the people. "The government has a hundred million
dollars in greenbacks in circulation out there, and we don't have to pay any
interest. It's amazing. The private banks used to do that, issuing paper notes,
and they must have made a fortune."
"I hope you don't say that in Cabinet, Father. The Biairs would use it
against you."
He smiled his thanks at her political protectiveness, then turned serious
again. "It is amazing how little we know about the political arithmetic, or
what they call 'economics' now. This war is costing a million dollars a day;
we are going deeper and deeper into debt; by all rights, the credit should be
drying up. But somehow, because we're acting as one nationnot as a collec-
tion of states and local banksthere doesn't seem to be a bottom to the well.
Extraordinary what we can do, acting as a nation, in borrowing money. Pity
it took a war to teach us."
"Do you suppose Lincoln understands any of that?"
"Of course not. He keeps talking about 'the Union' as if it had some
mystical influence, but I don't think he has the foggiest notion about what
this war is demonstrating in terms of national power."
Vast changes, it seemed to him, were taking place without anybody think-
ing them through. Chase suspected that Stanton's demand for national con-
trol of the telegraph was overreaching, and he had even more doubt about the
constitutionality of the government's takeover of the railroads, which was a
seizure of private property from loyal citizens in "the public's" interest. His
own Western faction in Congress, led by Ben Wade, put over the Homestead
Act, granting free soil to settlers and guaranteeing the stretching westward of
the nation's labor force; the Easterners countered with passage of the land
grant to set up agricultural colleges, by which the national government
threatened to replace sectarian churches in the sponsorship of higher educa-
tion. Would all this centralization lead to monarchism? Chase hoped that
federalist principles would emerge, with states running the new institutions
being set up by the national government, but nobody could be sure. It was all
happening so fast.
"Are you saying, Father," Kate's voice drifted to him, "that we should.
create one central bank and control the money from here?"
"In a way, yes." He struggled with the power and the danger of his own
contribution to the great new changes. "Yes. I should have the power to
charter all banks. I should be able to tell them what their reserves sho;uld be,
how much should be lent to the federal treasury. I suppose we could, run the
entire country from right here in Washington."
"Will Lincoln go along? Will the Congress?"
"Who knows?" he shrugged, although he would not admit such ignorance
to anyone but his daughter. "There are no experts in this. Plain paper seems
to be as good as gold. I think we can get a national bank. We can get any-
thing, provided we get McClellan out and a general in who restores the
people's confidence."
"So that's why Bill Sprague had to go to Corinth to see Halleck," she said,
"to put more pressure on Lincoln to kick out McClellan."
Chase liked the way her mind leaped ahead, but it troubled him that his
daughter's quick intelligence was too willing to attribute some ignoble motive
to his actions.
"Exactly," he told his daughter. "The President has unfortunately commit-
ted the management of the war almost exclusively to his political opponents.
If this continues, the public confidence that supports the paper money will
disappearnobody will take greenbacks, nobody will lend us gold, and we
will not be able to pay the contractors or the troops. I've explained all that to
Sprague."
"Yes, the boy governor told me."
Such a display of personal disrespect toward Sprague, her lovesick beau,
and her admission that she had wheedled the most confidential information
out of him with such ease, troubled the Treasury Secretary.
"There is nobody in this world I trust more than you, Kate, but I wish you
would not wring every last secret out of Governor Sprague, who is torn by his
obligation to confidence and his love for you."
"He was drunk," she replied with the sort of insouciance that irritated him
more, "and he would have told anybody anything."
He ignored that. Sprague was the wealthiest man in New England, said to
be worth $25 million, and had followed his purchase of a regiment by buying
a Senate seat for next year. He would make a superb son-in-law and a useful
supporter in a race for the presidential nomination. Chase checked himself;
such thoughts, in combination, were unworthy of a dutiful father.
He noted the frown on his daughter's lovely face. Perhaps he should not
burden her with the problems of high finance; it was not one of the subjects
taught at Miss Haines's school in New York. "But don't bother your head
with the financial ramifications of military politics, my dear," he sighed.
Still frowning, she gave him a sharp look. "I'm bothering my head, as you
put it, wondering how we can make some money to meet the household bills
out of all this. Thurlow Weed would know how to turn a profit out of what
we know."
"Don't talk to that man," he ordered. "Weed is a scoundrel, a wirepuller,
no sense of the public morality at all. Does Seward's dirty work, and he'll be
conniving against us at the next convention. Stay away from him." Seward
and Blair, probably with Gideon Welles, were forming a conservative clique
in the Cabinet and might soon dominate the vacillating Lincoln. Chase pic-
tured Weed at the center of such an intrigue.
"John Hay says that Lincoln keeps a special cubbyhole in his desk just for
communications with Thurlow Weed," she replied, ignoring his advice in her
headstrong way.
"Hay is another one you're seeing too much of," Chase told her. Kate had
claimed originally she was cultivating a contact close to Lincoln, to learn
what could be useful, but Chase knew she was attracted to the young man.
Young Hay struck him as a high-living and a sharp-witted fellow who could
turn the tables on Kate's use of him. Chase did not want the President to
know of plans to garner support for Chase's candidacy, or of Chase's widely
expressed low opinion of the way Lincoln failed to use his Cabinet: In this
Administration, a Cabinet session had degenerated to nothing more than a
meeting of department heads. The Treasury Secretary deplored both the lack
of central direction and the sense of moral fervor. In addition, as a father,
Chase had the obligation to warn his daughter of the occasion of sin, which
the mustachioed bachelor so obviously presented.
"I will see whom I please when I please," she flashed. "Who are you to tell
me whom to go out with?"
"I am your father," he replied, with what he thought was eloquent simplic-
ity.
"When it's convenient."
"And what is that supposed to mean?"
"I suppose you've forgotten that you sent me away for eleven years," she
blazed with what he feared was a reversion to the tantrums of her childhood.
She had been four years old when her mother died, and he had remarried
quicklytoo quickly for the child, who had refused to speak to her step-
mother. That was when he sent her to Miss Haines's school in New York.
"From five to sixteen, I did very well alone," she said, defiance growing.
"Mind your tongue, young lady."
"You never visited me," she went on, stinging him, "or wanted me home at
Easter or Christmas. Finally, when you needed a respectable hostess again,
after you buried your third wife, you saw that you had a beautiful, well-bred
daughter. Suddenly I fit in. And nowyou dare to tell me whom I cannot
see?"
"I did not leave you destitute for eleven years, as you seem to think." He
was furious, as only Kate could make him, and felt his self-control slip from
him. "What ingratitude! You could not bear to be at home with your new
mother, who was a fine and loving woman, and I had to go without proper
clothes to make it possible for you to learn your fine ways in New York."
"How you must have suffered, Father."
"Do you remember a bill for three hundred and five dollars for new clothes
that you sent me one day?" He had a picture of that invoice in his mind's eye.
"As governor of Ohio, I was making eighteen hundred dollars a yearthat
little extravagance of yours was nearly three months' pay. And I paid the bill
without a word."
"There is more to raising a daughter than paying bills."
"There is more to being a daughter than running around with corrupt
lobby agents and handsome young men who are your father's political ene-
mies," he thundered, hating himself for losing his temper, which he rarely
did. Only she could bring out the rage in him. All her life, the girl had been
afflicted with an unreasoning jealousyrooted in jealousy for her father, he
understoodbut she had an insidious way of making him, the most upright
of husbands three times over, seem almost unfaithful.              '
Chase was certain Kate's jealousy was none of his doing; his younger
daughter, Nettie, was sweetly dutiful, proving that the fault lay in some
strange dark urges in Kate wholly unrelated to any heritage of his. Now that
he had given her all she wantedan education that enabled her to flirt with
the British ambassador, an official position in Washington society second only
to the wife of the PresidentKate was as headstrong as when she spat at her
stepmother, rest that woman's saintly soul.
Now that it was her turn to repay some of her debt to him for her high
station in life, Chase was determined to call her to account. "I am going to
the office," he announced. "When I return, we will discuss your obvious need
to leave this city for a time." That assertion of parental authority seemed to
bring her up short; he could still control her physical whereabouts. "Perhaps
this is the time for a trip to Buttermilk Fallsyou can use the simple farm
life; it's good for a short temper."
"I am planning to dine tonight with Roscoe Conkling," she said icily, "the
Congressman who introduced the confiscation bill in the House. Tomorrow I
shall go riding with your good friend Major Garfield of Ohio. Is their com-
pany politically suitable for me?"
"Conkling is an adventurer and Major Garfield is married," he replied,
ignoring her sarcasm. "Neither has much of a future. Start looking to the
future." He took a deep breath and made a show of searching for his hat. "I
refuse to continue this discussion. I confess that you have made me pro-
foundly angry."
"Go to the office, then, where you can get your mail."
That was a low blow; he felt a new surge of anger mingled with guilt.
Against his better judgment, he was impelled to ask again: "And what does
that mean?"
"The postman who brings the mail, thanks to Postmaster General Blair,
tells me you have directed him to deliver the mail that comes here from your
lady friends to the Treasury Department."
He did not let himself express his outrage.
"Dear Father, I don't mind your correspondence with Adele Douglas, a
cultivated lady and respectable widow," she said, as if the subject was any of
her business, "even though she is Rose Greenhow's sister-in-law, and sus-
pected of trying to help that spy avoid the hanging she deserves. And Carlotta
Eastman worships you, an attitude you especially admire in your women
friendsyou left one of her letters lying on the table in the den, probably for
my edification."
She was getting the better of this discussion. Chase wished he had not been
irritable or so easily provoked, but he could not back down now. "Your
blessing is appreciated. I take it," he said, "that there is one correspondent to
whom you do object. I wish you would get to the point."
"Anna Carroll is the one you're seeing too much of," she said, in what he
Si'aw was a deliberate parallel to his stricture against John Hay.
He rose to go. "And what makes Miss Carroll especially offensive to you,
my dear daughter?"
"Certainly not her figger, which would delight a voluptuary," Kate said,
putting a suggestive hand to her own somewhat meager bosom. "No, my
objection is purely political. She's a Know-Nothing at heart, and on record as
one of their leaders. She's pro-slavery, anti-confiscation, against everything
you stand for, and probably in the pay of the Biairs. Your association with her
is a political embarrassment."
"Miss Carroll has made no secret of her views," he answered slowly, "and
her recent pamphlet, which I commend to you, unfortunately makes a fool
out of Sumner."
He put in that dig at Charles Sumner because the Massachusetts senator
had made frequent trips to New York while Kate was at Miss Haines's,
befriending the girl, who had undoubtedly professed her loneliness; Sumner
still retained what he claimed to be an avuncular affection, which Kate recip-
rocated. The foppish senator from Boston was a fellow radical in the Republi-
can ranks, but his manner put Chase off. Too often he had seemed to be
willing to make Chase feel inadequate as a father.
Chase had a subtler reason for reminding his ungrateful daughter about her
friendship with the senator who flattered her at all the best parties. If the
Senate radicals succeeded in getting Lincoln around to abolition, Sumner and
Wade would remove Chase's key moral issue in wresting the nomination from
the inadequate President. However, if Anna Carroll, in her obscure alliance
with the Biairs and Seward, succeeded in blocking an opportunistic shift
toward abolition by Lincoln, Chase would be well positioned to make his
move on an anti-slavery platform in 1864.
That was a political thought that Chase considered unworthy of greatness;
he felt a twinge of guilt in thinking it, and assured himself that its intricacy
escaped his daughter. He assuaged the twinge with the conviction that in the
long run a Chase presidency would be best for both the nation and the slaves.
"Miss Carroll is a spinster in her late forties," his daughter went on, now
on weaker ground, "and she has been rejected by two presidentsFillmore
and Buchanan. She's damaged goods and would make you a laughingstock."
"I am fifty-six," he replied. He had always been pleased to be in Anna
Carroll's company, stimulated by her strong mind andhe grudgingly admit-
ted itattracted by her delectable figure, but had not until this moment given
any serious thought to romance. Certainly she would bring him political
support where he was weakest, among the party's conservatives. He admired
her self-reliance. Stanton had told him the modest little lady was the origina-
tor of the Tennessee River plan, which if trueyou could never tell with
Stantonled to the Donelson victory and the successful flotation of the bond
issue in April. If Kate suspected she was more than a political ally, let his
jealous daughter think it. The shift in Kate's accusation from emotionally
abused daughter to unjustly competitive woman lessened his sense of guilt.
He could now feel better about her odious outburst; it was none of his doing.
He looked forward to Sunday and the cleansing of his soul.
With even more than his usual dignity, Chase put on his hat and walked
out into the July humidity. He did not deign to bid his daughter farewell. He
could hear Kate's parting shot: "And worst of all, she's smarter than you!3;,
That stung him.
FHAPT F. R '.

JOHN HAY'S DIAR'I
JULY 12, 1862

Everything seems to be coming apart.
The Prsdt has the hypo. The black mood started to descend three days ago,
when he came back from Harrison's Landing.
The obvious reason is the military debacle of our Little Napoleon, pushed
back from Richmond when the rebel capital was in his grasp.
The less obvious reason is the political box the Prsdt finds himself in. The
defeat ofMcClellan in the Seven Days battles gave a lift to Wade and the rest
of the Jacobins in Congress. This session will end in four days, on the six-
teenth of this month, but it will not be soon enough for us. The Jacobins are
pushing hard for abolition, which bids fair to break up the Republican Party
and totally divide the North. The confiscation bill must be headed off at all
costs, and I must confess that a note of desperation has attended our efforts.
This morning, a suffocating Saturday, the Prsdt made his plea to the bor-
der-state Congressmen. The meeting did not go as he had hoped.
"I do not speak of emancipation at once," he told the twenty or so Con-
gressmen who packed into the office, "but of a decision at once to emancipate
gradually. If you all had voted for this last March, the war would now be
substantially ended."
That told-you-so did not set well; I could see, from the back of the room,
how Lincoln's implicit charge that they had prolonged the war angered some
of the Kentuckians.
"Chase can't get the money to pay contractors for uniforms," one snorted,
"much less raise four hundred dollars a head to buy thousands of slaves."
The Tycoon has faith in the ability of Kate Chase's father to come up with
money miraculously, and he persevered. "How much better for you, as seller,
and the nation as buyer, to sell out and buy out slaveryrather than to cut
one another's throats."
But we could all tell that the majority of border-staters in that room was
hostile. When a few of them fretted that compensated emancipation would
solidify the spirit of rebellion in the South and fan the fires of secession in
their states, the Prsdt played his last card: the threat of growing pressure
from the abolitionists.
"I am pressed with a difficulty not yet mentioned," he broached it at last;
"an instance of it is known to you."
"If you're talking about General Hunter's misbegotten declaration of
emancipation," one of them said hotly, "that almost kicked my district into
secession. If you hadn't disavowed that abolitionist trick, Lincoln, most of us
wouldn't be here listening to you today"
"General Hunter is an honest man," Lincoln said of the persnickety Re-
publican general who pulled a fast one on him a few months ago. Hunter had
forced the Prsdt to slap him down, as the Prsdt did to Fr6mont when that
popinjay also took it on himself to free the slaves. "He proclaimed all men
free within certain states, and I repudiated the proclamation. Yet in repudiat-
ing it, I gave dissatisfaction, if not offense, to many whose support the coun-
try cannot afford to lose."
"Horace Greeley, and Wendell Phillips, and Ben Wade and that whole
crazy bunch," said a man from Maryland, with what I had to privately admit
was uncanny accuracy. "To hell with them."
"The pressure, from that direction, is still upon me," Lincoln insisted,
pacing behind his desk, knowing he was losing his jury, "and is increasing. By
conceding what I now askselling your slaves at a fair priceyou can relieve
me, you can relieve the country, in this important point."
"Not so," said the Marylander. "Once you give in to them on this buy-out
of slaves in the loyal states, the abolitionists will want the whole thing.
They'll demand you free the four million slaves in the rebel states, and this
will be a war not against the rebellion but against slavery. And my folks are
for Union, but not for abolition. So are you, Mr. President."
The Prsdt had no good answer to that; so, like a good lawyer, he flattered
them and appealed to their love of country. "You are patriots and statesmen,"
he said, laying it on a little thick, "and as such, I pray you, consider this
proposition. To you, the privilege is given to assure this nation's happy future,
and to link your own names with it forever."
I suppose he felt he had to give compensated emancipation one last try, but
the appeal to patriotism fell flat. The Kentucky man mumbled he would send
a written reply from the delegation, but everybody there knew what the
answer would be: thanks, but the loyal people in our border states prefer their
slaves to stay slaves. No sale.
John Crisfield, a Marylander but a good Union man, was going out with
the glum group, and Lincoln detained him. They had served together as
Whigs in Congress back in the forties. Crisfield was a member of a House
committee assigned to write a report on compensated emancipation, which
Lincoln knew would not likely be produced.
"Well, Crisfield, how are you getting along with your report? Have you
written it yet?"
"No." The finality of that suggested to me that not even Lincoln's old
friends among the border-staters could be counted on to offer payment for
slaves.
"You had better come to an agreement," Lincoln said doggedly, as if he
refused to grant he was losing. "Niggers will never be higher."
Crisfield shrugged; maybe he thinks Marylanders want their peculiar insti-
tution untouched, or maybe he thinks the price of negroes will continue to be
bid up by the federal government. He's probably wrong; they're all wrong;
the Prsdt is more likely to close down the game than to raise the ante.
Tonight the Tycoon ate alone at his desk. Mrs. Lincoln and son Robert are
up in New York, on the way to West Point. I brought in a bill for him to sign
creating a Medal of Honor for soldiers who have acted with incredible hero-
ism. He reviewed some of those cases, and the heartrending stories in the
citations made him feel worse. He pushed his plate away.
I went across the street with him to the telegraph office in the War Depart-
ment. There, Stanton told him McClellan's troop figures were cockeyedour
Little Napoleon is claiming to have only half the army we know he has
Stanton wanted to freeze the rebels on prisoner exchange, but Lincoln wants
General Prentice, hero of Shiloh, back from prison: he directed Mars t(
authorize General Dix to trade Simon Buckner (the non-hero of Fort Donel-
son) for Prentice. Dix wants to know what to do with Rose Greenhow, in th(
light of the hanging of our spy in Richmond, and nobody knows what to tel:
him. That's not a cheery thought, either. The Prsdt said he wanted to wort
on some writing in the telegraph office1 suppose it's his veto message on tht
confiscation billand told me to go out to a party, which I did.
No solace in parties for me, however, even at the Earneses'; Miss Chase;
who blows hot and cold, has left suddenly for a farm in upstate New York
Not a word of farewell to me1 found out about her abrupt departure from
Lord Lyons at the party. Strange girl. Close, so closethen gone. It may be
that she is fearful of her own feelings toward me.
Tomorrow, Sunday, is not going to be any better. Stanton's baby died;
which is a mercy in a way, after a short life of horrible boils, and the funeral
is tomorrow. That is bound to be a crusher to the Prsdt's spirits, a terrible
reminder to him of the loss of Willie. I know he will come back from tha<
dreary interlude with an indescribable look of sadness on his facehe really
can look sadder than any man aliveand spend an hour perusing an album
of war heroes that his own dead Willie had prepared. He does that now and
then, usually with Senator Browning, just leafing the pages, with Tad asleep
on the couch.

CHAPTER 3
THE TIME HAS ARRIVED
A white coach with a white coffin, symbolizing the purity of an infant, led the
way. The reins of the black horses were held by undertakers in tall black hats.
The coach of the Stanton family followed, and behind that was the coach of
the President. A dozen coaches of Cabinet members, family, and friends
formed the funeral cortege for James Hutchison Stanton, son of the Secretary
of War, who died before he reached his ninth month.
William Henry Seward sat next to Lincoln in the President's carriage,
facing forward. Opposite them sat Seward's daughter-in-law, her dark blue
dress decorated with the single white carnation that all the women had been
asked to wear that morning. Jammed into the seat next to her was "Father
Neptune," Gideon Welles, the Secretary of the Navy. It occurred to Seward
that the gray-white beard of "Father Neptune" kept getting bushier and
longer.
Seward knew when not to talk to Lincoln. As the cortege wound its solemn
way toward the cemetery north of Georgetown, the Secretary of State as-
sumed that the President was reliving the anguish of the burial six months
before of his beloved Willie. There had been no thought of having Mrs.
Lincoln attend this funeral, for fear of a relapse into extended hysteria. The
President, under his tall hat, was silent, lost in thought.
Although he never held any affection for the Secretary of War in the car-
riage ahead, Seward could feel a genuine sympathy for Stanton as a bereaved
father. The long-expected loss of his baby seemed to crush Stanton just at the
moment his many conservative Republican enemies, along with the Peace
Democrats, had made him the target of their most furious attacks. As he had
been hailed as "the organizer of victory" a few months before, Stanton was
now being denounced as a primary cause of defeat. Seward had undergone
the vicissitudes of politics as much as any man who had come within an
eyelash of the presidency, and knew how hard it was to bear those shifts in
public opinion when overlaid by personal tragedy.
He was glad that the Biairs had not told him beforehand of their campaign
to discredit Stanton. Newspaper friends of the Blair family, especially at the
New York World, had pinned McClellan's defeat squarely on Stanton's refusal
to reinforce him with McDowell's army. Lincoln was not the press's target;
Stanton drew the lightning. Even Horace Greeley's Tribune had printed a
dispatch from Wilkeson, its chief correspondent in the Peninsula, praising
McClellan and castigating the Secretary of War for throwing away the chance
to capture Richmond and end the war.
Seward could sympathize with anybody, even Stanton, who was the target
of Uncle Horace's personal fickleness and political infidelity; still, even on this
sad day for the Secretary of War, he found himself siding with the Biairs
against Stanton and Chase. Seward thought it curious: from a start as Lin-
coln's greatest rival in the party, William Henry Seward, of all people, had
become a "Lincoln man," more than any of his colleagues, who were still
representing factions of the party in the Cabinet.
"Good work with the governors," Lincoln said unexpectedly.
Seward bobbed his head in acknowledgment. He had been sent to his home
state of New York the week before, to induce a group of the governors meet-
ing there to raise additional troops, now that the realization struck that the
war was not going to be over in two weeks. Seward was well aware he had
performed at his ex-gubernatorial best, persuading his former fellow state
executives that the impetus for further recruitment must appear to come from
them rather than from the President.
As a result, the governors, led by Morgan of New York (Seward made a
mental note to get him a commission as major general of volunteers when his
term ended), had "volunteered" three hundred thousand men. A rousing
song was concocted: "We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred thou-
sand more." If those volunteers did not come, a military draft would be
needed; Seward could envision the riots that forced conscription would bring
in New York City, hotbed of copperheads' agitation about the necessary ar-
rests of traitors.
"I spoke to the border-state Congressmen yesterday," Lincoln, ready to
talk, reported. "You saw my speech. I wrote it out because I wanted a record
of it. Gradual, compensated emancipation. I really beseeched them, told them
my proposal acted not the Pharisee."
"No takers?"
"Oh, Crisfield says maybe a third of the delegation will go along," the
President said. "The others say it would be too expensive, or that we prom-
ised the war was for the Union and not against slavery. They just cannot read
the signs of the times."
Seward caught Lincoln's biblical allusion to the prophet's denunciation of
hypocrites; one of those "signs of the times" was the passage in Congress two
days before of a bill to educate the children of the freed slaves in the District
of Columbia. Six months before, nobody would have thought to appropriate
money to raise up black children.
Seward remarked that if the border states had not been moved by the
reaction to McClellan's defeat, they were never likely to take up Lincoln's
offer of buying back slaves at four hundred dollars a head.
"If the rebels do not cease to persist in this war against the government,"
said Lincoln, "and I see no evidence that they will, maybe it will be necessary
to emancipate the slaves by proclamation."
Secretary Welles, who had been leaning back in his seat, arms crossed,
suddenly leaned forward; what was that the President said?
Seward, too, was surprised at Lincoln's statement. Whenever the subject of
abolition had been raised before, the President had given it short shrift, point-
ing to three loyal states that would probably throw down their Union arms.
Up to this moment, Republican dogma held that slaverywhich could no
longer be extended to the territorieswas a matter to be decided upon by
each of the present states. Seward immediately sensed the scope of the change
in the President's thinking. Evidently the rejection by the border-state men of
his proposal yesterday had quite an effect on Lincoln; or perhaps the Union
reverses on the Peninsula, and the public's growing war-weariness, were driv-
ing him to desperate measures.
"I've been giving a lot of thought to it," Lincoln continued, "and I've
about come to the conclusion that it is a military necessity. It may be abso-
lutely essential for the salvation of the Union. We must free the slaves or be
ourselves subdued."
Now Seward was thunderstruck; this was no idle thought uttered aloud.
Lincoln, after behaving so sensibly in the face of radical Republican cries to
"arm the slaves," and after having braved the Greeley onslaughts by counter-
manding military orders declaring captured slaves "forever free," was now
showing signs of panic. His alternative to abolition"or be ourselves sub-
dued"was more than a bit excessive; Seward was sure the North was in no
danger of losing the war, only of losing heart.
"This is the first occasion I've mentioned the subject to anyone," the Presi-
dent confided. "Tell me, frankly, how the proposition strikes you."
Seward knew Lincoln well enough by now not to underestimate his politi-
cal cunning. The radicals' confiscation bill, which was given no chance of
passage when Trumbull and Conkling introduced it six months before, had
taken on new life with the bitter Peninsula disappointments of July. If confis-
cation passed in the coming week and Lincoln vetoed it, the radicals might
take over the Republican Partyor take the cause of abolition right out of
the party. If the bill passed and Lincoln could not avoid signing it, the issue of
slaverywhich Lincoln, at Seward's constant urging, had kept in his own
handswould be wrested away from him by the Congress. Wade's radicals
would then be emboldened to take over the direction of the war and the
resolution of the peace. That would be a disaster, Seward felt, a recipe for
sectional hatred for a century; evidently Lincoln felt the same way.
On the other hand, a proclamation issued without the ability to enforce it
might cause a servile rebellion and provide Lord Palmerston with the excuse
to send English troops to prevent anarchy in a cotton supplier. It would also
remove all possibility of negotiation for peace. The Secretary of State had to
think fast. Perhaps a limited military proclamation, basing an obviously un-
constitutional act on the President's claim of war power, would turn aside
Ben Wade's challenge.
"This subject involves consequences so vast and momentous," Seward tried
to hedge, "that I want to give it my mature reflection."
Lincoln, however, wanted a reaction then and there. "Of course," the Pres-
ident pressed, "but how does it strike you?"
"The measure might be justifiable on military grounds," said Seward, not
wanting to make a mistake, confining his reaction to the legalities. "You
might use words like 'expedient,' and 'necessary.' " The English might under-
stand that.
"Those are my views as well," said Welles when Lincoln looked toward
him. "The reverses before Richmond impel us to adopt extraordinary mea-
sures to preserve the national existence."
"Give it your special and deliberate attention," Lincoln directed, adding
carefully to Seward's daughter-in-law, "Not a word to anyone."
Seward nodded firmly to his son's wife, who because his own wife had been
ill was present at a moment of great import. In a way it was fortunate, Seward
thought, that Frances was not there: she would have let peal a great hallelujah
at the thought of eradicating what she kept calling "this great moral evil."
And if emancipation were presented as some great moral decision, rather
than a military necessity forced on a grudging government, the majority of
the north would rebel.
They rode on, each turning the matter over in his mind. Welles adverted to
it again before they reached the cemetery,  and when Seward suggested it
needed much more deliberation, Lincoln said only, "Something must be
done."
Seward set aside the politics for a moment to weigh the foreign-policy effect
of such a move. In England, most workingmen would embrace American
abolition and perhaps block the government's inclination to aid the Confeder-
acy now that a long war seemed assured. On the other hand, people in En-
gland and France would be repelled by anything that smacked of a call for
slave uprisings, and the rape of white women by rampaging blacks. He would
need Thurlow Weed's reading of the Europeans on that.
Weed would also want to know why Lincoln had chosen Seward and
Welles to discuss it with first. Why not Father Blair? Seward looked around;
none of the Biairs was present at this funeral, perhaps because of an aversion
to hypocrisy; they all hated Stanton. But the Biairs would not be consulted
first on emancipation, Seward assumed, because the conservative element,
which included Attorney General Bates, would likely oppose the proposition.
On the other hand, Lincoln would not likely turn to Chase first, because that
ally of the radicals would undoubtedly be for it, to the extent of letting one
and all know he was bringing it about. Same with abolitionist Stanton, though
he would be more circumspect.
No; Seward and Welles were the men in the center of this Cabinet to whom
Lincoln would turn for unbiased judgment. This was no sudden, emotional
idea that occurred on the way to a burial; the President was looking for a way
to counter his military disappointment and respond to the radicals without
roiling his own conservative center.
"You're not thinking of arming the slaves, are you?" Welles asked.
"Not at present," the President answered. "Arming former slaves would
produce dangerous, perhaps fatal, dissatisfaction in our army, and do more
injury than good."
Seward noted the "not at present"even the most extreme of radical pro-
posals was not beyond possibility in time. He tested to see how deeply the
President had thought this through: "What if this proclamation brings thou-
sands of Africans into our lines?"
"No negroes taken and escaping during the war should be returned to
slavery," Lincoln said, tempering that rejection of old fugitive-slave laws with
"but no inducements are to be held out to them to come into our lines. They
already come faster than we can provide for them and are becoming an
embarrassment to the government."
Seward noted Lincoln's care in shifting his earlier positions, and concluded
he must have been chewing it over since his return from Harrison's Landing.
Had McClellan said or done anything there to trigger this move of Lincoln's
now? Seward knew from the Biairs that General McClellan felt strongly it
would be a mistake to tamper with slavery where it exists. However, if Mc-
Clellan was a military loser, his political strategy would lose as well.
"Think about it," Lincoln repeated as they neared the cemetery. "The time
has arrived when we must determine whether the slave element should be for
or against us."
That puzzled Seward. Did Lincoln think that the slaves in the South would
withhold their labor on the plantations and thereby cripple the Confederacy?
Or was he unaware of the terrors of a slave rebellion, shocking and revolting
the civilized world, thereby giving the leaders of England and France the
chance they were looking for to come to the aid of the South?
The Secretary of State feared that Lincoln, buffeted by the failures of the
military and the storming of the radicals, was moving too far ahead of na-
tional sentiment. "Not a word to anyone," he agreed aloud, repeating the
President's admonition, hoping Lincoln would keep this thought to himself
lest some monumental mistake be made.
The procession was at the cemetery. Seward motioned Lincoln to go on
ahead. The President, walking alone, followed Stanton behind the white coffin
to the grave.
CHAPTER 4
DYING SOMETIME

Before breakfast on Monday morningbefore the week really beganOrville
Browning paid a call on Anna Carroll. The senator told himself the purpose
of his visit was to drop off his latest speeches, which she had helped prepare,
but he knew she would be available to discuss political strategy in the waning
days of the session.
"Will your friend Lincoln veto the bill?" she asked, handing him a cup of
coffee. He sipped gratefully at first, then more slowly. It tasted terrible; Miss
Carroll was no cook.
"He says he's leaning that way," Browning said. "But he doesn't want to
split the party."
"You told him about our idea for a Union party?"
"I did, and he seemed to like it." In reality, Lincoln had not shown more
than modest interest in the idea, but certainly it made sense to put together
the conservative Republicans, the war Democrats, and Miss Carroll's old
Know-Nothing friends under the rubric of a Union party. Such a coalition
would freeze out the radical Republicans bent on abolition and a long war of
subjugation.
"Orville, never forgetmost people in this country today are in favor of
the Union as it was, the Constitution as it is. They're against this confiscation
bill, taking away property, arming the freed slaves."
Browning agreed. He admired Miss Carroll, though she was too strictly
business when it came to politics. Most men resented her. He could see how
Lincoln could become irritated with Miss Carroll's damnable persistence but
would admire her withal. Not many peopleand very few womencould be
so helpful in figuring out legal arguments, then writing and circulating them
far and wide. He took a swallow of coffee and grimaced; no wonder she never
married.
"There is only one remedy for the evils upon us," she continued, in that
way he found so didactically charming. "Only one way to save the country.
That is, by antagonizing the abolitionists, by some unequivocal, unmistakable
act. He has to veto confiscation, and force his Cabinet, Chase and Stanton
included, to go along."
"I told Lincoln that this decision would be either his victory over the
radicals or his defeat by them," Browning reported. "And I'll tell him that
again in a few minutes, if he hasn't decided. It's one way or the other: sign or
veto."
"I wonder." She put her face in her hands, elbows on the kitchen table, and
pondered. She rose and fetched a piece of white biscuit. "This is hardtack,
what the soldiers eat. Have you tried it? Stays fresh forever. Watch your
teeth."
"What did you mean, 1 wonder'? The President is boxed in; he must either
go one way or the other, Anna. This is the moment of decision."
"Senator Fessenden has been talking to Chase," she informed him. "You
know the Senate far better than I do, Orville, but I hear they're looking for a
way out."
It bothered Browning that this woman knew more about the maneuverings
of the senators than he did. Bill Fessenden of Maine headed the committee
that kept an eye on the Treasury; he was an anti-slavery man, but considered
one of the more reasonable radicals. Browning knew that Fessenden would
have preferred no confiscation legislation at all; like him, the senator from
Maine thought that should be left to Union generals in the field. He could
understand Fessenden searching for a way to avoid forcing Lincoln to veto
the legislation, but where did Chase fit in this?
"I thought Chase was an abolitionist," he said to the lady, and tentatively
took a nibble of the biscuit. It was like stone. "I should have thought he'd be
urging Lincoln to sign the bill, and urging Wade and the others to fight for
it."
"Well, Chase is not altogether disloyal to the President," she said. When
Browning gave her a funny look, she laughed and said, "I suppose he has his
own reasons, but whatever they are, Chase wants a compromise here."
"Too late for that, the bill's been passed. Seward and Weed favor a veto,"
Browning told her, "and so do the Biairs, and Bates. And so does Lincoln's
best friendnamely, me. I don't see how he can wriggle out of this one."
"The President loses either way," she said, cocking her head analytically.
"If he signs that bill to abolish slavery wherever the Union army goes, Lin-
coln hands over his control of the slavery issue to. the Congress. Ben Wade
would effectively represent the North, and the South would become a distinct
people resisting an invader. Jeff Davis, Breckinridge, all "those traitors would
be seen down there as patriots."
"He must not sign that bill." Browning was certain of that.
"On the other hand, if Lincoln vetoes the confiscation bill, he splits the
Republican Party just before this fall's elections." She shook her head.
"That's not like Lincoln. He'd prefer to keep the issue to himself and keep the
party together at the same time."
Browning pulled back his cheek and tried to crack the rocklike hardtack
with his molars. "Our soldiers exist on these biscuits? God help them. I think
you're mistaken, Annathe Congress goes home tomorrow. No time left for
a compromise. We cannot change the bill, nor can Lincolnit's up or down."
"Could you sustain his veto in the Senate?"
"Yes. And if that is in doubt, Lincoln just has to put the bill in his pocket
and let the Congress go home without signing it. It won't become law." The
pocket veto might be the best strategy, even if it drove Ben Wade to heights of
fury until December, when the Congress came back in session.
She pulled some papers out of the cabinet and pushed them across the
table. "Here are a few thoughts for your speeches," she said modestly. The
Senator looked them over hungrily for what could be used in that day's
debate about the admission of West Virginia as a new free state. He forgave
her for the hardtack and coffee.
Twenty minutes later, Browning was at the Executive Mansion. Lincoln
was not in his office. Young Hay told him the President was alone in his
library, writing, and had left orders to deny entry to everybody, but of course
that did not apply to Senator Browning. The senator went down the hallway
and looked in on his friend. The President was at a map, peering at the
markings of forces arrayed on the Peninsula, and seemed pleased at the dis-
traction.
Browning handed him the copy of the confiscation bill passed by the Sen-
ate. "Lincoln, this is a violation of the Constitution and ought to be vetoed."
Lincoln read the bill as if for the first time, frowning.
"Your course on this bill will determine whether you are to control the
radicals," Browning told his friend, "or they are to control you. There is a
tide in the affairs of men"
"Taken at the flood," Lincoln murmured, showing he caught the Shake-
spearean allusion, "shallows and miseries."
"By vetoing abolition, you will raise a storm of enthusiasm for the cause of
union in the border states worth a hundred thousand muskets." Browning
could tell that Lincoln was not impressed with that prospect; the attitude of
the border-state men the other day had depressed him. "If you approve it, on
the other hand, I fear our friends in Kentucky will no longer sustain the
Union cause."
"McClellan says that about the army," Lincoln observed.
Lincoln always reacted better to incentives than threats. "A veto would
secure a unity of sentiment and purpose," Browning assured him, "that will
bring to our support every loyal Democrat and consolidate all truly loyal men
in one partythe Union party."
"I want to think about that, Orville." He dropped the bill on a table. "I
promise I'll give it the most profound consideration."
"You look careworn, Lincoln. How are you?"
"Tolerably well." He did not look well, tolerably or otherwise. Browning
was troubled by the President's appearance; Lincoln's complexion was nor-
mally sallow, but today the skin was almost gray.
"I've never seen you look this way, my friend." Browning went around the
library table, reached up and laid a hand on the bony shoulder. "With all
these troubles crowding in, I fear your health is suffering."
Lincoln took his hand, pressed it, and surprised his friend with a tenderly
spoken "Browning, I must die sometime."
"Your fortunes, Mr. President, are bound up with those of the country."
He had to shake Lincoln out of this mood, and patriotism was the most
logical route. "Disaster to one would be disaster to the other."
"I don't know about that," Lincoln said, sadness in his voice. He sat down
with a profound sigh.
Browning, seeing the suffering in his friend's eyes, could not bring himself
to talk further about the veto or any other Senate business. "Do all you can to
preserve your health," the senator said. He reached out and took Lincoln by
his shoulders and squeezed hard, the way he had when Willie died and the
numbed and shattered father seemed to need physical contact with humanity.
The two men parted, tears in their eyes.
"Sir." Hay, the second secretary, was speaking to him. Browning biinked,
wiped his eyes, and looked at a letter and an attachment Hay was handing
him. "If you're going to the Senate now, would you present these to the
president pro tern?"
He looked at the attachment first. "It looks like a bill." Presidents did not
submit legislation to the Congress. He read it warily, then brightened. "This
is a rehash of the compensated emancipation measure that never went any-
where." Lincoln's idea was apparently to make a nice gesture by sending a
substitute for the bill he was going to veto. "I get it. Okay, I'll give it to
Solomon Foot, the president pro tern. He'll bury it."
Browning then looked at the letter, which he found puzzling.
"It's an official request that the Senate stay in session one extra day,"
explained Hay. "I'll bring an identical letter to the Speaker of the House."
Browning still did not fathom Lincoln's motive, but did not want to go
back at that moment to ask why the President needed the Congress in session
an extra day. Perhaps Lincoln was too steeped in melancholy to face any
decisions that morning.
CHAPTER 5
NOT SO FAR TRUST ME
Senator Benjamin Franklin Wade sensed a move to head off his plan to force
Lincoln to free the rebels' slaves.
In the Capitol, on the Senate floor, Solomon Foot of VermontPresident
pro tern of the Senateaccepted a letter handed to him by Orville Browning,
looked at it, frowned, and signaled to Ben Wade to meet him in the cloak-
room.
Wade walked back, tapping Zack Chandler and Henry Wilson on the way;
with the confiscation bill finally passed in both houses, Wade suspected Lin-
coln would come up with some last-minute trick to cheat the Congress of the
honor of striking down slavery. The sniveling substitute bill sent up to the
Hill by the man in the Executive Mansion, delivered by his pet horse, Brown-
ing, was speared by Wade and promptly tabled. Trust Lincoln to try to set a
precedent with a presidential introduction of a bill in Congress; the man's
arrogance was infuriating. Wade was determined to prevent Lincoln's half
measure of buying up slaves from now till Doomsday from ever coming to a
vote; now, at long last, after the defeat of the cowardly McClellan by a ragtag
bunch of rebels, Wade was certain the North was ready for serious anti-
slavery legislation.
Arms folded, Wade awaited Foot, who came hurrying up with letter in
hand. "Message from the President, an informal request," said the president
pro tern. Foot read it to them: " 'Sir: Please inform the Senate that I shall be
obliged if they will postpone the adjournment at least one day beyond the
time which I understand to be now fixed for it.' "
"That's all?" Chandler asked.
" 'Your obedient servant, Abraham Lincoln,' " Foot added.
"I smell a rat," said Wade. The President's request, without a reason, was
disrespectful on its face. Lincoln had something up his sleeve. "He thinks the
Congress comes and goes at his whim. Tell the President to go to hell. I'll get
Tad Stevens over in the other body to tell him the same." Wade could count
on Thaddeus Stevens, the power of the House of Representatives, to strike
back hard at any attempt by Lincoln to water down the dispossession of
slaveholders passed by Congress.
"Maybe it would be better to smoke him out," Solomon Foot observed.
"I'll ask Lincoln what he has in mind."
"He has in mind making us appear to be his goddamn handmaidens,"
snorted Chandler.
Wade, on second thought, decided to go along with Foot's suggestion,
provided the Senate letter was sufficiently surly. He took out his pad and
pencil and drafted a reply.
Senator Foot read Wade's draft aloud to the others: " 1 am advised that it
will be exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to postpone the adjournment
unless some senator can say it is necessary. To this end, several senators desire
me to ask that you will state the ground or reason of such necessity.' "
"That'll show him," said Chandler.
Within an hour, a messenger brought back Lincoln's response. The four
senators gathered to go over it.
Foot handed the note, in Lincoln's tight handwriting, to Wade, who looked
it over first and growled, "Our friend downtown is getting a little testy." He
read: " 1 am sorry senators could not so far trust me as to believe I had some
real cause for wishing them to remain.' "
"Maybe my note was a little harsh," Foot worried.
"Shut up," snapped Chandler. "Keep reading what that baboon has to say,
Ben."
" 1 am considering a bill which came to me only late in the day yesterday,
and the subject of which has perplexed Congress for more than half a year.' "
"Confiscation," said Henry Wilson, "couldn't come as a surprise to him."
"He's threatening a veto," Wade told them. He read: " 1 may return it
with objections; and if I should, I wish Congress to have the opportunity of
obviating the objections, or of passing it into a law notwithstanding them.
That is all.' "
"Did he say, 'That is all,' " asked Wilson, "or is that you saying it, Ben?"
"He wrote it, right here. 'That is all.' Damnation, it's enough."
"He's going to veto the confiscation bill," said Foot.
Wade glumly added, "and blame us for not making the changes he needed
to sign it."
"Unless we make those changes," Fessenden interjected. Wade considered
the Maine senator a flaccid ally in the anti-slavery fight, like Wilson, who
voted right but did not have the passion to punish the slaveholders. Fessenden
had softened the bill already, removing the death penalty for treason, making
it impossible to suitably punish the slavocrats who had plunged the country
into bloody war.
"I would make the bill stronger if I could," Wade fumed. "When I have
brought a traitor who is seeking my life and my property to termsand when
I go bankrupt trying to put him down1 have no scruples about taking his
property to indemnify myself. Including his slaves."
"Lincoln's inviting us to make a few changes," Fessenden pressed, "to keep
him from having to veto it."
"For God's sake, the bill's been passed! Congress has worked its will! Who
does he think he is?" Wade saw this clearly as Lincoln's latest attempt to
usurp the power of the Congress.
"He is, after all, the President," Fessenden began, but Wade cut him off
with contempt.
"The President cannot lay down and fix the principles upon which a war
shall be conducted," he told Fessenden. "It's for Congress to lay down the
rules and regulations by which the Executive shall be governed in conducting
a war."
"Thinks he's a goddamn dictator," added Chandler.
"Saying that may make you feel better, Zack," said Fessenden, "but it isn't
going to free any slaves. Lincoln wants to deal. I say let's deal."
Wade was sure Lincoln wanted more than to deal. Now, finally, with public
sentiment turning against the go-slow, pro-slavery generals Lincoln had put
in command, and with more of the people beginning to realize that the war
was about slavery and not merely Union, Lincoln wanted to appear to be
leading the Congress.
The legalistic President had been dragging his feet against abolition all
along, Wade thought bitterly, up to this very morning; with defeat of his
pusillanimity staring at him, the man in the Mansion was suddenly seeking to
appear to be the Great Abolitionist.
"I'll stand for no mousing around the President," he told Fessenden, "no
crawling before the White House throne."
"I don't like your insinuation, Senator"
"Maybe we ought to have a committee on vetoes," Wade baited him with
sarcasm. "We ought to have a committee to wait on the President whenever
we send him a bill, to know what his royal pleasure is. You've been faint-
hearted on this bill from the start."
"I have a right to my convictions," Fessenden flared, "and no man has a
right to call me to account for them."
"The people of your state of Maine want an end to slavery"
"And no man has a right to threaten me with the judgment of the people of
Maine," Fessenden shot back. "I damned near had a son killed at Shiloh,
Wade, and, what's more, when General Hunter challenged the President with
an emancipation decree a few months ago, another son of mine formed a
regiment of negro soldiers. The Fessenden family doesn't have to answer to
you or anybody else about our dedication to the Union or to the cause of
ending human slavery. If you want to call what I do in that cause 'mousing
around,' you can make your impotent speeches in the Senate until you're blue
in the face. I will try to find a way to get a bill signed into law."
Wade had to admire the man from Maine for that outburst, but he would
give no ground: "Fessenden, you're missing the point of Lincoln's little trick.
If emancipation comes from the Congress, as it surely does right now, it sets a
precedentgives us the supremacy that surely belongs to the Congress over
the conduct of the war."
"And after the war too," added Chandler, correctly. Only if Congress
dominated postwar policy would the South be treated as a conquered prov-
ince, and would former slaves be given their full rights as human beings.
Wade was sure of this: If the Democrats, or the Republican Biairs and their
ilk, took over reconstruction, the blacks would be downtrodden for a century.
"You do what you like; I answer only to the people of Maine," Fessenden
said. "I'll see what Lincoln wants changed."
"We don't have to give him everything," Foot put in.
Wade stared down at his shoes. Last year, before Congress was in session,
Lincoln had assumed the war powers that properly belonged to the Congress.
Now, as this session of Congress was ending, Lincoln was moving to gain
total control of the slavery issue. What was he going to demand be cut out of
the confiscation act? Anna Carroll, in her Reply to Sumner pamphlet, had
made a fuss about the provision confiscating the property of people in rebel-
lion before the passage of the act, complaining it would be ex post facto law.
Of course, it wasserved the traitors right for killing tens of thousands of
loyal troopsand the Constitution would have to bend a little, as it had been
bent when Lincoln took it on himself to suspend habeas corpus. What else?
"If he tries to take out the forfeiture provision," he told Fessenden, "tell
him it's no deal. The traitors give up their property, homes and all, for all
timewe don't give it back to traitors' heirs. We'll use that confiscated prop-
erty to pay for the war."
"I still don't see how we can amend the bill at this stage," Henry Wilson
wondered. "It's been passed. We don't have time to pass another. He can't
veto parts of it, that's not the system; it's all or nothing."
"He wants control of the slavery issue," Wade warned. "We've taken it
away from him, and he wants it back. And if he gets it, Congress will have no
control of the war."
"Or the peace," added Chandler. "Lincoln isn't going to ship four million
Africans back to Africa, no matter what he says. And the North won't take
them. Those poor black souls will just sit in the South, supposedly free, but
hungry and ignorant and in worse chains than ever."
Solomon Foot left to see the Speaker of the House about granting Lincoln
the extra day. Wade could not stop Fessenden from going to sound out the
President's desires, but it galled him to be bluffed out of a position so labori-
ously won.
This session of Congress, no thanks to Lincoln, had changed the very
character of the country. Wade and his followingnot just radicals, either
had won four great victories that Southerners had been blocking in Congress
for generations. He had rammed through the Homestead Act, opening the
West to settlers over the protests of some Eastern industrialists who wanted
cheap labor close to home. Wade then turned against Westerners and the
churches and pushed through the land-grant college bill, establishing the idea
that the nation as a whole had a stake in higher education. Wade of Ohio had
followed that with the Pacific Railroad Act, recognizing that private capital
could not do the job of cutting through an uninhabited continent. These were
the acts of a nation, not a committee of states, and he knew that Benjamin
Franklin Wade, not Abraham Lincoln, was the guiding genius of this national
transformation; now, at the moment of triumph, when the greatest act of the
session was at stake and the issue of slavery was to be settled forever, he
suspected that the President was pulling a fast one to weaken and cheapen the
triumph.
Worse yet, Wade had a hunch that Lincoln would try something once
Congress was out of session to overwhelm and nullify the Confiscation Act.
Lincoln was showing himself to be the sort who would try to seize absolute
control of the war clear through to the return of Congress in early December.
Either the President was a shrewder politician than Wade had first thought,
or else that baboon from Illinois had learned a lot in the past year.
CHAPTER 6
THE VETO THAT WAS NOT
"Stroke of genius," said Old Man Blair. He and Lincoln were on their horses,
riding slowly up to the Capitol on a hazy Thursday morning, followed only
by Marshal Lamon. Blair was delighted that the President had asked him to
accompany him on his foray to the Congress on the final day of the session. It
would be good for the radicals to see that the Biairs were in the saddle with
Lincoln at a crucial moment. He had alerted Frank to leave his seat in the
House and to wait for them in the little room that was the President's official
office at the Capitol, near the rotunda. The office was a courtesy provided the
Executive branch by the Congress, primarily to show that the center of gov-
ernmental power was on Capitol Hill.
"I thought you'd appreciate it," Lincoln said, grinning. He sat tall in his
saddle, legs dangling to low stirrups, stovepipe hat firmly on his head, and
seemed to Blair to be about two feet taller than he was. "Fessenden turned
out to be helpful. He and Orville Browning and I had breakfast this morning,
and they went on ahead."
It was 9:30 A.M. on the last day of the session, the extra day the President
had requested. Lincoln told the Biairs he wanted the Senate and House to
convene and pass a joint resolution "explaining" the confiscation bill. The
President would be on the spot to sign the Act then and there. The ingenious-
ness of the Lincoln tactic was its amendment of the act without actually
amending it. The accompanying explanation would be treated by the Presi-
dent as part of the bill itself, shaping it to presidential specifications. Never
had a President so thoroughly interjected himself into the lawmaking process,
going beyond the mere threat of a veto.
"You got out the ex post facto impediment?"
Lincoln nodded. "Yes, there'll be no confiscation until every rebel has had
fair warning. And no blood attainder, eitherTad Stevens, I hear, had a hard
time swallowing that."
Blair approved. Property seized from rebels would be returned to their
families after their deaths, as the Constitution provided, in the wisdom drawn
from protection against the plundering of kings. Anna Carroll had made that
point about a "blood attainder" in her work on the veto message for Bates.
The old man made a political calculation. This meant that the losers' prop-
erty could not be used to pay the costs of the war. Who, then, would pay?
Surely not the winners; it would have to be the next generation. He resolved
to let the world know it was Chase, the conniving bastard, who had come up
with the unpopular idea of an income taxbut to be paid later, long after the
war ended, by generations that would profit from the sacrifices of these years,
not by the generation that fought and bled.
Blair wondered if Lincoln had forced the radicals to the wall. "What about
the enlistment of Africans as soldiers?" Blair called up to the man riding by
his side. "Ben Wade and Tad Stevens wanted that badly."
"I went along on that. Maybe it's time. We don't have to arm them right
away."
Blair liked the way the action had been cloaked. It would not seem to be
Lincoln's doing. The President appeared to be merely going along with the
will of Congress, forcing the hotheads to concede on some of their more
outrageous demands, and helping recruitment, which was suffering in the
wake of the summer's defeats.
Stanton had blundered badly on the suspension of recruitment, Blair was
pleased to recall. He had canceled recruitment when it was brisk, and was
now forced to plead with governors for troops, threatening to arrest young
men heading up to Canada to evade service. The patriarch of the Blair clan
marveled at the way Lincoln had positioned himself alongside, just a little
behind, public sentiment: drifting toward abolition, not too fast, strictly on
military necessity, able to step back from it if the war turned in the Union's
favor or if Northern sentiment reacted sharply against the radicals.
"Frankly, I thought you were going to veto the bill," he said to Lincoln.
Andy Jackson probably would have done that just to show Congress who was
boss.
"Still can," the President said, tapping his stovepipe, where he evidently
had stashed his veto message, "if the resolution explaining the bill doesn't
pass."
They dismounted at the Capitol steps, handing the horses to Lamon.
Biair's son Frank was at the entrance, eagerly awaiting them.
"The Senate has just acted, Mr. President," said Congressman Blair. "The
explanation resolution has passed. The House will be voting in a few min-
utes."
"Did you make a speech, Frank?" the old man asked him.
"No."
"Good." The boy was learning to think ahead. Blair, himself steadfastly
against the folly of abolition, wanted his son Frank to go with the tide of
public sentiment and not allow himself later to be portrayed as having been a
party to any weakening of abolition measures. Blair could see what Lincoln
liked to call "the signs of the times." In a few years, maybe in '68, Frank
would be the Blair running for President, and by then anybody who had
opposed freedom for the slaves during the war would have a difficult time
getting the Republican nomination.
When the Biairs and Lincoln came to the President's office in the Capitol,
the elder Blair signaled Frank to leave them alone. The young man went back
to the House chamber. The President made himself at home in the room that
the Congress had kindly provided the leader of the sister branch of govern-
ment.
Lincoln took off his hat, pulled out what Blair assumed to be his veto
message, and put both hat and paper on the desk. It was nearly 10 A.M. The
President sat down to await the action of the House. Blair sat in a corner,
steepled his fingers, and remained quiet. Ten minutes passed, and nothing was
said.
The old man spent the time trying to figure out a way to damage Chase in
Lincoln's eyes. The rebels were the immediate enemy of the nation, but
Salmon P. Chase was the ultimate enemy of the Biairs. Chase's man, Jay
Cookethe Philadelphia financier who was making too much money out of
his favored position in the financing of the warwas buying newspapers in
Missouri. That meant Chase would try to undermine Frank Blair in his home
base.
Stanton had turned out to be no bargain, either, undercutting Montgomery
Blair in the Cabinet and undermining McClellan in the field. Chase and
Stanton were thick as thieves these days, the old man mused, meeting with
the radicals and joining them in calling the Biairs and other sensible men
"Philistines." The old man was coming to cordially despise the Treasury
Secretary: Chase was a man who thought the country owed him the presi-
dency and, in his supreme arrogance, was willing to do anything to bring it
about.
A clumping sound could be heard in the hallway outside. In a moment, the
door, left invitingly ajar, was pushed open. The brooding face and crippled
form of Thaddeus Stevens appeared in the doorway.
The light was slashing in from the window behind Lincoln, into the radical
Congressman's eyes; he biinked and held his hand before his face. "That you,
Lincoln? I've got this damned weaseling explanation you extorted from us."
Blair looked at the President, who nodded politely to the power of the
House and said nothing.
Stevens dropped his hand and came forward, seeming to the old man to
slam down purposely on his clubfoot, and laid the joint resolution on the
desk. "We now construe this bill to mean that nobody is to be punished for
any act committed in the rebellion before the bill's passage," the Congressman
said. "That's what you wanted, is it? To let all the traitors off scot-free?"
"I shouldn't wonder," said Lincoln vaguely.
"I got eighty-four votes for confiscation," said Stevens of the darkened
brow. "We passed it eighty-four to forty-two. A year ago, I couldn't muster
fifty votes to free the slaves of traitors. We've come a long way, no thanks to
you."
"It's the war," said Lincoln. "I'm grateful to Senator Fessenden for"
"Fessenden has too much of the vile ingredient called conservatism," Ste-
vens interrupted, "which is worse than secession." He turned to Blair. "Oh,
for six months' resurrection in the flesh of your stern old Jackson! He would
abolish slavery as the cause and the support of the insurrection; he would arm
the free people of color, as he did at New Orleans; he would march into the
heart of slavedom to put weapons into every free man's hands. Do you deny
that, old man?"
"Andy Jackson wouldn't put up with such impudence from the likes of
you," Blair snapped. He disliked the haters, almost to the, point of hating
them, and Thaddeus Stevens was the quintessential hater; the old man
thought him obsessed with his need for revenge on all slaveholders, possessed
with some perverse notion that the black race deserved not merely tolerance
and freedom, but actual equality with whites. God help the cause of patching
together a Union if such as Stevens wrested power from Lincoln.
"We are doing only what is needed to end the war," Lincoln offered mildly.
"Our object," Stevens said bitterly, "should be not only to end this war
now, but to prevent its recurrence." Across the desk from the President,
continuing to stand while Lincoln sat, the man seeking to be scourge of the
South put his hand on the desk and leaned forward. "You know that slavery
is the cause of this war. So long as it exists we cannot have a solid Union.
Patch up a compromise now and leave this germ of evil, it would soon again
override the whole South, even if you freed three fourths of the slaves."
"How I wish the border states would accept my proposition," Lincoln
replied evenly, referring to the substitute bill he had sent up that all agreed
had no hope of passage. "Then you, Stevens, and all of us, would not have
lived in vain. The labor of your life would be crowned with successyou
would live to see the end of slavery."
"Forty more years of hell for four million people," Stevens spat back, "and
you call that 'gradual emancipation'? I call it ignominious surrender to the
South."
"What are you suggesting?"
"Don't just confiscate and liberate the slaves of rebels, Lincoln. Go beyond
this bill, with its pusillanimous explanationliberate the slaves of all, right
now."
Blair sensed that Lincoln did not want to clash with Stevens on his extreme
abolitionism; the purpose of this visit to the Hill was to get and sign the
watering-down resolution and bill. He put in, "What of the loyal slave states?
Should we break faith with them?"
"The real patriots who are still loyal to the Union," Stevens told him,
"would willingly lay the sacrifice of their property on the altar of their coun-
try."
"It's a terrible weapon," Blair said for Lincoln, "asking for a black upris-
ing, three or four millions of them"
"Instruments of war are not selected on account of their harmlessness,"
Stevens interrupted. "You choose the cannon that has the longest range. You
throw the shell that will kill the most men by its explosion. You grind your
bayonet to the sharpest edge." Stevens was pale, shaking with conviction.
Blair was worried that the man would have a heart seizure on the spot.
"You're trying to turn this war for the Union into a second revolution,"
Blair told him. Up to now, Blair had assumed Stevens was radical but reason-
able. When Lincoln saw to it that a rider had been tacked on to the bill
freeing the slaves in D.C. and providing them steamship tickets to Liberia or
Haiti, Stevens had added a half million dollars on the appropriation. He was a
good friend of colonization. But now Stevens was showing himself to be
worse than Wade. His black concubine must be driving him to such a lust for
vengeance.
"Nothing approaching the present policy will subdue the rebels," Stevens
said slowly. "Whether we shall find anybody with a sufficient grasp of mind,
and sufficient moral courage, to treat this war as a radical revolution and
remodel our institutions, I doubt."
"That would involve the desolation of the South," Blair began.
The Congressmen seized on his words. "Yes, exactly that, Blairdesolation
as well as emancipation, and a re-peopling of half the continent. This ought to
be done, now."
"I am going to sign the confiscation bill and the joint resolution together,"
said Lincoln, turning to business, "since they are substantially one." He
seemed to debate with himself for a moment, then reached inside his hat and
took out a copy of the draft veto message. "Before I was informed of the
passage of the explanatory resolution, Stevens, I prepared a draft of a message
stating my objections."
Blair was puzzled. What did the President have in mind? He'd won. The
Congress had backed off and met his objections. Did Lincoln plan some form
of congressional humiliation? Surely he would not now make public his veto
message, since he was signing the bill.
Lincoln signed both the bill and his veto message and handed both docu-
ments to Stevens with the cool and official words, "I am transmitting a copy
herewith."
Stevens, white-faced, looked at the long veto message in Lincoln's neat
script. "All your lawyer's reasons why the bill is no good," he choked. "What
colossal gall. You're for it and against it at the same time."
The President was impassive. Stevens turned to the door, papers clenched
in a fist, and spun round on his crippled leg before he left. "I'll have your
damned message read to the House, as I must. But I'll lead the members out
during the reading, and I'll be damned if anybody will offer a resolution to so
much as print it. Wade is rightthe country is going to hell with you in the
White House!"
When the clubfoot dragged himself out, Blair rose from his seat in the
corner, picked up Lincoln's hat, and handed it to the President. "That's what
Jackson would have done," he told him. "Rubbed their noses in it." He could
not resist sending a final shaft: "That viper Stevens is your man Chase's
closest political ally. Watch your back."
Lincoln shrugged that off and picked up his hat, not smiling. Blair assumed
he was worried about whether he had gone too far in setting forth his non-
veto veto message.
As they walked out into the July sun, Blair observed that there would
surely be an exodus from the city on the weekend, with the adjournment of
Congress. He suggested that the wifeless President come out to Silver Spring.
The tall man sighed, no, he had a delegation of senators comingSumner,
Wilson, Trumbull"the same damned three fellers again," with some substi-
tutions, to work out an order based on the Confiscation Act. General Dix was
coming in on Saturday, too, Lincoln mentioned, to get instructions about his
prisoner exchange.
The elder Blair frowned. The notion struck him that Lincoln would not
ordinarily let appointments like that keep him from spending the weekend
away from the heat and smell in the low-lying Mansion. What else did Lin-
coln have up his sleeve? The President, it seemed to Blair, was inclined to
keep his own counsel these days. A year ago, he would not have been so
remote; now he liked to play a lone hand. That was not good for the Blair
influence, but the old man could not think of much he could do about it.
"I think I'll get the whole family together for a few days," Blair told him as
they mounted their horses. "You won't miss Montgomery on Monday, will
you?"
Lincoln thought about that. "It would be helpful to have the judge at the
Cabinet meeting Monday," he said at last. "And Tuesday, the twenty-second,
especially."
"He'll try to be there." The old man fished for the reason.
"Tell him it could be important."
Blair gave up fishing. "Montgomery will be there."

CHAPTER 7
AN INSIDE SOURCE
"He's up to something," Greeley said to his managing editor. They were
reading the telegraphed text of Lincoln's halfhearted approval of the Confis-
cation Act, following the strangely backtracking joint resolution by the Con-
gress. "I do not trust that man, Sydney. He's like Seward. Quicksilver."
Sydney Gay did not wholly trust Lincoln's dedication to abolition, either,
but the newsman was more concerned with what the President was likely to
do than what he should do. Great moral guidance for the nation was
Greeley's affair; it was Gay's job to make sure Tribune readers knew what
was really going on. And on emancipation, Gay was not sure; Adams Hill
was the best reporter in Washington, but all these machinations about the
Confiscation Act had taken the Tribune's Washington office by surprise too.
"Lincoln is dragging his feet," pronounced Greeley. "I predict a faithless,
insincere, grudging"the editor groped for an expressive word"higgling
execution of the Confiscation Act, which is a most righteous and vital mea-
sure."
"Still," offered Gay, "if he permits generals to enlist and arm negroes, as
this new act permits, that'll be a big step"
"He won't," said Greeley with certitude. "I have that from both Chase and
Stanton, who want him to arm the blacks. Lincoln keeps telling them no."
"You trust their word, Mr. Greeley?"
"More than Lincoln's," said the man in the white round-brimmed hat.
"You'll see, Lincoln won't carry out this act. He'll tell his generals to hire
negroes as laborers or something. Anything to avoid antagonizing the trai-
tors. He'll see to it that this Confiscation Act is not worth a damaged Del-
monico shinplaster."
The editor rose and strode around the room. Gay remained in his chair in
the center of the huge corner office, twisting his body to keep his boss in view.
"I'm going to demand that he write a brief, frank, stirring proclamation,"
Greeley said, composing an editorial aloud, "recognizing the Confiscation-
Emancipation Act as the law of the land and the basis of a new war policy.
And no more of this flimflam from half the army officers who are more or less
in sympathy with the rebellion. Lincoln must instruct each of them to rigor-
ously enforce the Confiscation Act's provisions." He sliced the air: "Enough
of this McClellanite foot-dragging! We need more moral giants in uniform,
and we need this law backed up with an official proclamation."
"Have you considered the possibility," Gay asked, "that Mr. Lincoln may
be going in that direction? Toward abolition?"
"I know more about Lincoln's private plans Jthan you, Sydney, and he's
not. Seward is whispering in his ear that it would cause the blacks to rise up
and attack every white woman in the South, horrifying the world."
Gay thought the possibility of a Lincoln move toward abolition had to be
considered. "Did you read the Times this morning?" He produced a copy,
with a Washington dispatch from one of Henry Raymond's men reporting the
rejection of Lincoln's plea by border-state Congressmen. He read a line that
troubled him: " It seems not improbable that the President considers the
time near at hand when slavery must go to the wall.' "
"What the hell does Henry Raymond and the Times know?" scorned Gree-
ley. "Sycophants. They had McClellan winning a great victory in the Penin-
sula when my man Page knew that coward was running away from Rich-
mond."
Gay recalled how he had to press Greeley to run "my man Page's" report
that day, but said only: "I would hate for the Tribune to be caught com-
plaining about no action, if there's big doings in the works."
"What are you getting at, Sydney? I'm a busy man."
"I think we need an inside informant in the White House."
"Adams Hill is not getting the news? Dismiss him."
"No, he's a good reporter. But we need more than a reporter, if we're to
beat Raymond, with his Lincoln connections. We need an intermediary."
"You mean your friend Gilmore," said Greeley. "I won't have it. Lincoln
does not set the editorial policy of the Tribune. "
James Gilmore, whose novel about life in the deep South had caught Lin-
coln's fancy, was a friend of Gay's. Soon after Gay had taken over from
Charles Dana as Tribune managing editor, Gilmore had approached the new
managing editor with a remarkable offer. It seemed that through the good
offices of Robert Walker, the railroader and former Kansas governor who was
a behind-the-scenes power in Washington, Gilmore had proposed to Lincoln
that he be the go-between for the White House and the New York Tribune
whose support Lincoln readily asserted was worth a hundred thousand
soldiers to the Union cause. According to Gilmore, Lincoln had assented to
the proposed arrangement, promising to provide the Tribune with advance
tidbits of news. Greeley had warily consented to Gilmore's scheme, but when
the go-between acted mainly as an apologist for Lincoln's delays on emanci-
pation, Greeley ordered Gay to ignore him.
Gay had not obeyed his boss's order. Privately, away from the offices of the
Tribune, he had arranged to see the Lincoln intermediary whenever Gilmore
came up to New York. Gay had paid for the tidbits with assurances to Gil-
more that he would assuage Greeley's wrath about the foot-dragging Lincoln,
which the managing editor was sure Gilmore passed on to Walker and per-
haps the President. Keeping the channel open cost nothing and might pay off
one day.
"I'd like to use him, Mr. Greeley. We need a direct connection to the White
House. It would give us an edge over Raymond, and we could kill Bennett
and the Herald. "
Greeley was obviously torn. He wanted to beat his rivals, yet did not want
to be charged with compromising the integrity of the Tribune's editorials. "I
won't trim my position," he said grudgingly, which Gay took with a grain of
salt, since Greeley had trimmed more than his share to get ahead in politics.
"You needn't, sir. All we'll tell Gilmore is that if Lincoln enforces the
Confiscation Act vigorouslyincluding arming the negroesthe Tribune will
vigorously support Lincoln's conduct of the war. Which we will anyway."
"That much you can say," Greeley agreed, looking out the window at the
statue of Benjamin Franklin. "Don't bring Gilmore in here to the Tribune
offices, though. You go down to Washington," the editor ordered, adding, "or
continue to see him in the saloon down the street."
CHAPTER 8
SURPRISE SUPPORT

"General Hunter down in Hilton Head wants fifty thousand pairs of scarlet
pantaloons," said Stanton to his visitor from New York. "You know what
for? He wants to arm the slaves who come into his lines and send them into
action against the rebels."
"Dressed in scarlet pantaloons?"
That puzzled Stanton too. "I guess he wants them to stand out on the
battlefield. Or maybe blacks like colorful uniforms. Anyhow, Lincoln won't
let me do it."
It distressed the Secretary of War that the President, now that he had the
congressional authority to enlist escaped slaves, still hung back. Foolish waste
of a potential asset, Stanton thought; the use of slaves propped up the rebel
army. The Africans tilled the Southern soil and manned the rebel factories,
freeing every able-bodied white to fight in the Confederate Army, while the
North had to divert its manpower to such supporting tasks. If only he could
send the word South that escaped blacks would be welcomed into the North-
ern ranks, Stanton was certain an exodus would begin, stripping the rebel
generals of their advantage.
"General Hunter tried to emancipate the slaves all by himself a few months
ago," his visitor reminded him. "No wonder Lincoln worries about him."
"We had to slap Hunter down on that," the Secretary of War said hastily.
"I didn't know about it beforehand, no matter what they say." He assumed
his visitor from New York had heard the rumors of his complicity in embar-
rassing the President. "I countersigned the countermanding order along with
Lincoln."
"Come now, Stanton," his visitor said. "You and I are good Democrats,
and I'm for you. And for Hunter."
Stanton, feeling more isolated than ever before in his life, needed to trust
someone. In the nine days since the funeral of his baby, Stanton had plunged
into work, turning the Western command over to Grant, bringing Halleck
East, disputing McClellan's estimates of how many troops were present for
duty, supporting General John Popethe fiery leader the army neededin
Pope's stern warning to rebel civilians in Virginia that terrible retribution
would follow any guerrilla harassment. During this critical time, Lincoln had
been silent, remote, curiously detached. The President had spent long hours
in the telegraph office next door, mulling over some papers at Major Eckert's
desk, and had not come in to consult with the Secretary of War. That made
Stanton suspicious. Why was Lincoln being so secretive? Was he cooking
something up with the Biairs? Why had Lincoln been so insistent that Stan-
ton be present at the Cabinet meeting set for later in the day?
He impulsively decided to trust the lawyer in his office. Francis Brockholst
Cutting had been a pro-slavery Democrat, but he was a good War Democrat
from New York and a Stanton ally in that state where Seward and Weed and
Greeley held sway among Republicans, and where Sam Barlow and Fernando
Wood were the Democrats trying to make use of McClellan.
"Listen to this letter from General Hunter, Cutting." Stanton pulled it out
of the center drawer of his desk. "He says, 'Please let me have my way on the
subject of slavery. You can censure me, arrest me, dismiss me, hang me if you
will, but permit me to make my mark.' Do you blame me for wanting to send
Hunter his scarlet pantaloons?"
"In the Herald, " his visitor observed, "Bennett says that you and Chase
have been conniving with General Hunter on arming the fugitive slaves, try-
ing to force Lincoln's hand."
"I've already covered that with Lincoln," Stanton said instantly. In the
same folder with the Hunter plea was a copy of a letter from the President to
editor Bennett, which Stanton also read aloud: " 'Stanton mixes no politics
with his duties; knew nothing of General Hunter's proclamation;'this is in
Lincoln's hand, mind you'and he and I alone got up the counter-proclama-
tion.' "
Cutting, who, Stanton saw, was a born conspirator, smiled. "You manipu-
late the President that easily? Do you have Lincoln believing that?"
"He believes what he wants to believe," snapped the Secretary of War, "the
way he believes he can deport all the slaves that are freed to some congenial
clime back in Africa or someplace. It's comfortable .to believe, and has the
practical advantage of cooling off some of the hotheads in Illinois." Stanton
had no doubt that the President had the knack of avoiding worry by con-
structing certain fancies. "Lincoln trusts me, Cutting, because he knows I'm
not running against him for the Republican nomination, like Chase, or
dreaming of a military dictatorship, like McClellan."
"Will Chase stand firm with you on arming the slaves? I know McClellan
is against that."
Stanton nodded yes; Chase was rock-solid on anything to free the negro so
long as it was done by military commanders, and so long as Lincoln got no
credit for it among anti-slavery Republicans. In the brief Cabinet meeting the
day beforethe first one in weekshe and Chase had plumped for letting the
generals outfit fugitive Africans with guns and uniforms, but Lincoln would
go no further than employing them as laborers. The President, timorous as
usual about the border states' attitude, suggested an order promoting coloni-
zation in Haiti, as provided in the Confiscation Act, but backed away when
Chase argued against it. Lincoln struck Stanton as being secretive; why had
the President asked about Montgomery Biair's absence, and called another
Cabinet meeting for this afternoon? Did he have some surprise in store that
required conservative backing? Was he asking to be persuaded to put guns in
black hands? Seward and Welles seemed especially smug; Stanton worried
that they might know something he did not know.
In the light of Lincoln's reluctance to use his new power to arm escaped
slaves, Stanton doubted the President would move decisively to punish the
South politically for its resistance before Richmond. Stanton resolved to keep
up the pressure. Tentatively, he asked Cutting, "You and the other party
people still out to protect the peculiar institution, even now?"
Cutting surprised him with his answer: "Some Democrats have come
around to thinking that the North's only hope is to get behind the anti-
slavery movement. Shouldn't be just the Republicans."
Stanton looked at him sharply: "That just your personal idea?"
"No, the sentiment is spreading. Most Democrats still oppose abolition, the
way I did," Cutting allowed, "but the war's really about slavery, and we
might as well face it. I think it may be a good idea for you to let Hunter have
his scarlet pantaloons."                                               '
Stanton looked at the man hard. Cutting represented a small force that
Lincoln did not know existed: War Democrats moving unexpectedly toward
abolition, not out of any love for Africans but as a practical matter of winning
the war.
"Have you ever met Lincoln?"
"No."
"I'm taking you over to see him right now," the War Secretary announced.
"We have about two hours before the Cabinet meeting. Blair wasn't there
yesterday, and he won't be here today, so we could get something accom-
plished." Stanton did not say that he had assured Blair that nothing of sub-
stance was to be discussed. "You'll tell him Democrats support the arming of
fugitive slaves, but now go further: Why do you think our generals in the field
should be able to set free all slaves in their area of battle?"
Cutting put forward a cautious argument. "I think it would deter England
and France from recognizing the Confederacy. The leaders of those countries
could not go so strongly against popular"
Stanton made a face; Seward would sweep that argument aside.
Cutting stopped. "What is it you want me to say?"
"You're a politician, talk politics. Talk about his beloved border states.
Lincoln thinks that Democrats will go over to the secesh if our generals, on
military necessity, free slaves." Stanton walked to the window, looked across
the street, and talked fast, lawyer to lawyer. "Make the case that Kentucky
and Tennessee are disloyal at heart, can never be counted ontheir Congress-
men insulted the President last week when he begged them to come along on
compensated manumission. So to hell with themwe keep them in the way
we kept Maryland in, by brute force. Arrest the disloyal legislators if neces-
sary. The loyal Democrats up North won't scream. Assure him of that, be-
cause it's a new development; that's a shift in public sentiment he does not
know about. You ready?"
He led Cutting across the street to the Mansion, and into the secretaries'
office. Stanton knew that Nicolay would be there, with Hay off chasing some
lady love up in New York. Stanton strode through to Lincoln's office, where
the President was hunched over his desk, putting the finishing touches on
some document.
"Here's a man you want to see," announced the Secretary of War. "A
Democrat who may surprise you." He left Cutting in the President's office.
Two hours later, Stanton returned for the Cabinet meeting. He was pleased
to see that Postmaster General Blair was not in the Cabinet Room, and
surprised to see Cutting just coming out of the President's office. That must
have been a long, lawyerly session. Cutting signaled for Stanton to step out
into the hall.
"You hit him on the border states?" Stanton asked.
"Yes. Also the foreign intervention. Also the shifting opinion in New York,
general weariness with the war, need to do something dramatic to turn the
tide. He knows how important New York is, both for recruitment and for
money, and the split in Democratic ranks got him excited. Did you know he's
concerned with workers in the West worried about blacks taking their jobs? I
said deportation was the answership all four million back where the climate
is suitable."
"Sure, sure," Stanton nodded. If Lincoln had the need to think mass depor-
tation would solve everything, fine for now; he could be disabused later. "Is
he turning around on arming the slaves?"
Cutting shrugged. "Be ready for more than that. I think he wanted to be
persuaded to go all the way, so we talked about the support of Democrats on
that."
"About what?"
"About support on a proclamation."
Stanton could feel his excitement mount; Lincoln was on the verge of
permitting the right generals to do the right thing. "Hunter would, and
Pope," he whispered, "but not McClellan"
"No, not the generals. Lincoln himself. A presidential proclamation of
emancipation."
Stanton, shaking his head in disbelief, hurried into the Cabinet Room.

CHAPTER 9
THENCEFORWARD AND FOREVER
/
Chase was prompt. At precisely 2 P.M., that July 22 of 1862, he took his seat
and awaited the others.
The Treasury Secretary looked toward the head of the small Cabinet table,
at the chair that would one day, God willing, be rightfully his own. Chase
had long been appalled at the way Lincoln demeaned the great office, not
merely with his coarse language and vulgar stories, but by making it the
center of brokerage for political patronageworse than in Jackson's time,
when the spoils system was said to bloom. At the moment when the nation
was in desperate need of an infusion of moral authority, the United States was
afflicted with the non-leadership of a sometimes sly, sometimes buffoonish
country lawyer with no sense of the grandeur and majesty that should ema-
nate from the office of the nation's Chief Executive.
He felt vaguely apprehensive. Daughter Kate had gone off in a huff to
Saratoga, hinting of a romance with someone other than Governor Sprague.
Chase worried, too, about Lincoln's scheme for gradual, compensated eman-
cipation. Even if that plan were to take a generation to accomplish abolition,
the Treasury Secretary did not know where he could come up with the money
to begin to finance the purchase of the slaves.
Chase was also fearful of impending military disaster. After the retreat of
the Seven Days, the two Union armies of McClellan and Pope were split a
hundred miles apart, headed by generals whose temperament and political
outlook were even more widely divergent. At dinner the night before, General
Pope had told him that if he ever were to need support from McClellan's
army, he could not expect it of his fellow Union general because McClellan
was incompetent and indisposed to move.
This very morning, Chase had come to the Mansion to press again for
McClellan's removal. The President would not take action. Chase judged he
did not grasp the financial ramifications of a rise in public sentiment about
hopes for victory. However, Chase did shake Lincoln that morning with a
letter he had received from Colonel Thomas Key, a fellow Ohioan on McClel-
lan's staff. Key informed Chase that he had reason to believe that if General
McClellan found he could not otherwise sustain himself in Virginiaif he
were not reinforced, and found his army in extremishe would declare the
liberation of the slaves. Lincoln, of course, found that amazing. Fremont and
Hunter were abolitionists and such a move had been in character for them,
but McClellan! Chase shared Lincoln's dismay, and characterized the Key
letter as a form of political blackmail, especially since the colonel wrote that
the President would not dare to interfere with a McClellan emancipation
order. The general and his staff were obviously disloyal and had to be dis-
missed; why did Lincoln delay?
The others arrived, Stanton looking more agitated than usual, Welles im-
passive behind his huge beard, Seward exuding his oppressive sprightliness,
Attorney General Bates laboriously drawing on his glasses, Caleb Smith fret-
ting. Blair was absent again. Chase marshaled his thoughts to support the
arming of fugitive slaves, the best part of the Confiscation Act, and to oppose
the deportation of freed blacks, the worst part of that legislation.
Lincoln looked around for the Postmaster General, shrugged, and began.
"We have a few orders here, which we discussed yesterday, respecting mili-
tary action and slavery."
Chase leaned forward, determined to block Lincoln's order colonizing
freed slaves. It was impractical and inhumane, and Wade and Sumner were
against it; opposition by Chase would add to the proof that there existed a
clear distance between himself and Lincoln on the handling of the negro.
"The first gives authority to commanders to subsist their troops in hostile
territory," said Lincoln.
"We only hope that some of our generals try to find out what hostile
territory is like," murmured Stanton, in a reference to McClellan.
Next, the President read his proposed order to give commanders authority
to recruit negroes as laborers. "I think we should go much further than that,"
said Stanton, and Chase nodded his support; they had agreed to press for
arming the fugitive slaves. Lincoln said that was another matter, and the
Cabinet agreed to the issuance of the order.
Lincoln also proposed an order requiring commanders to keep good ac-
counts, so that compensation could be paid where slaves were taken from
their masters.
"I doubt the expediency of keeping accounts for the rebels," Chase put in.
"Our men in the field have more important things to do than to make certain
that traitors get paid." But it was felt that an attempt at accounting would
appeal to the border-state men, make it seem that the Union was being fair;
the Cabinet wanted to go along, and Chase did not disagree.
"Now as to your colonization order," Chase began, preparing himself for
eloquent evocation of the distress of blacks faced with deportation, his own
experience with the failure of previous colonization schemes, and the depres-
sant effect on slaves in the South who would otherwise be embracing the
Northern cause.
"I'm willing to put that aside," agreed Lincoln unexpectedly, pushing the
colonization order he had drafted under some other papers. With this surpris-
ing victory, Chase moved to the offensive on the arming of fugitive slaves.
"I wish to advocate," Chase began again, "with all the warmth and sincer-
ity at my disposal, the step that is clearly intended in the Confiscation Act
namely, the arming of those Africans who come across the lines to our side."
Stanton murmured assent; Blair was not there to disagree; Seward looked
uncomfortable; Bates was noncommittal; Caleb Smith stared at the ceiling.
Chase thought that argument could bring Gideon Welles of the Navy, over to
his side; because there was bad blood between Stanton and Welles, the presen-
tation of reasons to arm the blacks could not be made by Stanton.
But Lincoln appeared not to be listening. That was a departure for the
President, who was ordinarily quite solicitous of advice when he finally got
around to calling a Cabinet meeting. Chase wished the man would concen-
trate on the job at hand.
"I'm unwilling to adopt the arming of slaves at this time," Lincoln said,
without waiting for the rest of the Cabinet to comment. He pushed aside his
set of orders and placed another document in front of him. Chase was miffed;
recruitment of fugitive slaves was hardly a matter to be decided with no
discussion.
Lincoln took a deep breath and said, as if he had been rehearsing the line,
"I feel we've reached the end of our rope on the plan of operations we've been
pursuing."
Chase looked at Stanton. This was a new tack, not a continuation of yes-
terday's Cabinet meeting. What was the President's game? Would he replace
McClellan with Pope? Stanton did not meet his glance.
Lincoln took a long sheet of paper out of his jacket pocket. "I am deter-
mined upon the adoption of an emancipation policy."
Into the stunned silence, Lincoln went on: "I have resolved upon this step.
I have not called you together to ask your advice"Chase choked back his
protest at this breach of protocol, not to say common courtesy"but to lay
the subject matter of a proclamation before you. Suggestions will be in order
after you have heard it read."
Ponderously, the President began reading the draft he had written of a
legal document, beginning with reference to section six of the Confiscation
Acta warning to all rebels to cease rebellion forthwith on pain of the for-
feitures and seizures within the act.
The Treasury Secretary, piqued at the President's insult to his Cabinet at
the commencement of the reading, began to realize what the President had
been up to. The canny politician was leapfrogging the radical position, put-
ting aside the controversy about arming the slaves, to go directly to the action
that the most extreme radicals had been vainly calling for from the start
abolition of the institution of slavery.
"And I hereby make it known that it is my purpose," Lincoln droned on,
reading his detailed and legalistic proclamation, "upon the next meeting of
Congress, to again recommend the adoption of a practical measure for
tendering pecuniary aid to the free choice of any and all states . . . which
may then have voluntarily adopted . . . gradual abolishment of slavery."
There he goes again, threatening to break the United States Treasury by
bribing slaveholders. Chase began to relax a little, since this was Lincoln's
familiar position, but then he stiffened as the President took the plunge:
"And as a fit and a necessary military measure for effecting this object, I, as
commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, do order and
declare that on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand
eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any state or
states wherein the constitutional authority of the United States shall not then
be practically recognized, submitted to, and maintained, shall then, thence-
forward and forever be free."
Chase was thunderstruck. In a single stroke, the previously conservative
Lincoln was gathering to himself the credit for all that the radical Republi-
cans had long been fighting for. He was effectively removing the main basis
on which Chase could challenge him for the Republican nomination in 1864.
Lincoln was doing to Chase what McClellan had just threatened to do to
Lincoln: steal his emancipation clothing.
But as the most anti-slavery member of the Cabinet, what was the Chase
reaction to be? How could he dissuade Lincoln, the eternal compromiser with
an infernal sense of timing, to refrain from doing what Chase's faction had so
long espoused? Notes would be made of everyone's expressed opinion this
afternoonhe was certain he was not the only Cabinet member keeping a
diary, and Stanton was openly making notes at that momentand the press
would one day be informed of the stand each man took.
The Treasury Secretary steepled his fingers and appeared lost in thought,
waiting for others to speak.
Seward, wearing his best poker face, wondered what the hell had become of
Blair. His only ally in the Cabinet capable of making the political and mili-
tary arguments against Lincoln's extreme action was absent. Was this a trick
of the Biairs? The Secretary of State decided to put that possibility out of his
mind; it was one of those unworthy thoughts that came to a man too long
associated with the duplicitous Stanton and the ever-so-pious Chase.
He then wondered what had caused the cautious Abraham Lincoln to
suggest this reckless action. The man was no radical; granted, McClellan's
retreat in the Peninsula had made him impatient, and the President had
raised the possibility of an emancipation edict at the Stanton baby's funeral a
few days after that, but Seward thought his own coolness at that time had
chilled Lincoln's ardor for dramatic action.
Only the other night, the President had dropped in at the Seward house
and the Secretary of State had introduced his sister-in-law, Lazette, as a
radical. When Lazette demurred at that label, and claimed she was no ultra,
Lincoln had told a little story. During the War of 1812, it was the fashion for
sweethearts of soldiers to make belts with mottoes sewn into them, and one
young lady asked her soldier if he wanted his belt emblazoned with "Liberty
or Death!" To which the soldier replied that was a little strong, how about
just "Liberty or Be Crippled"?
That was the quintessential Lincoln speakingnever a radical. Why, then,
this sudden turn? Thurlow Weed might know; luckily, the Albany editor was
in Washington after his sojourn in London. Seward resolved to see him imme-
diately after Cabinet.
"I see no reason to rush into this," Seward told his colleagues briskly. "Of
course, I share with the Presidentwe all dohis wish that slavery be ended
one day." Nobody could go on record as opposing the President's move, least
of all Seward, who had been denied the Republican nomination because he
was seen to be too willing to welcome the "irreconcilable conflict," as the
phrase went that had been hung around his neck in 1860. "But is it wise to do
it in this manner, at this time?"
"The President has the war power to do this, I think," said Bates.
"I do not doubt for an instant that it would be legal," granted Seward to
the Missouri lawyer who so offhandedly made sweeping constitutional deci-
sions, "or could be made so in due course, when the Congress gets around to
it.  But it is,  let us not deny it,  a coup d'6tat.  There's no telling right now
where it all might lead."
"A servile insurrection, you mean," said Bates. "A slave uprising."
"What, in God's name, would be so bad about that?" demanded Stanton.
"We could use a good uprising down there. It's about time."
Seward gave Stanton what he hoped was a withering look. "If this procla-
mation causes the Africans to turn on their masters, with all the pillage and
rapine that would entail, the civilized world would look upon our action with
horror. The British would enter the war on the side of the South."
"The British workingman," Stanton held, "would never permit British
troops to be used to uphold slavery. Palmerston's government would fall
first."
Seward looked at the navy's Welles, who was familiar with Stanton's over-
reaching. "Perhaps Mars here should be given the State Department portfolio
too."
Lincoln allowed as how he would be interested in what Weed had to say
about British reaction, and Seward replied that he would send him around
that evening. Then Seward saw a second point to his barb about a slave
uprising: "Mr. President, consider the fact that this terrible war will not last
forever. After the war, assuming we are victorious and the Union remains
whole, there will be the challenge of a harmonious restoration of the Union.
How could we heal the wounds if we had incited the negroes to murder their
masters?"
Nobody spoke while that thought sank in. Stanton looked to Chase, the
leading radical in the Cabinet, who had been silent. Seward was confident
that Chase would straddle, so he looked expectantly toward the Secretary of
the Treasury.
Unable to preserve his silence any longer, Chase spoke cautiously: "Of
course, I should give to any such measure my cordial support, butwell,
first, I should prefer that no new expression on the subject of compensation be
made. We simply cannot afford it."
"But what of the substance of the Proclamation?" Lincoln asked.
"This is a military measure," Chase said slowly. "You are basing it on
military necessity and on nothing else. You are using your power as com-
mander in chief of the armed forces." He paused, thinking, and the others let
him. "Should not a measure of emancipationwhich of course I cordially
supportbe more properly issued by our generals in the field? As a military
measure to meet a military exigency, it should in my judgment be suffered to
stand upon the responsibility of the generals who make it."
Seward repressed a smile. The amalgam of pretension and ambition and
dogged shrewdness in Chase had given the Treasury Secretary an out.
"General Hunterindeed, General Fremonthave already led the way,"
Chase continued. "Public sentiment is prepared for military men to arm
fugitive slaves, and to encourage slaves to run away by promising them free-
dom. We could proceed much more quietlyavoiding depraved actions and
massacresby letting a military measure of emancipation be undertaken by
military men. And our generals would be in a better position to know how
and when to issue orders of emancipation, depending on local circumstances.
They could balance the avoidance of massacre with the support given the
insurgents by the slaves in any given area."
Stanton started to say something but stopped himself. Bates offered only,
"I support the President on this, provided that the deportation of the colored
race be made coincident with emancipation." Chase looked at the Attorney
General in disgust.
"Time seems to be getting short," said Lincoln glumly. Seward read that to
mean that the military setbacks and the prospect of difficulty in the fall
elections had made the President willing to do anything to reverse the trend
of the war.
Stanton said flatly, "I need to strike terror in the hearts of the rebel gener-
als. Their fear of insurrection back home would do that. What's more, I need
to get those negroes off the farms and out of the rebel military campsright
now, they're freeing white men to fight. I don't care who issues a proclama-
tion of emancipation"that, Seward noted with amusement, was a shot
across Chase's bow"as long as it is issued, and right away." He banged on
the Cabinet table. "That's what the people of the North want."
"Even among extreme men," said a voice in the doorway, "there is no
public sentiment in the North which now demands an emancipation procla-
mation." Montgomery Blair came in and took his seat. "I have just come
from Senator Sumner. He tells me that the anti-slavery men would be satis-
fied with the enforcement of the laws of Congress as they stand."
The Secretary of State breathed easier. He would no longer have to face his
wife and sister-in-law, abolitionists both, with the news that William Henry
Seward alone had saved the Union from an act of desperation which would
have ensured the loss of the war, followed by generations of hatred and
disunity. Besides, Seward was never at his best as a leading advocate; his
influence was best brought to bear when he could play the role of mediator,
coming in at the end with a satisfying synthesis. Montgomery Blair was the
one to make the argument that would turn Lincoln back from the precipice.
The proposed proclamation was poor politics, and the Biairs had Lincoln's
confidence on the subject of politics.
Lincoln seemed awfully determined, however. Seward found his informal
preamble about not wanting Cabinet advice on the wisdom of this matter to
be harsher than usual. Blair, at least, had not heard the admonition and was
not constrained by it. The trick was to delay the President this afternoon,
avert any decision, and give Thurlow Weed time to work on Lincoln's good
political sense tonight.
Seward, seated at Lincoln's right hand, reached in front of the President
and pushed the draft proclamation across the table for Blair to read. He gave
him time by turning to Chase and asking, "What do you suppose your friend
Sumner meant by that?"
Blair was furious at Stanton for misleading him about the importance of
today's meeting. The Postmaster General was more angry with himself for
ignoring the instruction of his father to be present; it was just that Lincoln
seemed to have lost interest in the Cabinet as an institution, and Blair thought
other meetings more urgent. Senator Sumner, on Capitol Hill, and a New
York Times reporter had asked Blair questions about emancipation that had
sped Blair belatedly to the Cabinet session. He read down the two pages of
the document in the President's handwriting, as Chase intoned his answer.
"I imagine that such an action by the President, rather than by generals in
the field," said the Treasury Secretary, "might be construed as an attempt to
evade the provisions of the Confiscation Act." Blair, reading, listened with
half an ear; it seemed that the Cabinet's resident radical was not being so
radical when the chips were down. Chase was making good sense. "The Act
calls for action now, whereas the President's suggested proclamation would
be announced now but not go into effect until January first of next year,"
Chase continued. "That effectively delays the process of confiscation, and
arming of negroes, for almost six months. I don't think that would sit well in
Congress. I imagine Thaddeus Stevens and Ben Wade would not appreciate
the President's motives, and might even see this as some sort of trick. You
know, the publication of the planned veto message did not endear the Presi-
dent to them."
" 'Forever be free,' " said Blair aloud, reading the last words of the Lincoln
draft in his hand. He looked across the table directly at the President. "This is
abolition. Total abolition."
"No," Bates interposed, "the slaves in the loyal border states are exempted.
This would free only the slaves in those states in rebellion."
"On what basis do you make that distinction?"
Bates looked to Lincoln, the author. The President replied, "I base this on
military necessity. It is a war measure, designed to reduce the ability of states
in rebellion to sustain their war. It cannot, on that reasoning, be applied in
loyal states."
"You may impress lawyers with that," said Chase, "but it flies in the face of
common sense. You can purport to manumit the slaves in rebellious states,
yet its operations will in fact be universal. Nobody will suppose that slavery
can still exist in the border states after it is abolished farther South."
"I think it is an error to exempt the border states from the proclamation,"
said Welles from behind his beard. "Any separation of regions, for any rea-
son, undermines the integrity of the Union. Chase is right. This document
dooms slavery in the border states as well; why not recognize it? Why treat
them differently?"
"Because the slaves in the border states," Lincoln answered with what
Blair saw was some logic, "as well as those in areas controlled by Union
troops, are not supporting the rebellion." The President did not add, Blair
noted, that loyal Kentuckians now endangered by Confederate General
Braxton Bragg's latest movements might just decide to defect to the South if
the war's aim was changed from pro-Union to anti-slavery.
The Postmaster General saw that it would be up to himthe defender of
runaway slave Dred Scott before the court of Chief Justice Taneyto save
the President from the terrible mistake of premature emancipation. Lincoln
was a lawyer, who respected sensible arguments; Blair set out to do his job
rationally.
"The purpose of this proclamation is to affect the behavior of blacks in the
South," he began, "to intimidate the secessionists, and to affect the sentiment
of whites in the North. Am I correct?"
"Yes, Judge," Lincoln nodded.
"Take the blacks first. We are already giving freedom to all those who join
us. Their masters have been telling them for years that abolition is our intent.
Publishing it in this new form gives them no new information." Blair rose; he
felt better on his feet in arguing his case.
He stood behind his chair. "It was confidently expected by the people of
the North, in the early stages of the rebellion, that when our armies reached
the negro regions, insurrections would follow their advent."
"But experience has not verified this expectation," said Seward, who, Blair
recognized, wanted to lend a hand.
"On the contrary," Blair argued to Lincoln, "the able men who stimulated
the rebellion did so despite the presence in the South of four million blacks.
They did not believe the negro was a source of danger to them. As events
proved, they were right."
Stanton, as Blair had hoped, took the bait. "How can you say that? Look at
what happened on Hispaniolathat was about the bloodiest rebellion the
world has seen. The overthrow of the whites in Hayti proves"
"Proves nothing," countered Blair. "You are in the grip of a false analogy.
In Hayti, the contest was one of race, and for supremacyand the climate
was on the side of the negro. Here the contest is between divisions of the
white race, and though one division offers personal freedom to the negro, we
do not offer supremacy to the race. And we cannot do it because the climate
is not his and never can be. The negro has neither the motives to join in the
fight, nor the physical superiority in the heat to give him the success he had in
Hayti."
"Freedom is not a motive?"
"He has that motive indeed, calculated to incline him to our cause," Blair
replied, "but he has not the fury imparted by the instinct of dominion in his
natural clime. The conduct of the blacks in our wartheir docility, if you
willjustified the opinions formed of them by those Southerners most famil-
iar with them. Their passivity is natural, in my judgment, and will not be
altered by any proclamation of the President."
As he was making the point, which was not refuted by any Cabinet mem-
ber, Blair realized from the expression on Lincoln's face that he was under-
mining his own case. Despite the military rationale given the proclamation,
Lincoln did not want a slave insurrection, with the horror and possible for-
eign intervention it entailed; he wanted merely to deny the slaveholders labor.
Any assurances from Blair that North-South hatred would not be abetted by
his proclamation were welcome to Lincoln. Blair changed his tack.
"Consider now the effect on whites. First, in the South. The way this
proclamation is drawn"Blair tapped the document on the table"it gives
the states in rebellion nearly six months to comply. The object of this post-
ponement is only that it may terrify the secessionists into submission. I can-
not think it will be in the least operative in that way."
Nor did the others at the Cabinet table, Blair knew; the notion that this
ultimatum would faze the Southern leaders was absurd. "The controlling
minds among them have long since been convinced that slavery must stand or
fall with the rebellion. This proclamation will only confirm what they have
been saying from the beginning."
Blair looked toward Chase, then Stanton, for any refutation; there was
none. Lincoln did not appear pleased, but Blair was not in the Cabinet to
please the President.
"Among whites in the South, then, this measure will only stiffen resistance.
Now, in the North"
"There is a general weariness of the war," snapped Stanton. "We can tell
that in recruitment. And the bankers are not exactly falling all over Chase,
here, to finance us."
"I have already reported to you my conversation with Senator Sumner of
Massachusetts," Blair retorted, "a leader of the radicals, who is content with
the Confiscation measures taken so far. The governor of Iowa, who has an
appointment with you this afternoon, Mr. President, will tell youas he has
told methat the people of his state would be satisfied with the orders you
were supposed to issue this week."
"We just approved them," said Chase, "before you came in. Except for
colonization."
"Good." He would argue for colonization some other time. "I disagree
with Stanton, Mr. President, this proclamation is not needed to recruit our
army. I see no reason to suspect a want of ardor in the support of the war at
present."
"I do," said Lincoln. "That 'want of ardor' is impressed upon me every
day."
"Our military reverses have saddened our people, surely," Blair conceded,
"and impaired our financial strength. But what people in the North want this
sort of proclamation? A small portion of the peoplethe radicals, a few
politicians, and a few newspapers. Not the effective partizans in the war."
"You're mistaken," Stanton said. "The President and I have received re-
ports only recently that even Democrats are beginning to swing over to the
need for some bold, decisive action about slavery."
"This proclamation is your idea?"
"No," said Stanton quickly. Blair did not believe him.
"You, Chase?"
The Treasury Secretary looked pained. "It would surely lead to universal
emancipation, and it is a measure of great danger."
Silence in the room. Blair gently pushed for more. "Is it your recommenda-
tion, Chase, to do this?"
"The measure"Chase, cornered, groped for words"goes beyond any-
thing I have recommended." Chase's backtracking caused Stanton to twist in
his seat and redden; the Treasury Secretary did not look Stanton's way. Blair
was glad to note that those two radical thieves had fallen out.
"The idea is mine," Lincoln confessed. "I feel that we have played our last
card and must change our tactics or lose the game."
"We are already changing our tactics," Blair argued, "with the Confisca-
tion Act, with the orders you are issuing today. But by going all the way to
abolition, you introduce a note of desperation. You will be seen to be counting
on insurrection of the slaves, which is the only military aid we can hope for
from it." He saw a way to turn that point to his advantage. "And I am not
sure that a slave uprising would not damage our cause rather than aid it." He
looked to Seward for help on that.
Seward nodded sagely and said, "I've spoken of that already. But what are
the politics of this, Judge? Will this help us or harm us in the congressional
elections this fall?"
Blair recognized the Seward touch. He would come in at the end, acting as
a judge alongside Lincoln, rather than as an advocate against the proclama-
tion. "If I am right in this," Blair responded, "it follows that abolition would
endanger our power in Congress. It would put power in the next House of
Representatives in the hands of those opposed to the war, or at least opposed
to our mode of carrying it out." His brother Frank could even be toppled
from his seat in Missouri if whites there lashed back at the sudden change in
the very basis for the fighting.
A voice not often heard in Cabinet councils spoke up. "Dithathter," lisped
Caleb Smith, the Interior Secretary.
The Indiana politician, forced on Lincoln as payoff for the votes of Indiana
at the Chicago convention, was not as embarrassing a legacy as Simon Cam-
eron had been, but the rotund Interior Secretary was a disappointment as a
Cabinet member. Blair was not sure if his support was helpful in any matter,
but nodded at him to continue.
"The Democrats will kill us with it. I can't imagine how I could ever
support it."
Was Smith threatening to resign? Blair knew that Lincoln would dearly
love Caleb Smith to quit, making room for his capable Assistant Secretary,
John Usher. Lest this welcome opportunity weigh in the balance for an eman-
cipation proclamation, Blair motioned Smith to be silent; his support for
delay was worse than opposition.
Lincoln, slumped deep in his chair, pulled himself up and abruptly walked
to the window. He looked south down the Potomac, his large hands clenching
and loosening. In that interim, with nobody saying anything, Blair wondered
if he had gone too far. His father had warned him to block any radical moves
proposed by Chase or Stanton, but this document was in Lincoln's handwrit-
ing. And if Prank Blair was to be a candidate for President one day, it might
not be helpful for the Biairs to be on record as having blocked negro freedom.
"Suppose you were my lawyer, Judge," Lincoln said, coming back to the
table and sitting down. Blair sat as well. "If I went ahead with this thing,
what do you think would be the best way to sell it to the countryso that it
does the least damage among your friends and mine in the North, and in the
border states?"
Blair struggled with that. He was an advocate for a cause: the gradual,
compensated manumission of slaves, justly and legally, over the course of the
next generation, with colonies established to receive them offering jobs and
dignity. In that way, North and South could reunite and build a great conti-
nental nation. He opposed the opposite cause, immediate abolition, because
he was certain that would lead to Republican election defeat, a peace settle-
ment on a basis of disunion, and the perpetuation of slavery.
At the same time, in a narrower sense, he was the appointee of the Presi-
dent of the United States, duty-bound to give him the best advice when it was
requested. Lincoln needed the argumentation of a trained lawyer to help him
examine his own judgment; Bates could not do that and Stanton had become
too passionately involved. Blair decided to construe his role narrowly, being
as helpful as the President wanted him to be, arguing against his own cause.
"The only reason that would be satisfactory to the country for this aboli-
tion measure," he replied with certainty, "would be its necessity to prevent
foreign intervention."
Seward frowned. Blair knew that the Secretary of State felt betrayed, with
the Postmaster General using foreign affairs to make the case that Lincoln
wanted made. But the President was entitled to support from even a non-
supporter.
"The political damage in the North would be lessened," Blair continued,
"if the measure were to be explained as a means of drawing the slavery issue
between the governments of Europe and their people. Our people here would
then hail the measure to be judicious, if it served to keep England and France
from entering the war on the side of the South." Having done his duty, Blair
tried to turn it to an argument for delay: "I therefore hope that you will
reserve the emancipation measure to meet that contingency."
Since Lincoln was his client, he might as well warn him of another way to
avoid danger in implementing the wrong course: "By the way, you should
change the scope of your proclamation. Do not limit it to the states in rebel-
lioninclude the border states as well. If you do not, our enemies abroad will
saynot with truth, but with effect neverthelessthat the federal govern-
ment still maintains slavery. They'll go further and say that it will be reestab-
lished in the South when the rebellion is put down."
Lincoln half-nodded, seeing the point but not accepting the argument.
Blair, while he was at it, could not resist fixing the document further: "When-
ever such a decree is made, and I trust it will not be soon, it should go into
immediate effect."
"Fairness requires notice," said Lincoln.
"Only if we were acting judicially." As the only former judge in the group,
Blair felt he was on solid ground. "But we are not. The law under which we
act is necessity. Our right to put forth such an order is derived solely from the
duty to resort to any measure to save the state. This implies that the emer-
gency is upon us at the dateright nowand that now the public safety does
not admit of a different line of conduct."
"I see no harm," Attorney General Bates put in, "and much equity, in
giving the rebels time to comply, say, by January first of next year."
Blair shut his eyes for a moment; the nation's chief law officer did not
understand the law. "The law under which we profess to act, by its very
emergency nature, restricts us to deal with the present, not the future. It is
only the law of necessity under which we can act; we cannot logically make a
decree operative in the future, because it cannot be said that any such neces-
sity will exist in the future." Blair had him; Bates shut up.
Seward cleared his throat. Blair hoped that Billy Bowlegs had some sort of
crushing argument to appeal to Lincoln to delay this decree. Blair was all but
certain it would lose the border states and cost the Republicans governorships
in New York and New Jersey at least, with all that meant to recruiting. It
would cause dismay in the army ranks; the boys were not fighting for black
freedom, but to save the Union. Blair was convinced that the cause of black
freedom would be set back for generations by this premature decree.
"We are not sure, then," said the Secretary of State, as if summing up for
Lincoln, "if this measure would cause an uprising or not, and we are not sure
we want one. We are not sure," he went on, "that it should exempt the border
states, because we run the risk of losing them to the rebels if we free their
slaves, and run the risk of seeming to the world to be hypocrites on slavery if
we permit it to continue where we have the ability to strike it down now.
"We are not sure if we should emancipate immediately," Seward contin-
ued, "which we have the legal authority to do under military necessity, or try
to coerce our Southern brethren with a six-month delay which will undergo
some challenge in the courts."
"I have considered those arguments," Lincoln said, shaking his head, "and
settled in my own mind what to do."
"Then it is not a question of if," said Seward smoothly, as if Lincoln had
agreed with him, "but when. I think we all concur that the matter of timing is
crucial. I wonder if its immediate promulgation would not be extremely un-
wise. The depression of the public mind, consequent upon our repeated re-
verses, is so great that I fear the effect of so important a step." He paused for
effect. "It may be viewed as the last measure of an exhausted government, a
cry for help; the government stretching forth its hands to Ethiopia, instead of
Ethiopia stretching forth her hands to the government."
"Your idea," said the President, "is that it would be considered the last
shriek on the retreat?"
"Precisely," said Seward. "Now, while I approve the measure, I suggest,
sir, that you postpone its issue, until you can give it to the country supported
by military success, instead of issuing it, as would be the case now, upon the
greatest disasters of the war."
Lincoln wavered; both Blair and Seward had made the point about the
appearance of desperation, and it evidently registered with him.
"I'll think about it some more," Lincoln said, folding the document and
putting it in his pocket. Blair suppressed a sigh of relief. "Mars, what else do
you have?"
"I want to talk about drafting fifty thousand additional men," said Stantou
"Not to serve under that incompetent, McClellan," said Chase.
As the meeting continued through the long midsummer afternoon, Blai
reached the conclusion that Lincoln had been only momentarily sidetracked
More pressure had to be put on, right away, that night, lest Lincoln launch b:
himself the proclamation that he had drafted by himself. Stanton probabi:
had a stream of abolitionists ready to pressure the President.
The politics of this thing was the key. Blair asked himself: Whose judg
ment, besides Father Biair's, did Lincoln trust most on politics, especiall;
New York politics? Not Seward's; that player in the power game did no
believe in the reality of the passions his positions excited, because he felt noni
himself. But Seward's alter ego, Thurlow Weed, was both more impassione(
and more devious. Montgomery Blair hoped that Seward had primed Thur
low Weed on the task that remained to be done because the emancipatiol
decision could still go either way.

CHAPTER 10
Sp.roNn THOUGHT?

Anna Carroll stepped into Chase's study in the house at Sixth and E streets,
not far from her Ebbitt House rooms, and was struck by the contrast of the
two portraits on the wall. One, recently done, was of Charles Sumner, an
abolitionist ally with whom Chase had served in the Senate. The other must
have been painted nearly seventy years before, around the turn of the century:
Charles Carroll of Carrollton, signer of the Declaration of Independence, first
senator from Maryland.
"He was a relative of yours, Annaa great-uncle?"
"A cousin of my grandfather's."
"A great man," the governor said. "One of the founders of the Catholic
Church in America, as you know. I visited him in my youth, because I
wanted to meet the last surviving signer of the Declaration of Independence."
Anna assumed that Chase would be impressed by that branch of her gene-
alogy. Anna's side of the family was firmly Protestant, and had long been
estranged from the Catholic Carrolls. She had taken a certain family delight
in her espousal of the Know-Nothing cause, with its vigorous anti-Catholic,
anti-immigrant bias, but that was not a matter to be discussed with Salmon
Portland Chase.
"He was probably the richest man in America," she observed, which im-
pressed her more about her remote forebear. "The Sprague of his time." She
could not resist that dig; it was the talk of Washington that the Chases, father
and his elder daughter, were making much of the dissolute Governor Sprague
of Rhode Island. The thought of a woman seeking the courtship of a drunk-
ard for his vast monetary resources was repugnant to her; on the other hand,
a liaison with a man of intellect and character who also happened to be a man
of financial substancesuch as Chasewas another matter. Wealth was
hardly a drawback. "And where are your daughters tonight?"
"Kate was suffering from an attack of immaturity," the tall man said,
stumbling over the word "immaturity"; Chase had a slight speech impedi-
ment that manifested itself when he was agitated. It had kept him, she heard,
from being much of an oratorical force in the Senate. "Sometimes Nettie,
who's only fourteen, seems more grown up. I sent them both to New York for
a couple of weeks, to some old friends on an estate near Troy. I suppose they
were just as glad to get out of this Washington heat."
Anna put two and two together: John Hay's sudden leave from the Execu-
tive Mansion coincided with Kate's brief exile, and it was an absence that the
two young people at the center of power had probably coordinated. She said
nothing, wishing she had done more of that at Kate's age.
"Lincoln has not become desperate enough to get rid of McClellan," he
said, fiddling with his glass, moving his silverware around fussily, adjusting
the napkin on his lap. "That was some campaign in the Peninsulafifty days,
fifty miles, fifty million dollars. And his failure has driven the value of the
dollar down to eighty-seven cents."
She had heard the dollar was falling against the price of gold, evidence of
lack of confidence in a Union victory. That meant more difficulty in borrow-
ing and less money for war supplies; Chase's antipathy to the "Young Napo-
leon" was based on more than his radical politics.
"The President won't budge when it comes to firing that incompetent,"
Chase was saying, "but he is desperate enough to take the most radical of
measures on emancipation. Beyond anything I have recommended."
"I was surprised when he signed the Confiscation Act," Anna replied care-
fully. "I sent him a memorial opposing it."
She found talking politics with Chase was both easy and hard: easy because
they were both so well informed, hard because they were on different sides of
the abolition issue. An added complication was their web of friendships: Ben
Wade, for example, who had said he would drop by Chase's house to take her
home later, was the man she trusted most in the world, and was a radical like
Chase; yet Wade and Chase, both Ohio Republicans, cordially disliked each
other. Chase had told her he thought Ben Wade had cheated him out of a
unanimous Ohio delegation at the Chicago Wigwam in the 1860 convention,
and Wade once told her, "Chase is all right, only his theology is wrong: he
thinks there is a fourth person in the Trinity." So often, she had found the
people she agreed with most were the least appealing; the other way around,
tooshe had argued with Breckinridge on Union and with Chase on aboli-
tion. The intruding thought of Breck saddened her; she had no reports about
him since the bloodletting at Shiloh.
"The Confiscation Act is as nothing," said Chase, "to what he's thinking of
doing now." He did not say what it was, muttering only "dangerous, danger-
ous. Too soon." Anna knew she had no need to pry; Chase could not keep
this to himself, and with his daughter gone, Anna was his natural confidante.
She let herself look puzzled, which was easy enough. What could Lincoln be
up to that went further than arming the fugitive slaves?
"Lincoln was positively insulting in Cabinet today," the Treasury Secretary
complained. "I, though charged with the responsibility of providing for the
enormous expenses entailed upon the country, have no control overno
voice even in deciding onthe measures by which the necessity for them is
created."
She nodded sympathetically, pouring them both some wine from his crystal
decanter. She liked wine with a meal, it made her merry, though she was
careful to limit her gaiety tonight. "Lincoln can be stubborn," she said from
experience.
"Anna, you shared your confidence with me about your unfortunate inter-
view with the President, when he acted so boorishly about your hard-earned
fee. I think it only right to take you into my confidence now."
She wished he would get to the point. If ever the two of them got together,
she could help him on that. She leaned forward, low-cut dinner dress exhibit-
ing her fine bosom, chin in hand, ready for the revelation of Cabinet delibera-
tions.
"He wants to threaten publicly to abolish slavery in the states in rebellion,"
Chase said heavily. "An invitation to an uprising. Stanton's behind it."
"Lincoln wants this?"
"Well, today he does. Tomorrow, I don't know. But he had a proclamation
all drafted. It put me in a most embarrassing position."
She saw that right away. If Lincoln went overboard to the radicals, Chase
would lose his constituency. But that was insignificant compared to the im-
port of the President's inexplicable shift. She feared its consequence: the end
of the Union, done in the name of the Union. "Did anybody stop him?"
"I could not, obviously. The position I took was to urge that local emanci-
pation take place by commanders in the field. It is galling to admit this, even
to myself, but I was glad that Blair and Seward were there to restrain him."
Anna was torn between delight at this measure of confidence from a lonely
man in the nation's highest council and her consternation at the awkwardness
of his position. When a conservative like Lincoln outradicaled the radicals,
what was a lukewarm radical like Chase to do? Should he go along with the
new, abolitionist Lincoln, for consistency's sakeor seek to restrain him for
Chase's personal political gain? She foresaw another complication. If Chase
counseled delay, it would soon become known that he had not been an enthu-
siastic backer of the President's change of heart. When that got out, Ohio's
favorite son would be hurt among his own radical faction.
"You're in danger, Governor, of being outflanked." The military metaphor
was apt. Lincoln's lunge leftward would undoubtedly please the radicals,
reducing their need for an alternative to Lincoln at the next convention.
Anna was about to give Chase some good personal political advice on how
to delay emancipation without appearing to do so when she stopped herself.
That was the mistake she had made with Fillmore and the others. She had
always been too free with her advice, making it the less valuable, and her help
had too often been interpreted as bossiness. Moreover, she was curious to see
how Chase would come out of this by himself. Would he put principle above
all, and encourage Lincoln? Or put long-term political advantage first, and
seek to stop him? Trickiest of allwould he see the danger in putting political
advantage first, and take a principled stand for fear of being caught off politi-
cal base?
She relished these possibilities, and was grateful to Chase for the chance to
see the play of power in Lincoln's Cabinet. To Chase, the war now offered a
way to abolition, and to Lincoln, abolition now offered a way to win the war.
She thought both were wrong. Abolition was a way to lose the war, and only
if the war were won would slavery ultimately be ended. Anna resolved to
restrain her impulse to tell a political leader what to do.
"What if this threat of abolition at year's end did cause the loyal slave
owners to sell their slaves to the government?" Chase asked aloud, finding
another chink in Lincoln's proposal. "Where would I get the money for that?
The spigot in Uncle Abe's barrel is twice as big as the bunghole."
That turn of phrase was uncharacteristic. "Excuse me, Governorwhat
did you just say?"
Chase looked at her, surprised and pleased with his own figure of speech.
"The President may have been a good flatboatman and rail-splitter, but he
never learned the true science of coopering. The bunghole in a barrel is where
the airin this case, the moneycomes in. It has to be bigger than the
spigot." He coughed nervously. "Perhaps that's an undignified way to
talk"
"Oh, no, Governortalk that way, by all means. Too many people take
your normal manner as, um" Was he ready for this? She took the plunge:
"stuffy. Lincoln is criticized for his coarseness, and rightly so, but many
voters appreciate a leader who speaks colorfully. I wish the public could see
you as I do, and hear you talk about the spigot and the bunghole."
He beamed at her, then caught himself and frowned. "Frederick Douglass,
the freedmen's leader, speaks often of the 'image' of a public man. I fear mine
hardly reflects the man I really am." When she did not contradict him, he
added ruefully, "I wish there were something I could do about this perception
of mywhat you call 'stuffiness.' I'm really not, you know. Not at all."
She reached over and squeezed his hand, then withdrew her own. "There's
a newspaperman I want you to meet," she said. "Whitelaw Reid. Writes
under the name of 'Agate.' He's asked me if he can be helpful to you in any
way, and I was thinking, maybe he can do some pieces on the 'real' Governor
Chase. Or even help you with some of your speeches, when you don't have
time to work on them because of the press of other affairs." She was not about
to volunteer for that assignment herself and wanted to shunt Chase off on
someone else before the need for such help occurred to him. Senator Brown-
ing demanded enough nonpaid writing for now, along with Bates and the
others.
A black servant knocked and entered. "The Secretary of War is here, sir,
with another gentleman. He says they not expected but must see you right
away quick."
Chase motioned for Anna to remain seated, adding, "I have no secrets
from you on this, Miss Carroll. And if Stanton brought a witness, perhaps I
should have one too."
Stanton and a tall, thin man who was introduced as "Cutting, a Democrat
from New York" were ushered in. She reached up to shake Cutting's hand,
squinted at him, and took a chance: "Did you not serve in Congress some
years ago?"
"Almost a decade ago, Miss Carroll," the New Yorker said, pleased to be
recognized. "I came here at the end of the Fillmore administration. We met at
a White House reception."
She remembered Francis Brockholst Cutting better than he knew. John
Breckinridge had told her of the time Cutting and the other "Hards" in New
York had joined with him in pushing a bill to repeal the Missouri Compro-
mise and bring in Kansas and Nebraska as states with "pop sov"free to
decide for themselves about the extension of slavery. When the abolitionists
in New York got wind of the deal, Cutting was forced to renege; then Breck
denounced the double cross on the floor, and Cutting claimed to have secretly
financed the Breckinridge campaign. When Breck called him a liar to his face,
Cutting challenged him to a duel. Breck accepted the challenge, named the
weaponsrifles at sixty pacesand Cutting, through some skillful seconds,
backed down. Breck had good reason to distrust Cutting politically and to
despise him personally.
"Look, Chase, we have a damned crisis on our hands," the agitated Stan-
ton said, ignoring amenities. "Victory is in our grasp, and Blair and Seward
and that sneaky lobby-agent Weed are trying to snatch it away."
Cutting looked at Stanton sharply and raised an eyebrow, taking note of
the presence of an outsider. Stanton dismissed his caution with "This lady
does the work that makes others famous." Anna liked the way he paid her the
compliment of not fawning over her. "Miss Carroll, I rely, as always, on your
absolute discretion." Stanton drew on his glasses. "No time to beat around
the bushthanks to Cutting here, Lincoln has proposed to emancipate the
slaves in rebel states. Happened this morning in Cabinet."
"I was not aware of your role," Chase said to the New York lawyer. Anna
was glad the focus had shifted from her; she did not want Chase put in the
position of admitting he told her about it or, worse, of having to cut her out of
the conversation.
"Cutting here was with Lincoln for two solid hours before the meeting,"
Stanton said. "Give Chase the gist," he ordered.
"I argued in substance that the emancipation of the slaves would produce
very important and beneficial effects on our relations with foreign powers,"
Cutting reported. "After we struck off the shackles of the bondsmen, foreign
governments would not dare to take sides in favor of their masters."
"That's what Blair said was the best argument for, but Seward doesn't
agree," said Chase, "and Lincoln trusts Seward in foreign relations. Did you
talk politics?"
"I dwelt on the importance of encouraging that rapidly increasing demand
of our loyal citizens," said Cutting, "who eagerly wish for the destruction of
slavery."
"This fellow is a New York Democrat," Stanton said, slicing through the
man's verbiage. "When those fellows start turning on abolition, that has to be
important to Lincoln."
"Did the President show any concern about the effect of his emancipation
order on the border states?" Anna put in.
"Oh, yes," the lawyer assured her. "That was his main difficulty with the
idea."
"Cutting hit that very hard," said Stanton, excited. "Tell them what you
told Lincoln."
"That we had already sacrificed too much to a vain attempt to conciliate
these people," Cutting replied. "At heart, most of them are disloyal, as the
inaction of a committee of them meeting with the President had shown. To
hesitate to confer freedom on human beings merely because it would be dis-
tasteful to slave dealers in Kentucky and Maryland would be to reject the
claims of justice."
Anna bridled at the effrontery of the New Yorker, who had probably never
met a slave. She held her temper: "And did the politics come up?"
"I told the President that a dramatic emancipation would infuse the hearts
of our loyal Democrats with additional fortitude." Anna took that to mean
that Cutting had not warned of the reaction of voters at the polls this fall.
"It had great effect, Miss Carroll," said Stanton, "so much that these argu-
ments caused Lincoln to move on a document he has evidently been working
on since the Seven Days defeat."
"You think he'll issue it?" Chase looked worried. "Tomorrow?"
"I think so," said Cutting. "He's ready."
"He said he was going to think it over," Chase countered. "He said Seward
had a point about his looking desperate, a last shriek on a retreat" Anna
wondered what that meant.
"Lincoln is damn well going to issue that proclamation tomorrow," Stan-
ton said with determination, "and I'll have it on every telegraph wire in the
country before he has a chance to change his mind again." If Lincoln was so
sure to sign the proclamation, Anna wondered, why was Stanton here? Why
was Chase's support necessary now?
"It is a larger step than I ever contemplated," said Chase. "I had in mind
that the generals in the field"
"Dammit, Chase, I thought we could depend on you," Stanton said, rising.
"You were awfully silent in that meeting at the critical moment."
"You know that my sympathies are"
"I don't need your sympathies, I need your heart and hand in this!" Anna
had never seen the Secretary of War this upset. "You sat in that Cabinet
Room today, when human slavery could have been dealt a death blow, and
you said nothing. Nothing!"
"That is untrue, Edwin Stanton." Chase rose and glared at his guest. "I ask
you to withdraw that remark, sir."
Anna's eyes darted back and forth between the men in confrontation.
Chase was on the spot. If Lincoln listened to Seward and Blair and put aside
the proclamation, Stanton and this man Cutting would let it be known to
Horace Greeley and other radicals that Chase was the man who failed them.
On the other hand, if Lincoln went ahead and issued the abolition order in
the morning, Chase might be even worse off politicallystanding on the
platform after the abolition train had left the station. Anna was enjoying this.
"I mean no offense"Stanton seemed to back down, but immediately
bored in again"but don't you see how it will look tomorrow, with the
proclamation issued over what some people may think is your objection?"
"You'll be ruined," said Cutting. Anna was certain he and Stanton had
rehearsed their argument.
"Then those are the consequences I am prepared to suffer," said Chase
solemnly. Good for him, Anna thought. "I give my advice in Cabinet on
principle, and not with any thought to political advancement." Sometime, she
decided, his stuffiness was endearing, if he meant it.
"Spoken like a patriot," said Cutting, motioning Stanton to sit down. Ap-
parently the New York lawyer would try another tack, since Chase would not
be stampeded. "If this golden moment passes, there are surely many who will
say that you, Mr. Chase, must be held responsible for delaying or defeating
the greatest act of justice, statesmanship, and civilization of the last four
thousand years. I shall surely not join them. I fully recognize your commit-
ment to emancipation, done in a more orderlymore soldierlyway." Cut-
ting paused to let that sink in; he was a good trial lawyer.
"It is a most dramatic step," Chase said. "I know that Stanton here wants
an uprising, but to think of four million Africans on a rampage against the
women and children of the South, with white husbands and fathers away at
the frontit's too terrible to contemplate."
Stanton started to speak but Cutting motioned him silent. "Forget the
political implications of failing to be behind the President when he takes his
historic action," said the New York Democrat smoothly. "Consider only the
principle. There comes a moment in a nation's history that great issues turn
on a single person's advice. We are at that moment now. The war is being lost
by the North, we all know it; emancipation is truly an act of desperation, of
military necessity. If Lincoln acts now, slavery can be made the issue of the
war, and struck dead if the North should win."
"And if he does not act" Anna was drawn into the flow of the lawyer's
presentation.
"Suppose there should be a military success next month," Cutting posited.
"Suppose Lee's rebel army disengages from McClellan and comes to chal-
lenge John Pope here outside of Washington, and Pope smashes Lee and the
Union wins the war. What pressure then will be on Lincoln to free the slaves?
None."
Chase was silent; the man had a point.
"The President, as you know far better than I," Cutting added, "is not the
sort of man to take chances. He is fundamentally conservative. If he begins to
win, Lincoln will stick to the cause of the Union and forget about abolition.
And the moment to end slavery now, in our lifetimes, will have come and
gone."
Chase took a deep breath and exhaled. Anna admired the presentation:
Cutting had changed the situation in Chase's mind from one in which he was
a reluctant follower to one in which he could be the central figure. But what
about Chase's convictions?
"Come with us to see Lincoln in the morning," said Stanton, controlling
his agitation. "We need you. Human freedom rests in the balance. Your si-
lence today will be forgotten, your voice tomorrow will be remembered for-
ever. Are you with us?"
Anna took a handkerchief and patted her face and chest while they waited.
God, it was hot in Washington in July.
"I want to think it over," Chase said finally. "Let's ride to the Mansion
together in the morning."
"We'll be here at seven," said Stanton, now sure of his man. "Miss Carroll,
if the Secretary of the Treasury has any doubts about the President's war
power in this matter, I know you are prepared to elucidate."
As they rose to leave, Cutting said to Anna, "I admired your pamphlet
tearing apart that scoundrel Breckinridge."
"He spoke of you often," she replied, not especially seeking this man's
friendship. "Rifles at sixty paces, wasn't it?"
The New Yorker blanched and followed Stanton to the door. After they
departed, Chase looked at her directly. "What do you think I should do,
Anna?"
"Do what your conscience directs," she replied, not helping him a bit. She
should have done the same with Fillmore and Buchanan; if Chase had no
political judgment or moral backbone, it was time she learned about it.
"I have no real choice," he said at last. "This proclamation at this time,
and in this way, may be a terrible mistake. It is surely more than I contem-
plated." He sighed deeply. "But I cannot afford to appear to be inconsistent,
which is what further opposition to a presidential proclamation would seem
to be."
She nodded sagely, in understanding rather than in agreement; he was
getting set to cave in.
"Tomorrow morning," he announced as if to an assemblage, "I shall go
with them to the presidential Mansion and give my unqualified approval to
emancipation. And I know, my dear lady, that I can depend on you to make
it clear to your friend and mine, Ben Wade, that at the decisive moment it was
Salmon Portland Chase who turned the tide."
"I feel I know you much better now, Governor," she said with feeling.
"I am glad," he said. "Your good opinion, Anna, means more to me than I
can now permit myself to say." Responding to his carefulness, she said noth-
ing.
He rose, took her hand, and led her to the library adjacent to the dining
room. She permitted herself to be ushered along, marveling at the way he had
decided, with no discernible anguish, to risk the lives of millions of white
women and children rather than risk his place in the pantheon of radicals.
She respected the Chase taste in good living, that was certain. The pol-
ished, leather-bound books were warmly inviting because each was an indi-
vidual copy, not part of matching sets; his desk was suitably stacked with
work taken home; the tea table was probably Sheraton, and the fire irons were
the sought-after old double lemon-tops made in Boston during the Revolu-
tion. A bottle of old Madeira was on the tea table, which he carefully de-
canted before pouring two servings into heavy crystal goblets. The man knew
how to live, in a way that reminded her of the Carroll home when her father
was governor.
Anna knew she was not about to live that way again short of marriage to a
man like Chase. She was three thousand dollars in debtnot a huge amount,
but one that always seemed more than she could get a handle on. The chosen
life of a spinster, with all its independence and privacy, was no longer so
satisfying. And there was place for pride, along with some derivative power,
in being what they were calling "First" Lady. Still, the need to keep her
opinions to herself rankled; she did not know if she could restrain herself for
very long.
"What troubles you most about the proclamation, Governor?"
He answered as if he were still addressing a meeting. "Arming slaves that
come across the lines, in small numbers, under local military control, is a
good thing, and I have been pressing for it. But a proclamation aimed at the
slaves on undefended plantations, far from military control of any sort, is
incitement to uprising. Pillage, carnage . . ." He groped for another word
ending with "age."
"Serve the traitors right," she could not help saying.
He looked closely at her and stopped talking to the whole room. "Do you
know what you're saying, Anna? The women and children at home are not
traitors. The children are not responsible for the rebellion. The people who
will suffer are the innocents, not the real traitors, who are surrounded by
soldiers."
She wondered if that concern was really what motivated him. "You want to
know what I think?"
He took a deep breath and said, "No." She looked up, more surprised than
annoyed, but ready soon to become annoyed.
"I hope you will not tell me what you think, Anna, because I fear that you
have a set of reasons, brilliantly marshaled, that will make me feel even worse
about what I am determined to do. I do not need reasoning that makes me
feel like a hypocrite. At this moment I would appreciate, instead, your sup-
port."
Anna chewed that over. After a moment, she decided the challenge went to
the heart of the sort of person she was, and wanted to be. She would do what
she could to minimize her bossiness, but she was not going to become some-
body's abject supporter at this stage in her life. She pushed her chair back and
stood up.
"I won't wait for Ben Wade to come by and get me," she announced. "I'll
walk home. I live only a few blocks away."
He motioned for her to sit down. "I knew you'd take it that way. I really
wish you would not."
"You've been living with your daughters for too long," she told him. "You
don't need a woman friend, you want an audience. I'm not that way." When
he said nothing, she went on: "So I'll say what I think, whether you like it or
not." Why didn't he argue? He merely looked defeated, which made her feel
bad; when she went into intellectual combat, she expected, needed, resistance.
"Are you listening?"
He rose to his full height and looked sternly at her. Chase was a very big
man; at times like these, she wished she had the physical stature of a Breckin-
ridge or a Sumner. At any rate, she had gained his full attention, and she
pressed on.
"You know where I stand on the war power," she told him. Stanton's
parting remark had contributed to her bona fides on that. "I think a President
in wartime may arrest a legislature, the way Lincoln did in Maryland. I think
he can defy the Supreme Court's decision on habeus corpus, the way he did
with Taney. I would even go further: as commander in chief, the President
has the right to put down rebellion or repel invasion by assuming dictatorial
power. I'm no weak sister on executive authority, the way F'nandy Wood's
copperheads in New York are."
Chase nodded. "Your position on the war power is well known."
"The President's expanded power comes from his constitutional obligation
to strike at the enemy," she said. "Now, who is the enemy? The Confederate
States of America?"
"We do not recognize the Confederacy," Chase answered correctly. "Our
opponents are merely insurgents, not another nation."
"Those states in rebellionare they the enemy?"
Chase hesitated, then said: "No. We hold that secession is unlawful. No
matter what the rebel leaders say, it remains our position that the states of the
South are still in the Union. This is not a war between the states and the
nation, it is an insurrection by rebels against the legitimate government."
He had it right, and she had him. "Then individual rebels may be punished
for acts of treason, but not entire statesright?"
His brow clouded; she could tell he could finally see where she was leading
him. "True."
"Then it is permissible to punish individual rebels who use their slaves to
wage war, by declaring the slaves contrabandas Butler didand freeing
them. And it is permissible to punish rebels further, in the Confiscation Act
as explained in the resolution, by seizing slaves of all traitors supporting the
rebellion. In those cases, you are striking at the property of individual rebels,
who collectively make up 'the enemy.' "
"Make your point, Anna."
"But if Lincoln declared all slaves within a state to be free, he would be
making war on that state as a state. He would be punishing all its slavehold-
ers, whether or not they were taking part in the rebellion. With no compensa-
tion, that's a blood attainder and unconstitutionalbut, worse, it says that
the federal government has the right to take property from all the citizens of
one of its states without regard to individual crime or liability."
"But isn't that war?"
She sagged; he had missed her point. "That's not war, that's revolution.
Don't you see? If Lincoln issues that proclamation, he becomes the revolu-
tionary. The Southern leaders can say, with absolute justification, that they
are the ones upholding the Constitution and Lincoln is the one who has
turned war into revolution. And by treating 'the enemy' as whole states, and
not as individual traitors within those states, Lincoln would inform the world
he is fighting a legitimate nation."
Chase sat down, comprehending. Anna sat beside him. "My own plan of
emancipation," he said, "was to have local commanders in the field free the
slaves in the areas they occupied."
"That has a legal base in martial law," she said approvingly, "which oper-
ates only in areas subject to military occupation. The military can appropriate
property in land it has won, call it contraband or whatever, and free individ-
ual slavesbut neither the military nor the President with all his war power
can legally abolish slavery itself. That would take a constitutional amend-
ment. And you certainly have no right in international law to seize property
in areas you do not occupy."
"My own plan, then," said Chase with growing satisfaction, "is not merely
the practical way, it has the advantage of being constitutionally sound. And it
does not confer sovereignty on the states in rebellion."
"The rebel leaders," she told him, "are in rebellion, not the states. This is
not a war between the states, as the Southerners like to call it, this is merely
an insurrection of individual rebels. Only if Lincoln issues that emancipation
proclamation does he practice revolution and elevate the rebellion to a war
between the states."
Chase beamed at her. "Why didn't Blair think of that?"
Her mind raced ahead to consequences months from now. "Lincoln had
better be prepared to be a complete despot, if he goes for his proclamation. I
take it recruitment is falling off?"
Chase nodded. "Stanton is preparing for a draft."
"Then you can expect riots, especially if young men are being sent to fight
for an unpopular cause like abolition. Agitators will urge resistance to the
draft, and Lincoln will have to put them all in jail. He'll need more power to
do that than he has now, power on a grand scale."
She had not thought this through before, but the natural consequences of
such a proclamation quickly occurred to her, especially with Congress not in
session. "If he issues this abolition proclamation, he'd better be ready to have
another proclamation ready simultaneously, asserting his authority to clap
every objector in jail. Vallandigham and the lot. Otherwise, we'll lose the
war."
Chase shook his head; he did not want to think about that. "Tomorrow,
Anna, I shall accompany the Secretary of War to the President and once
again urge my approach to emancipate and arm slaves on a local-commander
basis."
"If Lincoln persists in his own way?"
He sighed profoundly. "Then I will give my heart and hand to a war
between the states," he said wearily. "I cannot oppose him on emancipation
in any form."
She put her small hand on his large one. His was not as large as Lincoln's,
which was huge, but it was a substantial man's hand, knuckled and impres-
sively veined. "Get right with your constituency, if you have to," she advised.
She hated to see a man go against his conscience, and she felt small in offering
no objection to his doing it, but she was satisfied in having had her say. She
stood in her own shoes; he was too preoccupied with gaining power to stand
in his.
"We won't wait for the Wades," he said. "I'll walk you home."
Her rooms were a mess; she would bid him a firm good night at the door.
"I would appreciate your support," she said solemnly.
Chase did not catch that reference to her reaction to his earlier announce-
ment at first, but in a moment it registered, and he smiled back with warmth.
She hoped that the prospect of ending her own loneliness was not causing her
to give him too much the benefit of the doubt. Chase was not a quick-minded
man, and not a deeply principled man, but she judged him to be a good man,
or at least a good-enough man, better than most presidents she had known.
Anna resolved to find an excuse to come back to this house before his daugh-
ters returned.
C H-A P TER  I
WIZARD OF THE LOBBY
In front of Willard's, nodding to acquaintances entering the great hotel for
dinner, Thurlow Weed awaited William Seward. A late afternoon thunder-
storm had broken the heat, leaving Washington humid but tolerable. On the
corner of Fourteenth Street, Weed could look up Pennsylvania Avenue to the
half-built Capitol dome. As carriages approached, he stepped far back on the
wooden sidewalk to escape the splash of mud.
Seward had sent a messenger with a curt note, telling his longtime political
partner to stand by for a meeting with Lincoln after dinner, that the President
was on the verge of a coup d'6tat. What did that mean? How could a Presi-
dent be accused of taking over his own government?
The Secretary of State came rolling up in his carriage at about nine o'clock
and signaled Weed to climb in.
"I'm taking you to the Mansion and setting you on Lincoln alone," he said
with no preamble. "I've delayed him for a few hours, but I cannot handle him
on this. It will be up to you, Thurlow, to save him from losing the war in a
single stroke."
No mere matter of the patronage, this. "What's all this about a coup,
Governor? Has Lincoln taken it into his head to be President again?"
"He's written a proclamation freeing the slaves," Seward said. "Just like
thatabolition in less than six months if the South doesn't give up."
Weed said little, listening to his alter ego's analysis of that day's Cabinet
meeting. His first reaction was sorrow that the President evidently felt that
the war was lost. Weed's second thought was more in line with his natural
instincts for political combat: "Where is Chase in all this?"
Seward's hawklike face flashed a smile. "He's embarrassed. Floundering
about. This is Stanton's play, and he'll bring Chase around in the morning to
carry the radical banner. Meanwhile, I have bought the time for you to do the
job. Stop the proclamation before it splits the North."
Weed could see the white Mansion a block ahead. "Why does Lincoln
suddenly want to issue a proclamation on this?" If Lincoln felt so strongly
about freeing and arming the slaves, to stir up a servile insurrection behind
rebel lines, he had the Confiscation Act.
"Ah, proclamations," said his partner. "You know the story of the man
after the Revolution who couldn't rest until his village raised a liberty pole.
When his neighbors asked if he didn't feel as free without it as with it, the
man always answered, 'What is liberty without a liberty pole?' And what's a
war without proclamations?"
Weed nodded in appreciation at the jest but knew there was more to Lin-
coln's move than a need to give the appearance of leadership. Either Lincoln
was using emancipation to reverse the tide of war, or he was doing just the
oppositeusing the war emergency to do something about slavery. "Is Lin-
coln dead set against slavery? More than he lets on?"
"No more than you or I," said Seward with his customary certainty. "He's
influenced in this precipitate pronouncement by the notion that the common
people in foreign nations expect us to be against slavery."
"He's right about popular sentiment abroad," Weed said, remembering the
distaste felt by the cotton-hungry English leaders at the workingman's aver-
sion to American slavery. "Even the Tsar is freeing the serfs."
"The people in England and France, my dear Thurlow, do not understand
that this war, if successful, will ultimately end slavery here. But if we try to
end slavery during the war, we'll lose. There'11 be riots in New York City,
abetted by its contemptible mayor. Can you imagine drafting white Irishmen
to fight and die for the freedom of the Africans?"
"I want John Dix for governor on the Republican ticket," Weed said,
turning to a matter closer to home. "Greeley won't take himDix is a Dem-
ocrat. But if we don't put up a good War Democrat like Dix in New York, the
Peace Democrats will beat us, especially if the Democrats prevail on Horatio
Seymour to run."
"Don't bring that up tonight," Seward told him, as the carriage wheels
oozed to a stop in the mud outside the White House. "You're reputed to be
the Wizard of the Lobby. Concentrate on one great lobbying goal: stop that
proclamation."
Weed did not get out immediately. "Henry, it's a good thing your good wife
can't hear you say that."
Seward slumped in his seat. "I had a letter from Frances today. She said
that I had advocated liberty for forty years, and she cannot understand how I
can tell her now that the preservation of republican institutions is more im-
portant than the abolition of slavery. She thinks, as I used to think, that
Union and slavery are incompatible." He was silent a moment. "She said that
this was the first time in my life that I had spent an entire year without
writing a line in defense of human liberty."
"If Lincoln goes through with it, the name of Seward would be on that
paper, alongside Lincoln's," Weed reminded him. "The Secretary of State
countersigns proclamations."
Seward winced. "I know that. But abolition now is a mistake. Thurlow,
I've told you what to do, but I haven't asked what you thought. Are you with
me on this? Is my judgment sound?"
Weed squeezed his friend's bony leg and climbed down. "We think alike.
But I wish I knew what's driving Lincoln on this."
"I can't say for sure what, but I can tell you who. Stanton brought in our
old friend Cutting." Seward made a face.
"The professional switcher?"
"And he has switched again, from pro-slavery to abolition. I fear this has
unduly influenced the President. You're the antidote to that poison."
Weed nodded farewell, rapped on the front door with his knuckle, and a
black servant he remembered from Frank Pierce's day showed him inside.
The President's son, the little boy with the large head and cleft palate, raced
down the stairs to say that his father was in the telegraph office across the
street and that Mr. Weed was to wait in the small sitting room next to the
bedroom upstairs.
The Albany editor followed the boy upstairs and awaited the President. He
knew that the man would not be as easy to turn around as he had been a year
ago; Lincoln of late had become more confident of his own political judg-
ment.
Lincoln came in moments later with an expression that changed from mel-
ancholy to cheerful at seeing a fellow politician he liked. Then he went back
to a worried look: "Morgan's raiders are storming all over Kentucky, and we
can't get a firm handle on the state. Weed, I hate to say it, but the bottom's
out of the tub."
Weed knew better than to be drawn into a serious discussion about the war
right away. He complimented Lincoln on the way his boy was growing up,
meeting people cheerfully, handling himself well. The gangling President mel-
lowed immediatelyhis mood swings were remarkable, and not at all insin-
cereand soon was telling a story that Weed had long ago told Seward. They
laughed together, and Weed announced that Lincoln could relax, he had not
come to press him about the New York patronage.
"Justice to all," said the President benevolently, which was a code phrase
meaning an even split in New York between the Weed and Greeley factions.
Weed dearly wished he could tell Lincoln what he knew about Chase's ap-
pointee at the Port, Hiram Bamey, surreptitiously lending money to the Sec-
retary of the Treasury, but he knew that would be out of place.
"You surprised them in the Cabinet today."
Lincoln removed his shoes and massaged one of his feet. "Surprised, eh?
What did you hear?"
"Your abolition plan. Big meeting at Chase's tonight, with Stanton twisting
Chase's arm to get you to go through with your proclamation tomorrow."
"I think I will," said the President. "Wrote it myself, no help from anyone
in the Cabinet." He kept working on his sore foot. Weed had no foot prob-
lems himself, but knew how Seward suffered all his life from corns, and could
sympathize silently. Weed would never lobby a politician who did not ask to
be lobbied; he had no need to fill up the silence. That was the trouble with
people who met with presidents; they felt they had to use every moment to
get a point across.
"You were in London last month, Weed. How will they take emancipation?
Judge Blair says that's the best argument for it."
"The public in England and France will approve," Weed allowed, "al-
though that won't be decisive in keeping those nations out of the war. If the
negroes rise up in the South, and there's carnage on the plantations, you can
count on a revulsion all over the civilized world. I supported you on the
Confiscation Act"
"I saw those editorials in your Evening Journal; they were very good"
"and most of our readers go along with refusing to return slaves that
come into our lines, and with using them as laborers." Weed put on his most
somber look. "But to change the whole purpose of the war? To go from
preserving the Union to freeing the slaves down South?" He shook his head.
"If you issue that proclamation, Lincoln, I promise you that the Peace Demo-
crats will win this fall. You won't get any more troops out of New York."
Lincoln did not flinch at that. "We're thinking of conscription, if we have
to."
"A draft might work to defend the Union, maybenot to free the slaves.
You'll have riots, huge mobs in the streets. And not only the mayor but the
next governor on the side of the rioters."
Lincoln drew a deep breath. "If that's true in New York"
"It would hold for New Jersey, too, and most of Pennsylvania." Weed
could count and so could Lincoln. "You'd win in Massachusetts and lose the
border states, of course. You'd lose Ohio." Weed was pretty sure that in
Illinois, Lincoln's convention manager and old friend, Leonard Swett, would
go down to defeat, but thought it impolitic to tell that to the man from
Springfield. He phrased it delicately: "I wouldn't know about Illinois, maybe
Leonard Swett could squeak by"
"We could have trouble in Illinois," Lincoln admitted. "Depends on the
state of the war." He threw up his huge hands. "Well, it's the people's busi-
nessthe election is in their hands. If they turn their backs to the fire and get
scorched in the rear, they'll find they have got to sit on the blister."
Weed shook his head no; the way to approach the most important election
in America's history was with neither fatalism nor stubbornness. He had to
induce the President to face the adverse political consequences of his procla-
mation. "I know what you're trying to do," said Weed helpfully. "You're
trying to put new spirit in the North, to capture a great moral fervor after the
awful letdown in front of Richmond. But in my political judgment, a procla-
mation would do much more harm than good. On the stump, the issue would
turn on equality, not abolition."
Lincoln looked up sharply. "What do you mean?"
"The first question, in a political race, would be: Do you believe blacks and
white should be equal?"
"I answered that back in fifty-eight, in the debates," said Lincoln. "I said
then I had no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the
white and the black races, but I held then and hold now that there is no
reason in the world why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights
enumerated in the Declaration of Independence."
"Think politics, now," Weed pressed.
"Free the slaves, and make them politically and socially our equals?" Weed
could see Lincoln bristling at being forced to make again the disclaimers he
had made in his debates with Douglas. "No. A universal feeling, whether
well- or ill-founded, cannot be safely disregarded, Weed. You know that as
well as I do. We cannot make them our equals."
Weed noted Lincoln's disclaimer within the disclaimer"whether well- or
ill-founded"which was characteristic of the man. Weed had made a study
of Lincoln's statements on the negro, and while nobody fearful of social
equality could find fault with what Lincoln said, there was usually some little
twist or qualifier that made his anti-equality position seem grudging. In his
heart, he probably leaned toward equality.
"People up in New York are worried about the practical effect of aboli-
tion," he told the President, sticking to politics. "Take this step now, and you
take another tomorrow toward intermarriage, mongrelization . . ."
"Counterfeit logic," snapped Lincoln. "I won't accept an argument that
says that because I do not want a black woman for a slave, I must necessarily
want her for a wife." He glared across the sitting room. "I need not have her
for either. Hell, Weed, I can just leave her alone!"
"You're making debating points," the New Yorker told him, "and I'm
talking public sentiment. Remember the Fr6mont campaign in fifty-six."
He did not have to spell that out for Lincoln; everyone who had tried to
help John Fr6mont in that first Republican campaign for President remem-
bered the anti-black undercurrent that swept away so many votes and made it
possible for Buchanan and Breckinridge to win.
Lincoln raised both feet and brought them crashing down on the floor.
"Negro equality! Fudge! How long, in a government of a God great enough to
make and maintain this universe, shall there continue knaves to vend, and
fools to gulp, so low a piece of demagoguism as this?"
The bugaboo of social equality, Weed knew, was the greatest riposte any
politician could offer to appeals for abolition. A proclamation along the lines
of the one in the President's pocket, he was certain, would raise the equality
issue and elect governors and Congressmen who would settle the war on the
South's terms. If slavery were ever to be ended in America, it could not be
accomplished under an abolition standard or by a firebrand like Wade or
Stevens. The trick was to persuade Lincoln not to exaggerate the abolition
sentiment in the North; it was noisy, but abolition did not win elections. Weed
pondered the best way to get this simple point across to the complex man
before him; Lincoln was at once melancholy and droll, familiar and reserved,
easy enough to cajole but very hard to push. He probably saw this as a
military blow that coincided with his party's drift and his personal wishes.
Weed saw the proclamation as a military nullity that would harm his party at
the polls, ultimately defeating his personal hopes for emancipation by losing
support for the war.
"Forgive me, Weed. Here"he took a sheet of paper out of his coat pocket
"read it. What will the effect be? I hope for greater gain than loss, but I'm
not entirely confident."
That was frank; Lincoln was offering an opening. The editor perused the
document. Only two paragraphs. The first simply asserted the provisions of
the Confiscation Act passed last week, threatening to seize the property of
rebels. The second began by announcing an intention to submit another bill
proposing compensation for slave owners in all loyal states. Nothing startling
about that.
Then came the final sentence, concluding with "shall then, thenceforward,
and forever, be free."
Weed read the last line again. "This means you promise to free the slaves
where you have no power to free them, and not to free them where you can."
Lincoln acknowledged there would be charges of hypocrisy. "But I act out
of military necessity, and there is no military necessity to free the slaves in
loyal states."
Weed raised a large eyebrow. Military necessity seemed to him more of an
excuse than a reason.
Lincoln read his mind: "If I take this step without the argument of military
necessity, I do so without any argument at all. Should I say the measure is
politically expedient, or morally right? If I did that, I would give up all
footing on Constitution or law."
That explained why the proclamation was dry and legalistic, with no soar-
ing prose. Weed said: "It will infuriate the South, and discredit any Unionists
still there."
"What would you do in my position? Would you drop the war where it is?"
The President became sarcastic: "Or would you prosecute it in future with
elder-stalk squirts charged with rose water?"
Weed put the paper on the low table between them. "Do you act out of
military necessity? Or political necessity?" When Lincoln did not immedi-
ately answer, Weed answered for him. "I think you're acting out of what you
think is political necessitythat if you can't keep the radical Republicans
behind you, you won't be able to keep your troops at the front. I think that's a
mistake."
"Man came in here this morning, friend of Stanton's, Democrat from New
York. Cuttingyou know him? Says sentiment is changing, that the War
Democrats will go for abolition now."
"Frank Cutting couldn't get elected dogcatcher in Brooklyn," said Weed,
glad to get in a poke at a Greeley supporter. He wondered why Stanton, up to
now a moderate on abolition, was taking the lead, even ahead of Chase, to
push Lincoln to this extreme. But Weed put first things first: to undermine
Cutting's obvious credibility in Lincoln's judgment. "Frank's a pretty good
lawyer, I suppose, but you remember that duel business with Breckinridge
he tends to change his mind a lot. He served one term in Congress and
couldn't get renominated." Weed suddenly remembered that some said that
was true of Lincoln, too, and added, "because he is out of touch with the
common people. Abolition is fashionable among the well-to-do, but to the
man in the trolley cars, the negro represents a threat to his job."
"You disagree with Greeley on that."
"Uncle Horace," sighed Weed, on familiar ground with Lincoln, "reports
as fact what he wishes were true. What does his man Dana say?" Seward had
told Weed that Charles Dana, who deserted Greeley to go to work for Stanton
in the War Department, was advising against this proclamation because it
would go so strongly against popular opinion in New York City.
"Dana agrees with you," said Lincoln.
Weed nodded. "This is not a political necessity. Strange, I thought Stanton
had a good political mind"
Lincoln smiled. "He thinks it is a military necessity."
Weed could understand why Stanton, never a firebrand on abolition, had
become a radical, out-Chasing Chase. The Secretary of War wanted a slave
uprising to undermine rebel troop morale. And he wanted black soldiers in
the Union Army, because enlistments were falling off amid the general de-
cline in Northern spirit. Weed wondered, too, if Stanton had a personal politi-
cal motive. Why should the Democratic nomination in 1864 automatically go
to a conservative; why not to the Democrat who was the organizer of victory
in the war? "You believe this is a political necessity," he summed up, "which
you can cloak as a military necessity. Stanton sees this as a military necessity,
and is selling it to you as a political necessity. And you, in this document
here, are putting it to the people as a military necessity."
Lincoln smiled in a mysterious way, probably pleased that somebody else
understood it so well. "It's the only way I can do this. I have no power to
take property away from people for all time. It is justifiable only as a war
power, to confiscate rebel property. And as Judge Blair says, to keep the
Europeans out."
Weed marveled at the President's willingness to rise to the heights of decep-
tion in what he considered a just cause. He had to admire the man for that;
Seward might have balked, in such a spot. The problem was that Lincoln's
political assessment was unsound; he underestimated the voters' resentment.
"You have asked me my political judgment," Weed said, limiting his role
and avoiding the sort of presumption that always had a bad effect on Lincoln.
"I'm not equipped to argue the law1 assume you can justify this legally, or
maybe, when old Taney dies" He groped for the proper legal phrase.
Lincoln helped him: "When measures, otherwise unconstitutional, might
become lawful."
"However you work it out. Or Congress can pass a law later legalizing
what you've done, the way they did last summer. On the military side, I defer
to Stanton, although McClellan, I know, believes that a proclamation like this
would goad the Southern troops to new levels of fierceness."
He steepled his fingers and pronounced political judgment. "First, I think
the effect would be to dismay most of the Republicans and almost all the War
Democrats, who fight for the Union and not for the slaves. It would bring on
a terrible defeat in the fall elections, and enormous pressure to settle the war
short of victory.
"Second, any uprising on the plantations, and slaughter of innocents,
would give Lord Palmerston an excuse to bring England into the war to save
the South, soon followed by the Emperor of France.
"Third, the passions this would arouse would defeat your ultimate purpose
a reconciliation of North and South after the war."
Lincoln said nothing.
"I know how you feel about slavery," Weed added softly.
"It is a monstrous injustice," said Lincoln. "If slavery is not wrong, then
nothing is wrong."
"You have to judge whether this proclamation emancipates the slaves even-
tually, or dooms them to slavery if the North will not follow you."
Lincoln nodded. "I hate it, too, because it deprives our republican example
of its just influence in the world."
Weed nodded pious agreement. "If we win this war, slavery is surely dead.
If we do not" He left his thought unfinished. "I don't envy you the respon-
sibility to history of a rash decision." After a moment, he added, "What's the
hurry? Why do you have to lead public sentiment on this? Why not simply
encourage it along?"
"I confess that I have not shaped events," said the President, "but events
have shaped my policy."
"Let them push you into this," suggested Weed, who thought Lincoln was
being less than candid. "Be reluctant to do what you ultimately want to do.
Let a majority develop, if it is to develop."
"Seward suggested I await a victory."
"And if we win a great victory, if this fellow Pope turns out to be our
savior, you may not need the proclamation at all. It will cease to be either a
political or military necessity. Or you may want to let the commanders in the
field arm fugitive slaves, like Ben Butler in New Orleans, as Chase sug-
gests"
"No," Lincoln said abruptly. "If it is done, it will be on my authority."
"You're right, absolutely." ~lrithh Lincoln coming over, it was wise to keep
agreeing with him. Weed picked up the document again and read it over. He
saw an opportunity to press his advantage. "You know, this first paragraph
could stand by itself," he said. "It promulgates the Confiscation Act and
warns the rebels that they stand a chance of losing their all. You could hold
the second paragraph until the time is ripe, and go ahead with this."
Lincoln picked up the paper, considered the first paragraph alone, and
nodded. He seemed to feel better, since he would proclaim something right
away, and not leave the last word on slavery with the Congress.
Weed took his leave, certain that the issuance of the first, harmless half of
the proclamation would satisfy Lincoln's hunger for personal action this
week. He wished he could tell Lincoln Seward's liberty pole story: What's a
war without proclamations?
Having saved Lincoln from the folly of abolition, the bulky New Yorker
walked down the hallway with the tall, lanky President, debating with him-
self whether to broach the subject of patronage. He knew he should not, but it
was impossible for him to resist.
"John Dix," he said. "Loyal War Democrat. You like him?"
Lincoln nodded. "He has taken on some difficult chores."
That was putting it mildly. "I want him to be our candidate for New York
governor. Greeley wants an abolitionist. If Uncle Horace gets his way, the
Republican ticket will lose to Horatio Seymour, who's a copperhead for cer-
tain. A word from you"
The President shook his head. "That's for you two to fight out. Justice to
all."
Weed sighed; it had been worth a try. But it had not been a wasted evening.
At least he had saved the party and the Union from the folly of sudden,
uncompensated abolition.

CHAPTER 2
PHOTOGRAPH BY BRADY
Mathew Brady left his Whatizzit Wagon outside his studio on Pennsylvania
Avenue between Sixth and Seventh streets. The ground floor was occupied by
Oilman's drugstore and the banking house of Sweeney, Rittenhouse, and
Fant, but the top four floorsas the huge sign hanging from the balcony
proclaimedmade up "Brady's National Photographic Art Gallery." The
sign had cost enough, but he had to dominate a street already too crowded
with photographers, especially John Plumb's establishment a few steps from
his own. The competition to sell cartes de visite was keen, but Brady was
preeminent in the field coverage of the war; unfortunately, the money was to
be made in the little pictures of celebrated people.
He parked the wagon out front for a purpose. The mud-spattered convey-
ance from the field of battle served as an eye-catcher to passersby. Although
few people bought prints of war pictures, most would find it creditable that at
least one photographerthe intrepid Brady, not the commercial Plumbwas
doing his bit for the Union at war.
Business was terrible. The boom in cartes de visite had not ended, but
thousands of photographers around the country were turning them out more
cheaply than Brady. Alexander Gardner made it possible for Brady to com-
pete by ordering four-lens cameras that made four exposures on a single plate
of glass, quadrupling efficiency, but even so, the proliferation of photogra-
phers was killing his trade.
Brady arched his back to regard the giant Imperiales high on the walls of
his reception room on the second floor. Webster, Clay, and Calhoun, blurred
in his vision, looked back at him, their oil portraits made from glass-negative
copies of daguerreotypes taken by Brady in the days when he could see
clearly. The negatives had been projected on sheets of canvas, with the images
then colored in oil paint, resulting in startlingly lifelike portraits.
The Imperiales were Gardner's idea, Brady admitted to himselfhis in-
tense little employee was a wizard at chemicalsand were still a Brady Stu-
dio exclusive, but the cost was too high for all but the wealthiest. Then there
was the root reason for the falloff in trade: Brady was rarely on hand at his
studio. As at a restaurant, the customers wanted the man whose name was on
the door to serve them, or at least to greet them. Brady had chosen to go into
the war fronts for weeks at a time, spending much of his remaining time
badgering the War Department, to fulfill what he considered his destiny.
Brady was determined to make photography a respected profession, an ad-
junct to the written record of history; this noble determination was bankrupt-
ing him.
Time was short for that destiny. McClellan, he was sure, would not be
reinforced for another assault on Richmond, and the new commander from
the West, John Pope, so beloved of Secretary Chase, struck Brady as a blow-
hard. Two days before, Lincoln had issued a proclamation putting the Confis-
cation Act into effect, threatening to seize property of rebels, which seemed to
betray a certain desperation; there had even been rumors the President had
considered outright abolition, the telltale sign of a war being lost, until
Seward and Weed and Blair talked him out of it. So many images of war to be
recorded, Brady thought, so little war left.
"O'Sullivan, are these quills sharp?" He tested one on his fingertip. It was
ready for service.
Tim O'Sullivan was the best camera operator working for him. Gardner
was irreplaceable in the darkroom, and had organized an operation on the
roof to print pictures by means of bright sunlight, but it was O'Sullivan who
managed to bring in the best war pictures, the ones that the engravers sought
for the illustrated magazines. O'Sullivan looked to the freedman, Foons, and
asked if he had sharpened them. The black nodded. "Go ahead and use them,
Mr. Brady," O'Sullivan said. "I hope you're doing the books, so we can get
paid."
Brady sighed, not only for the days of his Broadway studio when a hired
bookkeeper did the nasty work, but for the time long ago when he could see
the point of a pen. Now everything more than two feet away was a blur. With
his thick glasses on, he put his face down toward a piece of stationery, taken
from a local hotel, and proceeded to write a promotional letter.
"I'm doing this to get in Judas goats," he informed his staff, who, he was
sure, would never get the hang of the sales end of the business. The Brady
studio, to remain celebrated, needed celebrated subjectsgenerals, senators,
entertainment personages, the President. Lincoln was scheduled to come in
this afternoon for the first time in six months, but not even the occasional
presence of the President was enough. People of power and influence should
be coming every day, even when he was in the field and a man of lesser
personality, like Gardner, was in charge.
Brady's invitations usually drew a favorable response. When he had written
to Harriet Beecher Stowe, the novelist had come into the studio and her visit
generated considerable business afterward. Same with Anna Elizabeth Dick-
inson, the youthful lecturer. Women were an untapped source of revenue for
most studios; individuals and newspapers would buy pictures of famous or
notorious women. He was glad Gardner had caught Rose Greenhow before
she was sent South, which was to be any day now, though Brady wished he
could have supervised that one himself, using one of his minor assistants to
focus and uncap the lens. No matter; it was still a "Photograph by Brady."
Only Brady's name would appear on any picture taken in his studio or by his
men in the field. Though he relied on their eyesight to operate the cameras,
the new vista of war coverage was Brady's vision.
He wrote "Brady's Gallery" across the top of the hotel stationery, and then
"Miss Anna E. Carroll. Dear Madam, A friend of yours has been kind
enough to tell me of your interest in photography"he always used that
opening; everyone had some friend curious about photography"and I sug-
gest that your portrait would be an interesting addition to my Gallery." He
picked up a book, not Miss Carroll's latest work but the only one he had been
able to find in the library, and personalized his letter further: "As I have read
with exceeding pleasure your work A Warning to America and Americans, I
beg leave to tender you the courtesy which it has been my custom for many
years to extend to the talented and distinguished." That meant the sitting
would be free, unless the talented wanted extra prints, which they always did.
"Yours respectfully, M. B. Brady." He checked Miss Carroll off his list and
was proceeding to Kate Chase, next in alphabetical order, when Gardner
asked to see him for a moment.
"You can see I'm busy," Brady told him. Brady's burly, bright-eyed Scot-
tish import was an annoyance, when he wasn't making amazing positives
from seemingly lost negatives. Gardner was a Mason, and Brady distrusted
the Masonic order: do-gooders in secret. Moreover, he suspected Gardner
was a socialist; the man had brought his entire family from Scotland to Iowa,
and now the uncles and aunts and cousins were engaged in a strange commu-
nal organization seeking to prove the universal goodness of mankind, even
while the immigrants were falling like flies from some unknown disease.
Gardner, Brady freely admitted, was an honest manager of the studio, and
Brady was glad to have paid the man's passage from Scotland, but Gardner
was too liberal with promises of wage increases and too inclined to spend
money for experimental devices.
"All of us would like to talk to you now, Mr. Brady," Gardner said omi-
nously. Brady squinted at the group. Behind the manager, in a semicircle,
were Gardner's younger brother, Jim, and Tim O'Sullivan, along with three
other photographers: Guy Foux, David Woodbury, and George Bamard.
Only the black freedman was not with them; apparently he had slipped out,
frightened of a confrontation.
"You'll get paid when we get some money in here," Brady said testily.
"The War Department is a notoriously slow payer. I'm planning to see Stan-
ton about it tomorrow." He went to the cash box and spilled the greenbacks
on the desk. "There's thirty dollars here, or so. Share it among you."
"It isn't only the money," said Gardner, obviously the ringleader. "It's the
creditthe photographic credit. It isn't right for you to put your name on
our work."
"You're using Brady cameras," said Brady slowly. "Brady chemicals,
Brady plates. You're using the world-renowned Brady studio, the famous
Brady Whatizzit Wagon. That means the pictures are Brady pictures. I own
them, I sell them, I put my name on them."
"Photography is not just a mechanical, chemical process," Gardner came
back stubbornly. "It is an art, like painting or sculpture. Someday people will
understand that. And nobody has the right to put his name on another man's
art."
Brady drew his white smock around him and glowered in Gardner's direc-
tion. "The fact that it is a Brady photograph enhances its value. Why do you
suppose we can charge so much for an Imperiale?"
"I invented the Imperiale, Mr. Brady. I do all the retouching and the
painting. My name should be on my work."
"That idea was mine!" Brady exploded. He vividly remembered telling
Gardner what he wanted, and the Scotsman had merely accommodated him
on the technical details. "Same with the cartes de visite, and the stereotypes
not the technical part, but the idea."
"The technical part is the idea," replied Gardner. "Why do you deny me
all of usour due? What does it cost you?"
In Brady's view, these ungrateful hired hands were attacking his dream of
making photography a respected profession. They could never understand
how necessary it was to act as merchants, to sell under one respected name, to
use the fame of an individual to spread the word of the entire new field.
"I can understand your impatience in not being paid," Brady said, control-
ling his temper, "but I cannot understand your objecting to 'Photograph by
Brady.' It does not mean by me as an individual, it means by my organiza-
tion."
"There is no such thing as a photograph by Brady," O'Sullivan put in.
"Never mind that, Tim, " said Gardner.
"What does he mean?" Brady wanted to know.
"I mean," said O'Sullivan, despite what Brady took to be Gardner's reluc-
tance, "that you have not taken a photograph in years. There hasn't been a
true 'photograph by Brady' since the war began."
Brady threw down his quill pen. "That's a damn lie and you know it. Get
out of my sight!"
"You have no sight to get out of," O'Sullivan shot back. "You can't look
through a lens and focus. Face it, Mathew Brady, you're damn near blind.
You're not a photographer at all, anymore. You're the employer of photogra-
phers, the exploiter"
"Shut up, Tim," said Gardner.
"I took you out of the gutter," Brady seethed, "I taught you everything
you know about this business. You call yourself a great war photographer
now, don't you? That's because you're too stupid to get out of the way when
the guns are firing. Too blind to take a picture, am Iyou scum! Out! You're
fired!"
The massive O'Sullivan stepped toward Brady to throttle him when Gard-
ner interceded. "Look, you two, this is not what I meant to do. I mean to
work out a compromise."
"Never," said Brady. "You all think that a photographer is somebody who
merely sticks his head behind the camera and uncovers the lens." He waited
for the pounding of his heart to slow before continuing. "I'll tell you what a
photographer is. He understands the subject. He composes the picture the
way a musician composes music. He pours the light the way a painter strokes
on the paint. He waits for the moment, no matter how long it takes, and then
freezes his subject and makes the moment immortal. That's what I do, poor
eyes and all. If I want, I can hire six teamsters off the street to do my
focusing. And a couple more blacks to make the prints. I don't need any of
you. You can all march to hell out of here right now."
"Mr. Lincoln will be here in a little while," Gardner reminded him. The
manager did not have to add that Lincoln preferred Gardner to take the
picture.
"I will take the President's picture myself," Brady told them. "I was taking
pictures of great men before any of you ever saw a daguerreotype, when you,
Gardner, were a miserable jeweler. Now get to work or get out."
"I'll get out when I get the two thousand, three hundred dollars you owe
me," said Gardner. "You owe the others another fifteen hundred."
"I'll pay you one day. I don't want you hanging around the studio with
your hands out, scaring off the customers. You're a bunch of deserters, no
better than any who run away from the enemy. You're deserting your duty to
history by running away from the photography of this war." Brady liked that
point; he believed it, and it stung them.
"We'll have our own wagon in the field," said Gardner, "but we want our
money, or something equally as valuable, right now."
Brady instantly knew what he was getting at. "You cannot have the nega-
tives," he said, really worried for the first time. "Those are mine. I intend to
present them to the government after the war."
"I am taking every single plate with me that belongs to me," said Gardner.
"That means every photograph that I have taken."
"And I, mine," said O'Sullivan. "And if you want to call the police, I'll
haul you into court and blacken your damn name as a cheat and a bankrupt
forever."
Brady knew he had no real defense; they could even take his wagon for
back wages if they wanted. He sagged in his chair and took off his glasses.
"You do not know what you are doing, breaking up the collection," he
pleaded. "Gardner, think of the profession. You think you're an artist, think
of the collection"
"There does not have to be only one collection," Gardner said. "I will
protect my plates just as fiercely as you protect yours." He offered a conces-
sion. "We'll leave behind with you the plates that were taken by operators
who just passed through the studio."
Brady thanked God for the rapid turnover of personnel in the past that
would leave him with the bulk of the collection. After a long silence, he
agreed to negotiate, plate by plate, through his entire collection, with the
right to keep one positive print of the plates the others took with them.
Gardner and his crew did not immediately quit; they walked out together
to think over the crisis. Brady, still seated, trembling with rage, hand on his
chest, felt a new fear. What would happen when the President arrived? O'Sul-
livan, damn his soul, was right: Brady could not take a photograph. After a
few moments, Brady walked upstairs to the third floor, the finishing and
mounting rooms, where the women touched up the photographs and oper-
ated the presses that sealed the bond between images and backings of cartes
de visite. He found A. B. Foons, the negro who drove the wagon, cleaned the
studio, and occasionally operated a camera when everyone else was out, and
told the free black to follow him upstairs to the fourth-floor studio.
An hour later, when President Lincoln arrived, Brady was ready. Hill
Lamon, who accompanied the President, inquired about Gardner's where-
abouts and Brady shrugged off the question.
"I want to pose Mr. Lincoln myself today," said Brady, as the President
took his accustomed seat in Brady's famous chair with the wooden arms.
Brady had borrowed that chair from the House of Representatives in 1859
and never got around to returning it. The photographer arranged his favorite
props on the table: the leather-bound copy of the annals of Congress, the
inkwell. He decided against the clock with his name on the face, stopped as
always at eleven fifty-two, because a clock would make the picture too busy.
Brady went behind the camera, threw the cloth over his head, pretended to
focus, and then stepped to the side of the camera. "Foons, uncap the lens
when I say," he said to the black, as planned. Foons went under and focused
the lens on the President's face.
Brady looked at Lincoln, who was sitting stiffly in the chair as usual, neck
pressed against the brace hidden from camera view, never smiling, expression
frozen, presenting to the lens only what he thought should be a portrait of a
President. "Put your right hand on the arm of the chair," he told the subject.
Lincoln complied. "The left hand, put it to your chin. As if in thought."
The President shook his head no; that was not a gesture natural to him, or
it was not the photo he had in mind. Brady found it regrettable that Lincoln
was so stubborn, because in his desire to maintain his dignity, the President
appeared stiff.
"Then lean forward a little, and just leave your left hand up there," Brady
urged, adding, "where it's natural, the way you often do."
Lincoln, frowning a little at Brady's instructionsevidently Gardner and
the others did not direct him how to pose so specificallykept his hand near
his chin, thumb to forefinger, which made him appear to be feeling his way.
Brady liked the expression and the pose, as well as he could tell through his
thick spectacles, but he knew the picture's composition was not in balance.
On an inspiration, he went to Lamon, who was holding the President's silk
hat, took the hat, and put it on the end of the table.
Foons moved the camera back a few inches to get in the hat, refocused
while Lincoln remained still, and when Brady said "now," uncapped the lens,
and when Brady said "cover," capped it again.
During the wait to make another for safety's sake, the President's body-
guard made conversation about the Southern resentment of the employment
of freed slaves by the Union Army, especially by the hated General Ben
Butler in New Orleans. Lincoln replied, "I am a patient man, Hill, but it may
as well be understood, once for all, I shall not surrender this game leaving any
available card unplayed." Brady, glad that his little deception about the fo-
cusing had not been noticed, did not intrude on their conversation; he hoped,
however, that all this talk about using blacks against the South did not give
Foons ideas.
When the President and his bodyguard left, he said to the black man who
took the pictures, "Remember, Foons, anybody can aim a camera, and any
careful hand can develop and print. The single most important element in
making a picture is composition. That's what makes a 'Photograph by
Brady.' "

CHAPTER 3
MAN OF AUDACITY
John Adams Dix, summoned from his headquarters at Fort Monroe, sleeked
back his silver hair, squared his shoulders as befitted a political figure acting
as a general, and marched into the President's office. The late July night was
stifling; Lincoln was in his shirt sleeves behind his desk, his son Tad sleeping
on the couch.
The President rose and pumped his hand cordially. Ever since the episode a
year ago, when Dix and Nat Lyon stretched the law to prevent the meeting of
the seceding Maryland legislators, the New York Democrat felt that he was
among Lincoln's most trusted political generals. Dix's service in the Bu-
chanan Cabinet and as Postmaster of New York City had not been held
against him. He knew how valuable a good War Democrat was to the Repub-
lican administration, especially one with political roots in New York, where
Democrats had come under the domination of Mayor Femando Wood and
Horatio Seymour of the peace wing.
"How go the negotiations?" the President asked directly. A year ago, Lin-
coln might have bandied about a bit at first. Dix wondered at the reason for
the new crispness; it could not be the progress of the war.
"I met my counterpart at Aiken's Landing, up the James River," Dix
reported, laying a paper on the President's desk. "Here is the tentative cartel
we drew up."
Lincoln put on his spectacles and began to read the exchange document.
Almost at once, after the first few lines, he said, "Good. I was worried, as you
know, about anything that might imply recognition of the Confederacy. This
is fine, calling yourselves 'the authorities they respectively represent.' Never
call them the Confederacy," he said sternly, adding, "as I just did. We're
having enough trouble delaying the prize cases from coming before Taney's
court."
Dix understood. Last year, by declaring a blockade of Southern ports,
Lincoln had treated the South as an independent power. In cases involving
blockade runners that had been seized, the rebel owners argued that if the
North was not acting against a belligerent nation, the laws of prize capture
did not apply. The rebels' trick was to force the federal government either to
release the ships or to treat the South as a separate nation at war, which
would help the Confederacy gain the recognition of foreign powers. Taney's
Supreme Court would probably stick to the law and recognize the South. Dix
muttered: "That old man just won't die, will he?"
Lincoln shook his head in frustration as he continued to read Dix's draft of
a cartel document. Dix knew that the Supreme Court, as presently sitting,
had only one Lincoln appointee, with two vacancies. The fight for the two
jobs was fierceDavid Davis, Lincoln's campaign manager in 1860 and best
friend (but for Herndon) in Illinois, was pitted against Orville Browning, the
President's best friend in Washington, for one of them. With both empty seats
filled, Lincoln might have a majority, if a couple of the earlier appointees
came over to Lincoln's side.
Dix also knew Lincoln had an ace up his sleeve. If old Chief Justice Taney
did not behave, the President would press for a tenth judicial circuit, and a
tenth judge on the Supreme Court. If it followed that an even number re-
sulted in split decisions and judicial paralysis, he could logically ask Congress
for an eleventh judge, and appoint him too. Lincoln's threat to the court was
unmistakable, but evidently he did not want to tangle with Taney, preferring
a strategy of delay, ignoring the court as he did after Taney's habeas corpus
challenge.
"Sign it," said Lincoln, nodding approval as he finished. "At the moment,
we need the cartel more than they do."
"There's a hitch," Dix reported. "General Pope's orders. They're infuriat-
ing the leadership in Richmond."
"Harsh," Lincoln acknowledged, "but Stanton says they're needed. He
wants the rebels to know they're not just fighting McClellan anymore.
Wouldn't be surprised if Mars had a hand in Pope's orders himself."
"It's not only the Pope order telling our Army of the Potomac to subsist on
the Virginia countryside," Dix argued, "which is a license for looting. It's his
order that holds the local civilians responsible for damage by guerrillas, forc-
ing them to repair any disruption of roads or telegraphs"Dix now came to
a delicate point"and any man captured who was firing on Union soldiers to
be shot without civil process. That's some order, Mr. President. Does it have
your approval?"
Lincoln turned and fished a paper out of one of the cubbyholes behind his
table. "Pope says: 1 find it impossible to make any movement without having
it immediately communicated to the enemy. Constant correspondence be-
tween the enemy's forces and the so-called peaceful citizens in the rear of this
army is carried on which can in no other way be interrupted.' That's what he
says, and he's the general on the scene."
Dix was surprised and disturbed at the President's willingness to go along
with such a barbarous policy of executing civilians, especially in light of the
state of negotiations about prisoners of war. Dix granted that Pope was angry
at the way some civilians behind his lines shot at Union stragglers; he granted
that Stanton and Pope wanted to show the rebels a new, get-tough attitude
after the too-gentlemanly war between Lee and McClellanstill, was that
cause to go to the outer limits of the rules of civilized warfare?
"Mr. President, surely you cannot be aware of Pope's Order No. 11 issued
day before yesterday." The rebel general who was Dix's counterpart on pris-
oner exchanges, already complaining about reaction to the earlier orders of
Pope, might break off negotiations entirely when word reached him of No.
II. "Pope requires officers to arrest all disloyal citizens of Virginia, give them
a choice of a loyalty oath or deportation South. And then Pope's order de-
clares that any who return to their homes and violate the loyalty oath can be
shot without a trial."
"I'm aware of it," said Lincoln, leaving it at that.
"Sir, that" Dix was about to say that such an order was barbaric, but
thought better of such insubordination. "That invites retaliation by the rebels.
They can hang our men, too."
"Proceed with your negotiations, General. Perhaps there won't be cause
for retaliation."
Dix took that to mean that Lincoln went along with the fire-eating oratory
in the orders but had some quiet understanding with Pope or Stanton that the
threats would not be carried out.
As if to ameliorate Dix's concern about presidential willingness to tolerate
Pope's blustering barbarity, Lincoln added, "Henry Halleck has arrived from
the West to take over as General-in-Chief. 'Old Brains' agrees with you about
Pope's ordersand, of course, McClellan is hopping mad about them. But
there is something to be said for a man of audacity."
Dix half-rose to leave, but Lincoln motioned for him to sit downhe had a
story he used to tell an old law partner about an audacious man. Dix crossed
his legs and relaxed, pleased to be passing the time of night with the President
and his sleeping child. It was a far cry from working for the stiff old bachelor
Buchanan.
"There was a party once, not far from Springfield," Lincoln began, en-
joying the tale, "and among the crowd was one of those men who had audac-
ity. Cheeky, quick-witted, never off guard on any occasion. The audacious
man, chosen to be the carver of the turkey at the dinner table, whetted his
great carving knife and got down to business carving the bird." The President
made carving motions.
"The man of audacity expended too much force," continued the President,
"and let a fart, a loud fart, so that all the people heard it distinctly. It shocked
all. A deep silence reigned.
"However, the audacious man was entirely self-possessed. He pulled off his
coat, rolled up his sleeves, spat on his hands, whetted the carving knife again,
never cracking a smile or moving a muscle on his face. It became a wonder in
the minds of all the men and women how the fellow was to get out of his
dilemma."
Lincoln leaned forward, and so did Dix. "He squared himself and said
loudly and distinctly, 'Now, by God, I'll see if I can't cut up this turkey
without farting!' "
Dix threw his head back and roared with laughter, joined by Lincoln, who
liked his own story. The New Yorker knew it was a gem he could use at
military and political gatherings, evidence of his closeness to the President.
He would not tell it to McClellan or his staff, however; it was too well known
that Lincoln thought his general in front of Richmond lacked the audacity of
the man carving the turkey. Dix had the clear impression that McClellan's
star was setting, Pope's was rising; that meant the Union Army would soon
be pulled out of the Peninsula. He guessed that something fundamental had
gone wrong between the President and his commander during their meeting
at Harrison's Landing.
As Dix was leaving, he was surprised to see about twenty men standing in
the hallway, awaiting admittance to the President's office. It was past 10 P.M.
Lincoln came out behind Dix, drawing on his jacket, his good mood chang-
ing; the President said somewhat testily to the men who wanted to see him:
"It is a matter of no importance to me whether I spend my time with half a
dozen of you, or with the whole of you, but it is of importance to you.
Therefore, when each of you comes in, don't stay long."
Before Dix could make his way through the crowd, Lincoln put a hand on
his shoulder. Not caring if he was overheard, the President asked what Dix
thought of Horatio Seymour, who Weed said might be hard to beat for Gov-
ernor of New York. Dix, who hoped to get the Republican nomination to
oppose Seymour, put the Peace candidate's position in a nutshell: "Union as
it was, Constitution as it is." Seymourand a large body of opinion in the
Northwanted the war ended and the Union preserved even if it meant the
continuance of slavery in the South.
"People in rebellion states must understand," said Lincoln, "that they can-
not experiment for ten years trying to destroy the government and, if they
fail, still come back into the Union unhurt. If they expect to ever have 'the
Union as it was,' I say, 'Now is the time.' " Unspoken was the alternative. If
the Southerners failed to return soon, the Constitution would be altered to
abolish slavery.
Dix headed toward Seward's house across the square, to find out more
about Weed's visit. Next morning, he would stop at Old Capitol Prison to
pick up Rose Greenhow and her daughter, to sweeten the atmosphere with
the Confederate exchange negotiator. After the predations of Pope in Virginia
and the treatment being shown the women of New Orleans, rebel tempers
would be high.
CHAPTER 4
FAIR EXCHANGE

Rose O'Neal Greenhow leaned on the rail of the Union gunboat taking John
Dix and his two female prisoners, herself and her daughter, up the James
River, past the site of what she knew to be the glorious defense of Richmond
during the Seven Days battles on the Peninsula. She strained to see if she
could spot Aiken's Landing, the official point of contact between the two
nations.
Her daughter was in a sulk since General Dix and his party awakened
them the night before. Young Rose flatly refused to believe she would soon be
free, after all those false starts throughout the spring, the assurances by Stan-
ton, the threats from Pinkerton, the handwringing visits from Senator Wil-
son. The girl, just turned nine, sat in the back of the boat, looking at the water
churned by the engines, frowning her fear of more disappointment. Rose was
thankful the girl's dark hair and pouting mouth showed signs of her own
good looks; in a vindictive world, her daughter would need them.
"It's not far now, is it, John?"
"Ten minutes or so, Rose. Don't lean so far out, you'll fall overboard and
I'll be blamed for pushing you."
"That would make you a hero in some quarters." She smiled at him. "Most
of your friends would love to see me dead."
"Not most," said Dix. "A few. Pinkerton wanted to see you hanged, but
that was because the kind souls in Richmond strung up his man, Timothy
Webster."
"In retaliation for the valiant ship's captain, Nathaniel Gordon, you
hanged as a slave trader," Rose reminded him. The thought of the detective
Pinkerton, cause of so much of the misery inflicted in the past year, oppressed
her. "That miserable little German Jew," she muttered.
"Pinkerton? He's a Scot from Glasgow. Protestant, I think." The hand-
some generalhe was aging gracefully, she thought, and looked fine in his
uniformhad a hearty laugh at the thought. "You ought to hear him and the
other Scot, Brady's man Gardner, hoot-monning each other."
"He only puts that on as a disguise, John. He's a German Jew named
Pincus." Rose had nothing whatever to base that on, but it pleased her to
plant a seed of suspicion; she would spread that rumor in the book she would
write to raise her suffering to patriotic martyrdom. "He may enjoy his work
as a Peeping Tom, but your man Pinkerton is not much of a spy."
"McClellan thinks highly of him."
She smiled with satisfaction. "The little sneak came to my cell back in
March, trying to find out, in his heavy-handed way, what I knew of our troop
strength around Richmond." She smiled at the thought; it was good to smile
again. "At the time, all that stood between McClellan's hundred and fifty
thousand troops and the gates of Richmond was Magruder's forceeight or
ten thousand Confederates who were marching and countermarching to give
the impression of being ten times as many. With that tiny force, General
Magruder kept your 'Young Napoleon' and the whole Yankee army in check
for nearly two months."
A pained look crossed Dix's face, which pleased her. "I aided in the mysti-
fication," she added, "by 'inadvertently' supposing our force on the Penin-
sula to be not less than two hundred thousand strong. Pinkerton swallowed it
all."
"You not only stole information," Dix said sadly, "you fed back wrong
information."
"Part of the job, overlooked by most who presume to call themselves
spies." A surge of anger mixed with her pride. "That German Jew is not the
only one who wanted me dead. There's also the Honorable Henry Wilson
he's terrified that I'll talk."
"You could hurt a lot of people, Rose," the general sighed. "But you
couldn't limit the damage to Yankees, could you? Once that story began
unraveling, it would touch your family, the Breckinridge family, a few men in
Jefferson Davis's Cabinetit's not the sort of thing you would want to be
remembered for." He looked aft. "Nor to have little Rose know about."
He was making a case she knew far better than he; in newspaper interviews
and in her memoirs, she planned to hint at the liaison with Wilson, but no
more, because such tidbits of truth invited trouble and would make legitimate
the calumny heaped upon her by the savage Northern press. She was deter-
mined to be remembered as a patriot, not as a whore.
"Stanton, too, I suppose," he said, fishing. Not even John Dix, her old
friend, was above interest in Rose's affairs.
"In the worst times," she replied slowly, "when the candle went out and I
could not burn the vermin off the walls, when the paws of those men reaching
out for my girl might have made me lose my mind, Edwin Stanton made it
possible for certain people to have access to me." She owed Stanton her
freedom, and would not betray him.
"Strange fellow," he mused.
"He has his demons," she agreed. "Soft and deferential in his manners, to
the point of servility when it suits himinsolent and arrogant to those placed
in his power, though that is tempered by a certain degree of prudence. Like
Seward, he is physically a coward." That was all she would tell Dix, or
anyone.
"See the work of your Merrimack, " Dix said, pointing to the wreck of
three ships near the shore.
"Hooray!" she shouted, drawing surly glances from the crew of the gun-
boat. "Cheers for the gallant Virginia!" She ran back to the stern, showing
her daughter the damage inflicted on the wooden Federal ships by the Con-
federate ironclad. The queer-looking black Monitor lay low in the water
nearby. Rose recounted the tale of the glorious series of victories, skipping the
final standoff. The glum little girl did not react; she left to take another bath.
It worried Rose that her daughter felt the urge to bathe every couple of hours.
Rose strolled down the deck and struck up a conversation with a seaman,
hoping to find out if McClellan's troops were to stay down here on the
Peninsula or withdraw northward toward Manassas, where Pope's army had
been making threatening noises. Two other seamen came and led their com-
rade away.
Rose returned to Dix, evidently the only person on the boat authorized to
have communication with her. He was cagey, but his kindly nature made him
a potential source; she was soon to be in Richmond, and wanted some verifi-
cation of her suspicionand some intelligencethat Halleck had ordered
McClellan to move his troops north, to reinforce Pope.
"John, you are the only gentleman in Abolitiondom," she observed. "I
thank God Lincoln has no other agent like you."
"You know we're not fighting for abolition, Rose."
"No? Then what was that Confiscation Act all about? The newspapers say
that Abraham the First issued a proclamation putting it into effect."
"Stop that 'Abraham the First' stuff. I don't want to hear it."
"You don't think he's a dictator? A man who can clap any person he
dislikes into prison, without a trial, without so much as a charge?"
"The Constitution allows him to suspend habeas corpus in times of rebel-
lion," Dix said grimly.
"There was a man who used to protect me in prison, John. He tried to
bribe a guard to let him out in the yardhe just wanted to get some air, away
from the stench of the effluvium that poisoned the atmosphere. The guard
took the money, and when my friend went into the yard, the guard shot him
dead, claimed he had been trying to escape. The guard who took the bribes
was promoted to corporal. Do you know what my friend was in prison for?
He was in jail for saying something favorable about secession."
Dix looked across the water and said nothing.
"Your Ben Butler," Rose continued. "The Beast of New Orleans." The
thought that New Orleans had been given up without a fight infuriated her.
"He issued an order, approved by Abraham the First, that any Southern
ladies who refused to have any truck with Yankee soldiers were to be treated
like common prostitutes."
"Some women were spitting at the troops," Dix said. "And then one of
them emptied a slop jar out a window and it hit Admiral Farragut."
"Is that a reason to insult every lady in an occupied city? Come now,
General Dix, doesn't that touch your conscience? General Butler's order
fairly invited his men to have their way with any woman who offended them.
And the execution of a citizen of New Orleans last month, for daring to haul
down the Yankee flag from the mintdo you go along with that sort of
justice?"
That spear went home, as she knew it would; Dix had become famous early
in the war for his "shoot him on the spot" message, directed at anyone who
hauled down the Union flag, but he had never actually ordered a human
being to be put to death for such an act. That blustering order of Dix's was a
threat to rally support, to cow resistancebut she doubted he ever intended it
to be carried out.
"I have warned as much myself, Rose."
"But you never killed a civilian for an act of patriotism. And the-man who
was later shot made his glorious gesture before the city was occupied. Your
Butler is nothing but a beast and a murderer, and Lincoln loves him for it."
"Butler may be worried about a counterattack at Baton Rouge by your
friend Breckinridge," Dix said defensively. "Fear makes a general do terrible
things. Killing civilians is not government policy."
John Breckinridge was considered a threat to Butler; she would remember
that bit of news. "I can recall the day when Breck was a good friend of yours
as well," she reminded him. Dix and Breck had been close in the Buchanan
administration.
"I felt for Breck," he said, "torturing himself last year, trying to find a
middle way. But in a war for the nationality of the country, there can be but
two sides. The neutral clogs the movement of the government by his dead
weight, as the vis inertiae of matter impedes its motion."
She interrupted before he slipped further into Latin; in his spare time, Dix
translated Latin love poetry, and in the past she had tried to look interested
when he started to declaim his dreary exercise. "And all the orders from John
Pope to take hostages and shoot innocent men if Southern farmers threaten
his soldiers? Are you trying to tell me that's not Lincoln's policy either?"
"That was a mistake by one of Pope's officers," Dix explained wearily.
"Some rebels, not in uniform, were bushwhacking stragglersthat's a form
of murder, and it sometimes calls for summary treatment."
"No trial? Just catch them and shoot them?"
"Damnit, Rose, stop trying to make Lincoln look like a monster. You're
trying to make a pattern of dictatorship out of a few isolated instances."
"Like closing newspapers that dare to challenge the government posi-
tion"
"Consider what he has not done, in the midst of a rebellion. A dictator
would suppress the legislature and rule without itbut the Congress sits and
argues and investigates and"
"Not the Maryland legislature, you took care of them."
He did not stop to wince. "A dictator would quell all political opposition,
and Lincoln has not. He's the most publicly abused man in the North. There
is no Lincoln party, no party emblem substituting for the flag, no secret
criminal violence to intimidate people, no systematic crackdown on the press,
no national policy to crush dissenters"
"What?" She would not let him get away with a defense of the indefensible.
"You saw what went on at Fort Lafayettethat's where they threw the peo-
ple who dared to say out loud, or write in a newspaper, what they thought of
the edicts of Abraham the First. I've spoken to former prisoners therethey
told me they thought the Old Capitol, with all its stench and filth, was an
improvement."
"There were a few mistakes until Stanton took over internal security from
Seward," Dix argued, in his stubbornly reasonable way. "I went to Fort
Lafayette this spring with Judge Pierrepont, and we held sessions with ten
prisoners a day until most of the political prisoners were released." He raised
his hand to stop her interruption. "They shouldn't have been there in the first
place, I know, but there was panic when the war began, and Lincoln could
not be expected to stand against the popular demand for suppression."
"It was Stanton's man, Watson," she recalled, "who said, 'Let them prove
themselves innocent and they will be discharged.' "
"A mistake. We rectified it. Fort Lafayette is half empty now and you see
how your own release has come through. There aren't many dissenters in jail
at the moment."
His relentless defense of wrongdoing infuriated her. "Don't you see that
you don't have to imprison everybody who disagreesjust enough of them to
serve as an example to everybody else?"
"No, I wouldn't," he said, holding his ground. "There's no attempt to
hinder the elections this fall. They'll be free elections, freer than anywhere,
and smack in the middle of a civil warthat's unheard of. That's not the
action of a dictator. It may be in the next month or so," he added, "the
President will have to issue a couple of proclamations that may seem espe-
cially harsh to the fainthearted in the North, but we're at a difficult moment."
"How can you stand there, John Adams Dix, and defend what you know
to be despotism?"
"The Constitution may be violated in some cases, and stretched in others,
but there it stands. Besides, who are advocates of human slavery to talk about
freedom?"
That was a low blow. She narrowed her eyes and hissed, "Go give your
pretty speeches in a Union jail! Suffer the most obscene indignities because
you dare to speak out for your country, and then talk to me about 'democ-
racy' and 'Constitution'!"
They stared at each other, breathing hard, hopelessly split. She turned
toward the water after a moment and thanked God, honestly this time, that
Lincoln had so few men as Dix as agents to undermine the hatred that
sustained her.
"When you negotiate your prisoner exchange cartel," she said when she
was in control of herself again, "remember what horrible cages prisons can
be. And when you hear talk of abolition, remember that no white men are left
on the farms in the South, only the slaves, who need very little to go out and
fulfill their dreams of raping every white woman they can lay their hands on."
"If emancipation comes, the South will have brought it on itself." He did
not give an inch; if this good man would not see, who in the North would?
"We're near the landing, Rose. Better get your child."
Heart pounding, but with her voice controlled, she said, "I want to repay
your many kindnesses, John."
"I prefer to think it was I who repaid your past kindnesses."
"Don't be gallant, be serious. I know something that might help you. I
know, from someone in Lincoln's highest councils, that you will not receive
the nomination to oppose Seymour for governor of New York. If you are
planning on it, forget it, your hopes will be dashed. Something1 don't know
whatis in the works that will make the convention take the abolition candi-
date and not you."
Dix was paying close attention to what she said. "This is not the sort of
trick you played on Pinkerton?"
She permitted herself a small smile. "I would not mislead you, John, on a
personal matter." The boat's engine slowed perceptibly and the foghorn blew.
"And I hope your command in Fort Monroe will not shrink to insignificance
when our Peninsula loses its foreign residents."
"Don't worry about that, Rose. I'll have plenty to do in the next cam-
paign." That was what she needed to know: the Peninsula campaign of Mc-
Clellan was over, and his troops would be moved back North away from
Richmond for the next campaign. That meant that General Lee was free to
move north and smash the barbarian Pope. Dix's unthinking verification
would have to be conveyed to President Davis immediately.
"Now that we are here, and you cannot change your mind," she added
soberly, "let me tell you what I hear about your mission this week. I have not
been totally out of touch with President Davis. Unless Pope's uncivilized
orders are changed, and until the Beast of New Orleans is brought to justice
for his murder of that innocent patriot, your prisoner cartel is doomed. So
long as you think you can kill our people you hold captive, your prisoners of
war will rot in Southern camps. We won't kill them, but the smallpox will."
She fetched her daughter, but before debarking delivered a message to
Little Rose in the hearing of some of the sailors and General Dix. "You have
shared the hardship of my prison life, my darling, and suffered all the evils
which a vulgar despotism could inflict."
Her daughter shook her head, resisting; the first words she spoke that day
were, "I don't want to think about that." But Rose wanted to drive the lesson
home to the listening sailors.
"Let the memory of that never pass from your mind," she said loudly, "else
you may be inclined to forget how merciful Providence has beenin severing
us from such a people."
An officer from the Monitor came on board and transferred the former spy
and her daughter to another, smaller boat, which took them toward City
Point. As she approached the soil of her country, Rose turned to the ship that
took her out of captivity, determined to make a last gesture of defiance that
would surely be reported back to the tyrant and his minions who had made
her life miserable the past year.
While in the hellhole of Old Capitol Prison, she had laboriously and se-
cretly stitched together a Confederate battle flag for presentation to General
Beauregard, and concealed it as the lining of her shawl. She gave one end of
the shawl to her daughter and told her to hold it high. The girl obeyed. Rose
faced the Union vessel, saw that General Dix and the Federal sailors were
lined up at the railing watching them, and unfurled her glorious Stars and
Bars.
Mother and daughter waved and jeered, little Rose releasing her emotion in
delighted shrieks. In the distance, she could see her friend and enemy, John
Dix, shaking his head. Let him tell Abraham the First and all his sycophants
that the spirit of the South was unconquerable.
CHAPTER 5

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
AUGUST 1, 1862

I suppose I'm fairly spoony about her. Up to now I have been languidly
appreciative, but a diary is a place to be honest: Kate Chase and I have
reached the point of outright spooniness.
Six hours on the train to New York City. Inhale fumes for an hour, chang-
ing trains, then on to Albany. In the station, peruse Thurlow Weed's Albany
Evening Journal, with its gobs of loyal worrying about General Pope's army
could it be that Weed harbors distrust of the audacious Pope and affection
for the craven McClellan? Story in the paper about Secretary Chase plumping
for enlisting negroes in the army; how little the correspondents know about
what really is going on. The other day, the Tycoon had me bring in a detailed
map of the Mississippi, and showed Browning how the counties on each side
of the river from Memphis down averaged four to one blacks to whites. "I am
determined to open the Mississippi," said the Prsdt, "and if necessary will
take all these negroes to open it and keep it open." When the time comes to
use blacks, he won't need urging from the likes of Chase.
Hired a horse in Albany, no easy matter, and then over the hills and down
the dales to Buttermilk Falls. What won't a poet do to fasten his eyes on the
object of his delight?
There is an actual falls in Buttermilk Falls. Kate and I strolled out after
dinner to a small glen where the creek pitched its water about four feet down,
making a nice small roar, and causing much evanescence from the turbulent
waters. Late dusk, rising moon, balmy air, no bugs. I wished I had time to
take a bath after the trip, but no matter. We took off our shoes, kissed long
and sweetly, and splashed our toes in the brook. The war was on another
planet.
Kate is a first-class woman in every way but she cannot detach herself, as I
can, from the world's hurly-burly.
"Nothing is happening in Washington," I assured her. It is true that the
Tycoon was tense and secretive last week, but nothing of import is likely to
happen until Pope takes the offensive. His firm treatment of rebel bushwhack-
ers has upset the prisoner cartel that John Dix had worked out last week; Jeff
Davis lost his head about Pope's taking of hostages and the threat to shoot
them, and has ordered that officers from Pope's army be treated as felons
rather than prisoners of war. Obviously the secesh have grown too accus-
tomed to McClellan's soft war. Poor old Dix is crushed, thoughhe really
wanted to get our men out of the tobacco warehouses where they're being
maltreated.
Kate did not accept my assurance of inactivity. "You think the condition of
the nation is something I shouldn't bother my little head about," she said
with an edge in her voice. Nice, well-modulated vpice, genuine edge.
Not so, I explained, but there was a time and a place for everything. This
was the time for romance, and I tried to kiss her again, but she turned away. I
don't like it when a girl turns away. It is taking advantage, it is insulting, and
I said so.
She looked straight at me, took my shoulders in her surprisingly strong
hands, and explained, as if to a younger brother, what she thought was wrong
between us. "You don't trust me and I don't trust you. That's because you
think my father wants Lincoln's job, and I think you're trying to find out
what my father is up to."
True enough, as far as it went. "Lincoln tells the story of the chin fly," I
said. "Farmer tells his farmhand not to knock the chin fly off the horse,
because that's the only thing that makes him go. Same thing about Chase's
presidential aspirations."
"Cut it out, John. Deal with reality." She turned pensive suddenlythe
changes in mood are immediately reflected in her face, especially her mouth,
and are quite stunningand decided to confide in me. "Here's something I
never told anybody about my father. He's deathly afraid of women. He really
fears that women will dominate him, and he cannot face up to it."
I did not have to search hard for something equally revealing about Lin-
coln. "He couldn't face his father's death, you know. Wouldn't go to see him
on his deathbed, even though it was only sixty miles away, and wouldn't
attend the funeral. Still talks about doing something about the grave marker,
but he never will."
"Now something about me," she said, as if to herself. I was glad we were
getting away from revelations about our principals and on to ourselves, be-
cause, the truth is, I do not always like to face the truth about Mr. Lincoln. I
respect him, I admire him, I even love him, and it will be my goal in life to
make certain the world knows what a great man he is, but I also know he is
neither the lovable Lincoln of the funny stories and Western ways, nor the
hateful dictator-baboon of the newspaper legends. He is a hardened man who
gives in at the edges but will not give an inch on his central idea, who knows
how to say no, who puts the fervor of the Declaration of Independence ahead
of the compromises of the Constitution, and who is looking for a general who
is willing to take and inflict heavy casualties to save the Union. And there is a
dark side to his brain that has him worried all the time about death and
madness, in those around him and in himself. I like to think he is a man of
balance, using the weight of others' arguments to pitch his own forward, but I
suspect he is frightened of the imbalances within himself.
Kate derides his modesty, but it is absurd to call A. Lincoln a modest man.
As I have asserted before, no great man was ever modest. It was his intellec-
tual arrogance and unconscious assumption of superiority that men like
Chase and Sumner never could forgive. He scarcely ever looks into a newspa-
per unless I call his attention to an article on some special subject, and
frequently says, "I know more about that than any of them." And when I
give him a cutting that extolls his vision to the heights, he carefully puts it in
his wallet and carries it around for months.
Never has there been such a prestidigitator of men and events. He manipu-
lates others by seeming to get them to manipulate him. The woods are crawl-
ing with politicians who think they have taken him into camp, and who never
realize that their camp is where he wants them to think he is at that moment.
I know this is nothing I ever want to discuss with anyone, least of all with
Chase's delicious daughter. Nor is this a side of Lincoln to appear in any
history.
Kate was telling me something about herself that I knew and did not want
to hear: "I'm too ambitious for you, John. Sometimes all I can think about is
the way it is going to be when I can tell everybody to do what I want them to
do. Including you. That's unattractive, isn't it? That's not what they taught
us to say at Miss Haines's school."
"Nothing wrong with ambition," I told her. "What I'm saying is that you
mustn't let it permeate your whole life. Go ahead, dare to be first Lady, or
whateverbut don't let that get hold of your whole being." I enjoy lecturing
to her. "You know what you should be afraid of? You should worry about
drying up inside, of growing cold, of toughening inside the way you would
never let your skin toughen on the outside. If you're a success in only one
thing, you're a failure." That's a dandy aphorism; Kate brings out the best in
me. It was not, however, the right thing to say.
"What do you know about my life?" she flared. "Who are you to judge? If I
can get the one big thing, everything else will follow, and if I can't have it, all
the rest means nothing."
"Children, husband, home," I said coolly. "Music, art, philosophy, civili-
zationyou don't care. You think if you're the Queen of Washington, all that
will come to you? You'll miss it all, you'll die lonely."
"And poor," she said, goading me, eyes glittering.
"Spiritually poor. You're driving yourself single-mindedly straight to hell.
You'll be celebrated, envied, bejeweledmiserable." It made me feel good to
tell her this, I am ashamed to say.
"That's enough," she said. "Talking this way is a mistake. You're really
talking about yourself, you know. You're the one who's the moth circling the
flame, in that big white house. Everyone dances around you, you don't have
to put on a" She stopped.
"Uniform," I finished for her. "I think about that a lot. So does the Presi-
dent's son, at Harvard. Give us a chance, we'll get a whiff of grapeshot before
this is over."
"I didn't mean that."
"Sure you did. You and I like to hurt each other. Why?"
"We're good at it."
I laughed bitterly. I have a superb bitter laugh, which I have been practic-
ing in my mind for many years, and the occasion to use it had at last arisen.
"You're wrong about me, Kate, my love. I am going to be a complete man.
First, after this war, I'm going to be a great poet. And then, if I can master
my French, I will be a great diplomat, and maybe a really grand historian if
there's time."
She thought about that in silence. When she responded finally, her question
took me off guard. "You're not going to run for office?"
"That depends on the woman with me," I said on impulse. Suddenly she
was all over me, laughing, biting, yelping, carrying on in a manner that her
finishing school mistress could never have had in mind. Then, as suddenly,
she sat up.
"You have to know a few things. That I am truly fond of you, and that I
am a virgin and intend to remain so until my wedding night."
I told her that only the first item was of concern to me, but that was not
true. I am a romantic and she is a flirt. I came here prepared for a genuine
romance, but Kate, I fear, has in mind merely an innocent flirtation. So be it;
my time will come.
One purpose of a diary is to make a record of what might otherwise be
forgotten, especially the significant detail or illuminating offhand remark so
vital to historians. I do that when I can. Another purpose, more central to the
poet, is to give stereoscopic depth to the turning points of youth, much as
Brady's special camera does, because as the moving moments are recorded,
the diarist knows that an older self will be receiving the letter and judging the
writer.
I will need no record to remind me of my night in Buttermilk Falls, and I
will surely relive its poignance a thousand times. Toward that more central
purpose, I must remember to be more than a camera, but to take the time
when there is the timeto be a portraitist. As I put the pictures of tonight's
closeness on paper, I wonder: Did I miss a message? Was Kate telling me
about herself, or about our future, in her supreme practicality? Am I missing
a warning? Or, as is more likely, is she concerned about being too old for me,
and is she protecting herself from the pain of what she sees is a young man's
passing fancy? I shall have to reassure her about that.
Back to Washington in the morning. Contrary to some mawkish poetry
spouted all too often by a man of otherwise good taste, the Spirit of Mortal
sometimes has good reason to be proud.
CHAPTER 6
BATTLE OF BATON ROUGE
"Didn't you once tell me, Father, that Ben Butler was a big supporter of
yours?"
"Long ago. This is no time to talk about it." General Breckinridge had
made his advanced command post the balcony of a saloon on the main street
of town, where he could best see the street fighting and hear the sound of the
naval guns on the river.
"You said he was one of the most astute political leaders of the North," his
son persisted. "I remember that because you made me look up 'astute' in
Webster's."
As far as the general could tell, the hand-to-hand fighting in the streets of
Baton Rouge was over. Breckinridge's "Orphan Brigade" of Kentuckians,
along with ragtag regiments from Mississippi, Alabama, and an undisciplined
collection that called itself the Louisiana Partizan Rangers, had retaken the
capital of Louisianaat least for a few hours. The shelling from the Federal
gunboats under Admiral Farragut in the Mississippi River would surely make
Baton Rouge impossible for Confederate forces to hold for long, but General
Breckinridge had hopes that a surprise was in store for the Yankee fleet.
The former Vice President of the United States rarely talked about the
political days before the war. But he could hardly begrudge his son and aide,
Cabell, an answer, and there was little to do until the surprise attacker came
downriver to stop the Federal naval barrage. "The Democratic Party split in
'60 over the nomination of Senator Douglas," Breckinridge recounted. "Ben
Butler of Massachusetts and a bunch of other Northern men came to see me
about joining the Southern Democratic Party, provided I was against seces-
sion. I was."
"How come the Massachusetts men weren't for Lincoln, Father?"
"I told you to call me General when you're in uniform, Cabell." The
uniform consisted of Kentucky jeans, but Breck felt even that semblance of
dress called for a military attitude. "Butler knew that Lincoln's election
meant the South would secede. So Ben and his Northern friends supported
me, figuring I could have prevented secession."
"You didn't even carry Kentucky," the boy observed.
"Neither did Lincoln. Run over to General Ruggles and see if there's any
word from the Arkansas. "
The boy sped off. He was nearly eighteen now, tall and broad as his father,
and so much a look-alike that the general had grown a mustache in amused
defense of his identity. Father and son had agreed to fight the war together,
recognizing the need not to do anything that would cause the other to flinch
from danger. It was painful at first for the General to send his son on a
messenger mission that might result in his death or capture, and he granted it
must be hard for the boy to watch his father expose himself leading a charge,
but both decided it was better to stay close through the war, even though that
proximity did not mean they could always protect each other.
Breck looked across the rooftops to the clock on the tower of the state-
house, still in Union hands; it showed ten o'clock. From that tower, he knew,
a Union naval observer was directing fire, the gunboat shells arching over the
city into Confederate lines. The morning fog had finally lifted; in the early
morning darkness, when Breckinridge had attacked, it had been impossible to
see twenty yards ahead. The fog kept casualties down on both sides, which
was especially fortunate because on the march down from Vicksburg the heat
and polluted water had cost Breckinridge nearly a third of his original force
of forty-five hundred. He was aware that the Federals had their disease prob-
lems, too, perhaps from the yellow fever the newspapers said had broken out
in New Orleans. Many of the Union soldiers firing from the houses were
wearing hospital gowns, a stranger uniform than jeans.
The Arkansas had been due at dawn. The ironclad Confederate ram, a
rebuilt riverboat, had already lifted Southern hearts by chasing the Union
gunboats from the waters around Vicksburg. Now the pride of the South's
river navy was taking on a more daring assignment: to combine with land
forces in striking southward through Baton Rouge toward New Orleans,
dispersing Farragut's gunboats that had made possible the Federal occupation
of much of Louisiana.
Breck's part of this first Confederate joint land-sea operation had been to
march his force downriver fifty miles from Vicksburg. Through heat and
swamp and despite all the straggling, that had been done. Regrouped, that
was the force now attacking the garrison that Ben Butler sent up from his
New Orleans command. The plan anticipated that the Federals would fall
back to the protection of Farragut's gunboats to prepare a counterattack,
which they were now doing. With superior numbers, the support of the gun-
boat artillery, and interior lines, the Union would expect to carry the day.
That was where the surprise was to be in store. The ram Arkansas was set
to steam on the scene, slam into the helpless Union gunboats, and make
possible the capture of at least five thousand Union soldiers. Breck was cer-
tain that the recapture of a state capital, for the first time in the war, would
lift Southern spirits, would force Grant, the new Union commander in the
West, to divide his forces against Vicksburg. As a result, the Confederacy
would reopen a needed supply line from the breadbaskets of Texas and Ar-
kansas to the Southeast.
The Battle of Baton Rouge was not a major engagement, but it had strate-
gic value, and was the first time John C. Breckinridge had been in complete
command of a fight. Remembering the example of Sidney Johnston, he was
determined not to take unnecessary personal chances. Breck also reminded
himself to correct his own mistake at Shiloh, and to delegate more field
authority to his brigade commanders.
To his knowledge, this was the first city street-fighting in the war. All
previous engagements were fought on proper battlefields, away from civilians.
But in this case, civilians were in the way, sometimes purposely; Breck swore
when he watched Yankee soldiers force a man carrying an infant to pace up
and down on a patio from which the Federals were firing. The fire from the
Union gunboats into the buildings held by Breck's force was intense; no
further advance was possible, and the position was becoming untenable. The
Arkansas had to move those gunboats out soon.
Cabell came running back down the street and upstairs to the balcony
headquarters. "Engine trouble on the Arkansas, " he panted. "Only four miles
upriver. They're trying to fix it now. And Ben Helm is dead, along-with Alex
Toddan accident with the ammunition."
That was a blow; Helm was his only experienced brigade leader. Todd,
Helm's aide, was Mary Lincoln's brother; there would be sadness in the
White House, but no official mourning for a Confederate casualty.
"A prisoner says that Williams, the Union commander, is dead, too," Cab-
ell added. "That's probably why there's been so much confusion in their
ranks."
Breck knew Williams to be a martinet, almost as bad as their own Braxton
Bragg, hated by his men but the most experienced general in Butler's com-
mand. That explained the initial quick success of the Confederate attack in
the fog.
An uneasy feeling gripped Breck, and in a moment he realized it was
caused by the silence; the barrage from the gunboats had stopped.
"They'll counterattack now," he told Cabell. He beckoned to his adjutant
and told him to take over Helm's brigade, which would probably bear the
brunt of the Federal charge.
The attack came, catching his Alabama unit out of ammunition. As boys
came racing back down the streets, half of them in bare and bleeding feet,
Breckinridge could see as well as sense the tide of battle shifting. He ran
downstairs, mounted his horse, rode up the street, rallying the leaderless men,
who cheered him and instantly turned.
"Fix bayonets!" he roared, saber high, taking courage from the need to
show fearlessness. "Charge!"
The energized but powderless Alabamians surprised a Yankee regiment
coming around a street comer with no time to stop and load weapons. With a
rebel yell, they plunged into the Federals, sticking the blades into those who
did not flee quickly enough. Breck had seen no uglier kind of fighting, with
stabbers stripping the stabbed of ammunition and firing at the men bringing
up the rear. He looked for Cabell, who was lost in the confusion of battle;
Breck pressed on to his second brigade, which had withstood a lighter coun-
terattack.
The rickety wooden buildings of Baton Rouge shook at the sound of a
tremendous explosion. Soldiers on both sides stopped and looked around;
such a blast could not have come from any cannon. Something terrible had
happened on the river. After long moments of silence, the two sides disen-
gaged. Ten minutes later, the Union's naval artillery barrage resumed; one
large ball crashed into the saloon Breck had been using as his headquarters,
setting it afire.
General Breckinridge sheathed his saber, turned his horse around, and
ordered his troops out of Baton Rouge. Cabell came scrambling back to tell
the general what he already knew: the Arkansas could not get its engines
started. When the Federal gunboats threatened to capture the ship, the crew
did what they had to do. They abandoned the Arkansas and blew it up.
Twenty-three days of glory on the Mississippi ended in a resounding bang. So
much for the first Confederate combined land-water operation.
In a clearing in the woods on the outskirts of the city, outside the range of
the naval guns, Breck assembled his remaining troops and made a casualty
count: 84 dead, about 370 wounded. He was certain that at least as many
casualties had been inflicted on the defenders, but the hellish march down
and the street fighting was for naught. He stood on a caisson and made a little
speech.
"You attacked a force that was well fed, well clothed, well armed," he told
the red-rimmed eyes looking at him. "You have had indifferent food and no
shelter, and half of you have no coats or shoes or socks; yet no troops ever
behaved with greater gallantry."
Three thousand men, repelled but undefeated, hungry for pride, listened to
him without a sound, and in the fierce attention of his audience the politician-
general found inspiration for a moving address. His voice rolled out as on the
stump so long ago, offering support to his supporters, comfort to his com-
rades, new spirit to men who wanted to find a meaning in the marching and
killing and retreating. After he and they partook deeply of each other's solace
and justification, he raised his voice and called out: "What can make this
differenceunless it be the sublime courage inspired by a just cause?"
Cheers and huzzahs. His undiminished ability, after changing from a man
of peace to man of war, to move a crowd to a roaring response exhilarated
Breckinridge more than his ability to lead a charge. He put in a jab at the
troops of Ben Butler who had so recently been insulting Southern wom-
anhood: "You have given the enemy a severe and salutary lesson"pause for
more cheers, and then a taunt at the enemy"and now those who so lately
were ravaging and plundering this region do not dare to extend their pickets
beyond the sight of their fleet."
Breckinridge was disappointed at not winning a smashing victory, yet he
had not lost; he decided he had a right to be elated at the fact that he and his
men had done their job well. He had held himself back as a commander
should, until the moment when he had no choice but to take personal com-
mand, which had made personal intervention all the more effective. His Or-
phan Brigade had been bloodied again, and he was sure those who could walk
would follow him anywhere.
He gathered six of his commanders around to explain his next objective
and how it fit in with what he thought might be the scheme of the whole war.
Farragut's Federal fleet could not stay and protect the city for long. Breckin-
ridge figured his best strategy was to conserve his troop strength and wait
until he could maneuver the Union troops out of Baton Rouge without a
fight. He would go upriver a few miles and take a position at Port Hudson,
whose high bluffs resembled those at Vicksburg, and thereby break the Fed-
eral grip on the southern Mississippi. With well-placed artillery, Breckinridge
thought he could keep Farragut from assisting Grant in any further attacks
on Vicksburg.
He remembered Anna Carroll's intensity about using the Tennessee River
to break the South. The first phase of that strategy, whoever had conceived it,
had been carried out by the Union, with the taking of Corinth and the sever-
ing of the South's east-west railroad. The second phase was under way now,
to take the Father of Waters, the Mississippi River, denying the South the last
chance of supply from the grainfields of northwest Louisiana and the cattle of
Texas. Together with the blockade of the Eastern seaboard, the "anaconda"
that old Winfield Scott spoke about at the start of the war would squeeze the
South to death. But that grip would be loosened if General Butler could be
scared into abandoning Baton Rouge and a sizable strip of the Big Muddy
could be secured. That was the military value of Port Hudson; to the weary
soldiers, the best news was that the target was only a few hours' march away.
In his tent that night, his son snoring nearby, the Confederate general lay
in his uniform, staring up at the blackness, replaying his speech in his head.
Was the cause as just as he had said? Yes, the defense of one's home against an
invader was just; his former political supporter, Ben Butler, was demonstrat-
ing in New Orleans, largest city in the Confederacy, what Southern life would
be like after the war under the heel of Yankee occupation.
The first task of Lee in the East and Bragg in the West was to get off the
defensive. The cavalry raids of Morgan in Kentucky and Forrest in Tennessee
had disrupted Yankee communications and given Southerners reason to take
heart, but they were merely local raids. Far grander raids were called for, up
through Kentucky, and simultaneously up through Virginia, carrying the
terror of war north into Union homes, strengthening the forces of peace in
New York and Ohio.
Breckinridge, at moments like these, worked at persuading himself he had
been right to take the course he had taken, "throwing his life away," as Anna
had put it, trying to avert the war. Now that Lincoln was turning out to be a
despot, putting his own people in jail for daring to oppose the war, supporting
Pope's barbarism and Butler's predations, Breck felt more secure in his early
judgment. But the effect of the war on the South's liberties troubled him now.
The draft was abusive, the newspaper suppression was almost as bad, and the
central control of trade was even more rigid than in the North.
Perhaps, on second thought, "despot" was too strong to apply to Lincoln.
That tower of relentlessness, as the general recalled from his arguments with
him only a year ago, was a man driven by a single obsession about "union,"
but his actions were shaped by events much as Breck's had been. If backed
into a corner, with his precious Union about to be defeated, would Lincoln
stoop to the encitement of the blacks on the plantations to riot and rape? And
if he did go through with abolition, would the millions of blacks rise and kill
their masters and mistresses? In the aftermath of such savagery, what kind of
nation would emerge?
Too terrible to contemplate. He wondered if the President, the Union Presi-
dent, had night thoughts as terrible as these. Lincoln was a man of the Decla-
ration of Independence, with its radical "all men created equal," while Breck
was a man of the Constitution, with its compromises, balances, and conserva-
tism. Which was more American?
Breck considered writing Mrs. Lincoln a letter about her brother's death,
and the death of Ben Helms. No, that might get her in trouble for corre-
sponding with the enemy.
He thought of his own wife, Mary, back in Kentucky, living with relatives,
uncomplaining. He never came home to her without feeling glad or left with-
out being sorry. Perhaps they could be together for at least a time if he took
an assignment in the central theater with Bragg, or took up Jeff Davis's offer
of a Cabinet post in Richmond. He closed his eyes. No, not that, not yet. The
bloodletting and bravery of the battlefield was easier to face now than the
need to change the South in order to save it. Soldiering helped him avoid the
wrenching paradoxes.
What would Anna Carroll think of his attack on Baton Rouge? In the
darkness, his mind brightened at the thought of her reading his exploits in
Washington's Intelligencer. She would see his strategy, of course, and warn
Lincoln ofBreckinridge's threat at Port Hudson to the coming siege ofVicks-
burg. He hoped that, like Cassandra, she would not be listened to. More
likely, Anna's advice would be heeded and the source of it never mentioned.
Anna had been right about the importance of the Western theater. The
North could win the war here, with long and painful squeezing, but the South
could not win in the defense of the West, not after Johnston's great trap failed
to spring at Shiloh. The hope of the South now was in striking northward,
taking advantage of Lincoln's evident indecision after the Peninsula cam-
paign's ambiguities. Davis and Lee would see that. The Confederacy could
not win a war of attrition, but the North could. The answer to the weight of
Northern numbers was to gamble all on a great raid into the North that
would seem like an invasion.
Breckinridge knew the Union generals who had been in the West and were
taking charge in the East. Halleck was a ditherer, Pope a fraud. On a Confed-
erate thrust northward just before the fall elections, the only Union opponent
worthy of Lee and Jackson was McClellan, and that capable defender was
apparently being cast aside because he was insufficiently bloodthirsty. Breck
thought of the charge that morning, the bayonets digging into flesh, the
screams of their men and his, and, worse than today, the awful picking-
through of the bodies by his horse at Shiloh.
"Father? General?"
He sat bolt upright. "What is it?"
"You all right? I thought you hollered."
"Wasn't me, I'm fine." After a moment he added, "When we're alone like
this, son, in the middle of the night, you don't have to call me General."
A Southern liberation of Kentucky would depress Lincoln, perhaps shake
that unshakable resolve, he thought, as he drifted off to sleep. And a victory
in Maryland or Pennsylvania, threatening New York, would lead to a Peace
Democrat landslide in November, and genuine fear in the crucial state of
New York could lead to negotiations between the two nations. If that did not
lead to ultimate reunion, at least it would offer hope for a neighborly sharing
of a roomy continent.
CHAPTER 7
THE BEAST OF NEW ORLEANS
George Smalley knew that most of his comrades in the "Bohemian Brigade"
the rakish name that war correspondents covering the Army of the Poto-
mac gave their loose associationthought him to be something of an aristo-
crat. On the dandyish side, the reporter, still a shade under thirty, did not
discourage that impression. When some woman was interested in his good
looks and sturdy physique, he let her know that he was the man who served
as stroke on the first Yale crew to race Harvard on Lake Winnipesaukee.
However, Smalley knew better than to use his affectation of elegance in the
presence of Major General Benjamin Franklin Butler. The "Beast of New
Orleans," as Butler was known throughout the South and in the courts of
Europe, was notoriously anti-aristocracy. He had imposed an onerous tax on
all the best families of New Orleans to bear the burden of paying a small army
of the poor to clean up the city streets. This strenuous and unprecedented
effort at municipal sanitation was motivated less, Smalley had heard, to bene-
fit the poor or to tidy the streets than to punish the wealthy. The leaders of
society in this largest of Southern cities under Northern occupation were
regarded by this Massachusetts politician in military uniform as the hated
slavocracy. Ben Butler was said to have taken it upon himself to humiliate
and break them, and thereby send a message of terror through all Southern
leadership.
The correspondent, waiting in the anteroom of the commanding general's
office, was more concerned than usual about his interview. Butler had put a
Boston Traveller correspondent in ball and chains for ignoring military cen-
sorship. Worse, an Evening Post reporterNorman Hudson, whom Smalley
knew to be the mildest of chaplains and a Shakespearean scholarhad been
put in a bullpen with Confederate prisoners and was later transferred to a
manure-laden stable when he had the temerity to complain about Butler
heavy-handedness.
But George Washburn Smalley represented the New York Tribune and Hor-
ace Greeley; that set him apart. Any general seeking radical credentials (espe-
cially one who had bolted the Douglas wing of the Democratic Party to
support Breckinridge in the last election) would have to be careful with the
leading radical journal, or so Smalley hoped. Sydney Gay, the Tribune man-
aging editor, had assured the reporter that the sea voyage around Florida
would do him good, and that Butler would receive him as a friendly corre-
spondent. Smalley wanted to get back in time for Pope's campaign to smash
Lee, and be there to cover the end of the war in Virginia. He was determined
not to irritate this "beast" to the point of languishing in the steambox of a
Louisiana cell through the rest of the summer.
"You're here to ask me about my woman order," Ben Butler announced
without a greeting. The general was seated in a large chair in an enormous
living room converted to office use. The man's uniform was wrinkled, his face
and body bloated. One eyelid drooped over a slightly crossed eye. Smalley
observed that this man was probably the least dashing or attractive officer in
the Union Army.
"I'm here to tell the Tribune's readers the story of your unexpected mili-
tary success," Smalley offered. He eyed a shiny pistol lying on the general's
desk, presumably a warning to the many who threatened his life that the man
was prepared to take care of himself. "Most people thought your expedition
would fail. The capture of the port of New Orleans was a stunning surprise."
"Give Admiral Farragut credit for most of that," Butler said unexpectedly.
"His ships forced the surrender. My men didn't have a rebel army to fight."
Smalley found that remarkably generous of Butler, in a war where generals
invariably sought renown at the expense of colleagues. Butler added: "Al-
though I brought the coal."
"The coal?" Smalley shifted his weight forward, as if stroking the Yale
crew.
"The usual way of ballasting a ship is to fill it up with stones," Butler
informed him. "But I learned that anthracite coal was rising in the market
when I left from Boston, and I assumed that if I ballasted all my ships with
coal, the ballast would be worth more when we got back than when I bought
it." The general regarded him with irritation. "You'd better write this down,
young man, I'm not going to repeat it."
Smalley began scribbling.
"When I got down here to meet Flag Officer Farragut at Ship Island before
the attack," Butler continued, "the man was in despair. His coal had run out,
and the Navy Department had forgotten about him. I told him I would let
him have three thousand tons of the best anthracite coalat no profit to me,
mind youand I would sail back later with dry sand as ballast. Farragut
said, 'Why, this is almost providential.' And I said, 'Yes, I provided it.' You
get that last part down? I said, 1 provided it.' "
"A play on words," Smalley noted without looking up. "You made nothing
on the transaction, you say?"
Reports of widespread official corruption in New Orleans had reached the
North. Butler, a canny criminal lawyer in civilian life, had chosen to associate
with the worst elements of the underworld, and it was bruited about by
Butler's many Massachusetts enemies that he and his top officers were mak-
ing fortunes trading with, the enemy. Those who did not call the general
"Beast" called him "Spoons," suggesting that he was making off with the
silver of his hosts.
"And my brother Andrew was not in on it, either," said General Butler,
his voice hardening. "He's a colonel in the Union Army, and what he does is
his own business, not mine. I am not responsible for any of his investments,
and I take no part in them. He makes what he can and more power to him.
Why are you so interested in my brother?"
"I'm not, General."
"Ask me about the woman order."
"What caused you to issue the woman order, sir?"
"The men of this city were set straight by the hanging of Mumford."
General Butler referred, the correspondent knew, to the controversial show of
harshness in executing a Southern patriot. "Farragut ordered the United
States flag to be placed on the government buildings as a token of the surren-
der of the city. He warned that if the flag were taken down by some rebel, it
would be a signal for him to bombard New Orleans. When somebody hauled
down our flag, Farragut sent a small boarding party ashore, and it turned out
this man Mumford, a gambler, had done it. We tried him, and I ordered him
hanged."
"Nobody thought you would go through with it," Smalley put in.
"That was because nobody had been hanged in the state of Louisiana for
eighteen years, and the abolishment of the death penalty resulted in crime
rampant. I saw this as a question of which should governa mob, or law and
order."
Smalley did not interrupt. The hanging of Mumford had been applauded
by many in the North, including the New York Tribune, as a necessary sym-
bolic act to show that no rebel could safely tear down the national flag. To
Smalley, the punishment of death for such a gesture seemed excessive, but he
did not say so.
"At the scaffold," Butler went on, reciting the story slowly enough for the
reporter to get it down, "a swearing, whiskey-drinking mob assembled, their
bottles and pistols sticking out from their pockets. They kept declaring that
this was only a bluff on the part of old Butler, and threatened what the people
would do if Mumford was hanged." The general waited.
"And did they riot?"
"At the appointed hour the drop fell, and as it did there was a universal
hush," Butler said, relishing his words. "The bottles and pistols went out of
sight, and the crowd separated quietly. And no scene approaching general
disorder was ever afterwards witnessed in this city up to now." Butler sat
back, satisfied; evidently the dramatic telling of this episode impressed all
visitors.
"Is it true, sir, that you had a man arrested for dropping a single sheet of
paper on the street?"
"Again a symbol. Every three years in this city, always in the summertime,
there has been the scourge of yellow jack. You ever seen yellow fever, young
fellow? I did, my father died of it. He served under Andy Jackson here, you
know. Did you know?"
"Oh, yes, sir."
"Most of our doctors say that yellow jack comes from tropical lands and
can be stopped by a quarantine. But we've seen that doesn't work. I learned
from a book and map published after the last outbreak here where the disease
had been worst. You know where?" He heaved himself out of his chair and
went to a wall map. "Here, and here, and herein those places that stank the
mostthe fish market, and the turning basin, which was covered with a thick
growth of green scum, variegated with dead cats or dogs or the remains of
dead mules. And it broke out near the open sewersthe people here were
used to that stink in the summertime." He sat down again.
"Well, it's my theory that yellow jack comes from bad air," said Butler,
"the way malaria is caused by the miasma rising from swamps. So I ordered a
cleanup the likes of which this place has never seen before. The rebels re-
sisted. I suspect they were relying on the yellow fever to clear out the North-
ern troops, since Yankees would usually be the first victims in any outbreak. I
ordered the sewers flushed daily. I had the walls whitewashed with lime and
salt. I put an end to dumping garbage in the streets. Infractions of my sani-
tary regulations are punishable by jail terms. Now in answer to your ques-
tion."
Smalley, WJ-iting notes furiously, knowing he would not need this for his
story, was glad Butler remembered the point.
"One rebellprovided a test case by very patriotically throwing a piece of
paper in front of a policeman," the general said. "I clapped him in jail for six
months, and now nobody else is breaking the sanitary law. And you know
what? This was supposed to be a big year for yellow fever, and there isn't all
that much. My theory is rightno bad air, no yellow jack."
Smalley was thankful. Disease was the cause of more casualties on both
sides than gunfire, and it was the danger correspondents feared most. A
wound could be a badge of honor, but no glory attached to dying of a fever.
Butler was undoubtedly dictatorial, but the correspondent allowed that good
ends could sometimes be accomplished by evil means.
"You keep avoiding asking me about the woman order," said Butler. "It's
important that such an episode be properly noted in the New York Tribune.
The woman order shows that I'm stern but I'm just."
"I'm ready to take it down now, sir."
Butler groaned out of his chair, which creaked in relief, and went to a
cabinet for a document. "After the Mumford hanging, the men of this city
were under control. Not so the women of New Orleans. Whenever an officer
would get onto a streetcar, the women would immediately get off with every
sign of disgust, abhorrence, and aversion."
"And aversion," Smalley repeated.
"On the Sabbath, on the way to church, one of my officers withdrew to the
outer side of the sidewalk to let two women by. As he did so, they both
deliberately spit in his face. He came to me and said, 1 want to go home. I
came here to fight the enemies of my country, not to be insulted and dis-
gusted.' Can you imagine my reaction?" Butler frowned, which made his
eyelid look more sinister. "And then there was the unfortunate incident with
Admiral Farragut and the chamber pot, which I need not recount because it
so pleases the traitors to talk about it."
The general paused in his narrative to let Smalley catch up on his notes.
"How is this to be stopped?" Butler asked himself. "We have a very few
troops in the midst of a hostile population of many thousands, including more
than twice our number of paroled Confederate soldiers. Many of the women
who do these vile acts are young, pretty, and ordinarily ladylike. Now, I
know that a police officer in Boston can hardly arrest a drunken woman in
the street without causing considerable commotion, which very quickly ex-
pands into something like a riot if she appeals for help. If Yankee soldiers
were to arrest a woman for doing what these rebels consider patriotic, we
would have the real danger of riot, possibly ripening into widespread insur-
rection."
Butler brandished the document he had taken from his file. "I once read an
old English ordinance, which, mutatis mutandis, I saw might accomplish my
purpose. Here it is."
Smalley listened to him declaim the brief order: "Headquarters Depart-
ment of the Gulf, New Orleans, May 15, 1862. As the officers and soldiers of
the United States have been subject to repeated insults from the women (call-
ing themselves ladies) of New Orleans, in return for the most scrupulous non-
interference and courtesy on our part, it is ordered that hereafter when any
female shall, by word, gesture, or movement, insult or show contempt for any
officer or soldier of the United States, she shall be regarded and held liable to
be treated as a woman of the town plying her avocation. By command of
Major General Butler."
"This order might lend itself to misunderstanding, General," Smalley said.
"It would be a great scandal if even one of your men should act upon it in the
wrong way1 mean, using your order as an excuse to force his attentions on
an innocent woman."
"Let there be just one case of aggression on our side," said Butler quickly,
"and I'll deal with that soldier in a way that it will never be repeated."
Smalley thought of poor Mumford. "But since that order was issued," Butler
said triumphantly, "not one case of insult by word or look has been reported.
The order executed itself. No arrests have been made under it or because of it.
You know why, young man?"
Smalley thought it best not to know why.
"I'll tell you why. All the fine ladies in New Orleans forbear to insult our
troops because they don't want to be deemed common women, and all the
common womenall the whoresforbear to insult our troops because they
want to be deemed ladies. Hah! It's working: no insults, no arrests, no riots."
"The foreign consuls in this city don't quite see it that way"
"Every little whippersnapper emissary from some government in Europe
finds fault with everything I do," Butler barked. "Here I am cleaning the
streets and feeding the poor and making the residents here pay for it at no
cost to the North. Still, Lord Palmerston got up in Parliament and called my
order 'unfit to be written in the English language.' Get this down, it will make
a good story for you: I got the language of this order from an ordinance of the
city of London!"
"One of the members of President Lincoln's official family," said Smalley
carefully, to protect John Hay, his source, "called your women order 'in-
defensible as a matter of taste.' "
Butler smacked his open hand down on the desk. "It's one of those damned
private secretaries of his! I don't carry on the war with rosewater, and I don't
spend it loafing around the throne."
The general was getting his dander up, and Smalley did not know if it was
such a good idea to annoy him further, but Butler had a few things on his
mind. "That skedaddler Hay is also probably telling you I wasn't the man
responsible for the theory of captured slaves being 'contraband of war.' I've
heard that some people around Lincoln are trying to deny me my place in
history."
Smalley nodded. The "contraband" idea was a brilliant legal maneuver,
and it would be useful to know its origin.
"Last year, when I was in command at Fort Monroe, I wrote Assistant
Secretary Scott asking what to do with slaves who came over to me across the
lines. But neither Scott nor his boss, Cameron, was a lawyer. I'm a lawyer. I
know something about the law of nations. At Fort Monroe, we had sixty
thousand dollars' worth of slaves, including the slaves of loyal men. I argued
that slaves being used'by their masters in actual warfare became contraband
when captured, subject to the capturer's disposal. I wanted the sanction of the
government for my action, and I got it. No pasty-faced sycophant avoiding
military service is going to rob me of my authorship of the contraband the-
ory!"
"No, sir," said Smalley. "I'll make certain the world knows who conceived
that legal theory."
"I have another idea along those lines," said Butler in a different tone of
voice, suddenly dropping all bombast. Strange man, Smalley thought; bril-
liant and stupid, liberal and cruel, shrewd and childlike. His contraband idea
was a tremendous legal contribution to the radical cause and had endeared
Butler to Mr. Greeley; his iron rule in the captured Southern city also at-
tracted radical applausethe "woman order" would be a great hitbut it
troubled many conservative Republicans and most Democrats because it was
being used by rebel leaders to whip up hatred of the North, and thus might
prolong the war. When the time came after the war to reconstruct the states
of the South, presuming the North won the war, the fierce occupation philos-
ophy of Butler would augur a harsh era. Such a prospect might be encourag-
ing Southerners to fight on.
"Has it anything to do with emancipation, General?" Mr. Greeley wanted
Smalley to prod Butler on that; where Fremont and Hunter had failed, per-
haps the shrewd political-legal mind of Butler could figure a way around
Lincoln's edict reserving all emancipation matters to the President.
"You can't print this yet," he said, "but tell Mr. Greeley I have a plan for
recruiting negroes to fight."
"You are forbidden to arm fugitive slaves"
"I know thatwho's the lawyer here, you or me?but there, are a great
many free negroes in New Orleans." His face took on a cagey look. "They
served under Andy Jackson in 1815, and even the Confederate governor last
year allowed them to form up as a couple of regiments of 'native guards.'
Those are legal precedents. I can call up those regiments of free negroes to
fight on our side, and"he lowered his voice"who's going to inquire
closely about the status of every man who joins that unit? That's for next
week, so not a word. But tell Greeley it's a step forward, and tell him to
remember who found a way to do it without embarrassing the President."
Smalley started to put his pencil away. "I suppose I should congratulate
you, too, on the victory at Baton Rouge."
"It was a great victory. Breckinridge was driven off with terrible losses."
Butler hesitated, looking uncomfortable for the first time in the interview.
"Of course, that city is not important. As a matter of fact, we'll be withdraw-
ing our forces from there. I've brought back here the city's statue of George
Washington, and the important books from the state capitol library."
That struck Smalley as odd. If Baton Rouge was not important, why had it
been defended so vigorously? Apparently Admiral Farragut could not station
his boats there forever, and the rebels would take back their first state capital.
"I only held Baton Rouge because of the danger of yellow fever in New
Orleans," Butler added unconvincingly, "in case I needed to move my men
elsewhere. But New Orleans is now as healthy as Boston, and Baton Rouge is
of no possible military importance. I want to concentrate my troops; let
Breckinridge have the damn place."
"And Port Hudson?" Smalley had heard that Breckinridge's seizure of the
bluffs upriver would facilitate rebel access to needed food supplies in the
West.
"That's Grant's problem," said Butler, eyes narrowing, including the cock-
eyed one, as if the correspondent knew too much. "He can take Port Hudson
after he takes Vicksburg."
Smalley took his leave from Butler. The correspondent was determined to
discuss the controversial commander with Smalley's friend, Ralph Waldo
Emerson. That great moralist would be fascinated with Butler's contradic-
tions: a genuinely unlikable fellow using his unpopularity to accomplish great
goals of sanitation and freedom, and a politician not above letting his brother
use his connections to make a million dollars. Butler was the sort to find ways
to cut ethical corners both in accumulating money and in helping slaves to
freedom. How is such a man to be judged? Smalley wondered if Lincoln knew
of Butler's planned subterfuge in enlisting a black brigade; he might appreci-
ate the cunning way around legal objections to arming blacks.
The Tribune reporter was glad to be out of Butler's conniving, domineering
presence and on his way north to the Pope campaign against Jackson and
perhaps Lee. Those soldiers were more his idea of generals. Smalley passed a
delegation of negroes in the street outside, all wearing bright white shirts,
presumably for an audience with the military commander. He said under his
breath they were welcome to Benjamin Butler.
CHAPTER 8
NATIVE GUARD, COLORED
Correspondents were damned pests but Butler knew when one could be use-
ful, even necessary. Horace Greeley's man was important. When the Tribune
thundered, Lincoln would say, "there's meat in that," a favorite expression of
his, and the President would try to go along or get along with Uncle Horace.
Benjamin Butler despised Greeley, with his white round hat, moon face,
and pusillanimous nature. That disastrous slogan "On to Richmond!" had its
origin in the half-addled brain of the editor, a man who had not strength
enough to stand political defeat or military reversal. The general hoped that
John Pope, arrived from the West to take over the army outside Washington,
would not be rattled by the Tribune's demands. Pope was the Union's best
chance to save the nation from the likes of McClellan; Butler had heard the
copperheads wanted to set him up as dictator. Meanwhile, some radicals
wanted to set up John Fr6mont as dictator. Butler marveled at Lincoln's
forbearance; if he were President, such treasonous talk about dictators would
get certain generals slammed into Fort Lafayette.
The commander of New Orleans could probably count on the Tribune
reporter to interpret properly the woman order and the sanitation crackdown,
although radicals were queasy about the Mumford execution. Would this
nervous snob Smalley write that General Butler had been driven out of Baton
Rouge by Breckinridge, and catch the irony of the two former political allies
now locked in combat? Butler hoped not; the Tribune would never again field
a reporter in his department if such an embarrassing story were written.
Butler nodded in grim satisfaction; he knew how to handle the press. When
the publisher of the New Orleans True Delta had refused to print the gener-
al's proclamations, Butler immediately ordered the takeover of the paper. The
publisher knuckled under soon enough.
"The Africans are here, sir."
"They're not Africans, they're American freedmen," he barked at his aide.
"Tell them I'll see 'em in a minute."
He picked up a letter from Secretary Chase that had come from Washing-
ton on the same boat with the Tribune's Smalley. Chase was closely apprised
of Butler's interest in recruiting blacks, and the general's worry about being
slapped down by Lincoln the way Hunter and Fr6mont had been. "The lan-
guage of the President's revocation of Hunter's order," Chase wrote him,
"clearly shows that his mind is not fully decided. It points to a contingency in
which he may recognize the clear necessity of emancipation. My conviction is
that that contingency will soon arise . . ."
Butler felt flattered by the personal attention of the Treasury Secretary.
Chase probably wanted some Massachusetts political support someday,
which was okay with Butler; he could use some radical help from Chase's
friends in seeking the govemorship of Massachusetts, especially if Chase
wrested the Republican presidential nomination from Lincoln after the war.
He saw the advantage to Chase to have emancipation accomplished by mili-
tary commanders rather than by presidential proclamation, and their political
interests were parallel. The war would not last forever.
Chase's letter of July 31 contained an assertion that Butler liked: "We must
either abandon the attempt to retain the Gulf states or we must give freedom
to every slave within their limits. We cannot maintain the contest with the
disadvantages of unacclimated troops." Right. Blacks could work and fight in
this impossibly hot weather when whites, especially Northern whites, tended
to drop in their tracks. That was another good reason for pushing Lincoln
toward arming blacks.
"It will not escape your acute observation," Butler read, smiling, "that
military emancipation in the Gulf states will settle the negro question in the
free states. I am not myself afraid of the negroes. I have not the slightest
objection to their contributing their industry to the prosperity of the state of
which I am a citizen."
Butler frowned at that. Chase might be willing to see Ohio swamped with
freed blacks, but there was no future in Massachusetts for a politician who
stood for anything of the sort. "But I know that many honest men really
think that negroes are not to be permitted to reside permanently in the
Northern states," Chase wrote "and I believe myself that, if left free to
choose, most of them would prefer warmer climes to ours." Butler nodded as
he read the radical's point: "Let the South be opened to negro emigration by
emancipation along the Gulf, and it seems pretty certain that the blacks of the
North will go southward."
Butler agreed. Lincoln's notion about mass deportation was silly, but the
idea of locating all the blacks in the South after the war made sense. That
result would fulfill a Boston politician's dream: abolition of slavery without
subsequent black competition for white jobs.
The first step was to find a way to arm the blacks in this area that would
not force Lincoln to rebuke him. If Butler moved warily, in a way that did
not directly challenge the President's authority, he could count on Chase to
keep Lincoln from countermanding any Gulf states order. He signaled for his
aide to send the negroes in.
Twenty freemen, selected because they were all former officers in the Con-
federates' "Native Guard, Colored," entered the office and formed a semicir-
cle around his desk.
"You're an intelligent-looking set of men," Butler said, sliding back in his
chair and looking up and around him. "Would you like to be organized again
as a native guard, this time as part of the United States troops?"
In every group there is always a natural leader, Butler believed. Most of the
men were of a very light shade of tan, reflecting the intermingling of the races
in this areaslave owners must have used black women freelybut the pur-
plish-black skin of the spokesman for the group was the mark of the pure
African.
"General," the blackest negro asked before committing himself, "shall we
be officersleading our own men as we were before?"
Why not? Some Northern whites would take offense, but to hell with them.
If the rebels had previously trusted the black leaders to hold the negro troops
in line, Butler would too. "Yes. Every one of you who is fit to be an officer
shall be."
The black leader looked at him steadily without responding. The man
could obviously tell a qualifying clause when he heard one.
"Okay," Butler said, using Andy Jackson's word for "oil korrect," and
waved his hand. He had no reason to be overcautious. "All the line officers
will be colored men."
"How soon do you want us to be ready?"
"How soon can you twenty men give me two regiments of a thousand men
each?" He added, "I won't be finicky about papers."
The black, whose name Butler had not caught and did not want to ask for
because he did not want to get caught in a last-name requirement, answered
immediately, "In ten days."
"Explain to me one thing," said Butler. He leaned back in his chair, arms
crossed, and flung out the insult: "My officers believe that negroes won't
fight."
Eager assurances from the entire group, all save the leader, filled the room.
Butler observed the freedman's silence and felt his anger, and directed his
remarks to him: "You know what this war is about. If the United States
succeeds, it will put an end to slavery. Then tell mewhy haven't some
negroes, somewhere in the South, struck a blow of their own for freedom?"
The others looked to the black leader, who refused to answer. Butler went
on, probing for the reason for the docility of Southern blacks, asking the
question in the minds of so many whites in the North. "All over the South,
the white men have been conscripted and driven away to the armies, leaving
ten negroes in some districts to one white man. The war to end slavery is
raging. But the colored men have simply gone on raising crops and taking
care of the white women and children. Why? Are you afraid to fight? Are you
happy in slavery?"
The black leader started to reply, then restrained himself. Finally he said,
"You are the general here. I don't want to answer that and lose the chance
you are offering us."
"Answer it honestly," Butler told him, meaning it, "and, I pledge you my
honor, whatever your answer shall be, it will harm neither you nor any of
your comrades."
The black leader thought that over. "Let me ask a question," he said at
last. "Let's say we colored men had risen up to make war on our masters.
Would it not be a war of all blacks against all whites? Would we not have to
see all the whites as our enemies, and kill them all?"
"That's what a slave insurrection would lead to," Butler admitted.
"If the colored men had begun such a war as that, General Butler, which
general of the United States Army should we have called on to help us fight
our battles?"
While Butler mulled that over, the black pressed him: "If black men were
slaughtering white men, and women and children, could we count on you, a
white general, to come to our aid and help us kill the oppressing whites? Or
would you have joined the whites to kill us?"
Butler, knowing the black's point to be well taken, changed the subject.
"You haven't answered my question," he gruffed. "Why should we think
you'll fight? You've been beaten down. You have servitude in your bones.
You're afraid to lift a hand against the white man." He did not bring up the
case of Hispaniola, where blacks had risen and murdered their masters. He
bailed them further: "Maybe you're just not fighters."
"We come of a fighting race," said the black, looking steadily at him. "Our
fathers were brought here as slaves because they were captured in War. Not
your kind of war, either, with guns that shoot men far awaybut hand-to-
hand." He held out his hands, huge and muscled, and made a slow, strangling
motion so vivid that Butler could almost feel those hands squeezing the life
out of him. He reached for the pistol lying on the desk and pretended to
examine it.
"You ask if we have cowardly blood in our veins. I tell you, Generalyes,
we do." The dark-skinned black looked around at his light-skinned comrades.
"But the only cowardly blood we have in our veins is the white blood."
Butler swallowed. "You are willing to fight?"
"As no other soldiers will, General, to break the chains of our people."
That was good enough for Ben Butler. "Recruit your men," he told them,
rising. "Let them be mustered into the service of the United States on the
City Hall steps two weeks from today at ten in the morning. I will meet you
there. I will be proud to have you in my command."
They filed out, as proud and satisfied as he. Butler's heart was pounding.
He had found a way to do what no other Union general could do, and what
not even the President would dare to undo. Butler was sure the blacks would
fight bravely, having more at stake than whites, and in the grim knowledge of
what they would face if taken prisoner.
The events that would flow from this, he knew, were sure to include wide-
spread emancipation. The armed freedmen of New Orleansjoined by many
more fugitive slaves posing as freedmenwould lead the way to the arming
of fugitive slaves wherever the contending forces clashed. And Butler was
certain that no slave who fought for the Union could be denied permanent
freedom, no matter what constitutional lawyers argued about property rights
or blood attainders. Those who fought on the side that would preserve the
Union could not later be denied full citizenship, with rights to vote and even
with standing to sue in a court of law. Taney's decision in Dred Scott denying
blacks their essential humanity would be a dead letter the moment a black
man donned a blue uniform.
Let the captious slackers around Lincoln's throne try to take that away
from him. Butler sat down to write a reply to his good friend and conspirator
in freedom, Salmon Portland Chase. The key to abolition without divisiveness
was in the fingers of military commanders in the field.
CHAPTER 9
BETTER THAT WE SEPARATE
"He's reading your memorial on colonization now," John Hay told Anna
Carroll, motioning to the closed door between the President's office and the
room for the three secretaries.
Anna noted that Nicolay was out. Hay, always more authoritative in the
senior secretary's absence, was writing a letter that, he informed her, was for
Lincoln's signature. She presumed he often drafted the President's correspon-
dence, or at least wanted her to think so. The third secretary, Stoddard, was
half-hidden behind a mound of mail.
"Caleb Smith sent it over from Interior with a covering stutter," Hay said
with the irreverence that so often accompanies youthful proximity to power.
"We expect a deputation of our African friends in a few minutes."
"There'11 be no objection to my being there?" Anna was eager to see Lin-
coln in action on a subject she had researched for him. This would probably
be the first time a group of blacks had met formally with any President of the
United States in his office, and she did not want to appear to be intruding on a
historic occasion. Lincoln was not the sort who would stand on ceremony,
but she knew him to be ready to slap down anyone who overstepped.
Hay waved off her concern. "Sydney Gay of the Tribune was in the other
day and arranged for a correspondent of his to be present. The Washington
Star will have a man here as well, because we want the world to know the
President's views on this. Sit in the back, scrunch down, nobody'll notice."
She nodded. It was not often that being small had its advantages. When
Interior Secretary Smith asked her to prepare a paper on the shipment of
negroes out of the United States, she had complied. Not for the pittance he
offered in recompense, but because it was a subject that excited the interest of
two rival Cabinet factions: the Biairs and Treasury Secretary Chase. The
Biairs were avid supporters of colonization, Chase was resolutely against.
Anna leaned toward the Blair position, remembering how hard it had been to
find jobs for the slaves she manumitted herself, but a couple of questions
about the deportation plan perturbed her.
She suspected that the Interior Secretary had some financial relationship to
the promoters of the scheme to create a colony on the huge Chiriqui Tract in
the Isthmus of Panama, all part of New Grenada, which supposedly offered
no objections. But the Navy Secretary"Neptune" Welles, who struck Anna
as stubbornly honestmade no secret of his opinion that the plan was a giant
swindle aimed at bilking the government out of the half-million dollars ap-
propriated by Congress for colonization in the Confiscation Act.
Moreover, nobody knew if the government of Guatemala would be willing
to see the Isthmus crowded with freed slaves, and Honduras was distinctly
unfriendly. It was certain that no refuge in Hayti was available, and the
negroes that Caleb Smith had spoken to refused to go to Liberia, clear across
the Atlantic.
Despite those drawbacks to the idea of colonization, Anna came down on
the side of pressing ahead with the project because another matter was con-
trolling: Lincoln, as Anna had learned from Chase, needed all the support he
could muster for the proclamation of emancipation he was working on, and
he would need the escape valve of colonization for the political pressure it
was sure to cause. If active planning for the deportation of blacks were under
wayor at least were openly reported to be under serious consideration in
the White Housethe conservative Northern fury at emancipation would be
ameliorated. Anna reminded herself to use the word "colonization," which
sounded less coercive than "deportation."
"I agree with Thurlow Weed, emancipation now would be a mistake," she
told Hay, "but if the President is going to free the slaves, he'd better have a
specific idea in mind about where to send them. People don't want them in
New York or Philadelphia or Boston. Chiriqui in Panama seems best, though
I wish I knew more about Brazil. At least Panama has coal, which they can
dig and the Navy can buy." Only one part of the arrangement troubled her.
"Are you sure the negroes will go along with this?"
"They'd better," said the President's younger secretary cheerfully, "or at
least this delegation coming today had better. Reverend Jim Mitchell is bring-
ing them, and he swears they'll hold still. That's why we have the reporters
present, to show how willing the negroes are to go bother somebody else."
The deputation of blacks appeared, and were soon joined by the two re-
porters. Hay went into the President's office, and returned to say to the
Tribune man, "Have you heard about the Sioux uprising in Minnesota?
That's just what we needed now, Indians on the warpath killing settlers.
Follow me, gentlemen, and Miss Carroll."
Lincoln looked sallower and more worn than on her last visit to his office.
His wife should make him run a comb through that thicket of hair, she
thought, and see that his coat is pressed every day as befits a President. Then
she thought of an item in that morning's Intelligencer about the death of Mrs.
Lincoln's rebel brother, and Anna softened. It must be hard not even to be
able to mourn.
The President solemnly shook hands all around, said "my dear lady" to
her, and motioned them to draw chairs into a semicircle around his leather
couch. That was wise; the large desk would have been a barrier at a moment
that required an ostentatious absence of barriers.
"We are here at your invitation, Mr. President," said the chairman of the
free colored men's delegation, a light-colored man who had been introduced
as E. M. Thomas, "to hear what you have to say to us." Evidently they had
been invited to come to hear a plea, not to make one.
"A sum of money has been appropriated by Congress," Lincoln began,
alluding to the half-million dollars Wade had put in the Colonization Act, "to
aid the colonization of some country by people of African descent. That
makes it my duty, as it has for a long time been my inclination, to favor the
cause of colonization."
"Why should we leave this country?" The question seemed to pop out of
the black leader, and he seemed embarrassed at having asked it.
"That is the first question for proper consideration," Lincoln assured him.
"Why should the people of your race be colonized," he repeated, and as if the
answer were a foregone conclusion added, "and where?"
He plunged in, frequently checking his notes, obviously well prepared.
"You and we are different races. Your race suffers very greatly living among
us, while ours suffers from your presence. In a word, we suffer on each side.
You are all freedmen?"
Thomas nodded yes, all present were freed slaves.
"Your race is suffering, in my judgment, the greatest wrong inflicted on any
people," Lincoln told them, "but even when you cease to be slaves, you are
yet far removed from being placed on an equality with the white race. You are
cut off from many of the advantages which the other race enjoys. On this
broad continent, not a single man of your racefree or slaveis made the
equal of a single man of ours."
Anna noted the President's careful choice of words about the sensitive
equality issue. He said they were not "placed on an equality," and not "made
the equal," which avoided a statement that they were inherently unequal.
Lincoln had thought through what he would say. "Go where you are treated
the best," he continued, "and the ban is still upon you."
Thomas started to say something, but Lincoln held up his hand. "I do not
propose to discuss this but to present it as a fact with which we have to deal. I
believe in the general evil effects of slavery on the white race." He pointed to
the map on the wall. "See our present conditionthe country engaged in war
our white men cutting one another's throats. Then consider what we know
to be the truth: but for your race among us there could not be war."
"Many men engaged on either side," said Thomas, "do not care for us one
way or the other."
Lincoln readily agreed and pressed his point: "Without the institution of
slavery and the colored race as a basis, the war could not exist. It is better for
us both, therefore, to be separated."
Long silence, punctuated only by the scratching of reporters' pencils catch-
ing up to his remarks. "We are freedmen," another of the negroes finally
countered. "Perhaps some of our race who are slaves might be inclined to go
out of the country if that is the condition of their freedombut we freedmen
can live here as easily as in any foreign country."
"I speak in no unkind sense," said Lincoln, preparing, Anna assumed, to
say something unkind in a kindly way, "but that is an extremely selfish view
of the case. You ought to do something to help those who are not so fortunate
as yourselves. If intelligent colored men, such as you, would move in this
matter, you would open a wide door for many to be made free."
To his visitors' dismay, the President argued logically that slaves, with
"their intellects clouded by slavery," offered poor prospects for a new colony,
while free negroes "capable of thinking as white men"such as those in the
roomand who had not been systematically oppressed, would offer much
greater chances of success.
"There is much to encourage you," he exhorted. "For the sake of your
race, you should sacrifice something of your present comfort. In the Ameri-
can Revolutionary War, sacrifices were made by men engaged in it, but they
were cheered by the future. General Washington himself endured greater
physical hardships than if he had remained a British subjectyet he was a
happy man, knowing he was benefiting his race."
His audience remained impassive. Lincoln added, "There is an unwilling-
ness on the part of our people, harsh as it may be, for you free colored people
to remain with us." The reporters noted that down.
He then swung away from the "why" to the "where." He touched on
Liberia and as quickly dismissed it, observing that blacks born in America
had a natural affinity for the country of their nativity, and came to the point:
"The place I am thinking about having for a colony is in Central America
with great natural resources and similarity to the climate of Africa, thus
being suited to your physical condition."
Lincoln then revealed a curious notion that Anna, in her analysis of the
commercial future of Panama, had not envisioned.
"The particular place I have in view," he said, "is to be a great highway
from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean." She wondered what the President
had in mind for the narrow Isthmus: a railroad, a wide boulevard for car-
riages, some other kind of passage between the two great oceans? "On both
sides there are harbors among the finest in the world," the President contin-
ued, as if he could see the area's development in his mind's eye. "And evi-
dence of very rich coal mines, affording the inhabitants an opportunity for
immediate employment till they get ready to settle permanently."
Was Lincoln trying to persuade the assembled blacks or to persuade him-
self? Anna knew that only the sketchiest evidence of "very rich coal mines"
had been submitted by land speculators; she hoped that Gideon Welles had
warned the President directly of the possibility of corruption between Caleb
Smith and the promoters of the Chiriqui Tract.
"Whites as well as blacks look to their self-interest," Lincoln said, as if
aware of the suspicions. "Everybody you trade with makes something. I shall,
if I get a sufficient number of you engaged, have provisions made that you
shall not be wronged."
He awaited a response; there was none. Lincoln hurried along: "The politi-
cal affairs in Central America are not in quite as satisfactory condition as I
wish." Anna biinked; Honduras was threatening to shoot blacks on arrival,
and even the enthusiastic Biairs were aware of the need for treaties and armed
protection.
"The practical thing I want to ascertain," said Lincoln, sitting up to make
the sale, "is whether I can get a number of able-bodied men, with their wives
and children, who are willing to go when I present evidence of encourage-
ment and protection."
Anna was glad he was not accepting the point of view of Attorney General
Bates that all the blacks must be deported, voluntarily or not; Lincoln was
offering freedmen, at least, the choice of going or staying, and she assumed he
would make the same offer to the slaves soon to be freed.
"Could I get a hundred tolerably intelligent men, with their wives and
children, to 'cut their own fodder,' so to speak?" The President looked at the
four men, and finally at E. M. Thomas, for a reply. The men looked at each
other and did not speak.
"Can I have fifty?"
No answer. The President, with an edge of desperation in his high voice,
fell back to his minimum plea: "If I could find twenty-five able-bodied men,
with a mixture of women and childrengood things in the family relation1
think I could make a successful commencement." Before they could fail to
respond again, he went on: "Let me know whether this can be done or not. I
ask you to consider seriously not pertaining to yourselves merely, nor to your
race, and ours, for the present timebut as one of the things for the good of
mankind, not confined to the present generation."
After a moment, the chairman of the delegation said, "We will hold a
consultation and in a short time give an answer."
"Take your full time," replied the President. "No hurry at all."
They withdrew. Afterward, walking down the hallway with Hay, Anna
concluded, "It's not going to work, you know."
The young man sighed. "He thinks it has logic on its side."
"On paper it may look perfectly logical," she told him, "and it may be
what he thinks is the most humane and proper thing to dojust as I didbut
it's all a delusion.  He may or may not get twenty-five blacks with their
families. But he won't get a few thousand. And he surely won't find this to be
the answer for four million people. They just won't go, and if you try to force
them to go, they'll hide. Or fight."
"It seemed like such a good idea," said Hay.
"But when you examine it closely, it falls apart." She began to regret her
own part in it. "It is something to talk about, maybe, but it is nothing to do."
"He had about the same success with the border-state Congressmen on
compensated emancipation," Hay brooded.
She stopped. "He pleaded with Crisfield and the rest in order to say that he
tried," she thought aloud. "And when they refused him, he signed the Confis-
cation Act. He begged them to take the money for their slaves, knowing he
would be turned down. Why do you suppose he does that? Why does he make
public offers of ideas he knows will be turned down?"
"Why, indeed?" said Hay, offering nothing.
"I suspect he knows this colonization idea is a lot of hogwash," Anna
figured, "or at least he knows it after this meeting. But tomorrow it will be all
over the newspapers, how he plans to send the Africans down to Central
America, and how their leaders did not object. And a great many newspaper
readers, especially in New York and Washington, are going to think that
abolition will not mean blacks coming North for jobs."
"I think he still thinks colonization is feasible," Hay said loyally.
"Maybe." If Lincoln thought that, he would be a fool. If Lincoln knew
otherwise, and was dangling colonization as a way out effacing the hard issue
of competition for employment, he was a knave. Anna Carroll sighed with
some satisfaction: she always preferred knaves to fools.
Lincoln, she concluded, had a more cunning mind than most politicians
credited him with; he was never far ahead of public sentiment, but always
catering to it, nudging it in devious ways. Here he was insulting the blacks,
espousing the separation of the raceseven as he prepared the ground for
public acceptance of abolition of slavery. Where did he learn this trick of
preparing the ground by getting rejected? Who was advising himThurlow
Weed? But Weed was against abolition. Chase? No, Chase wanted no part of
deportation, and did not have the type of mind that admitted such calculation
as spreading the rumor to make abolition more acceptable. The Biairs? No
they really thought colonization would work. Not Bates; not shrewd enough.
Maybe Stanton or Seward, both with conspiratorial minds. Or maybe no-
body; the thought struck her that "honest Abe" might be devious enough to
conceive the strategy himself.
CHAPTER I
FATAL ERROR

"Here, directly in front of this army," McClellan argued, tapping the map,
"is the heart of the rebellion."
George McClellan was all but certain that the general across the table, sent
down to the Peninsula from Washington, would not be blind to the military
opportunity. How could anyone with any military training miss it? "It is
here," he pressed, "within twenty-five miles of Richmond, that all our re-
sources should be collected to strike the blow that will determine the fate of
the nation."
The Army of the Potomac's field commander considered Henry Halleck to
be his inferior in every way except rank. But the man listening to his plea was
General-in-Chief and had to be reckoned with.
He wished "Old Brains" would comport himself more like a soldier and
stop scratching his elbows. Halleck had come from the West, where his pains-
taking crawl toward Corinth after General Grant's curious debacle at Pitts-
burg Landing had made it possible for the Confederates to regroup and de-
fend Vicksburg and the Mississippi. Now Halleck, having stumbled to the
pinnacle of the nation's armed forces, was paying what McClellan presumed
was a courtesy call on the army's most important field commander.
"I must take things as I find them," McClellan heard Halleck's whining
voice say. "I find our forces divided, and I wish to unite them."
"Good, good," McClellan replied cordially. "Send me Bumside's men and
McDowell's forces. That's all I need to take Richmond. I won't need Pope's
men, they can stay to guard Washington."
Halleck looked uncomfortable. "You don't understand. Only one feasible
plan has been presented for doing thisto move your army north to join
Pope outside of Washington."
McClellan was thunderstruck at the thickheadedness of the man, but he
kept his temper in check. "The more feasible plan," he said coolly, "is to send
me the reinforcements I need to attack the rebel capital."
"A week ago," said Halleck, "I wired you that it had been determined to
withdraw your army from the Peninsula to Aquia Creek. What have you
been doing?"
McClellan sensed a trap. He could not let it appear that he was resisting a
legitimate order. To show an intent to comply, he had been sending home his
sick and wounded, delaying the retreat northward of his fighting force until
he could prevail upon Lincoln and Stanton to do the militarily sensible thing:
to send Bumside and McDowell to reinforce him, and not turn back the clock
six months by going back to a static defense of Washington, followed by a
long, bloody, interminable fight overland through Virginia to Richmond.
That would be military madness, he was certain, war dictated by tearful
politicians; and this grumpy military bureaucrat was apparently giving it his
imprimatur.
"Your telegram caused me the greatest pain I have ever experienced," he
said to the clerk with the general's stars. Even Lincoln was known to have
described Halleck as "a first-rate clerk," and McClellan was unwilling to
classify him as a first-rate anything. "I am convinced that the order to with-
draw this army will prove disastrous to our cause. I have never done this
before, General Halleck, but I entreat you1 beg you: Rescind that order."
"We have to consider the defense of Washington. General Lee has sent
General Jackson and about twenty-five thousand men to strike at Pope."
That made McClellan wish fervently he had a President as daring as Jeffer-
son Davis behind him. Evidently Lee had persuaded the Confederate Presi-
dent to risk the defense of Richmondwith McClellan's army still within a
day's march of the capitalby sending Stonewall Jackson's brigade up to
threaten Washington. The move could only be a feint but, incredibly, the
Confederate strategy was working. Lincoln and Halleck were falling into the
trap by ordering the withdrawal of the Army of the Potomac from its threat-
ening position near Richmond. That retreat would free Lee to join Jackson
and smash Pope up near Washington. And Pope was no match for either of
those Confederate generals. McClellan considered Chase's choice for Union
field leadership to be a civilian-killing savage who was more imbecile than
general.
"The threat to Richmond is the true defense of Washington," McClellan
pleaded. This man had written a respectable book on strategy. Why couldn't
he see the obvious? "Here, on the banks of the James, the fate of the Union
will be decided. The moment I begin to retreatand it is a complex move-
ment, as you are awareLee will streak north. His army will be on the
attack, morale highwhile this army will be demoralized and in retreat.
Don't you see? This one wrong decision could cost us the war."
"The President expects you to carry out his instructions," Halleck insisted.
McClellan felt only scorn for this uniformed errand boy, passing along politi-
cal messages when he should be beseeching the President to act boldly as a
commander in chief. So be it; neither reasoning nor begging would affect
Halleck. McClellan rose, acknowledging defeat.
"If my counsel does not prevail, I will obey your orders," McClellan said
carefully. He would give his enemies in Washington no ammunition to criti-
cize him as mutinous.
"You cannot regret the order of withdrawal any more than I do the neces-
sity of giving it," Halleck sighed. After a moment, the little eyes of the
General-in-Chief grew cagey. "Are you certain you are not able to strike at
Richmond without reinforcements?"
McClellan calculated quickly. Even without Stonewall Jackson's troops,
now on the feint toward Washington, General Lee's force in front of Rich-
mond remained formidable. He sensed a little give in Halleck's attitude.
"Give me fifty thousand men, and I will win the war."
Halleck rubbed his chin and walked around. "I have no reinforcements to
send you. But if somehow we were to find those fifty thousand, you would
strike immediately? I should pass that on to Lincoln."
McClellan's hopes rose. They were negotiating with him after seeming to
order him home. If he agreed to fifty thousand, they would cut it in half. He
responded: "Make it a hundred thousand."
Halleck looked agonized. "That's just it. Lincoln says if he gave you two
hundred thousand men, you would suddenly discover Lee had twice that
many in front of Richmond. He had hoped that an attack on Richmond by
your ninety thousand, in concert with an attack through northern Virginia by
Pope and his forty-five thousand, would crack the Confederacy."
Rely on John Pope? That was absurd. If McClellan were to attack Lee's
superior force in Richmond, depending upon the'barbaric Pope to tie down
Jackson near Washington, Pope would surely fail. The skillful Jackson would
hold him off with a small rear guard and dash back to join Lee and over-
whelm the Union attackers by sheer weight of numbers. Why couldn't Hal-
leck see that and explain it to Lincoln?
Still holding his temper, McClellan said, "Lee has two hundred thousand
men with him in Richmond right now, and the advantage of interior lines and
friendly country. We know the number. Ask Pinkerton yourself. I have half
that number ready for duty, but if I had reinforcements I could take Rich-
mond. I could end the war in a single stroke, save all that bloodshed"
"If it is true that Lee outnumbers you two to one," Halleck replied, "he
could smash you here and then turn north and defeat Pope. By your own
reckoning, we would be wiser to unite our forces near Washington."
There was superficial logic to that, but he had taught Lee at Malvern Hill
that an army in a defensive posture under George McClellan could not be
overwhelmed, even by superior numbers. Wearily, not wanting to give the
ultras around Lincoln the satisfaction of cashiering him for insubordination,
McClellan assured Halleck that he would use all his skill in maneuver and
logistics to bring his men safely north, if that was the President's final deci-
sion.
After he put the uneasy Halleck on a boat back to Washington McClellan
sought counsel with General Fitz-John Porter, his most trusted subordinate,
the man whose troops had inflicted terrible losses on Lee during the Seven
Days. Lee was said to be audacious, but McClellan judged him to be fool-
hardy, as the casualty figures proved; the Richmond newspapers pointed out
that the South had lost more men than the North, which it could ill afford,
and McClellan was still threatening the capital.
A late afternoon thunderstorm was brewing. A gust of wind swept through
the wood-frame headquarters, blowing a tall desk over and smashing the
"monkey," a pottery jug filled with water to cool the room by evaporation.
"There's a bad omen," said Porter, looking at the smashed jug. "They're
getting ready to give you your walking papers."
"Maybe not." Halleck's tentative offer of some reinforcements made it
possible Lincoln would change his mind. "The absurdity of Halleck's course
in ordering the army away from here is that we cannot possibly reach Wash-
ington in time to do any good."
"Maybe Lee will attack us here," Porter offered. "We couldn't leave in that
situation."
"Do everything you can to draw him on," McClellan ordered. "If we could
only induce Lee to attack us now, I could beat him and follow through to
RichmondLincoln would have to send reinforcements in that case." Mc-
Clellan's spirits rose. "We could be ready to move tomorrow on Richmond
while Jackson is lamming away at Pope."
"Lee is too smart to attack us now," Porter said sadly.
Reality closed in on McClellan. "I wish we could humbug him into it, but
he must see the beginnings of a retreat. No, forget about an attack on Rich-
mond. Lincoln and that incompetent fool Halleck are committing a fatal
error in withdrawing me from here, and the future will show it."
"What do you see as the result of their machinations?"
"Pope will be badly thrashed within ten days, and then they'll be very glad
to turn over the redemption of their affairs to me." That was part bravado,
McClellan knew. He had already written to Aspinwall, the financier in New
York, about a job after he was forced to leave the army. But if Pope failed,
there would still be hope for McClellan and for the country. An eye-opening
defeat could be the necessary precursor to ultimate victory.
Porter nodded. "Sometimes things have to get worse before they get bet-
ter."
McClellan knew that Porter understood his position, and why they both
had to speak circumspectly. It would be best for the Union, in the long run,
for them to delay going to Pope's assistance, but such a maneuver had to be
conducted with subtlety. What was patriotism in the long run might seem
treason in the short.
"I presume Pope is being hard-pressed by Jackson," McClellan said slowly.
"We cannot help him in time, as we don't have the means of transportation.
The best way for Pope to handle Jackson in the Shenandoah Valley would be
to send McDowell and Fr6mont after himtrap him at Harpers Ferry, cut up
his force." That would never happen. McDowell was capable, but Fr6mont
did not know the first thing about moving troops. It was important, however,
for the written record to show that McClellan was struggling to get the means
to move north. He would make that point in telegrams to the War Depart-
ment. "I foresee," he told his favorite supporter, "that the government will
try to throw upon me the blame for their own delays and blunders. So be it. I
have learned to endure."
"But how unfair it is," the loyal Porter said angrily. "If you get Pope out of
his stupid scrape, they'll all say how wise Lincoln was to bring you north.
And if we don't get there in time to bail him out, Pope's defeat will be blamed
on you. You can't win."
A fair assessment of the situation; Fitz was a good thinker. McClellan saw
now that it was not primarily a personal animus that drove his Washington
enemies. Stanton's hatred was to be expected, since their approaches to the
warand the peace that would followwere diametrically opposed. Stanton,
Chase, Greeley, that whole radical abolitionist crowd, wanted to kill the
rebels, smash the South, conquer the territory, no matter what the casualties.
But George Brinton McClellanalong with half the Republicans, the great
majority of the Democrats, and most of the Army of the Potomacwanted
to capture Richmond and then offer generous terms for peace. Those terms
would include, as Lincoln had repeatedly promised, preservation of the pecu-
liar institution of slavery within Southern borders. That fundamental dis-
agreement about goals was why McClellan could be certain that Stanton,
Chase & Co. would go to any lengths to disgrace him.
The injustice was galling. Since they could not take him away from his
army without great uproar from the troops, they wouldpiecemeal, corps by
corpstake his army away from him. They would order him to fight here
without reinforcements, and tell the world that he was a coward to wait for a
full complement of troops. In the next breath, they would accuse him of
treason for not racing north to save the reckless Pope. If the radicals now
dominating Lincoln were so sure McClellan could win without reinforce-
ments, he wondered, why were they so fearful Pope could not win without
reinforcements?
"I want to strike square in the teeth of all of John Pope's infamous orders,"
he told Porter. "I want to give directly the reverse instructions to my army:
forbid all pillaging and stealing, and take the highest Christian ground for the
conduct of the war."
Porter grinned and nodded approval.
"Let Lincoln's government gainsay it if they dare," McClellan added. Lin-
coln, supposedly a lawyer, had never rescinded one of Pope's horrendous and
unlawful orders ordering the hanging of rebellious civilians. "I will not per-
mit my army to degenerate into a mob of thieves."
"I like that," said Porter, "but it will mean war to the knife with Stanton."
"And with Chase, and Wade, and all of them," McClellan added. "Their
game is to humiliate me and force me to resign. Mine will be to force tliem to
place me on leave of absence, so that when they begin to reap the whirlwind
that they have sown, I may still be in a position to do something to save my
country."
He trusted his right-hand man to conduct his portion of the withdrawal
from the Peninsula with the utmost caution, despite all Stanton's and Hal-
leck's demands for haste that might expose his Army of the Potomac to
unnecessary danger. That was it; if Halleck dashed his hopes, McClellan
would find good reason to protect his men in the process of safe withdrawal.
Meanwhile, he and Porter would burn up the telegraph lines with cabled
demands for more and better transportation. The Committee on the Conduct
of the War would never be able to support a charge of deliberate delay;
indeed, McClellan would contribute all his skill to a withdrawalbut by the
book, with prudent regard to the safety of his men.
If the absence of Porter's force during Lee's attack meant difficulty for
Pope, even his defeat, such were the fortunes of war. Lincoln and Halleck had
placed their favorite new general in that scrape, and it was for them to get
him out of it. He suspected that John Pope, manipulated by his sponsor
Chase and the ever-duplicitous Stanton, was an instigator of the wrongheaded
withdrawal from the Peninsula. He would never forgive that move, designed
to ruin the McClellan reputation and ultimately sacrifice the splendid army
he created.
In the midst of his frustration and humiliation, George McClellan sensed
that his rival would fail, and knew when that happened his countrymen
would turn to him again. Then the man they now called the "procrastinator"
and the "coward" would have his day.
When Porter left, Lieutenant Custer came in with a fresh pot of ink and
paper; it was time for the general to write home to Nellie.
"Armstrong," he told the aidesince they were both named George, the
general had come to address the young man by his middle name"with all
their faults, I do love my countrymen." He sighed profoundly. "If I can save
them, I will yet do so."

CHAPTER 2

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
AUGUST 19, 1862
These are halcyon days for me.
Kate and I grow in each other's mental and physical processes even as we
observe the competition to come between our champions. Her father, of
course, will fail in his desire to unhorse the Prsdt, but I shall be there to
comfort her and perhaps provide a surprising substitute for her need for the
proximity to power. The future, after the war, beckons us to become the most
sought-after self-seeking couple in the nation.
Adding to my euphoria is the generally prevailing sense that something is
finally to be done about the war. McClellan is finished, retreating in good
orderhe is really superb when it comes to retreats, there is no denying him
that. Slow but sure, leaving not a matchstick behind. The man falls back as in
the swoon of a great actress.
Bumside has already joined General John Pope in Maryland to mass for a
grand attack down toward Richmond. A new start, a new leader, a new army
away with the taste of stagnation and defeat!
However, the army loves its soon-to-be-replaced leader with an embarrass-
ing passion, which is why the Prsdt has been trying to paper over the differ-
ences between Stanton and McClellan in public. (Why shouldn't the rank and
file love their Little Mac? He doesn't get them killed.) Last week, at a meeting
in front of the Capitol, the Tycoon told the crowd that Stanton and McClel-
lan were not nearly so deep in a quarrel as were some gossips who pretended
to be their friends.
Everybody in the know knows that Stanton has triumphed and that Lin-
coln is only trying to salve the Little Napoleon's feelings, but I suppose it is a
part of any President's job to blame dissension within the official family on
second-level aides. Which brings me to the bothersome subject of the per-
snickety press, and especially Horace Greeley's Tribune. "Without public
sentiment, nothing can succeed," Lincoln likes to say, especially to scribblers;
"with it, nothing can fail." And public sentiment means the Tribune. In New
York, Henry Raymond of the Times, who is in Seward-Weed's pocket, will do
anything for us, and James Gordon Bennett of the Herald will do anything to
embarrass us, and here in Washington, Jim Welling of the Intelligencer will
run whatever we give him. But all across the nation, "public sentiment"
means Uncle Horace's Tribune.
Sydney Gay was in here a few days ago. He's Greeley's right arm now that
Charles Dana has become Stanton's right arm. Gay sent in a letter from some
anonymous reader that really got under the Prsdt's skin. I have it here: "Can
you enlighten the people in regard of the real object of the Administration in
relation to the rebellion? The people begin to fear that we are being trifled
with, that there is not and never has been any serious determination to put
down the rebels. The President with full power to act hangs back, hesitates,
and leaves the country to drift . . . does this mean he is ready to play con-
servative to the ruin of the Nation?"
The Tycoon's ire at that caused me to telegraph Gay in New York to come
down and see the Prsdt. He did, after some delay about a death in his family,
and A. Lincoln, commander in chief, gave him some broad hints about mili-
tary action under Pope and about more use of fugitive slaves as laborers,
which is catnip to the Jacobins. He hinted at emancipation but said nothing
about arming the slaves, letting Gay persuade him to make more use of the
Confiscation Act.
Then, yesterday, I brought in Robert Walker, the pro-Union former sena-
tor of Mississippi, and his partner in magazine publishing, James Gilmore.
Gilmore wrote Among the Pines, a sentimental novel about Southern life that
Lincoln likes, and is the fellow who is supposed to be our channel to Greeley.
"Well, Mr. Edmund Kirke," said the Prsdt, using Gilmore's pen name, "it
is a long time since I beheld the light of your countenance. I infer from the
recent tone of the Tribune that you are not always able to keep Brother
Greeley in the traces."
"Any direct attempt to influence him has no effect," said Gilmore. "With
Sydney Gay, I can be more direct, and he has softened Mr. Greeley's wrath
on several occasions."
The Prsdt did not let on he had just seen Gay himself. "What is Greeley
wrathy about?"
"The slow progress of the war," Gilmore reported, "and especially your
neglect to make a direct attack on slavery. Mr. Gay tells me that Mr. Greeley
is now meditating an appeal to the country which will force you to take a
decided position."
Irritated that Gay had not told him about that plan, the Prsdt asked, "Why
doesn't Uncle Horace come down here and have a talk with me?"
"Sir, Greeley says he objects to allowing the President to act as advisory
editor of the Tribune."
The Tycoon put on his most innocent look. "I have no such desire. Does
not that remark show an unfriendly spirit in Mr. Greeley?"
Robert Walker put in the answer: "I told Gilmore here that McClellan's
tardiness and disobedience to your orders was the cause of that. I also told
him, in strict secrecy, that a proclamation of emancipation had been drawn
and was awaiting a favorable moment for publication. Shall he not be allowed
to tell this to Mr. Greeley?"
Frankly, that was news to me; perhaps that explains the Prsdt's mysterious
slipping-off to the telegraph office in July to be alone with his writing. Also all
the secrecy about the Cabinet meeting last month and the reversal of some
momentous decision after a late-night talk with Thurlow Weed.
"I fear only Greeley's passion for news," the Prsdt was saying. "Do you
think, if you tell him, he will let no intimation of it get into his paper?"
"Not if he gave his word," Gilmore said hesitantly, "but he's absentminded
about those things. I'll tell Gay instead, who can be trusted."
"Do that," the President told him.
"You have to tie emancipation with deportation," Walker said. "How are
you coming on the Chiriqui plan? If that falls through, I have an idea about
shipping them through Texas to Mexico."
Lincoln said he had put colonization to a deputation of free negroes a few
days ago, but nobody wanted to be the first to go. He pressed the cunning
idea of getting Gilmore to head off the abolitionist pressure from Greeley. We
hardly needed more agitation from the radicals at a time when the conserva-
tives were so skittish; the trick was to let the middle-readers get comfortable
with the idea of gradual, compensated emancipation, hurrying them a bit
only with the argument of military necessity.
Unfortunately, the plan to head off Greeley was one day too late. Gilmore
left last night, but this morning the New York Tribune's front page is embla-
zoned with an editorial entitled "The Prayer of Twenty Millions."
I beat the Tycoon to work this morning, thanks to a tip from Kate that
something big was afoot among the radicals. He came in with his shoes in his
hand. As he massaged his feet before trying to insert them into their tight
containers, I read him the radical diatribe.
"It Starts OUt 'TO ABRAHAM LINCOLN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED
STATES: A great proportion of those who triumphed in your election are
sorely disappointed and deeply pained by the policy you seem to be pursuing
with regard to the slaves of the rebels . . .' Shall I go on?"
Lincoln grunted yes.
" 'We require of you that you EXECUTE THE LAWS . . . We think you are
strangely and disastrously remiss in the discharge of your official and impera-
tive duty with regard to the emancipating provisions of the new Confiscation
Act. They prescribe that men loyal to the Union, and willing to shed blood in
her behalf, shall no longer be held in bondage to persistent, malignant trai-
tors.' "
"There goes Greeley arming the slaves," Lincoln said, jamming his foot
into the shoe.
"Says, 'We think you are unduly influenced by the menaces of certain fossil
politicians hailing from the border slave states.' "
"That's always safe to say."
He had to hear this, because "The Prayer of Twenty Millions" would
surely be hotly discussed across the nation. " 'The government cannot afford
to temporize with traitors, to bribe them to behave themselves nor make them
fair promises in the hope of disarming their causeless hostility. Had you
proclaimed at the outset that rebellion would strike the shackles from the
slaves of every traitor, the wealthy and the cautious in the South would have
been supplied with a powerful inducement to remain loyal. The rebels from
the first have been eager to confiscate, imprison, scourge, and kill. We have
fought wolves with the devices of sheep.' "
"The devices of sheep!" Lincoln exploded. The night before, he had been
looking at the long casualty lists. He took the Tribune out of my hand and
spread it on his desk, drawing on his spectacles, resting his knuckles on either
side of the editorial. "He calls compensated emancipation 'bribery,' " he mut-
tered, taking up the reading-aloud himself.
" 'We complain that the Confiscation Act is habitually disregarded by your
generals. Fr6mont's proclamation and Hunter's order favoring emancipation
were promptly annulled by you. We complain that the officers of your armies
have habitually repelled rather than invited the approach of slaves; those
escaping have been brutally repulsed and often surrendered to be scourged,
maimed, and tortured by the ruffian traitors. A large proportion of our regu-
lar army officers evidence far more solicitude to uphold slavery than to put
down the rebellion.' "
His voice hardened; Greeley was accusing him of abetting the sins of Mc-
Clellan. " 'You, Mr. President, knowing well what an abomination slavery is,
seem never to interfere with these atrocities. The world will lay the blame on
you.' "
Greeley was getting personal; that was bad. Up to now, nobody with a
following had associated the President directly with the actions of some of his
field commanders. It had been part of Lincoln's way to remain detached from
what could be dismissed as mistakes under fire.
Greeley's "prayer"more of a jeremiadcomplained that the rebels were
using the anti-negro riots in the North to convince the slaves that they have
nothing to hope from a Union success. " If they impress this as a truth on
their ignorant and credulous bondsmen, the Union will never be restored.' "
The President, shaking his head at the power of the argument and the vigor
of the Greeley languageand estimating its likely effectread the conclu-
sion: " 'The loyal millions of your countrymen require of you a frank, de-
clared, ungrudging execution of the Confiscation Act giving freedom to the
slaves coming within our lines. I entreat you to render unequivocal obedience
to the law of the land.' "
We knew that Uncle Horace's philippic would be reprinted and debated in
every home in the North, read from pulpits and pounded into the public
consciousness. Butdid it represent the public sentiment of most of the
North? If it did not, would it swing much of the conservative sentiment over
toward the radical view?
After reading it all the way through again, the Prsdt walked around his
office and ours, repeating phrases like "the policy you seem to be pursuing."
We have come a far piece from the old "my policy is to have no policy"; the
Lincoln policy is clearly to save the Union, to solve the slavery issue through
compensated and gradual emancipation and colonization. Not everybody
likes that policyindeed, very few people seem to be embracing it at the
momentbut it is at least a recognizable policy. We are not drifting. Any
other policy, from Greeley's previously defeatist "wayward sisters, depart in
peace" to Greeley's present call to arm the slaves, would generate more oppo-
sition than the Lincoln way.
Then a curious thing happened. Instead of working himself into a fit of the
hypo, complete with lugubrious poetry recitations, the Prsdt grew almost
unnaturally calm. He lay down on the leather couch, propped his head under
his arms, and pondered a bit. I started to step outside and close the door, but
he beckoned me back.
"You notice," he said, " The Prayer of Twenty Millions' calls only for
adherence to the Confiscation Act. Nothing in it about emancipation on a
grand scale."
"But now, if you come out with an emancipation proclamation," I said, "it
will seem to be in response to the radicals' demand."
He shrugged; that seemed unimportant to him. Evidently he was beginning
to look at the Greeley letter not so much as an impertinent affront, which I
think it was, but as an opportunity for him to use a device to prepare the
public for his own coup. He hates to be seen leading, and much prefers to lead
by shooing others out front. Can a great shooer be a great leader? I suppose
so, if he gets the job done.
"I wouldn't give him the satisfaction of a reply," I advised. "The almighty
editor of the Tribune didn't even send you an advance copy of his polemic; he
just ran it in the paper. I would simply stand on my dignity and let people
forget about it."
The Prsdt shook his head, smiling one of his this-is-too-good-to-pass-up
smiles. He rolled off the couch and signaled for writing materials, which I
brought, and he started scribbling a first draft as I looked over his shoulder.
"As to the policy I 'seem to be pursuing,' as you say," he wrote to Greeley,
"I have not meant to leave anyone in doubt." Good way of handling an
insult.
"I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the
Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored, the nearer
the Union will be 'the Union as it was.' "
I grunted to show appreciation for the way he flung that phrase hated by
abolitionists in Brother Greeley's teeth: "the Union as it was" is the rallying
cry of those unionists who are willing to leave the South to its peculiar
institution.
"Broken eggs can never be mended," he wrote, "and the longer the break-
ing process, the more will be broken."
"Do you really want to say that?" I ventured. "Doesn't sound presiden-
tial." He looked around at me with that expression he gets when he wonders
if I spent too long at an Eastern university, but he neither argued nor acqui-
esced; he put a check mark against it, to think about it some more, and went
on.
"If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the
same time save slavery, I do not agree with them." That put him against the
Southern firebrands. "If there be those who would not save the Union unless
they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them." So
much for the Northern radicals. He is now firmly in the center, inviting the
ire of the extremes. I hope he is not alone in the center.
"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not
either to save or to destroy slavery."
That was the sort of pithy line that could be used against him. "Do you
really want to say that?"
He nodded firmly. That was his conviction, and not a matter of style up for
discussion. He paused a long time before writing the next line.
"If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I
could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by
freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that."
I had heard him say something like this to a friend earlier in the week; it
was a thought he had been refining, until Greeley's letter gave him a chance
to use it in finished form. I suspect that the last partfreeing some and
leaving others aloneis what he has in mind, and he is getting people ready
for what might seem like an outlandish or hypocritical compromise. He is just
putting the notion out there the way a dramatist lays a knife on the table in
the first act that he plans to use in the third act.
"What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it
helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe
it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I
am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing
more will help the cause." A perfectly balanced line; lucid, too, except that it
seemed to put him a few long steps away from the anti-slavery Lincoln of the
Douglas debates.
Perhaps he sensed that, too, because he added: "I have here stated my
purpose according to my view of official duty, and I intend no modification of
my oft-expressed personal wish that all men everywhere could be free."
Nice. Says his heart is with the radicals, but he can't let his heart rule his
presidential head. They'll say they voted for his heart, but it's a fine position
for him to take. Most important, it makes the arrangement for a reluctant
conversion to emancipation latertelling conservatives that when he does
emancipate, it will not be because of personal feelings but because it is the
best practical course for the preservation of the Union.
"I still hate to see this in the form of a letter to Greeley," I advised, and
Nico, who had come in to read it, agreed. Why let the man who insulted the
Prsdt sell his newspaper with a presidential response? It would put the editor
on the same level as the Prsdt.
"Send for Welling," Lincoln said, referring to the editor of Washington's
Intelligencer. I approved of that; if he was going to respond with a letter to
Oreeley, at least have it appear in another newspaper.
We sped Stoddard over to the editor's office, and he returned after the Prsdt
had written the letter out on his Executive Mansion stationery. By that time,
the salutation had been added:
"Hon. Horace Greely: Dear Sir1 have just read your letter addressed to
myself through the New York Tribune. If there be perceptable in it an impa-
tient and dictatorial tone, I waive it in deference to an old friend, whose heart
I have always supposed to be right"
That's pure Lincoln; he doesn't say he believes Greeley's heart is right, he
only supposes so. He splits those hairs like the lawyer he is. I noticed that
Lincoln misspelled Greeley's name, dropping the last "e," but thought that
might be intentional and so said nothing; if it was a simple mistake, then I
take pleasure in knowing it will cause that pompous old coot some discomfi-
ture when he finally sees it. (Now that I examine my own copy, I see that the
Prsdt spelled "perceptible" wrong, too; I should have caught that. Well, it's
been a busy day.)
Jim Welling, who is a good egg, said he would get the reply in the paper the
next morning, at least two days before Greeley could run it in the Tribune.
And thenbless his sharp editorial eyeshe pointed to the line about the
broken eggs and said, "Mr. Lincoln, this expression seems somewhat excep-
tionable."
The Prsdt did not like that. "Why so?"
"On rhetorical grounds," said the editor. "It seems out of place in a paper
of such dignity."
With a sound that could fairly be compared to a growl, the Prsdt crossed
out the line. I kept a straight face and said nothing.

CHAPTER 3
UNIVERSAL CHANGE OF FRONT
"It's not an answer to my 'Prayer,' " Horace Greeley stated, as he read the
presidential reply in the National Intelligencer and the Times.
Sydney Gay, summoned into the editor's office from his desk in the middle
of the newsroom, knew that Greeley was delighted to be at the center of
attention; his front-page "Prayer of Twenty Millions" had turned out to be a
journalistic masterstroke.
"Bennett at the Herald must be eating his heart out," he told his beaming
employer.
Greeley's round face bobbed up and down. "Do you see, Sydney, what that
proslavery knave Welling has to say?"
The managing editor had read Welling's editorial in the Intelligencer ac-
companying the President's reply to Greeley. "He says you had no right to
speak on behalf of twenty millions in the North, Mr. Greeley, and that most
of them would prefer Lincoln's position to your own."
Which, Gay added to himself, was true. When the managing editor visited
Lincoln the week before, he had no idea that Greeley had this up his sleeve.
He hoped the President did not think Gay had held back important informa-
tion.
"Welling, that little toady, thinks I need a lesson in etiquette. Calls my
editorial 'arrogant, dictatorial, and acrimonious.' Hah! I suppose that came
straight from Lincoln, along with a copy of the letter to me." Greeley, the
white round hat and white beard framing his cherubic face, was happy in his
irritability. Gay knew he was feeling proud and defiant, and his complaining
about the envious sniping of his competitors made him feel even better. Gree-
ley had been unusually civil to the Tribune's employees as he walked through
the building earlier.
"Raymond of the Times is grumpy too," Gay offered.
"Yes, I have that right here." Greeley cheerfully read aloud: " 'Several days
ago the President read to a friend a rough draft of what appears as a letter to
Horace Greeley. He said that he had thought of getting before the public
some such statement of his position on the slavery question, and the appear-
ance of Greeley's "Prayer" gave him the opportunity.' Do you believe that,
Sydney?"
"Yes," Gay dared reply. "Lincoln didn't just dash off that answer to your
editorial. His line about freeing some of the slaves, and not others, struck me
as very carefully prepared."
"I agree," the radical leader chirruped. "I have been used. How all the
other ink-stained wretches wish they could be so used!" Gay was astounded
at Greeley's willingness to be part of a political minuet. "The only pity is,"
Greeley added, growing serious, "that Lincoln refuses to budgehe won't
put the Confiscation Act into operation. He won't arm the slaves, he won't
force his Democratic generals to act like Hunter or Fremont or Pope. We
have to keep pounding away at this, lest the North lose heart."
"You're not as angry at Lincoln as your 'Prayer' editorial suggested, then?"
"In my eyes, Sydney, he's a bad stick. The President really doesn't under-
stand how weary people can get, how close we all are to quitting."
Greeley went to the large bookcase near the door and plucked out a book.
Gay noted that the editor knew exactly where it was. "Look at the table of
contents in this theological treatise." He jabbed a pudgy finger and the man-
aging editor read: "Chapter 1: Hell. Chapter II: Hell, continued."
"That's where we are in the war," Greeley said triumphantly. "In 'Hell,
continued,' and no end in sight. Lincoln's reply shows he doesn't understand
that only an attack on slavery can rejuvenate the Union cause."
"I don't know," said Gay, trying to assess Lincoln from his recent visit and
this seemingly contradictory letter to Greeley. "I thought he was coming over
your way. And Fomey, in the Philadelphia Press, just went beyond the Con-
fiscation Act clear to a call for emancipation."
"Fomey has always been in the pocket of the conservatives," said Greeley,
moved to wondering about that, "and he won't say boo without Lincoln's
approval. Do you suppose it was a French whadyacallit?"
"A ballon d'essai?" The French had a method of weather observation that
involved sending up balloons to see which way the wind was blowing, and
this idea of "trial balloon" was a phrase Greeley chose for a political meta-
phor.
"Yes, thatdo you suppose that Lincoln told the obsequious Fomey to
stick his toe in the water about abolition? If that's so, Sydney, I should be
fully informed. The Tribune should not be the last to know if Lincoln has at
last come around our way."
Sydney Gay shrugged. The President's emissary, Gilmore, was cooling his
heels in the outer office, awaiting an audience with Greeley. "Ask Gilmore.
He sees the President."
At the editor's nod, James Gilmore was brought in. The novelist-turned-
magazine-editor seemed to Gay less cocksure this time; if Gilmore's job was
to keep Greeley tied to Lincoln's wagon, he had not been doing so well.
"Well there, Gilmore," Greeley piped out delightedly, "what news from the
inner sanctum? Was it true that my 'Prayer' was merely the forum for a
statement heaping abuse on the cause of human freedom that Lincoln had
previously prepared?"
"I have a piece of information for you, Mr. Greeley," the writer replied
seriously, "but it cannot be bandied about, and certainly not used in your
paper. Do I have your word? And yours, Sydney?"
Gay started to say no, but Greeley cut him short with "Out with it. I can
keep a political confidence."
"Even before your editorial appeared, Mr. Greeley, the President prepared
and discussed privately with the Cabinetthe issuance of a proclamation
of emancipation."
"Ah." Greeley stopped to chew that over; Gay did not believe it. "And
what is keeping him from this necessary action?"
"He is only waiting a favorable time to publish it to the country."
"Then why," asked Gay, "does he give just the opposite impression in his
reply to Horace Greeley? Lincoln's letter is the sort of answer that the Wel-
ling pro-slavery crowd at the Intelligencer cheered."
Gilmore shrugged. "I suppose the President has his reasons."
That answer struck Gay as honestly devious. The managing editor was
coming around to the idea that Lincoln was a complex fellow, not at all the
weakling or the hayseed he had been painted in the press of late.
"If Mr. Lincoln were not so cautious and reticent," said Greeley, folding
his hands over his stomach and creaking back in his chair, "we should get
along much better together. Tell him that, Gilmore, would you? I could
forgive him a lot if he would infuse a little energy in affairs, dumping McClel-
lan and his ilk. And I could forgive him everything if he'll issue that procla-
mation. Even this duplicitous reply. Did he say anything about arming the
slaves?"
"No. Emancipation of all those in rebel hands, after proper warning."
"My, my, my." The watery eyes glittered; Gay wondered if the politician in
Greeley was hailing the possibility of freedom, or relishing the fact that his
timing had been perfect in leading the President. "Do you remember what
Victor Hugo says of Waterloothat it was not just a battle, but a change of
front of the whole universe? That is what an emancipation act of Lincoln's
would bea change of front of the country. Henceforth we would be a free
people."
Greeley turned to Gay, as if the tight-lipped editor were a blabbermouth.
"Not a word to a soul about this, Sydney. The fact is more important than the
news. Gilmore, tell the President it is time to fight with both hands now."
"I think he realized that, Mr. Greeley."
"And until he does," the emboldened editor went on, "just to be sure, the
Tribune will urge him to carry out the will of Congress in the Confiscation
Actnot in any grudging, halfway, underhand, equivocating, clandestine
deference to it, but in an open, loyal, hearty, thorough recognition and execu-
tion of it."
Gay knew that Greeley did not trust Gilmore. Moreover, even if the inter-
mediary spoke the truth about what Lincoln had told him on this occasion,
Greeley did not in the least trust Lincoln. If the President could pretend to go
one way while going the other, albeit to a great end, could not Lincoln also
pretend to be an abolitionist, thereby to curb abolition? If Pope were to smash
the rebel army assembling in front of him, and the South were to be forced to
its knees, no military necessity would exist to require a proclamation of eman-
cipation. In that case, Lincoln could then point to his reply to Greeley's
"Prayer," willing to save the Union "as it was"with slavery intact.
Gay hustled Gilmore out, thanked him for his efforts as an intermediary,
and hurried back to Greeley's office.
"That corroborates Adam Hill's information," he told his boss excitedly,
proud of his Washington chief. "He wrote us a week ago about a secret plan
to emancipate the slaves. You ought to give him a raise."
"Or at least a commendation," Greeley mused. "Next time, I shall be more
inclined to believe Adam's tips."
"He wrote that he heard it from two people" Gay was eager to get across
the value of the head of their Washington office. Greeley was too inclined to
dismiss what Adam Hill had learned.
"Neither is a totally reliable source of information," Greeley reminded
him. "Hill reported that Senator Sumner told him privately that a proclama-
tion was in the works, but Sumner's been saying that since the Fourth of
July."
"But Count Gurowski is right in the State Department working for
Seward," Gay pressed. The grumpy Polish exile was a keen observer and a
fountain of information. Why was Greeley so chary of giving credit? "And
Gurowski hates Seward, so when Gurowski tells our man in Washington that
Seward and Weed are trying to stop Lincoln from issuing a proclamation of
emancipation, why don't you believe him?"
"Count Gurowski is a solid anti-slavery man," Greeley acknowledged,
"and has the proper assessment of Seward and Weed. I think now that he told
our man Hill the truth. But I had to be sure. I could not risk the chance of
Lincoln's changing his mind. That is why I went ahead with 'The Prayer of
Twenty Millions.' "
Why was Greeley being defensive? The truth began to dawn on Sydney
Gay. Horace Greeley had not been in any doubt a week ago about Lincoln's
intention to issue a proclamation. Greeley had believed Adam Hill's letters.
But instead of running a story about the impending news event, Greeley
played the politician. He demanded in a thundering editorial that Lincoln do
what Greeley knew was about to be done.
If that was trueGay's logical mind moved ahead to the next manipula-
tionLincoln and Greeley were engaged in a complex game to use each
other. Greeley was running out in front of Lincoln's emancipation parade,
but if Lincoln should change his mind about parading in that direction, Gree-
ley would be in a position to pull him along.
"Let me see if I understand, sir, what's been going on," Gay said slowly.
"Lincoln had this emancipation proclamation planned, subject to some colo-
nization scheme in Chiriqui being in place, and presented it to the Cabinet in
the middle of July. Seward and Weed stopped it for the time being"
"But not for long," said Greeley benignly, rocking back in his chair,
"maybe just until the next victory in the field, if there ever is one."
"Knowing that, sir, you went ahead with your editorial demanding he
carry out the Confiscation Act."
"Go on."
"Then Lincoln, not knowing that you know about his secret proclamation,
puts out this letter to youpouring cold water on the idea of such a procla-
mation. Lincoln is still fighting strictly for Union, not for abolitionor so he
says. Meanwhile, he has his abolition order in his pocket."
"You could say there was a certain duplicity on his part," Greeley observed
mildly. "In political life, one grows accustomed to that."
"Then Lincoln sends word to you through Gilmore not to take his written
reply seriously," Gay went on, wondering which manhis President or his
bosswas the more duplicitous. "Lincoln wants you to know that no matter
what he says now in reply to your editorial, he means to do what you called
for, or even more."
"Is there anything in this interchange that troubles you, Sydney?"
"I'm not sure." Gay did not want to lose his job; Charles Dana had been
removed for crossing the boss. What did trouble him was the way Mr. Gree-
ley had used his advance information: not to tell the readers that the great
abolition day was fast approaching, but to take a noisy position that would
make it seem that he deserved the credit for the change in Lincoln's policy.
Gay mentally backtracked. It was true that Greeley and his radicals led
Lincoln on this issue, but in this specific instance the editor was juggling
events to make certain that history would give him credit.
Gay avoided stating that aspersion on Greeley's motives, but plunged
ahead on current plans. "What troubles me, I guess, is what is to happen
now. Emancipation of the slaves is news. I mean, it could be a very big story.
What if Bennett gets it and runs it in the Herald. What if Lincoln gives it to
Raymond to run in the Times' I think it would be better for the Tribune to be
first."
"I hold great store in being first, as you know." Greeley put on a stern
look. He had difficulty glowering; his round, completely white face, silken
hair and beard, and pale blue eyes made him appear more cherubic than
managerial. "On news from the front, Sydney, I insist that we be first. Is
George Smalley with General Pope, by the way? That may be the victory we
need to push Lincoln into doing his duty."
Gay had heard that their most intrepid and well-bred correspondent, Smal-
ley the oarsman, had been denied access to the area as a correspondent but
had resourcefully, if fraudulently, signed on as an aide-de-camp to a general.
Gay thought it better that Mr. Greeley not know of the breaking of the rules.
"Smalley's there," was all he said. If the decisive battle of the war was shap-
ing up near Manassas, scene of last year's debacle at Bull Run, the Tribune
could not afford to be denied access by some misguided penchant for military
secrecy.
"Good. On the military news, I want to be first. But on great events,
Sydney, I am a patriot first and an editor second. We shall keep our word to
this fellow Gilmore, or K-irke, or whatever name he goes by. We shall not
write about the imminence of a proclamation, lest we raise a storm that
would make it difficult for Mr. Lincoln to carry it out."
Gay nodded, but inwardly he shook his head. Mr. Greeley had in mind to
run for office again, and his "Prayer" with its ultimate proclamation "an-
swer" would be his platform. No matter that the Tribune served Lincoln's
purposes, and that Lincoln's temporary answer was a sham, misleading the
people; Mr. Greeley would make Lincoln serve his own purpose, even at the
cost of concealing the news.
"Lincoln is growing, you know," Greeley added, as if to justify the minuet
being danced. "When I first met him in '48, he was a Whig representative in
Washington, not quite forty, a genial, cheerful, rather comely man, the only
Whig from Illinoisnot remarkable otherwise."
It struck Gay as odd to hear the gangling President described as "comely,"
but he did not interrupt. He had not known Lincoln was the only Whig in the
Congress from Illinois, which must have made him a Henry Clay maverick
pressing for compromise.
"He did not vote for the resolution looking to the abolition of slavery in the
federal district," Greeley recalled, "but instead introduced a counter-resolu-
tion of his own, looking to abolition by vote of the peoplethat is, the whites
of the districtwhich seemed to me like submitting to a vote of the inmates
of a penitentiary a proposition to double the length of their imprisonment."
Greeley rose and donned his white duster over his white linen suit, prepa-
ratory to a walk around the newspaper offices. "Then, after his election, when
I said to him, 'Mr. President, do you know that you will have to fight for the
place in which you sit?' he answered pleasantly, in words which intimated his
disbelief that any fighting would be needed. And thus the precious early days
of the conflict against slavery were surrendered, while he clung to the delu-
sion that forbearance, and patience, and moderation, and soft words were all
that were needed."
"What changed him, do you think?"
"Bull Run. After the wanton rout of that black day," Greeley opined, "Mr.
Lincoln accepted war as a stern necessity and stood ready to fight it out to the
bitter end. Never before have I seen a man so constantly and visibly grow
since then. The Lincoln of 1862 is plainly a larger, broader, better man than
he was in sixty-one."
Sydney Gay knew that many editorialists explained away their mistaken
early notions about people by observing how they had grown. He reserved
judgment on Lincoln's growth; it might be that Mr. Greeley was shrinking.
CHAPTER 4
OUT OF THE SCRAPE
"A cabal, that's what it is," whispered Allan Pinkerton urgently. "A cabal
here in Washington determined to undermine the Army of the Potomac, to
defeat McClellan, and to plunge the nation into years of bloody war!"
His listener, Mathew Brady, stared at him from behind thick eyeglass
lenses. He seemed to be waiting for more information. Brady would have
made an excellent spy, Pinkerton judged; well placed, canny, dour.
"A great battle is about to be waged on the very site of the Bull Run
disaster," Pinkerton confided, keeping his voice down, although Brady's stu-
dio was strangely empty, "and the cabal in Washington is already conspiring
to produce a defeat and to blame it on General McClellan."
"What would be their motive in that?"
Pinkerton edged closer. He trusted Bradyalthough, of course, nobody
was to be completely trusted. "They hate McClellan because they know he
wants to end the war without killing every man, woman, and child in the
South," he said. "The cabal wants a harsh, brutal, bloody war, the South a
conquered province, run by themselves and the negroes."
"Weren't you a big abolitionist once yourself, Allan?" The photographer
took off his glasses and wiped them with a large lens cloth. "There's a picture
of John Brown I've been trying to lay my hands on."
Pinkerton knew that Brady knew that Pinkerton had all but supplied rail-
road tickets for John Brown and his three sons, and their band of eighteen
negro supporters in their bloody raid on the arsenal at Harpers Ferry. The
hot-eyed Brown thought he could arouse the blacks in Virginia to join in a
great rebellion against their slave masters, but the slaves were too frightened
and a detachment of U.S. marines under Colonel Robert Lee, of all people,
captured Brown and his band and turned them over to the courts for trial and
execution. The detective kicked himself for having boasted to Brady of his
part in that grand but foolish exploit before the war. He had put it out of his
mind and hoped it had escaped the attention of everyone else.
"That was a lifetime ago," he snapped. "I'm still for abolition, but Lin-
coln's wayover time. Let it die out by itself. The general understands that
and that's why the cabal is out to get him no matter the cost."
"And who is this cabal?"
"I am not at liberty to say." But surely Brady already knew, so he confided
in the photographer: "General Halleck, of course, he's their cat's-paw. And
several members of the Senate, that drunk Chandler especially, and Wade.
But the masterminds are in the President's Cabinet. Unbeknownst to Lin-
coln."
"Stanton and Chase, you mean?"
Pinkerton winced at the unauthorized mention of the names, then probed
for information. "What do you hear, Matt? Chase was in your gallery not a
week agodid he say anything about Pope's plans?"
"Not a cabalist sound out of him," the photographer replied. "All our
Treasury Secretary talked about was the unexpected success of legal tender.
And he apologized for not bringing his daughters. I wish I could get a picture
of the older one, Kate. I could sell a lot of those."
Kate Chase was of no interest to Allan Pinkerton. If his friend wanted to
be uncommunicative, the detective knew how to get the photographer's dan-
der up. Leaning back, he said in a normal, nonconspiratorial voice, "Why
don't you go into 'spirit' photographs? I hear there's real money in those."
Brady scowled. "You mean that woman from Boston, the damned charla-
tan."
"You sit for your picture, with nary another soul in the room," Pinkerton
said, recounting what he had heard from Smalley of the Tribune. "You get a
clear portrait of yourself, by ordinary process, but lo!standing beside you
on the plate is the white, shadowy form of somebody who looks like a lost
loved one. That's the spirit, the ghost. If you get a spirit on your portrait, the
lady photographer charges you double."
"And are people really paying for that?"
Pinkerton nodded, rubbing it in. "Might be a good business, Mathew,
things look a mite quiet around here."
"It's a humbug," Brady said, his voice rising. "She's a fraud. I can produce
that 'ghost' in a minute without any supernatural assistance."
"So?"
"It debases the art." Brady, distracted and furious, began stumbling about
the room. "Photography is not a trick or an entertainment. It's not even a
business, God knows. It's a way of using art and chemistry to show history. I
have to wheedle with Stanton and show him how it helps make military
maps, and I have to turn out these damned cartes de visite to make ends meet,
and I have to fight with my own assistants to stick together and to use this
war to launch the great new art"
"You're getting all worked up, Mathew." Pinkerton feared that the photog-
rapher, who had turned pale and was now leaning against a wall, might be
stricken with a heart attack.
"Gardner is gone," Brady continued, "and his brother too, the ingrates. I
paid for their tickets here from Glasgow. And Tim O'Sullivan, my best man
at the front1 hate him, the blackguard, but nobody alive can operate a
camera in the field like O'Sullivan. And three of the others gone, hardly
anybody left."
Pinkerton watched the anger seep out of the man, and feared for his friend
because the anger was the only thing holding him up.
"The President was in here not long ago," Brady said, his voice breaking,
"and it was all I could do to"
He stopped speaking and wept. Pinkerton did the only thing he could think
of, which was to look away until the photographer was himself again.
"We're not sentimental, Allan," Brady said after a while. "You and I are
practical men. But did you never have a dream? I dream of assembling all the
faces of our timefor these are historic timesas has never been done in all
of history. I dream of using this new science, this new art, to show the war in
all its glory and horror. I want people to see that war is not the brass bands
and parades, but the faces of the haunted men, and the bodies of the dead
turning stiff in positions of fear or grace. But noweven now, as the dream is
turning truemy operators are leaving, my manager is gone. And the edges
of my field of vision are frayingit's as if my lenses are closing down and it's
always too dark to make a picture."
Pinkerton did not know what to say to a man whose livelihood and life's
purpose depended on light, as the darkness closed in. He tried to remember
the name of the great music composer who went deaf, but it did not come to
him.
Impelled to share a genuine confidence, the detective began to speak of the
way he felt at the trial of John Brown. "I shouldn't have been there, at the
sentencing, but I couldn't stay away. There was something magnetic about
the man, the sort of pull I suppose you feel with a madman or a saint. They
said he was crazy, and maybe he was, sacrificing his life and his three sons
and all, but John Brown was so sure he saw something the rest of the world
was missing."
For the first time in two yearstime spent repositioning himself sensibly to
be able to do his bit in the war and get ahead in lifePinkerton let himself re-
live the scene in the courtroom. John Brown, haggard face, burning eyes
what a Brady photograph that would have beenstanding at the prisoner's
bar, listening to the sentence of death, responding with words that ennobled
the abolition movement. "I see a book kissed," Brown had said, "which I
suppose to be the Bible, which teaches me that all things whatsoever I would
that men should do to me, I should do even so to them . . . to remember
them that are in bonds, as bound with them."
Pinkerton, remembering, thought of the line in the letter McClellan deliv-
ered to Lincoln at Harrison's Bar that urged restraint on abolition, and felt a
twinge of shame. Colonel Key had shown him a draft of that letter and the
ex-abolitionist Pinkerton had not objected. "I believe that to have interfered
as I have done is not wrong, but right," he could hear John Brown telling the
judge who condemned him to death. "Now, if it is deemed necessary to
mingle my blood with the blood of my children and the blood of millions in
this slave country whose rights are disregarded by wicked, cruel, and unjust
enactments, I say, let it be done."
"God, Brady, what a moment that was. The beginning of all the blood."
"And not a camera in the room."
While Brady went over to the sink to wash his face, the detective took out a
batch of telegraph dispatches he had taken from the War Department and
began shuffling through them. In a few moments, Brady asked about them.
Pinkerton spread the dispatches out in sequence on the table Brady used in
his photographs.
"You can see here what the cabal is trying to do," he said to his distraught
friend, fixing on the matter at hand to snap them both out of their weak
moment. "Here are the dispatches from yesterday, the twenty-ninth." He
assumed Brady could no longer read, so he read aloud: "From Halleck to
McClellan: general battle imminent . . . Franklin's corps should move out by
forced marches. And McClellan replies: lam not responsible for the past and
cannot be for the future, unless I receive authority to dispose of the available
troops according to my judgment. And then Halleck tells him to send all his
troops to Pope in Virginia, and McClellan replies: We are not yet in condition
to move. Here's Halleck's immediate reply: There must be no further delay in
moving Franklin's corps toward Manassas, ready or not ready. Can you imag-
ine that? Halleck saying You should have acted more promptly. "
"Sounds like Halleck is making a record for a congressional investigation
in case Pope loses," Brady said.
"Exactly. And realizing that, McClellan sent this telegram to Lincoln this
morning: / am clear that one of two courses should be adopted: first, to concen-
trate all our available forces to open communication with Pope; second, to leave
Pope to get out of his scrape, and at once use all our means to make the capital
perfectly safe. No middle ground will now do. I ask for nothing, but will obey
whatever orders you give."
Brady frowned. "Lincoln's reply to that?"
"Here: / think your first alternativeto wit, 'to concentrate all our available
forces to open communication with Pope'is the right one. But I wish not to
control. That I now leave to General Halleck, aided by your counsels. "
"Your man McClellan made a mistake," said Brady. "He should never
have said he would leave Pope to get out of his scrape.' Sounds like he would
just as soon have him lose the battle."
"But that was just an alternative," Pinkerton countered, alarmed. "And
the second one at that. This shows how McClellan is willing to do anything,
even send in unprepared troops."
"If there is a cabal, as you say," said Brady with new authority, "then your
man McClellan is falling into its trap. You've come from the telegraph office
does Pope say he's winning?"
"Yes. All this Halleck paperwork, which was probably written by Stanton,
is to show that Pope's victoryaccomplished with McClellan's troops at the
crucial pointis all Pope's doing, with no thanks to Mac."
Brady was not so optimistic. "Lee has been racing up from Richmond to
join Jackson to defeat Pope today. If McClellan's army is not on hand to help
Pope, I'll bet we'll lose. And they'll then court-martial McClellan."
"They wouldn't dare. The army would revolt."
"I'm telling you, Chase wants to shoot McClellan. Line him up against a
wall and shoot him. He said as much, and he's a serious man, Chase."
"I'd better get over to the Mansion," said Pinkerton. Brady's opinion trou-
bled him profoundly. "My friend Hay, the private secretary, is an excellent
source for me. He's not part of the cabal."
Pinkerton put on his derby hat, headed for the door, then turned.
"Mathew, look, my boss is out of power now. Instead of taking him away
from his army, they've taken his army away from him, bit by bit. But when
the panic comes, and Pope shows he's no general, my man will be back on
top. And that's the time I'll see who gets passes to photograph the battlefield.
Gardner will never get within miles of the place. O'Sullivan's out too. You'll
be the chief photographer of the war, I'll see to that."
Brady surprised him with his gruff response. "Never do anything to keep
any of those ungrateful bastards away from the front. And take care of your
own backside. Be sure you're not sitting out the war in jail for helping Mc-
Clellan let Pope 'get out of his scrape' by himself."
Pinkerton jammed down his derby and made haste for Sixteenth Street to
see his friend Hay.
CHAPTER 5
SENDING OFF THE SILVER
"My friend Hay tells me that Lincoln is not part of the cabal," George
McClellan heard Pinkerton report, "but that such a sinister plot exists is
beyond all question. Hay has even heard, and vouchsafed to me in complete
confidence, that Stanton and Chase are prepared to suffer the loss of the
capital rather than see you ever returned to command."
McClellan, pacing the veranda of his Alexandria, Virginia, headquarters,
nodded glumly. He was located just across the Potomac from Washington but
might as well have been a thousand miles from the center of power. He could
hear, not far from his small camp, the sound of cannon. Major General
George Brinton McClellan was a general without a command; Stanton and
Halleck had broken his army into pieces, and systematically parceled it out to
John Pope.
He judged the cannon to be Pope firing at Jackson's fast-moving rebel "foot
cavalry," if all was going well; or it could be Longstreet's artillery in Lee's
army blazing at McClellan's own brigades now serving under the command
of an incompetent Union general.
The general without an army, pacing the veranda with an unlighted cigar
in hand, felt he had trained Lee and his lieutenants. He had taught them in
the Seven Days the folly of attacking entrenched positions and had shown
them the value of massed artillery on heights. He had, in effect, perfected the
generalship of his opponents. Only he could outfox them now. McClellan was
sure that John Pope, with his patched-together command of soldiers and
generals who did not know each other, had no idea of the character or caliber
of the enemy leadership he was facing: Robert Lee, still audacious but no
longer foolhardy, supported by Jackson, Longstreet, and Hill, all men who
now knew the way Lee would fight, all trained as a team just as much by
George McClellan as by Robert Lee.
"I have just telegraphed very plainly to the President and Halleck what I
think ought to be done," the general told his loyal intelligence officer.
"They won't listen, you know. The cabal has Lincoln's ear."
"I expect merely a contemptuous silence," McClellan agreed in pain. "Two
of my corps will either save Pope or be sacrificed for the country." He did not
add that he had also alerted Democratic friends in New York of the military-
political malfeasance of the Republican leadership.
"There's a scare spreading in Washington," said Pinkerton, his hat still on.
Wearing his derby at all times, even indoors, was an odd habit of the detec-
tive's; McClellan indulged him the idiosyncrasy. "A rumor got out that Lee
was advancing on the Chain Bridge with one hundred and fifty thousand
men. What a stampede! Chase ordered the government bullion placed on
ships for escape to New York. The battle is shaping up near Manassas, and
some people fear a second Bull Run."
"Are Lee's forces here?"
"I think so. What's scaring Halleck is that the secesh might have slipped in
between Pope and the capital."
McClellan feared for his men on their way to support Pope. Lee had gam-
bled intelligently in splitting his army, sending Stonewall Jackson up to strike
Pope near Washington while the main Confederate force had remained to
defend against McClellan near Richmond. Lee must have known that Lin-
coln would pull the Union forces off the Peninsula, freeing the main rebel
army to move north.
If Pope had attacked Jackson last week, with the rest of Lee's army still
near Richmond, the Union general would have crushed the rebels; or if Mc-
Clellan had been permitted to remain on the Peninsula to threaten Rich-
mond, Lee would never have been able to move north. But the imbeciles in
Washington had thought otherwise, and now Lee and Jackson had combined
to engage the Union forces under a rash commander like Pope, who probably
did not know how dangerous his predicament was.
"Did you go to the telegraph office in the War Department? What news
from Pope? Are my corps in place?"
"Pope seems to be out of communication with Washington," Pinkerton
reported. "Fitz-John Porter is still trying to find him, to join forces. Halleck is
screaming at him to get there in time for the battle, but Porter doesn't know
exactly where Pope is."
"I never felt worse in my life," the general said, lighting his cigar, taking a
few puffs, then stubbing it out on the porch railing in an expression of ner-
vous frustration that he rarely exhibited to even his closest confidants. "They
have taken all my troops from me. You see what's outside? A camp guard, a
few orderlies. I've sent every man I have to save Pope. I feel like a fool here,
sucking my thumbs and doing nothing that couldn't be done better by a
junior officer."
"The men of the Army of the Potomac must feel abandoned," Pinkerton
said.
McClellan did not want to hear that. He was torn. It was one thing to see
Pope discredited, and it was valuable in the long run to show Lincoln that he
could not trust Stanton and the cabal, but if such a necessary lesson meant
the sacrifice of thousands of lives of men who trusted and loved himthat
was hard to bear. That was why he had at first taken his time in the move-
ment north, then changed his mind and sent orders to Porter to hurry to
Pope, then held back Franklin's ten thousand men lest nobody be on hand to
defend Washington.
Because he was of two minds, McClellan had to act ambiguously. He knew
that seemed indecisive, never a good state for a commander of men, but he
was being pulled in four directions: two ways by short-range obedience to
orders and long-range duty to country, and two other ways between affection
for his troops and love of his countrymen. Now that the battle was starting,
however, he leaned toward selflessness, obedience, protection of his men; he
wanted Pope to be supported even at the risk of helping him win. The best
would be if he could share the sacrifices of his men and yet not be responsible
for the command.
"I sent a telegraph an hour ago asking Halleck permission to be with my
troops," he told Pinkerton. "Just to be on the scene with my men. They will
fight none the worse for my being with them. Not to be in commandjust to
share their fate on the field of battle." That offer to brave the dangers of
combat, sincerely made, salved his conscience at the risk to which he put the
Union forces to prove the necessity of his return to ultimate command. "Do
you know the reply? HereHalleck says he would have to consult the Presi-
dent first!"
"Obviously General Pope doesn't want your help," said Pinkerton bitterly.
"I do not regard Washington as safe against the rebels. What does Burnside
report?" Old Burn, a loyal friend, was a good brigade commander but was
not to be trusted with great numbers of troops. Fortunately, he knew his
limitations, and was truthful in his reports.
"Nothing from Burnside at the telegraph office," Pinkerton told him.
"Pope reports a glorious victory, driving the enemy all day, expects to finish
Jackson off tomorrow in detail. Says he has the rebel forces split."
"He does, does he?" McClellan's emotions collided. The thought of that
idiot's triumph was almost as hard to swallow as the idea of his own troops'
defeat. He guessed that Pope was being sucked into a trap by Lee, which was
the reason for the Union commander's optimistic dispatches. The Virginian
would take terrible chances, chances that McClellan would never take, and at
Malvern Hill Lee had been made to pay dearly for one of his gambles. But
now Lee knew he was no longer facing the prudent and experienced McClel-
lan, and could count on the overconfidence of the unblooded Pope.
"I am going into Washington," McClellan said. That was against orders,
which required special permission for such a movement from the War De-
partment. He would see Lincoln if possible, Halleck if need be. He would not
deign to speak with the cabal's leaders, Stanton and Chase, who were appar-
ently ready to surrender the capital rather than entrust its defense to the only
general in the army capable of rallying the Union troops and deploying them
in a way to block Lee.
And while he was at it, McClellan reminded himself, he would drop into
his own house, pack up the silver with Nellie, and send it off for safekeeping.
If Chase could so protect the nation's treasures, and had that little confidence
in Pope, then the McClellan family would do the same.
"I cannot express to you the pain and mortification," McClellan told Hal-
leckthe President was not available to him"of listening to the sound of
firing on my men." McClellan contained his anger, since Halleck was merely
the clerk, carrying out the orders of the cabal. "I respectfully ask that I be
permitted to go to the scene of battle."
Halleck shook his head. "Pope is in command."
"Even if I cannot be permitted to command my own army, I simply ask to
share their fate on the field of battle."
The General-in-Chief scratched his elbows and glowered. "You retain com-
mand of everything in this vicinity not belonging to Pope's army in the field."
"That's fewer than a hundred men!" McClellan shouted, then controlled
himself again. "I am ready to afford you any assistance in my power, but my
position is undefined. I have no right to,give anybody orders. Believe me, in
the field, I could be helpful."
Halleck pointed to a stack of telegraph cables on his desk. "Pope reports
that he has Lee and Jackson split twenty miles apart, and he has seventy-five
thousand Federal troops between them ready to strike. Your advice is wel-
come, General, but your presence on the field is not needed."
McClellan looked over the optimistic, bombastic cables from Pope and his
heart sank. They were reports from a general out of touch with reality.
"I see the cavalry I sentnot prepared for battlewas captured." With a
heavy heart, he added, "I have just come from Alexandria. The roads were
filled with Union wagons and stragglers. I spoke to one of our sergeants, a
man I know and trust. He says we were badly beaten yesterday, and that
Pope's right is completely exposed."
Halleck's face sagged. McClellan knew he had brought "Old Brains" infor-
mation direct from the field that he could not deny and had undoubtedly
suspected might be true. That was why Halleck had been so panicky about
getting Fitz-John Porter's men into line immediately. McClellan, reading
Pope's cables, was able to discern the outlines of Lee's bold plan.
"To speak frankly," he told the general-in-chief, flirting with insult, "there
appears to be a total absence of brains, and I fear the total destruction of the
army." He walked to Halleck's wall map. "By this time, Lee will have occu-
pied Fairfax Court House. Pope's forces will be cut off entirely unless he falls
back tonight." He pointed out the likelihood of disaster, which any good
general, even the deskbound Halleck, could see.
"I am fully aware of the gravity of the crisis," said Halleck, who had
moments before been as certain of Pope's impending triumph, "and have been
for weeks. That's why I kept urging you to get your men up here before Lee
could reinforce Jackson."
He was covering up his mistakes, an old army game, but McClellan was
not to be outmaneuvered. "I lost no time in moving the Army of the Potomac
from the Peninsula to Pope's support," McClellan replied coolly.
"Not so! You dawdled in camp for more than ten days."
"After my arrival at Alexandria, I left nothing in my power undone," said
McClellan, secure in the knowledge of his own difficulties on the scene, "to
forward supplies and reinforcements to General Pope. I sent my personal
escort out to guard his railway lines, leaving myself only with invalids and the
members of the band."
He could see Halleck weakening in the battle of the cables, and pressed his
advantage: "The impending disaster is not my fault. It is his fault and yours.
And the fault of the men who would prefer to lose the capital than see me in
command."
Halleck was staring at the map, no longer listening. Evidently even he
could see, finally, the rebel strategy. "The enemy is retreating toward the
mountains," Pope had overconfidently telegraphed. But now Halleck could
see that the enemy, under Jackson, was obviously drawing the Union forces
into a position where they could be slaughtered by the artillery of Lee's other
commander, James Longstreet.
"What can we do?" he asked McClellan, a plea in his voice.
Not much to avert defeat; something to avert disaster and the surrender of
the capital. McClellan did not hesitate: "Bring Bumside down from here and
have him watch Pope's right. Tell Pope to fall backtonight, if possible, and
not a moment to be lost."
"I'll order Bumside up right away. But look"Halleck showed a cable
"I can't order a retreat, not on the basis of this, where Pope says he's all
right."
"He is not all right, he is losing not just a battle but the whole war. You
don't believe me?" McClellan put a blunt challenge to Halleck: "Go to the
front yourself, it's an hour's ride from here. See the true condition of affairs."
"Impossible. I'm too occupied with office duty, with keeping the President
informed"
"What duty is more important than for the General-in-Chief to know the
condition of the chief army in the country? Your duty, Halleck, is to go out
and see for yourself how matters stand, and, if necessary, assume command in
person."
The man did not reply to this insult to his personal courage but grimly held
to the overriding importance of his presence in his office.
"At least send your chief of staff." McClellan, his concern increasing for
his men, pressed the point: "We could lose the war."
Halleck's chief of staff, a pale officer standing against the wall of the office,
shook his head; he did not want to go. McClellan, determined that the war
not be lost for lack of a reliable intelligence report putting the lie to Pope's
self-delusive reports, pointed next to Halleck's adjutant general. That soldier,
at least, saw his duty, and assented immediately.
"Don't just see Pope," McClellan told the man, assuming control if not
command from the hapless Halleck. "See his general officers, including Fitz-
John Porter, who should be there now. Talk to-some of the sergeants in the
field, and anybody captured from Jackson's headquarters. Talk to all of them
privately, but don't waste timeget back tonight, and demand to see the
President. Tell Lincoln the truth, whatever it is. He needs to know."
The adjutant generala man named Kelton, whom McClellan now re-
membered from West Pointdid not even look to Halleck for confirmation
but whipped around and ran out.
McClellan was certain of his military judgments, confident of having them
confirmed by an independent observer, but was simultaneously filled with
dread. Not at the loss of the battle, or the capital, or even the war; not one of
those events need be a great tragedy. What McClellan dreaded was Pope's
foolish bravery, which might cause him to force his men to stay and fight
when he should sensibly fall backor worse, fight to the bloodstained finish
when he should surrender. The tragedy would be the loss of the hundred
thousand men who were the cream of the North.
The Union's life was on the knife's edge. McClellan knew that the radical
cabal would blame him for Pope's defeat, but how much of the looming
disaster, he asked himself, was really his fault in not rushing north? Despite
the blame to come from men desperate to deny responsibility for their terrible
strategic blunder, would a Union in trouble turn to the man so often publicly
despised as "the procrastinator, the coward, the traitor"?
So much now depended on Lincoln. McClellan hated to admit it, but all his
hopes hinged on the possibility that the President could resist the drag of the
cabal and could defeat their plan to remove the Army of the Potomac from
the only man the troops trusted. He could not appeal to Lincoln directly; that
relationship had died at Harrison's Landing. Now Lincoln would have to act
alone, without advice, to save the army and the Union, at the cost of admit
ting a vast mistake. The young general did not know if the President was u)
to that.

CHAPTER f

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
SEPTEMBER I AND 2, 1862
September I
Washington is not, at present, an alluring village. Everybody is out of town,
and nobody cares for anybody that is here.
Yesterday I received a visit from Pinkerton, that polisher of McClellan's
apples, who talks in a hushed voice as if to conceal something important from
unseen listeners. He keeps referring to me as "my friend Hay." He never
comes in when the President is around, only when he can waylay me and
pump me for information to reassure his cowardly commander. This time,
the man in the dirty derby hat imparted to mein the strictest confidence, of
coursenews of a "cabal" to do in his idol. I refrained from telling him that
if such existed, I would happily join it.
This morning, Sunday, I rode out to the country and turned in at the
Soldiers' Home in Silver Spring, where the Tycoon and Hellcat are avoiding
the heat. The Prsdt's horse was standing by the door, and in a moment the
Prsdt appeared and we rode into town together. On the way in to the tele-
graph office, we talked about the state of things by Bull Run and Pope's
prospect.
"General Halleck says the greatest battle of the century is now being
fought," he said. "Seemed confident."
About time we had some good military news; Pope is a breath of fresh air
after the Little Napoleon. (There is no fresh air in Washington. The stale and
humid atmosphere has been sicklied o'er with the acrid smell of gunpowder;
we could hear the cannon from where we were in Silver Spring.)
Here is what the Prsdt thinks about McClellan: "It really seems to me that
McClellan wanted Pope defeated." Can you imagine? That's the insolence of
epaulets run amok, but it was not for me to suggest a court-martial for
treason, since the Secretary of War was busy drawing up the details for one.
"There's a dispatch to me from McClellan," the Tycoon went on, riding
along, not angry, feeling pretty good about the news from the war front, "in
which he proposed, as one plan of action, to leave Pope to get out of his own
scrape, and devote ourselves to securing Washington.' That's really some-
thing."
"Don't forget his dreadful cowardice in the matter of Chain Bridge," I
added, not to be outdone in McClellanophobia. "He ordered it blown up last
night, but Halleck countermanded the order. Little Mac is the chief alarmist
and grand marplot of the army."
The Prsdt had a topper: "George recalled Franklin's corps, and then when
they had been sent ahead by Halleck's order, begged permission to recall
them again. He only desisted when Halleck told him to push them ahead
until they whipped something or got whipped themselves."
I asked, "What do you suppose is wrong with Little Mac?"
The Prsdt made a circling motion with his finger near his ear; he seems to
think McClellan a little crazy. He's being charitable, perhaps because of the
demonstrated wisdom of his military policy; let us not forget that Lincoln
argued all along against McNapoleon's cherished Peninsula campaign, and
the Prsdt will be directly responsible for the coming triumph at Manassas.
When we reached the telegraph office, McClellan was there, trying to look
gloomy about the war picture even in the face of the glowing dispatches
coming in from Pope. The dread Stonewall Jackson, say the cables, is in full
retreat and Pope is out looking for him to administer the coup de grace.
Halleck was at the Telegraph office too, listening to McClellan explain
away his tardiness in assisting in the victory and begging for a few more
troops to be assigned to him for appearances' sake.
"We have reason to believe the Army of the Potomac has not been support-
ing General Pope properly," the Prsdt said to the new meek Mac, in a matter-
of-fact way. "I have always been a friend of yours, George. Use your influ-
ence to correct matters."
Little Mac promptly wrote out a message to Fitz-John Porter asking him
to make as his "last request" of the soldiers he led that they extend to General
Pope the same support they always gave McClellan. Since the man had
shown himself to be properly humbled, Halleck wrote out an order assigning
the dribs and drabs of soldiers hanging around the city to McClellan's "com-
mand." But Mac's day is over; the republic is better off without him.
The Prsdt took me along to dinner at Mars's house, with young Mrs.
Stanton as white and cold and motionless as marble, whose rare smiles
seemed to pain her. Stanton was loud and unqualifiedly severe about the McC
business.
"After this battle," Stanton boomed, "there should be one court-martial.
Nothing but foul play could lose us this battleit all rests with McClellan
and that coterie around him. He did all he could to undermine Pope, who is
the only real general the Union has had so far." The Prsdt agreed but, I
know, is disinclined to go so far as a court-martial, especially after a victory.
Little Mac may have saved what is left of his reputation by sending this
afternoon's "last request" to his friends in the field.
And so, as Pepys wrote in his diary, to bed. Everything seems to be going
well and hilarious for a change. I lay my head on the pillow expecting glad
tidings at sunrise.
September 2
Forget all that about glad tidings. The dispatches from Pope turned out to
be at best self-delusions.
Halleck, exercising excellent judgment on the need for firsthand informa-
tion, sent his adjutant general to the front to check up on Pope, and the man
came back with the accurate and tragic news. And Stod's brother Henry
came racing in from the front, having commandeered a mule, to report per-
sonally to the Chief Magistrate of the nation news that some of the generals
under Pope wanted the Prsdt to knownews that he might not get from
Pope's rosy dispatches.
"Well, John, we are whipped again, I am afraid."
Lincoln had that indescribable look of sadness on his face. He came in my
room as I was dressing and sat down on the bed. "The enemy reinforced on
Pope and drove back his left wing, and he has retired to Centreville, where he
says he will be able to hold his men. I don't like that expression. I don't like
to hear him admit that his men need 'holding.' "
That, of course, was a veiled reference to McClellan and the hold he had on
many of those same men. Our troops were bolting under Pope; the same men
might stand and fight under McClellan. The President was in a particularly
defiant tone of mind, despite his discouragement. "We must hurt this enemy
before it gets away," he said, hammering his big hand on his knee.
"If we don't succeed in this battle," I said to calm him, "there will be
others."
"No, Mr. Hay, we must whip these people now. Pope must fight them. If
they are too strong for him, he can gradually retire to these fortifications
around Washington."
"And if they don't hold?"
"If we are really whipped," he said, and changed his tense as his defiance
collapsed, "if we are really to be whippedwe may as well stop fighting."
I had no cheery retort to that. The thought occurred to me, really for the
first time, that the Confederacy could possibly win the war. Or at least oc-
cupy Washington, be recognized by England and France, and then win the
war. Or then offer to make peace, with secession a fact. We would then be two
nations, the Disunited States, with the North expanding west and north
(maybe Robert Walker was right in his plan to annex Canada) and the South
moving into Mexico and Central America. Two great nations. Would the
Confederacy and What's-Left-of-the-Union eventually become allies? The
whole idea is too staggering, and yet if Robert Lee routs Popeit's a good
thing the South is not thinking of conquest.
"Come," said the Tycoon. "Time to eat crow."
We rode over to McClellan's house, accompanied by a sheepish Halleck
whose hands appeared to have attached themselves permanently to his
elbows. Six months ago, after an insolent rebuff, the President stopped calling
on the Young Napoleon at home and summoned him to the White House for
meetings. Here we are, knocking on the general's door again.
McClellan was having breakfast with his wife and his aides, Colonel Key
and Lieutenant Custer, all the best silver gleaming on the table as if freshly
polished for the occasion, and graciously invited us to join them. Nellie Mc-
Clellan, my idea of an attractive matron, moved fast to set a few places.
Lincoln asked for coffee because he doesn't eat much breakfast, and came to
the point.
"Colonel Kelton, Halleck's adjutant general, has been to the front," the
commander in chief informed McClellan. "The condition of affairs is even
worse than you had represented to General Halleck yesterday." Lincoln
looked to Halleck, who looked miserable but took the cue.
"Kelton says there are thirty thousand Union stragglers on the roads,"
Halleck said with a sigh, "and that the army was entirely defeated and falling
back on Washington in confusion. It is Bull Run all over again. We are worse
off than we were one year ago."
McClellan said nothing and looked at the Prsdt. Lincoln kept his eyes on
Halleck. That unhappy general said, "I regard Washington as lost. Chase has
the money on ships; Stanton has all the ammunition in the city ready to send
to New York."
Nothing was said for a few moments. General McClellan ate his eggs. Key
and Custer and Halleck and I contemplated our plates. I wished I had a head
of hair like Custer's.
"I would, under the circumstances," the Prsdt said, "consider it a great
favor to me if you would resume the command, George. Do the best that can
be done."
Give him credit, McClellan did not dicker for conditions or titles. Without
hesitation, he said, "I accept the command. And I will save this city1 will
stake my life on that."
"That's impossible at this stage," Halleck said. "We do not expect miracles.
But perhaps you will be able to make a defense that will allow most of the
troops to escape."
"I will save the city," McClellan repeated matter-of-factly, in a tone of
voice that you would use for "I will have some more eggs."
Lincoln did not subscribe to Halleck's pessimism, but he did not contradict
him, either. "You are now in command of this city, General McClellan. Do
your best. Your troops are those who fall back on Washington from the front.
Collect the stragglers, place the works in a proper state, and go out and take
command of the army when it approaches the worksand I understand they
are approaching fast. I commit everything to your capable hands."
He searched for some statement that would tell McClellan that the general
had become indispensable, without demeaning his own office. "I am deeply
grateful that you are here at this moment in the life of the Union."
I was half-expecting some talk about dictatorship, but McClellan did not
even demand Halleck's General-in-Chiefjob. He was all business.
"I understand Stanton ordered a war steamer to the naval base," he said
crisp as bacon, "with steam up, to take you and the Cabinet to New York. I
would make a point of telling Admiral Dahigren that you do not intend to
make use of it, and let that word get around." Lincoln nodded yes. "The
contents of the arsenal, I understand, are now being put on board ship for
New York, in accordance with orders of the Secretary of War. Please counter-
mand that order immediately."
"It will be done," said the Prsdt. I think Lincoln was heartened, not merely
by McClellan's readiness to take over without conditions, but by the general's
evident confidence that he could defend Washington despite the willingness of
Stanton and the rest to abandon it.
Nobody can say I am a McClellan enthusiast, but here was a classic case of
not being able to beat somebody with nobody. Pope obviously is a nobody on
a grand scale, foisted on the Administration by the radicals, Chase his partic-
ular champion. McClellan, though not a fighter, could at least turn others
into fighters. He may not know the command for "attack," but he is the past
master at defense.
"I will proceed immediately to the front," McClellan said, tossing his linen
napkin on the table and dismissing us. Custer bolted out to get the horses.
Nellie McClellan kissed her husband and said something about not packing
the silver.
Lincoln, Halleck, and I went outside. Standing in the mud from the previ-
ous night's rain, Halleck told Lincoln that it would cause an awful scene if
McClellan went to the front and summarily superseded Pope; Stanton, in
particular, would take that as a personal insult. Lincoln reluctantly went
along, and sent Halleck back in the house to tell McClellan that he was in
command only of the troops returning to Washington, and only for the
capital's defenses. That alone would rouse the radicals to great heights of
fury, without adding insult to injury by putting McClellan back in charge of
the whole Army of the Potomac. Halleck hemmed and hawed, wishing Lin-
coln would tell Little Mac himself that the command was limited to strag-
glers, but Lincoln knew what he hired Halleck for, and sent him on the
bureaucratic errand. Certainly Halleck was not good for strategy or judg-
ment; how could any judge of military talent let himself be talked into believ-
ing in Pope?
Lincoln consulted nobody in the Cabinet in choosing McClellan as savior.
He knows that it might cause a mutiny, especially among those who have not
cultivated a taste for humble pie. But he has to face one crisis at a time.

CHAPTER 7
A HALTER AROUND His NECK
Pinkerton could not find a horse of his own. He sat behind Armstrong
Custer, holding the newly promoted captain round the slim waist, making a
face at the strong smell of cinnamon in Captain Ouster's whipping blond
locks. They followed McClellan and Colonel Key across Chain Bridge to
Virginia and toward the sound of the cannon. The four men on three horses
came to a halt at Upton's Hill, the most advanced of the works protecting the
capital.
"This is as far as I have authority to go," said the general, restrained by
Halleck's insulting curtailment of Lincoln's orders.
Pinkerton wished he could have brought Brady and his Whatizzit Wagon
along; either they were all going to get killed gloriously in the rebel attack on
Washington or McClellan would accomplish a miracle deserving of historic
record. The only trouble was that Little Mac was not in command of the
troops now under fire, his was only the army of stragglers, semi-deserters, and
others in retreat or pretending to be looking for their units.
The detective could see the remains of a regiment of defeated and dispirited
infantry trudging back from the front. Most of the men had no guns, many
were supporting wounded comrades. This ragtag assemblage was followed by
part of a cavalry regiment surrounding Generals Pope and McDowell. The
horses drew up and stopped at McClellan's post.
The rotund McDowell, who knew McClellanand had wanted to rein-
force Little Mac on the Peninsulaintroduced Pope to him. The former
"Hero of the West" was plainly a beaten man, angry and rattled and despair-
ing, no longer the willing issuer of Stanton-written statements or the scourge
of rebel guerrillas. It occurred to Pinkerton that now his headquarters was
truly in his saddle.
"What is the disposition of your army?" McClellan formally asked Pope.
"The straggling is awful in your regiments from the Peninsula," Pope half-
replied. "Last to arrive, first to break."
McClellan held his big black horse stationary; Pope's horse moved his
hooves about in the mud. "You are coming from the sound of gunfire," Mac
said coldly. "What's going on there?"
Pope looked over his shoulder as if the matter no longer concerned him.
"Probably an attack on our rear guard over that way. Sumner's commanding.
Kearny and Stevens are dead."
"Is the enemy in close pursuit?"
"Probably."
"And you are leaving the scene." That was less a question than an accusa-
tion.
"Yes. Unless something can be done to restore tone to this army, it will
melt away before you know it." That was not a task Pope had in mind for
himself, obviously. Pinkerton assumed that the beaten general now only
wanted a dry bed and a sympathetic Joint Committee on the Conduct of the
War.
Pope asked McClellan: "Do you have any objection to our proceeding to
Washington?" Pope's request for such permission could be construed as a
transfer of field command. Pinkerton sensed it meant that McClellan could
take over not only the loose change in the rear, but the leaderless army in
front of him.
"You might do that if you want," McClellan said, reining his horse past
them. "I'm going to the firing."
That brief meeting took place near Munson's Hill, which Pinkerton re-
membered uneasily as the place where he had been fooled by the rebel
"Quaker guns"logsthe preceding winter. The commander of a detach-
ment of infantry accompanying Pope had a familiar face; Pinkerton recog-
nized John Hatch, an old McClellan friend who had been stripped of his
cavalry command by Pope the month before. Hatch gave a high sign to
Pinkerton, who poked Custer on the front of the horse to get him to signal to
McClellan to stop a moment. The detective could tell that some delicious
humiliation was at hand.
With the retreating Pope and McDowell still within hearing distance,
Hatch raced down the line of his infantry column yelling, "Boys, McClellan
is in command of the army again! Three cheers!"
The effect of the commander's unexpected return crackled through the
lines of defeated men. Caps sailed into the air, followed by knapsacks, as men
who had been trudging behind a beaten general, away from glory and toward
disgrace, took the news of Little Mac's reappearance as a sign of miraculous
deliverance. As each platoon shouted, clapping each other on the back and
joyfully prancing around, the next down the line picked up the message and
the enthusiasm.
Pope and his small contingent, shaking their heads bitterly, rode back
toward the Capitol, the half-finished dome of which could be seen from atop
Munson's Hill. McClellan, wearing a yellow sash and riding as expertly as
any man in the U.S. Army, picked his way among the troops, saluting, nod-
ding, taking spirit from the men and infusing them with his confidence. At his
signal. Hatch organized the troops to change direction.
Pinkerton could hardly contain his delight at this turn of Fortune's wheel.
By nightfall of September 2, the shout of "Little Mac is back!" had traveled
through all the Union lines. The spontaneous joy of the soldiers of the Army
of the Potomaccertain their chief had been unjustly brushed asidein-
fected the others assigned to Pope's army, who were eager for a fresh leader.
These men, who had never served in the Army of the Potomac, had heard
and read that McClellan might not be a great winner, but he was surely no
loser; every one of the Union defeats had taken place under other generals.
The McClellan veterans assured them that their leader now would not march
them around in circles or send them vainly into a hail of fire, as Pope and
amateur commanders had. The Young Napoleon cared for his army; the
troops knew it and cared for him.
The second retreat from Bull Run did not turn into a rout. On the con-
trary, with McClellan improvising intelligently and Lee's lines stretched, the
Union units hurt the advancing enemy in dozens of skirmishes. No counterat-
tack could be mounted, but Jackson's advance was slowed and then stopped.
From a few rebel prisoners, Pinkerton soon ascertained that General Lee,
with his fearsome lieutenants Jackson and Longstreet, did not intend to at-
tack the Federal capital with an assault across the Potomac the next day.
"Armstrong, inform the President that the troops are in position to repulse
an attack," McClellan told Custer. "Tell him again to unload the money and
the ammunition, and make sure every rebel spy in the capital knows it. Wash-
ington is safe."
Pinkerton slipped off Custer's horse and scurried from sector to sector to
get a line on the Confederate order of battle. He reported to McClellan one
worrisome fact: Lee had moved some of his forces north and was preparing to
cross the Potomac into Maryland. The detective did not know if this meant
the rebels intended to swing down and attack the city by land, or to bypass
Washington and head toward Baltimore or north to Philadelphia. With both
possibilities in mind, McClellan promptly ordered the Union forces he could
muster to the Maryland side of the river above Washington, sending another
messenger back to inform the War Department.
Captain Custer, riding hard from Washington to get back to the scene of
battle, brought a message from General Halleck: "He wants to know which of
our generals is in command of those troops going into Maryland, sir. Says
that your authority is limited to the defenses of the city and that no decision
has been made as to the commander of the active army in the field."
Pinkerton swore. Typical damned military-clerk Halleck, harassing the
man actually saving the Union with pretenses of concern about usurpation of
military power.
"Say I'll take over the defense in person," said the general, "if the enemy
attacks in Maryland." McClellan was following Halleck's lead in playing
military politics, Pinkerton knew, making it sound as if the deployment of the
army in the field, following Lee northward, was still within his orders to
defend the capital. He carefully datelined his orders "Headquarters, Washing-
ton"; Lincoln had not yet empowered him to issue an order from "Headquar-
ters, Army of the Potomac." He was not authorized to attack, only to defend.
"They're preparing the charge for a court-martial," Pinkerton warned.
"I know that," McClellan said. "If I lose, they'll try me for exceeding my
authority. I'm expected to operate with a halter around my neck. On the
other hand"he grinned"if I lose, who will there be in Washington to try
me?"
Pinkerton took off his derby, mopped the sweat off his head, and returned
the hat to its position. "They're using you. The cabal is still out to get you,
now more than ever. Frankly, I'm surprised Lincoln has let you assume this
much authority. He must be desperate."
"He is." McClellan was curiously detached, not in the least vindictive.
Pinkerton wondered at the change; had Lincoln affected him in some way the
other morning at breakfast, by being so humble and fearful? Or did McClel-
lan feel touched by some destiny that sustained him in the absence of any
duly appointed authority? Or was he simply happy to be busy and with his
men again? "The President might even understand Lee's plan."
"Ah, Lee's plan," said Pinkerton knowledgeably. What plan?
"General Lee and I know each other well," the general observed. "The
reason I could confidently guarantee that Washington was safe last night was
not due only to our defenses. It is because Lee sees a chance to win the war
with a single blow."
Pinkerton nodded as if understanding.
"If Lee were able to take Washington now," the general explained, "the
Union Government would pack up and move north and continue the war.
But if he invades the North, gets an uprising in Maryland to support him,
moves into Pennsylvaniathat would break the Union back."
Pinkerton nodded, remembering the secesh mob in Baltimore. The ap-
proach of Lee's army would panic New York and cause a demand for imme-
diate peace. "And our plan?"
"To move up River Road in Maryland," said McClellan matter-of-factly,
"to stay with Lee until he is far from any source of support, and then to
deliver the fatal blow."
"Of course," said Pinkerton, adding, "even though he outnumbers us."
"This army is not ready to move," the general said, as he had said so often
when Halleck was haranguing him to get his men out of the Peninsula in time
to support the unsupportable Pope. Then he said something that surprised his
intelligence chief: "But we have no alternative, and so we will move."
"I'm more concerned about an ambush in Washington," said Pinkerton.
Did his commander have any idea of the intensity of feeling his return to
commandespecially his assumption of wider qommandwould have on the
men around the President? The cheers of the men in the field had heartened
him immeasurably, and the confidence grudgingly placed in him by Lincoln
must have buoyed his self-esteem, but the detective noticed a difference in
Little Mac now: more serious, less exuberant, a little older.
McClellan nodded, acknowledging the warning of political backstabbing
but curiously untroubled by it. "Lincoln will turn on me at the first opportu-
nity. But until that moment comes, he needs me as much as I need him."

CHAPTER 8
CABINET COUP

Although Attorney General Edward Bates, at sixty-eight, was the oldest
member of the Cabinet, it was Navy Secretary Gideon Welles who gave the
impression of being the dean of Lincoln's advisers. With his great white beard
which, with the naval assignment, gave rise to the sobriquet "Neptune"
Welles cultivated the attitude of maturity. Unlike the others, he felt closely
drawn to Lincoln as a man; Welles's wife was one of Mary Todd Lincoln's
few friends in Washington.
Welles thought of Mary Lincoln as a tortured woman, unable even to wear
black in memory of a dead brother lost in the rebel cause. On top of that, she
was unwilling to let her oldest son serve in the army, thereby causing anguish
for her boy and political embarrassment for her husband. Perhaps a naval
commission for Robert, on some safe patrolno, Welles shook his head, that
would create controversy and bring discredit on the senior service.
His thoughts about the President's family were interrupted by the unex-
pected arrival of Salmon Chase. The Treasury Secretary, usually forthright
and ofmoralistic bearing, today had the demeanor of a conspirator. He closed
the door behind him and took a sheet of paper out of his pocket.
"Something has to be done immediately about treason in high places," said
Chase.
Welles biinked; Chase was not usually given to dramatics.
"George McClellan has been deliberately spreading false rumors that
twenty thousand stragglers from Pope's army are clogging the roads," the
Treasury Secretary informed him. "As you know, that is wholly untrue
Pope is victorious, despite all that the Little Napoleon has done to deny him
help. But McClellan is spreading alarm, causing military and financial
panic."
"McClellan's movement north has certainly been dilatory," Welles al-
lowed. He was unprepared to credit or refute McClellan's information about
Pope.
"I have here a protest directed to the President," the agitated Chase said.
He began to read: " The undersigned, as your constitutional advisers, recom-
mend the immediate removal of George B. McClellan from any command in
the armies of the United States.' "
Welles, startled by Chase's presumption, said nothing.
" 'By recent disobedience of superior orders and inactivity,' " Chase read
on, his voice gaining resonance as he read, " 'he has twice imperiled the army
commanded by General Pope. We are unwilling to be accessory to the de-
struction of our armies, and the overthrow of the government, which we
believe must be the inevitable consequence of George B. McClellan being
continued in command.' "
Chase laid the paper on the desk in front of Welles; the startling document
was in Stanton's handwriting, a backhand scrawl familiar to the Navy Secre-
tary, over the signatures of Stanton and Chase, followed by their official titles.
"Bates and Caleb Smith have told us they will sign too," said Chase.
"Seward would, as well, but he is up in New York on some recruiting mat-
ter."
Welles gave an understanding grunt. Trust Seward to avoid a situation like
this, and with a patriotic excuse for his absence. The Navy Secretary was fully
aware that he beheld a document unparalleled in American history: a threat
by the Cabinet, or at least its leading members, addressed to the President, to
dismiss the commanding general or to suffer the mass resignation of the
department heads. Welles, who held no brief for McClellan, was astonished at
the audacityno, it was worse, the outright insubordinationof Stanton and
Chase. And of Smith and Bates, less audacious, who obviously needed one
more Cabinet signature to bring them along.
"I am not prepared to sign this," Welles said firmly. "First of all, we are
not his 'constitutional advisers.' The Constitution says nothing about the
Cabinet. The President can ignore our advice with no offense to the Constitu-
tion."
Chase waved that aside as nit-picking. "The moment is urgent. McClellan
deserves to be court-martialed and shot."
"I do not choose to denounce McClellan as a traitor, as you declare in this
paper," Welles told him, surprised at Chase's sudden conversion to
Stantonian summary judgment. Still, he believed the general deserved censure
for his delay in coming to the defense of Washingtonall the more so if, as
Chase reported him to be saying, Pope was in great difficulty. Perhaps the
same disciplinary end could be accomplished by more respectful means. "But
I would sayand perhaps it is my duty to sayin a Cabinet meeting that his
removal from command was demanded by public sentiment and the best
interests of the country."
"Not enough," Chase pressed. "The time has come for the Cabinet to act
with promptitude, together, forcefully, in a way the President cannot ignore.
Either the Government or McClellan must go down."
"That's an ultimatum." How would Lincoln react to this stab in the back?
Either he would fire the Cabinet, which would be bad, or he would accede to
the radical demands and become impotent, which would be worse.
"You don't know the full story of what this evil man has done," Chase was
saying. "If we were to show you copies of cables from McClellan to Demo-
cratic politicians in New York, hinting at his interest in their ideas of opposi-
tion to Lincoln, even to the point of dictatorship"
"Certainly that should be brought to the attention of the President," Welles
said, "in a general consultation." The more Chase pressed, the more Welles
became convinced that propriety demanded a preliminary discussion with
Lincoln, rather than a formal, written confrontation that would surely appear
in the newspapers. The Cabinet's ultimatum would be widely seen for exactly
what it was: a seizure of significant power from the President by the key
members of his Administration. Not complete executive power; but Welles
judged that the office of President would never be the same.
"After this document is signed," said Chase, "and there would be five of
us, a majority of the Cabinet, that's why your support is vitalwe should
certainly consult with the President immediately. This petition would add
substance and urgency to our demands."
Welles pushed the paper away. "Your method of getting signatures without
an exchange of views in council is repugnant to my ideas of duty and right."
A secretary knocked, and at Welles's order to enter, brought in a note:
Montgomery Blair had arrived, another surprise visitor.
"Have you consulted with the Postmaster General, by the way?" Welles
assumed Blair to be the last man on earth Chase would want to see. "Judge
Blair is a West Pointer; surely his military expertness is important here. Let's
consult him."
Chase's face took on a horrified expression; he could issue no spoken warn-
ing as Blair entered the room, but Welles took it that Chase did not want this
matter discussed with Blair at all. The Navy Secretary decided to accommo-
date Chase for the moment and covered the mutinous document.
Blair was dropping in on his way elsewhere in the building and did not
even sit down. Just a social call. He nodded to Chase, who gave him what
Welles thought to be an especially sickly smile, exchanged pleasantries, and
left.
When the Postmaster General had gone, Chase said gratefully, "It is best
he should for the present know nothing of this."
Of course not; either Monty Blair or his father, Welles assumed, would go
to Lincoln like a shot with the information that a coup by the Cabinet was
under way. They would put heat on Smith or Bates to refrain from signing;
Old Man Blair would also find a way through Thurlow Weed to bring Seward
back from Auburn to face the music.
"I will redraft this to meet your objections," Chase said, taking the docu-
ment back, ignoring Welles's prime objection to a written statement without
general consultation as a Cabinet. He left hurriedly, coming back only to say,
"Please, not a word to Blair. Or anyone else."
Welles stroked his beard and frowned. The nation faced a military crisis in
the field; it was wrong, at such a moment, to precipitate a political crisis in
the Cabinet.
Chase, furious at the rebuff, went back to Stanton's office. "I can't budge
the old goat," he reported to the Secretary of War. "Any news from the
front?"
"Pope reports casualties, but thinks he will win. That's as of last night,
nothing from him this morning." Stanton looked worried about that, which
boded ill. "McClellan is still poisoning the well with his claims of disaster.
You know, we have to get Welles on the document or it's no good."
"You get him," Chase said, worried now that there might be something of
substance to the rumors McClellan was gleefully spreading. "He's a stubborn
one."
"He hates me," Stanton stated as a fact, which Chase knew to be true.
Since the Monitor-Merrimack day, when Stanton had behaved less than hero-
ically, little communication had taken place between the Secretaries of War
and Navy. "Let's get Bates in on this, to get enough of the truth out of the
document to let you sell Welles on signing it. Welles trusts you."
As well he might; Chase had never done anything to undermine Welles's
authority, as Stanton had. Chase did not want to let Stanton dictate the
strategy on this document to him, and insisted that they both go to Bates and
then to Welles.
As Chase expected, the Attorney General changed "constitutional advis-
ers" to "confidential advisers" to conform to Welles's opinion of the Cabinet.
To induce Welles to sign, he removed both the charge of disobedience and the
threat of mass resignation.
Perhaps the fact that the document was in Stanton's handwriting offended
Welles. Chase told Bates to rewrite the petition in his own hand, which he
readily did: " 'The undersigned, as part of your confidential advisers, do but
perform a painful duty in declaring to you our deliberate opinion that, at this
time, it is not safe to entrust to Major General McClellan the command of
any army of the United States.' " The signatures of Chase, Stanton, Smith,
and Bates were on this watered-down draft, with space left for Welles.
Chase and Stanton headed back to see the Navy Secretary with the new
paper. Stanton drew his chair up close to Welles and whispered, "Chase tells
me you've declined to sign our protest. Can it be that you don't want to get
rid of McClellan, especially after his indifference to all your requests for
cooperation with the Navy?"
"I don't differ on that point," said Welles, "and I was also impressed with
what Chase has passed on about those 'contacts' in New York. The Young
Napoleon is definitely politicking, and it is reprehensible, considering all
we've done for him."
Chase braced himself for the "but" after these concessions. Sure enough:
"But I think your approach does not look wellit appears to be a combina-
tion by two of you to get their associates committed, seriatim, in detail, by a
skillful ex parte movement without general consultation."
"Nothing could be further from the truth," Stanton soothed, though Chase
had to admit to himself that the one-at-a-time approach was exactly what was
under way. "It's just that the Biairs are liable to ally themselves with McClel-
lan, as they always have, and destroy an honest attempt to show the President
the extent to which we see McClellan as a danger."
"This still appears to me unwise and injudicious," Welles said stubbornly.
Chase felt like yanking his beard. "I think it is discourteous and disrespectful
to the President."
At that, Stanton lost his temper. "I am under no particular obligation to
the President! He called me to a difficult, an impossible, job. He imposed
upon me labors and responsibilities that no man could carry!"
The War Secretary began wheezing and choking, staggering to his feet. "He
burdens me further by fastening on me a commander who is constantly striv-
ing to embarrass me in the administration of the War Department."
Chase put that near-apoplectic outburst down to Stanton's resentment at
Lincoln's imposition of Halleck, and the loss of the Secretary's own power it
had entailed. "I cannot and I will not submit to a continuance of this state of
things," Stanton choked. "I will resign."
"You have stated your case strongly," Welles replied in an unruffled way
the man, Chase thought, was unbearably pompous"and the state of things
is surely severe on you. But"
Chase interrupted before Welles could make a statement closing the door.
They needed the old fool. "There is no movement here against the President,"
he argued, and in his argument persuading himself of the rectitude of the
petition. "Surely this new document, drawn up by the Attorney General to
meet your excellent constitutional objections, is presented in a manner both
respectful and correct. It is designed, quite simply, to tell the President that
the Administration be broken up or McClellan dismissed."
"You do not consider that form of ultimatum unusual?"
"As our case is unusual, our course is unusual." It flashed in Chase's mind
that his response was particularly well phrased, and that he would have to
pass it along to Anna Carroll. This obstinate old Navy Secretary stood be-
tween assertion and abdication of authority by the Cabinet, and Chase
strained to bring him along.
"The President has called us around him," Welles countered, "as friends
and advisers with whom he might counsel and consultnot to enter into
combinations to control him." Waiting for an opening that would enable him
to agree rather than challenge, Chase let the old man ramble on. "Perhaps we
have not been sufficiently intimate, impressive, or formal in expressing our
views on some subjects. Perhaps not sufficiently explicit and decisive . . ."
"Exactly my point," said Chase. "Our Cabinet meetings have been much
too informal, as you say. Your views, Wellesvery sound views, indeedare
rarely put forward in the Cabinet sessions, because of your natural reserve."
"I take that as a compliment."
"As you should, and surely you are right to think that conversation with
the President on matters of great import goes around in circles." Chase felt he
had found a handle to steer the Navy Secretary arounda tiller, so to speak.
"These Cabinet meetings ramble on, they are not organized to a purpose.
Argument in such a setting is useless, like throwing water on a duck's back.
How can a more decisive, explicit expression of our views be made to help the
President? Only one way: in writing."
As Chase hoped, his appeal to efficiency apparently impressed the former
editor from Connecticut. "As early as last December," Welles acknowledged,
"I expressed my disappointment in McClellan. At that time, the general was
everyone's favorite, and neither you, Chase, nor you, Stanton, nor anyone
heeded my doubts and apprehensions."
"You were right and we were wrong," Stanton immediately admitted,
pushing the revised document toward Welles.
"And now it is evident that there is a fixed determination to remove and, if
possible, disgrace McClellan," Welles plodded on. "You, Chase, even sug-
gested harsher treatment."
"If I were President," Chase said with what he hoped was no trace of
equivocation, "I would bring him to summary punishment. He deserves to be
shot." No less than any soldier who deserts under fire.
Welles crossed his arms. "I think he occupies himself with reviews and
dress parades, drills and discipline. He hesitates and doubts and has no real-
ization of the true state of affairs. I think McClellan is wanting in the essential
requisite of a commander. He is not a fighting general."
Chase's hopes rose; was he coming around?
"Some statements of yours indicate delinquencies of a more serious charac-
ter," Welles said ponderously, "but I have seen no proof that he is a coward
or a traitor." He looked squarely at Chase, then at Stanton. "I will sign no
written demands to the President for his dismissal."
Chase was crushed. Stanton moved quickly to reduce losses. "Then we will
not present it at the Cabinet today. Since we have been talking all along in
absolute confidence, do we have your word to say nothing of this to the
President or anyone?"
"You do."
"And can we count on you," added Chase, "to speak up in the Cabinet
against McClellan, branding him as the nonfighting general he is?"
"I will."
"Have you heard the rumor that Lincoln is thinking of rewarding his
treachery with the command of Pope's troops?" Stanton asked.
Chase had not heard that until this moment, nor had Welles. When both
expressed shock, Stanton asked Welles: "Can we depend on your outspoken
support in Cabinet council to stop this abomination from taking place?"
"If the rumor is true," said Welles, always careful, "I will express the view
that I have just expressed to you."
They left before the Navy Secretary could amend his pledge. Chase knew
that Stanton was seething with the same frustrated fury that engulfed him.
Welles, with his reluctance to show disrespect to the Presidenthis slavish-
ness, reallyhad made it impossible for them to present him with the ultima-
tum for McClellan's dismissal or a breakup of the coalition Cabinet. Chase
knew that Welles, in refusing to go along with a written demand, had thrown
away the opportunity for the Cabinet as an institution to assume great de
facto powers, much as the Supreme Court had done under Marshall and
Taney.
But Chase also was aware that too much was at stake to permit this setback
to affect the continuance of the pressure of the radicals on the vacillating
Lincoln. Though weak on the conduct of the war, Lincoln was curiously
stubborn about the powers of the Presidency. Chase wished it were the other
way around.
"We won't let him get away with it," Stanton was muttering, as they were
returning to their offices before the Cabinet meeting. "Bates is rightLincoln
has not the power to command. Lacks nerve."
The time was ripe to confront the Presidentto stiffen his spine on Mc-
Clellan or to let him vacillate by himself, without the support of the Cabinet
that had been so carefully chosen to reflect the political factions in the Union.
Lincoln might have stolen the radicals' clothing in his emancipation ploy, but
in the treason of McClellan, Chase was certain he found an issue to regain the
radical Republican leadership.
To fail to shoot the treasonous McClellan was bad enough; but if Stanton's
suspicion was well-founded, if Lincoln was actually thinking of reinstating
him to save the nation from the defeat McClellan's own duplicity toward the
gallant Pope had brought aboutthe people of the North would never stand
for that. Chase would drive that point home in private council and, if need be,
in public.
"Be at the Cabinet on time," Chase told Stanton. "It may be the last time
this group gets together."

CHAPTER 9
I WILL ANSWER TO THE COUNTRY
"Something fishy is going on," Montgomery Blair told his father. "I went
into Neptune's office this morning and found Chase there, showing him some
draft of a document. Chase looked as if he had swallowed the federal treasury
never seen him so uncomfortable. They're plotting something, probably
about McClellan."
"Welles doesn't lend himself to plots," opined the elder Blair. "He doesn't
have that good a mind. Stanton plots. Seward plots all the time, even when he
doesn't have to, which is probably the influence of Weed. Chase would like to
plot, as befits a man of vaulting ambition, but he doesn't have a knack for it."
To cut short his father's woolgathering, the Postmaster General repeated,
"I think the document was about McClellan."
"McClellan told Pinkerton, and Pinkerton told Miss Carroll, and Miss
Carroll told me," said the old man, "that McClellan thinks the President is a
coward, that Seward is vile, that Welles is an old woman, that Bates is a
dithering fool, and that the only man of courage and sense in the Cabinet is
Blairand he doesn't altogether fancy Blair!" Francis P. Blair had a good
chuckle over that.
Montgomery Blair nodded curtly and made ready to leave for the Cabinet
session, which made his father serious again. "They're underestimating Lin-
coln again, Monty. The President's back is to the wall, and the radicals are
trying to deny him the only man who can save the situation. They'd rather
lose than win with a general who isn't simon-pure on slavery."
"The country is with them on McClellan," the son said. "He keeps losing."
"Not true; he just doesn't win. Little Mac doesn't like mass homicide, and
neither do 1. The place to win the war is in the West, where it's easy, not here
where it's hard." The old man frowned. "And whether the country is with
McClellan isn't the point. The army is with McClellan. It's the army, not the
country, that's falling apart. Let McClellan handle the army and Lincoln will
handle the country."
"And I'll handle the Cabinet?"
"If you're any good, you will," the old man said tartly. "I told McClellan
he should stop shooting off his mouth about slavery, to leave the politics to
politicians, and I think he'll listen from now on."
"What do I do when the whole Cabinet gangs up on McClellan?"
"Don't let that happen. Filibuster. Muddle everything up if you have to,
but split that Cabinet. Shake Caleb Smith up with rumors of a scandal about
Chiriqui landhe's up to his hips in it."
"Would have been helpful to have Seward here," Monty Blair put in. "Pity
he's on vacation."
"Vacation, my eye. Seward tried to take over from Lincoln right at the
start, and the President had to slap him down. Now old Billy Bowlegs thinks
Chase and Stanton will do the dirty work for him, and William Henry
Seward will come back as the grand conciliator. No, Lincoln's all alone,
except for you, Monty. Protect his back, and there'll come a day that the
President will protect ours."
"You really think he will, Father?" The younger Blair doubted it; Lincoln
struck him as a man who stuck with the people who could help him, and was
unswayed by sentiment.
"Look," the old man snapped, "if McClellan is driven out, he becomes a
martyr and the Peace Democrats unite behind him. The radical Republicans
will then rally behind Chase in sixty-four and Lincoln and the Biairs are out
in the cold. Use your headhelp Lincoln keep McClellan in."
Montgomery Blair accepted that good advicewhen the old man concen-
trated, there was nobody like himand crossed the street to the Executive
Mansion. The President was not yet in the Cabinet Room, nor was Stanton;
the others were milling around. He spotted the young secretary, John Hay,
across the hall, motioning to him.
"Pope and McDowell have come back beaten," the President's aide said
quietly. "This morning the President went over to McClellan's house and
offered him command." When Biair's eyebrows shot up, the young man
added hurriedly, "Just of the defense of Washington, not the whole army."
"Who's in command of the army in the field?"
"That's the rub," said Hay. "Nobody. We expect McClellan to move into
the vacuum, but the President doesn't feel he can appoint him, public senti-
ment being what it is. He hopes you will support him on that today."
"You've never been much of a McClellan man, Hay." Blair teased the
young man, who was known to be a most vociferous critic of the general at
Washington's dinner parties.
"I'm a Lincoln man, which means that today I'm a McClellan man. The
trick is to get through today."
Blair nodded and took his chair in the Cabinet next to Bates. Frederick
Seward, the Secretary of State's son and aide, was sitting in his father's chair
to the right of the President's. Chase and Smith were present; Stanton had not
yet arrived.
After some talk that Blair considered desultory, the Secretary of War burst
into the room, breathing heavily as if he had run all the way across the street.
In a suppressed, trembling voice, Stanton said, "I have been informed by
General Halleck that Lincoln this morning gave command of the army to
McClellan. Treachery has been rewarded."
"God help the country," said Chase. "The reinstatement of that incompe-
tent is a national calamity."
As dismay and shock were being expressed by all but Blair and young
Seward, who wisely said nothing, Lincoln came in, favoring his left foot, and
sat down. "Sorry I'm late. Not seeing much need for a Cabinet meeting
today, I have been talking over at the War Department, and McClellan's
headquarters, about the war."
"Is it t-t-true?" Caleb Smith asked what was uppermost in everyone's
mind. "Have you reap-p-p-pointed Mmm . . . mmm . . ."
"McClellan!" Stanton shouted.
"Did I reappoint him General-in-Chief?" Lincoln rephrased the question
so he could answer it in the negative. "No, I'm satisfied with Halleck. He and
I did go and call on General McClellan this morning. We set him to putting
the returning troops into the fortifications about Washington. I believe he can
do that sort of thing better than anybody."
Blair marveled at Lincoln's composure in undertaking what everyone in
the room knew to be a deliberate deception. But the President evidently
understood his immediate problem. If McClellan were given command of the
army in the field facing the rebels under Lee, the Cabinet majority might
resign en masse, ending the coalition so painstakingly built, and thereby split
the North. By couching his decision in the most limited of termspretending
he had made no dramatic decision to switch commanders in hopes of saving
the capitalLincoln evidently thought he might ameliorate the radicals.
"Investing the fortifications with returning troops could be done just as
well," said Chase with scorn, "by the engineer who constructed the forts. The
truth, Mr. President, is that putting McClellan in command for this purpose
is equivalent to making him second in command of the entire army."
Stanton did not wait for Lincoln to try to wriggle off Chase's truthful hook,
which Blair thought was fortunate. The War Secretary let loose with a petu-
lant outburst: "Now nobody is responsible for Washington's defense. Cer-
tainly not me1 don't give orders now that you have Halleck here. Not
Halleckhe never gave the order to McClellan, you did." Stanton slammed
some papers down on the Cabinet table in fury. "Should everything go
wrong, McClellan will shield himself under Halleck, while Halleck could and
would disclaim all responsibility for the order you gave."
Blair had to admit to himself that Stanton had a point. The command
structure was now incredibly confused, and blame for the disaster might
easily fall on the man who was quick to claim to be the "organizer of vic-
tory." But that was because Lincoln wanted the chain of command to appear
vague, and there might be political design in the military fuzziness.
"No order putting McClellan in command of the forces around Washing-
ton has been issued by the War Department," Stanton made very clear.
"I have done what seemed to me best," Lincoln replied calmly, almost too
calmly, "and I will be responsible for what I have done, to the country.
Halleck agreed to it."
"You rammed it down Halleck's throat," Chase charged.
"Halleck is just as responsible as he was before," the President said
blandly, using as his buffer the cerebral soldier who had been urged on him by
the radical faction. "I repeat, the scope of the order is simply for McClellan
to put troops in the fortifications and command them for the defense of the
city."
"In this situation," Chase pressed his point again, "that is equivalent to
making McClellan commander in chief for the time beingand it will prove
very difficult to keep him from taking command of all operations in the field."
"He has the slows," Lincoln replied obliquely, because what Chase said
was true. "I know his infirmities full well: he is not an affirmative man. For an
active fighting general, I am sorry to say he is a failure. He's never ready for
battle, and never will be. He's good for nothing for an onward movement."
That was no way, thought Blair, to justify placing the country in his hands
at its moment of greatest peril.
"But McClellan, we can all agree," Lincoln went on, having disarmed the
jury with his stipulation of the charge most frequently made against his client
of the moment, "is good at defense; if anything, that's his specialty. He is a
good engineer, all admit. He knows this whole ground; there is no better
organizer."
"God help us," said Stanton, eyes rolling upward.
"He can be trusted," Lincoln insisted, "to act on the defensive."
Blair saw the moment to drive a wedge in the Cabinet's anti-Lincoln soli-
darity. "You're all overlooking the most significant military fact staring us in
the face," he said. "George McClellan is the only general who has the confi-
dence of the men in the field. The men can't be fooled for longI've been
saying here that Pope is a liar and a braggart, and you can hear the men
returning from the field saying the same thing. Those glorious dispatches of
Pope's about victorythe work of an imbecile or a liar." Blair knew that
everyone present knew that Stanton wrote many of Pope's dispatches. "Mc-
Clellan may not be the most energetic commander," Blair followed Lincoln's
lead in conceding, "but he's the best we haveand the only one capable of
rallying the troops."
Into a chorus of angry denunciation, Lincoln seized Biair's point: "That's
what Halleck says too. You all wanted Halleck at my side, good Republican,
right on slavery. Well, he's with me on this; ask him." Obviously, Halleck was
not going to be useful to Stanton and Chase at the moment; Lincoln had
neutralized him by bringing him along to the pre-Cabinet meeting in which
he asked McClellan to defend the city.
"Giving the command to George McClellan," Chase said slowly, impres-
sively, "is equivalent to giving Washington to the rebels."
"I would prefer the loss of Washington to the rebels," Stanton added, "to
giving that traitor the command. One way we lose a city; the other way we
lose the war."
"That's a lot of wild talk," Blair put in. Stanton had gone too far, and Blair
saw a way to take advantage of his excess. Now, too, was the chance to take a
more extreme position on the other side, giving Lincoln the opportunity to be
the mediator. "McClellan has never been defeated; his last fight at Malvern
Hill was superb. Even in retreat from the Peninsula, at the President's orders,
he inflicted more casualties on Lee than we received. I am not wholly unfa-
miliar with military affairs"Blair thought it would be good to remind them
that he, alone of those in the room, had attended West Point"and I propose
that McClellan be given command of the troops beyond the capital, to go
after Lee in Virginia, and to follow him into Maryland if need be."
"Never." Chase took the floor. "McClellan came to the command last year
with my most cordial approbation and support. He possessed my full confi-
dence, until I became satisfied that his delays would gravely injure our cause.
Even after I urged the President to put another in command"Blair noted
that the Treasury Secretary avoided mentioning Halleck and Pope"I sup-
ported him, raising the means to wage war and the money to pay his troops.
But his omission to urge troops forward this weekend, his countenance of the
criminal delay by Porter's corps, evinced a spirit which renders him unwor-
thy of trust."
"Criminal is a strong word, Governor," Blair protested.
"George McClellan does not deserve a command," Chase said deliberately,
"he deserves a firing squad."
That hung in the air for a moment. Blair did not think it was wise for him
to step in; that was Lincoln's job now.
Unfortunately, Chase held the floor. "What say the others? Bates?"
Blair shot an alarmed look at Lincoln; was he going to let the Cabinet be
polled? The President was impassive.
"I am very decided against McClellan's competency," Bates replied.
"Smith?"
"C-c-catastrophe."
Now the key man. Chase fixed his eyes on the Navy Secretary. "Welles?"
"I would not go so far as to court-martial, until examining the facts around
the unconscionable delays in getting reinforcement to Pope," Gideon Welles
said laboriously, in what Blair assumed had been in rehearsal when he inter-
rupted the tete-a-tete in Welles's office, "but I am generally of the same judg-
ment."
"Against McClellan," put in Stanton, to nail it down.
"Yes."
That was it: five members of the Cabinet opposed, one for, one absent, on
the most momentous decision Lincoln had to make since the relief of Fort
Surnter.
"It distresses me exceedingly," said Lincoln, "to find myself differing on
such a point from the Secretary of War and Secretary of the Treasury." By
omission, he dismissed the others, including Welles; did he realize the con-
certed move against McClellan was primarily a Stanton-Chase plot? "If I saw
a better way, I would gladly resign my plan."
The last word was indistinct. Did the President say "resign my place"? Was
Lincoln offering to quit? Blair said incredulously, "Resign your what?"
"Resign my plan to put McClellan in charge of local defenses," Lincoln
said distinctly, to Biair's relief. "But I do not see who could do the work as
well as he. McClellan has acted badly in this matterunpardonablybut we
must use what tools we have."
"General Hooker," Chase put in instantly, "or Bumside. Either could do
the job better."
Lincoln, who until then had comported himself like a confident lawyer in a
hostile courtroom, suddenly looked stricken, as if wrung by the bitterest
anguish. "I don't doubt your sincerity, Chase. In fact, that is precisely what
distresses me soall of you are so obviously earnestly sincere." He drew a
deep breath. "I'm almost ready to hang myself."
Blair did not like that abjectness on the part of the President. "Hooker
could be impetuous," he said sharply to Chase, "like your man Pope. Re-
member how certain you were that Pope was our salvation?"
"Pope was done in by McClellan's deliberate delay," Chase shot back,
looking to Stanton for corroboration. Stanton nodded his agreement; that was
to be the radicals' story.
"I am alarmed for the safety of the city," said Lincoln, still too morose for
Biair's taste. "I've been talking with General Halleck, and he tells me that
Pope's army is demoralized. Said that if Pope's army came within the line of
our forts as a mob, the city would be overrun by the enemy in forty-eight
hours."
Bates, no military man, was the one to explode at that point. "If Halleck
doubts his own ability to defend this city, he ought to be instantly broken! We
have fifty-thousand men hereenough to defend it against all the power of
the enemy. If Washington falls, it will be by treachery of our leaders and not
by any lack of power to defend."
"Hear, hear," said Blair, urging him on. Chase and Stanton were all too
ready to abandon Washington.
"The damn shame is," the Attorney General went on, "we are on the
defensive instead of adopting an aggressive policy. Now, above all others, is
the time to strike out at the enemy. General Lee is a long way from home."
Lincoln stopped looking so distressed and sat up in his chair. By-support-
ing McClellan vigorously and attacking his attackers, Blair had tried to give
the President a second extreme, opening the way to his favorite position: the
middle way. But the Biairs were outcasts; now Attorney General Bates had
unexpectedly contributed the notion of a forceful campaign against Lee's
threat, presumably hitting the rebels as they massed for an assault on Mary-
land and northwardassuming Lee did not see fit to try to seize the White
House in Washington. Blair saw support for his alternative to the dumping of
McClellan beginning to emerge: to give Little Mac command of the whole
Army of the Potomac and send him out to strike Lee before the rebels could
move.
"McClellan is a known quantity," the President said with deliberation.
Hooker, Bumside, and the others were not. Then, as Blair had expected,
Lincoln took the middle position. "We've only put him in command of the
local defenses." Looking sternly at Blair, not at Chase, he added, "Not as you
suggest, Judge." Blair knew, as did the others, that Lincoln was directing his
"no" to Blair, but he was really saying no to Chase.
"I give up," Chase said, shutting his eyes and shaking his head.
Blair suppressed a smile at the way the President had outmaneuvered the
radical members of his Cabinet. Although Chase and Stanton might have
been able to kindle a blaze of outrage with the return of the hated McClellan
to full command of the entire Army of the Potomac, the radicals would be
unable to whip up much indignation at the obviously sensible use of an expe-
rienced defender at the head of a small force to help protect the local environs
of Washington. Chase and his friend Stanton, the expensive lawyer, had the
facts on their side, but they had been outlawyered by Lincoln. Blair found
that amusing.
"Unquestionably, McClellan wanted Pope to fail," Lincoln admitted, "and
that is unpardonable, but he is too useful just now to sacrifice. We must use
what tools we have." That was carrying manipulation to excess, Blair
thought; "too useful just now to sacrifice" was an implicit promise to sacrifice
McClellan at an opportune time; Lincoln did not have to placate Chase and
Stanton to that extent.
"Most of our troubles," the President said sadly, "grew out of military
jealousies. If the Administration erred in discarding McClellan and putting
Pope in command, the country should not have been made to suffer, nor our
brave men been cut down and butchered. Pope should have been sustained by
McClellan, but he was not. These personal and professional quarrels came
in."
Blair scowled; Lincoln was going much too far in placating Chase and
Stanton, but nobody else in the room said a word in the field general's de-
fense. Welles was looking down at the table and making notes.
"It is humiliating," the President continued, "to reward McClellan and
those who failed to do their whole duty in the hour of trial, but so it is.
Personal considerations must be sacrificed for the public good."
"The army is with McClellan," Blair put in, to change the emphasis.
"Maybe the soldiers know something that we don't know."
"I must have McClellan to reorganize the army and bring it out of chaos,"
Lincoln went on, evidently more concerned with placating his angry Cabinet
members than doing justice to his general. "There has been a design, a pur-
pose in breaking down Pope, without regard to the consequences to the coun-
try, that is atrocious."
"Shocking," Chase growled.
"Yes, it is shocking to see and know this, but there is no remedyat
present," Lincoln agreed, leaving implicit that there would be a remedy soon
enough. "As Judge Blair says, McClellan has the army with him."
Blair did not like the judgment expresseda summary judgment of trea-
son, with no trial or examination of contradictory evidenceand feared for
Lincoln's belated reaction when the time came that he did not feel compelled
to back his general. But he felt better when he looked at Stanton. The War
Secretary was looking dully at the Cabinet table, mouth open, as if in a state
of shock.
Chase rose and tossed a few tax appointments on the table in front of the
President. "If you like these men, sign the appointments. If not, don't."
"I'll sign them all right now," Lincoln said mildly, "no questions asked."
He did so and handed them to his Treasury Secretary with a small smile.

CHAPTER 10
THE CHIROPODIST
"How come nobody talks about peace?" Isachar Zacharie wanted to know.
"Only war, how we're going to wipe out the rebels. Never a word about
negotiations."
"Sha!" barked his patient, his naked foot on the table, leaning back in a
chair, "they'll call you a copperhead."
"Clement Vallandigham is wrong," the chiropodist said. That Ohio Demo-
crat was agitating for peace, to the extreme distaste of loyal Union men, who
gave the peace talkers the name of a poisonous snake. "He would have us just
give up. The North will never do that, not unless General Lee comes march-
ing up here toward New York. No, I mean a sensible arrangement, the way
wars end in Europe, with everybody's honor satisfied."
Dr. Zacharie, a British-born Jew, had been practicing his surgery on feet
throughout the United States for fifteen years. He always asked for testimoni-
als from famous patients, and on the walls of his office at 760 Broadway were
letters from Senators Henry Clay, Lewis Cass, and John Calhoun, as well as
the governor of Virginia and a group of distinguished citizens of Sacramento,
Californiaproving, he was aware, more about the itinerant nature of his
calling than about his abilities.
Other physicians accepted the presence of a practitioner of chiropody so
long as it was temporary; the disdained "toe-cutter" would have to move on
once the crop of corns was cut. The fact that he was a JewZacharie guessed
he was one of perhaps sixty thousand in a ration of twenty-three million
peopleadded to the nomadic and outcast nature of his life. He would come
to a town, take an advertisement parading his testimonials in the newspaper,
and point out that he was the author of Surgical and Practical Observations on
the Diseases of the Human Foot with Instructions for Treatment to Which Is
Added Advice on the Management of the Hand. That was true enough, al-
though he had borrowed some of itactually, most of itfrom an English
doctor. If anybody asked for a medical degree, he would produce a diploma
from the Academy of Medicine at Havana, which was fake but impressed
some people and was impossible to dispute.
"Lee could be on his way," said the patient, also a Jew, "and it says in the
Herald there's nothing between the rebels and New York but George McClel-
lan."
"Don't criticize McClellan," Zacharie said, pulling a toe toward himself
and using an instrument he had designed to probe a corn's subjacent tissue.
"He's not bad for the Jews. Maybe not good, but not like those momsers
Grant and Sherman. You heard about Memphis?"
The patient was more interested in his toe. "Something about Grant's fa-
ther, I heard."
Zacharie changed position so that his back faced the patient's body and he
rested his weight on the leg. The tissue around the corn was only slightly
tumescent, enabling him to pare away the hard induration first. Reaching for
his corn cutter, he squeezed the toe, cut along the plateau of the corn, and
then paused to make his observation about the Union general.
"Grant's father, Jesse, is trying to make a dollar selling goods from Illinois
to the Union army in Tennessee," the chiropodist said. "The old man is a
terrible businessman, the same born failure as his son, so Jesse Grant gets a
Jew as a partner and takes him to Memphis."
"Lots of business in Memphis these days. Careful, that hurts. With the
army contracts, plenty of crooked business too. And I hate to say, but plenty
of those peddlers"
"Jews." Zacharie changed position again, facing his patient, and proceeded
to place the sides of the corn in a clamp and gently jiggle it. "Well, it happens
that General Grant gets wind of what his father is up to, and he's furious. He
can't throw his father out of town, but he throws out his partner, the Jew. So
today, no Jew, honest or not, can show his face in Memphis."
He stopped the jiggling, slipped a probe under the corn for leverage, and
popped it out. "That's it, doesn't need a bandage. Other foot."
The other foot was more of a challenge. An ingrown toenail had discolored
the big toe and was causing the man to limp. Dr. Zacharie elevated the foot
and wrapped it in a cold, wet towel to lessen the flow of blood to the toe.
"What about Cesar Kaskel in Paducah?" the patient asked. Most Jews
knew who was influential in each major city, and the Kaskels of Kentucky
were a well-connected Jewish family along the border. "Can't he do anything
about Grant? God knows, there's money being made with half the army
running cotton North and medicine South, but it's not just the Jews. Could
Kaskel get to Lincoln? Or Stanton?"
"Maybe it'll blow over," Zacharie said uneasily. He did not deny his heri-
tage, but was not an observant Jew and thought open demands for fair treat-
ment stirred up trouble. "We don't want to make too much of this, or of the
way Sherman runs out Israelites. Nothing's been official, it's just these two
generals letting off steam. We don't want to make a fuss."
"I wish we had a friend near Lincoln, all the same," said the patient. "Abe
Jonas in Illinois was close to him, helped him in Whig politics, but Jonas is
not in Washington. The North doesn't have a Judah Benjamin."
Zacharie nodded grimly, turned his back to the patient, bestrode his leg,
and clamped the foot on the table. The scalpel's incision was quick, bloody,
but he doubted that it was terribly painful; few patients ever hollered. With a
scissors, he trimmed back the nail and then twisted the towel into a tourni-
quet; "I learned this technique from Sir Astley Cooper in London, the great
English surgeon." Patients always appreciated that evocation of medical tra-
dition, Zacharie knew; actually, Cooper died m 1841, when Zacharie was
fourteen, but he had heard about it from one of Cooper's students, and the
technique worked.
The chiropodist, still holding the towel tight, turned back to face the pa-
tient. "You have relatives down South?"
"Who doesn't?"
Zacharie nodded. "I have my father and sister in Savannah. They helped
raise a Jewish regiment to fight for the Confederacy. I told them it was a
mistake, it's better for the country not to be separate. I have a lot of friends in
New Orleans, too, where General Butler is now."
"The Beast?"
"Not such a beast, I hear. Very good on sanitation, and he lets the Jews do
business."
"Zacharie, listen to me. I have it on good authority, a member of my own
family, that Butler goes around saying that the Lord has been trying to make
something of the Jews for three thousand years and failed." The patient put
his hand on the doctor's arm. "Butler says King John had the best way to
deal with Jews'fry them in swine fat.' My cousin heard this with his own
ears."
"With his own ears?"
"He does business with Butler's brother."
Zacharie nodded his head with certainty. "That's what I mean. Butler says
terrible things, but at the same time Butler does business. Like in Shylock,
spit and borrow."
"Only because he has to. My cousin has some rebel friends in gold, and
Butler needs a go-between."
That sent a thought through Zacharie's mind: the dealers in gold dealt
fairly openly with financiers of both North and South. Jewish gold dealers
were already accepted as intermediaries in trade; why not in greater matters?
A more exciting thought immediately followed: Who could better deal with
such traders than one of their own religion? And who could pass through
lines more easily than an itinerant foot doctor, with testimonials from pa-
tients North and South?
He bandaged the foot. "Stanton," Zacharie said aloud.
The patient tried to read his mind. "You ought to go see Stanton, there's a
lot of footsore soldiers in the Union army. Not just corns, either"
"Hammertoes, bunions," Zacharie agreed. "You know, many people joke
about my profession. Physicians who should know better call it an unworthy
surgical skill."
"But a real doctor sent me here."
Zacharie winced at the unintended derogation. "They even resist asing the
word 'chiropodist'they call us 'toe cutters.' But I can tell you, my friend,
that a pair of good feet will often carry a man out of a scrape, and that's what
the nation needs."
"That's surely what soldiers need," said the patient, gingerly putting his
foot on the floor.
The chiropodist nodded. He would send his book, with an accompanying
letter, to the Secretary of War. He would volunteer to help the war effort, so
that he could one day initiate a peace effort.
Zacharie, who had already promoted himself to the forefront of his profes-
sion, liked to think on a grand scale. Certainly an army marched on its feet,
and healthy feet were the mark of a strong army. A corps of foot doctors,
treating the soldiers of the North, would do a great deal to help win the war,
and would surely raise the profession in the public eye. It was not too much
to foresee the appointment of a chiropodist general.
He decided to write Stanton immediately. He would arrange to have his
book and letter hand-delivered to Watson, Stanton's man, by a physician he
knew in Washington. And he would not forget to suggest he treat any foot
pains of the Secretary of War; that would get his attention. Everybody had
foot trouble, and if the President of the United States stood over six feet four
inches, as they said, with huge hands, then Lincoln very likely had big feet
and big foot problems. Who better to treat Lincoln than the man who had cut
the corns of his political idol, Senator Henry Clay?
Isachar Zacharie collected a greenback dollar with Chase's face on it and
watched his patient limp out. If Lee struck north, New York and Philadelphia
would be hit by panic and the war would be over; if Little Mac stopped him,
there would be time for the right man to put himself in place for the begin-
ning of talks between the sides. He closed the door and sat down to write.

CHAPTER II
THE FORGOTTEN WEST
"You are the mysterious Anna Ella Can-oil. I am Count Adam Gurowski."
Anna looked up to see a well-dressed gnome bowing formally to her. She
was seated in the anteroom to the Secretary of War's office, waiting to see
Stanton on a patronage matter, and was surprised at being addressed by this
stranger, especially as "mysterious." She had heard of Gurowski, respectfully
from Ben Wade, scornfully from the Biairs; he worked for Seward at State as
an interpreter but the Polish exile had a reputation as a great busybody.
She rose and shook hands, saying nothing.
"Mr. Lincoln has become a myth," the count announced, as if in the
middle of a conversation, confiding in her as an old friend. "His reality is only
manifested by preserving slavery, by sticking to McClellan, by distributing
offices, by receiving inspirations from Mr. Seward, and by digging the coun-
try's grave."
She did not want to be seen in the Secretary of War's outer office listening
to that sort of talk. The city was still in imminent danger of an assault by
Lee's troops; nobody knew what McClellan's status was, or if the rebels
would now follow up their victory with a move to the north. But when she
looked coldly and steadily at Gurowski, he took it as an invitation to con-
tinue. "Up to this day, the only man whose hands remain unstained is the last
Roman, Stanton."
"I'm glad you think well of someone."
"Last night marked the inauguration of the praetorian regime. Have you
heard? General McClellan has forced the President to postpone the investiga-
tion into the conduct of the slow and insubordinate generals who failed Pope
all three special favorites of McClellan's. Mutiny on the field of battle and
McClellan prevents investigation! We are ruled by the yanitschars of a sul-
tan."
Anna did not ask what a yanitschar wasshe presumed it was a Polish
wordbut went directly to the only word that the count had said that was of
interest to her.
"What makes you say I am 'mysterious'? My work is published, people
know where I stand. You can find copies of my latest pamphlet, An Address to
Maryland, here in the War Department and in the President's office as well.
What's the mystery?"
He smiled conspiratorially, which Anna assumed was the only kind of
smile in his repertoire. "How can a former Know-Nothing leader, not to
mention a friend of Fillmore and Buchanan, be a confidante of Lincoln? How
can one travel in the company of friends of the masses like Wade and Stanton
and then make herself at home in the Silver Spring mansion of the Biairs?"
The Count knew too much. And he had only scratched the surface of her
paradoxical political life. She could have added a few questions of her own.
How could a woman who argued against the Confiscation Act and an eman-
cipation proclamation remain loyal to Lincoln? How could a woman who
admired, respected, and even now felt a longing for John Breckinridge have
flayed him in a pamphlet and helped to blacken his name in the North?
"That is not the mystery, of course," Count Gurowski hurried on. "We all
have friends in different camps; it is impossible to agree with everybody on
every issue. I am not accusing you of being what they call a 'trimmer.' I
presume that is a nautical metaphor, from one who trims sails to catch the
prevailing breeze."
She pulled her head back an inch as if she were examining a strange insect.
"Frankly, Mr. Gurowski"none of this foreign-title stuff for a daughter of
Maryland"your opinion doesn't interest me a bit."
"That is untrue, of course," he replied evenly, "but let us be friends. I
admire your mind, and that is why I have presumed to speak so directly to
you. Ordinarily I am quite circumspect. Do you forgive me? If I may," he
went on before she had a chance to respond, "I will call you 'my dear lady,'
as Stanton does. And now I will come to the true mystery of Anna Ella
Carroll, to the question that nobody dares ask."
He paused, and she waited. If it had to do with her relationship with
Salmon Chase, she would hit him with her large pocketbook.
"Where did a woman with no formal military training gain the knowledge
to come up with the brilliant Tennessee plan?" His large eyes sho.ne in won-
derment. "The grasp of logistics, the understanding of high strategy, the
incredible modesty that allows others to bask in the glory that your mind
conceivedthat is indeed a mystery."
What a perceptive man. She felt a surge of warmth for this controversial
Polish nobleman, who was too often misunderstood or resented because of his
candor. She had heard nobody else willing to credit a civilian, least of all a
woman, with the strategy Grant had followed in the West. She put her hand
on his arm and whispered, "I know something about the railroad business,
my dear count. And I know which way the waters flow."
"Come in, both of you." It was Stanton, being peremptory. It occurred to
Anna that he might have sent Count Gurowski out first to say the outrageous
things about Lincoln that Stanton dared not say to anyone.
She stated her business immediately. "I bear a letter from Senator Garrett
Davis recommending Joseph Breckinridge for a lieutenancy. The young man
is presently serving as volunteer aide-de-camp to General George Thomas in
Tennessee."
"That's a familiar name," said Stanton archly. Anna stiffened; if Stanton
was going to suggest she was tender on the subject of Breckinridge, she would
remind him that Stanton had supported Breckinridge in 1860.
"He is the son of the Reverend Robert Breckinridge, a longtime friend of
my family's and mine. The Reverend Bob did more than anyone to keep
Kentucky in the Union. Another Breckinridge, Mary Elizabeth, serves as a
nurse for the Union Army in the West."
Stanton nodded. "Happens a lot in Kentucky, I know, but I cannot accom-
modate every senator who wants a friend made an officer."
"The endorsement on the letter is in President Lincoln's hand," she contin-
ued in a quiet voice, and began to read: "There are potent reasons why this
young man should be made a lieutenant"
Stanton snatched the paper from her, looked at it quickly, made a notation
below the President's signature, and threw it iit a box on his desk.
Count Gurowski smiled. "Now you owe Secretary Stanton a tremendous
favor."
"What were the 'potent' reasons?" Stanton wanted to know.
"While all eyes here seem to be on General Lee's thrust into Maryland,"
she explained, "little attention is being given to the other invasion by the
rebels across the Cumberland River into Kentucky. General Braxton Bragg is
threatening Don Carlos Buell in the most strategic area of the war. McClellan
is too far east to help, Grant is too far west. If we lose Kentucky"
"We won't lose Kentucky!" Stanton barked.
"Where is Bragg right now?" asked Gurowski, more to the point.
Stanton looked sourly at him. "You're not the only one who wants to
know." He rummaged on his desk and picked up a cable. "Here's a wire from
the President to our man in Louisville: 'Where is General Bragg? What do
you know on the subject?' And the reply is that we don't know anything. I
suppose Lincoln's telegraph message was the result of your agitation about
the importance of the West, my dear lady."
Anna Carroll did not deny it, though she had no way of knowing if her
emphasis on the war outside the environs of Washington had affected the
President. "If you were Jeff Davis, and had General Bragg's army ready to
strike northward to invade Kentucky, what man would you send for to get
the people of that state to rise up against the Union?"
"John Breckinridge, of course," Stanton replied. "Last I heard, he was at
Vicksburg."
"I doubt whether Breck has reached Bragg yet," she said, and immediately
wished she had not used the familiar form of the former Vice President's
name. "He would probably refuse to take reassignment without his men, the
Orphan Brigade."
"What brigade?" Gurowski asked. Anna knew he asked lest Stanton be
forced to show any lack of knowledge about troops.
"The Kentuckians under Breckinridge are the only rebels fighting whose
state remained loyal to the Union," she explained to Gurowski, with the
Secretary of War listening intently. "They're orphans, no home to go to.
Fought well at Pittsburg Landing. I imagine the traitor Breckinridge will
want them with him to try to liberate' their state. That will take a few weeks.
I would suggest that General Thomas in Tennessee needs reinforcements"
"and as many young officers named Breckinridge on his staff as we can
appoint," observed Gurowski, nodding vigorously. "I would say that is a
'potent reason.' "
"We'll leave all that to Halleck," said Stanton gruffly, "he knows the West.
I'm more interested, my dear lady, in what you have to offer the President on
the Chiriqui tract. Has Caleb Smith readied his report on colonization? It's
an urgent matter at this moment."
She drew a breath to tell him of her progress, but Gurowski broke in.
"Colonization is an absurdity," he announced, pronouncing the "s" in
"absurdity" like a "z." "It is a display of ignorance or of humbug."
Anna tended to agree with him, but the Chiriqui tract in Panama was an
assignment close to the President's heart, and she had to be careful. "Many
people think," she hedged, "that it's the only answer to the question of what
to do with the negroes once they are freed."
Gurowski made a loud noise inhaling through his nose. It was the first time
Anna had heard someone actually snort in disgust.
"Do you know why the best Americans do not utter their condemnation of
the colonization scheme? Because the President is to be allowed to carry out
his hobby." The count could afford to be contemptuous, as Anna and Stanton
could not. "The despots of the Old World envy Mr. Lincoln," the Polish exile
went on. "Those despots can no more carry out their hobbies. Le Rois'amuse
had its time there, but it continues here."
"Ignore him," Stanton told her. "Lincoln feels he needs the colonization
idea put forward in great detail in order for him to do what we need to do."
In an oblique way, Stanton was talking about the proclamation of emanci-
pation that had been drafted by the President and was being kept secret.
Anna looked at him quizzically and cocked her head toward the count, si-
lently asking Stanton, "Does he know?" The Secretary of War, looking un-
comfortable, shrugged as if he did not know.
Gurowski missed nothing of the byplay. "I am fully aware," he said more
loudly than either Stanton or Carroll would have wished, "that when the
Presidenturged by the noble Stanton herewas almost ready to sign a
proclamation in the spirit of the law of God, Seward and Blair opposed it."
Anna winced inwardly; certain things, like the politics behind emancipa-
tion, were not to be spoken of widely, and certainly not discussed with a
notorious gossip like Gurowski.
"Even the opposition of Seward and Blair was of no avail," the count went
on. "Finally, Thurlow Weed was telegraphed, and he settled the question."
"Lincoln had his reasons," Stanton murmured, dissociating himself slightly
from Gurowski's intimate knowledge of the inner workings of the Lincoln
Cabinet.
"He has only the justification Seward and Weed gave him," the count
declared, "which was that the President's proclamation would have evoked
riots and counterrevolutions in the North." Gurowski lowered his voice to a
level more befitting a conspirator. "I have informed Governor Andrew of
Massachusetts about this, and urged that he call a convention of the gover-
nors and force upon the President a change in the Cabinet."
Anna was shocked at the thought of rallying the governors to pressure
Lincoln, and more shocked at the willingness of Stanton to listen to such
she reached for the right words, not treasonpersonal disloyalty.
"Lincoln likes Seward and listens to Weed," was all she was willing to say.
She respected Weed's political judgment and agreed with him about prema-
ture emancipation: it would split the North and unite the South. But maybe
Lincoln knew best, and the President made the final decisions, and she was
working for him. She had been given the chance to have her say on that; her
advice was considered but not taken, and she would soldier on. Nothing
counted as much as being in position to get across the message of the military
importance of the West. That was where the war would be won, where the
Confederacy would be strangled, and not in the games and maneuvers of
McClellan and Lee near the capitals.
"Colonization is a great thing," said Stanton firmly, as if he believed it,
"and it is nobody's hobby. That's the answer Lincoln must give to the Demo-
crats in the Northern cities who say, 'What'll we do with them?' He's already
said that the North need not take the colored in, but nobody believes that
the fear is that four million blacks will inundate the North. This Administra-
tion has to have an answer. Colonization is the answer."
"Absurd, a cruel deceit"
"I don't give a tinker's dam if it is absurd!" Stanton exploded at Gurowski.
"Lincoln doesn't think it's absurd, or at least he keeps a straight face about it,
so we can all adopt the position that it is eminently practical. Later, we'll see.
First, let's get the proclamation out of him." He turned to her. "I charge you,
my dear lady, to come up with a report that even that dolt of an Interior
Secretary can present with pride."
"I'll do that in good time," she promised. "Meanwhile, you'd better give
some thought to the Northern reaction to emancipation, especially among the
workingmen in the big cities. Weed could be right. There could be trouble."
Gurowski shook his head vigorously. "When emancipated, the Africo-
Americans will at once make an excellent peasantry. Seward and his man
Weed do not understand that. I've heard Seward say that both extreme par-
ties will be masteredboth the secessionists and the abolitionists will give
way to Mr. Lincoln and himself in the center. Seward and Weed are wrong."
Anna looked to Stanton, who understood more about American politics
than the count. Was he blind to the likelihood of a lashing back at emancipa-
tion by white workers in the North?
"We'll be ready for a reaction," Stanton said ominously. "There will have
to be two proclamations, not just one. I want to be able to slam into jail every
rioter, every agitator who tries to use emancipation as a device to prevent
recruitment. We will suspend habeas corpus with a vengeance, my dear lady,
and let old Judge Taney scream. Your war powers paper will be put to the test
again."
"Weed thinks that sort of suppression could cost you New York," she said.
She agreed with the Albany editor but withheld her own opinion. "He says a
combination of emancipation and a crackdown on the dissenters will defeat
the Republican candidate in October. He says that Horatio Seymour"
Stanton waved in disgust, and she desisted. But Anna had seen Horatio
Seymour, the former Democratic governor of New York, in action. He was
persuasive. Seymour would likely be nominated at the Brooklyn convention
in a few days. He could capitalize on the resentment of whites against the
I percent negro population of New York, and build his popularity among
those incensed by Stanton's heavy hand crushing the right of dissent. The
triumph of the peace party in New York, the biggest state, the source of so
much money and so many men, was not even being considered here.
She stood frowning in thought. Anna was accustomed to men of power
waving her arguments aside, or otherwise making a point of paying no atten-
tion. She would not press ahead, making a nuisance of herself, but she would
not back away graciously either; a long, perturbed silence did her work.
"There is not a chance that the state of New York will be lost to the peace
crowd," Stanton said at last. "I know that for a fact, my dear lady, just as I
know we can brook no treasonable talk after we free the slaves. No agitation
anymorenot when we need hundreds of thousands of recruits at the front."
The military draftthat was what was worrying Stanton. He had foolishly
ended conscription in the spring, and by reimposing it, he would be admitting
that the war spirit was flagging in the North. That was why he would jail
every dissenter who interfered with recruitment. Anna guessed that he was
thinking of taking the draft out of state hands, making it a national effort;
that seizure of power might change the nature of the country, but the war was
making the nation more national every day. A national draft would be
"union" with a vengeance.
Stanton had confided in her as much as she thought he could; she could
take her leave with dignity. "Think about the rebels under Bragg striking up
through Kentucky," she cautioned, "and about Grant in Tennessee."
"Memphis is a hotbed of corruption," Stanton said, she thought irrele-
vantly. "I sent Dana out there to look into reports of rampant bribery among
Treasury agents. He says that every colonel and quartermaster is in secret
partnership with some operator in cotton, and every soldier dreams of adding
a bale of cotton to his monthly pay. Nightmare of profiteering and trading
with the enemy. If Grant can't clean it up . . ."He waved them off.
Gurowski bowed to let her pass, and they went out together. In front of the
War Department building, within sight of Lincoln's bedroom windows across
the way, he stopped and spoke in a low, urgent voice.
"Have you seen Lincoln's proclamation?" She had not; she doubted he had
either. "It is an illogical, pusillanimous, confused half measure, written in the
meanest and most dry routine style. Not a word to evoke a generous thrill,
nothing for humanity. It is clear that it was done under moral duress, under
the throttling pressure of events, and the writer had not his heart or soul in
it."
She assumed Stanton had described it to him and the count was pretending
to be more of an insider than he was. If his information and extrapolation
were sound, it meant only that Lincoln understood that the measure had to
be presented to conservatives as a necessity, not to abolitionists as a victory.
Anna poked her finger in his fancy vest. "I don't want to hear another
word out of you about the President. Keep your thoughts about Lincoln to
yourself. Scribble them down in a diary at night if you have to, but keep them
to yourself. Only then can you and I be friends."
"You are in mortal fear of my honesty."
She breathed deeply. "Maybe so, sometimes. You can afford to shoot off
your mouth like a cannon. I have to be careful, I have a goal in life, and
women do not have that much leeway." She was irritated with him for point-
ing to her fear of frankness, because it was what she liked least in herself, but
economic survival had its requirements. A woman could not stand in her own
shoes if she took on every battle in the world. She tempered her irritation by
reminding herself that the count was one of the few people who appreciated
her Tennessee plan, and was a useful voice in radical circles.
She looked at the count appealingly. "Sowill you behave yourself? A
least when you're with me?"
He bowed. "The mystery of your influence deepens," he said dramatically

CHAPTER 12
LIBERATING KENTUCKY
"You took your own sweet time getting here, Breckinridge."
"I have encountered every difficulty a man could meet," the Kentuckian
responded, surprised at the reception. "Van Dom didn't want us to leave Port
Hudson. He said it would weaken him at Vicksburg."
General Braxton Bragg's eyes were icy. "He wanted only your brigade to
stay. You could have come a month ago. I need you up in Kentucky, not your
ragtag band of malcontents."
Breckinridge drew in his breath and looked down at Bragg. The man
looked more like a chimpanzee than the leader of the Southern forces in the
central theater. He had gained a reputation throughout the Confederacy as a
capable tactician, but the rigidity of his discipline caused him to be viewed
with distaste by most of his commanders and with an aversion bordering on
loathing by the troops. Yet JeffDavis trusted him with most of the late Albert
Sidney Johnston's army, and Breck had to admit that Bragg had skillfully
maneuvered his way up through Tennessee across the Cumberland River into
Kentucky. Although Lee's invasion of Maryland was getting the headlines in
the Richmond newspapers, it was Bragg's threat to conquer the key border
state of Kentucky that Breck thought was more likely to force the North to
talk peace.
"I fight at the head of the Kentuckians," General Breckinridge informed
General Bragg. "Where I go, they go; that is my understanding with Presi-
dent Davis. And I wouldn't call them malcontents"
"I would and do," Bragg snapped. "Their conduct is a disgrace. They are
unpredictable in battle, and mutinous on the march. Don't defend them. You
know I speak the truth."
Breck conceded nothing, though he had been having more trouble with the
Kentucky Brigade than Bragg knew. Because they were not citizens of a state
in the Confederacy, most of the troops did not consider themselves bound to
orders from Richmond; because they were all volunteers, the Kentuckians
showed open contempt for the conscripts in other units. However, their term
of enlistment was ending. The struggle their leader faced was to get them to
reenlist while Bragg's push was on to take Kentucky and they had the incen-
tive of returning home in triumph.
"They fight well, General," Breckinridge replied, "and they'll stick with
me."
"Your sentimentality may cost us the state," Bragg told him. The com-
manding general of the Army of Tennessee had come up from his headquar-
ters in Knoxville for a quick look at supplies and reinforcements moving into
Kentucky's state capital of Frankfort, recaptured a few weeks before. "I
needed you in Kentucky for the past two weeks. Not as a general, but as a
politician. You were a senator here, your name means something to the peo-
ple. I've taken Frankfort, and General Kirby Smithwho is not under my
command, for reasons known only to Jeff Davishas taken Lexington. Now
is the time for a popular uprising of KentucKians still behind the Union
lines."
"Who told you that would happen?"
"Colonel John Morgan, among others. He's a fine cavalry raider, driving
Buell crazy by blowing up his bridges, and these Kentuckians are his people."
Breckinridge knew the man well; brave, resourceful, hotheaded. "John
Morgan is no expert about Kentucky politics."
"Perhaps you forget, General," said Bragg, "that in the 1860 election Lin-
coln did not carry the state of Kentucky."
"Neither did I," Breckinridge countered ruefully. "It went to Bell because
the people were confused. Kentuckians will cheer us on, and their hearts may
be with the South, but they've pretty much decided the North will win. And
they want to be on the winning side."
"Cowards." Bragg obviously cared little that Breckinridge was a Ken-
tuckian to the core. "The people here have too many fat cattle. They're too
well off to fight. They have to be made to see who will win this war."
"That's not what I meant," said Breckinridge hurriedly. "They don'twe
Kentuckians don'ttake well to being told what to decide. Whip Buell's
army, General, but don't try to whip the Kentuckians. Show the people here
which army wins battles, then let them decide to help us."
Bragg dismissed all that with a sharp hand gesture. "I want you out front,"
he ordered. "All along the line. Visit every camp. Talk to the newspapers.
Tell them I'm here to save them from the Northern invaders, but if Kentucki-
ans do not cooperate in throwing off the Union yoke, it will go badly for
them."
"I'll do it my way," said Breckinridge. Bragg was in command, and a
direct order in battle, no matter how sadistic, would call for instant obedi-
ence, but in political matters Breckinridge had some leeway. He suspected
that Bragg had in mind to draft Kentuckians into his army; that idea would
surely miscarry.
"And for God's sake, get some discipline in that brigade, or I will. I cannot
have your mob contaminating my army. It's bad enough I have to put up
with inferior generals who have friends in high places." Breck assumed that
Bragg, who was known to complain about his colleagues in order to have
somebody to blame in case of defeats, meant "Bishop" Polk and William
Hardee, and not him. "First thing," directed Bragg, "is to get them to cut out
drinking. Liquor doesn't belong in my army, Breckinridge. I would hope you
would set the example for your men."
What did the little chimpanzee mean by that? Breckinridge was widely
known to take a glass of Old Crow or two, or even three, but not in battle and
not to excess. Never in public, at least.
"Don't let the good people of Kentucky hear you say that," he tokl Bragg.
"Lot of good bourbon whiskey is turned out around here. If you want to get
Kentuckians to harass the Union troops and not ours, you better start think-
ing about what sort of people you're dealing with."
He whipped around and left Bragg's headquarters in the State Capitol. It
was good to be home, near bluegrass again, and he nodded kindly to a woman
who recognized him on the street, but he was uneasy. The commanding
general did not seem to have a realistic objective; the men in his own com-
mand were about to quit to go to their nearby homes; worst of all, he had no
fix in his own mind about the worthiness of the Southern cause. There had to
be more to fighting than a need not to be beaten. When he found himself
wondering what the Southern cause was, he worried about his own political
effectiveness in Kentucky on the impossible assignment Bragg had in mind.
His son Cabell was waiting outside with the horses and directions to Gen-
eral Breckinridge's new quarters.
"We're sharing a private house with General Clebume, sir."
"The Irishman?"
"We met him at Shiloh."
Breckinridge liked Clebume almost as much as he disliked Bragg. The only
general of Irish descent in the Confederate Army, Clebume was a hard man
for anyone to forget. After Shiloh, on the retreat to Corinth, when the fight-
ing had died down, Breckinridge and Clebume had shared a bottle ofwhiskey
and tried to figure out the war strategy. Patrick Ronayne Clebume had failed
the apothecary's test in Ireland as a young man, spent some unhappy time in
the army, then came to America and settled in Arkansas as a druggist. When
the war started, he organized the "Yell Rifles" and seized the Little Rock
arsenal, launching his military career with gusto. Breck smiled at the thought
of the rich brogue, which appeared in full when Clebume was angry or ex-
cited, exhorting the Southerners and Westerners to charge.
"He's a big hero now," Cabell went on. "Couple weeks ago, he led a
division under Kirby Smith that took Lexington. Our biggest single victory of
the war, some say. At least the most lopsided."
Lexington was home; perhaps Clebume had seen Mary Breckinridge. His
long pace became longer and quicker.
"He took about five thousand Yankee prisoners, the rest ran away," the
boy continued, long legs matching his father's stride. "Only about eighty
dead on our side. Never been such a rout. That was while Lee was licking
Pope at Bull Run, but Cleburne's victory was even bigger, scarin' the Yankees
across the Ohio in Cincinnati."
"Pat's a courageous leader. Good man, too."
"They call him the Stonewall of the West. Wish to hell you could win a
battle, Father, sir," Cabell observed. "Even when you win, you have to pull
back in the end. It's been discouraging."
At the billet, Breck introduced his son to Pat Clebume, who ushered them
into a grand sitting room and found a couple of glasses. The Irishman had a
bandage on his jaw but was able to smile through it and quickly give his new
housemate an account of a visit to his headquarters the week before by Mary
Breckinridge. He called her "Maureen," in the Irish way, and used that
diminutive with Breck's name, calling him "Breckeen."
"The boy doesn't drink on duty," said Breck, toasting his host. "To your
great annihilation of Yankees at Lexington."
"Sure, you should have been there." Clebume pronounced the word "thay-
ur" as he sipped the local product. "We captured two barrels of this stuff, but
some lieutenant with no sense put a company of Irishmen to guarding it, and
this bottle is all that's left."
"That wasn't all you captured."
"We came to the little suburb of Richmond, Kentuckyyou know it? Of
course you do, you probably stumped for votes"thereand found six thou-
sand raw Federal recruits in front of us. Kirby Smith, he's not like Bragg, he
knows when to attack. Kirby gave me the sign, and my boys rolled right over
th'm, grabbed the bunch. A few skedaddlers made it out to Louisville."
"Your wound?"
"I caught a ball in the cheek, passed right through1 spit it out, I think.
Doc says it'll give me a charmin' dimple." Cleburne leaned forward. "You've
dealt with this madman Bragg before?"
Breckinridge nodded grimly.
"Kirby Smith won't serve under him, has President Davis's promise to
operate separately. Bragg established martial law in Chattanooga, did you
hear? Had every Tennessean line up and list his occupation. Man's wild!
Complains about his own generals all the time. Watch out, you'll get court-
martialed before you know it."
"Let him just try that on Father," Cabell put in, then shut up.
Cleburne's bandage moved, suggesting a quick smile behind it. "I forgot,
you've got connections. They say you turned down Secretary of War, Breck-
een, is it true? Don't have to answer. But I have an idea for you next time
you've got your feet up on the Cabinet table with the rest of the high and
mighty."
"That won't be soon." Breckinridge did not expect President Davis to call
him to the capital as long as Confederate fortunes were rising. With Lee
striking into Maryland and Bragg into Kentucky, spirits were high in Rich-
mond; if the populations of those border states treated the Southerners as
liberators and turned on Union troops as the real invaders, the military situa-
tion might become untenable for Lincoln.
"Mine is a kind of a revolutionary idea," Cleburne was saying, "sort of
thing you might expect from a politician like you, not a druggist like me."
Breck smiled. "We're in a revolution. Only if it fails will it be called an
insurrection."
"What's our biggest problem?" Cleburne asked rhetorically. "As generals,
what do we need most?"
"Men." Conscription was going badly in the South, especially after it had
been called off in the North. Some men were just cowards, but others did not
want to leave the farms in the hands of the women, in case the blacks were to
stage a bloody uprising, as in Nat Turner's day. "The North outnumbers us
better than two to one."
"Spoken like an old national candidate, my friend. Now if the war drags on
much longer, and if our invasions don't succeed before this winter, the great
advantage in men is going to swing over to the North, right?"
Breck nodded.
"And even presuming that one of our fine lads is worth two of the Yankees
in a fight," the Irishman said, "sooner or later they'll overwhelm us by sheer
force of numbers."
"Unless the Yankees get disheartened and force Lincoln to quit." To the
Kentuckian, that was the purpose of Bragg's thrust into Kentucky, and Lee's
move into Maryland. He saw them as raids, not invasions, because they could
not be sustained in enemy territory through a winter; unless Kentuckians and
Marylanders rose to embrace their "liberators," the armies ofBragg and Lee
would have to return to their Southern base for sustenance, and Breck saw
little hope in a sudden popular surge in the border states for disunion. He
knew Bragg disagreed; he hoped Lee was not similarly misled.
"We can hope for that in the next couple of months," said Clebume, "but
we can't count on it. In the end, the South will need men. Help in big
numbers."
Breckinridge tried to guess what Clebume was driving at. "Bring the Brit-
ish in? Judah Benjamin is working on that, and they're thinking of sending
Rose Greenhow over through the blockade to appeal to English womanhood,
but it's unlikely they'd send troops"
Clebume waved that aside. "The men we need are right here. Our Afri-
cans."
Breckinridge did not react. Evidently Clebume was too wrapped up in his
idea to remember to be a good host; the Kentuckian reached for the bourbon
and poured the two of them a long drink. None for Cabell. He tilled his head
back and drained the glass.
"Out of four million blacks," Clebume went on, "there must be a million
good fighting men. They're after knowing how to follow orders, and they're
after working longer and harder than most of our soldiers."
Cabell broke in, disbelieving. "You suspect our niggers will fight for slav-
ery?"
"Course not," replied Clebume, who seemed almost merry in his excite-
ment. "But they'll fight for the highest wages any people can be paidtheir
freedom." His eyes leveled on Breckinridge's. "Here is my idea: Offer free-
dom to those slaves who enlist in the Confederate Army."
The Kentuckian, from years in the Senate in Washington, knew better than
to interrupt a man expressing a big, original, and controversial idea. Breck
could see horrendous objections to the very thought of putting arms in the
hands of slaves, or of enabling a million blacks to earn their freedom and
thereby undermine the "peculiar institution." But he knew enough to wait.
"Faith, the choice is going to be made soon," the Arkansas Irishman con-
tinued, "about what we're fighting this war about."
"Southern independence," said Cabell.
"Slavery," corrected Breckinridge. He had never admitted it in the 1860
campaign, but he could not deny it anymore. Slavery was at the root of
disunion, planted in the Constitution by the founders, his grandfather among
them, who could not stop the slave trade then and there.
"You're wrong, Breckeen. Your son is right. How many men in your Ken-
tucky Brigade are slave owners?"
Breckinridge looked at his son. "One out of four?"
"Not as many as that, sir. One out of six own slaves, or one slave. This
brigade is not fighting for the plantation owners."
Breckinridge was surprised, not so much at the facts but at his son's point
of view. He had always supposed Cabell, like himself, longed for the ultimate
restoration of the Union. They were fighting against the domination of their
state and region by a central despotism, with their aim to reestablish the
Union as it was, with the sovereign rights of all the states reaffirmed. Now it
seemed that his boy had other ideas.
"Tell your old man what you think about the_draft," Cleburne urged.
"Maybe conscription is needed, but we don't much like the way it's being
done," Cabell responded quickly, as if glad to tell his father about matters he
had never been asked about. Breckinridge had worried about conscription,
begun by the Confederacy in the spring; it brought into public view a long-
hidden desperation about manpower. "There's talk of an exemption for any
man with twenty slaves or more," the young man went on. "That's not fair. If
it's slavery we're defending, why shouldn't slave owners be drafted?"
"They're needed to run the plantations," Breckinridge heard himself say-
ing, not satisfied with his own response. "And when the North starts drafting
men again, there's sure to be a money exemption. Money's needed as much as
men, and the sons of the rich up North will buy their way out."
"Rich man's war, poor man's fight."
Cleburne slapped his thigh and shouted through his bandages, "That's
right! That's what they're saying, North and South. For every slave trader
like Nathan Forrest, there's five of us who never owned a slave and never will.
Now, let's get down to the nubbin: if it isn't slavery you're fighting for, young
man, what is it? The chastity of Southern womanhood? Military glory?"
Cabell looked straight at his father. "Independence, like I said. It's our
revolution. We want to do things our own way." Breckinridge felt that im-
plicit in what the boy said was another question: "Why did my father never
ask me?"
"It's only you old fogies think slavery is all," Cleburne added to Breck.
"The rank and file, even the high-born ones like your boy hereand he's a
fine lad, Breck, you brought him up to speak his mindthe rank and file
know better. You politicians used to talk about 'states' rights,' remember?
What rights does a state have in the Confederacy? Richmond has mustered
all the state troops into the national army. Martial law, and where's your
habeas corpus now, my friend? Soon there'll be a national tax, same as in the
North. And how'd you like to be a businessman"
"I know, I know." Breckinridge didn't want to hear about any of that. The
suspension of the rules against arbitrary arrest had shattered one of his funda-
ments, and as for central powerthe Confederate Government owned or
controlled all war production, and had issued rules about profits and markets
that mocked the freedom of the entrepreneur. The Confederacy was already
more centralized than the Union, and bid fair to become as repressive, though
that was limited by the angry independence of Georgia and South Carolina.
"But these are temporary, emergency measures," he held. "It's wartime.
This won't be the way it will be when the war is over." The former politician
knew he was off balance, stunned at the way he seemed to'be so out of touch
with new ideas. He had been debating slavery and states' rights for his whole
political life. Cleburne might be a wild Irishman, but if young Cabell Preckin-
ridge thought this way, how many of the brigade did? How many of the
Confederate rank and file?
"We're not fighting to save black slavery," pressed Cleburne, "we're fight-
ing to stop white slaveryagainst becoming slaves to the government in
Washington. The Yankees are fighting for sectional superiority; they want to
conquer the South and deprive us of our rights and liberties. Dr. Beecher as
much as admitted the agitation about slavery was a guise, a device to inflame
the North to take over the stubborn South."
"Independence is not our cause," insisted Breckinridge. He remembered
his long arguments with Lincoln in the White House only a year ago. He had
told the President, whose election Breckinridge as president of the Senate had
personally certified, that the Southern "cause" was simply to be let alone. He
had warned Lincoln not to strike at the institution of slavery, as the radicals
were demanding. Even today, the Union could still come back together "as it
was" if the offensives of Lee in Maryland and Bragg in Kentucky led to
election victories in the late fall by the Peace Democrats. "Face the reality,
Patrickthe difference between North and South is slavery. If we can keep it
only where it was, we'll be back in the Union. One nation, each section
respecting the other's rights."
"Is that what Jeff Davis thinks?" Cleburne shot back. "He sees himself as
our George Washington, doesn't he? He put General Washington on the Con-
federate seal, didn't he? Forget Union, Breckeen, it will never come again
unless we surrender."
"Heresy," declared Breckinridge. Cleburne was right about Davis, though
that good man saw himself as a military messiah, freeing his people from a
distant tyranny as George Washington did less than a century ago. "Have you
talked about this to anybody else?"
"I'm afraid to," said the hero of Lexington cheerfully, "they'd tar and
feather me. But mark my words, that's what this war will come toenlisting
the blacks to fight with us."
"Would they fight?" Cabell asked.
"The helots of Sparta stood their masters in good stead in battle," Cleburne
replied. "Paid with their freedom, the slaves will fight. More important, the
passion will go out of the abolitionists in the North. And our present embar-
rassment will end with our dealings with the Englishthose foul blackguards
could then recognize us."
"Could we spare the blacks from the fields?" Breckinridge found himself
asking, as if the scheme were worthy of consideration.
"Enough slaves are administering to luxury alone," said Cleburne with
some scorn, "to fill the places we need. After that, we could leave some of the
skill at home in the fields and take some of the muscle to fight with. It would
work. No, the real heresy is to admit that the slaves want to be free. That's
something our Southern friends refuse to face. They spin a fairy tale about the
slaves loving their present condition."
"He's right, sir."
Breckinridge shook his head; the idea, while eminently logical, could never
be accepted by Southern firebrands. When Secretary of State Judah Benjamin
secretly broached it to Jeff Davis, as a means of earning recognition of the
Confederacy by Britain and France, he had been turned down immediately.
Davis agreed only to consider drafting a force of slaves into the army to work
as laborers, with no promises of freedom.
"Lincoln's getting ready to use blacks, you know," Cleburne added. "We
could beat him to the punch."
"How do you know?"
"Butler the Beast, down in New Orleans, is training a regiment of Africans,
supposedly for guard duty, but that's a lie."
Breckinridge had to admit that the prospect of the Federal Army's employ-
ing blacks, or of the Lincoln government's approving some form of emancipa-
tion for fugitives who joined Union ranks, gave weight to Clebume's notion.
If Lincoln tried to free the South's slaves, or even announced his intention to
in some far-off future, that could be a blow to the South. It could turn many
blacks actively against white masters. Emancipation might even force Jeff
Davis to match the offer of freedom to potential black soldiers, no matter how
the plantation owners protested.
"President Davis would have to be desperate to even entertain such an
idea," Breckinridge concluded. "Patrick, I presume you told us this to get my
political counsel."
"That I did, Breckeen. I can handle myself in an apothecary or on the field
of combat, but politics was never mother's milk to me."
"It could be you're right and I'm wrong about independence now being
more important than slavery," Breck allowed. "But if Lincoln thinks the
cause of the Union is losing its force, he'll turn to abolition, and try to make
the war about slavery."
"We mustn't let him, don't you see?" Clebume's passion was infectious, but
Breck did not want to be drawn into a conspiracy around an idea that would
give Bragg a chance to come down on his neck and punish his brigade.
"We're fighting for our own country. The Confederacy can expand down into
French Mexico. To hell with the slave system if it's going to lose us the war."
Breck decided he would have to think about it some other time. He wished
he could talk it over with Anna Carroll. "Just be sure, Pat, you don't let
Braxton Bragg know what you're thinking."
"Then how do I gain support for the idea? Come on, now, man, this is your
field, not mine."
"Talk it over only with men you trust." When an orderly came into the
room with a pressed gray uniform, Breck stopped talking until the man left;
Bragg was not above spying on his commanders. "Commit nothing to paper.
In a while, if our advance continues into the North, or if sensible Democrats
win up in New York in the election, you may want to forget you ever thought
of it."
"But if things go sour," Clebume posited, "if McClellan defeats Lee, or if
Bragg gets us thrown back into Tennessee"
"The moment might come to write ajoint letter to a superior officer," was
all Breck would say. He hated himself for being so tentative, but Clebume
was among the best soldiers of the South, and his career could be snuffed out
by this foray into the most sensitive political issue. "Hand it personally to
Hardee, or Polkto be forwarded directly to President Davis. If I'm around
Richmond," he added vaguely, "I'll talk to the President about it."
Cabell left to answer a knock at the front door.
"But what do you think of the chances, Breck?"
"Not good. At least not soon. It's just too big an idea to get your mind
around. You really think Lincoln wants to use black troops?"
Clebume nodded. "I have friends in New YorkIrishmen. They say Gree-
ley and the radical Republicans are screaming for it, and Lincoln can't resist
much longer or he loses his party's backing."
"Freedom for the slaves cuts both ways," Breckinridge observed, "and a lot
of your Irish friends don't want to see blacks flocking up there to take their
jobs."
Cabell returned, papers in hand. "It's a petition from the men of the 5th
Kentucky Brigade. They're almost home now. They've marched and ridden
eleven hundred miles in fourteen days, switching to sever railroads; shoes are
in short supply, and they demand to be discharged when their year is up.
Which is next month."
"Sure and you've got a mutiny on your hands, General Breckinridge."
The Kentuckian despaired of the way Bragg would use this uproar against
him and his men. He told his son to assemble the brigade along three sides of
the parade ground and on the fourth set up a platform for him to speak. His
task was not so much to incite the people of Kentucky to join the revolution
against Yankee oppression as to keep the Kentuckians in his command from
breaking up and going home.
"This means we won't be going home to visit your mother," he added to
the boy. Again, Mary would have to wait. He thanked the Irishman for
looking in on his family in Lexington and warned him again to keep his black
freedom ideas to himself and a tight circle. Then Breck began to get his
thoughts together for a fire-eating political stump speech. He had his own
little election to worry about within the Orphan Brigade.

CHAPTER 13
THE RISE OF SEYMOUR
Anna Carroll had received a note from Thurlow Weed, sent by messenger
from Secretary of State Seward's office, asking her to breakfast at Willard's.
That was good news. She assumed he wanted some political favor done,
requiring someone who had influence with Chase. Her influence with the
capital's most eligible widower was never stronger; although he was seeing
other women, Anna was certain there was nobody with whom the Treasury
Secretary was more politically intimate. Other intimacy, she hoped, would
soon follow. He was extraordinarily straitlaced, almost tortured, about giving
way to his normal needs as a man. And his daughter continued to hover over
him like his mother. She wished she could induce a phase of active courtship,
but knew that any show of impatience would be fatal.
Whatever Thurlow Weed wanted, she hoped she could deliver it for him,
because she wanted to enlist his support on an unpaid government bill in
return. She told the messenger to tell the New York editor and political leader
she would be there promptly at 8 A.M.
She arrived at seven-thirty, expecting to find a copy of the Albany Evening
Journal, Weed's paper, at the Willard's newsstand, one of the best-stocked in
town. The paper would be a few days late, but she knew it would be flattering
for an out-of-town publisher to breakfast with a lady who took the trouble to
read his editorials.
Sure enough, the man at the newsstand had a recent copy and a comment:
"Mr. Weed makes certain his paper comes down on the same train with the
New York Tribune, ma'am." She riffled throughto get the drift of Weed's
political positions.
Weed's Evening Journal, she was glad to see, expressed its gratification at
McClellan's reinstatement. That unequivocal support of the man who was at
that moment saving the Union from the predations of Lee in Maryland was in
sharp contrast to the fury of Horace Greeley's Tribune at Lincoln for turning
to "Little Mac" to defend Washington. Weed's Albany newspaper was also
urging New York Democrats, whose convention would take place in a few
days, to nominate General John Dix, a loyal War Democrat, rather than
former governor Horatio Seymour. Anna noticed a low blow: Weed had
dubbed Seymour the "Knight of the Sorrowful Countenance," a hint that
Seymour might have been one of those who sympathized with the traitorous
"Knights of the Golden Circle," the plotters of Southern insurrection.
"Your kindness and perspicacity in reading my newspaper are typical of
you, Miss Carroll," he murmured, sinking heavily into the large chair. "I
recommend the hominy grits here, if you are in the mood for porridge, unless
you are watching your figger. Which, I am told, and meaning no offense, at
least one former President has done."
"Two," she replied merrily. Washington in early September was still hot
and humid, and she wore a dress that showed more neck and shoulders than
fashion dictated for daytime, but her bosom was an asset she never hesitated
to display. She folded her Journal and leaned forward to put it with her purse
under the table. "You forget Fillmore."
"I can never forget Millard Fillmore," Weed said, looking at all of her with
the frank admiration of a man too old to act but never too old to appreciate,
"because his 'Silver Grays,' as the old-line Whigs now call themselves, are
going for Seymour. And as governor of New York, Seymour would be a
disaster for the Union."
"Can he be stopped?"
"That is where your intercession with Fillmore would help," he near-whis-
pered, his soft voice always pitched to impart confidences. "You were influen-
tial once in providing him with the support of the Native American Party."
Anna noted that Weed skirted the term "Know-Nothings," as if to spare her
sensibilities. "A message from you and your many old friends of that persua-
sion, madam, which I would be happy to deliver, as I am going to Troy this
afternoon"
"Fillmore is an ingrate." She recalled the former President's pathetic
maunderings at their last meeting in Rochester on her way back from the
West. But she was in no position to turn Weed down; he might be able to help
with her bill for $6,250 for her pamphlets, including printing, which the
damnable War Department bureaucracy was questioning. The budget.officer
was writing to local lawyers to find if the fee was conscionable; paying a
woman for anything was more than most disbursing officers could stand, and
Tom Scott was no longer next door to Stanton to look out for her interests.
"But I'll write the letter if it's important to you. Here's something you should
find useful: the key to Fillmore and his supporters is Dean Richmond. If you
could get to him"
Weed nodded. She was talking about a fellow wirepuller, positioned across
the political street, but not unreachable. Because she could not bring up the
subject of her unpaid fee so soon, Anna changed the subject: "I notice you
came around to supporting the Confiscation Act, Mr. Weed." Like her, he
had originally opposed it as unlawful seizure of property.
"I was in England this summer, as you know," Weed replied. "Lincoln
wanted me to buttress Ambassador Adams in talks with the Prime Minister
and Foreign Secretary, who want to recognize the South. They fairly salivate
for our permanent disunion. But the English workers are opposed to slavery.
So we have to do what we can to show that the Union is fighting the extension
of slavery. That's why I came around on the Confiscation Act."
"My own view of emancipation is changing," she said, treading carefully,
"because the nature of the war has changed. What used to be a rebellion is
now a full-scale war between two powers. Under the laws of war, slaves set
free as a military measure cannot be deprived of their freedom after the war,
any more than horses taken as booty or purchased by a prize court can be
remanded to the original owner."
"Do not go overboard, my dear lady. Abolition would end all possibility of
peace negotiations. It would mean a fight to the finish, unimaginable desola-
tion, utter destruction. Moreover, the reaction of the voter to abolition would
cost us the state of New York. The loss of New York to the Democrats would
mean the loss of the war."
"I defer to your judgment on New York state politics. Maryland is my
state."
"Will the people of Maryland, Miss Carroll, rise up to support Robert E.
Lee when he comes to lift what he calls the Union yoke?" Weed was quick
and to the point. General Lee was about to strike across the Potomac into her
Maryland, where John Dix and the Union troops, by the most expeditious if
undemocratic means, had only a year before prevented the legislature from
seceding. If Marylanders welcomed Lee's Confederates, providing food and
support to the rebel forces, not even McClellan could stop him. Philadelphia
and New York City would be undefended; Lincoln would have to sue for
peace.
"No," she said firmly. "The plug-uglies of Baltimore don't speak for Mary-
land. Lee will be disappointed. I've written to Governor Bradford to appoint
Hicks senator, and he's popular with loyalists. No, the greater danger is
Bragg and Breckinridge moving up into Kentucky."
That stopped him. "Tell me about Breckinridge."
She avoided that. "Kentuckians aren't like Marylandersthey'll go with
whoever looks like the winner. The whole state of Kentucky could shift"
"No, not the military situation. I mean Breckinridge as a political man.
You knew him?"
How much did Weed know? "Our families were close. His cousin, the
Reverend Robert Breckinridge, was my spiritual adviser." Uncle Robert was
a loyal Unionist.
"I could have sworn Breck would be President one day," Weed mused.
"Young, a gifted orator, strong for the Union, good understanding of patron-
age, everything going for him. Now John Breckinridge is branded a traitor,
expelled from the Senate, a man without a state, ruined forever in politics."
He added a phrase that was barely audible: "Unless they win."
She finished that thought for him: "And then he'd be the likely President of
the Confederacy." That was the first time such a possibility had occurred to
her, and if the recently beaten troops of the Army of the Potomac could not
contain the triumphant Lee and Jackson, that might be a lively prospect. She
wondered how Breck felt at the suspension of habeas corpus and other crack-
downs on dissent by Jeff Davis; did he understand at last that, in the presence
of arms, the laws fell silent?
"I can understand why men of power are attracted to you, Miss Carroll,"
the politician said in his most confidentially avuncular manner. "Why is it
you've never chosen to marry?"
That was a nice way of putting the question so often asked of her. She
decided not to take offense because Weed thought of all romance as a political
game. She could hardly tell the truthFillmore was a cad, Buchanan never
asked, Breckinridge was already taken, and Chase, perhaps on the brink, still
hesitatedso she dissembled artfully.
"Most men of power want women who supplement their talents," she said.
"I'm of an independent mind, and they see me as competition. It's too bad, in
a way. I would like to have had children. On the other hand, being unat-
tached has given me the freedom to do what few other women ever get a
chance to do."
"I'm having great trouble with Chase," Weed said, seemingly irrelevant,
finally to the point. "And now I come to my motive in inviting you to this
sumptuous repast." He dropped a dollop of raspberry jam on a corn muffin
and handed it to her, as if in outright bribery. "I don't know how well you
know Chase, Miss Carroll"
"I wish you would call me Anna, Thurlow." He knew precisely how well
she knew Chase, which was why they were having breakfast.
"I would be grateful if you would drop two messages in Secretary Chase's
ear."
He waited. Was she supposed to take out a pencil and make notes? She
committed herself to nothing: "Go on."
"First, Anna, I would hope that Chase and Seward could get together on a
suitable policy toward slavery and go to the President with it. Not abolition,
by any meansjust enough promises of abolition in the distant future to keep
the English out of the war."
Anna wanted to tell him she knew about the proclamation of emancipation
now sitting in Lincoln's desk, which Weed evidently thought he had stopped.
But she was not about to confide in him more than he confided in her. She
knew one fact that would have amazed Weed: that Chase was not as close to
abolition as Lincoln was. Chase, to prevent Lincoln from seizing his radical
following, would probably side with Seward in the Cabinet to restrain Lin-
coln from proclaiming emancipation personally.
"I'll do what I can to bring Chase and Seward together," she promised
faithfully, since that temporary alliance was inevitable. "What else?"
"Tell Chase, for God's sake, to keep Greeley from running an abolitionist
for governor of New York. Back John Dix for the Republican nomination."
Anna could not promise that; she was prepared only to ask Chase to do
what he had already half-decided to do. To avoid having to turn him down,
she asked, "Is Horatio Seymour that good a candidate? The Republicans
carried New York by a hundred thousand votes last year."
"Seymour is not your usual politician," Weed said slowly. "He is very"
Weed searched for the word, which he pronounced with distaste"high-
minded. He is a man of intellect and principle, the sort Lincoln would like to
debate. He would give respectability to those Irish ruffians who oppose aboli-
tion because they fear the African will come up and take their jobs."
"But he's a copperhead, like Vallandigham"
"Ah, you underestimate the man. You will never hear him crying for peace
at any price; on the contrary, he sounds like the voice of sweet reason. Sey-
mour, with all his noble motives, could become the rallying point for those
opposed to Lincoln on baser motives. I want you to get Chase to put the fear
of Horatio Seymour into Oreeley."
"Maybe Ben Wade is the best approach," she said obliquely, which was the
best way to conclude a political conversation with Weed. Then she raised the
matter of her unpaid bill at the War Department. As he hailed a hack to take
him to the railroad station, Weed took out a notebook and jotted down the
amount.
Horatio Seymour, nominee for governor of New York of the Democratic
Party in convention assembled, had to remind himself to keep a straight face
during the introduction.
He was seated on the jam-packed stage, in the middle of a crowd of run-
ning mates and party leaders, with the eyes of conventioneers, helpers, and
hangers-on all upon him. The introducer spoke of a nominee carrying on a
great family tradition of service to New York State; Seymour thought it was
fair to recall the work of his legislator-father who helped build the Erie Canal,
and knew that no introducer would add that Papa made a fortune in land
speculation and shot himself in the Panic of 1837. The speaker shouting from
the rostrum lauded the "family ties"; yes, it was nice that Mary Bleecker, his
wife of thirty years, was of the Dutch landowning family. That had given him
his estate and his chance to experiment with agricultural techniques, and to
plant a great pear orchard with his own hands. Nothing would be said of the
Seymours' profound disappointment at their childlessness.
Looking over the crowd, Seymour could seein a flag-draped box, de-
tached from the mobthe man who had cajoled him into acceptance of this
nomination, Dean Richmond, an amiable wirepuller who would soon be
lifted out of crass political dealing to fit Seymour's notions of high-minded
campaigning. He spotted the massive form of Republican "dictator" Thurlow
Weed in Democratic "dictator" Richmond's box, looking uncomfortable next
to another journalistic guest, Horace Greeley of the Tribune, clothed as usual
in the white suit that was supposed to stand for candor or purity. Seymour
would suffer the slings and arrows of both men in the coming months; he was
glad that they could hear his speech tonight.
The introducer was up to Seymour's days as governor in the early fifties,
extolling the way he had wisely borrowed to widen and extend his father's
Erie Canal. Nothing was said about his unpopular veto of the law passed in
Albany to prohibit the sale of liquor; Seymour believed that such prohibition
was an unconstitutional invasion of the rights of local government, and the
former governor was proud to this day of that veto, but it had earned him the
reputation of being a drunkard and captive of the liquor interests.
Seymour, half-listening, was not in the least-ashamed at having had the
political temerity to invite the papal nuncio to a dinner with Protestant
clergy, which brought down the wrath of Millard Fillmore and his anti-Papist
Know-Nothings. In his campaign for reelection in 1856, these forces com-
bined to drive Seymour out. It was a filthy campaign even by New York
standards, and he had been happy to retire from politics to his Utica orchard.
Now here he was again, responding to the Democratic Party's call, prepar-
ing to campaign in a manner untried by any other New York candidate: he
would stump the state from one end to the other, reaching out for votes in a
systematic way that would shatter the tradition of professing nonchalance
and giving out interviews from a rocker on the front porch. But he was not
doing this in the spirit of party, or to line Dean Richmond's pockets; now he
had a mission, a purpose beyond politics.
The speaker's last line, including the traditional "gre-a-a-t state of New
York," was drowned in the hullabaloo of bands and shouts and cap-tossings.
Seymour did not deny himself the moment's exhilaration. He knew why he
was there, and why a voice within him wanted the nomination: he could be
the nation's peacemaker.
"Two years ago at this convention," he called out, "we implored the new
national Administration to submit some measure of conciliation which would
save us from civil war. Our prayer was derided and denounced, and false
assurances were given that there was no danger." Seymour was persuaded
that Lincoln had not gone far enough to prevent the war; if the President had
imagined then the horrors the nation knew now, he would surely have acted
differently. Most voters knew that was true; the Lincoln intractability that led
to bloody war was an exploitable weakness.
"Rottenness and corruption pervade the Executive department." He held
up a clipping from a newspaperthe Albany Evening Journaland, looking
toward Thurlow Weed in the box, read with relish:
"Listen to the organ of the Secretary of State: 'Contractors have fattened
on fat jobs, adventurers have found the war a source of private gain. Moral
desperadoes have flocked about the national capital, and the scum of the land
has gathered about the sources of power.' " Seymour grinned at the roar of
the crowd at the discomfited Weed, and was glad that he had been able to find
a similar diatribe in Greeley's Tribune to make a different point:
"And listen to this, from the New York Tribune, the organ of the founder of
the Republican Party: 'The country is in peril. The rebels seem to be pushing
forward all along the border line. They are threatening the Potomac and the
Ohio. Through the timidity, despondency, or folly of the federal government,
this simultaneous movement may become successful . . .' " Seymour en-
joyed using Tribune pessimism to show that even Lincoln apologists could
not hide the danger to which the Republicans had brought the courury.
Before attacking further, Seymour wanted to reestablish his loyalty to the
Union. "We charge that this rebellion is most wicked. Rebellion is not neces-
sarily wrong. The rebellion of our fathers is our proudest boast, the rebellion
of our brothers is our national disgrace." That establishes the loyalty of the
opposition, Seymour reasoned; now to the disunity of the party in power.
"I have read to you the testimony of Messrs. Oreeley and Weed, charging
fraud, outrage, and incompetency. But bear in mind that the embarrassment
of President Lincoln grows out of the conflicting views of his political
friends."
Lowering his voice for emphasishe had the crowd now, he no longer had
to strain his voiceSeymour drove home a subtle point: "Mr. Lincoln's
hands would be strengthened by a Democratic victory. We will relieve him of
the pressures of those who thirst for blood."
Seymour had the proof: "In his communication with the loyal men of the
border states, the President confesses he is pressed to violate his duty, his
oath of office, and the Constitution, pressed by cowardly and heartless aboli-
tionists who demand that those who have suffered most in this contest should
have a new and further evil inflicted upon them by the hands of a government
they are struggling to uphold."
Having lightly touched the tender subject of abolition, Seymour savaged
"the brutal and bloody language of partisan editors and political preachers
which has lost us the sympathy of the civilized world." Few politicians would
dare to attack such powerful editors, but Seymour knew he had nothing to
lose in taunting them; they would excoriate him anyway, and by attacking
them, he attracted those voters who resented the rising power of the press
lords.
Surely the Republicans would wrap themselves in the flag, imputing sup-
port of Lincoln's candidates to be support of the soldiers in the field. Seymour
knew he had to chip away at that. "I went to the camp of our soldiers. Amid
sufferings from exposure and want, I heard and saw only devotion to our
Constitution." That was the week he had visited George McClellan, who he
was certain had become his secret ally against the implacable Lincoln. "But a
fanatical majority of Republicans in Congress make war on the Union men of
the South and strengthen the hands of secessionists. Most of their time is
spent in annoying our army, in meddling with its operations and embarrass-
ing our generals."
The hall applauded this indirect support of McClellan. Having broached
the issue of slavery, Seymour reminded his audience of the compromise
struck by the Constitution's fathers and added, "Proclamations of emancipa-
tion are now urged upon the President, which could only confiscate the prop-
erty of loyal citizens, for no others could be reached. You have been deceived.
Who deceived you? Who stained our land with blood? The authors of our
calamity now ask to adopt measures which they have heretofore denounced
as unjust and unconstitutional. They cannot save our country."
The audience was attentive and enthusiastic, and Seymour felt he was
doing for his cause what Lincoln had done at Cooper Union years before:
impressing both the faithful and the undecided that at least here was a man
who knew how to marshal the forces of his argument. He put in a ringing
defense of the right of dissent, castigating the supposed patriots who were too
quick to label as "traitor" anyone who stood for constitutional principle.
The nominee reached his peroration:
"Opposed to the election of Mr. Lincoln, we have loyally sustained him.
Differing on the conduct of the war, we have responded to every demand
made upon us. We are pouring out our blood, our treasures, and our men to
rescue our government from a position in which it can neither propose peace
nor conduct successful war. We wish to see our Union saved, our laws vindi-
cated, and peace once more restored to our land."
The reaction was better than he had expected and as much as he had
hoped. No wild roars of racialist hatred or disunionist sentiment, no banners
insulting the President or undermining the war effort; instead, long, sustained
applause, as if the New York Democratic conventionhaving received his
message and understood his campaign themewas ready to join him in battle
for a negotiated peace on the basis of the Union as it was, with slavery
confined to the original slave states.
Now, for the first time, Seymour was looking forward to the campaign. He
was not running for or against slavery. He was not running only for governor.
He was running for peace.
In his box, Dean Richmond observed his guests with amusement. Weed
wore a mournful look. Greeley's pink face mottled with passion, his shrill
voice piping, "Traitor! He's nothing but a traitor! He'll be buried under the
biggest avalanche of votes ever seen in the state of New York!"
Richmond, saying nothing, looked to Weed for the response. He knew the
political adage that held it was folly to murder an opponent who was commit-
ting suicide. Weed said only: "Peace has an appeal, Horace."
"This idiot is advocating surrender! And he has the gall to suggest that his
victory would help Lincoln!" Richmond had never seen the great Greeley so
agitated; the Seymour speech must have been more effective than he at first
thought. Perhaps the approach of Lee's rebel legions would make radical
voters think twice about abolition.
"If any emancipation moves go forward," Weed said in a tone lower than
his usual lowered voice, but one that Richmond could still catch, "Seymour
will win on the peace issue."
"What does abolition have to do with delaying peace?" Greeley demanded.
"It will hurry victory along, if anything."
"A proclamation would end all hope of a peace overture. It would mean a
fight to the finish." Weed seemed quite certain of the future. "If peace is to be
offered, if any negotiations are to take place, secret or otherwise, they have to
be undertaken before any emancipation announcements. Striking at slavery
crosses the Rubicon."
"It's the Potomac I'm worried about," Greeley rejoined. "As soon as Lee
moves, McClellan will sue for peace. He won't fight. I cannot understand
what got into Lincoln, reappointing that miserable ditherer. Hooker's the
general, or Bumside. And if we should be taken to disaster by your McClel-
lan, Thurlow, we are better off as two separate nations than as a Union
incorporating the moral evil of slavery."
Richmond, out of a sense of political decency, turned as if to look at what
was happening in an opposite direction. He heard Weed say, "No. The West
needs the Mississippi River all the way down to the Gulf. The West will never
let you permit the South to secede, because that would put the Mississippi in
the hands of another nation. Before they'll let that happen, the Westall of
it, Ohio, Illinois, Missouriwill accept slavery in the Union as it was. Think
of the West, Horace."
"I have long recommended the frontier to our youth," the editor in the
white smock and white hat said frostily. "I am getting the train to New York
City. Troy always depresses me."
Richmond stepped out of the box and made his way through the crowd to
the candidate's side, acknowledging nods from the politically cognizant. In a
few minutes he was in the governor's suite, where he could report on the
editors' reactions to Seymour's use of their editorials against them.
"Greeley is overconfident," the political leader reported to candidate Sey-
mour in private. "He wants to humiliate Weed and Seward at their conven-
tion, and that will make Weed sit on his hands during the campaign. The
radicals' hatred of Seward is fierce. You have a chance."
"I don't care about my election, that's not probable." Seymour was the first
candidate to say that in Richmond's political experience; the political leader
hoped the candidate was saying it only for effect. "But I want the opponents
of the men who brought our country into its deplorable condition to be so
much aroused as to make themselves felt and respected."
"You will have a great many people on your side, Governor, that you won't
like. You realize that?"
"I want a strong, compact party that can defy violence and can keep fanat-
ics in check," Seymour said. "Make certain you stay in touch with Barlow,
and through him McClellan in the field. Mac is on our side; I know that for a
fact. F'nandy Wood and I spoke to him. He's for peace, he doesn't want those
fine men of his army butchered to satisfy some agitators."
"Casualties don't seem to worry Lincoln."
"True, he'd let the Union bleed to death, but remembernot a word by
any of our supporters against Lincoln."
"The President is terribly unpopular" Richmond did not want to lose a
good target.
"He's a target for others, not for us. We attack only his advisers. If I met
the man someday, I would not like to be burdened with the memory of
personal attacks on him."
"He is tougher than he seems," Richmond said. Weed had told him how
Seward had underestimated Lincoln's tenacity and stubbornness at first; the
President was a man who used every kind of guile and Western folksiness to
get his way. And he persevered. "I hear Lincoln is very good on patronage,
but very hard on policy."
"We will attack that policy, but not the President personally," Seymour
directed. "Stanton is the one who is waging war on the North with his arbi-
trary arrests. I will denounce the doctrine that Civil War in the South takes
away from the loyal North the benefits of one principle of civil liberty."
The Democratic boss was pleased with his choice. "Use that idea of your
victory helping Lincoln," Richmond advised. "I thought Greeley would turn
purple when he heard it."
"In many respects, Dean, it was injurious to me to be nominated." Sey-
mour smiled wryly: "I thought I had traded ambition for avarice. But now
that I'm in the field, I want a sharp, bitter fight. If we save New York, we save
the Union."
CHAPTER 14
JOHN HAY'S DIARY
SEPTEMBER 12, 1862
"How does it look now?" That was the message Lincoln sent to McClellan
from the telegraph office across the street at 4 A.M. this morning.
The Prsdt is haggard, worried. He is limping around in his slippers because
of his damned corns and now has a sprained wrist because of the damned
runaway horse. He is not in a good mood. Two weeks ago Bates said after a
Cabinet meeting that he looked as if he was ready to hang himself, and the
Tycoon has not snapped back with his usual resiliency.
General Lee's invasion of the North has begun. The only force between
him and Southern victory is George McClellan and the army recently
whipped under John Pope. The Young Napoleon sent word back through
Halleck that he is in Rockville, Maryland, looking for Lee. We think Lee is
probably marching into Pennsylvania. Philadelphia is in a panic, and the
governor of Pennsylvania is burning up our telegraph wires with horrific
claims that 120,000 Confederates are streaming into his state.
Halleck says that McClellan wanted the garrison at Harpers Ferry to come
and join his forces, insisting that the place is indefensible and he needs the
troops to swell his ranks. Halleck disagrees, with Stanton probably egging
him on, and won't send Little Mac those 12,000 men from Harpers Ferry.
Lincoln said to send up Fitz-John Porter's 20,000 slow movers from the
Washington area instead; McClellan likes Porter.
So all the archives, treasure, and bonds of Pennsylvania now in the capital
at Harrisburg and at Philadelphia are being shipped up to New York. That
doesn't help anybody's morale. We don't know which way Lee will head: he
could aim for Philadelphia, or cut across Maryland for Baltimore, or double
back here to Washington. The dismaying thing is that there is nobody to stop
him from going clear to New York except McClellan, who is exceeding his
authority by acting like the field commander of all our troops facing Lee, for
which I suppose the Prsdt should be thankful. Lincoln does not have the
backing to appoint McClellan to do what we expect him to do.
And that's only half the military problem. Bragg and Breckinridge, if not
stopped, will overrun Tennessee and Kentucky and win the war that way. I
ran a message across to the telegraph office from Lincoln to one of our more
confused generals: "Where is the enemy which you dread in Louisville? How
near to you?"
In the midst of all this commotion, with our armies having all this trouble
finding the advancing enemy, a delegation from the Society of Friends
trooped in. They want their coreligionists to be exempt from the draft. We
passed a draft law for 300,000 men last month; now the papers are printing
how many men are expected from each district in each state and the shoe is
pinching. Adding to the general sense of desperation, a thousand old, grizzled
squirrel hunters from the Ohio Valley sent word that they have formed a
home guard in Cincinnati, in case Breckinridge or Bragg comes their way.
The West as well as the North has invasion jitters.
I put on the Prsdt's desk the contract for shipping five hundred negroes to
the Chiriqui Tract in Panama, and he signed it. Put the government of Hon-
duras is threatening to make trouble, as Anna Carroll warned; nobody wants
our Africans, and they don't want to go to Africa. If we have this much
trouble with shipping out five hundred, what will we do with the four million
if the Tycoon goes through with the plan to set them free?
The Tycoon has tied together emancipation and colonization in his mind,
and says he will not surrender the game leaving any available card unplayed.
He is prepared to listen to the hollering of the blacks about being deported
because he thinks that will quiet the hollering of the whites about freeing the
slaves. And it's working: Frederick Douglass, whose black hand the Prsdt has
shaken in the White House, reacted to the Tycoon's little chat with the coop-
erative colored leaders the other day with a blast at Lincoln's "inconsisten-
cies, his pride of race and blood, his contempt for negroes and his canting
hypocrisy." Douglass's disappointment soothes our conservative friends a bit.
(Good turn of phrase, "canting hypocrisy.")
Speaking of hypocrites, Governor Sprague came in with an offer of three
negro regiments raised in Rhode Island and Massachusetts. He knew, with
the widespread white resentment about the draft, how hard it would be for
Lincoln to say no. But the Prsdt is not willing to enlist black soldiers. Yet.
I do not like Sprague. He sees entirely too much of Kate Chase, slobbering
over her in his stupidly drunken way, and she says she has to tolerate it
because Sprague has a political hold on her father. I suspect Sprague must be
offering to put his vast fortune at Chase's disposal to wrest the Republican
nomination from Lincoln in '64.
Consider the position at this moment of the man trying to hold the country
together: enemies in the field, on the march in two major offensives; enemies
within the army, conniving to create a dictatorship or at least throw their
weight to the Peace Democrats; enemies in the Cabinet, eager to supplant
him at the next party convention; enemies in the Congress, plotting to snatch
away his authority to run the war. Not to mention a wife crazy as a coot, now
bringing in spiritualists to hold ghostly seances in the Mansion so she can
speak to the dead Willie. Sometimes it seems that the Prsdt has to fight a half-
dozen wars at the same time; who can blame him for looking as if he wants to
hang himself?
CHAPTER 15
ANTIETAM I
WITH LEE
General Thomas Jackson noted that his commander, Robert Lee, launched
his invasion of the North while seated in an ambulance. Lee had fallen for-
ward on his hands at the sudden move of a startled horse and had broken a
bone in one hand and sprained the other wrist. With both hands in splints,
Lee could not handle a mount, and was forced to lead his troops in a cart
designed for transport of the wounded.
Jackson's back was aching from a fall of his own when his gray mare
reared and toppled over backward. That would not have happened with his
regular horse, Fancy, which his men liked to call "Little Sorrel." He found
there was no accounting for nicknames, although he did not mind being
called "Stonewall," the sobriquet universally applied after the first victory at
Manassas. Jackson favored his regular horse, though others thought the red-
dish-brown animal ungainly and ugly, because Fancy was like himself: lean,
angular, ascetic, not much for seems. The mare that nearly fell on him was all
grace and beauty; the dour commander took that as a lesson.
Seated in pain on another mount, Jackson watched the Confederate Army
on the march and did not like what he saw. The long columns of infantrymen
were ragged and undisciplined. Stragglers frequently dropped off to the side
of the road, pulling off their clothes to get at the "graybacks," the lice that
kept even the sleepiest awake.
The men were unshaven and dirty, the butternut uniforms the color of road
dust, shocks of hair sticking through holes in hats. Blankets, supposed to be
tightly rolled and strapped to the back, were slung over the shoulder, as were
knapsacks, tin cups, and canteens. As they walked, their general could hear
the sound of flapping soles from those lucky enough to wear what was left of
shoes.
Never in his military experienceWest Point, the Mexican War, and just
before the war an instructor at the Virginia Military Institutehad Jackson
seen such a tatterdemalion bunch of tired men claiming to be an army. The
ribbed, hungry horses and old artillery wagons with creaking wheels com-
pleted the picture of military dilapidation. This did not strike Stonewall Jack-
son as the picture of an invading army, come to liberate the oppressed people
of Maryland; it seemed more like a bandit horde.
A. P. Hill's command, as usual, looked the worst; in his "Light Division,"
as the moody Hill liked to call it, the straggling and formlessness was so
unmilitary as to be a disgrace to the Army of Northern Virginia. Jackson
moved his horse forward and halted one brigade to allow it to re-form. The
red-bearded Powell Hill, in his flamboyant red shirt, came galloping up and
asked the brigade's leader by whose orders his division was being delayed.
The brigadier motioned toward Jackson.
Hill glared at Jackson, unbuckled his sword, and held it out hilt-first to his
superior. "If you're going to give the orders to my men," he seethed aloud,
"you have no need of me."
"Consider yourself under arrest," Jackson snapped back at the imperti-
nence, "for neglect of duty."
"You're not fit to be a general," Powell Hill told him. Jackson, now burn-
ing with anger, did not trust himself to reply; he stared down "Little Powell"
until that erratic and insubordinate officer turned and rode away.
That made two generals Jackson had under arrest; General Hood, whose
Texans were among the fiercest fighters in Lee's army, had already been
removed from command for insubordination. The tensions of invasion were
at the breaking point in the highest echelons of the army, but Jackson consid-
ered discipline in the ranks and subordination in command above all. Powell
Hill was unreliable; Jackson wished he could have a stiff-backed organizer
like Braxton Bragg with them now, but Bragg, at Lee's suggestion to Presi-
dent Davis, had been chosen to lead the invasion in the West.
"Li'1 Powell is one of them army lawyers," said Jackson's aide-de-camp.
"He'll be demanding a written statement of charges."
The paperwork was a burden. "Only if I decide on a court-martial," Jack-
son said. "Tell Hill to remain with his division."
In the city of Frederick, before a small gathering in the town square, Jack-
son stood near Lee as the commanding general read a proclamation. It struck
Jackson as a strange way for a conqueror to act, but Lee must have had his
reasons, and Jackson trusted Robert Lee as he had no other man.
"The people of the Confederate States," read Robert Lee in his quiet voice,
which could barely be heard by the small crowd, "have seen with profound
indignation their sister state deprived of every right and reduced to the condi-
tion of a conquered province. Your citizens have been arrested and impris-
oned upon no charge and contrary to all forms of law." That was a reference
to the arrest of Merryman, Jackson recalled; Lee would probably cite Chief
Justice Taney's opinion, so widely hailed in the South until the necessary
suspension of habeas corpus there.
"The faithful and manly protest against this outrage," read Lee in this
effort to make friends with the local population, "as made by the venerable
Marylander, to whom in better days no citizen appealed for right in vain, was
treated with scorn and contempt."
Jackson saw much nodding in the crowd; that was when Lincoln ignored
Judge Taney's decision on habeas corpus, and later ordered the Maryland
legislature arrested before the state could secede. Jackson figured he would
have taken the same direct action in Lincoln's shoes.
"The people of the South have long wished to aid you in throwing off this
foreign yoke, to enable you to again enjoy the inalienable rights of free men,"
Lee was concluding, as some of his soldiers looked longingly into the window
of a shoe store. "Marylan~ers shall once more enjoy their ancient freedom of
thought and speech. We know no enemies among you, and will protect all, of
every opinion. This army will respect your choice."
A band played "Maryland, My Maryland," to the tune of the German
Christmas carol "0 Tannenbaum." A group of Southern stalwarts sang out
the new lyrics:
The despot's heel is on thy shore, Maryland, my Maryland!
His torch is at thy temple door, Maryland, my Maryland!
Avenge the patriotic gore. That flecked the streets of Baltimore,
And be the battle queen of yore, Maryland, my Maryland!
Jackson, the stern Presbyterian, was not one for music, but hoped that the
song would influence some local residents to hand out shoes and clothing.
After the crowd dispersed, Lee called a council of war. Jackson pointed out
the need to demand local supplies and food; living off the land in enemy
country was a traditional way of war. Lee differed; his was to be a liberating
army, treating the population respectfully, in sharp contrast to the repression
practiced by General Pope in Virginia.
"But what about food?" Jackson asked. "The hand of the quartermaster
has never fallen on these Maryland valleys. We don't have the money to buy
supplies, and if we try to press Confederate money on storekeepers, they'll say
it's a form of confiscation."
Lee shook his head; they would have to put the strategy of winning the
hearts of the residents ahead of the needs of the soldiers. James Longstreet,
the other corps commander under Lee, had an answer: "In Mexico, I remem-
ber we lived for days on corn and green oranges. Here the corn is ripening in
the rows, tassels everywhere. They're called 'roasting ears.' The men will get
tired of corn, but they won't starve."
Jackson said nothing more; his men were doubled over with diarrhea, soil-
ing the underclothes they marched in, because of their diet of corn and ap-
ples, apples and corn. Perhaps they would get used to the diet or, better yet,
get better fed in Philadelphia.
"I have a motive in my proclamation, and in my concern for the sensibili-
ties of the population in the North," Lee told them. "I have suggested to
President Davis that we make a proposal of peace."
Lee's lieutenants looked at each other, then at their commander. Had they
come this far to give up? Jackson was first to speak: "Is it for the South now
to sue for peace?"
"In no way could it be regarded as suing for peace," Lee replied. "Being
made when it is in our power to inflict injury upon our adversary, it would
show the world that our sole object is the establishment of our independence
and the attainment of an honorable peace."
"Lincoln will reject it," said Longstreet. For once, Jackson agreed with
him.
"That would prove to the country who is responsible for the war," Lee
argued. "An election is coming next month in the North. The proposal of
peace would enable the people of the United States to determine whether they
will support those who favor a prolongation of the war, or those who wish to
bring it to a termination."
Jackson had not realized before that Lee considered himself to be a diplo-
matshowing all the world who wanted peaceor a politician, appealing to
public sentiment in order to influence a coming election. Jackson's goal was
simpler: winning the war. There lay the answer, he was certain, not in "settle-
ment." When Lee said he would transmit his ideas about a peace offer to
President Davis first, Jackson stopped worrying; like Lincoln, Jeff Davis
thought only in terms of victory.
Longstreet rolled out the maps on the table in the tent, and they waited for
Lee to explain his campaign.
The Southern commander obliged by pointing one of his crippled hands to
a spot on the map that must have been most familiar to him: Harpers Ferry,
Virginia, at the junction of the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers. Jackson
knew that in 1859, it was at that arsenal and armory, where rifles were made
and stored, that abolitionist Kansan John Brown made a raid that infuriated
the South and delighted the anti-slavery partisans of the North. At that time,
Colonel Robert Lee of the United States Army, with Lieutenant Jeb Stuart as
his cavalry aide, was sent to the Harpers Ferry arsenal to put an end to the
insurgency. Lee stormed the barricaded enginehouse, freed Brown's hostages,
and brought the abolitionist to justice. Created quite a stir when they hanged
the fanatic, Jackson recalled; the Yankees marched to a song about how his
body was a-moldering in his grave.
"That is the crossing," Lee was saying, tapping his splint on the map, "of
the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, and is held by a Federal garrison of per-
haps twelve thousand men. As you remember, Thomas, mountains on three
sides."
"Foolish to try to defend," Jackson observed. "Harpers Ferry is more of a
trap than a fort." When the war began, the Confederates controlled that
arsenal, with Jackson in command of the dismantling of its machinery. He
had shipped as much as possible to Richmond before slipping down the
Shenandoah Valley to join Lee's main forces. Unless the garrison at the rivers'
junction held out heroically, the position could be taken fairly easily, and
with it a much-needed store of supplies and guns. "Pope's been replaced by
McClellan, the papers say. I would think that McClellan would remove that
garrison and bolster his own army."
"That would be the intelligent thing to do," Lee agreed, "but perhaps
McClellan, by all odds their best man, is not in total command. At any rate,
the prize is there. I propose to send you, General Jackson, to capture that
garrison."
Jackson smiled his assent, but Longstreet demurred: "Divide our forces,
here in the North, with a Federal army waiting to attack us? I don't think
that's a good idea."
"That's how we beat Pope," said Jackson. Dividing the army was always a
riskperhaps it could not be reassembled in time to counter an enemy attack
but war required that sort of audacity. Longstreet was always too cautious;
to Jackson's mind, the willingness to risk all made the Southern forces under
Lee far more effective than the Northern army, under its series of generals.
"The second objectiveGeneral Walker's assignmentis the wrecking of
the aqueduct of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal at Monocacy," Lee contin-
ued. "The final objective is here, about sixty miles beyond Hagerstown: the
bridge at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where the railroad crosses the Susque-
hanna River. General Longstreet, you and I will undertake that. In achieving
these three objectives, we will isolate the Federal East from the Federal
West." It was the same strategy, Jackson realized, behind the Federals' "Ten-
nessee plan"to cut the South in two along the Charleston to Memphis
railway.
"Reinforcements for McClellan would thus be cut off," said the strategist.
"After that, I can turn my attention to Philadelphia, Baltimore, or Washing-
ton, as may be best for our interests."
That would end the war; no need for peace proposals. Longstreet, however,
was shaking his head.
"You doubtless regard it as hazardous," Lee said, finally addressing his
concern, "to leave McClellan practically on my line of communication, and
to march into the heart of the enemy's country. Are you acquainted with
General McClellan?"
"Haven't seen much of him since the Mexican War, sir," Longstreet re-
plied.
"He is an able general, but a very cautious one," was Lee's assessment.
"His enemies among his own people think him much too cautious. His army
is in a very demoralized and chaotic condition, and will not be prepared for
offensive operationsor he will not think it sofor three or four weeks.
Before that time I hope to be on the Susquehanna."
Jackson returned to his headquarters. He was not troubled, as Longstreet
was, by the notion of splitting into separate units the Confederate force of
about sixty thousand men. McClellan's larger Union force would be cautious
for good reason: a tactical blunder might cost Lee his invasion, but a similar
mistake by McClellan would cost the North the war. A losing Lee could
always withdraw and defend the South; a losifig McClellan would have no
alternative but to tell Lincoln to sue for peace, and such a prospect would
surely increase the caution of a cautious man. The only move that Lee feared,
Jackson knew, was a McClellan thrust by water into the Peninsula to take
Richmond. Fortunately for the Confederacy, Lincoln was not likely to let him
do that again.
He awaited the delivery of Lee's written order, outlining the complex cam-
paign assignments to each of the Confederate generals. When Special Order
No. 191 arrived, Jackson studied it closely; the detailed plan showed extraor-
dinary boldness in dispersing Lee's army for separate assignments in the
presence of a stronger enemy army.
Trusting no aide to read the highly secret document, he made a copy in his
own hand and sent the copy to his brother-in-law, General Harvey Hill, who
was serving with Longstreet. Harvey was the solid, reliable General Hill;
"Little Powell" was the troublemaker. Thomas Jackson dispatched the copy
under seal, prepared mentally to recross the Potomac to strike the garrison at
Harpers Ferry, and turned to his evening prayers.

CHAPTER 16

ANTIETAM II
WITH MCCLELLAN
Corporal Barton Mitchell, Company E of the 27th Indiana Volunteer Infan-
try Regiment, United States Army, was persuaded that the citizens of Freder-
ick, Maryland, were fine people and loyal Unionists and the women were
good cooks.
"You sure you got the pie?" he asked First Sergeant John Bloss.
"I got the piesapple and peachand the fruit and the milk," said the
sergeant, next to him in a rank of four men. They were walking route step on
the road out of Frederick, forty miles northwest of Washington. "You better
have the ham, and the chicken legs, and the bread, and everything else."
"Fine people, Marylanders," said the Hoosier corporal. "Yesterday Bobby
Lee and his rebs was here, speechifyin' and proclaiming how they was lifting
the yoke of oppression, and the people looked at 'em sullen-like. And as soon
as the secesh moved out last night and we got here, all them same nice ladies
in the streets with the food, the men in the windows with the Stars and
Stripes, kids jumpin' up and down, made you feel good to be on our side."
"Be nice to eat this real food," said the sergeant. "Beats hardtacl and salt
horse."
"Can't bitch about McClellan chow," corrected the corporal. "Sure picked
up after Pope got kicked out. Little Mac knows how to take care of his boys."
He trailed along behind the sergeant for a few minutes, then added, "Except
for tobaccy. I could go for a good smoke." He thought back dreamily to the
time, before the Seven Days, when he had enjoyed a cigar.
"Here's a good patch of grass, an' a run of water." The sergeant raised his
voice and hollered to the platoon behind them, "Fall out! Stack arms! Take a
break!"
"Looks like secesh had the same idea," said Corporal Mitchell. The chosen
campsite showed signs of recent use: fruit rinds lay about and spots in the
earth showed where tent pegsJiad been ripped up not long before. No matter;
a good site was useful for whatever army was passing by, and a nearby brook
answered sanitation needs.
He built the triangle of rifles and lay on the grass near a sycamore tree. He
remembered the leaf from Indiana hikes. "S'pose we're gonna catch those
rebs, Sergeant?"
"Hand over the ham. They got a general with a red beard, went to West
Point with Little Mac. The two of them were sweet on the same gal, and
McClellan won out, married her. The feller who lost out, A. P. Hill'Li'1
Poweirwas sore as hell, swore he'd get even. Ever since, whenever McClel-
lan and Lee face up, like in the Peninsula, there's A. P. Hill charging our lines
like crazy, taking out his old grudge."
"S'pose that's a true story?"
"Everybody knows it. Last time he hit us, Malvern Hill, I think, the colo-
nel yelled out, 'My God, Nellie, why didn't you marry him!' "
Corporal Mitchell had a good laugh at that. Only a week ago, he remem-
bered, it had been hard to smile: he was a member of a beaten army under
that tyrant Pope, and all he could think of was getting home alive. Now
spirits were up; McClellan was in charge again. Colonel Silas Colgrove told
them that Little Mac had never lost a battle, which was true, and some of that
dread was gone. The corporal was not looking forward to catching up with
the rebels, but if a battle had to be fought, better it should be under a general
who knew what he was doing and thought about keeping his men alive.
After the peach pie and the milk and a hearty belch, he looked for a slope
to stretch out on. The rest of the regiment had filed into the open field and the
place was getting a little crowded, but the comfort-conscious Corporal Mitch-
ell found a spot, not far from the sergeant, fit for generals. In fact, from the
fairly fresh holes in the ground, it appeared that a headquarters tent had been
on that spot. He sat down, wishing he had a smoke, and his eyes lighted on a
large white envelope.
He reached over, picked it up, opened it, and his heart almost stopped. As
if in answer to a prayer, three big, beautiful, fragrant cigars were inside,
wrapped in a sheet of paper. Unbelieving, he inhaled the odor: the cigars were
the best quality. He rolled them gently in his fingers; they did not crinkle,
they were fresh, which brought forth a vision of hours of surcease from the
rigors of war.
Some rebel general must have left behind his packet of cigars. These were
not enlisted men's smokes. Corporal Mitchell looked around quickly to see
who had seen him make the find. Sergeant Bloss, ten yards away, was looking
at him. That meant two for himself, one for Bloss. He nodded to the sergeant,
who came over.
"Go get some matches," said the corporal. When in possession of cigars, a
corporal could give a sergeant orders. While Bloss was hunting up the light,
Mitchell glanced at the document in which the cigars were wrapped.
"Headquarters, Army of Northern Virginia, Special Order 191" was writ-
ten across the top. Rebel orders. "The army vill resume its march tomor-
row," it began. At the bottom was "By command of General R. E. Lee: R. H.
Chilton, Assistant Adjutant-General."
Good memento; he would take it home to Indiana after the war was over,
to remind him of this day and his good fortune with the cigars. Reading
farther into the orders, he noted the specific place-names of towns and moun-
tains in that area: Jackson to Harpers Ferry; Longstreet to Boonsboro;
McLaws to Maryland Heights, Walker to Loudoun Heights. The rebel gener-
als seemed to be marching off in all directions.
The sergeant came back with the matches, and Mitchell handed him one of
the cigars, showing the paper to him. Sergeant Bloss read the whole docu-
ment, put the matches back in his pocket, and inexplicably reached over and
took the two cigars out of Mitchell's hands. He rolled all three up in the
order, and put cigars and paper back in the original envelope. "We'd better
take this to the company commander."
In ten minutes the captain had taken them to the colonel, who examined
their discovery, gasped, and raced toward McClellan's headquarters. The
corporal thought it amazing how three cigars could go from an enlisted man
clear up the chain of command to the commanding general in less than an
hour. Mitchell and Bloss returned to the rest area, where the regiment was
unstacking weapons and getting ready to march.
"I'll see you get a commendation or something," said the sergeant.
"We could have just passed up the paper in the envelope," Mitchell ob-
jected. "You never should have given up them cigars."

CHAPTER 17

ANTIETAM III
AT DAYBREAK IN THE MORNING
Allan Pinkerton found it hard to believe what his eyes beheld. On a single
sheet of paper handed to him by Captain Armstrong Custer, the aide-de-
camp who smelled of cinnamon, was the battle plan of the enemy.
If authentic, and not some elaborate trick by a rebel out to embarrass him,
this document would be the greatest piece of military intelligence in all the
world's history. In terms of its effect, possession of this single sheet of paper
could decide the coming battle and secure victory for the Union and immor-
tality for George McClellan. The detective reached for a comparison. When
Rose Greenhow provided General Beauregard with the expected movements
of Federal troops before First Bull Run, that had been enormously i'elpful to
him, but never had there been a discovery of the most intimate secrets of a
campaign just before the battle.
"Chilton is Lee's adjutant, and he would sign the order," Pinkerton said.
"But how do we know this is Chilton's authentic signature?"
Custer signaled the two colonels who had brought in the document and
introduced them to "Major Alien, our chief of the Secret Service." One of the
colonels, from the 27th Indiana, told how the document had been found, and
showed the cigars. The other, Pittman, adjutant of the XII Corps, had what
Pinkerton judged to be the necessary corroboration: "Chilton and I served
together in Detroit before the war, Major Alien. I've seen his signature on
orders a thousand times. That's his handwriting, I'll swear to it."
The thought occurred to Pinkerton, as he pocketed the cigars, that if this
were a rebel trick, the same trickster who concocted the orders would have
had the sense to have Lee's adjutant-general put his signature on them. But
he did not want to think that; such suspicion undermined the chance to use
military intelligence as it had never been used before. He handed Lee's order
back to Custer, and the four of them hurried to McClellan's headquarters in a
local Frederick house. A delegation of local citizens was present, but this
news could not wait.
"Found by one of our men in the bivouac area used last night by General
Hill," Custer reported.
"Powell Hill?"
"No, Harvey Hill. According to that set of orders, sir, A. P. Hill is with
Jackson attacking Harpers Ferry right now."
McClellan read the paper quickly, then over again slowly, his astonishment
giving way to delight. In the presence of the colonels and the local citizens, he
cried, "Now I know what to do!"
When Pinkerton shot him a warning look, McClellan told the locals he had
pressing military business to attend to, and Custer ushered them out. One of
the visitors, Pinkerton noted suspiciously, seemed in a hurry to go; what was
his rush? General Jubal Early, the damnably daring rebel cavalry leader, was
undoubtedly in the area, reconnoitering; if this lost order was so important,
the news of its finding should be protected. Pinkerton began to wish he had
waited to see McClellan alone with the find. What could be done now? He
would look foolish if he demanded the most distinguished local citizens be
held in custody, and the detective in this moment of high drama hated above
all to look foolish. He let it go.
McClellan was addressing him. "Do you suppose this is a ruse de guerre?"
Pinkerton wished the general would not use foreign languages in these
crucial situations. That unfortunate habit came from having all those foreign
princes around headquarters as observers. The Secret Service chief pulled his
derby down tighter and scowled, as if in thought.
"It's not a trick," Custer put in, rashly as usual. "Pittman here vouches for
the signature. He served with Chilton."
McClellan dismissed the colonels and sat down, reading the document
again. "Here is a paper," he said with a mixture of deliberation and excite-
ment, "with which, if I cannot whip Bobby Lee, I will be willing to go home."
"It doesn't give the size of the various forces," Pinkerton cautioned. "I
estimate the total Confederate army at one hundred and twenty thousand. If
Lee sent Jackson and Hill off to Harpers Ferry with half of them, we still face
sixty thousand seasoned men behind South Mountain."
"Now that Porter's arrived, I have eighty thousand present for duty, and I
have the other side's plans. It is as if I sat in at Lee's staff conference." He
rose, folded the paper, and acted without the caution that Pinkerton always
associated with him. "We'll strike through Crampton's Gap across South
Mountain at daybreak in the morning."
"There's still time this afternoon," Custer suggested.
"Daybreak in the morning," McClellan repeated. "My general idea is to
cut the enemy in two and beat him in detail. First Lee tomorrow, then Jack-
son the next day."
Pinkerton never saw such a commotion around a McClellan headquarters
as followed that decision. Everything became now. The Army of the Potomac
was moving out, not proceeding in its stately, well-organized custom, but
with the first sense of urgency that Pinkerton remembered did not come from
fear of impending disaster. Supply wagons were packed, the men were told
"three days' cooked rations and forty rounds" in each knapsack. The horses
were fed and readied for a long march across South Mountain, more of a long
ridge of land running roughly parallel to the Potomac farther west. The rebel
armies, now known to be split up into three or more units in that long wedge
of land between the mountain range and the Potomac, made such an inviting
target that alacrity rather than caution was the order of the day.
Pinkerton picked up a telegraph message on McClellan's desk and noted,
"The President is asking his favorite question again." The plaintive tele-
graphed query read, "How does it look now?" Pinkerton thought that it
would be wiser to keep the blabbermouths in Washington in the dark about
the discovery of the lost order.
The general decided otherwise. He dashed off an excited message dated
"Frederick, September 13, twelve noon" that Pinkerton thought was unlike
any other sent by McClellan to Lincoln. "I have the whole rebel force in front
of me, but am confident, and no time shall be lost. I think Lee has made a
gross mistake, and that he will be severely punished for it." The general
paused, then plunged ahead: "I have all the plans of the rebels, and will catch
them in their own trap. Will send you trophies."
Pinkerton shook his head as the telegraph operator came in for the mes-
sage. The detective read it and passed it to him, with a peremptory "Send this
immediately, and show it to nobody else. Bad enough that Stanton will see
it."
"Castiglione will be nothing to it," McClellan said to nobody in particular,
as if still in wonderment at his good fortune. Pinkerton made a mental note to
check up on Castiglione, whoever he was. Possibly another one of those
foreign princes.
"This order confirms my estimates of rebel strength," said Pinkerton, lest
his commander get carried away by his unaccustomed euphoria. "No num-
bers are in it, but eight commands are spoken of. Figure fifteen thousand men
in each command, that's their average. Makes one hundred and twenty thou-
sand men." He was pleased when McClellan nodded agreement. "Our forces
may say eighty thousand on duty, but when you figure the cooks and quarter-
masters, and all our stragglers, that's maybe sixty thousand fit to t~ht.. Even
cut in half, Lee's forces are formidable, General; our cavalry scouts confirm
this."
The general lost some of his euphoria. "And if we should be so unfortunate
as to meet with defeat," McClellan added, sounding more like himself, "our
country is at their mercy."
"Lincoln is holding fifty thousand men in reserve in Washington that
should be here to fight this battle," Pinkerton said, deliberately touching his
commander's most exposed nerve.
"If I lose, I'll be court-martialed and shot," McClellan said, now fully
himself again. "I still have no authority beyond 'the defenses of Washington.'
Wade and his committee, and that blackguard Stanton, will say I lost on
purpose."
Pinkerton expressed his worry that the order might be a fake. The general
waved that aside: "No matter, I'll whip Lee here and now. He is not a general
to be trifled with, or carelessly afforded an opportunity of striking a fatal
blow." He thrust the paper into Pinkerton's hand. "Here, take this to Colonel
Key to be copied. I have to stir the utmost activity in my generals, Bumside
especially. I cannot understand what has happened to Burn, he's loyal to me
but he's been paralyzed in the movement of his troops. Go, quickly."
Pinkerton jammed one of the cigars found with the order in his mouth
the secesh had better tobacco than the Federals, never mind that they were ill
equipped otherwiseand headed for Colonel Thomas Key's office across the
hall. Nobody was more closely trusted than Key, officially the judge advocate
but in reality McClellan's political adviser, and Key had a source of informa-
tion that was invaluable to Pinkerton: his younger brother, Major John Key,
worked as a lawyer for Halleck at the War Department.
Key had a couple of civilians in his office. The detective started to back out,
but the colonel from Ohio waved him into the meeting. Pinkerton casually
slipped Lee's order inside his jacket pocket for transmission to the colonel in
private.
"Mr. Smalley and Mr. Paige of the New York Tribune," Key introduced
them, "this is Major Alien, who supplies us with information about the en-
emy." These reporters, too, were the enemy, in Pinkerton's opinionHorace
Greeley's men, from the journal that was after McClellan's scalp. Why was
Colonel Key seeing them? It must be at McClellan's behest. Smalley was a
regular journalist, but Paige was a Washington lawyer who only pretended to
be a war correspondent.
"I've been telling them of the plot, or talk of a plot, that we uncovered the
other night," said Colonel Key. Pinkerton caught on; Key was sending Lin-
coln and the radicals a message through Greeley that McClellan was un-
waveringly loyal to the Union.
"It's amazingand frightening," said Paige.
"Some members of the staff of the Army of the Potomac," Key went on,
"approached me last night with a scheme to turn and march on Washington,
and to"he searched for the word"intimidate the President."
Pinkerton nodded; Colonel Key had come to his room with the informa-
tion late last night. "General McClellan knew absolutely nothing about this,
you understand," the judge advocate said. "He knows nothing of it even now.
He is too much occupied with turning back Lee's invasion to be bothered
with the idle talk of a few misguided officers."
"What is it that these officers wanted to intimidate Mr. Lincoln about?"
asked Smalley.
"They wanted him to abandon his interferences with slavery," Colonel Key
replied, "hoping that the war could be settled on the basis of 'the Union as it
was.' They claimed to have heard that an abolition move was in the works in
Washington. They wanted to take a substantial force down there to impress
the President with the army's unwillingness to tand for that."
"Are you prepared to tell us who they are? They should be cashiered
forthwith," said Paige.
"No, it was in the nature of idle talk," said Key. "I told them to abandon
all such ideas, and they said they would. Now is hardly the moment, on the
eve of battle, to strip this army of its field-grade officers because of a crazy
idea."
"Why are you telling us this, then?" Smalley was a bit of a dandy but
sharp, Pinkerton noted; a man to be careful with.
"To let you know the sort of thing we're up against," Key answered
smoothly. Pinkerton knew the point the judge advocate was implanting. If
McClellan and other loyalists were not on the scene, the largest Union force
near Washington might be tempted to turn on Lincoln and take over the
government, as the military did so often in other countries. The very possibil-
ity of a coup should give the radicals pause in their campaign to vilify Mc-
Clellan. "It should be no secret to you gentlemen that some staff officers
speak of our highest officials in Washington as 'those old women.' The irra-
tional hatred of Lincoln, Stanton, and Halleck is rampant."
"Appalling," said Paige.
"What will stop this talk once and for all," Pinkerton put in, "is a victory.
We're heavily outnumbered1 trust you've seen the messages from the gover-
nors of Pennsylvania and Maryland, estimating rebel troops in their states as
over two hundred thousand?but General McClellan is determined to give
them a licking soon. That will stop the foolish talk in the camps."
"Let's hope so," said Paige, who would surely carry the story to Greeley or
to Stanton. "Colonel, I do not doubt the entire accuracy of your account.
Shocking."
"I trust nothing of this will appear in your newspaper," Key said, lawyer to
lawyer. Paige nodded his assurance and Smalley looked dismayed, but went
along. "But I thought it would be something for you to understand as you
write about the fighting to come." The political fighting for McClellan's scalp
was what he meant, Pinkerton knew; he had to admire Judge Key's adept-
ness.
On the way out, Smalley said, "I would like to put in a word for Alexander
Gardner, the photographer. He would like to be attached to the army next
week."
Colonel Key looked at Pinkerton, who said, "No. Mathew Brady is the
Army of the Potomac's photographer." So much for that; the detective did
not want Brady's competition wandering around the camps. If Brady's un-
grateful employees wanted to set up for themselves, they would have to do so
without access to battlefields. Pinkerton would be loyal to his friend.
When the Tribune men left, Pinkerton brought out the lost ord&' of Lee's
and enjoyed Key's amazed reaction.
"You were a genius to find this," the colonel said. "Thank God the general
has a Secret Service like yours."
Pinkerton said nothing; he felt he had helped verify the information, and a
truthful denial of all participation was not in him. With what he hoped was
some mystery, he asked, "Does the name Castiglione mean anything to you?"
"That was a battle of Napoleon's, in 1796," Colonel Key answered in-
stantly. He snapped his fingers. "Yes, yes, that's a perfect analogyBona-
parte divided an overextended Austrian army and beat it in detail. I had no
idea you were such a student of tactics, Pinkerton. You're absolutely right."
The detective tried to look modest.

CHAPTER 18

ANTIETAM IV
LEE'S OLD WARHORSE
James Longstreet was "Old Pete" to his troops, "my old warhorse" to Gen-
eral Lee. The forty-one-year-old South Carolinian could not figure out why
everyone called him old.
Maybe it was because he inspired trust; if so, he had let them all down at
Fair Oaks and Seven Pines. Longstreet blamed himself for the mistakes that
caused those operations to fail. Overall, he must have performed well in the
Peninsula, because Lee had rewarded him with command of the wing con-
taining half the Confederate infantry. But at Second Manassas, Longstreet let
down his commander again by not attacking quickly enough to complete the
rout of Pope's Union troops. He was dependable enough, went Longstreet's
self-assessment, but not bold enough. Why did Lee put him at his right hand,
superior to all but Stonewall Jackson? Longstreet supposed it was because
Lee had all the audacity he required and felt the need for a restraining mind
nearby.
Longstreet was with Lee in Hagerstown, Maryland, worried about the
Confederate forces being spread all over the map, as Special Order 191 had
laid out. Thirteen miles away, at South Mountain, Harvey Hill was plugging
the gaps in the long ridge with his rear guard. Even farther away, Stonewall
Jackson was headed for Harpers Ferry on what Longstreet thought was an
unnecessarily dangerous expedition; Jackson had A. P. Hill with him, re-
leased from arrest in view of the impending battles.
Old Pete, as he was beginning to call himself, was uneasy. On the other side
of South Mountain, possibly preparing to pounce on the separated elements
of the Confederate Army, was McClellan with at least ninety thousand fresh
Federal troops, well-equipped, close to home, and with more and better artil-
lery. General Lee had taken the terrible risk of dividing his army this way
because he was certain of McClellan's caution, but the Young Napoleon was
acting with uncharacteristic energy lately. Did McClellan somehow know he
outnumbered Lee's total forces nearly three to two? Did he sense that Lee
was risking all by sending Jackson and Powell Hill off to reduce the garrison
at Harpers Ferry?
Pacing in front of the headquarters house, wondering if he should bother
the commander again with his doubts about leaving the Southern forces so
scattered, Longstreet made way for a hard-riding cavalryman. The man dis-
mounted and announced he had a message for General Lee from General
Jubal Early. Early's cavalry provided eyes and ears for Lee's forces. Long-
street nodded and led the man to the commander's office; it was 10 P.M., but
Lee had not yet retired.
The general could not open an envelope with his bandaged hands. Long-
street did it for him, handed it over, and stood behind him to read it over
Lee's shoulder.
He caught his breath. A Frederick citizen loyal to the South had been with
McClellan when a messenger arrived with important information, which
caused much excitement at the Union headquarters. Did the Union know of
Special Order 191? Whatever had come in, McClellan had responded with a
great flurry of activity, quite uncharacteristic of him. The citizen had re-
ported to Early that an attack was likely through several of the mountain
gaps at daybreak, and the cavalry leader passed it to Lee with urgency.
Lee dismissed the messenger. "Pete, you'll have to march back-to South
Mountain at first light. Harvey Hill cannot hold the Federals for long."
"What if McClellan knows we're spread out all over Maryland?" Did Lee
realize the enormity of the damage done by the betrayal of his secret plans?
"We'll meet him at South Mountain with the men we have," the com-
mander said softly. "Jackson and A. P. Hill will reduce Harpers Ferry and
join us as soon as they can."
Longstreet was convinced Lee was making a mistake. "We're not prepared
to make a stand in the mountain gaps. After a four-hour forced march, my
men won't be ready for a major battle. We'll be outnumbered two to one,
three to one."
"We've been outnumbered before."
"But this time McClellan knows ithe'll come at us with all he has. Let's
try to get Jackson's men back intime, and to hell with Harpers Ferry."
Lee listened patiently, then ordered, "Get your men there. Make a stand at
the mountain passes."
Longstreet swallowed his objections and left. With McClellan in probable
possession of the Confederate battle plan, he felt naked. At the least, Lee
should take advantage of the knowledge that he knew that McClellan knew
and change his plans radically.
He lay down on the cot in his tent, could not sleep, then wrote a note to
General Lee with an alternative plan. Let South Mountain go, bring Harvey
Hill and his five thousand men back to the town of Sharpsburg, and move
Longstreet's men to that position as well. There, on the banks of the Antie-
tamnot a very deep stream, but one that offered some sort of natural defen-
sive positionthey could organize a new defense that would await the arrival
of Jackson and Hill from Harpers Ferry. Would Lee listen to reason? Did he
have no respect for a rejuvenated Union army under a suddenly active com-
mander? This deep in enemy territory, prudence required consolidation, if not
withdrawal. He sent his note to Lee and waited for a reply.
Just before dawn, Longstreet gave up waiting and let sleep come. General
Lee had given his order and expected it to be carried out. Old Pete, glad he
had at least expressed his reservations in writing, set out with his men to try
to stop McClellan, or at least to delay him, at the place of the Young Napo-
leon's choosing.

CHAPTER 19

ANTIETAM v
AN ARMY WITH BANNERS
Corporal Mitchell felt for the first time that he was part of a great enterprise.
Sunrise on Sunday morning, September 14, 1862, the hills of Maryland pink
and green, leaves just starting to turn, and the Army of the Potomac was on
the move. Times before, he thought only of his platoon plodding along, with
little idea about where the rest of the regiment was, and less idea of the grand
plan.
This time was different. Three vast columns were forming to march down
the western slope of the Catoctins, into a long valley, then up into the gaps in
the long ridge known as South Mountain, where the Johnnies were.
Marching in cadence down into the valley, looking back, a soldier could get
a picture of all he was a part of. The columns trailed back up into the hills
like blue-black snakes, moving imperceptiblyand in clear view of the rebels
on the far ridge. What must they be feeling, Mitchell wondered, as we
come at them with all the power and majesty of the Union in train? He
remembered a phrase in his Bible, "terrible as a" army with banners." A sight
like this could make a man tremble.
A shout went up from the troops in front of him. There, astride his famed
"Dan Webster," sat the man who put all this into action, Major General
George Brinton McClellan, looking like a grand equestrian statue, reviewing
the troopshis army, and Corporal Mitchell was proud to be a part of itas
it marched to war. As his platoon passed the general, the corporal saw Mc-
Clellan raise his arm and point to the gap in the mountain ridge where the
firing had begun. Corporal Mitchell knew he would never forget this moment
as long as he lived, even if that went long past the impending battle; there,
bestride his horse, was a real general, a leader who lifted a soldier's heart.
This was what war should be like, Corporal Mitchell decided, not all home-
sickness and dread of death, but being part of the greatest adventure of the
age. He raised his cap to join his platoon in a thrilling "huzzah!"

CHAPTER 20
AT BRADY'S GALLERY
"Let me go out there, Mr. Brady," Gardner pleaded. "This may be the final
battle of the war."
"I'll go myself. I'll take Foons. You stay in the studio."
Foons, the black who was a wagon driver and camera operative, knew
whose side he was on in the dispute between Mathew Brady and Alexander
Gardner. Foons was one hundred percent for Brady.
Not for the money, that was for certain: he had not been paid since the first
of the year. He ate Mr. Brady's food and slept on a mat in the back of the
studio, glad for shelter and scraps, more than most runaway slaves pretending
to be freedmen could count on.
He had not been singled out for nonpayment; nobody had been paid, not
even the men who thought wages a natural thing. Business was terrible and
Mr. Brady was not much for keeping accounts. Gardner and his brother,
along with Gibson and Tim O'Sullivanespecially the fiery O'Sullivanall
had horrendous fights with Brady that nobody could win. Foons was well
aware that Brady's eyes were failing fast and he needed his operators to run
the studio and photograph the war; but the operators needed Brady just as
much, because the owner of the studio seemed to have a stranglehold on the
rights from the War Department to go into the field and make war photo-
graphs. As a result, Brady's studio had become a little war zone all its own.
"Brady, you goddamn pigheaded fool," O'Sullivan roared his w&.v into the
argument, "you and that skinny little nigger can't go out on a battlefield and
you know it! You can't see your hand in front of your face and he'd get his
black ass blown off by the rebs as a runaway slave, which he probably is."
"Irish scum," said Brady, which was all he ever said to O'Sullivan any-
more. Brady was of Irish stock, too, but made it a point that he had been born
in New York. Foons thought O'Sullivan a bully, but knew that Gardner
considered him to be the best photographer of all of them, especially after
seeing the pictures of the bridge destroyed at Second Bull Run, with the
amazing texture of the water. His portrait of a derailed locomotive in the
wake of Pope's defeat made the machinery look like a dead elephant.
"Tim, stay out of this, please," said Gardner, "you never do us any good
with him. This time it's too important."
"Credit-grabber!" Sullivan shouted as he stormed out. "Cheap bastard!"
"I apologize for my colleague, Mr. Brady," said Gardner wearily. "He
shouldn't insult you. And he shouldn't try to scare you, Foons; I'm sure
you're safe here."
Foons knew he was safe in the studio, provided the South didn't win the
war, but he knew also that O'Sullivan was right about being caught on the
battlefield by the secesh. They did not take kindly to colored men who
seemed to be working for the Union troops, and all this talk about abolition
coming soon made them even madder. Foons was suspicious of what the
politicians were saying about emancipation, especially when they added "col-
onization"; he did not want to be sent to Africa to become a slave again to
some tribal leader. Besides, none of this freedom talk would mean much if
McClellan got whipped by Lee. Where would he hide if the South took
Washington and the Fugitive Slave Act was no protection?
"Mr. Brady," Gardner was saying in his most reasonable voice, "you have
done more than anybody alive to make possible the photographic coverage of
the war. I realize that."
"Who persuaded the Secretary of War, and McClellan and Pinkerton, that
photography was an asset in mapmaking?" Brady demanded.
"You did, to your eternal credit, Mr. Brady. Generations of photographers
yet unborn will revere your name."
"That is not what is important, Alex. I'm not a credit-grabber, as your
Irish scum friend says." Foons had heard this lecture before. "But the name
'Photograph by Brady' is what gives a picture importance, and makes it
possible for us to go into the field and record history."
"I've never disputed that."
"Ingratitude," muttered Brady, slamming around the empty plates on the
table.
"I'm grateful for your bringing me here from Scotland," Gardner recited,
"for the opportunity to use my knowledge of chemicals in this new art."
"You're lying," Brady declared. "If you meant it, you wouldn't keep
threatening to leave and take all my help with you."
"All I want to do is what you wanted to do once," Gardner pleaded. "Set
up for myself. Get the recognition that every artist deserves."
"Go ahead, do it. Leave today! Close up the shop on your way out, for
Foons and I will be in Frederick, Maryland, with McClellan."
Now Mr. Brady had him, Foons judged. That was Gardner's weak point.
The desire of the men who worked for Brady to cover the war made them no
more than slaves to the man who was master of the military passes in the
Whatizzit Wagon.
"You know I can't leave now," said Gardner, "any more than you can go
to the front in your condition. We're at an impasse, Mr. Brady." Long pause.
"I have a proposition for you, sir."
"I know what it is." Brady opened the medicine cabinet and took out a
bottle of lavender lotion to slap on his face. "You want to go to the front and
take the pictures of the last great battle, and bring the horror of war to every
home in the North. And all you want is the credit'photograph by Gardner'
and you'll let me have half the proceeds from the sale. Go to hell."
Gardner started to breathe deeply, and seemed to Foons to be near tears.
"Hell, then, is where I will go. I'll take a wagon and go to the front without a
pass and if I get arrested, so be it."
"Do that!" Brady slammed the chest shut. "Good luck."
Gardner crumpled. "You know I can't. Go ahead, Brady, you do the job
yourself. You go to the last great battle of the war. If your eyes fail, if you
miss the shot, if Foons cannot get the colloids ready just at the moment
needed, or the pictures developed within ten minutes, then photography can
wait until the next war."
After a long silence, Brady said, "Now I have a proposition to make to
you. I'll get you a pass from Stanton and give you the wagon and equipment
stereos mainly, some eight by ten plates. I'll give you Gibson as your
assistant." Good choice, thought Foons, who was just as glad not to have to
go; as O'Sullivan had guessed, he had no freedman's papers. Gibson had done
some fine work in the Peninsula.
"And it will be 'Photograph by Brady' as usual," said Gardner, thankfully
but helplessly.
"The album card will say 'Brady's Album Gallery' in big letters," said
Brady. "Along the lower edge of the print, in lettering too tiny for me to see,
it can say 'Photograph by' whoever."
"And I'll have the copyright."
"Or Gibson will, if he took it."
"Fair enough. More than fair, Mr. Brady."
"The proceeds of all sales, of course, go to Brady and Company," the boss
added. "You're on salary, if and when the money comes in."
"I'll leave within the hour," Gardner nodded, as if the money were not
important. "Homer Bates in the telegraph office says that the fight has al-
ready begun at a ridge near Sharpsburg, about six hours' ride in the wagon.
McClellan's never been so aggressive; he's forced his way through the gaps
and told the President he's on the verge of a great victory." Foons had never
seen Gardner show such excitement.
"And what did the President say?"
"He invoked God's blessing on the troops, and said, 'Destroy the rebel
army if possible.' "
"Sounds like Lincoln, all right," said Brady. "Get going before the war is
over. Shoot faces, not houses."
Gardner bolted out. Brady took off his thick glasses, folded them and put
them in the pocket of his long chemise. He leaned forward and held. his head
in his hands.
"That man owes you a lot, Mr. Brady."
"He says it but he doesn't mean it. He'll take the great pictures and open
his own place and drive me out of business if he can."
"Why do you let him, then?"
"Ah, Foons, they'll be great pictures. He has the eye." Brady sighed and
added bitterly, "And he has the eyes."

CHAPTER 21

ANTIETAM VI
DESTROY IF POSSIBLE
South Mountain's gaps had been forced. As George McClellan had expected,
the Confederates under Harvey Hill put up a fierce fight, emulating the
Greeks at Thermopylae, delaying the Union advance a full day before falling
back into an obviously prearranged defensive position behind a rust-brown,
meandering creek called the Antietam near Sharpsburg. McClellan welcomed
Lee's choice of battlefield; the Southerners would have a narrow stream in
front and the wide Potomac at their back. It was as if Lee, unconcerned about
a line of retreat, dared him to attack.
The Federals had at last won a battle, and for the first time since May were
following up the fighting with a general advance. After notifying Halleck that
Lee had been "shockingly whipped" at South Mountain, McClellan could not
resist sending a telegraph message to old Winfield Scott, in retirement at West
Point, saying: "R. E. Lee in command. The rebels routed, and retreating in
disorder." So much for Scott's first choice to head the Union forces.
The Gorilla had been heard from: "Destroy the rebel army if possible."
McClellan put that exhortation from Lincoln in his pocket with a wry smile:
for the first time since he had reassumed command, and only as a result of his
victory at South Mountain, the Union Army's general had an order making
legitimate his very presence in the field. It seemed to him that whenever he
succeeded, he was said to be carrying out orders; but if he failed, he would be
prosecuted for exceeding his authority. He felt as though he were fighting
with a noose around his neck.
The general scribbled out a message to Nellie, who he knew would be
worried: "the army has gained a glorious victory. We are pursuing with the
greatest rapidity, and expect to gain great results." He could almost hear her
telling him to rein in his enthusiasm. Plenty of fight was left in Lee, and
Pinkerton was certain that even this split portion of the South's forces out-
numbered his own. It was a risky business, attacking 90,000 rebel troops
behind a natural water barrier, with only 80,000 men of your own, with
maybe 20,000 out sick. But if he was going to strike at all, McClellan knew he
would have to strike quickly before Jackson's corps, including A. P. Hill's
division30,000 more Confederatescould return from their victory at Har-
pers Ferry to join with Lee's main force behind Antietam Creek.
The bad news was that Harpers Ferry with its 12,000 defenders had
promptly fallen, proving McClellan right and Halleck a dolt. Still, McClellan
had to grant that the garrison and all its supplies had served as bait, causing
Lee to make himself vulnerable by splitting his force.
"Is the headquarters to your liking, sir?"
He nodded approval to Colonel Key and Captain Custer. They had chosen
a two-story brick house on high ground about a mile from the Creek. Camp
chairs, telescopes, and a flagpole had been unloaded from the wagons and set
up in the front yard, augmented by armchairs belonging to the house's owner,
a man named Pry. The general had an unobstructed view of the long slope to
the river, where his army was slowly assembling. He would have a panoramic
view of the battle.
He put his eye to the telescope on the lawn. Three bridges across the
stream were visible. At the south end, to his left, a substantial stone bridge
invited crossing. In the center, another stone bridge was heavily defended by
artillery; that was where the rebels evidently expected the main attack. A mile
and a half northward, to his right, a third bridge would be sheltered from
rebel artillery fire by a dip in elevation; still farther upstream, the creek
appeared shallow enough for Federal infantry to ford.
A plan of battle formed in his mind. Joe Hooker was his most energetic
leader, especially with Burnside fretting about his authority these days; he
would send General Hooker's division across the north bridge toward the
white building he could see through the glass, dominating the high ground.
"What's that white building?"
"That's a Dunker church," said Captain Custer.
"A what?"
"The Dunkers. They're a religious sect, against war," Colonel Key ex-
plained.
McClellan grunted. "Why no steeple?"
Custer deferred to Key, who said, "I suppose they think it's arrogant to
have a steeple. None of the Dunker churches do."
He would send Hooker and his men there to make a sharp left southward
parallel to the stream, and then roll up the rebel defense line. At the same
time, at the stone bridge farthest south he would send Burnside's corps
across, which would prevent Lee from swinging his forces over to stop
Hooker. He would hold Porter's men in reserve, and if needed apply the
crusher with a thrust into the center. Or, if the battle went badlyif Jack-
son's force had already arrived back from Harpers Ferry and the rebel army
was unitedand Lee counterattacked across the Antietam, Porter and his
11,000 men would be there to make the stand to save Washington.
"Where's Burn?" McClellan was irritated at Burnside: he had been four
hours late getting into position two days before, and McClellan had to send a
sharp message calling him to account.
"He feels slighted and he's sulking," said Custer. "Thinks he should have
the command you gave Hooker."
McClellan gave a small groan. Burnside, with his odd-shaped cheek whisk-
ers, was a man whose reputation McClellan had been saving all his life. First
at West Point, helping him with his examinations; later, in civilian life, hiring
him for the Illinois Central Railroad because Burnside couldn't succeed as an
inventor. And now, when Burn seemed gripped by some mental paralysis, he
would have to carry him again.
"I have Jake Cox under him," McClellan said. "Get word to Cox to get the
Ninth Corps into position to take the bridge as soon as Hooker attacks in the
north." Lee had the advantage of interior lines, but a coordinated attack
could defeat him; the settlement of the war would follow.
"Will that be today, sir?" Custer asked. "Hooker's ready now, it's not yet
noon."
McClellan was torn: on one hand, there was the need for speed, with the
rebel forces at Harpers Ferry finishing their job of paroling the Union prison-
ers and heading back to join Lee. On the other hand, he felt the constant tug
of the need for better preparation: his artillery pieces were not yet properly
positioned to take full advantage of his firepower. Burnside needed time to
reconnoiter the stream around the southmost stone bridge; maybe it was
fordable.
Another doubt assailed him: was he right to attack at all? Lee's invasion of
the North had been stopped at South Mountain; the Gray Fox no longer
seemed to be in the mood for an offensive.
He thought of Lincoln's order in his pocket: "Destroy the enemy, if possi-
ble." It was surely possible, and despite Lincoln's mistake in withdrawing
from the Peninsula, the President did understand the need for a grand,
pitched battle between the armies preparatory to any sort of settlement. His
troops scented victory.
McClellan decided to carry the battle to the enemy. Honor as well as
politics demanded that the invader be forcibly repelled, and not permitted to
withdraw without punishment. The general was aware that the decision he
had just made was the most important of his life. It would put to rest all false
charges of treasonable timidity. He would strike the superior rebel force
where it awaited him.
But not impetuously, not foolishly. To Custer's question about an attack on
this day, he replied, "Tell Hooker to put an advance party across the creek
upstream this afternoon." He would delay the attack until the morning. "To-
morrow," he declared, "tomorrow we fight the battle that will decide the fate
of the Republic."

CHAPTER 22

ANTIETAM VII
TO THE DUNKER CHURCH
George Smalley was aware of Stanton's order banning all correspondents
from battlefields. Accordingly, the Tribune reporter sought out the general
most likely to be in the thick of the fight to offer his services as a volunteer
aide-de-camp.
His choice was "Fighting Joe" Hooker. Smalley dressed properly for the
occasion of meeting the general, setting aside his linen jacket and lavender
pants for a blue suit that could easily be adapted to a Union uniform. He rode
up to the general at dusk as Hooker prepared to launch a reconnaissance in
force across the Antietam and briefly introduced himself, not so much as a
correspondent as a volunteer. Smalley assumed that anyone who encouraged
the sobriquet of "Fighting Joe" was eager for all the recognition he could get,
and this judgment was confirmed when the general gave him all the creden-
tials he needed with a casual "Come along with me."
The cavalry, in the lead, splashed across the creek far upstream, led by
Hooker on a white horse, two divisions of infantry following in water no
deeper than their knees. Smalley was instantly as thrilled by Hooker as he
had been disappointed earlier in McClellan. Hooker played the game of war
as the youngest member of a football team plays football, showing a joy of
impending battle that the reporter had never observed in McClellan.
Hooker's countenance glowed when the battle began. Rebel muskets
flashed at them in the gathering darkness, backing Hooker's lead cavalry,
including Smalley, into the Federal infantry in the rear.
"If they had let us start earlier, we would have finished them tonight," the
general muttered, freely criticizing his commander's decision to wait until the
next day for a general attack. But even Hooker could not fight an unknown
foe on unknown terrain after dark. The Union troops lay down on the ground
within a stone's throw of the rebel skirmish line. Smalley slept with his
horse's bridle wrapped around his arm.
At four in the morning, as soon as a man could see the sights on his rifle, a
sergeant roused Smalley with a kick on the soles of his boots. The reporter
did not have time to shave before the battle of the Antietam, or the battle of
SharpsburgSmalley did not know what to call it yetbegan.
Three divisions abreast, Hooker's corps drove the rebel pickets back to-
ward the white Dunker church, taking a withering fire along the thousand
yards. Smalley saw the puffs of smoke and heard the bursts that indicated the
source of most of the rebel fire as coming from an adjoining cornfield. Hooker
reined in his horse and with his sword waved at his batteries of artillery.
Thirty-six Union fieidpieces began blazing canister and shell into the standing
corn, chopping itand the rebels firing from withinlike a long scythe.
From across the creek, longer-range Federal guns joined in the barrage. After
five minutes of the worst artillery hell Smalley had ever heard about, General
Hooker called a halt to the firing and led his infantry forward.
They were met by a new sheet of rifle fire; the Federal barrage had not
dislodged the rebel infantry. An officer in front of Smalley dropped off his
horse, the animal bolting forward until it, too, stumbled and dropped. He
could hear the hail of bullets, and realized why it was called "hail"the lead
was whizzing through the air before thudding into flesh or dirt. Military
formations were lost as the two armies grappled man to man. His eyes
smarted from the smoke, his ears were deafened by the boom of nearby guns.
Some crazed artillerymen were firing into the engaged infantry as if not car-
ing which side's men were being killed and maimed.
But Hooker's troops kept on, swarming ahead toward the objective, a
whitewashed church now peeked with rifle fire. The Confederate line at last
broke, soldiers in butternut gray-brown trying to scramble over turnpike
fences and being impaled as bullets caught up with them. Northern voices
were roaring as the tide of battle seemed to turn.
Then the Texans hit them. The yelps of the countercharging rebels sent a
shiver through the ranks as Hood's troops emerged from the woods, pulled
up short, and at point-blank range decimated the Union ranks. In horror,
Smalley saw men falling all around him, felt himself in the vortex of blood
and death. He fought back a sudden urge to evacuate his bowels.
"The enemy are breaking through my lines!" Hooker shouted. "Fall back!"
Smalley's horse took a bullet in the neck, reared backward, and the re-
porter slipped out of the saddle before the horse collapsed on him. He ran to
the rear with the others, all the way back to where the Federals had begun the
charge a thousand yards and two thousand casualties ago. General Hooker,
seated against a tree, looked dazed, one foot oozing blood, the fight gone out
of him. But the massed Federal artillery saved the day: when the Texans
whooped and charged again, Union canister ripped into their ranks and the
rebel line melted away.
Hooker could not bring himself to assemble his men to mount a new
charge. Some had deserted, others were separated from their units, thousands
were dead or wounded; his corps was shattered. Another Union general came
by, a white-haired manSmalley assumed it was old Mansfieldand the
bleeding Hooker waved him and his fresh troops ahead toward the Dunker
church.
The terrible slaughter began again, without the mercy of a lull, the two
armies stepping on their own and each other's dead, attacking and counterat-
tacking. In the end, about noon, a gray-faced force of bluecoats held the
ground around the church, too exhausted to press their advantage. The men
in gray farther down the slope, many firing from the cover provided by
corpses, were too whipped to throw more bodies into the carnage.
Longstreet rode down the line from the north. Stonewall Jackson, newly
arrived from Harpers Ferry, having ridden far in advance of his own infantry,
had helped stop the Federal assault, thanks to Hood's Texans.
"Where are your men?" Longstreet asked General Hood, who replied,
"Dead on the field." The Texan had started fighting with nine hundred; three
hundred were left. In all, the force under Jackson must have lost five thou-
sand men that morning, probably more than the Federals.
Longstreet knew they could not afford that; in all, Lee had fewer than forty
thousand men at Sharpsburg, not half of what he presumed to be the effec-
tives available to McClellan. The gray line was a wisp, shuttling men up and
down the interior line to meet the uncoordinated Yankee thrusts. Luckily the
southernmost bridge had not been seriously attacked; Longstreet could not
understand why McClellan's favorite, Bumside, was holding back, but he was
thankful that all the attackers did not come at once.
Suddenly the center was in crisis. A sunken road had offered the Confeder-
ates a natural entrenchment, and from that cover the gray troops had been
picking off any Yankees who dared come up the middle. But a Yankee force
had outflanked the long trench and started blazing into it with enfilade fire.
Longstreet looked down into the position and for the first time in his military
career wanted to be sick. Bodies of Southern boys lay next to each other, on
top of each other, scores of corpses shot in the bloody lane, as if prepared for
mass burial.
Slightly to the north of the center, not far from the remainder of Hood's
Texans, a force of bluecoats was pushing back a regiment of North Carolina
men. Longstreet signaled for them to get back into line and return fire, but a
Confederate colonel held up an empty rifle helplessly. His men were out of
ammunition.
Two artillery pieces were standing idle, no gunners to man them. The
general dismounted and told his three aides to follow him and bring the
cannons into line against the oncoming charge. Longstreet held the reins of
the four horses and walked forward to call the shots. When the Yankees
appeared, they were met with a roar of canister from one gun, then in a few
seconds from the other. Longstreet signaled for the otherwise useless North
Carolina men to stay in line and wave their colors; he was determined to
make it seem as if the position were defended by ammunition-laden infantry
backed up by artillery.
General Chilton, Lee's adjutant general, came riding up moments later and
asked, "Where are the troops you're holding the line with?"
Longstreet pointed to his three aides, firing faster than they had ever done
in artillery school, and to the flag wavers. "Over there, but they don't have a
cartridge." Chilton's eyes widened; he struck spurs to his horse and sped to
Lee for reinforcements. Longstreet knew the southern part of the line could
spare them; he silently blessed Bumside for delaying his attack.
Arms folded, contemplating the stone bridge a hundred yards ahead of
him, Ambrose Bumside turned over in his mind the advisability of sending
his men charging across.
"An order from General McClellan," called Colonel Key, dismounting.
That was unlike Mac; he rarely interfered with the decisions of his field
commanders once a battle had begun. Bumside doubted that Hooker, Mac's
new favorite, was being similarly harassed. "Push across the bridge," went
the order, "and move rapidly up the heights."
"Great loss of life involved," Bumside warned.
"Carry the bridge at the point of the bayonet, if necessary," Colonel Key
insisted; "sacrifices must be made." That did not sound like McClellan at all.
Still, Key was the commanding general's right-hand man, which was proba-
bly why McClellan had chosen him to be the carrier of such an unlikely
order. "Every moment is of the utmost importance."
"McClellan seems to think I am not trying my best to carry this bridge,"
General Bumside told Colonel Key. "You are the third or fourth one who has
been to me this morning with similar orders." He waved him off.
For seven hours, Bumside had been probing the defenses around the stone
bridge. Perhaps he should have sent a man ahead the night before to test the
depth of the stream; if it was fordable, he could send his fourteen thousand
men swarming across and overwhelm the rebels sniping from the other side.
Bumside had been determined to get his men across dry-shod, thus better
able to carry the battle up to higher ground, but Key's visit could not be
ignored: He took a deep breath and ordered two regiments to rush the bridge,
never mind the casualties.
The charge, to his surprise, was successful; for some reason, the rebel
defenses were weaker than he had anticipated. With that bridgehead secured,
Bumside ordered another division to attempt to ford the creek farther down-
stream, if it was not too deep. To his chagrin, the men did so with ease; they
could have been across and in the fighting first thing in the morning.
Instead of pressing ahead against the thin Confederate ranksit seemed
that most of Lee's men were defending the other two bridges, in light of the
relative inactivity at Bumside's positionthe Union force stopped just over
the bridge. A colonel came running back to him with embarrassing news.
"We're out of ammunition, General. The men have been shooting at snipers
all morning, and we didn't realize that when we put them across the bridge."
"Ah," said Bumside. He could count on nobody.
When he said nothing else, the colonel asked, "Can we get the cartridges
across to them?"
"No, bring that division back. Send up another division equipped to fire."
That took two more hours to do. Bumside was still irritated at the way he
had been treated by McClellan; it struck him that Mac unaccountably fa-
vored that sneaky military politician Hooker in this campaign. He was fur-
ther annoyed by, and refused to respond to, messages of urgency from the
command post in the Pry house. By midaftemoon he had put only three
thousand of his fourteen thousand New Yorkers and Pennsylvanians across
the stream and into the fighting, but could not see why his steady deliberation
should be cause for McClellan's haste. He wondered if his old friend Mac had
been panicked by the relentless pressure from Stanton and Halleck into at-
tacking a superior force.
Lee did not let it show, but he knew he was witnessing the development of
a catastrophe.
He had no reserves. His left, the northern position under Jackson, could
not withstand another Union assault; accordingly, he ordered Jackson to
deliver an attack of his own. His center was evidently being held by Long-
street's staff aides manning a cannon and a few unarmed men with flags. His
right, which had been stripped to a skeleton force to strengthen the left
against Hooker and those who followed him, now was under pressure as
Bumside's well-rested thousands were pouring across the stone bridge. He
needed a few thousand men to stop Bumside's belated move but could draw
them from nowhere. A. P. Hill's light division was seventeen miles away in
Harpers Ferry, but Lee did not know whether his message to drop everything
and join the battle had made it to him.
"General, are you going to send us in again?" The voice of a cannoneer,
ordered with his comrades to join Jackson in his attack, was familiar. It was
his son, Robert.
"You must do all you can to drive those people back," the general replied.
The boy was in the ranks, as he should be, with no privileges. He was proud
of him.
His right began to cave. Blue flags could be seen on the ridges above,
almost a mile up from Bumside's brigade; they could soon come around and
cut off his line of retreat to the Potomac. In the distance, he could see two
columns of troops in blue uniforms marching along separate sections of the
ridge line. If they were Bumside's men, he might have to consider the possi-
bility of surrender. Longstreet had been right: Lee should not have divided
his army in the presence of McClellan, because Little Mac was not the easily
confusable Pope. Lee did not dwell on those thoughts; if this army was going
to lose, it would lose in glory, and he would take the ragged remnant home to
fight again another day. Only heroes would be left.
"Whose troops are those?" he asked an artillery lieutenant. The officer
offered him his binoculars. "Can't use it," Lee said, showing his bandaged
hands. "Those troops therewhose are they?"
"They are flying the United States flag, sir."
Burnside's men, to cut him off. "And whose troops are those?" he pointed
to the other column approaching from the southwest.
The lieutenant focused his glasses. "Those are blue uniforms, I'm sorry to
say, General."
Lee did not permit himself a groan. The gamble had been his own, against
Old Pete's prudent advice, and he would bear the responsibility not only for
the terrible losses, but for the defeat.
"They're Union soldiers, I think, sir, but they have our flags." The spotter
seemed confused. "Virginia and Confederate colors, General, maybe captured
from us."
Hope surged in Lee. The colors were not captured, the uniforms were
taken along with shoes from the captured Union garrison and worn by the
captors on their forced march to the battle.
Lee nodded calmly, as if that was what he expected. "It is A. P. Hill from
Harpers Ferry." He was not finished yet.

CHAPTER 23

ANTIETAM VIII
A MASTERPIECE OF ART
"In ten minutes the fortunes of the day seem to have changed," wrote Smal-
ley, kneeling, his notepad on his knee. "It is the rebels now who are advanc-
ing, pouring out of the woods in endless lines, sweeping through the field
which their comrades had just left . . ."
The Confederates were wearing blue Federal uniforms, the Tribune man
noted, part of the loot captured at Harpers Ferry, along with boots and rifles
in such short supply. The Rhode Island and Connecticut regiments were
confusedmen in blue shooting at them?and held their fire. A couple of
Ohio regiments were rushed over to help Burnside's men but A. P. Hill's
angry rebels were not to be stopped.
Powell Hill had apparently whipped his men seventeen miles in seven
hours, over rugged terrain, losing two thousand of his five thousand by the
wayside, but the men who arrived, no matter how tired, knew what their
mission was. Their first volley dropped four hundred Connecticut men and
drove the rest to cover. Burnside's line sagged and broke. Bursting shells set
fire to haystacks where men were hiding or resting; their screams mingled
with the sound of musket fire and the yip-yip-yip of rebel yells.
Was the battle over? Who had won? Smalley faced the twin problems of
figuring that out, compounded by the challenge of finding a telegrapher to
send his copy back to the New York Tribune.
A brigadier on McClellan's staff rode up to him. "Smalley! You're a friend
of General Hooker. Ride to him now, tell him to rally his corps and lead it
back onto the field. He can save the dayand save the Union!"
"Hooker is injured," the correspondent replied. "He took a bullet in his
foot."
"Let him get into an ambulance, for God's sake, and drive back onto the
field." McClellan's man, a general who said his name was Wilson, was insis-
tent that Smalley and nobody else carry the message. "We need Hooker now,
to take command. The men need a leader."
What was this general suggesting? That Hooker seize command from Mc-
Clellan, or merely take command of his own mennow under George Meade
and rejuvenate them? He chose to interpret the suggestion as well-inten-
tioned rather than mutinous. "Hooker will go back in action," he responded
with enthusiasm, "I'll answer for it."
He rode back to the farmhouse field hospital. General Hooker was seated
with his bandaged foot elevated on a chair.
"General McClellan wants to know how you are," said Smalley.
"In pain. What news from the battlefield?"
"Our side is no longer fighting," Smalley said. "Bumside cannot get his
troops into the battle. Porter's reserves have not been committed and may
never be. The rebels have suddenly been reinforced, and there's every chance
that Lee will escape across the Potomac."
"All a waste, all those gallant men dead."
"Unless" Smalley let the word hang. Here was this man's opportunity to
become a genuine hero, since McClellan's caution and Bumside's ineptitude
had created a vacuum.
"You need not go on," Hooker said hastily. "You see I cannot move."
The correspondent's shoulders sagged. He left, not knowing whether he
had carried a message from McClellan, or from a group of insubordinate
officers who wanted a fighting general to replace McClellan. Smalley won-
dered for a moment if a newspaperman should be carrying that kind of mes-
sage, then reminded himself that he had wangled his way onto the field as a
general's aide.
But now he had to write and file his story, whether or not the battle was
finally over. No other correspondent was likely to have seen as much as he
had seen. He made a note to remind himself of the critical mistake: "Bumside
hesitated for hours in front of the bridge which should have been carried at
once by a coup de main . . ."
As darkness began to add to the smoke in making observation difficult,
Smalley hurried to McClellan's headquarters at the Pry house. The battle was
stalemated; Lee's men had held at all three bridges. Were the Confederates
exhausted, weak, ready to collapse at one more blow from fresh troopssuch
as those reserves under Fitz-John Porter that McClellan had saved for this
critical moment? Or was Lee playing possum, holding back thousands of
hidden troops of his own, waiting for McClellan to commit his last offensive
reserve so as to strike back hard, win the battle and the war?
He looked at the men gathered on the lawn in front of the Pry house and
made notes on the relevant details: "McClellan's glass for the last half hour
has seldom been turned away from the left. He sees clearly enough that
Bumside is pressedneeds no messenger to tell him that. His face grows
darker with anxious thought." Nobody else would have these details.
"Looking down in the valley where fifteen thousand troops are lying,"
Smalley scribbled, "he turns a half-questioning look on Fitz-John Porter, who
stands by his side, gravely scanning the field. They are Porter's troops below,
fresh and only impatient to share in the fight.
"But Porter slowly shakes his head, and one may believe that the same
thought is passing through the mind of both generals: 'They are the last
reserves of the last army of the Republic; they cannot be spared.' "
McClellan, with Fitz-John Porter at his side, Captain Custer and Colonel
Key at hand, stepped away from the telescope. Bumside's attack downstream
had been a disaster. He should have followed orders and had fourteen thou-
sand men across that bridge at 7 A.M. The strangely lackadaisical, probably
fearful Bumside had finally put a fourth of his force across in midafternoon,
but the delay had allowed Lee to concentrate on stopping Hooker to the
north; now, the portion of Bumside's Federals who had crossed were met and
stopped by A. P. Hill's men in their new Union blue coats.
Little Powell's relatively small force, coming just at the wrong moment,
had effectively stemmed the Union tide; Nellie would find that ironic. It
occurred to McClellan that if he had gone into action a day earlier, Lee
would not have been able to reassemble his divided army. He put that trou-
bling thought out of his mind; today's real problems were caused by the
failures of Bumside and Hooker.
In McClellan's eyes, "Fighting Joe" had received a bullet in the foot and
taken himself out of the action on the most important day of his nation's life
not much fight in Joe. McClellan reminded himself that Albert Sidney
Johnston had died from neglect of a similar wound, but a corps commander's
place in battle was at the head of his troops, unless he was seriously disabled.
He stepped back from the eyeglass to take in the panorama of the battle:
Federal shells were bursting over and in the Confederate lines, as his artillery
outgunned Lee's; the smoke from cannon and muskets obscured the fields
where men were yet grappling in the dusk. Most of the flashes came from his
left, downstream, where Burnside's men were being stopped; to the right,
what was left of Hooker's old command was still putting pressure on the rebel
lines.
Now was the moment, McClellan knew, to gamble all with a charge of
Porter's fresh reserve troops up the middle. If such an attack succeeded, Lee
might well be routed, the war won, McClellan recognized as the worthy
successor to Napoleon.
"Robert Lee has always come up with the troops needed to stop us," said
Porter, reading his thoughts. McClellan rested his arm on the telescope and
looked at the ground; Fitz was the one general he could depend upon. He had
courage and judgment. If McClellan called on him, Porter would lay down
his life, if need be, in breaking that rebel center.
But what Porter had observed about Lee was true: somehow, at every
stage, the aggressive Confederate commander, when forced on the defensive,
had come up with enough troops at the right place to stop the Union thrusts.
McClellan was certain that Lee had more forces than he was showing. How
strong were his reserves? If Porter's men charged the center, would Lee then
commit Longstreet and his corps, who had probably been held secretly in
reserve, to stop them? And if Longstreet did stop the charge, as the rebels had
done all this uncoordinated day, what then?
The overeommitted Union Army would have no way of stopping Lee's
counterattack across Antietam stream. The Union commander put himself in
Lee's shoes: Let McClellan exhaust his reserves attacking us all day, and then
with typical audacitythrow in Longstreet's fifteen thousand to drive the
Union from the field. Nothing then would stand between Lee and Washing-
ton, or Baltimore, or Philadelphia. With an army of only fifty thousand men,
he could humble the North and end the war.
"How many men do you have for a charge, Fitz?"
"I had eighteen thousand to start. We've been feeding them in slowly all
afternoon, left and right. About four thousand infantry ready to go now."
That decided it for McClellan; the reserve was not great enough to carry
the day on a charge, but it might be strong enough to make a stand and hold
fast if Lee threw in his reserves in the next hour. McClellan could not prop-
erly take the gamble. His historic assignment was to stop Lee's invasion,
which he had done; his task was not to risk total Union defeat on the possibil-
ity of total Union victory. No commander had the right to gamble for per-
sonal glory with his nation's existence.
"We'll hold your men here to stop Lee if he attacks," McClellan decided.
Yesterday and today, he had taken the offensive; he won a victory yesterday
and fought Lee to at least a draw today. The dead and wounded were heaped
on the field in numbers that staggered the mind; the moans of the wounded
could be heard behind the roar of artillery. Enoughthe day's battle was
over, the Republic saved; nobody could ask more of this army.
"Today's battle was a masterpiece of art," Porter assured him.
McClellan agreed. "My only mistake was not in giving to you the com-
mand I gave to Bumside."
He put his eye to the glass and watched the battle slowly become history.
McClellan had found the enemy army, driven it to bay, and attacked a force
that everyone agreed was much larger than his own. His fine army had bled
and caused the enemy to bleed, as never before on this continent. He had
captured a dozen guns and scores of enemy colors, losing, to his knowledge,
none of his own. Plenty of trophies. He had been on the offensive all day;
tomorrow, let Lee take the burden of the offense. McClellan would not leave
the bloodsoaked field; when Lee learned that, he would have to withdraw.
"You'll be criticized by Lincoln and Stanton," Porter reminded him, "for
not being aggressive enough."
That would be the next battlewith the second-guessers in Washington.
But who in that crowd, with bags packed for evacuation, could dispute the
fact that he had saved the country? "I'm going to insist that Stanton be
removed and that Halleck shall give way to me as commander in chief."
"General-in-chief," Porter corrected him. "Lincoln is"
"I will not serve under Halleck, the incompetent fool." He thought of the
twelve thousand Union troops captured at Harpers Ferry, thanks to Halleck's
stupidity and Lincoln's agreementa force that could have been charging the
rebel center right now. "Stanton must leave and Lincoln must restore my old
place to me. Unless those two conditions are fulfilled, I will leave the service."
"They cannot refuse you that."
"I have done all that can be asked, in twice saving the country." That was
the nub of it: McClellan had never campaigned to crush the South and subju-
gate its people. His mission had been only "the defense of Washington," but
he had interpreted that as "to seek out and confront the enemy and save the
country," and that is what he had done this day, here on the banks of the
Antietam. He had demonstrated that neither side could conquer the other;
now was the time for sensible statesmen to work out a settlement to restore
the Union as it was.
With Stanton and Halleck out of the way, he could deal directly with
Lincoln, who was not a bad sort when well advised. McClellan promised
himself to keep the President better informed in the future; he was entitled to
know grand strategy, just as McClellan, if he succeeded Lincoln as President,
would expect to be informed by his subordinates.
He looked through the telescope again at the seemingly vulnerable center.
Who knew how many men Lee had in reserve? The General straightened, and
to Porter shook his head; there would be no gamble.
George Smalley looked again at the speculative line he had written, placing
words in the mouth of one or the other of the Union generals: "They are the
last reserves of the last army of the Republic; they cannot be spared." Was it
fair of him to put that last part in quotations? It was only an observer's
educated guess at what had been said, but perhaps the reader would think
Porter actually was overheard using those words. Smalley liked it; he left it in
quotes. Poetic license. Let the generals deny that was what they were think-
ing.
What about his lead? The Tribune's readers would want to know who won,
but he could not tell them because the battle was not over. Who would
withdraw tonight or tomorrow? Would the exhausted armies, more than deci-
mated by casualties, simply accept a stalemate and go home?
He could start with the casualties: "George McClellan, whose concern
about casualties has caused him to be charged with timidity, today led the
Union Army into the bloodiest single day of the war. Preliminary estimates
are twenty-five thousand men killed, wounded and missing, evenly divided
between the armies despite the South's advantage of interior lines and of
being on the defensive all day . . ." The reporter rejected that before his
editor could; irony did not belong in a lead.
Smalley began again. "Battlefield of Antietam, Wednesday evening, Sept.
17, 1862 . . . Fierce and desperate battle between two hundred thousand
men has raged since daylight, yet night closes on an uncertain field." That
was safer and better. "It is the greatest fight since Waterloo, all over the field
contested with an obstinacy equal even to Waterloo . . ."
Hungry, bone-tired, afflicted with the urge to unburden himself of all the
unreported information cramming his head, Smalley commandeered his col-
league's horsePaige started to object, but Smalley snatched the reins out of
his handsand raced for Frederick.
The Union forces had outrun the telegraph cable, which could only be
strung at a mile an hour. Smalley had heard that McClellan had sent back a
few cryptic messages to Stanton that a great battle was raging, perhaps the
greatest in history. Those had been sent by rider to Frederick, Md., and then
telegraphed to Washington, which would be the Tribune's method of filing.
Smalley whipped his horse like A. P. Hill driving his troops but arrived at
the telegraph office too late. The door was locked and the office dark. Nobody
in the upstairs apartment knew where the telegraph operator lived; the corre-
spondent would have to wait until seven in the morning.
Smalley sat on the front step of the telegraph office and started to compose
his copy. If Bennett's man on the New York Herald had gone up to Hagers-
town and found the telegraph open there, the Tribune would be beaten and
editor Sydney Gay would never forgive him. Should he ride north? What if he
got lost, or the horse stumbled, or the Herald had some unsuspected method
of filing near Frederick? Smalley decided not to move; he would write his
story where he sat, sleep on the telegrapher's doorstep, and file at daybreak.
Covering some battles, a reporter often had to operate with no knowledge of
the competition's resources.
CHAPTER I
Two PROCLAMATIONS
No news from the front in Maryland. Lincoln fretted in his office for a time,
then bolted over to the telegraph office, but the only word Stanton had re-
ceived from McClellan was a brief message relayed through Baltimore be-
cause the Union forces had outrun the telegraph line, "We are in the midst of
the most terrible battle of the warperhaps of history."
He weighed McClellan's adjective: not the "greatest" battle, but the "most
terrible" battle. What did that meanmore casualties than at Shiloh? Typical
of McClellan to think of the hair-raising terror of a battle and not the oppor-
tunity to deliver the blow to save the Union and end the war. Lincoln had
sent him eighteen thousand men with Fitz-John Porter; had that been
enough? Had he been prudent, or criminally timid, to hold back fifty thou-
sand for the defense of Washington? Certainly those fifty thousand could not
hold Washington if McClellan lost to Lee north of Frederick. Lincoln began
to have second thoughts about not giving McClellan all the reinforcements he
sought before "the most terrible battle."
Lincoln had to give McClellan credit for unaccustomed audacity: for the
past two weeks he had been acting like a fighter. What had changed him so?
Lincoln assumed his reappointed general had been aroused to action by the
sort of snubbing he got after Pope's angry charges against him. Certainly
Little Mac had performed well a few days before at South Mountain, the first
real victory the Union could claim since Grant at Donelson more than half a
year ago. If he won today at Sharpsburg, capturing Lee's army, McClellan
would pose a new and different problem: the victorious commander, with the
army personally loyal to him, demanding that his views of peacemaking be
carried out by the President.
On the other hand, if McClellan lost, the war was lost. The government
would have to evacuate Washington and sue for peace on terms of disunion.
Lincoln closed his mind to that; it was not in McClellan's nature to lose
decisively, as he had shown on the Peninsula. If this day at Sharpsburg went
against him, the Young Napoleon would retire in good order, defending
Washington, holding fast to his professional reputation, husbanding the re-
mains of his beloved army. At least he could be depended on not to lose.
That, of course, might be accounted for by more than his cautious nature;
Lincoln suspected that the never-losing, never-winning pattern was part of
the ambitious general's political-military design. Word had reached him of
the talk in the army of stalemate, and negotiation between officers on both
sides who knew and admired each other. And Stanton had reported the
communication between McClellan and the Democratic leaders in New York.
Such insubordination was really intolerablethe President slammed a sheaf
of telegraph messages down on Major Eckert's desk at the thought of itbut
what could be done? No McClellan, no army.
He could do nothing about that internal threat in this dark and doubtful
moment. But Lincoln resolved, at the first opportunity, to rid himself and the
nation of the determinedly irresolute general, and of the element in the officer
corps whose heart was not in the war. The clearing of that particular hard
acre, roots and stones, could not take place after a defeat, when McClellan
would still be needed to defend Washington; nor could it be after a victory,
which would make the general's removal appear to be politically inspired and
might stimulate an army revolt.
Lincoln pondered a third possibility: the ambiguity of a draw. What if the
result of today's battle turned out to be mutual bloodletting and exhaustion,
as at Pittsburg Landing, with no clear victory for either side? In that case,
Lincoln suspected that the pressure from Wade and Sumner and Greeley
would make it expedient to take important command from McClellan soon.
But not too soon; elections were coming and the Peace Democrats needed a
dramatic issue to rally 'round. The second dismissal of McClellan, especially
after any sort of achievement at Sharpsburg, would provide them that issue.
Election Day in most states was only six weeks off; Lincoln could wait until
then, but was determined not to wait a day later.
Meanwhile, if his generals could not win the war, Lincoln knew of one
powerful political action he could take to strike at the secession.
Favoring his sprained left wrist, which was swollen and aching, Lincoln
strode down the long War Department hall to Halleck's office. Senator
Reverdy Johnson of Maryland, a good War Democrat, was there with a
Union captain in tow, obviously dropping some bad news on the general-in-
chief. Halleck was slouched behind his desk, clinging to his elbows the way he
did when he was too scared to give a recommendation. He rose when the
President walked in and told the captain to tell his story again.
"I just rode in from Harpers Ferry, sir. Our cavalry escaped."
"And the rest of the garrison?" Lincoln, as he asked the question, dreaded
the answer.
"Surrendered. Colonel Miles wouldn't put up a fight. He just saw those
rebels up on the heights and he ran up the white flag. Got killed doing it, too
cannonball."
Lincoln dug his hands into his hair; twelve thousand men captured at a
time when the draft was producing no men at all! Tons of supplies now in the
hands of the rebels, when they needed boots and rifles as never before to
supply their invasion of the North. The garrison had been under the com-
mand of an officer convicted of drunkenness at First Bull Run, and this
sudden surrender smacked to Lincoln of cowardice or treason.
"Other Union officers were there," Halleck said to the captain, as if it were
all his fault. "Did they all turn tail when Miles wanted to give up?"
"Almost all tried to argue him out of it, General." The captain was near
tears. "But Colonel Miles kept saying he was not going to be party to a
massacre. We told him that McClellan had sent a relief column, and that we
ought to try to hold out a while if only to tie down General Jackson's men,
but he wouldn't listen."
"It's true he was outnumbered," Halleck said weakly.
"That's when the cavalry made our dash out. We didn't want to spend the
war on parole or in prison."
"You did well to do that," Lincoln told him. The cavalry would have done
better to dash toward McClellan's forces in battle rather than run home to
Washington.
Lincoln shook his head in disgust. He told Halleck he was going out to the
Soldiers' Home for the night, and to send a rider immediately with any
telegraphed word from McClellan. He could not help the war by waiting in
the telegraph office, but he could work on a second draft of one of the procla-
mations in Silver Spring.
"Stanton asked me to remind you about the proclamation on internal secu-
rity," said Halleck miserably. "He expects riots about the draft, and he may
be right if things go badly at Sharpsburg."
Lincoln nodded and walked outside to his horse. Hill Lamon handed him
the reins, and followed him on the forty-minute journey to Silver Spring. The
heat had let up; a thunderstorm appeared to be brewing. The well-armed
Lamon was a comfort, even though Lincoln liked to say he had no need of a
bodyguard.
He could think on the horse. Lincoln tried to direct his mind away from
the battle in Sharpsburg because there was nothing he could do about that
now. He had two proclamations to consider, both of them presidential actions
that would surely affect the outcome of the war. The papers were in his plug
hat, where he had been accustomed to carrying important papers as a lawyer
riding circuit.
One proclamation was the suspension again of habeas corpus, this time on
a much broader and more official basis. Stanton, who had lifted a milder
order when he took over at the War Department, now felt it absolutely neces-
sary. Agitators were everywhere, sowing disloyalty and disunion, undermin-
ing the recruitment of needed troops. When the commanding general at
Cairo, Illinois, tried to find jobs for confiscated slaves sent Northoverriding
the Illinois law against bringing free negroes into the statethere had been a
terrible ruckus. Lincoln judged the courts incompetent to handle such wide-
spread anti-Union activity.
The other proclamation was general emancipation, leapfrogging the provi-
sions of the Confiscation Act. He would work on that first, having wrestled
with it for months, ever since that dismaying session with McClellan at Har-
rison's Landing, coming back from the Peninsula, when he'd had to suffer
instruction from his military commander on political goals.
Seward, Weed, Blair and the rest of the conservatives would continue to
counsel against it, and Lincoln granted the soundness of their expectation
that emancipation would harm some Republican chances in the elections that
fall. But he also knew that emancipation cut both ways: Sumner needed such
an act to help him win in pro-abolition Massachusetts. And Stanton was
denying General Wadsworth combat command because he wanted him to run
for New York governor against the Peace Democrat Horatio Seymour; Stan-
ton said Greeley was sure Wadsworth and emancipation would win, no mat-
ter what Thurlow Weed said.
On the whole, it was Lincoln's political judgment that this fall's elections
would not be damaged as badly by an emancipation edict as Weed and the
Biairs warned. Abolition would hurt the Republicans in Illinois--iis friend
Leonard Swett would have a hard timebut it would be good to have Wade
and Tad Stevens and the rest of the radicals in Congress, along with Stanton
and Chase in the Cabinet, enthusiastic about the Administration's policy. The
abolitionists were still a minority in the country, but Lincoln sensed that their
view had become dominant in the Republican party.
And emancipation would be an answer to all those in the North, like
August Belmont and that money crowd, who kept demanding something
decisive. Lincoln could declare that it was "my policy to have no policy," and
claim to be driven by events, but a real policy was what people wanted
many of them only to be able to oppose that policy. Drift was the worst thing;
with the military initiative now in Lee's hands, Lincoln could ill afford the
appearance of political drift.
Walking his horse, reins in his good hand, holding his throbbing wrist high
to alleviate the pain, Lincoln was aware that he was making a case for issuing
the two proclamations right away. Still, the blatantly unconstitutional seizure
of property troubled him: of the Founders, Adams and Jefferson had been
abroad when the slavery compromise was made at the Constitutional Con-
vention, but Washington and Madison were present; was it now for Abraham
Lincoln, elected by forty percent of the people, and after having solemnly
promised in his Inaugural not to strike at slavery where it already existed, to
break that compromise?
Yes, he reckoned it was, because otherwise the Union would dissolve. The
governments of England and France were fixing to recognize the Confederacy
Gladstone, Chancellor of the Exchequer, had said as much recently. That
would give Jeff Davis the means and method to buy arms, to break the
blockade, to set up in business as a country. But by freeing the South's slaves,
Lincoln would embarrass the British government in the eyes of its own peo-
ple. Prime Minister Palmerston might have to stay put, at least for another
year.
More important, he reasoned, the threat of abolishment would hurt the
enemy where he lived, in the South, on the plantations. He had to hurt them,
and keep hurting them, until they realized that secession cost too much in
lives and treasure. Emancipation might cause hundreds of thousands of
blacks now producing the South's food and cotton to run away. A good
number of young whites would have to be kept at home in fear of a servile
revoltwhich, of course, Lincoln did not intend, but which would be recog-
nized as a danger.
On top of that, he could use Africans in the U.S. Army, first as noncombat
helpers, later as soldiers. By letter from New Orleans, General Ben Butler
reported that he had met with a black delegation and assured him that they
would be excellent fighters.
Of course, there was the plain morality of emancipation: if anything was
wrong, slavery was wrong. He had spoken out against its extension to free soil
all his adult life: it was a monstrous practice, and those who deny freedom to
others deserve it not for themselves. But that moral argument was not con-
trolling in this case: he had pledged time and again not to interfere with the
peculiar institution where it lay, provided only the Union would stand. And if
the Southern states would come back today, he could not insist that their
peculiar institution be abolished. Beyond the moral argument, legallycon-
stitutionallyLincoln knew he did not have a leg to stand on. The only
justification that would hold up in the court of public sentiment was military
necessity. On that basis, anything could be done.
The unconstitutional nature of abolition by fiat did not overly bother him:
the Southern leaders had warred upon their flag, unforgivably calling into
question the central idea of majority rule, and that had to cost something.
That it should cost them the profitable institution of slavery was not all that
distressing.
Lamon was humming. The brawny marshal from back home knew a lot of
songs, both sweet and sad, which he would sing to the rhythm of the horses'
steps. Lincoln asked him to sing "Picayune Butler," a comic ditty he always
enjoyed, as they approached Silver Spring. Lamon obliged, and the President
went back to his thoughts.
The counsel for the defense of the Constitutiona voice in Lincoln's mind
as he was making the case for emancipationhad asked, Was this lawful?
The attorney prosecuting the preservation of the Union, another voice in his
mind, had a ready answer: Constitutional, no, but lawful, yesas a war
power needed to preserve the Constitution itself.
So military necessity is the justification, said the defense counselbut is
military necessity the real reason? Isn't the ulterior motive purely political,
that you are losing your basic constituency in your party, and that without
appeasing your radical Republicans you will not be able to fight on for
Union?
Good question, Lincoln, sitting as judge, said to defense counsel, and
looked to the prosecutor of the war for reply. Stipulated, conceded that fierce
Unionist, surprisingly: let us grant that military necessity is merely a subter-
fuge, enabling the President to justify the political act of holding on to his
noisy core supporters. By so doing, the prosecutor argued ingeniously, the
President rebuilt the political backing needed to carry on the warwhich
transformed that politically motivated action into a military necessity.
Lincoln nodded approvingly. The prosecutor's argument seemed to be the
embodiment of hypocrisy and sophistry, but it was happily freighted with
common sense. Rallying the radicals was a political necessity; if it required
the guise of military necessity, that guise became realitybecause the war
could not be fought without the new war spirit that only abolition or military
victories would bring. The victories were not forthcoming; the action at
Sharpsburg would probably not destroy Lee's army because that destruction
was not McClellan's way; that left only the weapon of abolition.
The Constitution's defense counsel would not give up. What of Blair and
Weed, the best political minds in your party? Don't they warn you that
emancipation would be a political liability, that it would lose congressional
seats in the North to Peace Democrats? Come on now, Lincolnaren't you
really doing this to satisfy some long-held moral imperative against the cru-
elty of slavery, or to trigger a slave uprising that would draw rebel troops
back to the plantations, or to make impossible a negotiated peace that pre-
served slavery?
In the courtroom of his mind, still playing all the roles himself, the presid-
ing Lincoln swung his glance over to the prosecutor, wondering how he
would handle that.
Weed and Seward and the Biairs are mistaken, was the reply. Oh, you may
lose some votes and offend a few pro-slavery generals, but not to act is worse
than to act. Not to act against slavery is to play along with your conserva-
lives, who will ultimately want to join the Democrats to make peace on
Southern terms of disunion if the war drags on. Not to act means to lose your
radicals and become another impotent Buchanan. By acting now to strike at
slavery, you encourage the growing radical minority that can keep the war for
Union going.
It is a coup d'etat, declares constitutional defense counsel. No, it is counter-
revolutionary, concludes the prosecutor of the war.
Lincoln the judge came down on the side of counterrevolution. Yes, he
could analyze his political motive, the moral imperative, the diplomatic need,
the military advantages, but the overriding reason had to do with crystalliz-
ing public sentiment to fight to win.
He would take this desperate step of abolition, necessarily accompanied by
a despotic step of suppression of rights, because it was the only way he knew
to stop losing the war. The cause of Union, which was at the core of his
political being, was being paid lip service by almost everyone else. But after
the disasters at First and Second Bull Run, after the North had good reason
to fear invasion by the South, after an onerous tax on income had been
imposed on the people, after dissent had to be brutally suppressed, the cause
of Union was losing its appeal. A more exciting cause was needed. Slavery
had brought on the war; the abolition of slavery would have to reignite the
war spirit of the North.
The rain came in long, sweeping sheets, but as long as it was this warm, he
could afford to get wet. He could not fool himself: emancipation would mean
a fight to the finish. The abolishment by proclamation would bury what few
loyalists remained in the South and end their peace hopes. It would send an
unmistakable message to Richmond and the world that all possibility of com-
ing to terms was gone forever.
That troubled him most. Was there not a way, first, to use the threat of
emancipationto predict the action to come, and then offer the Southern
leaders an honorable way out? In fact, noan ultimatum would certainly be
rejectedbut in near-fact, maybe: at least he could demonstrate that his
central idea was Union, and that abolition was a weapon to enforce Union.
In the prison camps, he had heard, there was a "deadline"a line drawn
near the prison wall, beyond which a prisoner could not step without being
shot dead. Could there not be a similar demarcation for ending the state of
insurrection, beyond which slavery would be abolished?
That was the way to do it: not to emancipate immediately, but to announce
his intent to emancipate at some future date certain, which states in rebellion
could avoid by rejoining the Union. By acting before the deadline, the South-
erners could keep their slaves, just as loyal border states like Kentucky could
keep slavery. The South would not do it, of courseJeff Davis was hardly
likely to treat this deadline as an incentivebut it would show the North that
abolition was intended to be a military act, not a betrayal of past promises
and a surrender to the moralizing of the radicals.
He would have to prepare both proclamationson emancipation, and on
suspending habeas corpusfor issuance in quick succession. One would
cause explosions of protest that the other would have to cap.
He and Lamon, drenched and dripping, drew up in front of the Soldiers'
Home in the verdant Maryland countryside. Lincoln looked back down the
road to see if any messengers from the War Department were on the way with
news from Sharpsburg. So much was beyond his control. No messenger; he
slid out of the water-slick saddle.
Tad came running out and Lincoln lifted him up with his good arm, kissed
him, and followed the boy inside. He limped in, wondering when he could get
proper attention for his aching wrist and toes, wondering why news of the
greatest battle in history, taking place not fifty miles away, should be with-
held from the President of the United States.
At dinner, Mary told him of a wondrous new medium who could make
contact with the beloved dead, and asked him to join her at a seance that
night. He declined; Lincoln would not ridicule her belief if it gave her com-
fort in her extended bereavement, but he was not much for spiritualism.
Before they finished the spare meal, Homer Bates came racing in, suitably
out of breath, from the telegraph office. He handed Lincoln a long yellow
sheet.
"From General McClellan?" Mary asked.
"No," said Lincoln, looking at the paper in puzzlement, "from a man
named Smalley."
"It's an intercepted cable, sir," the telegraph operator explained. "It was
sent from Frederick, Maryland, to the New York Tribune, but the telegrapher
in Baltimore didn't relay it to New York. Instead, he sent it to the War
Department here."
Lincoln nodded; those were Stanton's orders. "This fellow Smalley says the
day's battle ended with an uncertain field," he summarized as he read, "great-
est since Waterloo . . - it seems that it's a standoff. Awful casualties. Lee's
invasion has been stopped, at least."
Washington was probably safe. He took a deep breath; the war was not
going to be lost today. It appeared that the bloody struggle at Sharpsburg was
not yet a great victory, but at least no defeat. Nobody could gainsay the fact
that Lee had failed in his object of invading the North; perhaps today, right
this moment, McClellan would be attacking again, pinning Lee's forces
against the Potomac. Little Mac was now in the attacking habit, though the
great cost in lives must be torturing him; a thrust now, really hurting the
enemy, could be decisive.
All eyes would soon be on the triumphant McClellan, who would surely
press for his Harrison's Landing terms of unpunished reunion, "the Union as
it was." That settlement, bearing what Lincoln had come to believe were the
seeds of future renewal of the conflict over slavery, was no longer acceptable.
Lincoln, the dispatch from the correspondent Smalley in his hand, saw as
urgent the need to accompany the news of victory with a stunning action by
the President to force the Southern leaders to come to the negotiating table
with hats in hand.
A proclamation of threatened emancipation would do that. End the insur-
rection now or I will free your slaves. On top of the loss of Lee's army, that
threat might crush the rebellion; in the more likely event that Lee's army
would be stopped and turned back but not destroyed, the proclamation would
inspirit the North and dispirit the South.
Lincoln dismissed young Bates with a nod and a smile; there would be no
message to McClellan until the general reported to him.
What if the tide turned, if Lee drove the Federals back? Then he would
forget about proclamations and fight on with another general, hoping to
achieve reunion without abolishment. What if McClellan failed to attack
again, if Lee's army escaped intact? In that case, Lincoln decided, he would
go ahead with his proclamations, extending the deadline for ending the rebel-
lion for sixty days, or perhaps to year's end. The political-military pressure
would come from him; the President, not the Congress or McClellan and his
army clique or the Peace Democrats, would frame the terms for peace.
In that regard, a notion formed in his mind to visit the battle scene soon; it
was not McClellan's army, it was the Union Army, and it would do for the
commander in chief to be with the troops. It would also do to set certain
requirements for quick action which, if not met, would be the basis for reliev-
ing George on the day after elections.
He went to his plug hat and pulled out the drafts of the two proclamations
aimed at enemies North and South. The proclamation suspending habeas
corpus needed no further editing: "Be it ordered, first, that during the existing
insurrection and as a necessary measure for suppressing the same, all Rebels
and Insurgents, their aiders and abettors within the United States, and all
persons discouraging volunteer enlistments, resisting militia drafts, or guilty
of any disloyal practice shall be subject to martial law." Surely it was sweep-
ing"any disloyal practice" could be construed to mean anythingbut
times were hard and recruitment vital. He would sign it as Stanton had
drafted it.
The other proclamation, of emancipation, needed work. He could see what
was wrong with it instantly: in the first draft, written in the telegraph office
and read to the Cabinet in July, he had been trying to hide behind Congress's
Confiscation Act. "In pursuance of the sixth section of the act" was no way to
begin a supreme assertion of executive authority; this was not a case of the
President's carrying out the will of the Congress, but of the President's seiz-
ing the lead in infuriating the Southern rebels.
He brought a quill pen and a bottle of ink to the dining room table and
began to write: "I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States of Amer-
ica, and Commander-in-chief of the Army and Navy thereof . . ." That was
more like it.
Before threatening to free the slaves of the states in rebellion, he would
make absolutely clear that his primary purpose was not abolition, but union:
". . . do hereby proclaim and declare that hereafter, as heretofore, the war
will be prosecuted for the object of practically restoring the constitutional
relation between the United States and each of the states, and the people
thereof, in which states that relation is, or may be suspended, or disturbed."
He would never admit that a state had left the Union. Secession was not
possible; the so-called Confederacy was never to be treated as a nation, lest
that encourage foreign recognition. He paused, quill in mid-air, ?o much
depended on the outcome at Sharpsburg. That was where the South could
make a nation. He wondered if George McClellan realized how much the
American experiment in self-government rested on his ability to hurt the
rebel army. Not merely to make a stand, to stop Lee's advance, but to inflict
such pain on the rebels that they would come to understand that the rule of
the majority was the unshakable political religion of the land.
He returned to the document at hand. The rhythm of the drafted words
threatening to change the status of slaves held by rebels"shall then, thence-
forward, and forever, be free"did not sit well with him. He moved the "be"
up to follow the "shall," lending strength to the concluding phrase.

CHAPTER 2
AFTERMATH AT BLOODY LANE
The Whatizzit Wagon of the Brady studio, with Alexander Gardner in
charge, assisted by James Gibson, reached McClellan's headquarters over-
looking Antietam Creek on Friday morning the nineteenth. Gardner thought
it would be wise to seek out Pinkerton before the detective heard about the
presence of the wagon.
"Is the battle over, Major Alien?" Gardner could hear no sound of firing.
Wednesday had been the day of the great battle; yesterday, he had been told,
both battered and bloody armies had stared at each other across the field,
neither willing or able to mount an offensive.
"The pursuit of the beaten rebels has begun," was the way Pinkerton put it,
in the accent Gardner recognized as Glasgow. "Lee pulled his army out last
night, slipped across the Potomac into Virginia. The field is ours. Great vic-
tory."
"Lee has escaped, then?"
"General McClellan sent Porter's corps after him." Pinkerton evidently
did not like the tone of Gardner's question; the photographer knew he should
not have allowed a hint of criticism to slip into his question. "What are you
doing here instead of Brady, anyhow? I said yes to Brady, no to you."
Gardner silently handed him an envelope addressed to "Major Alien" in
Brady's fluid script; Pinkerton unsealed it and read the contents. Satisfied
that Gardner was still working for his friend rather than in competition with
him, the detective said, "You can set up right over there."
"We'd like to go out into the battlefield, if we can."
"No, the burial details are just setting out," Pinkerton said. "You can't
make pictures of the Federal dead; it would start a panic in the North."
"How about just the dead rebels?" Gardner had a notion that the essence
of this battle was its cost in human life. It was being said that this had been
the bloodiest day of the war, worse even than at Shiloh. Gardner thought of
himself as less a photographer of events than an artist interpreting universal
suffering, which set him apart from Brady and the others.
Pinkerton shrugged. "I hope you have a strong stomach. Does your wagon
horse know how to pick his way around bodies? It's no pretty scene out
there."
The practical Gibson asked Pinkerton to point out the landmark scenes in
the battle. The detective took them to a telescope in front of headquarters,
near the flagpole.
"Burnside's bridge was important," Pinkerton explained. "If Burn had
crossed it in the morning when Mac ordered him to, at the same time Hooker
was charging from the other side, Lee's retreat would have been a rout." It
seemed to Gardner that the McClellan staff was expecting criticism and had
defenses ready.
Pinkerton swung the glass around. "The Dunker church. Be more famous
than Shiloh."
"The what?"
"Dunker," Pinkerton repeated slowly. "They're Germans. The word has to
do with the way they baptize their babiesthey just dunk 'em in."
Small arms fire erupted in the distance. "That's Fitz-John Porter's men,
chasing what's left of A. P. Hill's brigade," the detective said. "We're destroy-
ing the enemy. Tell that to your newspaper friends, Gardner. And take my
advice, stay away from Bloody Lane."
"What's that?"
"You can't see it from here, because it was a sunken road. Sesesh used it as
a trenchLee isn't much for digging trenchesand it's like an open grave
now." Pinkerton removed his derby, mopped his head with a red handker-
chief, and replaced the hat. "If you want to see dead rebs in stacks, that's the
place. You're welcome to it."
Gardner and Gibson climbed back aboard their wagon. The dour detective
turned away, then back. "Wait, you two1 have a trophy for Brady." He
reached in his inside jacket pocket and took out a cigar. "It's a secech cigar.
Don't smoke it yourself, be sure to give it to himI'll ask Brady if he got it
later. Had something to do with the battle." He carefully wrapped the cigar
in the envelope Brady had addressed to him and handed it over.
A cavalryman raced in with bad news: Porter's pursuing force had been
caught at the Potomac and smashed by A. P. Hill's rear guard. Maybe three
hundred dead Federals, many floating downriver. Nor was Pleasonton's
Union cavalry doing much better; the new rifled guns taken by the rebels at
Harpers Ferry were all too accurate. The infantry now had an advantage over
cavalry.
Gardner did not wait for the reaction from McClellan headquarters be-
cause he did not want any changing of minds about the approval to photo-
graph the battlefield. He told Gibson to make for the Dunker church first.
They crossed one of the stone bridges and followed the pointed fingers of the
gaunt-faced men seated on the ground staring at one another. Gardner was
not new to scenes of battle, but this landscape was like nothing he had seen.
Every vista was dotted with death. The stench of decaying bodies, humans
and horses, fouled the air, relieved only occasionally by the smell of the
residue of gunpowder and clinging smoke.
"Make the wet plate," Gardner ordered, taking the reins. Gibson, as soon
as the wagon stopped, slipped back into the darkroom in the back; he coated
a sheet of glass with collodion, the guncotton dissolved in alcohol and sulphu-
ric ether mixed with a little bromide and iodide of potassium they bad com-
pounded the night before. Gardner trusted the careful Gibson to allow the
plate to dry to the proper tackiness.
Gardner set up the camera in front of the church. Odd, a house of worship
with no steeple. Gibson appeared from the back of the wagon with the wet
plate in its lightproof holder and together they inserted it into the camera.
Gardner ducked his head to the eyehole, moved the camera, tripod and all,
six inches back to get a dead horse in the composition, and removed the lens
cap. He counted to ten, covered the lens, and Gibson pulled the plate out and
raced back to the wagon to develop it. In this hot, humid weather, the entire
operation had to be completed within ten minutes or the plate would be
spoiled.
Gibson came out into the light and signaled that the plate was okay. Gard-
ner nodded, picked up the camera, loaded it onto the wagon, and they set out
for the Bumside Bridge. Halfway there, in what had been the center of the
rebel line, the horse refused to step forward. Gardner stood up to see what
was causing the horse to shy and then sat back abruptly.
"Bloody Lane." The sunken road offered a stark spectacle he was certain
he would not forget as long as he lived: hundreds of corpses neatly lined up in
rows. The bodies in butternut brown had been fighting men before they were
mowed down by the enfilade fire. He tied the wagon securely to a tree lest the
horse bolt at the stench. He went through his picture-taking routine with
Gibson once again, both eager to get away but unable to hurry.
In one half hour, they took three photographs of the heart-stopping sight.
The burial detail was far away. A couple of Federal soldiers came and looked
at the carnage, but would not stand still, and Gardner knew they would be
blurred in the last photo.
"Let's get out of here," said Gibson finally.
Forty yards from the Bloody Lane, a cluster of corpses in blue uniforms
were lying, obviously shot trying to storm the rebel position when the sunken
road had offered a potent defense. Gardner, obeying Pinkerton's rule about
Union bodies, passed them by until he heard a moan. He pulled back his
reins. One of the Federal soldiers on the mound in front of the sunken road
was alive.
"We'd better bring him in," he called to Gibson, who had heard the sound
from the back of the wagon.
"Not our job," said Gibson. "When we get back, we'll tell them to send an
ambulance."
"Just this one," said Gardner. The man could die in the time it would take
for doctors to arrive. They rolled the moaning man over. He had taken a
bullet in his upper leg, but the blood and his uniform material had clotted
into a kind of bandage, and his eyes were focused.
"Thought you'd never get here," the man whispered hoarsely as they lifted
him into the wagon, alongside the plates. "What in hell kind of ambulance is
this?"
"We're war photographers," said Gardner.
"Like Brady?"
"We work for Brady."
The wounded soldier thought about that. "You gonna take a picture of
me?"
"No, we're just going to take you to the field hospital. Can't waste plates."
Gardner looked at the man's sleeve. "Where you from, corporal?"
"Twenty-seventh Indiana Volunteers. We beat the Johnnies, didn't we?"
"The rebels have left the field, pulled back across the river," Gardner told
him. "Lee's invasion is over."
"We beat 'em. You know why? We knew every move Lee was going to
make. Thank God for Little Mac," said the corporal.
They rode in silence for a few minutes, the bumping surely causing the
soldier pain. He said what struck the photographer as a curious thing:
"Lordy, what I'd give for a good cigar now."
Gardner couldn't say no. He took out the envelope with "Major Alien"
written on it and handed over the cigar meant for Brady.

CHAPTER 3

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
SEPTEMBER 22, 1862
Any number of rumors are flying around about the McClellan conspiracy.
Some say he plans to play the man on horseback, riding to Washington in
triumph to take over the country, which may seem farfetched but you never
can tell.
I have been passing these rumors on to the Prsdt, of course, only slightly
embellished, but this morning I was told of a new and most disturbing one
from the Tycoon himself.
"I heard of an officer who said that the army did not mean to gain any
decisive victory," Mr. Lincoln told me, "but to keep this running on so that
they, the army, might manage things to suit themselves."
I asked him what he planned to do about such treason. He said, "I will
have the matter examined and if any such language had been used, his head
should go off."
That's the spirit. The cabal around McClellan is a danger to the Republic.
Certainly his decision not to pursue the rebel army fits in with that plot to let
the war run on until Little Mac can take over or make a deal to split the
country peacefully, under a Democratic administration in the North with
himself at the head.
Big success for me this morning. The Prsdt has been limping in pain be-
cause of his corns. Stanton's assistant, Watson, sent me a note about a man
who performs wonders on the feet. At my urging, Lincoln today saw the
corncutter, who calls himself a "chiropodist." The fellow has been seeing
Stanton about organizing a corps of foot doctors to work on the army's feet
(which I understand are in terrible condition), when the Young Napoleon
ever gets around to giving the order to march.
The doctor, if you can call him that, is an Israelite born in England and
speaks in a cadence that I have never heard before. I scheduled Isachar
Zacharie a half hour with the Tycoon this morning before the Cabinet meet-
ing.
"They tell me you have a testimonial from Henry Clay," the Prsdt said in
greeting. "He was my idol when I was a Whig."
"Hammertoes," said Zacharie, shaking his head in recollected sympathy. I
had heard Henry Clay described many ways, but never as one who suffered
from hammertoes. "Very painful. He could hardly stand up in the Senate to
make a speech. I fixed it."
"Your idol had feet of Clay," I observed, which drew a hearty laugh from
the Tycoon. My best line of the day.
Lincoln sat in his desk chair, took his shoes and socks off and at Zacharie's
direction placed his giant feet gingerly on his desk. The doctor took out a
towel and a little black bag and asked me to bring a pan of water. Forewarned
by Watson at the War Department, I produced the medical equipment in-
stantly.
"General Banks says you're an old friend of his," the Tycoon made conver-
sation as Zacharie massaged one of his feet, which is presumably the way a
foot doctor gets acquainted with a new patient. Nate Banks had been Gover-
nor of Massachusetts, but had not fared as well as a general against the
unpredictable Stonewall Jackson. Lincoln knew Banks to be a capable admin-
istrator, scrupulously honest, and appointed him to command the troops
remaining around the military district of Washington when McClellan took
the army up to reach a stalemate with Lee. (Little Mac now claims those
troops should have been with him, but he thinks of reinforcements as moth-
er's milk.)
"Good man, fine family," said Zacharie of Banks.
"I'm thinking of sending him down to New Orleans," said the Tycoon, "to
replace General Butler."
That was news to me; "Beast" Butler had been drawing plenty of criticism
from people in the North about corruption and arbitrary arrests, and election
time was drawing near. Sending Banks down there would placate Democrats
in Massachusetts and might even calm things down in Louisiana, now a
liberated state.
"Butler? Not such a good man," Zacharie opined, "if you'll pardon my
saying so."
"You know him?"
"I have relatives in the South, mainly Savannah. And there are plenty of
Jews in New Orleans, trading, banking. What I hear about Butler is not
good."
"Give me specifics," Lincoln said, wincing but not looking away as a
tender corn was touched by the surgeon's blade. It surprised me that he was
talking of such confidential matters with a man he hardly knew, but perhaps
direct contact with the foot engenders intimacy.
"Messer, Hyde and Goodrich are the principal jewelers in New Orleans,"
said Zacharie matter-of-factly. "They made out a check to a relation for five
thousand dollars, the proceeds to be paid to clerks for salary. General Butler
intercepted the mail and found the check. He made the relation cash the
check and give Butler the cash. He claims he gave the money to the poor, but
I doubt it."
Lincoln was interested in that. A specific charge is always more useful than
accusatory generalizations, which is all we'd been hearing. He grunted when
Zacharie finished with one toe, put that foot in the pan of water for more
soaking, and took out the other foot, knotting the towel around it tightly. No
blood; I supposed that spoke well of his skill at chiropody, if that is the word.
The comcutter changed the subject, with a line of patter that kept his
patient's attention from focusing too intently on his foot. "You did us a favor
the other day, Mr. President. I see in the papers you appointed the first
Jewish chaplain, Frankel of Philadelphia. I know him, know the whole fam-
ily."
I confess that I had primed Zacharie to say that. Fewer than 150,000
Israelites can be found in the whole country, North and South, two thirds of
them piling in during the past decade. Those in the United States Army don't
always identify themselves as such, so they don't really need a chaplain. But
the law called for chaplains to be of some "Christian denomination" and
some Jewish leaders didn't like that. Vallandigham, the copperhead, had
taken up this issue in Congress, making it seem as if religion was being
unconstitutionally established. So the law's wording was changed to "reli-
gious denomination" and the Tycoon appointed this fellow Frankel as a uni-
formed chaplain the other day. Zacharie, who is the first Israelite I have met,
apparently sees the appointment as most significantthe first time his people
got something they wanted from the Federal government. (It was easy
enough; Lincoln never turns down anybody who wants to get into uniform.)
"Abraham Jonas was one of my earliest political supporters," said Lincoln,
in oblique response to the mention of the chaplain appointment. "He came
from Kentucky, as I did, and we met in Quincy back in thirty-eight. Like
you, born in England. I appointed Jonas postmaster of Quincy last year."
The Israelite gave a that's-nice smile and stopped chatting because he came
to some important part of his operation on the left big toe. "This is some big
foot," was his only observation.
Zacharie switched the position of the feet in the pan and the towel. "You
know, a lot of our soldiers have this same kind of trouble, even worse, Mr.
President. I talked with Mr. Stanton about attending to the feet of our boys. I
told him we could organize a corps of chiropodists to go from camp to camp
to cut corns and treat diseases of the feet."
"Foot soldiers," the President said before I could.
"You make jokes," said the Israelite in reproof, "but I hear Lee's army had
a terrible problem with stragglers in Maryland. Why? Because their feet were
killing them, they couldn't keep up. Hill's division, seventeen miles in seven
hours from Harpers Ferry to Sharpsburg. Could you imagine yourself, with a
heavy pack and gun on your back, marching that far that fast on these feet?"
Lincoln looked impressed with Zacharie's specific instance again. Few peo-
ple brought him hard facts to buttress their arguments. "I'll talk to Mars
about that after the Cabinet meeting. Dr. Zacharie, something you said ear-
lier interests me. You said you had relatives down South, and you obviously
know a great many people in trade."
"My profession has taken me to every major city in the nation, Mr. Presi-
dent. My office is in my bag."
"Do the Israelites generally stay in touch with one another, more than
most?"
"I know what you are getting at, Mr. President. I have friends and rela-
tions everywhere."
"New Orleans? There are a great many of"he searched for an inoffensive
word "your co-religionists in that city. As you know, it is the only major
Southern city that we occupy."
"Jews are in soft goods there, and in the money business. Although Gen-
eral Butler, like General Grant, doesn't have much use for us. Couple of
rotten apples among our people spoil the barrel. But given the chance, we
could do a lot for the cause of reunion. We know how to deal with both
sides."
Lincoln wriggled his toes in thought. "The time may come for that. I have
a proclamation in work that might bring about the need for some informal
communications. You're finished? Is that all there is to it?"
"Step down on the towel."
Lincoln put his feet on the towel, gingerly at first, then more confidently.
"That feels better. By jings, that feels pretty good."
"The test is with the shoes on," said the doctor. "No, not the slippers, try
on leather shoes." He examined the canalboats that passed for Lincoln's
shoes, and said he would recommend a shoemaker who made different shoes
for each foot, but signaled for the President to go through what was always
the painful process of encasing his feet.
The Prsdt drew on his socks and inserted his feet in his rarely used shoes.
He stood up, always a slow, unwinding process.
"It doesn't hurt." He took a few steps, then walked back. "The terrible
pressure is off. These old feet haven't felt so good in years." He gave one of
those great grins that light up the countenance so rarely. "Zacharie, you're
remarkable."
"It would be a great honor, and helpful to me in my profession, Mr.
President, if you put something like that down on a piece of paper."
The Prsdt did not hesitate. He walked, almost skipped, to his desk and
wrote out a brief testimonial: "Dr. Zacharie has operated on my feet with
great success, and considerable addition to my comfort. A. Lincoln."
Zacharie read it and beamed. "I'll come back this afternoon? After you've
talked to Mr. Stanton?"
"You have to see Seward, toonot about your foot soldiers, about his feet.
He has the same trouble I had. I'll tell him about you."
After the good doctor marched out, Lincoln stood in the middle of the
room, rocking on his heels. Though his wrist was still swollen, with his feet
miraculously cured of the dread corn affliction, he was not in such bad shape
for a man of fifty-three. "When Dr. Zacharie comes back, I think I'll ask him
about my wrist, too."
Since he was in such a good mood, I handed him a copy of a new book that
had been sent by Charles Farrar Browne, the humorist whose nom de plume
is "Artemus Ward." His face lit up even more, and he sat down and immedi-
ately started reading it.
Fifteen minutes later, I came back in and he was chuckling away. It's not a
good idea to interrupt the Tycoon when he's having a good timethose times
come so infrequently these daysbut I had something of importance to im-
part.
"Allan Pinkerton is in my office, fresh from the front," I said. "He came to
see me, thinks I'm his source of inside information about all those nasty
fellows around here out to get his revered general. He wants to pump me, but
he most especially does not want to see you. Shall I drag him in?"
"I'd be pleased to receive him," the Prsdt nodded solemnly.
"Cabinet meets at noon," I reminded him. "You have about twenty min-
utes."
The Tycoon nodded from the couch where he'd been reading Ward and set
the book aside. He was already thinking about the questions to be put to
McClellan's man Pinkerton. That worthy gentleman, if he ever heard the
words "McClellan conspiracy," would think not of the army's disloyal officer
corps and its desire for a coup d'6tat, but just the oppositeof a cabal of
elected officials out to unhorse his idol. It is in the ambitious McClellan's
interest to make much of the affair at Antietam; it is in the nation's interest to
minimize the victory, to treat it as the mere overture of the grand symphony
to be played out at Cabinet today.

CHAPTER 4
MAJOR ALLEN'S INTERVIEW
Pinkerton forced the smile of the pursuer pursued. The head of the Secret
Service of the Army of the Potomac had hoped to pry information out of
young Hay without having to undergo interrogation from the President in the
next office. That gamble failed, but not all was lost: Perhaps Lincoln, in his
line of questioning, would reveal the truth about the cabal's intentions toward
the man who had just saved the nation.
"How are the plums and nuts today, Pinkerton?"
"Heh-heh. You remember that still, Mr. President."
That damned coded message would haunt him all his life. It's only saving
grace, he told himself, was the way it reminded the President that Pinkerton's
vigilance had saved his life in Baltimore on the way to the Inauguration.
"I want you to tell me all you know about the movements of General
McClellan's army," the President said. "And whatever I ask, I ask not in the
spirit of criticism. Please understand that."
That sounded suspicious; beware of questioners who protest that no criti-
cism attaches to their questions. Pinkerton had done that often enough him-
self.
"South Mountain, Antietamthose were great and decisive victories,
achieved under great difficulty," the President said. "General McClellan has
accomplished all he set out to do. He's pushed the rebels out of Maryland and
freed the capital from danger."
Pinkerton relaxed a bit. "I wish everybody understood that as well as you
do, sir."
"The nation owes him a deep debt of gratitude," Lincoln went on,, "and I
personally owe him morehe took command of the army at a time C-f great
peril, when the army was suffering great defeats, and he took that army out to
meet the foe. We can never repay him for that, Pinkerton."
The secret service chief nodded enthusiastically; this was just what he
wanted to hear. He decided he would not ask the President to refer to him as
Major Alien, in the light of Lincoln's unfortunate amusement at code names.
He took out a pencil and paper to make notes, so that the general would have
the well-deserved praise as it came from the President's lips.
"I'm desirous of knowing a few things, which1 suppose from all the
pressure on the general's mindhe hasn't advised me about, or perhaps
thinks of minor importance. If your duty to General McClellan permits it,
and if you know the answers, I'd like to ask you about them."
"The general relies on having the full confidence of the President," Pinker-
ton began, "and so relying, often does not deem it necessary to burden you
with detail that"
"The surrender of Harpers Ferry. Had everything been done to relieve the
garrison there promptly?"
Pinkerton brightened. He had a good answer for that. "I happen to have
right here in my pocket a copy of a dispatch from General McClellan to the
commander of Harpers Ferry. Here, read it."
Lincoln did so and expressed his relief: "Many have tried to impress me
that the general might have done more than he did for the relief of the
garrison. Yes, this breathes his spirit, and I recognize the signature. At Antie-
tam, what were the number and condition of the opposing armies?"
Pinkerton was certain about that one, too; he began to think he was wise in
coming to the Mansion that day. Perhaps some detective's sixth sense had
drawn him to Lincoln's office. "Enemy strength one hundred and forty thou-
sand, ours ninety thousand, one army as eager to fight as the other."
"I believe the rebels have that many. I would estimate our strength at one
hundred thousand," Lincoln observed, "but you're probably right. Tell me
about the battle."
Pinkerton described his patron's strategy and bravery. Lincoln kept nod-
dingPinkerton assumed that meant he agreedand almost in passing
wanted to know, "Why didn't the army fight on Thursday?"
Pinkerton explained the exhausted condition of the army Wednesday night,
and the presence of the enemy in line of battle all day Thursday. No general
short of a butcher could fight a battle on top of the very bodies of the dead
and wounded, which had to be cleared from the field; long-range artillery
ammunition, which had given McClellan the greatest advantage the day be-
fore, was in short supply; there was great need for caution lest the enemy,
with its larger forces, counterattack and gain final success.
The President launched into praise of McClellan's skill, repeating that his
questions were in no way evidence of criticism, rather of averting the criti-
cism of others. Pinkerton felt much better about the man: it could well be that
the cabal had not taken charge of the mind of the President, as he had feared.
"I wonder if you could tell me, without betraying General McClellas's
confidence, how come the rebels escaped across the Potomac?"           t
Pinkerton assured him that the general wanted him to know the facts. That
on Thursday night orders were given to bring on a general engagement the
next day. That the stage of the water level made it easy for Lee's infantry and
cavalry to cross the river anywhere. "I accompanied Captain Custer on a
cavalry patrol Wednesday afternoon," he was able to add, "and had my sorrel
horse shot out from under me."
At the President's praise of his personal bravery, Pinkerton made a defer-
ential gesture. Lincoln wanted to know why, if the water was so easy for Lee
to cross, it had been so hard for our troops to cross in pursuit.
"Oh, on our side, time was needed to probe enemy positions, to bring up
ammunition, and to care for the wounded," Pinkerton explained. "Even so,
on Friday, after Lee had crossed the river, General Porter's brigade pursued
him into Virginia with great vigor and rapidity."
From the expression on Lincoln's face, the Secret Service chief got the
distinct impression that he had put the President's mind at ease. He allowed
himself a small smile as he jotted down Lincoln's commendation of McClel-
lan's caution, along with the President's mild-spoken request that the general
keep him more fully informed. "For example," said Lincoln, "I knew nothing
of the position of Antietam Creek in relation to the two armies until I read
about it in the newspaper."
Pinkerton promised to tell the general of the importance the President
attached to seemingly insignificant details of minor skirmishes.
Secretary Stanton entered the President's office. Lincoln said something
about being grateful for what sounded to Pinkerton like the corn cuttings,
and asked him to sit down. The Secretary of War took one look at Pinkerton,
said he supposed the President wanted to see Major Alien alone, and left. The
detective suspected that Stanton felt uncomfortable about him, perhaps be-
cause he knew that Pinkerton knew about the Secretary's hidden support of
the unconscionable release of Rose Greenhow.
Hay came in and reminded Lincoln of a Cabinet meeting in a few minutes.
The detective, satisfied that Lincoln was not nearly as disaffected as the gen-
eral feared, put on his hat and took his leave. He heard Hay ask if the
President needed any papers for Cabinet that day.
"Couple of proclamations," the President replied, pulling some papers out
of his desk drawer and inserting them in his plug hat. Pinkerton stood re-
spectfully waiting for him to walk out the door first, which Lincoln started to
do, then snapped his fingers and came back. "I'll take the Ward book, too.
Cabinet will get a kick out of it."

CHAPTER 5
THE YOKE OF OXEN
Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War, could not believe his ears. Here was the
President of the United States of America, his nation rent by civil war, casu-
alty lists stunning the cities of the North after the bloodiest day of t~ttttt war,
traitorous agitators undermining the military draft, the Union Army's\)fficer
corps a snake pit of conspiracy to subvert the Confiscation Act and seize
executive power, his Treasury nearly empty, Congress fed up with his vacilla-
tion, and his Republican Party support threatened by the looming elections
and what was he doing? Preparing to read a comical book to his Cabinet!
"The chapter I was reading just after I had my corns cut," Lincoln was
saying, "and Stanton, I want to talk to you about making the talents of this
fellow Zacharie available to our men in the fieldis called 'High-Handed
Outrage at Utiky.' Ward is really very funny. Listen:
" In the Paul of 1856, I showed my show in Utiky, a trooly grate sitty in
the State of New York.
" 'The people gave me a cordyal recepshun. The Press was loud in her
prases.'
"The spelling is humorous, too, which you're missing," said the President,
as the Secretary of War writhed in his chair, awaiting the discussion of a
proclamation imposing martial law. "But let me go on," Lincoln continued,
and did. Stanton thought it would never end.
Toward the end of this exercise in dialect humor, Lincoln broke out laugh-
ing, slapped his leg, removed his glasses to wipe his eyes, and returned to
finish: " 'The young man belonged to I of the first famerlies in Utiky. I sood
him, and the Joory brawt in a verdick of Arson in the 3rd degree.' "
The Secretary of War pointedly did not join in the chuckling around the
Cabinet table. Not for him to participate in such sycophancy; he despised
Seward, the toady, for laughing out loud. Of the others, only Chase main-
tained his dignity in the face of this foolishness by the Chief Executive. Stan-
ton glared his disapproval.
"Gentlemen, why don't you laugh?" Lincoln looked suddenly sorrowful.
"With the fearful strain that is upon me night and day, if I did not laugh I
should die. And you need this medicine as much as I do."
With that, Lincoln set the book aside and said in a grave tone, "Gentle-
men." What now, Stanton wondered, a recitation of his confounded poem
about the spirit of mortals being proud? A proclamation was on Lincoln's
desk that would give the Secretary of War the power he needed to slam down
the lid on agitation. "All persons discouraging volunteer enlistments," Stan-
ton had written, "resisting militia draft, or guilty of any disloyal practice"
would be denied the coddling of the civil courts and made subject to Courts
Martial. It was the only way to stop the coming riots; what was he waiting
for?
"I have, as you are aware, thought a great deal about the relation of this
war to slavery," the President began. "You all remember that, several weeks
ago, I read to you an Order that I had prepared on this subjectwhich, on
account of objections made by some of you, was not issued."
Stanton looked sharply at Seward, who had scotched the proclamation of
emancipation in July, supposedly because it might look like "the last shriek,"
as someone had called it, of a desperate nation in retreat. At that time
Seward's henchman, Weed, had come in to give an abolition edict the coup de
grdce with his political nervousness. Today's topic was a surprise to Stanton:
instead of discussing the proclamation suspending habeas corpus, Lincoln
was talking about emancipation.
"Ever since then," Lincolne continued, looking at his folded hands, "my
mind has been much occupied with this subject. I have thought all along that
the time for acting on it might very probably come. I think the time Jias come
now."
A new vista opened to the startled Stanton: the defeat of Blair and Seward
in the Cabinet on the paramount issue of the age, followed by the removal of
McClellan and his clique from military command. An act of abolition now
would sweep away all talk of negotiations and compromise with the slavoc-
racy. At last Lincoln was becoming a serious man.
"I wish it were a better time," the President was saying, "I wish that we
were in a better condition. The action of the army against the rebels has not
been quite what I should have best liked."
Stanton cautiously nodded agreement; as Secretary of War, he did not want
the vast engagement at Antietam to be considered another defeat, but at the
same time he was damned if he would credit the traitorous McClellan with a
victory. The emphasis in public had to be placed not on the salvation of the
North from Lee's invasion, but on the failure of McClellan to destroy Lee's
army. No gratitude could be shown the Young Napoleon, lest his set of
Democratic generals be encouraged to settle the war on terms that would
preserve slavery in the South. Lincoln was right in speaking of the recent
fighting as an "action" rather than a military triumph; Sharpsburg was to be
described as merely a modest victory, only a limited action, which under a
decent commander might have given the valiant Union troops a decisive
victory.
"But they have been driven out of Maryland," said the President, "and
Pennsylvania is no longer in danger of invasion. When the rebel army was at
Frederick, I made a vowa covenant that if God gave us the victory in the
approaching battle, I would consider it an indication of Divine Will. I said
nothing to anyone, but I made the promise to myself," he said, and in an
aside Stanton could hardly hear, "and to my Maker."
Was Lincoln suddenly getting religion? Stanton wondered if all the spiritu-
alism surrounding his wife had affected him, and promptly decided not; this
was a politician saying he was following God's will. Stanton did not care how
Lincoln explained his change of mind, so long as he did it.
Lincoln looked at Seward, seated to his right. "The time for the enuncia-
tion of the emancipation policy can no longer be delayed. Public sentiment, I
think, will sustain it, and many of our warmest friends and supporters de-
mand it." He shifted his attention toward Chase, considered by all the most
overtly pious man in the room, adding, "And I promised my God that I
would do it. It might be thought strange that I submitted the disposal of
matters this way. The rebel army is now driven out, and I am going to fulfill
that promise. God has decided this question in favor of the slaves."
Chase listened impassively, annoyed at Lincoln's uncharacteristic evoca-
tion of divine guidance. The Treasury Secretary had hoped that Lincoln
would let the military business of freeing and recruiting fugitive slaves be
handled by military commanders in the field, as Fremont and Hunter had
tried to do. If the damnable McClellan had won overwhelmingly at Sharps-
burg, no such emancipation edict by the President would have been justifiable
militarily. The lead in freeing slaves could have been taken by Congress c the
military commanders.
Now the President, a consummate politician, was raising emancipation to a
high moral plane, taking full credit for finally doing what enlightened Repub-
licans had been clamoring for him to do for over a year. Chase fought down
the resentment rising in him, which he quickly deemed unworthy, at the
adept way the President was able to run off with the radicals' clothes; on the
contrary, he told himself, he should feel elated at the conversion of Lincoln to
his cause.
"I have got you together to hear what I have written down," said the
President with finality. "I do not wish your advice about the main matter
that I have determined for myself." Typical Lincoln, Chase bristledtreating
a Cabinet like his personal rubber stamp.
"This I say without intending anything but respect for any one of you,"
Lincoln added, perhaps sensitive to Chase's frown, "but I already know the
views of each on this question." He regarded the papers in front of him. "If
there is anything in the expressions I use, or in any other minor matter"
Chase noted how he emphasized the "minor""which any one of you thinks
had best be changed, I shall be glad to receive the suggestions."
Then Lincoln made what Chase considered a curious and gratuitous point:
"I know very well that many others might, in this matter, as in others, do
better than I can. And if I were satisfied that the public confidence was more
fully possessed by any one of them than by me, and if I knew of any constitu-
tional way in which he could be put in my place, he should have it. I would
gladly yield it to him."
That same obsequious point again, Chase thought, remembering the last
time Lincoln offered to "resign his plan" or place. Why does he have to insult
us and then fawn on us this way? Why doesn't he read the proclamation and
get on with it?
"But though I believe that I have not so much of the confidence of the
people as I had some time since," Lincoln went on deliberately, "I do not
know that any other person has more." Time would tell about that. "I am
here. I must do the best I can." He looked at Chase, who looked back at him
squarely; neither man's eyes wavered.
So he is finally going to take the plunge into the political unknown, Seward
observed. The Secretary of State recrossed his legs and unsteepled his fingers.
Pity that McClellan had not been able to score a more smashing triumph,
which would have forced the British leaders to scrap their plans to recognize
the Confederacy and run the Union blockade. Now it will be Lincoln's aboli-
tion of slavery, rather than the Union Army's destruction of the Southern
armies, that will hold the British and French at bay: the sentiment of work-
ingmen over there would now be firmly on the side of the North. Unless, of
course, the slaves revolted and started raping white women; then Lords Palm-
erston and Russell, eager to manufacture the Southern cotton, would enter
the war on the Southern side for what they would call humanitarian reasons.
Who was advising the President to do this? Not Chase, surely, who would
lose much of his political following by it. Stanton? Yes, but Lincoln used him
to absorb unpopularity in n~naginggg the war, and paid little attention to his
political judgmentsStanton had his own foolish Democratic ambitions any-
how, which was why he so feared McClellan's success. Certainly not the
Biairs, or Bates or Seward or Weedall had counseled the oppos-te course.
Remarkably independent and strong-willed fellow, this Lincoln; chis situa-
tion was similar to Surnter, where all the wise heads save Blair advised
against precipitating a civil war, but Lincoln accepted war. Seward freely
admitted his misjudgment of the man; at the start, he had been certain he
could control the unsophisticated President, and rule while Lincoln reigned.
That had been a mistake. He sighed profoundly as Lincoln proceeded to read
aloud the draft of his proclamation.
"/, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States of America, and Com-
mander-in-chief of the Army and Navy thereof . . . "
If he's bound to do it, Seward conceded to himself, that's the way; as
Bonaparte had advised, if you are going to take Vienna, then take Vienna.
That assertion at the beginning was to call attention to his war power; as
Lincoln read on, Seward approved of the way he unequivocally reiterated
that the goal of the war remained preservation of the Union, which was
intended to remind one and all that he had not changed the purpose to
abolition.
"That it is my purpose to again recommend the adoption of a practical
measure tendering pecuniary aid to states which may voluntarily adopt imme-
diate or gradual abolishment of slavery . . ."
The familiar bow to the border states: Lincoln was going through his litany
of gradual, compensated abolition. Seward assumed he would next put in the
usual nonsense about deportation.
".  .  .  the  effort  to  colonize  persons  of  African  descent  will  be  contin-
ued ... "
Yes, there it was; Lincoln, in the midst of what surely was an unconstitu-
tional coup, was nothing if not consistent about all his previous offers.
"Hold it," Seward interrupted. "Put in 'with their consent.' "
Lincoln nodded, wrote in those words on the draft, and continued: "That
on the first day of January in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred
and sixty three, all persons held as slaves within any state, or designated part of
a state, the people whereof shall be in rebellion against the United States shall
be then, thenceforward, and forever free . . ."
That dry legal tone was probably best for a coup, Seward judged, but
showed a frown at Lincoln's next line: "and the executive government of the
United States will, during the continuance in office of the present incumbent,
recognize such persons as being free. "                     i
"That won't do."
Lincoln looked up and took off his spectacles, waiting for Seward's objec-
tion.
"Where you say, 'during the incumbency of the present President'I'd
strike that out. You're issuing a state paper, not a personal message." Seward
thought, but did not say, that Lincoln's qualifier seemed to invite the next
President to revoke the whole thing. Chase piped up to say he liked Seward's
suggestion, as Seward had assumed he would; the Treasury Secretary would
prefer the proclamation be issued by anybody but the incumbent.
Seward also saw the weakness in Lincoln's proposal: the Presidents was
merely personally "recognizing" freedom during his term without saying' he
would actually deliver it permanently. "Where you say that you 'will recog-
nize such persons as being free,' I'd change that to 'will recognize and main-
tain the freedom of such persons.' " In for a dime, in for a dollar; if Lincoln
was going to stage a coup, he should do it with firm resolve.
"I considered that," said Lincoln, "but it's not my way to promise what I
am not entirely sure I can perform."
"You ought to take that ground," Seward told him with great assurance.
"Recognize by itself isn't strong enough."
"I'm not prepared to say that I think we're exactly able to maintain this,"
said Lincoln dubiously.
"Seward's right," said Stanton, though Seward knew it must have pained
him to go along with a Cabinet rival.
"Put in maintain," agreed Chase. "The Proclamation does not, indeed,
mark out exactly the course I should myself prefer." Seward rolled his eyes at
the understated truth of that; Chase would probably have preferred an anony-
mous whisper in the night. "But I am ready to take it just as it is written, and
to stand by it with all my heart. I think the suggestions of Governor Seward
very judicious, and shall be glad to have them adopted."
Lincoln looked around the table and agreed to go along with the change.
He rewrote the phrase as Seward had suggested. He continued reading a
section that Seward considered ballastcalling attention in laborious detail
to the Fugitive Slave Act and the Confiscation Act, inserting in the proclama-
tion the printed sections of the legislation. Why all that?
Seward's puzzlement ended with the reading of the final paragraph: "And I
do hereby enjoin upon and order all persons engaged in the military and naval
service of the United States to observe, obey, and enforce, within their respective
spheres of service, the act and sections above recited. "
Ah, that was why Lincoln felt the need to quote from previous acts of
Congress: to send a message to George McClellan & Co.: in this Executive
proclamation threatening to free the slaves of rebels, he was building upon
laws duly passed by both Houses. By ordering McClellan to obey the laws
passed constitutionally, and enumerating them, Lincoln apparently hoped the
exhortation would slop over to his unconstitutional coup of the seizure of the
property of everyone who lived in the South, rebel or not. Shrewd.
But it troubled Seward that a President should have to "enjoin" the na-
tion's armed services to obey the laws; that was surely unprecedented. "En-
join" meant "command" or "direct" in Seward's lexicon: possibly Lincoln
was worried about a counter-coup by the army, feeling its oats after its
achievement at 'turning back Lee's invasion, and he wanted to remind the
sure-to-be-angered officers who had not signed up for abolition that the recent
acts in that direction were swathed in constitutional legitimacy.
When the President was finished reading, Seward, who realized his com-
ments had been peripheral, looked to Blair for the much-needed political
rebuttal. Although Lincoln had said his mind was made up on the central
question, surely he was not impervious to comment from his Cabinet on the
substance of the move.
Blair, however, merely looked at the ceiling. Seward assumed the Postmas-
ter General had been adviser by his sagacious father that the Biairs should
not be in the forefront of opposition to the shift in the center of gravity of the
partyespecially if Seward was willing to take on that onerous task.
Because nobody else was making specific suggestions on a fairly important
document, much less challenging its basic wisdom, Seward said 'coloniza-
tion. Isn't the Attorney General working on something along those lines?"
He knew that the redoubtable Anna Ella Carroll was working with Bates on a
policy statement about the emigration offreed blacks. They would be sent out
as emigrants, not as colonistswithout the protection of the mother country
in order to make their arrival more palatable to the Central American
countries.
"I'll have that by the end of the week," said Bates.
"So where you say 'the effort to colonize persons of African descent will be
continued upon this continent, or elsewhere,' " Seward suggested, "add 'with
the previously obtained consent of the governments existing there.' That will
be the import of the Attorney General's memorial when it arrives, I under-
stand, and it should conform with your proclamation."
Lincoln nodded and put it in, adding "That's an important point, Seward.
How come you didn't bring it up right away?"
Seward shrugged.
"You remind me," smiled Lincoln, leaning back, "of a hired man out West
who came to the farmer with the news that one of a yoke of oxen had
dropped dead. And after chewing the fat for a while, and hesitating, the hired
man said the other ox in the team had dropped dead, too. The farmer asked
him, 'Why didn't you tell me at once that both oxen were dead?' and the man
answered, 'Because I didn't want to hurt you by telling you too much at one
time.' "
Seward had not heard that one before; Lincoln seemed to have an inex-
haustible supply of tension relievers that were entirely apropos. He joined in
the laughter and then Stanton had his say.
"I want it known that I support this measure to the fullest," Stanton said,
without equivocation. "This brave act will infuse new spirit in the forces of
the Union, and it will strike fear in the heart of the rebellion. It will win the
war. It will set right a terrible wrong."
Stanton looked around the room fiercely. "This act is so important, and
involves consequences so vast, that each member of the Cabinet should be
called upon to give distinctly and unequivocally his own opinion of it."
"Some of us have spoken up," said Seward cheerfully.
"Two gentlemen," Stanton replied, glowering in victory, "have not been
sufficiently explicit, though they seem to concur. I refer )to the Secretary of
the Treasury"Chase looked startled and then offended, a sequence of reac-
tions Seward thought he was especially good at"and to the Secretary of the
Navy." That, thought Seward, was Mars getting even with old Neptune for
making him look like a fool in the abortive Cabinet coup last month. "And I
have in mind another member," Stanton added ominously, "with whom I am
not in full accord on many policies." That, Seward knew, meant him; he
airily waved it off.
"I must admit the subject came upon us unexpectedly," Chase expostu-
lated, on the defensive. "I was surprised. As you all know, I have long es-
poused the arming of blacks, and this proclamation goes a step further banan I
had ever proposed. But I am prepared to accept and support it." Chase
looked to Stanton for approval, which was withheld, so he went on: "I am
glad the President has made this advance, which he should sustain from his
heart." Seward made no effort to conceal his amusement as the distraught
Chase, trying to cover his lack of enthusiasm, went on to make an impromptu
argument in favor of emancipation in the rebel states.
Stanton nodded; then, like a strict teacher demanding that his pupils recite
their lessons, glared at Navy Secretary Welles.
"The President does not misunderstand my position, Mr. Secretary,"
Welles responded solemnly, "nor that of any other member of this Cabinet. I
assent most unequivocally to his measure as a war necessity."
"I am an emancipationist from principle," Blair felt constrained to put in.
"At some personal sacrifice, at a time when many who are now all-out for
abolition were silent, I defended the slave Dred Scott in court. You will recall
I helped John Brown get a fair trial after he was captured at Harpers Ferry."
Seward nodded; that established his bona fides, with a nice dig at the come-
lately Stanton.
"But I have doubts of the expediency of this executive action at this partic-
ular juncture," Blair said. At last; Seward was beginning to doubt if anybody
would have the courage to stay Lincoln's hand from this bluhder. "We ought
not to put in jeopardy the patriotic element in the border states, already
severely tried. Elections are coming in a month. As soon as this proclamation
reaches the border states, it will carry over those states to the secessionists."
"I have considered that danger," Lincoln said, "which is undoubtedly seri-
ous. But there are two sides to it. The difficulty is as great not to act as to act.
For months I have labored to get those border states to move, in vain. We
must make the forward movement, and they will acquiesce, if not immedi-
ately, soon."
"Why?"
"Because they will realize that slavery has received its deathblow from
slave owners," Lincoln explained, as if it had always been apparent to him
that by seceding, the South had given up its constitutional right to perpetuate
slavery where it existed. "Slavery cannot survive the rebellion."
That was a sweeping conclusion, Seward thought, but Blair was not fin-
ished making his case against emancipation now. "There are also party men,
politicians in the free states who are striving to revive the old party lines and
distinctions. We're putting a club in their hand to smash the Republican
Party."
"That does not carry much weight with me," said Lincoln. "Their clubs
will be used against us, take what course we might."
"I would like to ask your leave," said Blair stubbornly, "to file a paper with
you against this policy. Time, and the course of the war, and the elections,
may cause you to change your mind."
"I have no objection to that," said Lincoln.
Seward, who had hoped earlier in the meeting that Blair would pose the
necessary objections, now worried that he had held his ground too long; it
would not do for conservatives to appear to be against emancipation, if that
was to be the policy. The aboMionists would lacerate them for not jumping
when Lincoln did. Did Blair mean to file his objections privately, or publicly?
Privately would be meaningless; publicly would invite his dismissal.
"Think twice about filing written objections, Judge," Seward said
smoothly.
"I am worried," Blair replied, "about the effect of this proclamation on the
army."
Nobody said a word at this allusion to the unspoken fear in the Cabinet of
a coup by McClellan, only one day's march away. Seward thought the mo-
ment propitious for the protection of the Biairs, his allies in the Administra-
tion, against the memoirs and diaries and backstabbings to the press of the
radical faction. "But you are emphasizing your personal belief, Mr. Blair,
that slavery should not be perpetuated, and that it should be struck down in
the states in rebellion, and only in those." Seward leaned forward and held a
finger up, to be certain Blair caught the political warning. "Your objection is
purely on timing."
"Of course. Yes," Blair responded. "That is my position exactly. Let no-
body misconstrue it."
Stanton harrumphed, got everyone's attention, and looked hard at Seward.
The Secretary of State alone had not really tipped his hand, not counting
Caleb Smith of Interior, who had been heard to say, "Th-th-there goes Indi-
ana."
With a sense of the occasion, Seward rose to his feet. "I'll take that docu-
ment," he said to the President, who obediently handed it to him. "And I
shall have the formal phraseology of attestation added, along with the Great
Seal. I'll have it back here early this afternoon for your signature, and it can
be released to the newspapers for publication tomorrow morning." He flashed
a big smile at Stanton, and the meeting began to break up.
"Stay a moment, Stanton," Seward heard the President say. "I want to go
over the other proclamation with you. And I want to ask you," he added,
"what are we doing about the ailments of our soldiers' feet? That fellow you
sent over was amazing."
"Wait," said Chase, shuffling through a stack of papers in front of him, "I
should like to discuss a plan for the central purchase of all cotton, sugar,
tobacco and rice, in which a certificate would be given, redeemable at the end
of the rebellion, to"
"That's entirely too important for decision without reflection," Seward told
him gently. "That should be the first item at our next meeting." Threatening
to free the slaves in Secessia by New Year's Eve unless the rebellion ended,
followed by assuming dictatorial powers of arrest, was enough for one after-
noon.

CHAPTER 6
GETTING RIGHT ON EMANCIPATION
Old Man Blair took the lengthy memorial prepared by his son Montgomery
and read it through. The handwriting was near-illegible, making it hard on
the old man's eyes. The reasoning was typical of Monty, sound and lacid; the
arguments themselves, taken one by one, he found persuasive. The Proclama-
tion of Emancipation, if carried out as yesterday's preliminary proclamation
promised to do come January I, would transform the war in a way that
Lincoln had said must never be permittedby turning an answer to insurrec-
tion into "a remorseless revolutionary struggle." But now it was the North on
the side of revolution.
"Brilliant," he pronounced. Monty looked pleased; Frank, who had hur-
ried over from the House of Representatives to join them for lunch at the
Biairs' Pennsylvania Avenue house across the street from the Mansion,
smiled at his brother proudly. "Now, Monty," the Old Man said, handing the
document back to his elder son, "tear it up."
The boys looked perplexed. "Tear it up, tear it up," the Old Man insisted.
"Into little pieces. You never wrote it. No copies exist, do they? Good. You
didn't pass this around for comment? Thank God."
"I feel strongly about this, Father," said the Postmaster General. "I was
thinking of issuing my objections publicly. If you think that making it public
is a mistake, I can understandit might weaken the President's hand at a
difficult time. But I see nothing wrong in handing it to him privately, so that
the President will have the argument against emancipation at this time in
front of him."
"What in hell good would that do? The decision's been made. The procla-
mation is in all the newspapers."
"But it is provisional. His plan will not take effect for a hundred days, and
plenty could happen in that time. Lincoln might yet be dissuaded. At least I
want my objections on file."
"Horseshit," said the old man. He picked up the New York Tribune, which
Monty had brought over from the railroad station. The headline read: "God
Bless Abraham Lincoln!" Greeley's editorial was ecstatic.
"But look at these," his elder son protested. "From the New York World, an
abolitionist sheet which thinks that Lincoln did not go far enough: '. . . the
President has purposely made the proclamation inoperative in all places
where we have gained a military footing which makes the slaves accessible.
He has produced emancipation only where he has no power to execute it.' "
That was the whole beauty of the thing. The elder Blair was irritated at
Lincoln both for ignoring his advice and for not warning him in advance. But
the way the President had done it was ingenious: threatening to free slaves
only in those areas in rebellion, where he was unable to free any slave. The
maneuver was designed to rally the radicals without permanently estranging
the conservatives. The Old Man's mind wandered to a curious fact his son
had noted: from the issuance of the proclamation to the date it was supposed
to be carried out was one hundred days, the famous length of time in which
the returning Napoleon Bonaparte drove the French king out of Paris. Did
Lincoln plan it that way? Did he know that much about history?
"And from the other side," Monty was going on, "Bennett's Herald: 'a sop
to the abolitionists.' "
Frank held up a telegraph message: "Here's the reaction from the South.
The Richmond Examiner calls it 'more an act of malice toward the master,
than one of mercy to the slave.' And Jeff Davis is quoted this way'A
restitution of the Union has been rendered forever impossible by the adoption
of a measure which neither admits of retraction nor can coexist with union.'
This means war to the bitter end."
"We cannot know where it will lead," the Old Man told his sons, "but
emancipation is now a fact. A political fact." He asked himself: was it? Lin-
coln had left himself an out if the South agreed to surrender, but that was
most unlikely. What about a peace probe, with terms calling for no emancipa-
tion in return for reunion? Possible, if McClellan went on to new victories;
Lincoln had created a strong bargaining position, and had placed himself
rather than his general in command of the ultimate resolution of the war.
Smart. "And I do not want any Blair on record on the wrong side of the
slavery issue."
"We don't want to ruin my chances for national office, Monty," said Frank
sensibly. "Your memorial would be construed by our enemies as a Blair
family stand against emancipation. You could put in all the qualifiers you
like, but that's what people would say."
"Frank's right, Monty," the Old Man said. "We lost. For the time being,
conservative Republicans will have to take a back seat to the likes of Greeley
and Wade and Sumner. Good generals like McClellan and Porter, who want
both Union and peace, will be under pressure from incompetents like Hooker
and Hunter and poor Burnside, who want abolition and conquest. That's the
way it is, son. Don't run from reality."
Monty's face and body sagged. "This is all wrong. Half emancipation is a
compromise that won't bring peace, it will bring war to the knife. If Lincoln
wants to abolish slavery legally, why doesn't he propose an amendment to the
Constitution?"
"Because he doesn't have the votes," said Frank, who had been carefully
taught how to count the House. "And after November, he'll have even fewer
abolition votes."
"What's done is done, Monty," said the Old Man. "Now let's look ahead.
First, we want to be on the right side. There's a serenade to Lincoln tonight
outside the Mansion and a reception at Chase's afterward1 want both of
you to be there, and not looking glum. Agreed?"
Monty nodded reluctantly, adding, "There's a crisis brewing in the army,
Father. We suspect that this emancipation announcement may be the match
needed to light a revolt. The army is fifty miles away and in love with its
commander. If the troops move on Washington, are you for McClellan or for
Lincoln?"
"We're for both," said the Old Man unhesitatingly, speaking for the three
of them. He had worked out the politics of this in his head during a long talk
with the President. "First, we are for constitutional government and the man
the people elected, Lincoln. An army coup is anathema. I'd stand out there in
front of the Mansion with my old musket and let them shoot me down first."
"What a way to go, for a Jackson man," Frank said admiringly.
"Next: we're also for McClellan because he is the best general in the army
and because we're the only people close-to Lincoln who don't want to see this
war end with the bloody conquest of the South. A hundred years of hatred
would be no reunion. So we have to persuade McClellan not to do anything
stupid that would get him fired."
"He's a very angry man," said Monty. "Stanton and Halleck never so
much as congratulated him. They're picking apart his victory, even spreading
rumors that he secretly met with Lee to work out a stalemate. Mac has
provocation."
"Then we'll just have to unprovoke him." A family of influence did not
merely react to events, it took concerted action to shape them. "Little Mac
wants to be President, doesn't he? In sixty-four, the Republican candidate
will be Lincoln, if the North has won the war. But if the war drags on, Chase
will challenge Lincoln for the nomination and that damned trimmer may just
take it from him."
"Country would be sick of war by then," Frank agreed.
"Either way," the elder Blair concluded, "the Republican candidate will be
greatly unpopular in the North. That means a Democratic victory, and Mc-
Clellan can have the Democratic Party's nomination for the askingif he
behaves like a patriot now and not like a would-be dictator."
"We're for Lincoln," said Frank slowly, trying to get it straight. "But if the
radicalsChase, Stanton, Ben Wade, Tad Stevens, the whole abolitionist
crowdtake over the Republican Party, then we switch over to McClellan
and the Democrats. But what about Horatio Seymour? He's the Democrat I
like."
"Each of us will decide for himself," said the Old Man piously, since
Monty was showing signs of unfilial independence, "but Seymour would have
to win Governor of New York this year, and that's a long shot even with all
the resentment against abolition." He abandoned the pretense of individual
action; the Biairs would stick together to put Frank in the White House.
"Here's the family plan: step one is to warn McClellan away from trying to
set himself up as dictator, which would probably fail and would ruin him in
sixty-four. The President is stronger than the army, and Lincoln told me he
means to show it."
"The suspension of habeas corpus," Monty nodded. "He'll have that proc-
lamation tomorrow. Stanton wants the power to jail anybody who says any-
thing against the war. To protect the draft, Lincoln is backing him up."
"Not that," the Old Man shook his head. It was true that the anti-dissent
proclamation would add to the impression of a tough-minded president, but
that was not the demonstration of authority Francis Preston Blair had in
mind. "He's going to make an example of a disloyal officer here at the War
Department. Lance the boil, challenge the crowd that wants McClellan to
take over. Show 'em a strong President, like Jackson."
"The officeranybody we know?"
"Have you heard of a major named Key?"
Monty frowned. "There's a Colonel Key, Thomas Key, who's the judge
advocate for McClellan. More than that, he's Mac's right arm, drafted that
Harrison's Landing letter. He must be at Antietam now."
"May not be the same man that Lincoln's after. But you run the Post
Office, Monty. Get a letter off to McClellan tonight. Tell him we've been
talking to Lincoln, which is true enoughthat he's caught a major here in
the War Department named Key who said that McClellan's plan was to hold
back his troops to make a compromise with the rebels for Union with slavery.
Going to make a public spectacle of the man. This might be a good time for
McClellan to say something critical of slavery."
"He won't want to," said Frank. "Mac believed all that stuff about the war
being for the Union and not for abolition. He's as much against 'subjugation'
and 'conquest' as cousin Breckinridge ever was."
"Put it this way, write this down," the Old Man dictated to his older son.
" 'Even if you had the ambitions to be President, George, this would be the
best course to adopt, for I can assure you that no appreciable portion of the
nation will favor the continuation of slavery after this war is over.' Got that?"
Monty was scribbling fast. "You're certainly a President's man, Father."
"And when McClellan becomes President legitimately, I'll be his man. The
Biairs are no dictator's men, though. Tomorrow, I'll write Mac a letter, too.
End of the week, you do too, Frank. Don't hint that one of these days he may
be getting a surprise visit in camp from Lincoln."
"Did the President say he'd do that, Father?" asked Frank.
"No, he's playing what he calls 'shut-pan' with me, but now I know how he
thinks." Francis Preston Blair resolved not to be caught napping again by a
bold Lincoln move to protect his power. The President no longer had any
intimate advisers to influence himnot the Biairs, not Weed, not Browning
or Swett or any of those he used to lean on; he was his own man totally,
confiding in one man for one purpose, using another for something else.
The Old Man saw how Lincoln subordinated every interest to his central
idea of majority rule, with terrible punishment to those who tried to subvert
it. The man was now President in his bones, prepared to use everyone to help
him coax public sentiment toward defending that noble but unrelenting end,
with little regard for personal affection or political loyalty. Blair noted that
leaders, as they matured, trusted themselves more and others less, and found
themselves at their most effective unencumbered by the barnacles of grati-
tude.
Even as he hated to be edged out of what had been an innermost circle,
Blair admired that implosion of confidence he could see in Lincoln. As a
family, the Biairs, too, had a central ideato put Frank in the White House,
which the Old Man granted was not as high-minded as majority rule, but
from which could flow great things for the Republic. Strength of character,
he had learned, was always more important than brilliance of mind in a
democracy, and he was sure his youngest son had the Blair character. He
hoped the boy would develop, in time, the shrewdness Lincoln was showing
in jabbing sharp elbows into the sides of all the political forces pressing in on
him. Perhaps one day the leader of an embattled democracy would find a way
to defend the system more democratically, but that seemed a long way off to
the man who had watched Jackson and was watching Lincoln.
Intimacy was not all, however; more satisfying than to be told a secret was
to figure out a secret. Blair saw Lincoln's view of his main problem as the
impatience of radical support: that had been taken care of by the tentative
proclamation of emancipation, with the angry reaction suppressed by a proc-
lamation suspending habeas corpus. _Now a new problem would be from an
angry officer corps dominated by Democrats who disagreed with his ap-
proach to the war.
"Do you know what I would do if I were President?" He looked from one
son to the other. "First I would challenge the disloyal element in the military
by slapping down some loudmouthed staff aide, loudly and publicly. Show
authority, that's what they understand." He would not like to be in the shoes
of this Major Key, whoever he was.
"And then you would do some local politicking," said Monty, understand-
ing. The Old Man wished Frank had caught on as quickly.
"Exactly. I would go right to the source of the trouble with a sudden
review of the army in the field." Blair could see Lincoln at his most serious
and kindly, visiting the wounded, praising the brave, urging on the generals,
establishing by his presence the fact of civilian control to the troops, and the
fact of his military control to the people. "It's Mr. Lincoln's army, you know
not McClellan's. Not yet, not till he's elected President. It's up to us to save
Little Mac from unwise counsels." At Antietam, the young man had earned a
second chance to lead the armies.
Frank reached for his brother's memorial to the President on the table and
looked at it again. "What are you going to do with this, Monty?"
The Postmaster General took it from him, and to their father's great satis-
faction, slowly tore it in half, then in half again. The President would be
denied some excellent advice he did not want to get, and the Biairs would not
run the risk of being seen as standing in the way of emancipation.
"See you both at the party tonight at the Chases'," the Old Man said
proudly. "Remember to smileit's a celebration."

CHAPTER 7
SERENADE

Kate Chase, fresh from an exhilarating month-long sojourn at the Saratoga
spa, felt guilty about her lack of participation in the war. Most of Wash-
ington's women of note had something noble to do, from rolling bandages to
visiting hospitals; she had no role to talk about in a self-sacrificial way, and
she told her father it troubled her.
"But you do a great deal, Katie," he replied, glumly reading the God-bless-
Lincoln editorial in the New York Tribune. She knew he had been in a stunned
state ever since Lincoln's political masterstroke. "Your long talks with Lord
Lyons have done more to keep England out of the war than anything Seward
can claim."
"I'm a parasite," she murmured. That was what John Hay had called her
and she hated him for it because it was true. Why did he want to hurt her?
Probably because she paid too much attention to Major Garfield and when
John objected, she had called him a draft-dodger.
"Parasol? You already have a dozen of them."
She sat on the arm of his chair and kissed his massive, balding head. Father
and daughter read the newspaper together, as they often did. He pointed to
an article about casualties in the battle for Maryland: more than 20,000 killed
and wounded on both sides, not counting the captured. The bloodiest single
day of the war.
"I thought McClellan prided himself on maneuvering, keeping casualties
low." she said.
"Not at Antietam. Lost more men than Lee, I suppose because we were on
the attack, for a change. They say the carnage there is unbelievable."
"Brady is going to show the pictures at his emporium here and in New
York," she noted, from the paper. " 'Exhibit of the dead at Antietam.' I don't
want to go." That was unworthy, to use her father's favorite word. "Perhaps
we should visit a hospital today, together."
"Too horrible for you, Katie. And we'd only be in the way." He read
further and changed his mind: "They say General Hooker is at the Insane
Asylum, which has been taken over as a hospital for the wounded. That's not
far from here. I want to meet Hooker. He may be our man to replace McClel-
lan."
She pulled him to his feet. "We're off." After the serenade at the White
House tonight, she was planning to bring back a dozen or so couples for a
reception, reminding everyone that emancipation was a great Chase victory.
Wine and cake in the late evening made an appropriate entertainment, and
cost much less than a sit-down dinner. She wanted to have something provoc-
ative to report, and "Fighting Joe" Hooker, wounded at the battle, would
surely have something to say. "You get our boarder," she said. "I'll get a
bonnet and parasol. Or parasite."
The "boarder" was her father's houseguest, James Garfield of Ohio, a
major in the Union Army. More important, the major was newly nominated
to be a Congressman. If elected next montha certainty, in the most Republi-
can district in Ohiohe would probably remain in the army and delay taking
his seat, but he was guaranteed the role of delegate to the '64 Republican
convention. Kate enjoyed the company of the mercurial, handsomely bearded
Garfield, and had happily endorsed his move from the Willard to their home
at Sixth and E; at thirty, he was almost her contemporary.
Kate and the moody major had already shared one intimate moment: re-
turning from a ride in the Silver Spring countryside, she had broken through
his reserve and listened to his complaints about his prissy wife back home and
his love for a girl who had been his former schoolmate in Florida; it was
deliciously complicated by the guilt he felt toward his wife after the death of
their infant a few months ago. Kate flirted with Garfield out of habit, but her
feeling toward him was comradely.
Major Garfield had no money, no connections other than in Ohio politics,
and in her mind no great prospects, and he was already married, unhappily or
not; still, he was a fine second man to have around the house this season. She
liked to compare him to John Hay: brooding where John was sparkling,
constrained and respectful where the younger man was lustful and irreverent,
as easily drawn completely into Chase's orbit as Hay had been into Lincoln's.
She sent the servant up to fetch their houseguest for what she called "our
mission to succor the wounded." When the major came down, her father
bravely set the tone of the day by praising Lincoln for taking his advice on
slavery at long last.
"Strange," said the major, "that a second-rate Illinois lawyer should be the
instrument through whom one of the sublimest works of any age is accom-
plished."
She came only slightly to the defense of the President by recalling Wendell
Phillips's perfect characterization of Lincoln as "a first-rate second-rate
man."
"No, I mean that," Garfield insisted, and related what he had heard from
Edward Stanly, military governor of North Carolina, when that conservative
had stormed into Washington to protest to Lincoln about the devastating
effect of the proclamation on Union sentiment in that state. "The President
told him that emancipation had become a civil necessity to prevent the radi-
cals from openly embarrassing the government in the conduct of the war.
Lincoln said he'd prayed to the Almighty to save him from this necessity,
said he'd asked, 'Let this cup pass from me,' but his prayer had not been
answered."
Chase blanched at that evocation of the Bible in a direction opposite from
that taken by Lincoln in the Cabinet Room. But Kate refused to let them
become surly on what was a day of public celebration; she took the arms of
both men and they set out merrily for the Insane Asylum.
The general did not look like a wounded man to Kate. She presented him
with a basket of grapes and peaches which she had arranged herself, after
calculating what was the proper thing to bring to a wounded hero. General
Joseph Hooker was not in bed but lying on a couch, his bandaged foot inside
a large slipper.
The doctor was optimistic enough: "The general's wound is as little dan-
gerous as a foot wound can be," he told them cheerily. "The ball passed
through the fleshy part just above the sole and below the instep, without
touching a bone."
"I would suggest trying Dr. Forsha's Balm," said Chase, trying to be help-
ful. To the general, Chase said: "General Hooker, if my advice had been
followed, you would have been in command this summer when the Union
Army stood before Richmond."
"If I had commanded," Hooker took the opportunity to reply, "Richmond
would have been ours."
"What happened at Sharpsburg?" Garfield put in. Kate noted that he
spoke not as a major to a general, but as a future Congressman to a soldier.
"The tragedy was that I was wounded in the morning, leading the first
attack. If I could have remained on the field three hours longer," Hooker
spoke with certitude, "our victory would have been complete. I had already
gained enough ground, and seen enough, to make the rout of the enemy
sure."
"Who did McClellan replace you with?" asked Garfield.
"George Meade, a fine man, butwell, let me just say this. After I had
been carried off the field, McClellan sent for me to lead an advance in an
ambulance. That's how much that field of battle needed a fighting general."
Kate looked at the slightly injured foot and marveled at how little it took to
change the course of a battle.
"McClellan is surely no fighter," her father said. "He and Stanton, they
say, are like oil and water."
"McClellan is unfit to lead a great army," Hooker said. "He is timid and
hesitating where decision is necessary. The Battle ofAntietam was near being
lost by his way of fighting it. If the attack had been simultaneouswith
Burnside's corps attacking along with me, and Porter in the centerthe rout
would have been complete. For God's sake, Governorexcuse me, Miss
our force in the battle exceeded the enemy's by thirty thousand men! McClel-
lan lost the chance to finally defeat the enemy."
"There's some talk," Chase said carefully, "of elements in the officer corps
urging McClellan to come to Washington to intimidate the government. Espe-
cially after the Emancipation Proclamation. Do you place any credence in
that?"
"It's not true that he has the support of the whole army," Hooker said
obliquely. "Just two corps, Porter's especially, and those men are indulged
and protected."
Kate wondered how many men were in two army corpsenough to seize
Washington? Hooker relieved her mind: "Besides, McClellan is not audacious
enough for a coup," said the general with his foot in the slipper, obviously
eager to show his contempt for a commander in disfavor with Chase. "He'd
think that Lincoln had two hundred thousand troops defending the Mansion.
McClellan is just not dictator material."
As they left, Chase stopped the doctor in the hallway of the Insane Asy-
lum, jammed with moaning wounded attended by nurses who seeded not to
know what to do. The doctor was a military surgeon who had considerable
battlefield experience, her father had told her. "What is your estimate of the
wound?"
"He'll be walking in a week."
"What's your estimate of the man as a general?"
"Brave, energetic, full of life."
Garfield asked, "Were you at Antietam?" When the surgeon said yes, the
major asked, "Was General Hooker skillful on the field?"
"Yes." It was a tentative yes, with a "but" underneath. "Not comprehen-
sive enough, perhaps, for the plan and conduct of a great campaign. But he is
surely a better soldier than Bumside."
The surgeon went on to recommend a colonel for appointment to general,
which Chase noted down. Everybody, Kate observed, wanted something; it
made her feel justified in her own long list of wants. What her father wanted,
having been so disappointed in John Pope, was a general capable of replacing
McClellan right away; she knew that Bumside, the other main possibility,
had turned down the command a month ago, pleading inadequacy. What
General Hooker wanted was a political sponsor to press his cause when a
Republican replacement for McClellan was needed. What the doctor wanted
was a general's star for a friend, and perhaps a high place on Hooker's staff.
What Garfield wanted was an introduction to Washington power, a whiff of
Republican radicalism, a taste of sophistication. Coming full circle, what
Chase wanted in Garfield was an active supporter in his home base for the
Republican nomination against Lincoln, and in Hooker a general who would
be obliged to him for his command.
And what did she want? In the carriage back to the Executive Mansion,
where the President was to be serenaded by a crowd enchanted by his emanci-
pation edict, Kate changed the "what" to "who": she wanted, first, her fa-
ther. She wanted his unalloyed affection, shared to a slight degree with her
younger sister, Nettie, but unchallenged by any other potential official host-
ess.
That meant Kate Chase would have to counter Addie Douglas, widow of
Stephen Douglas, cousin to Rose Greenhow; she seemed to be connected in
some way to everyone who counted in Washington. The mail to her father
from Addie had stopped; that probably meant she was writing to Salmon
Chase at his office, to avert Kate's interception of correspondence. Addie,
however, was just a charming socialite; more ominous were the frequent visits
of Anna Carroll, who was a political force operating on a level of intellect and
influence that Kate had not yet reached. Miss Carroll was troubling because
she was smarter than her father and did not let him know it. Did her father
call on Miss Carroll? Did he write her letters in reply to her interminable
political polemics? Kate did not know, but sensed that this womanMiss
Carroll must be nearly twice her agecould seize the prize position that
rightly belonged to the elder Chase daughter.
Kate was prepared to make great personal sacrifices on the way to becom-
ing what the newspapers had begun to call "first Lady." Calculation was
central: when she learned that a crowd was planning to serenade the Presi-
dent at the Mansion that night, it was her idea that the crowd be encouraged
to march over to the Chase house and serenade the Cabinet member who had
persuaded Lincoln to take the step toward emancipation. That, in turn, led to
the opportunity for a reception inside the house for the people who counted
in Republican and military ranks.
The prospect of a party with a purpose of sharing the credit for abolition
excited her. Lord Lyons would be there, and Roscoe Conkling, and Governor
Sprague, her three most public beaux; Major Garfield would be looking at
her, as he always did, as if she were an especially ripe piece of forbidden fruit;
and John Hay would come over with the crowd from the Mansion. Red wine
was the suitable beverage; thirty people, by her estimate, would consume at
least two cases on a festive occasion. Sprague, she sighed, would handle a
couple of bottles by himself.
John Hay stood several paces behind the President and Mrs. Lincoln on
the front porch of the Mansion. He positioned himself next to Ward Hill
Lamon, whom the Tycoon had appointed marshal and who had promptly
appointed himself presidential bodyguard. Like so many people from Spring-
field, Marshal Lamon and Hay were related by marriage: John Hay's uncle
Milton was Hill's brother-in-law. The burly Lamon was looking out into the
crowd at dusk, searching for unfriendly faces, but there seemed to Hay to be
none. This was an exuberant crowd, mainly Republicans, some negroes, al-
most all men, orderly and with a core obviously practiced in the ant~;slaveryy
songs of the day.
The Hutchinson Family Singers were there at John Hay's personal invita-
tion. This group had given a concert to the Army of the Potomac one night,
and George McClellan had later ordered them out of the army lines perma-
nently. Their sin had been to sing the song they were singing right now, to the
tune of a Martin Luther hymn, the words by Whittier:
What breaks the oath
Of the men (>' the South?
What whets the knife
For the Union's life?
Hark to the answer: Slavery!
Those abolitionist words had been too provocative for McClellan. The
Hutchinsons sang them with extra fervor tonight, with the hint of a threat of
another armynot Lee's but McClellan'shanging over Washington.
"Fellow citizens," the President began his response to the serenade. Hay
was not surprised: when he had asked Lincoln if he was planning any re-
marks, the President had said no but his second secretary knew he would
have to say something.
"I have not been distinctly informed why you do me this honor, though I
suppose it is because of the proclamation." That brought a laugh and ap-
plause.
"I can only trust in God that I have made no mistake."
"No mistake, all right!" cried a voice.
"I shall make no attempt on this occasion to sustain what I have done or
said by any comment."
"We understand," said somebody; Hay thought it sounded like a revival
meeting. He also knew that the President's disclaimer meant he would have a
thought to offer.
"It is now for the country and the world"Hay hoped that reference
would get to the correspondent of The London Times"to pass judgment on
it, and, may be, to take action upon it. I will say no more. In my position I am
environed with difficulties."
"That's so," said a sympathetic voice. Hay marveled at the use of the word
"environed"a great, King James biblical, mysterious verb; he vaguely re-
called Lincoln reciting some Shakespearean passage with the phrase "envi-
roned he was with many foes." Lincoln surprised him from time to time with
his use of archaic language slipped into the modern tongue.
"Yet they are scarcely so great as the difficulties of those who, on the
battlefield, are endeavoring to purchase with their blood and their lives the
future happiness and prosperity of this country. Let us never forget them."
(Long applause.)
"On the fourteenth and seventeenth days of the present month there have
been battles bravely, skillfully and successfully fought." Lincoln then called
on the crowd to give three cheers to "the good and brave officers and men
who fought those successful battles." He did not mention the name of the
general in charge.
Hay followed the crowd to the Chase house on E Street, a ten-block stroll
on a lovely fall evening, marred only by the sight of ambulances coming back
from Frederick behind tired horses on the way to local hospitals. As the
singing begana little more organized this time, after the practice at the
Mansionthe Secretary of the Treasury came out on the front lawn, accom-
panied by his two daughters. Hay swallowed at the sight of Kate dressed in
dark green silk with a golden sash around a waist that his hands had held
much too long ago.
During the singing, he spotted Anna Carroll at the edge of the crowd,
standing with Senator Ben Wade and his wife, Caroline, waiting for the sere-
nade to end before going in to the reception. Hay knew that Chase and Wade
were rivals in Ohio, but allies of a sort in Washington in the badgering of the
President to strike down slavery. He joined the group.
"Harrah for Old Abe and the proclamation," said Wade, not too enthusias-
tically. "You can tell him I said that, young fellow. About damn time. Not far
enough, either, but I'm surprised Billy Bowlegs and the Biairs let him go this
far."
Hay let that go; Wade was too important an ally, flaying McClellan as
Chairman of the Committee on the Conduct of the War, to offend in any way.
"You think, Senator, that the Proclamation of Freedom will have the mili-
tary effect the President intends?" That was innocuous enough, Hay thought;
maybe diplomacy would be his future. He also wanted to see whether the
grand-sounding "Proclamation of Freedom" would catch on.
"The country is going to hell," Wade said, "and the scenes witnessed in the
French Revolution are nothing in comparison with what we shall see here."
"He's a little bloody-minded tonight," said his wife, as if to apologize for
the senator's extreme hostility toward the South. "He's heard that the army
officers are plotting to ease up on the rebels."
"The rebels must be made to feel the horrors of war," Wade growled.
"They won't give up until they've lost their slaves, their homes, their sons. We
need a general who knows that, and then we'll have peace."
Hay nodded vigorously and turned to Anna Carroll. "Miss Carroll, your
plan on colonization will be issued by the Attorney General day after tomor-
row," he complimented her, knowing that she had prevailed on Wade to
support Lincoln on the shipment of freed slaves to Chiriqui. Hay thought the
deportation scheme was a barbarous and hideous humbug, so he changed the
subject promptly: "We have another proclamation to put out first, making it
hot for agitators."
"Good," said Wade. "If there is any stain on this administration, young
man, it is that you have dealt too leniently with these traitors at home."
"You'll like this proclamation, then," Hay assured him. "It is aimed at the
Democrats who will say that they signed on for Union, but not for abolition.
We expect they'll oppose the draft."
"Mercy for traitors is cruelty to loyal men," said Wade. "Remember that."
Hay would; the senator spoke in epigrams.
When the serenade ended, the Treasury Secretary made an earnest speech
about the proclamation of future emancipation. He did not have a way with
the crowd such as Lincoln had shownthe stump debates with Dcuglas had
long ago taught the President how to play off a crowd's reactionbut he gave
an impression of gravitas and trustworthiness. Hay listened for any hints of
personal disloyalty to the President, any suggestions that Lincoln had not
gone as far as Chase preferred on emancipationin fact, the truth was the
opposite. But Chase's remarks could not be faulted; Hay flashed a smile and
waved in the direction of Kate, hoping she would see him.
The crowd marched off to bellow their songs at the Attorney General's
house down the street and to force Mr. Bates to say something. Hay took
Anna Carroll's arm as they went into the Chase reception, partly because he
admired the woman, mostly because it would irritate Kate, who had made
him lonely when she skedaddled to Saratoga for an interminable month.
"Hello, abolitionist," Anna said to Secretary Chase, who first looked star-
tied, then grinned at Wade and said, "That's what we are, aren't we?"
Gleefully, merrily, they all called one another abolitionists, not mere eman-
cipationists or Free-Soilers, and it seemed to Hay that they enjoyed the novel
sensation of appropriating that hitherto dreaded label. All those at the party
seemed to feel a sort of new and exhilarating life; they breathed more freely;
in a way, the President's proclamation had freed them as well as the slaves.
"This is the most wonderful history of an insanity of a class that the world
has ever seen," Chase told them after a few glasses of wine, savoring the
moment and his part in it. "No party, no public feeling in the North," Chase
went on, "could ever have hoped to touch what the rebels have madly placed
in the very path of destruction."
"Incredible," said Anna Carroll. She looked at him with the conspiratorial
respect that Hay assumed had worked wonders on a couple of former presi-
dents.

CHAPTER 8

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
SEPTEMBER 25, 1862
Isachar Zacharie has established himself with the top levels of this adminis-
tration as no medicine man before. He was in today to affix a splint and
bandage to the Prsdt's still sprained wrist, on the theory that if he can give
relief to one appendage, he can give relief to all.
Mr. Lincoln sent him to Seward to cut that gentleman's corns. Now Dr. Z
is the only doctor in the country with a second testimonial, this one signed by
both the President and Secretary of State, saying, "We desire that the soldiers
of our brave Army may have the benefit of the doctor's surpassing skill." As a
result, Stanton has given him a pass through the lines for thirty days to cut
his way through the vast cornucopia of Federal marching feet. The pass takes
him from Fortress Monroe clear down around New Orleans, where it is
intended that General Banks will replace General Butler. The Prsdt has had
several long talks with Dr. Z, and I suspect that something more is afoot.
Chase was slightly troubled by the "other" proclamation this week. Thinks
it may unduly bend the Constitution to set up a band of civilian provost
marshals, as Stanton plans to do in the discouragement of dissent, to carry
out the decree of martial law. In fact, Stanton now has unlimited power to
create new offenses such as "constructive treason" and jail and prosecute
offenders, subject only to the President's review. The Democrats are scream-
ing, especially Horatio Seymour and a few other friends of McClellan and his
West Pointers in New York, but they had better not scream too loud, lest they
arouse Stanton's ire and into the hoosegow they go.
Chase furrowed his large brow at Lincoln about this: "We are doing more
to destroy self-government by these arbitrary arrests and illegal punishments
in the North," he pontificated today, "than the Confederates of the South in
their attempt to wipe us out as a nation."
Our high-minded Treasury Secretary can assume that noble posture be-
cause he has only to raise money, not troops. The Ancient of Days did not let
him get away with that:
"This thing reminds me of a story I read in a newspaper the other day. It
was of an Italian captain who ran his vessel on a rock and knocked a hole in
her bottom. He set his men to pumping and he went to prayers before a figure
of the Virgin in the bow of the ship."
Lincoln, as he does when telling a story like this, grew all animated. Chase,
at the sound of the word "Virgin," looked pained.
"The leak gained on them," continued the Tycoon. "It looked at last as if
the vessel would go down with all on board. The captain, at length, in a fit of
rage at not having his prayers answered, seized the figure of the Virgin and
threw it overboard.
"Suddenly the leak stopped. The water was pumped out, and the vessel got
safely into port. When docked for repairs, what do you suppose they found?
The statue of the Virgin Mary was found stuck head-foremost in the hole!"
Chase frowned some more. He was mildly unhappy with the arbitrary
arrest policy, but he must have been most unhappy not to get the joke. "I
don't quite see, Mr. President, the precise application of your story."
"Why, Chase, I don't intend precisely to throw the Virgin Mary overboard
and by that I mean the Constitutionbut I will stick it in the hole if I can.
These rebels are violating the Constitution to destroy the Union, and I will
violate the Constitution, if necessary, to save the Union."
"To give Stanton the power to imprison anyone for as long as he likes on
mere suspicion of disloyalty," Chase persisted, sounding to me like a resusci-
tated John Breckinridge, "seems to be a terrible encroachment on individual
rights. The Constitution says"
"I suspect, Chase, that our Constitution is going to have a rough time of it
before we get done with this row. But we can't fight the rebels with elder-
squirts and rosewater."
CHAPTER 9
THE KEY EPISODE

"The witness is here, Mr. President," said George Nicolay. "You sent for
him."
Lincoln looked up, pulled his chair in and sat up straight. "Send the wit-
ness in."
A nervous officer on Stanton's staff stood at attention in front of the com-
mander in chief's desk. Lincoln did not ask him to sit down.
"Your full name?"
"Levi C. Turner, sir; Major, Judge Advocate Corps."
"I am informed, Major," said Lincoln formally, "that within the past week
you propounded a question to Major John Key of General Halleck's staff."
He picked up a slip of paper. "The question was, 'Why was not the rebel
army bagged immediately after the battle near Sharpsburg?' Did you ask such
a question?"
"Yes sir, that's what I asked him."
"And what did Major Key reply?"
"As well as I can remember, sir, that that wasn't the game. It was a private
conversation, sir. I happened to mention it to the Judge Advocate, who
passed it up the line, I suppose."
"Please just answer my question, Major," said Lincoln, "and try to be quite
specific. What exactly did Major Key say to you? What were the words he
used?"
"He said, 'That is not the game.' I think those were his very words, Mr.
President."
Lincoln nodded encouragement to the witness. "And then what else did he
say? Be specific."
"He said that the object is that neither army shall get much advantage of
the other; that both shall be kept in the field till they are exhausted, when we
will make a compromise."
Lincoln shook his head at what he knew to be a deliberate omission. "I am
told there was more to it. You left something out of the conversation as
originally related."
The nervous officer took a deep breath and began again. "Major Key said
that the game was that both armies should be kept in the field till they are
exhausted, when we will make a compromise and save slavery."
"Anything else?" Lincoln asked.
"That was the substance of the conversation, sir. We were just talking, sir,
as friends, in my room late at night. I don't think he meant anything serious
by it, it was just talk."
"Thank you, Major Turner. Keep yourself available in your office across
the street."
The troubled officer saluted and left. Lincoln wrote down the incriminating
statement by Major Key and addressed a letter to him, concluding, "I shall be
very happy if you will prove to me by Major Turner, that you did not, either
litterally or in substance, make the answer stated."
He called in Nicolay, whom he preferred to have working on this serious
business than the easygoing Hay. "Make a copy of this, and deliver the
original to Major Key right away. When he has read it, bring him here."
Lincoln waited. He picked up a newspaper and read that the Confederate
Congress had authorized President Davis to conscript men between thirty-
five and forty-five; evidently his counterpart in Richmond was having the
same trouble as he was in squeezing the civilian population for troops. He
recalled that Jeff Davis had months ago applied martial law to areas of the
Confederacy, a good answer to those who claimed that his own proclamation
of military rule this week was unprecedented. That reminded Lincoln of his
arguments with Senator John Breckinridge over encroachments on individual
liberty that were required by national security.
Breck. He had heard that Breckinridge, now a rebel general, was back in
his native Kentucky with Bragg, threatening an invasion of Ohio; he wished
he could be more confident that General Don Carlos Buell could stop them.
Buell, heading the Department of the Ohio, was now evacuating central Ten-
nessee, falling back to defend Louisville and Cincinnati. Even if successful in
defense, the cautious Buell would probably be content with stopping the
invasion, as McClellan had stopped Lee at Sharpsburg, without destroying
the rebel army. Such was the state of mind of all his generals, it seemed.
Was the Union Army's leadership loyal? Lincoln remembered George Mc-
Clellan's fury when he confronted him with rumors of his disloyalty. He
concluded that Little Mac thought he was loyal, but his allegiance was to the
people in general and not to their elected commander in chief. That was
dangerously wrongheadednot traitorous in intent but treasonable in effect.
The clique of West Pointers and political officers, with their ties to old class-
mates and friends leading the rebel army, had infected George McClellan
with the notion that the army should have a voice in the settlement of the war
on the basis of "the Union as it was." McClellan's Harrison's Landing letter
against emancipation was an example of that presumption. Now the Union
could never be as it was.
McClellan's popularity with his troops worried the President. Lincoln had
to give the man credit where it was due: when the nation had a bone in its
throat and was on the brink of strangling, George had responded correctly:
the general had not flinched or sought deals or promises, or even the author-
ity that his President could not give him, but instead had taken a hundred
thousand defeated, dispirited men (whose defeat his sulking had unforgivably
helped bring about, but that was another matter) and whipped them into an
army capable of finding and fighting to a standstill the best of Lee's veterans.
Those bloodied but victorious men were now his constituency; would they be
loyal, in a crisis, to their beloved commander in the field, or to the com-
mander in chief who had just offended many of them by promising to free the
blacks?
Lincoln supposed that McClellan was now facing the choice of remaining a
patriot, subject to removal by civilian authority, or becoming the central
figure in a military coup d'6tat. But Lincoln also knew the man: caution was
his middle name. If George McClellan could be persuaded that the President
had no fear of the Federal officer corps, he would ask himself why the Presi-
dent had no fear; that would lead McClellan to wonder if Lincoln had some
hidden strength, perhaps troops assembling near Washington. To help Mc-
Clellan choose patriotism and civilian rule, Lincoln felt himself compelled to
demonstrate executive authority in the most vivid manner.
Nicolay brought in the accused. Lincoln remained seated, returning the
salute with a nod. He let the officer, a bookish-looking man in his early
forties, stand in the middle of the office. "Now bring in Major Turner, Mr.
Nicolay."
Both majors stood before him, looking straight ahead, not at each other.
"You have my letter, Major Key. Did you give the answer stated therein?"
"Sir, I have never uttered a word that might not have been addressed to
you without giving ofFense," said Key. "The conversation held with Major
Turner, in his own room, was with him as a friend"
"Did you say," interrupted Lincoln, familiar with evasions in a witness
box, "what you are accused as having said?"
"I have no recollection of the expression, as reported."
"Are you saying," said the interrogator, making his voice and eyes cold,
"that Major Turner here is not telling the truth?"
"I have no doubt, Mr. President, that Major Turner so understood me."
"Then you do not deny the accuracy of the statement attributed to you?"
"Sir, I have often remarked," said Key, panic in his eyes, "that the rebels
would never let this contest be decidedif they could help itby a decided
battle between us. It's true I've said that they hoped to protract this war, as
they hoped to make a compromise in the end, and that they were fighting
with that end in view."
"You're evading the question." Lincoln turned his eyes toward the accusa-
tory witness. "Major Turner, please repeat what you told me before about the
specifics of that conversation."
"As I remember, sir," Turner said with evident reluctance, "the conversa-
tion was, I asked the question: why we did not bag them after the battle at
Sharpsburg?"
That was what Lincoln had asked Pinkerton the other day, and received a
simpering reply from a man it was too easy to fool. "And what was Major
Key's reply?"
"Major Key's reply, sir, wasthat was not the game; that we should tire
the rebels out, and ourselves, that that was the only way the Union could be
preserved, we come together fraternally . . ."
Lincoln waited, looking at him.
".  .  . and slavery be saved."
The President nodded grimly; sometimes in court the best question was no
question. "Major Key, I am going to give you the opportunity to cross-
examine Major Turner. You may proceed."
Key, his career at stake, was rattled. With no opportunity to consult coun-
sel or to examine the evidence against him beforehand, he was obviously
unprepared to controvert or shake Turner's damning allegation. Lincoln was
aware of the unfairness of his kangaroo court, but was hardly going to turn
this over to the military for a court-martial and sure acquittal. The defendant
was a lawyer. This was as fair an examination, he felt, as the mutinous
situation warranted. Much more was at stake here than an individual's ca-
reer.
"Major Turner," Key began haltingly, "have we talked often aboutthe
current troubles?"
"Yes," Turner replied. "We've had many conversations about the war."
"And have I ever said anything that sounded disunionist to you?"
"No. I have never heard you utter a sentiment unfavorable to the mainte-
nance of the Union."
"This particular conversation," asked Major Key, gaining confidence from
the friendly witness, "was it intended to incite anybody to anything?"
"No, it was a private one. And I have never heard you utter anything
which I would consider disloyalty."
Key looked to the judge behind the President's desk. "Mr. President, I
don't know what else I can say." To Lincoln's silence, he hurriedly added, "I
solemnly aver that if this war terminates in the entire destruction of the South
they have brought it on themselves."
Lincoln cut through the amelioration with, "Are you attempting to contro-
vert the statement of Major Turner?"
"I don't see how I can, other than to say again, to assure you, that I am
true to the Union. I have no recollection at all of talking about a
'game'. . ."
"If there was a 'game' ever among Union men," said Lincoln slowly, "to
have our army not take advantage of the enemy when it could, it is my object
to break up that game."
Lincoln reached for a quill, dipped it in the inkwell before him, and wrote
out his verdict. He rose and read it aloud:
"In my view it is wholly inadmissable for any gentleman holding military
commission from the United States to utter such sentiments as Major Key is
proved to have done. Therefore let Major John J. Key be forthwith dismissed
from the military service of the United States."
Key staggered; Turner's head dropped in dismay. Lincoln handed the pa-
per out to Nicolay, with the words "To the Secretary of War. Good day,
gentlemen." The secretary took them out.
Lincoln went to the window and thought out his next step. He would send
for Montgomery Blair, McClellan's staunchest supporter in the Cabinet, and
tell him of Major John Key's dismissal for speaking of a policy that some men
around McClellan might be actively pursuing. Blair knew that the major's
brother, Colonel Thomas Key, was McClellan's closest confidantsome said
the "evil genius" behind McClellan's reluctance to destroy the enemy. Judge
Blair would be the best person to interpret Major John Key's dismissal to the
general in the field: that the President would brook no such disloyal "games"
from his subordinates, and that he was making an example of Major Key for
McClellan's benefit.
Nicolay put his head in. "Sir, Major Key started to leave, and came back.
He wants another moment of your time." The secretary came to t incoin's
desk and added, "His son, who was a captain in the Fiftieth Ohio, with Buell
in Tennessee, was killed the other day."
Lincoln braced himself against the appeal. "Send him in." He folded his
arms and sat on the edge of the desk; when the still-stunned officer came in,
he motioned for the major to sit down.
"Mr. President, sir, I just can't believe this is happening to me." He
slumped forward in the big chair, head in his hands, then rose and made an
effort to pull himself together. "Just by a dash of the pen, you've ruined my
life. It's a terrible disgrace."
Lincoln nodded; it was.
"I come from a family, sir, of patriotic Americans. All of us are brought up
that way. One of us wrote the poem, the 'Star-Spangled Banner,' another is
married to the Chief Justice. My brother Tom just fought at Antietam, and
we're told is ill from some disease contacted there. How can I face the people
I love? My son Joe" His voice broke.
"I sincerely sympathize with you in the death of your brave and noble
son," the President said.
"I'm a loyal Union man, Mr. President, I have been all my life. I don't
deserve this, being cashiered in wartime, disgraced foreverfor what? For
something I'm supposed to have said to a friend that may have been misun-
derstood? Please, sir, consider this again. You're ruining my life, you're sham-
ing my whole family"his voice broke, but he continued"and I'm as loyal
a soldier as serves in the United States Army."
"You misunderstand me," Lincoln said after the officer had composed him-
self.  "I did not charge, or intend to charge you with disloyalty." Lincoln
wondered whether this man, a pawn in a "game" other than the one he had
unfortunately spoken of, deserved an explanation of the reasons of state in his
punishment. He decided, especially in the light of the recent loss of his son,
that the man did.
"I have been brought to fear, Major Key, that there is a class of officers in
the armyand not very inconsiderable in numberswho were playing a
game not to beat the enemy when they could, on some peculiar notion as to
the proper way of saving the Union." Lincoln had no way of knowing how
many there were; he hoped it was not more than a small cabal.
"When you were proved to me, in your own presence, to have avowed
yourself in favor of that 'game'and did not attempt to controvert the proof
1 dismissed you from the military service. I dismissed you as an example
and a warning to that supposed class." The unfortunate fellow chosen to be
made the example was entitled to the truth. "I bear you no ill will," he
continued, rising from his chair, coming around and laying his hand on the
younger man's shoulder, "and I regret that I could not have the example
without wounding you personally."
"You could show some mercy," Key offered, "then you would have your
example, and I would have the chance to die for my country on some honor-
able field."
Lincoln could not permit himself to dilute the lesson. "Can I now, in view
of the public interest, restore you to the serviceby which the army would
understand that I endorse and approve that 'game' myself?" He shook his
head, no. Mercy would serve the wrong purpose.
"But you know the punishment is unduly severe. At the very most, this
rates a reprimand, not a dishonorable dismissal."
The major was a fair lawyer, Lincoln had to admit, and had attacked the
weak point in the case: the unfairness of the severity involved in "making an
example" of anyone with an unblemished record. But a stern judge could not
concede the point. "If there was any doubt of your having made the avowal,
the case would be different. But when it was proved to me, in your presence,
you did not deny or attempt to deny it. On the contrary, you confirmed it in
my mind by attempting to sustain the position by argument."
No use prolonging this. "I am really sorry for the pain the case gives you,"
Lincoln concluded. "But I do not see how, consistently with duty, I can
change my mind. Goodbye."
When the shattered officer left, John Hay came in, looking pleased. "That
was a trial as prompt as those of Saint Louis, dispensing justice under the oak
at Vincennes," the secretary said. "You were judge and jury, attorney for the
prosecution and for the defense, and on top of all that"he pointed to the
transcripts Lincoln was drawing up for the record"you functioned as clerk
of the court."
"I dismissed Major Key," the President told him, not taking the exposition
of the drumhead court-martial as such a compliment, "because I think his
silly, treasonable expressions were 'staff talk' and I wished to make an exam-
ple."
"Little Mac is not pursuing Lee into Virginia," Hay remarked. "Do you
suppose he's listening to that staff talk?"
"I begin to fear he is playing falsethat he does not want to hurt the
enemy." McClellan ought to be able to intercept the enemy on Lee's retreat
to Richmond; Lincoln resolved to make that the test that would justify his
replacement. He could not replace him until after the elections in November.
Between now and then, he could call attention to his delays and suggest that
the "staff talk" of Key and others might be behind his caution. George Mc-
Clellan would have to go because his goal was not Lincoln's goal: the Presi-
dent wanted to win and reunite the nation on his own terms, while the gen-
eral wanted to work out a compromise peace that would solve nothing.
Lincoln was certain that the message, however much it ill-used one officer,
would get through to the officer class at Antietam, to their instigators and
abettors in the Democratic ranks, and to George McClellan himself. At this
critical moment, driving that message homethat no reluctance to destroy
the enemy would be toleratedwas more important to the fate of the nation
than the career of one major.

CHAPTER 10
SURPRISE VISIT

Alexander Gardner, seething at Mathew Brady's egotism and selfishness,
snapped the reins at the horse pulling the Whatizzit Wagon.
"Not too fast," cautioned Gibson, his assistant, "you'll rattle the plates and
stir up the chemicals."
"We have to get to the Antietam before Lincoln does," Gardner told him,
"or else we won't make Mr. Brady famous again."
The photographs taken three weeks before at the battlefield were works of
art; Gardner was certain that never before had the horror of war been cap-
tured as vividly on wet plates. Shrewdly, Brady had gone beyond the normal
distribution to magazines and newspapers for engravings and woodcuts. To
capitalize on Gardner's work, he had arranged for special shows in his gal-
leries in Washington and New York, bringing crowds into Brady's studios,
stimulating other Brady business, spreading Brady's fame. The New York
Times wrote of the show in that city in words burned in Gardner's memory:
".  .  .  there is a terrible fascination about the battle-field that draws one near
these pictures and makes him loath to leave them."
The reportage of war would never be the same after Antietam, and Gard-
ner knew that the battles to come would see photographers from North and
South rushing to the scene. The artist and social reformer in him wanted to
use his art to show the horror rather than the glory of war, even as his
commercial sense told him there was money in horror.
Although the photographic impresario with the failing eyesight had kept to
his agreement and permitted a credit linein the smallest typeto the opera-
tors who had made the stunning pictures, the photos were presented as a
Brady Gallery special event. The artists who composed the pictures, who
took their lives in their hands to go to the front and accomplished technical
miracles as well, were obscured in the general admiration for the man who
staged the event.
"Are you sure Lincoln will be coming to the battlefield?"
"The President is going to Harpers Ferry first," replied Gardner grimly,
"then he'll pay a surprise visit to the Army of the Potomac. McClellan
doesn't know. The general doesn't tell the President his movements, so the
President isn't telling McClellan."
"If it's going to be a surprise to the commanding general, how come we
know?"
"Hay told me. He has some sense of the historic importance of the visit and
wants the scenes recorded. Wants me to do it; didn't even tell Brady for fear
Brady would send somebody else, or worst of all, come himself."
"I suppose he didn't want Brady to tip off Pinkerton, if it is supposed to be
a surprise," Gibson observed.
Gardner understood from Hay that it was important the public know that
the Army of the Potomac was Mr. Lincoln's army, not General McClellan's
army. And it was urgent that the troops in the field feel the physical presence
of the commander in chief, lest some ofiicers get ideas about taking control of
the direction of the war. No matter that Lincoln on a horse looked like a
clothespin on a line; the country and the army had to know that their leader
was the man in the black frock coat and not the man in uniform.
"We'll take a few pictures of the President with McClellan," Gardner said,
"and one of Lincoln with Pinkerton, to help us get around. Be sure to call
him Major Alienhe thinks he's fooling somebody with thatbut most of
the pictures should be of the President with the other ofiicers and troops."
"Brady wants"
"Don't concern yourself with what Brady wants. The pictures that are
important to the Gardner Gallery are the ones Lincoln wants."
McClellan was at his desk in the Sharpsburg headquarters tent trying to
puzzle out Montgomery Biair's scrawl in a letter just delivered. Pinkerton
slipped in. Pinkerton never entered; he preferred to materialize silently beside
one's elbow.
"I have information, General, that his Excellency the President is about to
honor the Army of the Potomac with a visit."
McClellan frowned. The last time Lincoln had paid a visit to the front was
in the Peninsula, and what followed the President's return to Washington was
an order from Halleck to abandon the position.
"Who's he bringing? Halleck? Stanton?" That would mean greater trouble;
when the President came under their sway, he was impossible, demanding
actions so precipitate as to be suicidal.
"No, sir. Some politicians from Illinois."
That was good: he would probably have John McClemand in tow, a politi-
cian-general who posed no threat. But why would Lincoln drag Illinois politi-
cians out to the battlefields in Maryland?
McClellan posed that question to his intelligence chief, who was ready with
an answer: "He's worried about Illinois in the elections next month. If Lin-
coln's close friend, Swett, loses in his home district, then Lincoln might as
well plan to skedaddle. His own party will have repudiated him." When the
general nodded agreement, Pinkerton added, "The President even has a pho-
tographer coming. Same one as operated the camera last week, taking pic-
tures of the rebel dead. Only the rebel dead, sir."
McClellan approved. Photographs at the field of victory served his purpose
as well as Lincoln's; William Aspinwall, the source of much money and
influence among Democrats, had written to say how impressive his victory
looked to visitors at Brady's Gallery. "Here, you look at this letter, Major
Alien," he said to Pinkerton. "See if you can decipher Biair's handwriting."
Pinkerton squinted at the letter, going to the window to hold it up to the
light. The Biairs were his only friends in Lincoln's inner circle, McClellan
knew, and he would value their counsel if only he could make it out.
" 'The recent action of the President,' " Pinkerton read slowly, "1 sup-
pose Blair means the Proclamation of Emancipation'will undoubtedly in-
cite the radicals to new efforts to secure your removal from command.' Next
few words are hard to make outyou'd think the Postmaster General would
write a letter that was readablebut here it says, If you could make known
the opinion which I suppose you entertain in common with the whole coun-
try, that whilst you supposed the object of the war to be the maintenance of
the Government, yet the natural result would be the extinction of slavery, I
think you would head off your opponents very cleverly.' General, that's a big
step he's suggesting. You've never accepted abolition as a goal of this war."
Biair's idea was clever, but worrisome; was it politic to go along with
Lincoln on abolition? The likelihood was that the proclamation of emancipa-
tion, followed closely by the equally infamous declaration of martial law,
would stiffen the South and protract the war. The officials and financiers from
the Democratic Party, from Femando Wood to William Aspinwall, had
urged him to take no stand on slavery specifically, but to send a signal of his
toleration of its existence by standing on preserving the Union "as it was."
Biair's suggestion that he say a word against slavery might strengthen Mc-
Clellan with the conservatives in Lincoln's Republican Party, but might
weaken him with Democrats.
"Ah, here's why Biair's writing this to you right now," said Pinkerton,
pushing his derby back on his head to see better. " 'The President told me this
morning that Major Key of General Halleck's staff, brother of Colonel Key of
your staff, has said that the reason why the rebel army had not been de-
stroyed at Sharpsburg was that the plan was to exhaust our resources' "
Pinkerton grunted in disgust" 'so that a compromise might be made which
would preserve slavery and the Union at the same time.' "
McClellan slammed his fist down on the table; to catch the younger Key in
the act of speaking treason reflected on the elder Key, and on McClellan
personally. He sent the orderly to get Tom Key from his tent nearby.
"Read that last paragraph from Blair again," the general said when Colo-
nel Key came in, which Pinkerton did, and continued, " 'The President sum-
moned Key,' Blair writes, 'who could not deny that he had used such lan-
guage but protested his loyalty. The President left me saying that he intended
Major Key's dismissal.' "
Judge Key slumped into a chair. "Oh John, you poor fool."
"Your brother deserves to be cashiered," said McClellan harshly, angered
at the indiscretion that reflected on him. "Didn't we agree that just the oppo-
site point was to be made known? Didn't you tell the correspondents that I
was actively discouraging such talk among junior officers?"
"I did, I did," said Colonel Key. "But I never thought to tell my own
brother to keep his mouth shut around Halleck. John is such an innocent. He
was probably just gossiping with a friend"
"Now Lincoln has me at a disadvantage," McClellan said coldly. "Read
Biair's advice in that light."
" 'Even if you had the ambition to be President' "Pinkerton read, "I
wish Blair wouldn't put that sort of thing in a letter, General'this would be
the best course to adopt, for I can assure you that no appreciable portion of
the nation will favor the long continuance of slavery after the war is over, or
will tolerate any guarantee for its perpetuity as the price of peace.' Do you
suppose Lincoln put the judge up to this?"
That drew the general up short: was Blair acting as Lincoln's agent or
McClellan's friend? McClellan had to ask himself: Was slavery doomed, as
even the conservatives near Lincoln now held, or was the Union doomed to
years of war and possible separation if slavery became the central issue?
Would it be politically wiser, as Blair suggested, to go along publicly with
Lincoln on emancipationor more prudent to stay above the partisan issue
and act only as a soldier?
That decision would rest on the extent of Lincoln's support of him now.
McClellan suspected that the President's purpose in coming to the front was
to push him into a premature advance into Virginia. If Lincoln threatened
him with removal again for not following that ill-advised plan to march
before the Army was ready, McClellan might respond with pressure of his
own.
"You recall, Judge, how the men crowded around me yesterday, breaking
ranks to fill the air with cheers. They love me. What a power," he mused
aloud, "that places in my hands."
"Tremendous power," nodded Pinkerton. "And we're less than fifty miles
away from the capital."
"What is there," McClellan put it to Key as if rhetorically, "to prevent my
taking the government in my own handsto bring about peaceful reunion?"
He was not being serious, of course; but it was interesting to turn the thought
over in his mind.
Keyprobably distracted, McClellan assumed, by the prospect of his
brother's and his family's disgraceseemed startled by the thought. "Gen-
eral, don't mistake those men. So long as you lead them against the enemy,
they will adore and die for you. But attempt to turn them against their
government, and you will be the first to suffer."
That was not what McClellan wanted to hear. By promoting widespread
talk of such a possibilityfollowed quickly, of course, by shocked disavowals
of any such disloyal intent, McClellan backers could combat the radical
warhawks demanding his removal. It made sense to remind the world that he
was refusing to be dictator, even as Caesar had. The people would remember
that in the next campaign for President.
Irritated by his aide's obtuseness, the general strode out of the building and
mounted his morning horse, Bums. An excellent mount, in some ways more
responsive than his familiar Kentuckon Dan Webster, Burns had a habit of
bolting for his oats at feeding-time in the afternoon, no matter what his rider
had in mind; consequently McClellan rode him only in the mornings.
Key and Pinkerton came running along behind, organizing a party to go
out and greet the President. McClellan told them to keep the group small;
Lincoln had been heard to say that the Army of the Potomac was "only
McClellan's bodyguard," and the general did not want too many in his entou-
rage.
"Would you please take your hats off, gentlemen? I can't see your faces in
the shadow."
Gardner had set up his camera directly in front of the commanding gener-
al's tent. The President and McClellan were seated inside the tent, a table
between them, a stack of captured rebel battle flags to the left. At the photog-
rapher's direction, the two men had moved to the front of the tent, near the
flap, which had been drawn back as far as possible to let in the light. Gardner
ducked his head under the black cloth and told himself no: there was still not
enough light to see the faces. The hats cast a shadow. At Gardner's urging,
McClellan removed his military cap, Lincoln his stovepipe topper, which he
placed upside down on the battle flags. The photographer had Lincoln in
profile, McClellan three-quarter view, the tent pole dividing them starkly,
which Gardner thought was nicely symbolic of the division known to exist
between the two leaders.
Gardner, still under the hood, raised the angle of the camera to get as
much as possible of the tent, removed the lens cap to the count of ten and
replaced it. Gibson grabbed the heavy plate and ran with it into th? wagon.
"We are going to take the same scene in stereograph," Gardner announced,
remembering Brady's way of asking for another sitting by declaring his inten-
tion with great firmness. To his relief, the Brady technique worked; the
Union's leaders were content to wait fifteen minutes for their next portrait.
The general's aides, and the Illinois party accompanying the President,
remained well out of the picture-taking area. Gardner stood by his camera,
waiting for Gibson to finish preparations of the plate in the Whatizzit wagon.
The photographer could hear the conversation of his two subjects clearly in
the tent. Lincoln's voice was high-pitched with a Western drawl, McClellan's
resonant and brisk, like an Eastern railroad executive.
"You remember my speaking to you," Lincoln was saying, "of what I
called your overcautiousness."
"And I did not accept that. My army is not fit to advance."
"Are you not overcautious when you assume that you cannot do what the
enemy is constantly doing? Should you not claim to be at least his equal in
prowess, and act upon the claim?"
"You people don't know what an army requires," the general countered.
"The old regiments are reduced to mere skeletons, and are completely tired
out. They need rest and filling up. The new regiments are not fit for the field.
Cavalry and artillery horses are broken down. So it goes"
"You are now nearer Richmond than the enemy is," said Lincoln, tapping
his finger on a map on the table before them, "by the route that you can and
he must take. Why can't you reach there before him? Unless you admit that
he is more than your equal on a march"
"That's enemy country," McClellan explained. "That is country where the
inhabitants furnish to the enemy every possible assistancefood for men and
forage for animals. They tell him about all our movements. In such hostile
territory, we especially need cavalry to be our antennaeand the horses we
have are sore-tongued and fatigued."
Lincoln half-rose. "Sore-tongued and fatigued? Will you pardon me for
asking what the horses of your army have done since the battle of Antietam
that fatigues anything?"
Gardner stood stock-still, trying to disappear. McClellan sat in silence for a
moment, and replied slowly, "The cavalry was in low condition before this
campaign began. While on Stuart's track, it marched seventy-eight miles in
twenty-four hours. The cavalry has been constantly making reconnaissances,
scouting and picketing, engaging the enemy frequently."
"I'm sure there have been things to do, but"
"If you can find, Mr. Lincoln, any instance where overworked cavalry has
performed more labor than mine since the battle of Antietam, I am not
conscious of it."
"Stuart's cavalry has consistently outmarched ours."
"You are misinformed," McClellan told him. "On one raid, Stuart had two
relays of fresh horses to none of ours, which is why he outmarched us. We
need more horses. You do an injustice to our cavalry, its officers and men,
which is just as efficient as that of the rebels."
Lincoln backed off in the face of McClellan's facts and defense of troops. "I
intend no injustice to any. But to be told, after a period of inaction, that the
cavalry horses were too fatigued to move presented a very cheerless, almost
hopeless prospect for the future. It may have forced something of impatience
into my tone."
"My plan is to secure Maryland, and then to pursue Lee down the Shenan-
doah. But we cannot race after him unprepared, inviting a counterattack that
would change the course of the war."
McClellan's plan seemed to aim at Lee around Warrenton, Virginia, in a
month; Lincoln's plan seemed to Gardner to involve an attack much sooner.
The President offered the general more reinforcements if McClellan would
position the army so as to protect Washington while he was attacking Lee; in
turn, the general sought to get Lincoln to understand the urgency of rail
communication as an army prepared for battle.
When the talk turned to politics, Gardner could feel the tension rising.
McClellan said he hoped Lincoln would pursue a "conservative course," and
objected to the proclamation of martial law, saying that it was an unjustifiable
abuse of the Constitution. That criticism stung Lincoln, who explained that
the measure was needed to stop obstruction of the draft, which McClellan of
all people should appreciate.
The general then said something that Gardner did not quite catch, about
an honorable armistice after the defeat of Lee's army, leading to a peace
without humiliation for the South and without complete victory for the
North.
Lincoln did not agree with that at all. He leaned forward and, motioning
with his finger toward McClellan's chest, spoke most deliberately and dis-
tinctly: "I expect to maintain this contest until successful, or till I die, or am
conquered, or my term expires, or Congress or the country forsake me."
"Success, as I interpret it, is the maintenance of the integrity of the
Union," McClellan shot back, "not the achievement of abolition. If we can
put down the rebellion and end the secession, we will have succeeded. You
have said that yourself in your Inaugural, and a hundred times since."
"You may not make war on a government without being hurt," Lincoln
replied. "Blood has been shed. A penalty is called for. We must rip up dis-
union like a dog at a root, so that this may never happen again."
Gibson ran up with the stereograph plates, which Gardner inserted into the
camera. He could feel his subjects watching him fuss with the lens. When the
President spoke again, his tone changed from the taskmaster to the supporter.
"I want to assure you, George, that I am fully satisfied with your whole
course," the President said. "The only fault I can possibly find is that you are
perhaps too prone to be sure that everything is ready before acting."
"That episode with Major Key"
"Was not intended to reflect on you personally. I had to set an example. I
will stand by you against all comers."
"Stanton and Halleck want my scalp," said McClellan directly. "We saw
the way they resented your decision to put me in charge of the defense of
Washington, when they were preparing to surrender Washington. You'll stand
by me? I can count on you?"
"I am entirely satisfied with you," Lincoln repeated. "You shall be let
alone, and I will stand by you."
"On a personal note," McClellan's voice was lower, "I have a request."
Gardner made an effort not to listen, but he could not help hearing, "My
wife, Nellie. I need very much to visit her, to see her and the baby. We are
nothing without each other. As I launch a campaign into Virginia when the
army is outfitted, perhaps you would not consider it taking too much time
from my duty"
"Ready," said Gibson aloud.
"Take a breath," Gardner called out. "Now hold it, please. Hold it. Don't
move. Little longer . . . not yet . . . thank you!"
McClellan rode with the President back through one of the passes in South
Mountain toward the Frederick railroad station. Lincoln was good enough to
say that he did not see how the Union had ever forced its way through that
pass, and that had McClellan been defending it, Lee would never have carried
it. McClellan felt better about the President's surprise visit. He knew he was
being flattered now, after the initial prodding, but did not mind Lincoln's
obvious changes in approach. It had been three weeks since the battle, and he
expected to be able to move in another three, if Lincoln could prod Stanton to
get Quartermaster General Meigs to send up the shoes and horses.
Then an unfortunate coincidence took place: just as McClellan was saying
farewell to the President, who should come up the road toward camp but the
last person he wanted Lincoln to see in camp: William Aspinwall, the New
York Democrat. Lincoln greeted him cordially. McClellan was grateful the
President chose to ignore the likelihood that the New Yorker had come to
talk Democratic politics.
Armstrong Custer was pleased at having been asked by the general to join
the group posing for a picture with the President in front of the headquarters
tent. He stood separate from the group, the only one in a cavalryman's slouch
hat, ignoring the photographer's imperious signal to move closer to the oth-
ers. Captain Custer did not take orders from civilians.
Abraham Lincoln was not his idea of what a President should be. Old Abe
was a laughable sight on a horse, second-guessed his commanders in the field,
and withheld needed supplies and reinforcements from his fighting forces
while dandying up his useless bodyguard in Washington. Worse, he showed
no appreciation for the salvation of the country by a far greater man, George
Brinton McClellan. Worst of all, the President had shocked the headquarters
staff of the Army of the Potomac with his cruel disgrace of John Key, who
was guilty only of saying what everybody was thinking.
Custer could not understand why Little Mac did not simply change front
and seize power in Washington. The troops would be with him, no matter
what Colonel Key said; Key was a strange man, inconsistent, hating Lincoln
and most of the radicals but hating slavery too, wanting McClellan in the
White House but wanting to wait two more years to go through the folderol
of election. Armstrong Ouster's mind was clear: his leader should denounce
both presidential proclamations of last week, march to Washington and take
over, whip Lee at Warrenton to prove which army was better, and offer the
South terms that would end disunion forever.
After the President and his party departed camp, followed by the photogra-
phers in their conveyance that looked like a spiritualist's wagon, Custer was
told to assemble the headquarters staff outside McClellan's tent to listen to
the general's message to the army.
Colonel Key, feverish from some ailment he had picked up a month before
on the battlefield, stood next to Custer to hear General Order No. 163.
"The Constitution confides to the civil authorities," went McClellan's or-
der, "the power and duty of making, expounding and executing the Federal
laws. Armed forces are raised and supported simply to sustain the civil au-
thorities, and are to be held in strict subordination thereto in all respects."
"I hope he says something about the President's meddling in running a
war," whispered the captain to the colonel.
Key shook his head; Custer imagined he'd had a hand in the writing.
"The Chief Executive, who is charged with the administration of the na-
tional affairs, is the proper and only source through which the needs and
orders of the Government can be made known to the armies of the nation."
And not through the commanding general in the field, bitterly added
Custer to himself. He was disappointed in his hero; McClellan was not about
to become a Caesar. "And what about your brother?" he whispered to Key.
"Discussions by officers and soldiers concerning public measures," McClel-
lan's voice resonated, "when carried at once beyond temperate and respectful
expressions of opinion, tend greatly to destroy the discipline of troops. There
must be no substitution of the spirit of political faction for that firm, steady
and earnest support of the authority of the government which is the highest
duty of the American soldier."
"He's doing the right thing," said Colonel Key heavily.
"Damn," said Custer under his breath. "And what about all of us who
didn't sign up to fight for abolition?"
"He listened to Aspinwall, not Blair. Not a word against slavery."
"The remedy for political errors," McClellan was reading out, "if any are
committed, is to be found only in the action of the people at the polls."
The sweating Key took Ouster's arm for support. "Lincoln will stab him in
the back at the first chance," the colonel predicted, "but it isn't treason to run
for President."
Custer shook his head. "If Lincoln tries that, I'll resign and go home. And
so will half the army." But he did not know about half the army; the fickle
troops had been proud to cheer Lincoln as they passed in review. He had a
heavy feeling in his chest that the cadaverous politician, with all his promises
of standing by McClellan against "all comers" of the abolition faction, had
taken his general into camp.
CHAPTHR II
THE DREAM

"Whiskey? Wine?" Mary Lincoln threw up her hands. "What are we going to
do with it?"
Elizabeth Keckley, seated at her sewing in Mrs. Lincoln's upstairs parlor,
looked up with amusement. The President's wife was understandably per-
plexed; two expressmen had arrived from New York with twenty cases of
liquor from an anonymous donor. "I suppose we could drink it," the modiste
observed. "Not all at one time."
Mary Lincoln shook her head emphatically. "We do not entertain here, not
since Willie. And if I accept it, people will say I'm a secret drunkard."
Keckley recognized the truth in that. The President's wife was variously
criticized as a bumpkin or a social butterfly, as a rebel sympathizer and a
spendthrift. All but the last were unfair; the President's wife did have diffi-
culty with money affairs, and her dressmaker knew that bills were sometimes
left for months to be paid, but the attacks on Mrs. Lincoln's loyaltyand her
dedication to emancipationwere as unfounded as they were vicious. No
wonder she was so often afflicted with sick headaches.
"I'll get Stoddard," Elizabeth Keckley said, and went to fetch him.
The sallow young man who was Lincoln's Third Secretary contemplated
the array of boxes and said to the two bored deliverymen, "There's plenty of
room in the basement."
"My husband will never permit that stuff to remain in this house," Mrs.
Lincoln told him. "The first thing he wrote that was printed, when he was
still a boy, was about the evils of whiskey. Can we send it back? Nowhoever
sent it would take offense, and then people would say I'm wasting money."
Keckley gave Stoddard a do-something-quick look, and the young man
rose to the occasion. "Divide it into five lots," he told the men, "and take it to
the head physician at five hospitals. Come with me, I'll give you the ad-
dresses."
Mrs. Lincoln, relieved, added, "Say it's for anybody in pain, from the
Lincolns."
"And bring back the five receipts," added the modiste, who did not want
the expressmen taking the liquor for themselves.
"I like Stod," Mrs. Lincoln said, back in her sitting room, the minor crisis
resolved. "He opens and reads all my mail, you know." Keckley said she
assumed much of it was cruel, and that intercepting the worst was a good
idea, but was surprised to learn that was not Mrs. Lincoln's reason: "It's
because they accuse me of corresponding with the rebels, Lizzie. I want all
my mail read beforehand."
The dressmaker was not in the Mansion that afternoon to work on-a gown;
rather, she was present in her capacity of companion, to accompany Mrs.
Lincoln to the seance scheduled for the early evening. Before Willie died, the
President's wife occasionally went to a spiritualist, as did many of Lizzie
Keckley's clients and friendsas did Mr. Lincoln on occasion, more out of
curiosity than belief, she suspected. Since the death of the boy, however, Mrs.
Lincoln had made it a habit. She would see any medium who would put her
in touch with the ghost of her Willie.
She knew Mrs. Lincoln to be a religious woman, probably more so than her
husband. The first Lady had told her dressmaker how she took the sacrament
in 1852, though Mr. Lincoln would not. He had not joined the church as she
hadLincoln was not a church member to this daybut he paid the dues for
the family pew. And he read the Bible more than most, quoting from it a lot,
especially of late.
Keckley remembered the time, only a month ago, when the President had
met the delegation of preachers from Chicago who had come to tell him, first,
to order his generals to observe the sabbathwhich he didn't want to do
and, even more important, to carry out God's will by emancipating the slaves.
She had been in the anteroom of his office with Mrs. Lincoln and Stoddard,
and had been discouraged at the President's reply: "It is my earnest desire to
know the will of Providence. These are not, however, the days of miracles,
and I cannot expect a direct revelation. Good men do not agree."
The preachers told him, she thought rightly, that the Bible denounces
oppression, and the nation was guilty, and the war was a just punishment.
And he had answered, "What good would a proclamation of emancipation
from me do? I do not want to issue a document that the whole world will see
must necessarily be inoperative, like the Pope's bull against the comet." Then,
when the preachers said the blacks would enlist to fight, he had told them
how General Butler in New Orleans had been issuing more rations to fugitive
slaves than to his white troops, adding cruelly, "They eat, that's all."
That had hurt. Freedmen had been flocking to Washington all that sum-
mer, fresh from benighted regions of the plantation, looking for freedom and
had found instead a new bondage of poverty amid the hostile whites of the
North. No perpetual sunshine, only cold neglect. The Africans, no longer
fugitives but only legally free, soon discovered that Yankees looked on their
helplessness as proof that they were members of an idle, dependent race.
Negroes like Keckley could organize some help, prevailing on Mrs. Lincoln
herself to set a public example by contributing, but what if millions came
North? Half the whites were worried the blacks would lie around and wait to
be fed, while the other half were afraid the blacks would take their jobs.
Lincoln had sent the Chicago clergymen away with little hope, saying only
that he had not decided against emancipation. Preaching to the preachers, he
had left himself room to turn around: "Whatever shall appear to be God's
will, I will do."
What had happened to change his mind in a week? She wondered if it
could be that he had deliberately misled them to protect the surprise he had
in mind, or to get them angry so they would cry out more loudly to their
congregations to push his countrymen along the abolition road ahead of him.
She decided that he must have been afflicted with terrible doubts right up to
the last minute, when the Divine will had indeed been revealed to him.
President Lincoln appeared in the upstairs parlor, ducking his head down
to let his wife straighten out his spiky hair, listening to her tell proudly of
how she had handled the challenge of the donated whiskey.
He nodded gravely and said "Madam Elizabeth" to her, but as this was the
first she had seen of him since the glorious proclamation, she felt called on to
say what was in her heart.
"Mr. Lincoln, in your proclamation you carried out God's will."
"God's will," he repeated, slumping down into the sofa in the small sitting
room, taking a small Bible from a stand near the head of the settee.
"I'm glad you listened to those preachers from back home," Mrs. Lincoln
agreed, extending their Illinois home clear up to Chicago, "and to Senator
Sumner, and even to that uppity Greeley. I've never been so proud. The will
of God prevails."
Lincoln shook his head, not so much in disagreement, Keckley suspected,
but in not being sure. "In great contests each party claims to act in accor-
dance with the will of God. Both may be, and one must be wrong."
He hefted the small book in his huge hand, opened it, and began leafing
through. "What was that passage you commended to me, Mrs. Keckley?"
" 'Gird up thy loins now like a man,' " she recited, " 1 will demand of
thee, and declare thou unto me.' " She had prayed that he would have the
courage to strike down slavery, and the prayers had been answered. Or at
least promised an answer: by year's end, unless the slave owners did the
impossible and gave up, all her people in the South would be free.
"Book of Job," he nodded. After a moment, Lincoln ruminated: "In the
present civil war, it is quite possible that God's purpose is something different
from the purpose of either partyand yet the human instrumentalities, work-
ing just as they do, are the best adaptation to effect His purpose."
Elizabeth Keckley recognized that as the message of Job, a good man who
could not fathom why God had singled him out for awful punishment. The
Bible had taught her that Job could not know that he was the subject of a
struggle between God and the devil over the issue of the strength of faith. Mr.
Lincoln seemed to be saying that he could not fathom God's will and had
accepted that he might be an agent of a change that he did not comprehend.
"I am almost ready to say this is probably true," the President said, "that
God wills this contest, and wills that it shall not end yet. By His mere quiet
power, on the minds of the now contestants, He could have either saved or
destroyed the Union without a human contest. Yet the contest began." He
closed the book and took a deep breath. "And having begun, He could have
given the final victory to either side any day. Yet the contest proceeds."
He did not finish his argument. She assumed he meant that, like Job, he felt
that God was trifling with him as part of some grander design. She wondered
if that was not a little bit heretical.
He looked under the sofa and drew out a pair of overshoes.
"Where are you going, Father?" his wife asked.
"To the War Department, Mother, to try and learn some news. About
Bragg coming up into Kentucky, which we cannot afford to lose. About Lee
escaping to resupply in Richmond so he can attack us again."
"Don't go alone."
"I'm not a child, Mother; no one is going to molest me." He stopped in the
middle of drawing on an overshoe. "It seems strange how much there is in the
Bible about dreams."
"Mostly the Old Testament," said Mrs. Keckley.
"Sixteen chapters in the Old, four or five in the New," he specified; obvi-
ously he had studied the subject. "And if we believe the Bible, we must accept
the fact that in the old days God and His angels came to men in their sleep
and made themselves known in dreams." He returned to pulling on the shoe
and pounded his foot on the carpet. "Nowadays dreams are regarded as very
foolish, and are seldom told, except by old women and young men and
maidens in love."
"You look dreadfully solemn," said Mrs. Lincoln. "Do you believe in
dreams?"
"I can't say that I do," he returned, in one of those replies that Mrs.
Keckley noticed could go either way. "But I had one the other night which
has haunted me ever since. Like Banquo's ghost, it won't go down. To sleep,
perchance to dreamay, there's the rub!' "
"The one about being on a ship coming close to the shore, and you can't
make out what's on shore? You've had that a few times."
"No, and not the one that's a welcome visitorof the ship drawing away,
badly damaged, and our victorious vessels in close pursuit. I dreamed that
just before Antietam."
His face took on a stricken look. "In this dream, there seemed to be a
deathlike stillness about me. Then I heard subdued sobs, as if a number of
people were weeping. I went from room to room; every object was familiar to
me, but why were all the people grieving as if their hearts would break? I kept
on until I arrived at the East Room."
The President seemed to Mrs. Keckley to be reliving the dream in the
telling; she worried about its effect not on himhe was strong in every way
but on Mrs. Lincoln's mind.
"There I met with a sickening surprise. Before me was a catafalque, on
which rested a corpse wrapped in funeral vestments. Around it were stationed
soldiers who were acting as guards. There was a throng of people gazing
mournfully on the corpse, whose face was covered . . . then came a loud
burst of grief from the crowd, which awoke me from my dream."
"That is horrid! I'm glad I don't believe in dreams," Mary Lincoln said
sharply, "or I should be in terror from this time forth."
Elizabeth Keckley wondered why he had told the troubling dream to his
wife, knowing how impressionable she was. Perhaps he could not stop him-
self.
"Only a dream, Mary. Let us say no more about it, and try to forget it. I
am afraid I have done wrong to mention the subject at all, but somehow the
thing got possession of me." He belatedly tried to make her feel better:
"Don't you see how it will turn out? In this dream it was not I, but some
other fellow who was killed."
Mrs. Lincoln shuddered and said she had to prepare for the seance. When
asked if he wanted to join them, the President declined. He wasn't much for
spiritualists.
Lincoln, at the head of the staircase, heard the sound of a grand march
coming from the Red Room downstairs, where the seances were usually held.
The piano was being played with great authority, and he kept step with the
music until he reached the doorway. He debated with himself a moment
about going in: if the medium was Lord Colchester, he would not have any
part of it. Noah Brooks told him he suspected the medium was nothing but a
mountebank. He had gone to one of his circles in Georgetown, and in the
darkness, as the guests listened to the sound of drums and bells from the
spirit world, the disbelieving reporter lunged for the source of the sound and
caught the medium detached from the circle of hands, making his own noises.
Unfortunately, this had not discouraged Mrs. Lincoln from visiting the spiri-
tualist again.
Nettie Colbum was another matter. She was a delicate young woman with
the voice and demeanor of a little girl, but when entranced came under the
control of other personalities, including "Old Dr. Bamford," who spoke with
an authentic Yankee twang and told salty stories. There was also her inexpli-
cable trick with the waltzing piano: at one seance, Miss Nettie had levitated
the grand piano, which remained three inches above the floor, tilting this way
and that to the music, even after Lincoln and the journalist Fomey sat on top
of it. Lincoln had joked with those present about being part of "the weight of
the evidence" of the little spiritualist's powers, but it certainly defied rational
explanation. Lincoln had been moved to look over the new book, Further
Communications from the World of Spirits, and while he remained skeptical,
he would not deny his wife comfort in communication with Willie; besides, he
knew he always did have a strong tendency to mysticism.
He pulled open the door and stepped inside. The pianist stopped playing.
"So this is our little Nettie, is it?" He walked over and took her hand,
asked a few kindly questions about her mediumship, and saw her lose con-
sciousness and seem to pass under the control of someone or something.
He did not join the circle with his wife; instead, he took an easy chair in the
corner, throwing his leg over the upholstered arm, to listen to Miss Nettie
relay, in a strong, masculine voice, her message from what could be presumed
to be the upper country.
"You have begun to hear counsels against your Proclamation of Emancipa-
tion," said a stentorian voice coming from Miss Nettie. "You are being urged
to delay the final act beyond the first of the year." True enough, but that
pressure for deferral was known to every member of the Cabinet, and to more
than a few newspapermen. Above the piano, which Lincoln was relieved to
note was not moving this time, a portrait of Daniel Webster looked down on
the group. "Liberty and Union," that senator's most famous phrase, was
surely Lincoln's purpose as well, but one did not always help the other.
"In no wise heed such counsel. Do not abate the terms of its issuance,"
said, or relayed, the medium. "It is to be the crowning event of your adminis-
tration and your life."
When the medium came out of her trance, he thanked her: "My child, you
possess a very singular gift; but that it is of God, I have no doubt." He left
before the others.
Trudging back up the stairswonderful, no pain in his toes even when
shod, and his wrist was better, toohe wondered about the handred-day
deadline he had set the South and himself as well. lfMcClellan were to catch
up with Lee and destroy his army, if Rosecrans, replacing the cautious Buell,
should be able to smash Bragg and Breckinridge in Kentucky and Tennessee,
the "military necessity" of emancipation would disappear. Pressure to defer,
on solid constitutional grounds and in the name of making peace with re-
union, would surely increase.
That was the sort of worry he hoped to have. He would deal with any
alternatives to emancipation at year's end in a month, when he would have to
write his annual message to Congress. Certainly the threat of abolishment
was an important move, necessary to hold Republican support, diplomati-
cally well timed, perhaps militarily useful. And slavery was plain wrong.
Next month's election would determine whether the proclamation had been
politically wise.
Was it possible that declaring the rebels' slaves free, when he was in no
position actually to free them, would turn out to be the central act of his
administration? He sat on the bed and turned that over in his mind. He
couldn't say that it would.

CHAPTER 12

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
OCTOBER 8, 1862
On the train back from Frederick, the Tycoon must have been stewing about
the meetings McClellan has been having with Democratic leaders. Irritation
will be expressed, however, not at his political flirtation but at the inexcusable
military inactivity of the Young Napoleon. I make this assumption because no
sooner had he returned than the Prsdt closeted himself with Old Brains.
The upshot of that confabulation was a red-hot telegraphed order from
Halleck at headquarters to McClellan in the field: "The President directs that
you cross the Potomac and give battle to the enemy or drive him south. Your
army must move now while the roads are good."
The uninitiated may ask: why, since Lincoln saw McClellan only yester-
day, did he not tell him this himself? The answer is obvious to me: McClel-
lan, in person, has a million good reasons for every delay, and the Prsdt
cannot argue military tactics with him at length. However, McClellan at the
other end of a telegraph line is a different being. He is a soldier to whom
orders are sent, to be obeyed.
Not only that: from the command post of the Executive Mansion, the
President can push Halleck and Stanton out in front of him. Halleck's tele-
graph ended, "I am directed to add that the Secretary of War and the Gen-
eral-in-Chief fully concur with the President in these instructions."
And who do you suppose directed Old Brains to 'fess up to that? The
Tycoon himself, of course, who wants the top brass on the record with him all
the way. Everybody knows that Halleck's order to McClellan to get off his
duff will be examined in due course by Wade's Committee on the Conduct of
the War. The telegraph message is proof that the word from on high to
advance on the enemy was clear and unmistakable, no matter what McClel-
lan says Lincoln told him while the two were passing the time of day in his
tent.
Is this construction of a paper noose fair to the man at Antietam? Perhaps
not, but the Ancient of Days has a strange ambivalence when it comes to
George Brinton McClellan. Although the Prsdt is quite able to be harsh to
somebody's facesee Jessie Benton Fr6mont or Major John Key for testi-
mony to thatwhen it comes to this short (my height), young (thirty-five,
only twelve years my senior) whippersnapper of a general, Lincoln is loath to
crack the whip. Why?
The answer is one part personal affection; one part a concern with Little
Mac's incredible sway over his troops; one part gratitude for organizing an
army twice out of a beaten rabble without asking for a contract; one part guilt
for holding back troops to sit around Washington when they might have been
better employed in front of Richmond and at Antietam; and three parts not
having any general of proven ability to turn to.
That is why, on the very heels of that telegraphed, official order which
must have come as a bit of a shock to the fellow he was chatting with only
yesterday, Lincoln sent a handwritten note to McClellan telling him it would
be okay to slip back into Washington some night to see his wife.
To some, that act of kindness and sympathy following a sharp blow to the
back of the neck would be an anomaly; to me, it is quintessential Lincoln.
There is a curiously appealing personal side to McClellan, and I should re-
cord it here: he loves his wife with an admirable passion. He is not foolish to
do so, because Nellie is intelligent, beautiful, and radiant with her one-year-
old in arms. Tales have reached here of the way the general, no matter what
the military pressure, steals time from sleep late at night to write her long,
intimate letters. I cannot say this is a weakness.
The Prsdt finds this side of the Young Napoleon touching, which is why he
permits him to skulk into town for a feverish embrace when he should be
splashing his way across the river at the head of his vast and expensive army.
Perhaps Lincoln wishes he had a feeling like that for the Hellcat. No impas-
sioned letters for her. I recall my favorite correspondence from the Tycoon to
Mrs. L in New York last summer: "I am here, and well. How are you? A.
Lincoln." Hardly lyrical, but the Hellcat surely does not inspire all that the
lovely Nellie McClellan does.
At any rate, we have to tolerate the insolence of epaulets only until Novem-
ber 4. On Election Day, the Young Napoleon meets his Waterloo. I have no
doubt about his dismissal on the day after elections. It would be impolitic at
this moment to feed the flames of Democratic ire in Pennsylvania and New
York, both of which now feel some gratitude to McClellan for halting Lee
before the rebels swept into those states, by firing their military savior. We are
less worried about the border states, because Stanton has some hush-hush
plans for troops to keep secessionist sympathizers away from the polls, but
Thurlow Weed's whispered eruption about the effect of the Proclamation of
Freedom in New York has stirred the Prsdt's concern. Better to play it safe by
not firing McClellan yetat least not until Greeley's Republican candidate
rolls over the "peace candidate," Horatio Seymour, in New York.
The Democrats are mistaken to make a fuss about the two edicts uf "proc-
lamation week": on emancipation, the fear of a tide of black job seekers will
soon recede, and on agitators, we think the sentiment of the North is swing-
ing toward punishing the South and its sympathizers. The copperheads are
foolish to say that the two proclamations prove that the war is being waged
"for the freedom of the blacks and the enslavement of the whites."
Although the Prsdt, Stanton, et al. think Thurlow Weed and the Biairs are
alarmiste on the possibility of copperhead gains in the Congress, we are at-
tracted to Weed's idea of bringing Horatio Seymour down to the Mansion to
let Lincoln get the measure of the man. After all, Seymour as much as anyone
is the leader of the opposition now that Stephen Douglas is dead. Maybe a
brief exposure to the reality of life in the President's office will have a salutary
effect on Seymour's foot-dragging view of the war.
Nothing would keep me from witnessing that confrontation. Miss Carroll
says she is an old friend of New York Mayor Femando Woodshe calls him
"F'nandy"and she claims that the mayor is persuaded that Seymour has a
chance of upsetting our man in the race for the most important govemorship.
Oh, ye of little faith. The Tycoon is serene: he thinks his two proclamations
and his continued sufferance of McClellan will get him through the late
autumn of discontent.
This war is hitting home. The Prsdt's salary warrant came in today for the
month of September: it is $2,022.33, some $61 less than his previous monthly
warrants. That is because 3% has been deducted as a result of the "income
tax," an abomination perpetrated upon us by the father of the woman I know
at Sixth and E. Even my pittance is being clipped; some birthday present! (I
am 24 today.) An end to that nefarious practice of snatching money from
salaries will be one of the blessings of peace. There is no reason why this
government cannot continue to be run on the revenues from customs duties.

CHAPTER 13
PRISONERS
Commotion in camp: some Orphan Brigade skirmishers had brought back a
pair of runaway slaves, a field hand and his daughter. Cabell Breckinridge,
washing his jeans in a stream, wrung them out as fast as he could, jammed his
legs in and raced to the circle of soldiers.
"Caught 'em headed up toward the Gap and Kentucky," one of the skir-
mishers said proudly. "They made a dash through the woods, but the girl fell
down and the man had to come back for her and we grabbed him."
"Mean-lookin' buck, ain't he?"
"She's a cute one, though."
Cabell looked over shoulders to the runaways in the center. The man wore
overalls and a dark green shirt and hatclothing for escape through the
fields, except for a leg iron, its chain broken. He was short, well muscled,
purple-black, his chest heaving from what Cabell assumed to be either ex-
haustion or terror.
His daughter was in rags freshly torn by her run through the brambles;
slim, with long, scratched legs, breasts beginning to bud, she must have been
about thirteen. Every man in the circle was looking at her hungrilyit had
been a long, lonely march these three weeksbut Cabell knew their normal
lust had to be tempered by a reluctance to get satisfaction out of a slave girl
that young.
A Confederate officer came up before any fun could begin and detailed
Cabell and the sergeant to return the fugitives to the sheriff in Maynardville,
three miles southeast of the camp. The Kentucky Brigade was not due to
begin its march to Knoxville until morning.
The sergeant tied a rope around the girl's wrists, with a six-foot length to
walk her by. The field hand needed no restraints, he explained to Cabell,
because the pappy wasn't likely to run anywhere without the girl. You kept
her, you kept him.
"Ain't gonna hurt you," Cabell told them both, "but if you run, we'll shoot
you dead. That's orders, you hear?"
He knew he wasn't going to shoot either of them no matter what, but they
didn't know that. The owner would be asking after his property, and if Cabell
failed to do his duty, any such failure would be used by General Bragg
against his father. Bragg really had it in for Father.
Walking down the hilly road, the two soldiers and two slaves came on the
body of a dead Yankee. The morning before, a skirmish with some of the
Iowa volunteers had taken place here, and the Federals had drawn off too
quickly to take their dead.
"Take off his shoes," the sergeant ordered the field hand. The man obeyed;
the shoes came off the corpse. The sergeant handed Cabell the girl's rope and
sat down at roadside to try them on. He stood up and stomped around. "Not
bad. Better too big than too small, hunh? I'll just stuff the tip with leaves."
"You want Billy Yank's jacket?" Cabell asked the girl. "Keep you warm, if
you don't mind the bloodstains. You could wash 'em off."
She shook her head, eyes wide with fear. Cabell wondered what sort of life
he was bringing her back to. The Breckinridge family seldom had truck with
slaves, so he did not know if the stories about what they did with young slave
girls was true. It was exciting to think about the terrible acts of the slave
masters, but he was certain that the Yankee book Uncle Tom's Cabin was
exaggeratedabolition talk just to whip up people who didn't know that
nobody smart abused their property more than a normal lickin'.
"Why'd you run away?" Cabell asked the man.
The slave looked at him but silently plodded ahead.
"Speak up when a soldier asks you a question," the sergeant barked,
clomping along in his new shoes. "Did you hear that 'Massa Linkum' set you
free? Was that it?"
The man continued to walk, eyes on the ground. The girl, wanting to be
obedient, said "We beared. But that weren't all."
"Well tell us, chile," said the sergeant.
The field hand spoke his first words. "Gwine shoot us in the back," he
warned his daughter.
"No, only if you run," said Cabell. He began to feel badly about his threat.
You had to be careful how you talked to slaves, especially runaways, he
decided; they took anything you said to heart. In their minds, whites were
capable of anything, and that kind of power made him uncomfortable.
It didn't trouble the sergeant. He stopped in his tracks, pointed his rifle at
the man, and shouted, "Talk!"
The man merely looked at the sky and awaited execution. He seemed past
caring. The girl tugged on the rope in Cabell's hands, looked a plea at him; he
let her go to him. She lifted her father's shirt to show the soldiers his back.
Cabell, who had seen his share of wounds at Shiloh, turned away. All the
skin had been flayed off the man's back; black shreds hung from the red
exposed muscles. The vicious beating must have been administered within the
last twenty-four hours. Since then, the man's every movement must have been
an agony.
"Okay, keep walking," said the sergeant, slinging his gun, subdued. "You
ran away before, didn't you?"
The slave, walking, nodded.
"Shouldn't do that, you get punished," said the sergeant. "Massa Linkum
up north, he can say you're free, but that don't make you free down here.
Fact is, up home in Kentucky, he didn't free no slaves. Runnin' there won't
help you. Only place you're 'free,' 'cording to Massa Linkum, is down South
where you're slaves."
That wasn't quite true, Cabell thought; if rebel-state slaves ran into Union
lines anywhere, he had heard the Union military now had new orders not to
return the fugitives to their owners. Times were changing.
In a low voice, Cabell asked the sergeant, "What do you suppose the owner
will do to him now? Can't hurt him much more than last time. Kill him,
maybe?"
"Probably take it out on the girl," said the sergeant. "Be a waste, markin'
up a nice young thing, but some folks get mean when they're crossed."
A few hundred yards further, Cabell said, "You know, we're pulling out in
the morning, all the way down to Knoxville, Tennessee. Owner'd never know
the skirmishers caught 'em."
The sergeant shot him a funny look. "And you the general's son?"
"I don't say we let 'em go," Cabell said carefully. "Just that if they run,
we'd be wasting good ammunition to shoot. We're short on cartridges. Sup-
posed to use the ammo on the Yankees, not on a nigger cripple and his kid."
If it were a straight chase, without shooting, the sergeant would surely fall on
his face in those oversized shoes, and Cabell was not going to be the one to
catch them.
What would his father do? He was a former senator, a former Vice Presi-
dent of the United States, a general in the Confederate Army, a man of the
law. Cabell's grandfather had served as Speaker of the U.S. House of Repre-
sentatives, and with Thomas Jefferson had written the resolution denouncing
John Adams's unconstitutional Alien and Sedition Acts. Cabell was bred to
revere the Constitutionnow both of themwhich made it all right to own
slaves. He had been taught to obey the law, and no law challenged the right of
people to hold on to their own property. Not even Lincoln's proclamation
had done that. Was it right and proper for Cabell Breckinridge, son of a
candidate who opposed Lincoln on forbidding the extension of slavery, to
look the other way when a law-abiding man's property was running away?
That dilemma came on top of his disillusion with Braxton Bragg, who
seemed to be defending every Southern state except Kentucky. Disgusted
with the unfairness of it all, Cabell Breckinridge snatched his butternut cap
off his head and threw it in the dirt. He and the other fifteen hundred mem-
bers of the Orphan Brigade, under the command of his father, had trudged
over roads, and climbed on and off railroad cars, clear across the Confederate
states from the Mississippi to Cumberland Gap, where the northeastern tip of
Tennessee meets the southeastern tip of Kentucky. And now that they were
finally about to set foot on native Kentucky soil, joining the Confederate
troops holding it free from the Yankee invader, in came orders from General
Bragg to fall back down into Tennessee.
"Just 'cause Bragg got whupped at Perryville," Cabell said bitterly, "he's
givin' up on Kentucky."
The sergeant, from Bourbon County near Lexington, picked up the cap
and chucked it at him. "More than that, Cabe. Bragg hates your pappy's guts,
blames him for losing at Perryville 'cause the Orphans didn't get there in
time. And the folks up home didn't hold no parades signing up for this army.
Bragg is pure Mississippihe thinks Kaintuck is way up north."
"If we ain't got no better generals than Bragg," Cabell agreed, "we're in a
bad row for stumps."
It struck Cabell that wars sure turned around in a hurry. Couple of weeks
ago, General Bobby Lee was roaring through Maryland, scaring Yanks clear
up to New York. At the same time Bragg, Kirby Smith, and cavalryman John
Morgan had the Union on the run in the bluegrass. On top of that, Lincoln
makes a grab for every Southern slave, riling up the people and the soldiers of
Dixie with his proclamation, giving them a new determination to win. Even
the mutinous members of the Orphan Brigade, with their enlistment times up
and fixing to go home, agreed to stay on till the end of the war when they
heard about Old Abe's abolition. From Shiloh in April right up until Sharps-
burg last month, all spring and summer, the war had gone the right way for
the C.S.A.
But the news from Sharpsburg worried the men: McClellan, a soldier's
general, had turned Lee's men around and sent the butternuts home. And at
Perryville, the Yankee general Buell and the first respectable Union cavalry
commander, Sheridan, had fought Braxton Bragg to a standstill. Nobody had
won that battle, Cabell had been told by his fatherBragg had not really
been whuppedbut when you're on a big raid and you don't win, you lose.
Worried about being trapped too far North without a railroad or a river to
supply him, Bragglike Lee in Marylandturned around and hightailed it
out of there.
Now the Federals, east and west, in Virginia and Tennessee, were pulling
together all the supplies and ammunition, horses and brand-new shoes they
needed to invade the South again. It seemed to Cabell that as soon as one side
got into the other's territory, the invader lost for not winning and had to pull
out.
The girl on the other end of the rope stumbled and fell. Cabell reached for
her, his hand accidentally cupping one of her little teats, just as the field hand
turned and leaned down for her. The black man's face was about six inches
from his own, and Cabell didn't want to get a look from anyone like that
again. He backed away and pulled her up by the rope, like a dog on a lead.
His own father was in a sullen mood these days. Bragg was bothering him,
harassing the Orphan Brigade, wiring complaints about Breckinridge as well
as "Bishop" Polk to Jeff Davis in Richmond. His father was worried about
Mother, too; she had malaria, and her letters came from a hospital where she
was a patient rather than a nurse. Cabell would see him sitting up late in his
tent, bottle of bourbon by the lamp, writing home, as if afraid the world after
the war would all be different.
He was thinking hard of what General Clebume had told his father about
the idea of Southern emancipation when he heard a sharp command behind
him.
"Halt! Drop your guns!"
Might be a trick; he looked over his shoulder, unwilling to disarm himself
until he knew the man behind him was armed. Four men in blue uniforms
were in the road behind them, two with guns leveled at them. As the sergeant
and Cabell stood stock-still, other Yankees appeared on the side of the road
and in front of them. The skirmishers of yesterday had returned. These were
live Yankees.
Still holding the rope, Cabell slowly put down his gun. The sergeant did the
same, murmuring, "Libby Prison, here we come."
Libby was the hellhole every Johnny dreaded, as filthy and disease-ridden
as the South's own Andersonville. It made Cabell sad, too, to think that his
parents would think he was dead. But he was relieved at not having to maki
the decision to break the law about the runaway slaves.
"You are hereby emancipated," he said to the girl, and dropped the rope

CHAPTER 14
DEBATE
"You and I are substantially strangers," the President began, addressing Ho-
ratio Seymour, candidate for Governor of New York, in what he intended to
be a mood of friendly formality, "and I have asked you here chiefly that we
may become better acquainted. I, for the time being, am at the head of a
nation which is in great peril, and you are a candidate to become head of the
greatest state in that nation."
"I don't claim any superior wisdom," Seymour replied, "but I am confident
the opinions I hold are entertained by one half of the population of the
Northern states."
Lincoln cocked an eyebrow at that sally; the urbane New Yorker, carrying
the demeanor of man of wealth and executive experience, was apparently
unawed by his presence in the White House and was ready for a rhetorical
scrap. Might be interesting; Lincoln's purpose was to take the measure of the
leader of the political opposition as the election campaign heated up, and he
was secretly pleased that Seymour obviously overestimated Democratic
strength. The President shrugged and allowed as how the election in four
weeks would provide the answer to the candidate's contention.
Seymour nodded with civility. "I intend to show those charged with the
administration of public affairs a due deference and respect," he promised.
"After I am elected governor, Mr. President, I will give you just and generous
support in all measures you may adopt within the scope of your constitu-
tional powers."
His careful qualification did not escape the President. "You have been
asserting that certain military arrests," Lincoln said to draw the man out,
"for which I am ultimately responsible, are unconstitutional."
"I say that your suspension of habeas corpus will not only lead to military
despotism," Seymour replied coolly, "it establishes military despotism. This
action of your administration will determine, in the minds of more than one
half of the people in the loyal states, whether this war is waged to put down
rebellion in the South, or to destroy free institutions in the North."
Lincoln was not going to let him get away with that. "May I be indulged,"
he returned mildly, "to submit a few general remarks on the subject of ar-
rests?"
"You have shown that you think the Constitution is somehow different in
time of insurrection and invasion," Seymour continued, not indulging the
President at all. "I disagree. The safeguards of the rights of the citizel. against
the pretensions of arbitrary power were intended especially for his protection
in times of civil commotion." As Lincoln shook his head, Seymour added:
"You forget, sir, that these civil rights were secured to the English people
after years of protracted civil war, and were adopted into our American
Constitution at the close of the Revolution."
"Wouldn't your argument be better," Lincoln asked, "if those safeguards
had been adopted and applied during the civil wars and during our Revolu-
tion, instead of after the one and at the close of the other? I, too, am devotedly
for them after civil war, and before civil war, and at all times exceptand
here I quote the Constitution'except when, in cases of rebellion or invasion,
the public safety may require' their suspension."
Lincoln thought he had the better of that exchange, but Seymour conceded
nothing. "You are quoting the portion of the Constitution dealing with the
powers of the Congress, not the President. You tried to justify your usurpa-
tion of this power in the Merryman case last year by claiming the Congress
was not in session. Well, Congress is in session right now. If it is so urgent
that those who disagree with you be clapped into jail without a trial, why not
call on Congress to pass martial law? Who are you to override the most
sacred rights of free mensolely when you choose to say the public safety
requires it? You were not elected dictator."
Lincoln recognized the debating tactic: goad your opponent to anger with a
personal dig. "Divested of your phraseology calculated to represent me as
struggling for an arbitrary personal prerogative," Lincoln said slowly, con-
taining his temper, "your question is simply a question of who shall decide, or
an affirmation that nobody shall decide, what the public safety does require, in
cases of rebellion or invasion."
"Not so. The Congress can decide."
"The Constitution contemplates the question as likely to occur for deci-
sion, but it does not expressly declare who is to decide it," Lincoln corrected
him. "By necessary implication, when rebellion or invasion comes, the deci-
sion is to be made from time to time; and I think the man who, for the time
the people have, under the Constitution, made commander in chief of their
army and navy, is the man who holds the power and bears the responsibility
of making it."
"With no restraints? No checks and balances, no appeals? That, sir, is
dictatorial power."
"If he uses the power justly," Lincoln said matter-of-factly, "the same
people will probably justify him; if he abuses it, he is in their hands to be dealt
with by all the modes they have reserved to themselves in the Constitution."
"Do you realize what you are saying?" Seymour uncrossed his legs and
leaned forward. "You are saying, If you don't like my arbitrary arrests,
impeach mebut I can arrest you for speaking out to demand my impeach-
ment.' No despot ever seized more power to mete out punishment."
"The purpose of these arrests is not punishment," the President said pa-
tiently. He realized he was in a dispute with a lawyer who knew his case, but
Lincoln had been writing thoughts for this session on little scraps of paper for
days, putting each arguing point in a drawer to be assembled for his presenta-
tion. "You claim that men may, if they choose, embarrass those whose duty it
is to combat a giant rebellion, and then be dealt with only in turn as if there
were no rebellion. The Constitution itself rejects this view. The military ar-
rests and detentions which are being made are for prevention and not punish-
mentas injunctions to stay injury, as proceedings to keep the peace. Hence,
like proceedings in such injunction cases, they are not accompanied by indict-
ments, or trial by juries, nor in a single case by any punishment whatever
beyond what is purely incidental to the prevention."
"Not punishment? To be arrested for one knows not what; to be confined,
no one entitled to ask where; to be tried, no one can say when, by a law
nowhere known or established, or to linger out life in a cell without trial
you call that no punishment? That is a body of tyranny which cannot be
enlarged."
Lincoln could just hear those words being used effectively in a political
stump speech. It was demagoguery, he knew, but, like all effective demagogu-
ery, contained a germ of truth: Stanton had already appointed a special
provost marshal in Washington to carry out the arrests, with provost mar-
shals in every loyal state with power to ignore local court rulings. That would
strike fear in traitorous hearts, as Lincoln intended, but would also send a
chill into the hearts of the loyal voter.
"Habeas corpus does not discharge men who are proved to be guilty of
defined crime," Lincoln instructed Seymour in the law, "and its suspension is
allowed by the Constitution on purpose that men may be arrested and held
who cannot be proved to be guilty of defined crime. Arrests are made, not so
much for what has been done as for what probably would be donepreven-
tive, not vindictive. In crimes against the state, the purposes of men are much
more easily understood than in cases of ordinary crime."
"Oh?"
"The man who stands by and says nothing," Lincoln said, "when the peril
of his government is discussed, cannot be misunderstood. If not hindered, he
is sure to help the enemymuch more, if he talks ambiguously: talks for his
country with 'buts' and 'ifs' and 'ands.' "
Lincoln watched Seymour burn at that imputation of disloyalty, and as
Seymour said nothing, awaited the question the candidate would have to ask.
Sure enough, Seymour rose to the bait: "Can you not bear to wait until a
crime has been committed before meting out punishment?"
He had him. "Wait until a crime has been committed? Let me give you an
example. General John Breckinridge, as well as others occupying the very
highest places in the rebel war service, were all within the power of the
government once the rebellion began, and were nearly as well known to be
traitors then as now. Unquestionably, if we had seized and held them, the
insurgent cause would be much weaker. But no one of them had then com-
mitted any crime defined in the law. If arrested, they would have been dis-
charged on habeas corpus, were the writ allowed to operate." The President
made his point triumphantly: "I think the time not unlikely to come when I
shall be blamed for having made too few arrests rather than too many."
The candidate for chief executive of the state Lincoln counted on most for
men and money shook his head as if in disbelief. "The Constitution provides
for no limitations on the guarantees of personal liberty, except as to habeas
corpus. Even granting you the usurpation of that power from COngF:SS, do
you hold that all the other rights of every man throughout the country can be
annulled whenever you say the public safety requires it? Freedom of speech,
of the press"
"The benefit of the writ of habeas corpus is the great means through which
the guarantees of personal liberty are conserved and made available in the last
resort," Lincoln conceded. "But by the Constitution, even habeas corpus may
be suspended when, in case of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may
require it." Through his power to suspend that essential right, the President
held the key to all the other rights.
"Can you be unaware, Mr. President, that the suppression of journals and
the imprisonment of persons has been glaringly partisan? Republicans have
been allowed the utmost licentiousness of criticism, while Democrats have
been punished for a fair exercise of the right of discussion. For supporters of
mine, even to ask the aid of counsel has been held to be an offense."
Lincoln started to interrupt, but the New York candidate pressed on: "An
attempt is being made to shield the violators of law and to suppress inquiry
into their motives and conduct. I warn you, sir, this attempt to conceal the
abuses of power will fail. Unconstitutional acts cannot be shielded by uncon-
stitutional laws."
"Now hold on." He did not appreciate being warned. "In this time of
national peril, I would have preferred to meet you on a level one step higher
than any party platform. But not all Democrats have denied me this. The
Secretary of War, on whose discretionary judgment the arrests are being
made, is a Democrat, having no old party affinity with me. And from all
those Democrats who are nobly exposing their lives on the battlefield, I have
heard from many who approve my course, and not from a single one con-
demning it."
If Seymour caught the subtle import of his pointthat those Democrats
doing the complaining were not the patriots doing the fightinghe ignored it
airily. "I shall not inquire what rights states in rebellion have forfeited, but I
deny that this rebellion can suspend a single right of the citizens of loyal
states. I denounce your doctrine that civil war in the South takes away from
the loyal North the benefits of one principle of civil liberty."
Lincoln wondered if the man would go as far as to threaten the national
authority, and was astounded when Seymour did: "In the event that I am
elected governor next month, I will make it plain that it is a high crime to
abduct a citizen of the state of New York. I will admonish my sheriffs and
district attorneys to take care that no New Yorker is imprisoned or carried by
force outside the state without due process of legal authority."
The man was a danger to the Union. Seymour was, in effect, promising
insurrection of another sort: a "high crime" was an offense of state, and could
lead to the arrest, impeachment, and imprisonment of the arresting federal
officer. And New York's police forces, added to local militia, would be more
than a match for the thin federal forces in that state. If elected governor,
Seymour would have the military power on the scene to back up his threat to
federal authority.
"I can no more be persuaded," Lincoln told him, hoping a practical argu-
ment would take hold, "that the government can constitutionally take no
strong measures in time of rebellionbecause it can be shown that the same
could not be lawfully taken in time of peacethan I can be persuaded that a
particular drug is not good medicine for a sick man because it can be shown
not to be good for a well one. Nor am I able to appreciate the danger that the
American people will, by means of military arrests during the rebellion, lose
the right of public discussion, the liberty of speech and the press, the law of
evidence, trial by jury and habeas corpus any more than I am able to believe
that a man could contract so strong an appetite for emetics during temporary
illness as to persist in feeding upon them during the remainder of his healthful
life."
"I suppose those homespun metaphors go over well with juries, Mr. Lin-
coln, but ask yourself this: did you approve of President Folk's war with
Mexico?"
Lincoln frowned, not getting his opponent's sudden shift of argument. He
reluctantly shook his head. Like many good Whigs in the 1840s, he had
faulted Polk for provoking the war at the behest of the Texans.
"During the war with Mexico," Seymour recounted, "many of the political
opponents of the Administration thought it their duty to denounce and op-
pose the war. With equal reason as you give now, it might have been said of
them that their discussions before the people were calculated to discourage
enlistments and to induce desertions. Were these people, yourself included,
'warring on the military,' to use your own phrase, and did this give the
military constitutional jurisdiction to lay hands upon them?"
"I dislike to waste words on a purely personal point," answered Lincoln,
"but you will find yourself at fault should you ever seek for evidence to prove
your assumption that I opposed, in discussions before the people, the policy of
the Mexican War." Lincoln had privately spoken forcefully against the start
of Folk's war, but had refrained from speaking out publicly for fear of jeopar-
dizing his political career in those early days. He realized now that as a young
Congressman, he had been wise to stay silent; anti-war oratory would have
come home to haunt him now. Nobody could make him feel guilty now about
not speaking out then. Time for an anecdote.
"Seward says that one fundamental principle of politics is to be always on
the side of your country in a war," Lincoln drawled. "I remember Butterfield
of Illinois was asked, at the beginning of the Mexican War, if he was not
opposed to it. He said, 'No. I opposed one war and it ruined me. I am now
perpetually in favor of war, pestilence, and famine.' "
Unfortunately, Seymour was too worked up for Lincoln's attempt to re-
duce the animosity to have the desired effect. "Do you seriously think that
arresting the outspoken opposition," asked the New York candidate, "is go-
ing to preserve the public safety? I think the opposite. I think all authority is
going to be weakened by your repression. Government is never strengthened
by the exercise of doubtful powers: it always produces discord, suspicion, and
distrust. If that is what you feel you must do, Lincoln, that is what I must run
against."
Lincoln fingered the mole on his cheek; although he had flushed Seymour
out and learned the campaign strategy, he was unhappy with what he had
learned. He rose from his couch and walked to the desk, half sitting there.
"This civil war began on very unequal terms between the parties. The insur-
gents had been preparing for it more than thirty years." Anna Carroll had
documented the activities of the Knights of the Golden Circle in her pam-
phlet exposing Breckinridge. "Their sympathizers pervaded all departments
of the Government, and nearly all communities of the people. Under cover of
liberty of speech,' liberty of the press,' and 'habeas corpus,' they hoped to
keep on foot among us a most efficient corps of spies, informers, suppliers,
and aiders and abettors of their cause in a thousand ways."
"I find it hard to believe that a President of the United States swallows
such a"
"Hear me out, Seymour. They knew that in times such as they were inau-
gurating, by the Constitution itself the habeas corpus might be suspended; but
they also knew they had friends who make a question as to who was to
suspend it; meanwhile, their spies and others might remain at large to help on
their cause."
"The person who first raised that question was the Chief Justice of the
United States," Seymour said hotly. "Are you accusing him of being a part of
a conspiracy to"
Lincoln kept on going. "Or if, as has happened, the Executive should
suspend the writ, without ruinous waste of time, instances of arresting inno-
cent persons might occuras are always likely to occur in such casesand
then a clamor could be raised in regard to this, of service to the insurgent
cause."
"For God's sake, Lincoln, what about the courts? I'm not talking about
arrests of bushwhackers and guerrillas in a war zone, I mean arrests of dis-
senters in those areas where judges now sit, empowered to hear cases."
"Nothing is better known to history than that courts of justice are utterly
incompetent to such cases," Lincoln held. "Civil courts are organized chiefly
for trials of individuals, or at most a few individuals acting in concert, and
this in quiet times. Even in times of peace, bands of horse thieves and robbers
frequently grow too numerous and powerful for the ordinary courts of justice.
But what comparison, in numbers, have such bands ever borne to the insur-
gent sympathizers even in many of the loyal states?"
"Why are you, a lawyer, afraid of judges and juries?"
"A jury frequently has at least one member more ready to hang the panel
than to hang the traitor," the President shot back. "Thoroughly imbued with
a reverence for the guaranteed rights of individuals," he went on, "I was slow
to adopt the strong measures indispensable to the public safety. Remember,
Seymour: he who dissuades one man from volunteering, or induces one sol-
dier to desert, weakens the Union cause as much as he who kills a Union
soldier in battle. Yet this dissuasion or inducement may be so conducted as to
be defined as no crime in civil court."
"Your reverence for the rule of law is overwhelming, Mr. Lincoln. I take it
that you believe all of us who strive to protect the right of dissent are weaken-
ing the cause of the Union. You have become so obsessed with holding the
Union together that you have forgotten that the purpose of the Union is to
preserve individual freedom."
"Your own attitude, therefore," said the President, unrelenting, eager to
make clear the political danger in the line Seymour had been taking, "encour-
ages desertion, resistance to the draft, and the like, because it teaches those
who incline to desert and to escape the draft to believe it is your purpose to
protect them, and to hope that you will become strong enough to do so."
"We have nothing further to discuss," said Seymour, rising. "Your preten-
sions to more than regal authority are contemptible. You claim to have found
within the Constitution a germ of arbitrary power, which in time of war
expands at once into an absolute sovereignty wielded by one man, so that
liberty perishes at his discretion or caprice. I will stand for election in New
York, sir, and refute you. The American people will never acquiesce in your
extraordinary doctrine."
"We shall see." Lincoln judged this fellow to be stronger than he had
thought, and no demagogue, but felt confident he could take him in debate in
'64 if it came to that, just as he had taken Stephen Douglas in '58. If he felt
like debating, that was a President's prerogative. Greeley was certain that
Seymour had no chance of winning the govemorship next month, but Weed
was worried about the undignified and unprecedented way he was travehng
all over the state of New York, running instead of standing for election in the
traditional way. "We shall see. I'll just have to keep pegging away."

CHAPTER 15
THE GOLD ROOM
On the wide landing of the stairs, her hand resting on the railing, Kate Chase
listened to the familiar voices in the library below.
"I congratulate you on the rise of your seven-thirties, my dear Cooke," her
father was saying, "and now I want to be a borrower myself. Will you lend
me two thousand dollars, in the shape of your draft on New York?"
"Of course." Jay Cooke was always accommodating; but the Treasury Sec-
retary had made Cooke's Philadelphia firm the exclusive agent for the gov-
ernment's bond issue, Kate was persuaded, only because Cooke had proved
himself to be the most effective salesman of bonds in the land.
"I want it to pay on the account of a store I am rebuilding on Katie's
property in Cincinnati," her father explained.
"Say no more," Cooke told him; "I'll write the draft now."
Scratching of quill. Kate waited on the landing; now was hardly the time to
make an entrance.
"I must remind you again," her father told Cooke sternly, "of the necessity
of putting a little more form in the address of your letters to the Secretary of
the Treasury. I don't like to have private and public matters mixed. Please
commence all your letters on public matters to him with 'Sir.' Write separate
letters on private matters, or those in which you are trusted as a confidential
agent, with 'Dear Governor' or 'Dear friend' or as you will. But let those
personal letters contain nothing on public business or vice versa."
"Of course," said Cooke again. "Here you are1 hope the store is a great
success."
"The store? Oh, on Katie's property. Yes."
Humming "Picayune Butler" as she walked down the stairs, Kate entered
the library and kissed them both.
She ensconced herself on the part of the couch that needed coveriiig. "Tell
me about the Gold Room," she said to Cooke. "I hear it's a terrible scandal,
and you should be ashamed."
Kate had read that a group of brokers in New York had formed an ex-
change to set the price of gold, and she knew that Jay Cooke would find
pleasure in explaining it to her. It would help Father, too, who was sometimes
too proud to seek financial instruction.
"Early this year your father put out the greenbacks, remember? The paper
dollar is supposed to be worth a dollar in goldand so it is, for paying the
new tax on incomes, but foreign countries insist on payment of their debts in
gold. That makes a gold dollar worth somewhat more than a greenback."
"And the more greenbacks we print, the less the paper dollar is worth
against gold," her father put in.
Cooke nodded. "In January, gold was worth one dollar and three cents.
Today, it's one dollar and twenty-five cents in the Gold Room. Since the
nation would rather borrow than tax, the paper greenback will buy even less
gold next year."
"Well, why do you let those money changers in the templethose gamblers
make all the money that we need to finance the war?" Good question: she'd
worked on it.
The young financier, smiling, shook his head. "In gambling," Cooke ex-
plained, "an artificial risk is created. But in gold speculation, a genuine risk is
inherent in the situation. Since the price of gold against the dollar is sure to
go up and down, depending on the fortunes of the North in the war, some-
body is needed to accept the risk. If it isn't the speculator, it has to be the
importers and other businessmen who must use gold in trade. The speculators
perform a service taking that risk, which is why they should profit from it."
She shook her head warily. "There must be politics in it. I hear the 'Cop-
perhead bulls' sing Dixie right in the Gold Room on news of a rebel victory,
and the 'Union bears' sing 'John Brown's Body' when the North wins a
battle."
"The reason for that," Jay Cooke explained, more to the Secretary than his
daughter, "is economic, not political. When rebels win, confidence in the U.S.
dollar drops, which means it takes more dollars to buy goldso the price of
gold goes up. The 'Copperhead bulls' are betting that the rebels will win and
the price of gold will shoot up."
"Lincoln doesn't understand that," said her father. "He thinks the tail
wags the dog, that the gold traders put the price up because they want the
South to win. He banged the Cabinet table the other day"Chase banged the
table and imitated Lincoln's high voice" 1 wish every one of them had his
devilish head shot off" "
"I'm sorry to hear that," said Cooke, no longer smiling. "If Lincoln tries to
control that market, or put the gold speculators out of business because he
thinks speculation is unpatriotic, he'll bring our foreign trade to a halt. And
then goodbye to your revenues from customs duties."
"Fear not," said Chase. "He does that to show Thad Stevens and that
bunch he's one of them, against the vile bankers with their diamond stick-
pins."
A servant came in to announce that Miss Anna Ella Carroll had dropped
by and was waiting in the front parlor. Kate, who had expected to be out all
day, seethed; she was glad now that she had changed her plans, and glad her
father looked discomfited.
"Were you expecting her, Father?"
"No, but Miss Carroll is always"
"You two continue your important business," she said to the men. "I'll see
her first, and bring her in when you've finished."
"We're finished," said Cooke, being helpful, then catching Kate's glare
added lamely, "well, there are a couple of confidential details left, I suppose."
"Don't let her go," said her father; "I want Miss Carroll's thoughts on next
week's elections. We didn't do too well back home in Ohio this month in our
early elections, except for Major Garfield." Turning to Cooke, he added,
"that young man won by a two-to-one margin, you know. Ashtabula is the
most Republican county in the state, of course, but it shows James Garfield
has a great future."
"Will the major take his seat, or remain in the army?"
Chase looked uncertain; Kate said, "He'll stay in the army awhile, if he
gets a decent assignment. He thinks a good war record is the most important
thing in the long run, and, of course, he's right." She had talked with him
intimately and at length on a recent horseback ride toward Annapolis. Gar-
field was an attractive, passionate, in some ways mysterious man.
"I have an assignment in mind for him first," Chase told Cooke. "Stanton
is going to get Lincoln to approve the convening of a court-martial of General
Porter, for his disgraceful conduct toward Pope at Second Bull Run."
"McClellan will never stand for that," said Cooke. "Porter is his pet."
Kate nodded approvingly; she had explained that to Jay the night before. She
taught him more politics than he taught her economics.
"McClellan is finished," said Chase with finality. "It is inexpedient for
Lincoln to remove him before the elections, because that would be miscon-
strued by most conservatives as a sop to those of us who have long demanded
an end to slavery. Come Election Day, McClellan will be removed."
"But if he's hot on the tail of Lee at the time"
"No matter. That's not the point. His delays are dreadful, and that's an
excuse for sacking him, but McClellan and his crowd must be removed be-
cause of all the compromising on slavery they stand for."
"I can see why Lincoln wants to wait past the elections," Cooke said. "The
man did save the country at Antietam, a lot of people in Philadelphia think
we were certain that Lee was on the way."
"McClellan failed to win the war at Antietam," Chase said sternly. "And
after he's been removed, the court-martial of his man Porter will commence.
That's why it is important for an officer with political judgment to represent
us on the court-martial board. Major Garfield will see that justice is done."
"The major is not as sanguine as you about the elections," Kate said. She
hoped she did not seem to her father to know too much about Garfield's
thinking; she knew better than he that Garfield as judge would come down
hard on Fitz-John Porter and drive the last nail in the coffin of McClellan's
reputation.
"The unfortunate results of the early elections in Ohio and Pennsylvania,"
pronounced her father, "were influenced by the fear of Southern invasion.
November's elections will reflect the enthusiasm for the emancipation and the
relief at the defeats of Lee and Bragg."
"That might help in New England," Kate said, eager to put forward her
political thoughts before Miss Carroll had a chance, and to show Jay Cooke
how well she had been informed by Major Garfield, "and in California."
"We'll pick up seats in Congress," Chase said confidently, "and governor-
ships as well. Greeley assures us that his man Wadsworth will trounce the
Peace Democrat, Seymour, in New York." A frown crossed his fine brow.
"But Illinois, of all places, might prove a problem. Leonard Swett, Lincoln's
close friend running in Lincoln's old district, predicts a close race. Strange.
Maybe Miss Carroll knows why."
Anna did not enjoy being sidetracked, but she could not refuse a cup of tea
in the parlor with the lady of the house while the financial conference was
concluding in the library. Kate Chase appeared drawn, not the radiant center
of attention of the levees. The young woman apparently had something to say
and Anna let her take the conversational lead.
"I understand, Miss Carroll, that you have been approaching several mem-
bers of the Cabinet with your claim that the government owes you money,"
Kate Chase said abruptly, silver teapot in hand.
Anna waited for her to go on.
"Six thousand, two hundred and fifty dollars," Kate specified, pouring the
tea. "That's a great deal of money."
Anna had not mentioned the sum to her father. Had Bates told her? Stan-
ton? John Hay? "Yes," she replied. "I laid a great deal of money out myself,
in the production of pamphlets."
"I know this is a rude question, Miss Carroll, but are you a woman of
means?"
"You're right, Kate," she said, using the younger woman's first name to
assert her seniority. "That is a rude question."
"I felt free to ask it, because I'm not. Not a woman of means."
Anna sipped her tea.
"Many women," Kate went on, "many single women, assume that because
my father is Secretary of the Treasury and deals in millions of dollars, the
Chase family is rich. It's not true."
Anna's eyes roamed the walls of the elegant parlor, took in the paintings
and draperies, pointedly noted the breakfront with the expensive china, and
continued sipping her tea. The young woman certainly knew how to brew and
serve a cup of tea; it was a talent Anna had never mastered.
"All this is a fagade, Miss Carroll," said Kate after Anna's eyes returned
from their tour. "I thought you ought to know. It is not something my father
would confide in you, or in Addie Douglas, or in any of the women who have
set their cap for him. But it is the truth. Salmon Portland Chase, once a
wealthy man, is now as poor as"
"A church mouse, the expression is."
"Thank you. In telling you this, I am taking you into my family's confi-
dence. It would not do for the city of Washington to know that we have to
scrimp and save to meet the bills. Because my father trusts you, I trust you."
"Your predicament will never pass my lips."
"It would therefore be advantageous," Kate continued, "for my father to
marry a woman who can present a bill for six thousand, two hundred and
fifty dollars to the government every now and then. It would pay for my
winter wardrobe. Are you quite prepared, Miss Carroll, to help support the
Chase familythere's Nettie, too, my sisterin the manner to which we are
accustomed?"
Anna put down her cup and sat back. "Young woman, you seem to be
suggesting, with some puerile drawing-room irony, that I am running after
your father for his money."
"I am glad you took my point."
"You're young, you're possessive, and you're wrong."
"If you could see the house accounts"
Anna waved aside the details. "Your pecuniary problems are of no interest.
I believe you, that you're short on ready cash, and, yes, it's a surprise to me.
But your problem is not in protecting your father from avaricious women.
Your problem is to create a life for yourself independent of your father."
"How d''
"I dare because I've always dared to stand in my own shoes. You're filled
with fear because you've always stood in your father's shoes. Grow up and
get out on your own."
"I have worked, Miss Carroll, and been charming, and fought, and
scratched, and lied and spied and done damn-all for a chance to be hostess in
the Executive Mansion, and no society widow, or, or"she struggled for a
suitable capsule of Anna Carroll"concubine of past presidents who never
wears a dress with a decent bodice is going to deprive me of it!"
Kate's face was flushed, her chest heaving. Anna remained cool, choosing
to deal with the insults obliquely. "I was flat-chested, like you, when I was in
my teens," she said pseudosympathetically. She breathed deeply and arched
her back. "Be of good heart. Over the years, figgers change."
After a moment, Kate recovered. "I would like you to stop seeing my
father," she was able to say calmly.
"That's natural," Anna replied. It was time to stop fencing with the girl. "I
resented every woman who came into the house after my father was widowed.
We were very close, and I was a great support to him, just as you are to the
governor. But what you want for your father, and from your father, is not my
concern. That is between you and him."
She felt like rising to make her point, but then Kate would rise and tower
over her, so Anna remained seated. "Your father is a self-made man and I am
a self-made woman. We admire each other. We like each other. We can be
helpful to each other. Perhaps we will get together someday, perhaps not
that's as much my choice as it is his."
"But neither of you knew the other was poor."
"And do you know what that means, Kate? It means that we both know
how to keep up appearances."
Kate neither dissolved nor started whining. "I will fight you. I am more
worried about you than about the society ladies."
"Good, that says a lot about your father's sense of himself, and it shows
you know where you are weakest."
Kate looked puzzled, probably because she did not want to disagree with a
compliment.
"You can share his ambition," Anna went on, "but you cannot share his
life. He has needs that go beyond those that can be supplied by an official
hostess, and those needs it would be"she paused for emphasis, knowing
precisely the word to use"unnatural for you to provide." He had not yet
expressed that need to her in any of their meetings, which Anna was not
about to tell his daughter; let her suspect the worst. From the tension of her
last meeting with him, she had hopes the worst would come soon.
"You think of me as a belle of parties, Miss Carroll, the hostess of a
matinie dansante. But I will surprise you. I am prepared to make sacrifices to
reach my goal, and to help Father reach his. More sacrifices than you have
ever made in your life."
"Let him go. Make your own way."
Kate rose. "I'll show you to the library."
"No, I'll wait here. If they're not finished with their bond issue in a few
minutes, I'll go along." Since Kate did not offer more tea, Anna poured
herself a cup. She wished it were a glass of wine. What in God's name was a
matin6e dansante? Dancing in the afternoon, with the drapes drawn, by can-
dlelight? Is that what these people did after lunch?
As she expected, as soon as Kate withdrew, Chase and Cooke came in to
join her, accompanied by Major Garfield, the Chases' houseguest. That was
the sort of political man Kate should be seeing, had he been single; not Lord
Lyons, a professional bachelor, or John Hay, a comparative boy she could
manipulate at will. Kate needed a man to share both ambition and bed. Anna
was prepared to admit that so did she, but at least she was aware of it.
"The President is afflicted with the notion that the way to take Vicksburg is
to send General McClerland, an Illinois politician, down the Mississippi,"
Anna Ella Carroll told them. "That's ridiculous. Grant should attack the fort
by land, from the rear; that's what the Tennessee plan had in mind from the
start. If the subject comes up in the Cabinet tomorrow, Governor, here's my
idea ..."

CHAPTER 16

JOHN HAY'S DIARY
NOVEMBER 5, 1862
Yesterday was Election Day and the results coming in today amount to a
national calamity.
I knew that political disaster was imminent. I was home in Illinois last
week, partly for some unobtrusive sparking but mainly to help Leonard Swett
and other family friends get organized to turn out the Republicans on No-
vember 4.
Away from the federal city, in touch with the West, I was able to read the
signs. I wrote Nicolay to tell the Tycoon how badly the political currents
were running in Illinois. With stunning prescience, I predicted that the inac-
tion of McClellan and Buell and the ill success of our arms would have a
terrible effect. I pointed out that all our energetic and working Republicans
are in the army. The district "captains of ten" and "captains of 100," who
have always done our best vote getting, are all soldiers in the field and not
enough were furloughed. I warned that the State of Illinois was in great
danger.
But even I, fresh from the grass roots, had no more than an inkling of what
turned out to be the sad state of public sentiment in the nation.
With the Prsdt lounging on his couch, as he does when flirting with the
hypo, and Tad and the kittens unable to shake him out of his gloom, it was
my task to take in the messages brought over from the War Department
telegraph office by William Slade, our trusty colored messenger.
New Jersey was the first shock. A Douglas Democrat took the governor-
ship by 61,000 to 46,000 votes, an upset of staggering proportions; on top of
that, Peace Democrats took four of the five House seats and gained control of
the Jersey legislature. Then came Delaware, just as bad in a smaller way,
following in the pattern dismayingly set by our defeats in Pennsylvania, Ohio,
and Indiana.
Hoping to break the chain of bad news, I went across the street to the
telegraph office to get the word from Michigan, where I was certain that old
Zack Chandler would deliver. He did, and I forgave him for his dalliance
with John Barleycorn as I started back with the one small piece of cheer in
the dismal landscape.
In the hall of the War Department near Stanton's office I came across
Major Garfield, Chase's house guest, who is sort of hanging around waiting
for a military post that will enshrine him in the eyes of Ohioans, meanwhile
playing chess with Chase and mooning after Kate. Since he was one of the
few winners in the congressional racesit would be impossible for us to lose
Ashtabula1 asked him for some more good news to take to the Prsdt.
Congressman-elect Garfield was no help. "The news is most dishearten-
ing," he said heavily. "Several of the most important states seem to have gone
secession."
"Word from New York? The defeat of Seymour would be a good sign, if by
a large margin."
"Not yet. But Roscoe Conkling lost his seat, that was unexpected."
I was of two minds about that; Conkling was another one of Kate's admir-
ers, but was one of the President's stalwarts in the House from New York.
I hazarded the view that all was not going well.
"There will be ajubilee in Richmond," Garfield responded miserably, "the
like of which has not been seen since the first battle of Bull Run. At this rate,
we will be overpowered by treason at home."
Since he was in Chase's orbit, I asked the major's opinion of the cause of
the calamity.
"Democratic generals," was the response. "Having failed to buy up his
enemies by kindness, Mr. Lincoln has been driving away all his friends by
neglect."
I said I presumed he meant that he and his radical allies in the army had
not been given the positions they wanted. "Please tell the President this," he
urged. "If these disastrous elections act as a spur to give him some ~otion,, I
shall welcome them as messengers of mercy though they come in the guise of
terrible disasters."
I thanked Garfield for that solace and ducked back into the telegraph office
for any late word from Illinois.
"Not good," said Homer Bates. "The legislature has gone Democratic."
That meant that Orville Browning, who had been appointed to the Senate
after the 1860 election by the legislature, would lose his seat to some Peace
Democrat. It also meant that he would be badgering Lincoln for a Supreme
Court seat that Lincoln had in mind for David Davis, his 1860 campaign
manager. Two intimate friends, both deserving, but only one job; that meant
trouble.
I asked about Leonard Swett, known as Lincoln's best friend back home,
running in Lincoln's home district.
"Defeated," said Bates. He handed over the dispatch from the correspon-
dent of the Chicago Tribune. The voters in our own backyard have rejected
Republicanism and Lincoln. The Prsdt would take that hard.
"Frank Blair won in Missouri," said Bates, to perk me up. That was a
foregone conclusion: the Biairs owned the big newspaper in that state, in a
season when most other newspapers were killing us. William the messenger
arrived, looking for fresh returns; I told him to await new results in the
telegraph office, especially from the governor's race in New York, while I
hurried back to the Tycoon. He had gone down the hall to the Cabinet Room.
I followed with my bad news.

CHAPTER 17
BE RELIEVED FROM COMMAND
"The defeat of the administration is your own fault," Carl Schurz was lectur-
ing him, "You placed the army, now a great power in this Republic, in the
hands of its enemies."
The election defeat a result of neglect of patronage? Lincoln refused to
accept that. "I distributed to our party's friends as nearly all the civil patron-
age as any administration ever did. The war came. It so happened that very
few of our friends were of the profession of arms." Even so, he added, "I have
scarcely appointed a Democrat to a command who was not urged by many
Republicans and opposed by none. It was that way with McClellan."
Carl Schurz and Stanton were in the Cabinet Room with him, not commis-
erating, but blaming Lincoln for the poor results. Schurz was the human
rights leader who had been tossed out of Germany after the revolution of
1848, and who swung great weight with the German vote here; accordingly,
he was listened to, and had been appointed Ambassador to Spain after Lin-
coln's election. Schurz was bored there, however, so a military command was
found for him, in charge of German regiments, of course, near Washington.
Lincoln liked Schurz. Even if a bit ultra, he had been a thoroughgoing
Lincoln man, unlike Wade and Stevens; on top of that, Lincoln was comfort-
able with a lively fellow who spoke his mind with a refreshing absence of guile
unt der unmistakable accent.
"But you sustained those generals after they had been found failing," in-
sisted Schurz, as Stanton nodded. "Am I wrong in saying that the principal
management of the war has been in the hands of your political opponents?
McClellan, in eighteen months, has succeeded in nothing except the con-
sumption of our resources with the largest and best appointed army this
country ever saw."
"The Democrats in the country were left in a majority by our friends going
to the war," Lincoln explained. "Our newspapers, by vilifying and disparag-
ing the Administration, furnished them all the weapons to do it with."
"The President is right about the damned newspapers, Schurz," conceded
Stanton. "Look at Iowa. The only reason we won in Iowa is that I put the
two Peace Democrat editors in Fort Lafayette for seditious agitation. Should
have done a good deal more of that."
The German, now a general, disagreed. "That some of our newspapers
disparaged and vilified the Administration may be true. But however that
may be, I ask youwhat power would there have been in newspaper talk had
the Administration been able to set up against it the evidence of great mihtary
success?"
Lincoln dug in his heels: "I certainly have been dissatisfied with the slow-
ness of McClellan, but before I relieve him, what successor would be better?"
"One who sympathized with your political aims."
"I need success more than I need sympathy," Lincoln said heatedly.
"The people had shown confidence in you," Schurz pressed, "and reaped
disaster and disappointment. They wanted change in military leadership, and
yesterday sought it in the wrong direction."
Lincoln suddenly didn't much feel like arguing. "We still have a Republi-
can majority in the Congress."
"I entreat you, Lincoln," said Schurz, "do not attribute to small incidents
what is a great historical event. You appointed generals who have no heart in
this war. See the fact in its true light: the election results were a most serious
and severe reproof administered to the Administration."
The President would not take that slumped in his couch; now he felt a
surge of resentment at the unfairness in the accusation. He had done all that
the radicals had asked him to do about emancipation and more; that, and not
a failure of patronage, was what had cost the party dearly at the polls. Blair
and Weed had been proved right in their dire predictions, Stanton and Sum-
ner and Greeley wrong in their easy assurancesand now the radicals, in-
stead of accepting political responsibility for emancipation's unpopularity,
were searching for arguments to blame Abraham Lincoln.
He rose up and struck back: "I certainly know if the war fails, the Admin-
istration fails, and that I will be blamed for it whether I deserve it or not. You
think I can do better, therefore you blame me already. I think I could not do
better, therefore I blame you for blaming me." He poked his long finger in the
German's chest. "Believe me, my dear Schurz, there are generals who 'have
their heart in this war,' as you put it, that think you are performing your part
as poorly as you think I am performing mine."
The German started to say something, swallowed, turned and departed
without another word. Stanton looked at the floor.
Distraught at the election results, angry at himself for lashing out at a loyal
friend who happened to be mistaken, and whose continued political backing
was important, Lincoln stood uncertainly in front of the open-grate fireplace.
He rocked back and forth in his gigantic morocco slippers until his testiness
subsided, then he told Stanton, "Go bring him back."
When the Secretary of War ushered the troubled Schurz back into the
room, Lincoln put his hands on the German's shoulders and shook him
gently. "I gave it to you hard, didn't I? But it didn't hurt, did it? I didn't
mean to."
Lincoln forced a laugh. "It's just that all the criticisms coming down on me
from all sides chafed a little. You happened to be the one to sum up all the
criticisms and offer me a good chance for reply. I know you are a warm anti-
slavery man and a good friend to me." He shook the man's shoulders again
until Schurz smiled.
At that moment William appeared with the latest from the telegraph office.
Lincoln looked at the message, laid it down on the Cabinet Room table, went
over to the window looking out on Pennsylvania Avenue, and crossed his
arms. He heaved one of those profound sighs that seem to come up from the
Mansion basement. The opposition now had a leader in a position to chal-
lenge his executive power.
Stanton picked up the message and read aloud: "Horatio Seymour has been
elected Governor of the State of New York."
After a moment's silence, Schurz took his leave. Lincoln asked Stanton to
stay and they went down the hall to the President's office. He pointed to the
map and asked his Secretary of War for the latest on the whereabouts of
McClellan and Lee.
"Our army has finally put all its units across the Potomac into Virginia,"
Stanton reported. "It's been seven long weeks since Antietam."
Lincoln nodded and asked for specifics. McClellan's headquarters was in
now Rectortown, near Warrenton; the general was complaining of lack of
shoes for his men, and wanted more carbines and muskets, but he was un-
doubtedly on the move to engage the enemy. Lee's army was again separated
by the Blue Ridge Mountains, with Jackson's corps on the western side in the
Shenandoah Valley and Longstreet's troops down at Culpepper Court House.
Apparently McClellan planned to strike down the east side of the mountain
range at Longstreet, driving him back on Gordonsville before Jackson could
unite with him. From there, Mac could take the Fredericksburg route to
Richmond or try to talk Lincoln into letting him try the Peninsula route
again.
The President noticed something as Stanton was talking; strange, how
maps could speak to you about armies. If Longstreet was in Culpepper, that
meant he was in McClellan's front; no longer could Lincoln hope that the
Federal forces could cut off Lee's army from the rear. A case could be made,
then, and would readily be understood by the public, that Lee's army had
"escaped." Although he could no longer relieve McClellan on the grounds
that he was not actively pursuing Leeindeed, McClellan seemed in the
process of making a major attackhe could relieve the general on the
grounds that he had allowed Lee to slip his army between McClellan and
Richmond, to escape. The President could say that had always been his crite-
rion for replacing his field commander.
Because replace him he must. The victory of the Democrats in the elec-
tions, combined with what Schurz rightly recognized was the West Point
crowd's unhealthy dominance of the army, had flung down a gauntlet. Lin-
coln knew he faced a stark choice: either back away from emancipation, ease
up on the Democratic dissidents, woo the Republican conservatives, and ac-
cept the policy laid down in McClellan's Harrison's Landing planor do just
the opposite; ignore the election results, crack down on the agitators, lay a
strong hand on the colored element by using them as soldiers, fire McClellan
and root out the West Point mind-set in the army.
The President crossed to the desk, took out a quill and ink, rummaged in
the drawer for paper, and composed a message.
"Take this to Halleck," he told Stanton, knowing the Secretary would
approve without hesitation. "I want this under his signature, not mine or
yours." That was what Halleck was for: professional military coloration.
, Stanton read it aloud: "By direction of the President, it is ordered that
Major General McClellan be relieved from command of the Army of the
Potomac; and that Major General Burnside take command of that Army."
Stanton nodded vigorously. "Leave it undated," he said. "We want to give
Halleck some discretion in sending it. It should be taken to Burnside first by a
high-ranking officer, then to McClellan in person only after Burnside says he
is willing to do his duty. I would not trust this to the telegraph; it may be that
McClellan will listen to the traitors around him and try to march his army to
take control of Washington."
Lincoln agreed, glad that Stanton had not tried to make an argument for
Chase's choice, General Hooker; Burnside seemed more solid than the flam-
boyant "Fighting Joe." Also, McClellan was a longtime friend of Burnside,
and that choice of a successor would be less likely to ignite an army coup.
Stanton gave Lincoln another suggestion: "Perhaps you should relieve Por-
ter in the same order and give his command to Hooker. If Burnside gets an
attack of modesty, Hooker and not Porter would be next in line to take
command, and we need somebody like Hooker to stop what the West Pointers
call 'a change of front to Washington.' And then I want to court-martial
Porter for not supporting Pope back at Bull Runthat will break the back of
the whole cabal."
Lincoln saw the wisdom in that and wrote it out: "That Major General
Fitz-John Porter be relieved from the command of the corps he now com-
mands in said Army; and that Major General Hooker take command of said
corps."
That was the sort of tough-minded response to the election needed to whip
the North into line. Lincoln knew it was not his usual way, of pushing others
out ahead of him and appearing to be led in their direction, but sometimes a
sharp blow needed a more forceful return blow.
Stanton said he would dispatch a general in his office to carry the secret
order to Burnside, and then to McClellan, putting a new man in command of
the 142,000 well-organized troops of the Army of the Potomac. "No one else
is to know," Stanton sternly adjured him, "no other member of the Cabinet,
Blair especially. This must not get out to McClellan through any source but
the general I send to him."
Lincoln pledged absolute secrecy; it would be hard playing shut-pan with
Old Man Blair, who was coming to see him that night at the Soldiers' Home,
but it was clearly necessary.
"We'll have to inform Chase," Stanton said, adding with what struck Lin-
coln as an unfortunate note of vindictiveness: "Chase has an officer who will
make sure we get the right verdict in the court-martial of Porter."
Lincoln was fairly sure that the only way to overcome electoral defeat
and a loss of thirty-two seats in the 179-man House was surely a defeatwas
a show of renewed authority, followed by military victory. The place would
be the gateway to Richmond, perhaps in the vicinity of Fredericksburg, and
the man of the hour would be Ambrose Burnside.

CHAPTER 18
1
PLAYING SHUT-PAN
Francis Preston Blair drove his carriage the short distance from his Silver
Spring home to the Soldiers' Home, where the President was staying. Lin-
coln, sitting on the porch in the crisp early winter evening, seemed curiously
relaxed for a man whose party has just been trounced in an election. He
congratulated Blair on his son's victory amidst the general Republican deba-
cle in the House, and allowed as how the election result was largely caused by
the absence of good Republicans who were away from home fighting the war,
and the baneful effect of the newspapers.
The Old Man did not argue. Above all, he was determined not to become
an I-told-you-so on the effect of emancipation in New York, where Greeley
now looked the fool and Weed and Seward the wizards. Presidents, he knew,
did not welcome advisers to tell them why they had been wrong. At times like
these, presidents needed sympathetic listeners to the lame excuses, and men
who could offer sensible advice as to what to do next to ameliorate the losses.
"I would like to make the case for retaining McClellan," he said at the
appropriate moment. "Monty tells me you're on the verge."
"I have tried long enough," Lincoln replied, "to bore with an auger too
dull to take hold."
"A certain torpidity of McClellan's must be infuriating at times," Blair
admitted, rolling with the President's evident distaste toward the com-
mander, "but consider the difficulty, as I am sure you must have, of finding
any other general capable of wielding so great a force and so complicated a
machine."
"He has got the slows, Mr. Blair."
"You're right. That is why it would be important to send some common
friend of yours and his to reach an explicit understanding with him. Tell him
what the President expected him to do and when, and tell him that absolute
and prompt obedience was the tenure by which alone he held his command."
Lincoln looked at the night sky. It seemed to Blair that the President felt
his talks with McClellan at Antietam obviated the need for an intermediary.
Those talks had produced merely a six-week delay, at a time Lincoln needed a
pre-election military victory.
"I'm not qualified to make the military argument," said Blair, he hoped
disarmingly. "Maybe it took too long, but he's now across the Potomac,
aggressively seeking out the enemy. He surely has a plan to divide the forces
of Lee and Jackson and defeat them in detail, but I understand he has been
unwilling to share that plan with you. That should be rectified right away."
"You're giving the military argument," Lincoln reminded him.
"Let's talk politics, then. What would be the political result of your super-
seding McClellan? You would be seen as yielding once more to the ultras in
our party, and acting in defiance of the majority that just spoke in the elec-
tion. That would weaken you at a time you cannot afford to be weakened."
"No doubt the bottom is out of the tub," the President said.
"If, on the contrary," the Old Man continued, "McClellan could be pushed
hard now, on the line he has taken, and compelled to make a vigorous winter
campaign, what political effect would that have?"
, The President just listened. Blair took that uncharacteristic response to
mean that Stanton and Chase had persuaded him to get even with the voters
by ridding himself of McClellan. Why? It was illogical, on the basis of the
facts in hand; the Old Man sensed that there must be another element in all
this of which the Biairs were in the dark. Ever since midsumme.", when
Lincoln returned from his meeting with the general at Harrison's Landing,
the Blair espousal of McClellan's cause had been met with a certain numb-
ness. Had the general said anything insubordinate or overtly political?
"Consider for a moment what your strong support of McClellan would
mean," he went on, squinting at the expressionless face of the President. "The
Democrats in the Congress, who are in heart on the side of oligarchy and the
South, would be compelled to make war on McClellan. In turn, McClellan
would be compelled to take sides with you, bringing to your support in the
Congress the real War Democrats."
"Interesting theory, Mr. Blair."
The former adviser to Jackson warmed to his theme. "After that, those
trying to resuscitate the Democratic Party to carry the presidency in 1864
would necessarily take an anti-McClellan man for their candidate. That
would split the Democrats and enable you to win again."
"And if, as a general, McClellan fails?"
"He fails as a Democrat and the Democrats fail with him. At least your
cause would best be served by retaining him until he failedand I do not
believe he would, given a new impetus."
The President slowly shook his head. Blair, losing him, tried one last time:
"If you replace him now, on the very eve of battle, and his replacement fails,
then the Democrats will unite behind a formidable ticket in sixty-four: Mc-
Clellan and Seymour. That could beat you, and everything we all stand for."
Lincoln seemed on the brink of confiding something, then held back. He
rose, stretched his arms, and closed the discussion with, "I'm sorry to play
shut-pan with you."
Let Lincoln keep his own counsel; it would not be the first time that
advisers who had been all too accurate in their dire predictions were snubbed
by a President stung by the consequences of not listening to good advice. On
his way back to Silver Spring, the elder Blair focused on his goal: the best
route for his youngest son to the vice-presidential nomination in two or six
yearsas either Republican or Democrat. A partnership with Lincoln would
be best. If that did not work out, there was always the possibility of an
alliance with Horatio Seymour.

CHAPTER 19
BLOODLESS WATERLOO
"Pinkerton reports a special train from Washington arrived at Rectortown a
couple of hours ago," Colonel Thomas Key told McClellan abruptly, "with
Stanton's aide, General Buckingham."
"Secure the flap," McClellan said, motioning toward the tent entrance,
"the snow is coming in."               ,
Key moved to the entrance, but backed away as Captain Custer struggled
in out of the storm.
"Buckingham is not coming here," Custer added to Key's report. "He's
ridden to Bumside's headquarters at Salem, about five miles from here."
"That's worrisome," Key told McClellan. "If Stanton is dealing directly
with your corps commanders, it could mean a change of command is in the
works."
McClellan nodded understanding. "Judge, I have been told about your
young nephew's gallant death at Perryville. I've written to your brother
John"he interjected sadly"the former Major Key. He must be doubly
crushed."
Key took off his greatcoat before answering and moved near the stove for
warmth. McClellan noted his pallor, and the film of sweat on his face; he was
ill, perhaps the typhus, picked upjust after the fighting at Antietam. "Sixteen,
the boy was," Key replied. "Picked up a regimental flag and led a charge. I
suppose that balances the family disgrace."
"Mightn't that change the President's mind?"
Key said with sadness that his brother's appeal, notwithstanding the death
of the boy, had been turned down. Evidently, to President Lincoln, a lesson
was a lesson: there could be no mercy in the setting of an example to the
military.
"I can imagine what they're conspiring in Burnside's tent," said Custer,
getting to the central issue. "But the army won't stand for it."
"Don't talk that way, Captain," Key snapped. "The Secretary of War has
the right to send an aide to see any commander in the army. It's no conspir-
acy."
"Stanton is doing his best to sacrifice this army again," Custer replied
hotly. "For God's sake, Colonel, just one week ago, Lincoln telegraphed how
pleased he was with the movement of this army. Why is Stanton sending
messengers to talk to Burnside behind the general's back?"
"It could be that we haven't taken Washington into our confidence suffi-
ciently, General," Key said to McClellan.
"That isn't the problem," McClellan said. He felt at the peak of his powers
more sure of himself, satisfied with his line of supply from Harpers Ferry,
no complaints about needed reinforcementsand confident, after Antietam,
that he could defeat Lee again. He had won two in a row, counting the last
battle on the Peninsula. He knew how to take advantage of Lee's rashness
and over-reliance on Jackson.
"Halleck certainly knows how I intend to interpose my army between
Longstreet and Jackson," he explained. "Mr. Lincoln may not agree with my
strategy, but he surely knows what it is."
"Lincoln needed a military victory so he could win a political victory," said
Custer flatly and, McClellan thought, accurately. "Simple as that."
"Just as we think the President wanted us to speed up the battle to take
place before the elections," Key said carefully, "the radicals think we have
been waiting until after Election Day to launch our offensive."
The general found some truth in that suspicion, too; it was easy to sit in
Washington and order a tired and bloodied army of 140,000 men, short of
shoes, to march immediately. Experienced generals knew that it took at least
sixty days to reprovision and reorganize between major engagements.
"You don't understand," said Custer urgently. "They're planning to court-
martial us all. The black Republicans cannot admit that their darling Pope
lost at Second Bull Run, and that the man they hate won at Antietati. They
have to prove that Pope's loss was our fault, and blacken our names forever.
They'll court-martial McClellan, Porter, you, meeverybody who isn't a
damned abolitionist."
Key's shudder told McClellan there was something in what Armstrong
Custer was saying: rumors were rife of a court-martial board aimed at Mc-
Clellan, Fitz-John Porter, and other unnamed "West Pointers" unsympa-
thetic to abolition. Lincoln's personal cashiering of Key's brother John was a
deliberate signal; now that the elections were over, and the radical defeat
blamed on McClellan's "inactivity," Wade and the rest would be going after
the scalps of all those at the top of the Army of the Potomac.
But Bumside was exempt, as was Hooker, both outspoken abolitionists.
The charge of treason would probably be leveled at McClellan, surely at
Porter, and perhaps others who had failed to get Pope out of his scrape. Small
wonder, the general thought, that the reaction of a portion of the officer corps
to the beheading of McClellan's army would be to demand that McClellan
march on Washington. If the officers were to be denounced as traitors any-
way, why notas Patrick Henry once put itmake the most of it?
"Lincoln and Stanton and Halleck have fought you every step of the way,"
Custer was pressing on. "At the Peninsula, when reinforcements would have
enabled you to take Richmond from the rear, they brought McDowell's forty
thousand men back to sit in Washington to guard the Mansion."
The general nodded. "In the end, whoever is in command will have to
follow my plan," he predicted calmly. "From Games' Mill, Cold Harbor, the
Federal forces will have to move to the James River to make Richmond
untenable."
"Then they abandoned the only way to take Richmond," Custer said, "and
put their favorite abolitionist, Pope, in charge of a doomed campaign. And in
that disaster, not only do they blame you for not coming to his rescue but, by
God, Lincoln was willing to surrender Washington rather than give the com-
mand back to you!"
"Stanton, Chase, and Halleck," McClellan corrected him. "Not Lincoln.
Be fair."
"Halleck was wrong every step of the way toward Antietam," Custer went
on. "I have all the telegrams warning you against following Lee north into
Maryland. If you had listened to that nonsense, Lee would be in New York
today. You were the only one who could organize this army, and the only one
who saw where it had to move to stop Lee from defeating the North. Lincoln
and his crowd were all wrong, first to last. Now they want to disgrace and
maybe hang you, take the army into battle with a damned incompetent who
couldn't get his men across a bridge at Antietam all day longand all be-
cause the damned politicians want to be sure you don't emerge the hero of the
war!"
"Take care not to talk treason," warned Key, mindful of his brother's fate.
"You know as well as I do what Stanton said to the radical senators,"
Custer shot back. "He said, It is not on our books that McClellan shall take
Richmond.' I say that is the real treason. General, the radicals hate you and
they fear you, and they are willing to sacrifice this army rather than see it
victorious under you."
McClellan looked to his older aide, a man of the law and a good Democrat,
albeit an abolitionist, to counter Ouster's passion.
"Armstrong, we do not know what message it is that General Buckingham
bears, if any," said Colonel Key. "We also know that General Bumside, who
may be irritated at the moment because of our criticism of his inaction at
Antietam, knows his limitations."
"That's fair to say," judged McClellan. "He turned down the command
before, when they gave it to Pope. Burn knows better than anybody that he
cannot command the entire army in the field."
"He'll follow political orders," disagreed Custer, "and take the Army of
the Potomac to bloody disaster."
"Let's hope Bumside asks Buckingham for a delay," said Key, speaking his
hopes. "We only need a few days, then we'll be out of telegraphic contact with
Washington and into battle."
"We'll see," McClellan said. "I don't have to make any decision yet."
"General," Custer pleaded, "this army loves you. You have a responsibility
to save tens of thousands of these brave men from certain death. Do not
submit to an order that history will condemn as the most brazen injustice
ever motivated by politics. Lead us, Generalthe Army of the Potomac will
follow you."
McClellan studied the pen he had been using to write to his wife. The post-
election dismissal of a general on the eve of battleespecially a general loved
by the troops, to be replaced by one distrusted by the troopswould send a
wave of anger through every corps and regiment. The army knew it was
ready to fight, and about to fight, and the injustice, not to say the danger, of
firing a commander on the pretext of not being ready or about to fight would
profoundly affect the main body of troops. All it would take would be one
moment of anger, and in twenty-four hours the coup d'6tat would be accom-
plished.
"History does not remember Cromwell kindly," Key said.
"It remembers Caesar kindly enough," countered Custer.
"This is the United States of America, a republic," Key said. "For nearly a
century we have abided by a constitution, as no other nation in history ever
has. General, do you want to be the man remembered as the one who shat-
tered that tradition of political stability?" When McClellan remained impas-
sive, Key put in a practical point: "Besides, Lincoln will never get Burn to
agree to replace you."
The general, ever the tactician, smiled ruefully: "Unless he threatens to
appoint Hooker instead. Burn couldn't stand that."
"I am unfit for the command," Bumside told Stanton's messenger unequiv-
ocally. "Do you have any idea what it is like to try to figure out what Bobby
Lee and Thomas Jackson are about to do? And then to be responsible for the
lives of thousands of men who trust your judgment, when you do not trust it
yourself?"
In Ambrose Bumside's tent, snow swirling outside, Brigadier General
Catharinus Putnam Buckingham began what he knew to be the only impor-
tant military mission of his life: to persuade the man Lincoln had chosen to be
commander of the Army of the Potomac to accept the assignment, clearing
the way for the relief of George McClellan.
"I taught a little topography at West Point thirty years ago," Buckingham
said. "Ever since, I've been a professor of mathematics at Kenyon College in
Ohio. Couple of years ago, I built a grain elevator; that's my only accomplish-
ment. I wear this star because Stanton thinks his adjutant should have one.
I'm not a military man, sir. I can't answer your question."
Burnside sighed. "What does Stanton expect me to do that McClellan
cannot do?"
"The Secretary of War has no confidence in McClellan's military ability."
"He's wrong. If he thinks I am a better general than McClellan, he's out of
his mind. Ask the officers, ask the men. Ask me."
"Moreover," Buckingham carried on, "he has grave doubts about McClel-
lan's patriotism and loyalty."
"Just as George doubts Stanton's, but that's a personal dispute between
two men. Surely President Lincoln does not subscribe to the Secretary's harsh
indictment of a loyal soldier's patriotism."
"The President doesn't take me into his confidence, General, but I know
this: Mr. Lincoln has said that if McCleHan permitted Lee to slip away, he
would fire him."
"What the hell does that mean?"
"I was hoping you'd know."
"But that's nonsense."
Buckingham biinked. It seemed to make sense to most of those who heard
it.
"Don't tell the President I said this," Burnside reasoned, "but that cannot
be the reason he wants to remove McClellan. General Lee is not a fool. He is
not going to let any Union army get behind him to attack Richmond. There
has never been any chance of thatnot right after Antietam, not now. Every
time McClellan moves South to threaten Lee's communications, Lee retreats
South. Pete Longstreet just isn't the sort to let us run around behind him. To
think that is justsilly. Is that what Stanton expects the commander to do?"
"No," Buckingham said hastily. "Not nowthat chance to stop Lee's
escape has passed. Lincoln and Halleck have a plan to drive Lee down to the
Rappahannock, cross on pontoon bridges, and strike him near Fredericks-
burg."
"McClellan has a better plan," said Burnside. "To catch Lee much sooner,
near Gordonsville, with Jackson the other side of the Blue Ridge."
"Lincoln's plan would offer more protection to Washington," the mathe-
matics professor said, "I think. But General, I cannot really argue strategy. I
must know if you are willing to do your duty and accept command."
"I have always done my duty. Sometimes duty demands that you inform
your superiors of a mistake."
"But you don't understand, Burnsideunless I have your agreement, I
cannot deliver the order to McClellan relieving him of command."
"Why not?"
Buckingham decided that Burnside might just be as thick as he made
himself out to be. "Because if we do not have a man immediately in place
when we dismiss him, McClellan might just take the army to Washington
tomorrow and proclaim himself dictator. That's why."
Burnside thought that over. "Lincoln complains that McClellan has the
slows. And yet we are now on the eve of battle, if McClellan stays. If I were
to take over, I would need at least a month to organize staff, to get into
position. More likely six weeks before any major engagement."
"The President and the Secretary are aware of that. You won't be rushed."
Burnside frowned, stroking his strange whiskers. "Then delay is not Lin-
coln's reason either, is it?"
Buckingham was on the verge of giving up. He played his last card. "My
orders, General, are first to obtain your agreement, and secondly, with you at
my side, present General McClellan with his dismissal. But if you fail to
accept your responsibility, my orders are to proceed to General Hooker and
make the same arrangement with him. I am told he is sufficiently recovered
from his wound to take command."
Burnside snorted. "Some 'wound'! If Joe Hooker had had the courage to
stay and fight at Antietam, I would have carried that bridge early in the day
apd Lee would have been routed and the war over. Hooker's appointment
would be a disaster."
"In effect, you are ceding the command to him."
Buckingham let Burnside agonize in silence. Finally Burnside said, "My
appointment is merely a mistake. Hooker's would be a catastrophe." He
sighed. "Let's go and tell George."
A half hour before midnight, as he was writing to his wife, McClellan
heard a tap on the tent pole. He called out for whoever it was to enter, and
was not surprised to see Burnside and Halleck's adjutant, the mathematics
teacher.
He greeted them cordially, ignoring the solemn looks on both faces, and
engaged them in conversation to show his lack of concern at their mission.
"I think we had better tell General McClellan the object of our visit,"
Buckingham told Burnside, who nodded glumly.
Stanton's adjutant handed over the orders signed by Halleck: "General: On
receipt of the order of the President, sent herewith, you will immediately turn
over your command to Maj. Gen. Burnside, and repair to Trenton, N. J.,
reporting on your arrival at that place, by telegraph, for further orders."
McClellan saw that both men, especially Buckingham, were watching him
most intently as he read the order and the attachment making the removal
official. The mathematics teacher in a general's uniform from Stanton's office
surely knew McClellan had the power to reject the order, to protect himself
and his leading officers from courts-martial and possible execution, and to
make himself commander in chief. Poor Burn was probably hoping McClel-
lan would do just that, saving him from the terrible choice of taking un-
wanted command or handing this fine army over to Hooker.
McClellan knew what he had to do because he had no doubt about what he
was: an officer of the United States Army and a loyal American citizen. He
handed the papers to his unhappy and fearful friend with a brief, "Well,
Burnside, I turn the command over to you."
He said it as if no other course were thinkable; George McClellan hoped
that never again would a military officer of the United States be faced with
the temptation presented to him that night.
Buckingham closed his eyes and took a deep breath, as if the other course
had been narrowly averted. Stanton had probably poisoned the man's mind,
McClellan assumed, causing him to expect a loyal soldier to turn traitor and
usurper.
"I will leave in the morning, Burn. You have been as near as possible to me
on this march, and I have kept you closely informed on the condition of
affairs. You ought to be able to take the reins in your hands without a day's
delay."
McClellan had planned for this eventuality, assuming that Lincoln would
turn to Burnside, who was acceptable to the radicals, rather than to the
respected Fitz-John Porter, the only general other than himself capable of
facing Lee. He wondered which of them would face court-martial, Porter or
himself, or both. The trial of George McClellan would certainly be dramatic,
but perhaps too divisive; the radicals would probably go after Fitz instead.
He had hoped for more from Lincoln, especially after that last message of
encouragement. Surely the President knew the next battle would be decisive,
and it was less than a week away. Had he shown the commander in chief the
proper respect? On mature reflection, he had to admit not always, certainly
not in the beginning. But now that McClellan was showing his willingness to
work in tandem with the civilian side, his service was rejected. He could see
an irony in that, a belated justice that became injustice.
"I beseech you," Burnside said, "stay a few days, settle the officers down. I
need you to transfer their loyalty over to me, as much as possible."
"To stay a revolt," Buckingham put it plainly.
Poor Burn; again, McClellan would have to try to save him, at least loni
enough to stumble into an engagement planned by Lincoln himself. Stayin.
on as the replaced commander would be painfully demeaning, but McClellai
would do his duty. He consented. His two visitors shouldered their way out o
the tent into the driving snow.
He took up his pen and continued the one comfort of his life in the field, i
letter to Nellie. "Another interruption, this time more important. It was ii
the shape of Bumside, accompanied by Gen. Buckingham. They brough
with them the order relieving me from the command of the Army of thi
Potomac. No cause is given.
"Alas for my poor country! I know in my inmost heart she never had i
truer servant. Do not be at all worried, my dear Nellie1 am not. I havi
done the best I could for my country; to the last I have done my duty as
understand it. That I must have made many mistakes, I cannot deny. I do no
see any great blunders, but no one can judge of himself. Our consolation mus
be that we have tried to do what is right."
What would have been wrong was to seize the presidency. What he ha(
come to see was right was to challenge Lincoln legitimately, in two years
time, as the candidate of the Democratic Party.

CHAPTER 20
IN JACKSON'S CHAIR
Darkness fell early in late November and Lincoln nodded gratefully to Wil-
liam for lighting the gas lamp on his desk. Hill Lamon was running a political
errand; Nicolay and Hay had gone to eat at Willard's.
William asked if he would be taking dinner at his desk and he nodded; Mrs.
Lincoln was in New York on one of her shopping trips. Angry at him for
refusing to appoint one of her most unworthy favorites to an undeserved
position, for three days before she left for Boston and New York she had
refused to sleep in the room next to his. These petulant moods of hers came
and went.
Stoddard, the third secretary, came in with a couple of pins to put in the
map on the table. The pins with blue sealing wax on their heads signified
Union battalions. After both William and Stod left, Lincoln rose from his
desk chair, studied the map, and was pleased to see that Burnside was moving
south toward Fredericksburg where the Union troops could fall upon Lee's
<army.
Burnside, though not one to inspire confidence, at least did what he was
told. A year ago, Lincoln had been intimidated by the general officers, partic-
ularly the West Pointers, persuaded by his ignorance of military maneuver to
rely on them for decisions in the war. Now he felt that he knew as much as
any of them, and Hallecka first-rate clerk and nothing moreWould serve
to reassure the public that well-trained military minds were in charge. But he
had concluded that military men never understood the political dimensions of
military strategy. Sometimes action or just activity, even if premature in
purely military terms, was needed to enable the government to spur the peo-
ple to raise troops and money. Ambrose Burnside might cavil at a point of
tactics here and there, but he showed a refreshing humility when it came to
sharing plans and carrying out orders.
Rocking back and forth in his shoes, looking at the pins in the map, Lin-
coln was glad he had not been forced to choose Hooker to replace McClellan.
Too rash, just as George was too cautious. Had he been wise to relieve the
Young Napoleon on the eve of battle, after he had finally begun to move on
Lee's army? Lincoln thought that over again and decided he had been right.
With the elections over, the Peace Democrats who had been using McClellan,
along with the West Point element that wished to settle the war, had to be
dealt with firmly. Besides, the radicals were desperate for an excuse for the
Republican election defeat, and McClellan's tendency to delay was as good a
reason as any.
Lincoln could not deny a personal affection for George, despite the man's
fits of arrogance. He felt a twinge of conscience when he recalled the way the
young general had stepped forward to defend the capital when Stanton and
the others were ready to evacuate, and the way the general had manfully
accepted his dismissal, showing none of the mutinous inclinations that Stan-
ton and the others had feared.
But McClellan's goal in this war was not Lincoln's goal, as the episode
with Major Key had demonstrated; moreover, the Collector of the Port of
New York, Hiram Bamey, Chase's man, had reported to him the discussions
McClellan had been holding with Barlow, the New York Democratic leader.
Barlow had told Bamey, and Bamey passed it along to Lincoln and Welles,
that General McClellan planned to pursue a policy line of his own, regardless
of the Administration's wishes and objects. Lincoln, remembering, shook his
head at such perfidy. Yes, the evidence was hearsay, but he believed it because
it was of a piece with the Harrison's Landing letter.
Perhaps if George had taken on Frank Blair as his chief of staff, as old
Francis Blair had wanted him to, communications between field headquarters
and the Executive Mansion would have been much improved; but no, Mc-
Clellan had seen that as an effort to put a Lincoln man in his tent, and had
rejected the idea. In retrospect, Lincoln assured himself, firing McClellan
after his organizational\usefulness had ended was inevitable; the Union could
not remain whole with a commander more inclined to peace than victory.
Grant, out West, had been a possibility as a replacement, but he had a way
of being away from his troops at critical moments, and the drinking was a
problem. Even Congressman Washburne, whose prot6ge Grant was, was now
having his doubts: Chase had come in with a letter from Washburne's
brother, a general in Grant's command, printing a disturbing picture of con-
ditions at Grant's headquarters. Not merely drinking and carousing, but
commercial corruption. Grant was a fighter, and Lincoln respected that, but
he could ill afford to take a chance with the most important command in the
nation. Bumside, whose only personal quirk was a pair of silly muttonchop
whiskers, offered the least risk.
Thinking of Chase reminded him of a worry. He went back to his desk,
reached in the drawer, and took out a new greenback. The signature of the
Treasurer looked real; that was the trouble, it looked too real. Did that not
suggest infinite possibilities of fraud and embezzlement? Lincoln had to sign
every commission of every assistant paymaster for it to be legal, and his hand
hurt from signing sometimes; he was aware, too, that all government bonds
were signed by hand by the Treasurer. That the paper currency seemed to be
so signed, but was instead engraved, troubled him. He would have to talk
with Chase about that in the morning.
Nor did he relish the likelihood that the Executive Mansion would be
accused of mismanagement of funds. "Honest Abe," he was called; he hated
the "Abe" but he intended to keep the "honest" part. He wished he could fire
Watt, the gardener, but Mother protected him fiercely; it was all Lincoln
could do to keep the stationery fund out of his hands. And he was the one she
had taken with her to New York.
He walked out of his office, through the anteroom that served as the office
of Nicolay and Hay, across the dark hallway to Stoddard's mailroom, hoping
to find the young writer from Springfield. Stod had lent a helpful hand in the
early political campaigns. He was a bit on the stuffy side, but was a fair writer
and a good listener; Lincoln liked to try out speeches and important letters on
him. Nicolay and Hay treated Stod like dirt, so Lincoln compensated from
time to time by taking him along at night to visit Seward across the park.
Nobody in the office. Lincoln turned up the gaslight and looked at the
mountain of mail on the deskmostly, he knew, from conservatives com-
plaining about his dismissal of McClellan or from radicals complaining about
his failure to dismiss Seward. "Billy Bowlegs" was the new target of the
radicals, Wade and Chandler stirring everyone up, Stanton and probably
Chase quietly encouraging them; to their taste, Seward was insufficiently abo-
litionist. To Lincoln's taste, his Secretary of State was just right on slavery,
and had supported a gradual approach from the start. The radicals, having
tasted blood on McClellan, were now lusting after Seward. Lincoln had been
prepared to toss them McClellan for his own reasons, but he was not about to
sacrifice the man he was most comfortable with in the Cabinet.
His gaze lit on Andy Jackson's chair. Placed near the fireplace in Stod's
room was that strange-looking chair, unlike any other item of furniture in the
Mansion. Designed for reclining, it sloped backward, the slender mahogany
frame held together by finely tooled leather. The Mexican-made chair had
been in the Mansion since it had been sent to President Jackson; Mother
didn't like the looks of it, and Lincoln preferred his cushioned couch, so the
historic chair had found its way into the third secretary's office. Lincoln
decided to try it out. He sat his long frame in it, gingerly at first, and found to
his surprise that it accommodated him nicely.
Perfect for contemplating the ceiling, the Mexican recliner was conducive
to rumination. Wiggling himself comfortable, Lincoln concluded that An-
drew Jackson must have used it rarely. Jackson, a military man of action, had
known how to enlarge his powers to fit his responsibilities; that could have
had much to do with the fact that he was the last American President to have
been reelected. Strange that he should understand Jackson's needs now; for so
many years, as a Whig, Lincoln like his political allies had denounced the
monarchic hunger of "King Andrew the First."
"Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud?" he said aloud into the
silence, stretching out as far as he could and preparing to recite the entire
poem. Then he changed his mind: the lines that came to him were from
Shakespeare's Richard II, and he closed his eyes to visualize the monarch's
cry of despair:
"For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground
And tell sad stories of the death of kings:
How some have been depos'd, some slain in war . . ."
Lincoln groped for the next lines, could not remember them, and skipped
ahead:
"All murder'd: for within the hollow crown
That rounds the mortal temples of a king
Keeps Death his court, and there the antick sits,
Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp;
Allowing him a breath, a little scene,
To monarchize, be fear'd, and kill with looks,
Infusing him with self and vain conceit
As if this flesh which walls about our life
Were brass impregnable; and humor'd thus
Comes at the last, and with a little pin
Bores through his castle wall, and farewell king!"
Lincoln's fingers held the imaginary pin and twisted it through the castle
wall to dispatch the king. That reminded him of the blue-headed pins on the
map in his office; he frowned, breathed deeply, and allowed himself to feel
guilty about avoiding work on his second message to Congress. He had to
write his portion of that in the next week.
He would give the border states one last chance to join with the Democrats
and conservative Republicans in preventing the drastic action contemplated
in the proclamation of emancipation. The more he thought of it, the more
that proclamationto take effect five weeks from now unless the South re-
lentedseemed not merely radical, but revolutionary. The Biairs and Weed
had been right about the voters' reaction to an act that Lincoln knew was so
clearly unconstitutional. He had struck back hard at that reaction, cleaning
out the army and letting Stanton go to work on the disunionists in the North;
now, having demonstrated his willingness to use the stick, perhaps it was time
for the carrot.
He had little doubt that once carried out on January I, the edict of emanci-
pation would make impossible any negotiated settlement of the war. Jeffy D.
would see that as the final challenge to the South, the political lunge for the
jugular when the North's military campaign was not succeeding. But having
issued the threat, could he now not offer a stay of its execution? There was no
magic in the date of January 1, 1863; the date of final emancipation might just
as well be January 1, 1900, provided everyone agreed the day of slavery's
demise would surely come. He thought it only fair that the large portion of
the body politic that was not represented by the radical Republicans had a
final opportunity to embrace gradual, compensated emancipation.
Jackson's chair was growing uncomfortable but he did not want to change
position while a new approach was forming in his mind. The only way to
make abolition constitutional was by amending the Constitution.
The amendment he had in mind would put off the abolishment of slavery
until the year 1900, which would mitigate the opposition of those who held
slaves today. It would provide just compensation, with a bond issue to finance
the purchase of freedom. And it would provide for voluntary deportation in
congenial climes when new homes could be found for negroes in lands of their
own blood and race. What could be more reasonable? If the Congress or the
states in rebellion wanted to stop his emancipation edict set to come on
January first, all they had to do was to adopt the amendment and then
appropriate the money to buy up and manumit all slaves by the start of the
next century.
He had worked out the figures: Since the revolution, the nation had been
growing at the rate of 35 percent every ten years. By 1930, if the present trend
of growing by one third every ten years continued, that American family
would be over 250,000,000 peoplegreater than that of Europe, provided the
nation did not split up or otherwise inhibit the natural growth of its popula-
tion.
Nobody could say he had failed to try. The case, thus put, was new; per-
haps the Congress, too long held in thrall by the slavery issue, could be made
to see that it had to think anew and act anew. In giving freedom to the slave
four decades hence, the amendment would assure freedom to the free in the
meantime and after. By paying hard cash for every slave, it would not offend
the Founders' compromise; by encouraging the freedmen to emigrate, it
would not upset white workers.
Lincoln would have no trouble with the peroration of such a message: it
should exhort the Congress to nobly save the last best hope of earth, lest
inaction cause the Congress to meanly lose it. That thought could be put
more positively.
He asked himself, as a practical politician: would the amendment idea be
accepted or rejected by the Congress? As matters stood now, probably the
radicals would holier that he had sold them out and the conservatives would
still not seize their last chance, and the proposal would fail. But his con-
science would be clearer in usurping property rights on the first of January
and more to the point, if Bumside was able to whip Lee's army at Fredericks-
burg, his amendment would suddenly look much more attractive to the states
in rebellion, and the loyal slave states too.
With another Union military victory, and the path to Richmond opened,
little "military necessity" for unconstitutional emancipation would exist. In-
stead, a political necessity might well be created to reunite North and South
under terms that would guarantee the abolishment of slavery, but by constitu-
tional means and not until the next generation. Lincoln resolved to meet with
General Bumside at Aquia Creek, near his headquarters, at dark tomorrow
night. Nothing was more urgent than a triumph at Fredericksburg soon. He
would go over every detail with the man; the army would have everything it
needed this time.
Lincoln was pleased with his amendment alternative; it was a way to re-
state his central idea of majority rule, with a practical and absolutely consti-
tutional solution to the matter that was more on the minds of the people. He
slid down even farther in the Jackson chairbetter for his back but his feet
overhung the end. The chair, he decided, was better left here in Stod's office
than moved to his own.
He saw the occasion to be piled high with difficulty. But it was surely as
difficult for the Southern leaders, now faced with squabbling within the Con-
federate states as Georgia resisted the dictates of Richmond. Was he doing all
he could to make it easier for voices of reason and reunion to be heard down
there? The finality of his promised January I edict troubled him as that date
approached all too quickly. He did not want to give at least half the North
cause to criticize him for closing the door to peace: in New York, for example,
Fernando Wood was passing the word that only an amnesty from Lincoln was
needed to enable Southern leaders to return to the next session of the Con-
gress. Did Mayor Wood and Governor-elect Seymour have any secret contact
with like-minded men in the South, or were they making mischief?
Lincoln turned his shoes overhanging the chair inward and outward, as he
could do without pain since his corns had been miraculously attended to.
Zacharie. The Israelite had family in the South, had volunteered to make
contact with Southern leaders, and pointed out that Judah Benjamin was a
co-religionist. Lincoln knew that General Nat Banks wanted the Israelite
along in New Orleans when he relieved Ben Butler, to help with the unofficial
gold exchange. It might seem slightly ludicrous to send Dr. Zacharie south to
attend to the feet of the Union Army, and while he was at it, to see if the
rumors about Southern interest in amnesty had any foundationbut it would
do no harm. Certainly the corncutter would arouse no suspicion and his real
purpose could readily be denied, even laughed off.
Generals Grant and Sherman, Lincoln was aware, believed fiercely that
Jewish peddlers in their command were a cause of the army's corruption, and
the President had heard that there was an unofficial ban on admitting any
more Israelites to the area, but that would not apply to anyone with a pass
from him. He strongly doubted that the men in Richmond would be ready to
talk peace until Bumside was at the gates and Lee whipped, but he wanted to
be sure.
Lincoln pulled himself out of Jackson's chair to return to his office and
write out a pass. But more important than sending an unlikely agent on what
was likely to be a wild-goose chase, it was time for him to get started on the
draft amendment in the message to Congress. The beliefs of the past were
inadequate to the present, he would exhort them; rewriting in his head, as he
walked back through the dark hall to his office, he added "quiet" to the past
and "stormy" to the present, for the emphasis of contrast. And "beliefs" did
not have the negative connotation he sought; "dogmas" was the word.
CHAPTER 21
JEPHTHA'S DAUGHTER
A man Chase recognized as Lincoln's bodyguard, Marshal Lamon, showed
up at the do8r df.the house at Sixth and E before breakfast.
"The President is worried about the integrity of our financial system," the
broad-shouldered Westerner told the Treasury Secretary. "He wants you to
come as soon as you can."
Chase looked hard at the man. His portion of the annual message was not
due until the next day. Was Lincoln trying something to make him look
dishonest? Had anyone been poisoning the President's mind about the deal-
ings with Jay Cooke? "I'll be in to see him before the Cabinet meeting."
"Sooner would be better," Lamon replied. "Right now would be best."
Chase turned to Kate, who appeared behind him. "The imperial sum-
mons."
"If Mr. Lincoln is so worried," she asked Lamon coldly, "why didn't he
come over with you this morning?"
That irritating thought had crossed Chase's mind too; when Lincoln
wanted to see Seward, the President did not send for him; rather, he strolled
across Lafayette Square to the Secretary of State's house. Seward was ever-
more Lincoln's eminence grise; now that McClellan had been driven from the
scene, the man who next needed removal was the Secretary of State.
"I'm sure the President knows I'm always available to him," Chase said
through his daughter to Lamon. With a twinge of conscience troubling him,
Chase did not want to appear to stand on ceremony; perhaps Lamon, who
was as much crony and confidant to Lincoln as bodyguard, knew what the
President had on his mind. On the ride over, Chase could frame the answers
about Cooke's exclusive and lucrative representation of the Treasury in the
sale of its notes.
Climbing into the carriage, Chase asked, "What's bothering the Presi-
dent?"
"The greenback currency. Up to last night, he thought that Spinner was
signing each bill himself,"
Chase rode to the Mansion in silence, relieved that the integrity being
questioned was the system's and not his own. Surely Lincoln could not be so
naive as to think that old Spinner signed every single greenback issued; that
was the way it had been done at the start, and the poor fellow had found
himself scribbling his signature twenty hours a day. Engraving the signature
was the only way to keep up production. Lincoln must know that; what was
really going through his suspicious mind?
At the entrance to the Mansion, Lamon reined in the horse and tui.aed the
reins over to the black man at the door, offering Chase a hand down from the
carriage. The Treasury Secretary declined the help.
"Chase, there are not sufficient safeguards to afford any degree of safety in
the money-making department," Lincoln said at once, no offer of coffee or
anything.
The President expressed his worry that some unscrupulous operators could
run off thousands of greenbacks and no one would be the wiser until the day
of redemption, when a huge fraud would be discovered and his administra-
tion would be covered with shame.
Chase tried to reason with him. "In the nature of things," he told the
nervous Lincoln, "somebody must be trusted in this emergency. You have
entrusted me, and I have entrusted Francis Spinner, the Treasurer, with un-
told millions. When he was a Congressman, they called him 'the watchdog of
the Treasury.' We have to trust our subordinates."
The President was not in a trusting mood. He wanted to know exactly how
Chase was protecting the public from the counterfeit printing of millions in
excess greenbacks. As Lincoln's words waxed warmer, Chase began to won-
der about his own lack of concern; could Lincoln be onto something? Who
was actually counting the money that was being printed?
"It strikes me that this thing is all wrong, and dangerous." Lincoln had
never before taken such an interest in the Treasury operations. "I and the
country know you and Mr. Spinner, but we don't know your subordinates'
who have the power to bankrupt the government in an hour."
Chase was nonplussed; he had gone along with the idea of greenbacks at
Lincoln's urging. Indeed, when he had expressed his reservations on constitu-
tional grounds, the President had told him that he was prepared to violate the
Constitution to save the Union. The idea of paper money had worked, amaz-
ingly so; public trust was such that the paper was treated like real money, and
was in effect a huge, interest-free loan from the people to the government.
"Spinner has been hiring women," Chase blurted, so that he could not be
accused later of concealing anything of moment from the President.
"As employees of the government?" Lamon was surprised.
"They're very good at counting money," Chase explained. "Nimble fingers,
good on the close detail work, and they never miss a day's work. I am
prepared to take whatever criticism the policy causes." Chase was well aware
that the potential for scandal existed when men and women were placed in
close proximity, with the advancement of the women employees in the hands
of male supervisors, but skilled money counters were in short supply. Now
the unprecedented employment of women was Lincoln's problem as much as
his.
"Perhaps we can protect ourselves by involving the Congress," Marshal
Lamon offered. Lincoln nodded, and urged Chase to talk it over with his
friends in the Senate.
"Yes, in particular Senator Sprague," Chase suggested. "Very sound on
this. And he can keep financial matters to himself, which we need." He added
a warning about the matter that had originally triggered the President's con-
cern: "Not a word of your worries about the engraving of signatures on
greenbacks, Lincoln, must get to the public. Jay Cooke and I have enough
trouble maintaining confidence. Don't you start a run on the bank."
The President, with a pained last look at his own face on a greenback,
nodded agreement.
Chase took his leave and walked across the street to his Treasury office,
satisfied that Lincoln's fears could be handled, but worried about discovery of
his relationship with Cooke. He was also vulnerable to misunderstanding on
his dealings with Hiram Barney, Collector of the Port of New York. What if
Thurlow Weed and Seward, who resented the way Chase had snatched away
their New York patronage, found out and made a fuss in the newspapers? His
chance at replacing Lincoln on the Republican ticket in 1864 would be
ruined.
It was awkward for a man in his position, dealing in millions, to be person-
ally short of funds. Nor was the problem likely to disappear in years to come;
if anything, it would grow worse with the need to entertain potential dele-
gates and keep up appearances. And every time the President sent Lamon
over on some silly worry, Chase knew his own too-sensitive conscience would
afflict him with the fear that somebody was impugning his integrity. That
thought depressed him further.
Kate was at the office when he arrived. He shook his head to the unasked
question, saying only, "Just some foolishness about Spinner's signature being
engraved on the paper. If Lincoln knows as little about military affairs as he
does about finance, the country is in worse trouble than I feared."
She closed the door to the office and faced her father across his desk. "I
suppose the time has come when we have to make some sacrifices."
"You've been very good, Kate, about making do with last year's ward-
robe," he began, and would have gone on in a fatherly way, but her grim look
told him she had more far-reaching sacrifices in mind.
"Bill Sprague and I had a quarrel last week," she said. "I didn't like the
way he was drinking, and making a mess all over himself in public. I told him
I wouldn't put up with it any more."
Chase winced, hoping his daughter had not pushed Sprague too far. His
support was absolutely essential to their plans. The Rhode Island Legislature
had accommodated its state's richest family by electing the former governor
and general to be senator; Sprague now had control of future convention
delegates, and his influence reached into Massachusetts. "I'm certain your
good advice will encourage him to reform. He adores you, as you know. He's
told me that often."
"He tells that to everybody when he's in his cups," Kate said sourly. "No,
he won't reform. He's a drunkard and always will be. Let's not fool ourselves
about the boy governor."
Chase's heart sunk; would she never see Sprague again? Would she throw
herself away on the effete Lord Lyons or the defeated Roscoe Conkling, or
indulge her desires with young Hay, or become scandalously involved with a
married man like Garfield? Sprague had his faults, but there were compensa-
tions, and his redemption from an unfortunate tendency toward a reliance on
John Barleycorn might be possible under the influence of a good woman.
Chase could not bring himself to say that. If Kate intended to put her
selfish interests ahead of their mutual dream, he would not try to dissuade
her. Any such suasion he judged to be morally wrong. He thought of the
biblical general Jephtha, who vowed if he won a victory to make -a burnt
offering of the first living thing that came through his door; to his horror, his
daughter and only child was first, and she expressed her love by willingly
becoming his sacrifice. NoChase told himself that Kate had her own life to
lead; he had hoped their ambitions were parallel, but the painful compromises
demanded by politics were better understood by those who had suffered as he
had.
"I am aware," he began, drawing a deep breath, "that you have been
brought up to enjoy the company of men of substance and temperance. Lord
Lyons. Senator Sumner"
"And Salmon Portland Chase, who has the strength of character never to
make a fool of himself. Father, you've spoiled me for men the likes of
Sprague."
He hardly knew what to say to that, except, "Perhaps you underestimate
him."
"Bill Sprague is impossible to underestimate. John Hay is quite righthe's
a small, insignificant youth who bought his place." She seated herself and
looked at her father levelly. "When would the announcement be most advan-
tageous?"
He had been looking at the portrait of Alexander Hamilton over the fire-
place, thinking of the cruel shortening of the first Treasury Secretary's career.
He did not quite comprehend the import of his daughter's question. "An-
nouncement?"
"My betrothal to Senator William Sprague of Rhode Island," Kate said,
seeming to test the words for a printed invitation, "savior of our nation's
capital in the early days of the rebellion, gallant general in command of his
state's fighting men, confidential adviser to the President and Treasury Secre-
tary on financial affairs, darling of the social salons of Washington, and well-
known drunkard."
"Kate, are you serious? If you are, you must not act in a spirit of hypocrisy.
Marriage is a sacred covenant before God"
"I am deadly serious, Father. Becoming President is a serious business, and
I am prepared to make the necessary sacrifices. And never, never speak to me
of hypocrisy."
He was torn between delight at her sensible decision and his dread of
sacrilege. After a moment, Chase was able to dismiss the latter as unworthily
judgmental; who was he to dismiss a long tradition of marriages of conve-
nience, which so often led to warm lifelong companionships, based as they
were on shared interests rather than youthful passion? His own first marriage,
to the unforgettable Katherine, had been a love match that had ended with
her death of childbed fever; his second wife was also the object of his love,
and died giving birth to Kate; but the third time he had been more prudent,
selecting a judge's daughter of strength and health and social background,
who served as a fine, if necessarily stern, stepmother for seventeen years
before her death. If Kate could show the maturity in her early twenties that it
had taken him much longer to attain, so much the better.
"I'm very proud of you, Katie. I know you will be happy."
"I'll be happy as the official hostess in the Executive mansion," she said
with what he felt was unnecessary calculation, "with the country in the hands
of President Chase."
He hoped his expression bore the proper humility. She drummed her fin-
gers on his desk. "The spring would be the best time. We have the household
money to hold out till then. Sprague's mother is a smart old lady, and she
likes me; I can talk to her about the finances of a big wedding without
involving you or the boy gov."
"I do not think that a proper sobriquet for your chosen husband-to-be,"
Chase said disapprovingly. "He is familiarly known as Bill. Or you could now
call him 'the senator.' And you should not go ahead with this with avarice in
your heart, Katie, I won't allow anything of"
"Don't tell me what should or should not be in my heart," she snapped.
"It's not love and it's not avarice. I don't need fancy clothes and expensive
furnishings, you know that. I want to amount to something, and I want you
to be all you should be."
He nodded, understanding that her decision was, if not based on love for
her prospective husband, at least rooted in love for her father. He reproved
himself for thinking her at first selfish and later calculating. She was a good
daughter and, he was certain, would make an excellent wife. He went around
the desk, assisted her to her feet, and embraced her with pride and tender-
ness. "You have my blessing, Katie."
She bugged him tightly for a moment, the way she had when she was small
and had fled from her stepmother, and then stepped back to look directly up
at him.
"I want more than a blessing, Father. I want a promise. I'll do my part."
"And I'll do mine," he said, hoping she would not become specific.
"You know what I expect," she said.
He knew exactly: no more letters to the office from Adele Douglas, no
more visits at home from Anna Carroll, no possibility of remarriage until
after the presidency, if then. The sacrifice was realprolonged celibacy
would be new to himand he could not avoid the feeling that her demand
was somehow unnatural. But her own sacrifice was at least as great, and the
thought of his dutiful and self-assured daughter as hostess in his White House
appealed to him. Kate would be far better received than Mary Lincoln.
"I hope always to live up to your expectations, Katie," he said, hoping she
would find a meaning in that beyond his words.
She kissed him lightly on the cheek and made ready to leave. She drew on a
vest espagnole, which he presumed to be the latest fashion since he had seen
Addie Douglas in one recently, and the black-embroidered Moresco cloak
brought down the week before by Jay Cooke. She had adorned her bonnet
with wood violets and ties of lilac ribbon. "Say nothing for the time being,
Father. I have some loose ends to tidy up. Perhaps you do too. Wait a week,
and then arrange for thefor Bill to be summoned to Washington."
As she left, it occurred to him that hers would be the most glittering
wedding that wartime Washington had yet seen. He began to think of a guest
list.  Which of their acquaintances would be most likely to determine the
delegates to the next Republican convention?
CHAPTER 22
JOHN HAY'S DIARY
DECEMBER 7, 1862
Dr. Zacharie, our favorite foot man, is back from a couple of months at Fort
Monroe, where he says he operated successfully on the feet of 5,000 of our
soldiersor 5,000 individual feet, I don't recall which. After uprooting these
vast cornfields, he has returned to Washington to check on the impedimenta
of the President.
I should not make sport of his profession because he brought both the
Prsdt and the SecState great relief. The Tycoon used to hobble about in the
King of Morocco's huge gift slippers because he could not stand shoes. No
more; thanks to his friend Isachar, with whom he has these extended conver-
sations after his treatments, the Prsdt bounds about as I have never seen
before.
The Israelite came into the office devastated that word of his ministrations
to the President had leaked. The Israelite assured us that the editorial in the
New York Herald last week was not of his doing, and was anxious lest the
notoriety impinge on his confidential relationship. Isachar did not know his
man. I had put the cutting on the Prsdt's desk, and he read portions aloud to
the somewhat uncomfortable foot surgeon with great glee.
"Says here, 'we have a cornucopia of information' about your activities,
Doctor," Lincoln grinned, reading on: " 'The President has been greatly
blamed for not resisting the demands of the radicals; but how could the
President put his foot down firmly when he was troubled with corns?' That's
pretty good. Says the bickermg in the Cabinet has beenhere'caused by
the honorable Secretaries inadvertently treading on each other's bunions un-
der the council board.' "
"Not a word of any of this came from me," Zacharie said, looking misera-
ble.
Lincoln positively cackled at the editorial. " 'No human being could be
expected to toe the mark under such circumstances, which originated not so
much with the head as with the feet of the nation.' " The Tycoon gave one of
his great hee-hee laughs, hardly able to finish with " 'Dr. Zacharie has shown
us precisely where the shoe pinches.' By jings, that's all right."
Zacharie perked up as it became clear that the Tycoon was amused and not
upset by the public notice of his corns. Foot doctors must be sensitive to the
way people poke fun at their profession, but Zacharie, I am sure, is torn
between fear of ridicule and desperation for recognition. Well, he has claim to
fame now. He is without doubt the most famous Jewish foot doctor in the
world.
I suspect the President is pleased with the publicity for another reason. He
intends to use the Israelite as an agent to get information from the South. The
corn cutting that all of us are so quick to mock has the virtue of removing all
suspicion from his clandestine activities.
"I see that you are sending General Banks to replace Butler in New Or-
leans," Zacharie said. Lincoln nodded; Banks had been a better governor of
Massachusetts than a general in the field against Stonewall Jackson, but Lin-
coln trusted Banks to manage our biggest Southern capture more honestly
than "the Beast."
Zacharie looked at me, wishing I were out of the room, I suppose, and said,
"I think the time is ripe for my mission." Since the Prsdt did not throw me
out, I looked at the ceiling, and Zacharie went on with his half-concealed
plans: "The sister of the gentleman in Richmond is in New Orleans now, and
in some distress. I should intercede on her behalf with the new Union com-
mander."
I presumed "the gentleman in Richmond" was Judah Benjamin, the rebel
Secretary of State and Zacharie's co-religionist. I doubt that we are planning
to get any military information out of Jeff Davis's Cabinet; could it be that
Mr. Lincoln has in mind a roundabout exploration of the peace rumors? He
wants to do something before January first.
"I'll need a personal letter from you to Banks," said Zacharie, "telling him
to take me to New Orleans with him."
Lincoln nodded. "While there is nothing in this which I shall dread to see
in history, it is, perhaps, better for the present that it should not become
public." That was putting it mildly. Zacharie could pass the word broadside
about his corn-curing prowess, but on checking into supposed peace probes,
the Tycoon expected great discretion.
"The pass," Zacharie reminded him. Lincoln went to his writing table and
wrote a note to General Banks. When he finished, he read it aloud to the two
of us: "Dr. Zacharie, who you know as well as I do, wishes to go with you on
your expedition. I think he might be of service, to you, first, in his peculiar
profession, and secondly, as a means of access to his countrymen, who are
quite numerous in some of the localities you will probably visit."
"There's the problem of the prohibition of my people," Zacharie put in.
"Grant and Shermanfine officers, don't misunderstand me, but they don't
want any Jews in their area. They blame us for all the trading with the enemy
not true, I assure you, and not fair, but such a feeling exists. We all know
it."
Lincoln was aware of Grant's policy to make it difficult for Israelites to
come near his command. The Prsdt did not want to involve himself in the
general's efforts to stem corruption, however, and as long as the anti-Israelite
policy was unwritten, and unapproved by the President, it posed no constitu-
tional difficulties.
He added in his note to Banks: "This is a permission merely, excepting his
case from a general prohibition which I understand to exist." That acknowl-
edgment of Grant's tacit prohibition may be putting too much in writing, but
no other way presented itself.
"My desire is to serve you," Zacharie said, picking up the pass, "in such a
manner that my services may redound to your honor." That was Old-World
style, but Lincoln seemed to appreciate it. I took the doctor into my office,
put the pass in an envelope, and while I was at it handed him the latest
cutting from the New York World: "The President has often left his business-
apartment to spend an evening in the parlor with his favored bunionist."
"Mr. Hay, believe me, I had nothing to do with this notoriety." Zacharie
tucked the clipping in his wallet and set off on his perhaps impossible assign-
ment. What is there in that fellow that makes the President want to spend
long hours talking with him? What do they have in common? Mystifies me.
I went back in with some newspaper reaction to his annual message; most
of the radical press, like the Evening Post, said that Lincoln's idea of freeing
the slaves by installments was like cutting off a dog's tail by inches to get him
used to the pain. The conservatives and Democrats pretty much ignored it;
Browning says there's no hope for a two-thirds vote in the Congress for such
an amendment. Curiously, this does not upset the Prsdt; he did what he felt
he had to do to show his willingness to make a deal.
The Tycoon, feet on the desk, smiling at his shoes, waved off the tut-tutting
about his message. The editorial in the Herald about the cornucopia was still
tickling him. "I tell you the truth, John," he told me, "when I say that
genuine wit has the same effect on me that I suppose a good square drink of
whiskey has on an old toper. It puts new life in me."
The Tycoon is in fine whack. I have rarely seen him more serene and busy,
managing the war, foreign relations, the rambunctious Cabinet, and the ma-
jority of the country that needs to be dragged along on emancipation. With
McClellan gone, and a more loyal general now actively pursuing Bobby Lee,
Lincoln is at last fully in charge. I remember his saying back before Antie-
tam, "if what I feel were equally distributed to the whole human family, there
would not be one cheerful face on the earth"; ISO-degree turn. A. Lincoln
would never be cocking an ear toward any peace talk if he weren't sure he
was on the verge of a great victory. I think he senses a turning point.
He sent for Halleck. "I had a long conference with General Bumside," he
told the general-in-chief, who was scratching only one elbow today. "He
believes that General Lee's whole army is in front of him at or near Freder-
icksburg."
"He's right," said Halleck promptly. "Bumside has one hundred and ten
thousand men to Lee's sixty thousand. Does he say he wants more men?"
Lincoln shook his head, "No, he could not handle them to advantage."
That was a far cry from McClellan. "Bumside thinks he can cross the river in
the face of the enemy. But that, to use his own expression, is somewhat risky.
I wish the case to stand more favorable than this."
He suggested a plan of attack to Halleck that did not rely so much on a
frontal assault. Lincoln's scheme was to delay an attack until a second force
could cross the Rappahannock, and then a third force swing around via the
Pamunkey River to cut off Lee's line of retreat toward Richmond.
Halleck listened to what seemed to me to be a brilliant maneuver, and
shook his head. "We cannot raise and put in position a force behind Lee in
time. If we don't strike him now, he'll get away. That's what Bumside thinks,
too, I'm sure."
The Tycoon nodded uneasily. Curious; Lincoln was in the McClellan role
now, not wanting to risk Union lives on a single assault across a river,.prefer-
ring a three-pronged attacknot unlike Antietam, which might have been
more successful if all three of our corps had attacked at the same time. Now it
was Bumside and Halleck who wanted to strike massively, quickly, before
Lee could get reinforcements.
"Can't waste time," concluded Halleck confidently. "You gave Bumside
the command, his army is in fine shape. We can't fight the war from here."
The Prsdt nodded again; Bumside did not have the McClellan slows.
"What news from Tennessee?"
Only a few months ago, with Lee invading Maryland and Bragg invading
Kentucky, the war was one gigantic Union retreat. But after Antietam in
Maryland and the standoff at Perryville in Kentucky, the tide turned. Bragg
lost his nerve and pulled back.
"Bragg's army in Tennessee doesn't threaten Kentucky and Ohio any-
more," said Halleck. "He's trouble for Grant out West, though, who cannot
turn his back completely and attack Vicksburg, not with Morgan's raiders
storming around his supply lines. Soon our forces under Rosecrans will move
on Bragg's headquarters at Murfreesboro, on Stones River."
I asked why Bragg had wilted. Halleck shrugged that off with, "His com-
manders hate him, I hear, and only Jeff Davis backs him up. We should not
underestimate Bragg. He cut loose from his base, marched two hundred miles
and beat an army of ours twice the size of his."
Lincoln asked for a detailed plan on the Rosecrans move on Murfreesboro
in Tennessee, but we could see that his mind was on the more important
battle impending between Bumside and Lee at Fredericksburg. That could be
decisive. The war could be over by Christmas and then the question of an
emancipation proclamation might become moot.
Which reminds me that I had better think of getting into uniform before it
is over and I have no heroic answer to "What did you do in the war, Daddy?"
But Washington has its compensations: Kate has never been so warm and
winning as she has been in the past week. I shall soon have to put out some
feelers of my own to see what sort of family life I shall be building when the
war is over.

CHAPTER 23
FIRING SQUAD
"You must not execute this boy, Bragg. He's no deserter."
General Braxton Bragg, standing at the window facing the courtyard
where the execution of Corporal Asa Lewis was to take place, did not look at
Breckinridge. "He had a fair court-martial. He deserted. The firing squad will
send a message to every troublemaker in your brigade."
"He went home to help with the planting," Breck pleaded, "to put in next
year's crop. He was coming back; he did the same thing last year."
"You should have shot him last year, then. Kentucky blood is a little too
feverish for the health of the army."
Breckinridge, steaming, held his temper. He was certain that Bragg had
been driven from Kentucky by his own lack of zest for battle. The Mississip-
pian was a maneuvering general, a fine marching officer, a classic disciplinar-
ian, but not a commander of men in battle. When the citizens of Breck-
inridge's state failed to welcome the Confederate troops, and even went so far
as to deny them supplies, Bragg directed his hatred at all Kentuckians. Breck
knew that Bragg bile was especially directed at him, because the little chim-
panzee had assumed that the Breckinridge name would rally all residents of
the bluegrass state to the Southern side. Now that Bragg was conscripting
any Kentuckian who fell into his hands, he would soon have plenty of desert-
ers for hanging.
"If you won't listen to me," Breck pressed, "General Clebume has asked
to"
"Waste of time. Don't you belong out there when the sentence is carried
out? They're your men."
The Kentuckian withdrew, mounted, and rode into the courtyard where
the condemned corporal was being blindfolded. The tall boy declined the
blindfold at first, but the lieutenant told him that the men of the firing squad
preferred not to have him looking at them when they did their distasteful
duty.
Breckinridge dismounted. He walked to the corporal and told him his final
appeal had failed, but that all his Kentucky comrades knew he was no de-
serter. He suggested that the condemned man say something to the soldiers
about to carry out an abhorrent order.
Corporal Lewis complied. "Do not be distressed," he called out from be-
hind his blindfold. "I beg of you to aim to kill, it will be merciful to me.
Goodbye."
Breckinridge, who had seen so much death in the past year, was swept by
an unaccustomed sense of dread. He went back and remounted. General Pat
Clebume, muttering Irish curses, moved his horse next to him. The clicking
of the hammers could be heard in the morning cold on the command of
"Ready." The men of the Orphan Brigade, drawn up in three formations to
the rear of the firing squad facing the condemned man, tensed. Breckinridge,
sweating, shuddered in the cold.
As the order to fire was given, Breckinridge started to lose consciousness.
He felt Clebume's hand grabbing his arm as he was falling off his horse. His
aide, the boy who had replaced Cabell, ran up and helped the commander of
the Orphans to the ground. He leaned against his horse, breathing deeply,
until consciousness returned. That had not happened to him before; only
women fainted. Breck was mortified that it had happened in front of the
entire brigade; at Clebume's suggestion, he remounted and they rode off
together.
"Bad business. Bragg's a vindictive fool," the Irishman said. "This will
cause more desertions than it will discourage. You all right now?"
"I never saw us shoot one of our own before," Breck said. The corporal
had given him his comb and pocketbook to pass on to his mother, and he
could feel the presence of the dead man's effects in his pocket.
"No news about your son yet?" Clebume was trying to change the subject
with a duller, deeper pain.
"He isn't on any of the prisoner lists." Breck was fighting off the sense of
certainty that the boy was dead. Cabell was about the age of the corporal just
executedin fact, the same height and build. He shook his head and gulped
the cold air.
"There was a Yankee nurse named Breckinridge we captured in Lewis-
burg," General Cleburne said, trying to be helpful. "I figured you all must be
related, so I sent her up to Louisville to tell your Union relations to look out
for him."
"Her name?"
"Margaret Elizabeth; said her father was Judge John Breckinridge."
That was Uncle Robert's kin; if the girl got to that famous Union loyalist
with a question about Cabell, he would know to get in touch with Anna
Carroll in Washington, and she would press General Dix to search the prison
camps. The possibility existed that the boy was still alive, his memory
shocked out of him; or perhaps he was afraid to reveal his identity as the son
of a man condemned as a traitor by the U.S. Senate. False hopes, probably.
"You were right about Lincoln and the slaves, Pat. He's going to enlist
them in his army, maybe hundreds of thousands."
"That's what we should be doing." The Irishman was off on his favorite
forbidden subject. "Lincoln was willing to take a gamble, and stand up to the
hollering of most of his own people. That's the difference between him and
Jeff Davis."
Breck was not sure. Lincoln's proclamation promising emancipation to the
slaves of rebels was a stunning political act, wiping out all hope of ending the
war by compromiseif he went through with it at the end of the month. But
maybe Lincoln was searching for an excuse to delay the edict: his message to
Congress last week, reported with some interest by the newspapers in the
South, mentioned the proclamation only as something to be stayed. Was he
trying to elicit a peace offer?
"The question is," Cleburne was saying, "why is Lincoln gambling now? Is
he convinced the North is losing, and he must enlist black troopsor is he
convinced the North is winning, and he can afford to challenge us to a fight to
the finish?"
That was the question that had been nagging at Breck ever since late
September, when he had read the news of Lincoln's two proclamations free-
ing the slaves and jailing the dissenters. Was Lincoln acting out of weakness
or strength? Was the reason what he said it wasmilitary necessity, which
would mean weaknessor was that a pose, and Lincoln's ulterior motive to
whip up the war spirit in the North to subjugate the South once and for all?
He remembered his arguments with Lincoln in the White House eighteen
months ago. The man was then torn between his disgust for slavery and his
solemn promise not to strike at the peculiar institution where it existed. The
stunning way he resolved that dilemma had surprised Breckinridge, who had
thought of his former presidential rival as a born compromiser. This was a
decision, coming down hard on one side.
The war must have changed Lincoln, made him more certain of his tenta-
tive ideas, just as it had changed Breckinridge, making him unsure of what he
was fighting for, or why he was fighting at all. Not for independencehe had
always opposed disunion; not slaverythat was no cause to inspire a willing-
ness to die; and not even individual liberty, since Richmond was now just as
eager to suspend habeas corpus in the name of national security as Washing-
ton ever had been. For Kentucky? The people of his state had just been given
the chance to rise to greet its liberators, and had decided against that; their
apathy or indecision was as authentic a plebiscite as could be conducted. His
only certainty at the moment was that the picture would never leave him of a
Kentucky firing squad killing a Kentucky boy for the crime of slipping away
to do some planting. The Breckinridge family was on both sides, and so, in a
sense, was he.
Cleburne brought him back. "Maybe we'll sound out some of the hi-muck-
a-mucks about recruiting the slaves at the Morgan wedding." John Hunt
Morgan, the hothead turned heroic cavalry raider, was to be married the
following week. His forays behind enemy lines had disrupted Union logistics
and provisioned Confederate soldiers with Yankee supplies, the leaders of the
army and the government would assemble for that wedding. "He's the only
Kentuckian who gets along with Bragg."
"They can have each other," Breck said sourly. "But maybe a good woman
will settle John down."
"Or take the fight out of him."
"Is that why you're a bachelor, Pat? You want to keep your fighting edge?"
When Breck was Cleburne's agethirty-threehe had been married a dozen
years. Breck now wished he had spent more time with Cabell. That notion
was a dead weight on his line of thought and he shook it off.
"I'll find the colleen one of these days, but not when I have to worry about
leaving her a widow every time the moment comes to lead a charge. You have
to be a little crazy to be a good raider like Morgan or Forrestbloodthirsty
too. You suppose Jeff Davis will come to the wedding?"
Everyone in the command, including Bragg, assumed that Breckinridge
knew the President's plans. The Kentuckian never disabused anyone of that
thought, because it helped him stand off the insufferable martinet of a com-
manding general. He shrugged and said he hoped so.
"Sure and we could use a council of war here in Murfreesboro," Cleburne
said, slipping deep into his brogue. "The new Union general, Rosecrans, is a
tad more headstrong than Buell. He'll be coming after us, because if he
doesn't he knows Lincoln will be coming after him. Bragg had better be ready
to fight. He can't keep blaming us for his own damn cowardice."
"I hear Lincoln paid a visit one night last week to Bumside at the Virginia
front," was all Breck could say.
Cleburne nodded. They left unsaid their feeling that the Yankee general
might be getting the better advice and greater inspiration.

CHAPTER 24
THE PRESIDENT VISITS
Jefferson Davis was glad of the chance to get out of Richmond, even for a few
days. The wedding of Colonel Morgan, the dashing cavalry raider (why was
"dashing" the only word to apply to a horse soldier?) to a young :voman
known throughout Central Tennessee as the belle of Murfreesboro offered an
occasion to reaffirm his support of his good friend, Braxton Bragg.
Such a visit would also show the men of the Army of Tennessee that their
commander in chief in Richmond considered the Central theater every bit as
important as the Eastern, despite the likelihood that a great battle was im-
pending on the banks of the Rappahannock near Fredericksburg.
Even as he prepared to meet Bragg, President Davis found it hard to shift
his concentration from Robert Lee in Virginia. General Lee wanted to fall
back thirty miles, drawing the Union forces away from their water base at
Aquia Creek, in hope of destroying Bumside's army completely if the Union
attack failed; Davis had overruled that, recommending entrenchment on the
heights overlooking the river, hoping to draw Bumside into a hopeless uphill
charge.
The leader of the Confederacy did not believe it necessary to destroy the
Army of the Potomac; at this crucial post-election time a decisive repulse,
with heavy casualties, would be more than even the unreasonable Lincoln
could stand. Copperhead sentiment was obviously on the rise in the North,
and needed fuel for its orators' fire. A stunning defeat of the army that
expected to march on Richmond, coming just after Lincoln had staked all on
the removal of McClellan and taken personal responsibility for this cam-
paign, might well trigger angry uprisings in the North. A military defeat
coming on the heels of a vote of no confidence might finally convince the
English people that the North could not win, and that the South, as Glad-
stone had said truthfully, had made itself a nation.
Davis had more in mind with this visit to the West than assuring the
soldiers of the Army of Tennessee of the importance of their task. Earlier that
year he had chosen February 22, birthday of George Washington, to be inau-
gurated as the permanent President of the Confederacy; like General Wash-
ington, Davis saw the need for military daring designed for political effect.
He was planning a mission for Colonel Morgan and his raiders that tran-
scended the usual military tactics. Davis wanted to tell Morgan in person
about that great raid, even as he promoted the gallant and fearless Ken-
tuckian to brigadier general. The promotion would serve as a wedding pres-
ent from the Confederacy in gratitude for the bridegroom's fervor in dis-
rupting Union logistics by destroying railroads and bridges.
The Richmond that the President left behind was turning, he was sad to
admit, into a cauldron of bickering interests. The newly revered Robert Lee
was the one who had advised Davis to press for conscription to offset the
weight of numbers in the North, but the blame for this extension of the power
of central government had been placed on Davis. When the President recog-
nized the need to have the power to impose martial law in those Southern
cities in danger of attack, the treacherousDavis did not feel that treacher-
ous was too strong a wordeditors of the Richmond newspapers had vilified
him for imitating Lincoln in suspending the privilege of habeas corpus. He
found that comparison odious: it should have been clear that Lincoln had
seized the power of arbitrary arrest illegally while Davis had obtained it
lawfully, by seeking it through an action of the Confederate Congress.
He had some constitutional advantages over his Federal counterpart: Davis
was serving a single term of six years, no reelection permitted, which put him
above the maneuvering to maintain control that must trouble Lincoln; and to
counterbalance the South's presumed shift away from national authority, the
Confederate Constitution gave the President the power to veto specific items
within legislation. But there were disadvantages to rejection of central power:
Lincoln might have his critics in the North, Davis mused, but at least he did
not have his Vice President stabbing him in the back at every opportunity.
"Little Aleck" Stephens was becoming impossible. The President found it
hard to believe that Stephens, that emaciated gnome, was giving public politi-
cal support to the Governor of Georgia, a states' rights fanatic who not only
had been resisting conscription but refused to run military trains on Sunday.
Davis had been told, on good authority, that Vice President Stephens had
been saying of the President of the Confederacy that he was "a man of good
intentions, weak and vacillating, petulant, peevish, obstinate but not firm, and
now I am beginning to doubt his intentions."
Davis remembered every slight from an opponent and every insult from the
press. His wife Varina kept telling him that his inability to forget an insult
was a flaw in a political leader, and Davis knew he was more thin-skinned
than he ought to be, but such sensitivity to slights had been part of his
character since he had been a boy in Kentucky and nothing could be done
about it now. His daughter Maggie had the sunny nature that allowed her to
smile away people who snapped at her; Davis marveled at the way she had
the forbearance to turn away from the cats as well as the snakes, but such
charity was not in him. He felt every jab and remembered everyone who
wounded him, but the Confederate President consoled himself that he also
remembered those who loyally spoke up for him in times of trial. His old
Mexico comrade Braxton Bragg was one of those, especially when that
French popinjay Beauregard tried to blame Davis for failing to capture the
Federal capital after First Manassas.
Seated in the room of the Murfreesboro Hotel, preparing for the prerecep-
tion visits of Bragg, Breckinridge, and the others, Davis wondered whether
Lincoln was afflicted with the same sensitivity to criticism. Probably not; he
and Lincoln had been born in the same Kentucky county within a year of
each other, but the Davises were a distinguished and wealthy family, the
Lincolns a poor and uneducated lot. Lincoln had campaigned hard for the
presidential nomination, trading promises for support, and been elected by a
minority of the people; in contrast, Davis had not sought the leadership of his
nation, had even chosen not to attend the convention in Montgomery that
selected him unanimously. Out of a sense of duty, he had accepted the re-
sponsibility to lead the seceded states.
To Davis's mind, there was a coarseness to Lincoln, part and parcel of an
innate hunger to triumph over his betters. Davis was a West Point graduate,
experienced in command in the Mexican War, Secretary of War in the Pierce
administration, and could deal knowledgeably with military affairs; Lincoln's
military background was practically nonexistent, and yet he presumed to
consider himself a great strategist and was known to meddle in the planning
of campaigns.
Worst of all, thought Davis, Lincoln's coarseness had turned to sheer sav-
agery in the crucible of war. His toleration of General Pope's barbarism was
indicative, but his proclamation of abolition revealed a man so desperate to
keep his dominion over the states that he would actually seek to incite a
servile rebellion. For drawing that weapon of terrorisme, Davis was certain
the Union leader would be remembered in history as a man capable of the
most monstrous acts.
Lincoln's sly recommendation to the Southern blacks "to abstain from
violence unless in necessary self-defense" was particularly infuriating, since it
was an unmistakable hint to encourage the assassination of their masters.
Every slave being disciplined now had the "right" from the President of the
United States to strike out at his owner. Davis detested Lincoln for putting
forward the most execrable measure recorded in the history of guilty man,
and was fearful that it might have the effect intended of setting slaves on a
path of rapine and murder on thousands of undefended plantations. He was
convinced that Lincoln's protestations of the past two years that he had no
intention of striking at slavery where it existed were a sham; the man was an
abolitionist at heart, determined to impose his ways on an independent people
just as had George III on the American colonists.
Braxton Bragg was the President's first caller. Davis assumed that the
general, in constant strife with his subordinates, wanted to be sure that the
President understood his side of any disputes before he heard them from the
likes of John Breckinridge. Bragg was an irritating fellow, Davis was aware
as U.S. Secretary of War, he had accepted Bragg's angry resignationbut
when General Beauregard failed, it was the abrasive but effective Bragg that
Davis had turned to, and the stern disciplinarian had justified that faith with
his march northward into Tennessee and Kentucky.
"You have not been receiving the praise you deserve in Richmond, Gen-
eral," Davis told him, going to the heart of what must be bothering his friend.
"The venal press want you to remove me from command," Braxton Bragg
announced. "The Richmond Whig says the Kentucky campaign turned out to
be a fizzle."
"I ignore the press completely," said Davis, wishing he could.
"A fizzle is exactly what it was," said Bragg, surprising him, "thanks to
Breckinridge. If he had been with me a month sooner, when he should have
been, he might have helped with those damned Kentuckians. Selfish, misera-
ble people, wouldn't volunteer a crust of bread to the army. And our Ken-
tucky Brigade is a joke, thanks to Breckinridge's coddling."
"I was born in Kentucky," Davis reminded him. "We Kentuckians have an
independent turn of mind." He suppressed his irritation with Bragg's congen-
ital derogation of his own subordinates, because the unfortunate man's simian
looks and dyspeptic demeanor denied him friends and followers. Certainly he
had too few supporters in the press: in his invasion of Kentucky, Bragg had
accomplished as much as Lee in his invasion of Maryland, at less cost, yet it
was Lee who was hailed by his countrymen as a hero while Bragg bore the
brunt of criticism as a retreater. The pity was that both Confederate generals
had been forced to fall back; valor was no match for railroad lines of supply
to bring up ammunition and new shoes.
As Bragg launched into a series of complaints about his other officers,
Davis interrupted to ask whether there were any men in Bragg's command
worthy of promotion. He had in mind that day's groom, who, Davis had been
told, would be married by General Polk with a bishop's robes worn over his
uniform.
Bragg submitted a list for promotion. Davis saw the name of a colonel,
recommended for general of a brigade, who had recently written a letter
critical of the Davis administration that had been published in the newspa-
pers. He struck that name off the list, along with several others he knew to be
overly outspoken. Bragg did not always understand that the need for disci-
pline also had to include political reliability. He came to Patrick Cleburne's
name.
"You like the Irishman?"
"Young and ardent, but sufficiently prudent," Bragg nodded. "A fine drill
officer. Has the admiration of his command."
"So does Breckinridge," Davis observed, knowing it would get a rise out of
Bragg. "Popularity with the troops does not always mean good generalship,"
he said, adding, "although Breck is a superb commander and, like you, a
colleague of long standing."
"Breckinridge is soft," Bragg said. "And he drinks."
Davis frowned, not wanting to hear this, but Bragg would not desist. "He
came into my tent the other night and I could tell he was drunk. Mumbling
something about his damned 'orphans,' and tried to get me to pardon a
deserter. He's been drunk in the presence of the troops, too. Fell off his horse
at a formation, dead to the world, made a fool of himself. As far as I'm
concerned, you can send him back out West, along with his brigade of riff-
raff."
"I'm glad you can spare the troops," said Davis, ignoring the serious
charge. "I want you to detach Morgan's raiders for a mission I have in
mind."
"I cannot spare Morgan's cavalry," Bragg said abruptly. "He has five thou-
sand fighters under him. I expect an attack from Rosecrans soon, and I need
every man I can get, excluding the shirkers under Breckinridge. You should
not split my command more than it is already."
"I must. You are to send one division," the President ordered, "full
strength, ten thousand men, to Mississippi right away. We must stop Grant
from taking Vicksburg."
Nothing was more important to Davis, not even the defense of Richmond,
than the continued denial of the Mississippi River to the North. He fervently
hoped that the importance of Vicksburg would not assume an overriding
significance in Lincoln's war strategy. He counted on Lincoln to remain
transfixed with the battles along the Potomac.
"And you're taking Morgan's cavalry," said Bragg. "That's quite a loss."
Davis knew what he was doing with Morgan's force. He would take For-
rest's cavalry raiders from Bragg as well, to harass Grant in the West and
thereby prevent an attack on Vicksburg, but that could wait a few days.
"Fight if you can," he told Bragg, "and fall back if you must, beyond the
Tennessee River." He drew himself to his feet. "I expect you to work together
with Breckinridge and General Hardee. I will promote Cleburne to major
general, as you suggest, and will promote Colonel Morgan to brigadier. We
will now attend the festive occasion."
"They'll come at us right here at Murfreesboro," said Bragg. As Davis
expected, the general did not argue further; it was for him to try to work out
what he could do with the forces remaining with him. "We don't have much
of a natural defense at Stones River, but if we can stop them here, we can
chase them up past Nashville."
Davis liked that spirit, and resolved to protect this faithful soldier from the
wolves of Richmond. He cautioned Bragg to use entrenchment whenever
possibleneither Bragg nor Lee liked that device, thinking that it robbed the
men of their warlike spirit and undermined their discipline, but Davis was
persuaded that earthworks and trenches improved the prospects of successful
defense.
"I must do all in my power," the President told him as they walked out
together, "to overcome the impression that I am an austere and unfeeling
person." When the general demurred, Davis pressed the point that pained
him, but was true: "No, that is an unfortunate burden I bear. That is one
reason for my coming to the wedding, General, to show the officers and the
troops that I am not the cold and distant person I am made out to be in the
press."
He was telling Bragg this not merely because it was true, but to suggest
subtly that the general suffered from a similar reputation. Some political men
could succeed without appearing warm and outgoingGeorge Washington
was the outstanding example of one who had maintained his reserve and
dignitybut on the whole, Davis felt, men like Bragg and himself were weak-
ened as leaders by a modesty or taciturnity that made it hard for them to let
their inner natures be seen by their countrymen.
"There's going to be a lot of drinking at this wedding," said the general,
"and a temptation to become lax in discipline. Your presence here will
counter that, Mr. President."
Davis sighed; Braxton Bragg would never understand human relationships.
Better Bragg in command than Beauregard, however; the ambitious little
Frenchman wanted to be President. Bragg had his sick headaches that crip-
pled him for days on end, Davis knewmigraines, they were being called
and his relationships with his fellow officers left much to be desired, but he
would not run out on his President. One thought troubled President Davis,
however: "About General Breckinridge. You realize that he is a braver man
than either of us."
Bragg looked up sharply, as Davis knew he would. "You are a resident of
Louisiana," said the President, "a state that seceded legally from the Union. I
am the former United States Senator from Mississippi, also a state that se-
ceded. If we should lose this warand we must recognize that our maximum
strength has been mobilized, while the enemy is just beginning to put forth his
mightyou and I have an unassailable legal defense against vindictive
charges of treason."
He let that sink in. "Breckinridge, on the other hand, is from Kentucky.
That state, unhappily, did not secede. If we should lose this war, or if General
Breckinridge fell into enemy hands in the course of battle, he would surely be
tried as a traitor. The likes of Tad Stevens and Ben Wade would settle for no
less than the most severe punishment. And the likelihood is that Mr. Lincoln
would see him hang."
"That's a chance he takes," Bragg said coldly. "No excuse for drinking."
CHAPTER 25
THE BANDIT TAKES A BRIDE
Breckinridge could not understand what had come over John Hunt Morgan.
The hothead of Lexington, the reckless risk-all raider, the Yankee-hating
swashbuckler who had been loosely attached to the Orphan Brigade since the
start had undergone a transformation. Morgan was moonstruck.
To be in love was a fine thing, Breckinridge conceded, and let himself recall
the innocent early days with Mary and the later days in Washington jousting
and loving with Anna Carroll, but none of those experiences had intrinsically
changed him; Colonel Morgan, in contrast, seemed positively lovesick.
"You know what Mattie said last year, when a Yankee officer asked her
name?" Morgan asked him, as he asked everyone on his wedding day. "It was
a year ago, we hadn't met. She told him, 'Write down Mattie Ready now, but
by the grace of God, one day I shall call myself the wife of John Morgan.'
There's a woman for you."
"She knows her mind," Breckinridge said to the groom, "for someone that
young. And she's a lot better-looking than some of those women you've been
slipping into camp."
"At least all my men are men, Breck," the cavalryman responded merrily.
Breckinridge smiled; in his brigade, as elsewhere in the army, there were
more than a few young women masquerading as boys. These volunteers usu-
ally buddied up, concealing their sex from the officers but not from the men
in the ranks, for whom they performed their services profitably and well.
Some of the disguised girls even charged nothing, considering it their contri-
bution to the Cause. In battle, these hardened young women in soldiers' garb
were among the steadiest under fire, and the noncoms passed the word up the
line that it would harm morale if their services day or night were withdrawn.
Breckinridge pretended to know nothing about it.
He sloshed around some of the purplish fluid that had been put in his glass.
"What kind of God-awful wine is this?"
"Scuppemong," said the cavalryman, "and over there you can find all the
applejack and peach brandy you want. I suppose they can break out a little
bourbon for you, Breck."
Morgan looked across the large reception room of the house of the bride's
father at the figure of President Jefferson Daviscadaverous, pale, almost at
the edge of infirmityentering at the side of Braxton Bragg. "I think I rate a
honeymoon with this incredible girl," Morgan was saying in a lower tone,
"but we've been told to be ready to set out on a raid right after the wedding."
He seemed sorry for himself; that was the first time Breckinridge could
recall that Morgan had not approached action with the eyes of a man who
loved war more than a man should. Morgan was not the only Southern
hotblood who was becoming more sober about the game of war, Breck had
observed; the fighting was lasting too long and the adventure was losing its
piquancy. He could not fault Jeff Davis on that. His former colleague in the
United States Senate had warned of a long war from the start; Breck had
agreed, remembering his conversations in the Executive Mansion with Lin-
coln, who was obsessed with what he insisted was "an oath registered in
Heaven" to prevent Southern independence at all costs.
Breck stayed away from the bar, moving instead to a table laden with quail,
doves, and roast pork. Supplies were plentiful in Murfreesboro, a city
crowded with wives and sweethearts of officers. He wished Mary had been
well enough to come; it would be good to be with her in this soul-wrenching
time of uncertainty about Cabell. No word about the boy in a month; the
longer there was no news, the more the likelihood of never seeing him again
grew. His name had not appeared on any of the prisoner lists.
The gaiety of the party, the whooshing of silk skirts, and the laughter of
Morgan's raiders oppressed him. How many of these reveling raiders would
come home across the backs of their horses after the next foray, and how
many brides and sweethearts would soon be searching for replacements, just
as generals demanded replacements that so seldom came? That led to-another
thought: why was Morgan's force being sent on a mission when the likelihood
was that Bragg would be called upon to defend this area any day now?
Cavalry provided an army its eyes, and the talent of Southern horsemen in
scouting and harassing an approaching enemy provided the Confederacy an
edge of supremacy that sometimes made up for the Northern advantage in
artillery. General Breckinridge hoped Davis had a good reason for stripping
Bragg's army of Morgan and his men at a critical moment.
At a nod from President Davis, who seemed unusually convivial and atten-
tive to the guests this afternoon, Breckinridge went into the study to await his
audience with the leader of the South. He was surprised and glad to see Pat
Clebume waiting there already, poking the fire, complaining about the bone-
chilling dampness of these rambling mansions.
"I'm either going to be promoted or cashiered," General Clebume told him
quickly. "I'm afraid I couldn't keep my Irish mouth shut, Breck. I didn't take
your advice."
"You didn't put anything in writing about recruiting and freeing slaves, I
hope."
General Clebume shook his head as the President entered. Jefferson Davis
took their hands and motioned them to chairs before the fire.
"My friends, with constant labors in the duties of office, and borne down
by care, I have had such little opportunity for social intercourse," the Presi-
dent saidit seemed to Breckinridge stiffly, like a politician incapable of
warmth even among his closest supporters. "I hope the time may come when,
relieved of the anxieties of the hour, we may have more social intercourse."
"The war is not going well, then," Clebume probed.
"On the contrary, I see nothing in the future to disturb the prospect of the
independence for which we are struggling." Breck knew the President had
been profoundly troubled by the setback at Sharpsburg, but knew also that
Davis would brook no defeatist talk. "Have you spoken to the bride and
groom? With such noble women at home and such heroic soldiers in the field,
we are invincible."
"Sure and you're a man of great faith," Clebume replied, "but we just lost
Kentucky. And with all respect, Mr. President, our glorious invasion of the
North, by both Bragg and Lee, is a thing of the past. If we're to win, we need
some radical changes."
Davis biinked, rubbed his bad eye, and changed the subject. "Breck, first
let me say I have nothing to report to you about your son. The official
channels, through the exchange commission, say he is not listed as a pris-
oner."
Breckinridge nodded numbly and said he was grateful for his concern.
"We have an informal means of communication with the North," the Presi-
dent continued. "Judah Benjamin's sister in New Orleans is in touch with a
doctor of some sort attached to the headquarters of the Union occupiers.
Some inquiries are being made through that channel, which was initiated by
Mr. Lincoln, I suspect, when he replaced that madman Butler. Perhaps he is
coming under pressure to see if negotiations for peace are possible. We will
telegraph you immediately if there is any news of your gallant boy. Our
prayers"
"Send news about peace negotiations, too," said the irrepressible Clebume.
"The only basis for talks would be a recognition of the Confederacy's
independence," Davis said with great firmness. "The possibility that the
North is interested is encouraging. It may be a sign of weakness. Demands for
peace are growing every day in the North."
But not in the South, Breckinridge noted, and wondered why. Possibly
because the North was the aggressor, striking against an attempt at peaceful
secession; the way Lincoln had goaded the South into firing the first shot had
been a transparent trick. More likely, peace talk was muted in the South
because it was equated with a suggestion to surrender. Life in the two sections
was surely of a different character (lending some credence, Breck would
grant, to the idea of independence), and part of that difference was the incli-
nation of the Southerner to consider a defeat of his cause to be a loss of
personal honor. If a Yankee thought of losing the war, he did not worry about
the occupation of his land by Southerners; but every Southerner had to con-
sider the personal humiliation in store when the Yankee overlords came down
to see that the slaves were in the saddle.
And then Breck felt another, unstated, slowly smoldering reason that peace
talk was not heard in the South: not every Southerner was partial to the
peculiar institution, particularly when slavery did him no personal good. To
talk of peace was to doubt the necessity for slavery, which was to attack the
aristocracy, and you didn't do that if you knew what was good for you. But
plenty of poor Southern soldiers resented having to fight to help the planta-
tion owner keep his slaves; Cabell had taught him that. And Breck knew that
at least some well-bred officers felt that slaverywhich might be justified on
abstract economic grounds, and was surely permitted by the writers of the
Constitutionwas not the sort of cause that made its justifiers proud.
"Independence, then, is the Southern cause," Clebume was saying to Da-
vis, "the very essence of the war and the reason for the glorious struggle. Not
the preservation of slavery."
Davis nodded unhesitatingly. "Abolition is merely the excuse for the war
on the part of some Northern zealots," he explained, as if this were a lecture
he had given often. "The real design of most of the Yankee bankers and
politicians is to subjugate the South totally, dominating our economy and
imposing their culture upon our own. The abolition of slavery was merely
their excuse, and a device to keep foreign nations from recognizing us."
"If they're not really fighting to end slavery," said the Irish-born general in
seeming innocence, "and we're really fighting for independence and not to
save slaverythen why don't we emancipate the slaves ourselves, and use
negro troops to fight for our independence and their own freedom?"
"There's been some talk of that around," Breckinridge put in, to soften the
sound of Cleburne's heresy. "It's not disloyal in any way, Mr. President. Just
take it as a suggestion to help swell our ranks."
"How would we pay for it?" Davis asked. Breck biinked and Clebume
smiled; that practical reaction was a surprise. "The Confederacy would have
to buy the slaves to use in the army, at eight hundred dollars a head for a
good field hand, and then free those who served honorably. Where's the
money for that? We hardly have enough to pay for ammunition, for shoes
even, and could not think of affording a million slaves."
"Is that all that stands in the way?"
Davis smiled his bleak smile. "Tell me where to find eight hundred million
dollars for the first million slaves. But of course that is not the only drawback
to the scheme. Some of our states would try to secede from the Confederacy
to protect the peculiar institutionGeorgia, South Carolina."
"We're outnumbered in every battle, sometimes two to one," Breckinridge
put in. "The North outnumbers us three to one in men of military age avail-
able for the draft." As an experienced politician, Breckinridge was not pre-
pared to endorse Clebume's idea at this early stage. But that the notion
evidently did not trigger automatic rejection by the President of the Confed-
eracy was encouraging.
"Until our white population shall prove insufficient for the armies we re-
quire, to employ the negro as a soldier would scarcely be deemed wise or
advantageous. Certainly not now, and the less said the better," said Davis.
"The notion is quite premature."
"But if recruitment fell off," Cleburne pressed, and Breck wished he would
not keep assaulting the position, "and we really needed the men"
Davis shrugged. "Should the alternatives be subjugation of the South or the
employment of the slave as soldier, there seems no reason to doubt what
should then be our decision. We are not, of course, faced with those alterna-
tives."
Breckinridge was stunned. Here was the President of the Confederacy
coolly facing the prospect of ending slavery in order to maintain an indepen-
dent state. Hundreds of thousands of men were dying for whatfor indepen-
dence? He would have to think hard about the politics of that, because he had
not departed the Senate of the United States, to be branded a traitor by his
peers, because he favored disunion; on the contrary, he had done his damned-
est to avoid disunion, short of war. Nor was he an advocate of the property
rights that enshrined human slavery.
Then what was he fighting for? What was the "cause"? Was resentment at
the Republicans' political insistence that slavery not be extended to the West-
ern territories worth this fratricidal war? His young cousin Margaret, Uncle
Bob's daughter, intruded on his thoughts. She was a nurse for the Union,
swabbing blood off the injured in hospitals that no belles like the girl mar-
rying the lovesick Morgan had ever seen. Margaret Breckinridge had a pur-
pose, simple, clearthe abolition of slavery, the end of the degradation of a
race, the fulfillment of the American revolutionary promise that all men were
created equal. That was something to drive her to serve in ways that no well-
bred Kentucky girl would ever have considered in peacetime. What opposing
cause gave strength to John Morgan's bride? Resentment of the majority's
iron rule? Independence from an already independent Union? It was under-
standable for proud and sensitive Southerners to despise the arrogance of
individual Yankees, but something else entirely for Southerners to hate the
Union their fathers had helped create.
As these thoughts crowded in, Breckinridge felt as if his roots were rotting.
He wished he could have a long talk about the underlying motives of North
and South with Anna Carroll, who might have the wrong answer but would
at least understand the question.
"As general officers," President Davis was saying, "you are both undoubt-
edly concerned about my decision to remove men from this command in the
face of an impending attack on Murfreesborowhy, particularly, I am send-
ing Morgan north for a long foray. I realize that your relationship with
General Bragg is not close, and he is unlikely to explain my rationale."
Breckinridge broke away from his disturbing line of thought and looked up
sharply: had Bragg been complaining about him again? The leader of the
Orphan Brigade felt a surge of anger at the martinet willing to trouble the
President of the Confederacy with petty squabbles.
"The copperhead movement is gaining strength in the North," Davis ex-
plained. "Horatio Seymour has been elected Governor of New York, the
largest state in the Union, on a pledge to end the war with 'the Union as it
was.' Clement Vallandigham of Ohio has introduced a resolution in the
House of Representatives accusing Lincoln of trying to establish a dictator-
ship. Rumors are rampant that Seward intends to negotiate a peace on the
basis of separation"
"How did Val's resolution do?" Breckinridge wanted to know.
"Voted down seventy-nine to fifty, strictly according to party lines," Davis
said.
Breck was impressed; when the leader of the copperhead faction of the
Democrats in Congress could impose party discipline to support a calumni-
ous attack on Lincoln, that meant the opposition was hardening. The South
had no such opposition in place; no two-party system had been given time to
develop. That made the Northern political system stronger in the long run, in
Breck's reckoning, but vulnerable now.
"This is the time to do all we can to contribute to copperhead sentiment in
the North," Davis said, "particularly in the fertile Western groundOhio,
Illinois, Kansas." The President lowered his voice, requiring his generals to
lean forward to catch his words. "I have been visited by men hatching what
they call the Northwest Conspiracya rising of the copperhead secret societ-
ies, a riot in Chicago, open agitation to free our prisoners and negotiate an
end to the war. That is where Morgan, and perhaps Forrest in a few weeks,
can fit instriking north and west, making the message plain that the war
cannot be won by the Union."
Breck looked at Clebume; did Davis know something about Northern mo-
rale that they did not know? He had no feel for the depth of support of the
peace movement in the North, but if the movement could turn out every
Democrat in the House to denounce the President of the United States as a
dictator, perhaps Davis's faith in the value of raids in the Northwest was well
placed. He wondered if Lincoln would be rattled by an explosion of peace talk
in Ohio and Illinois; somehow, he doubted it. He could not be wearied of
making war, because he was sustained by his obsession with Union and ma-
jority rule. The only way to defeat Lincoln was to beat his army.
"This is the critical time," said President Davis. "Now, this month. Our
victory could come not so much from our strength, but from weakness in the
Northern will. Do you agree, Breck? You have a surer grasp of politics than I
do."
"We need more than successful raids," was his judgment. "We need some
victories in the field here in Tennessee, leading back up into Kentucky, threat-
ening Ohio. And we need General Lee to crush Lincoln's army at the Rappa-
hannock in the East."
"Defense is the key," the newly promoted Clebume put in. "If there is
anything we've learned, 'tis the effect of the rifled barrel on all warfare. The
guns can start killing at over five hundred yards, not one hundred, and that
means the attackers are at a terrible disadvantage against prepared positions.
That should be our strategy here, if you can get it through Bragg's thick
skull."
"It is the plan of General Lee at Fredericksburg," said Davis, ignoring the
slight to his local commander.
"That is the way to weaken Lincoln's resolve," Breckinridge concluded.
"The removal of McClellan was all his doing. The next battle is his defeat or
his victory, no matter who the Union general is. A military setback there,
followed by a repulse of the Federals here, would force him to listen to the
Democrats and settle the war. Only then would he make a deal for 'the Union
as it was,' with slavery."
"Which I, of course," said Davis, "will never accept. We are two nations
now."
The practical Irishman made Breckinridge's point. "First let's get him to
make us an offer."

CHAPTER 26
ALONE AGAIN

Governor Chase had never before come to see her at her flat in The Washing-
ton House. Her lodgings, Anna Carroll assured herself, were respectable
enough, and the bedroom-work office had a certain genteel seediness attribut-
able to the war. Certainly the quarters were not as grand as he was accus-
tomed to at the Chase mansion at Sixth and G, but her sitting room had been
host to a parade of Congressmen and office seekers. Not a month ago, she had
made the final arrangements in this drab room with Senator Henry Wilson
for the appointment of a middle-level assistant in Chase's Treasury Depart-
ment, which did nothing to pay the rent but at least enhanced her reputation
as a person of some influence. That reputation, in turn, led to writing assign-
ments. She wished the War Department would pay the $6,500 she was owed,
or at least made an offer to settle the bill.
Anna was flustered when the bellboy arrived at the door with the Chase
calling card, but she was not about to waste the governor's time by plumping
up the pillows or brushing her hair. She wished she had bought a Christmas
wreath to put on the door to show her piety. She also wished she had not
worn her high-necked blouse but now was no time to change. She sent the
boy down to the desk clerk with word to escort the Secretary of the Treasury
upstairsshe was eager for the management to know that her visitors were of
the first rankand ordered tea.
"I trust I am not coming at an inopportune time," Chase said formally,
handing her his hat and heavy overcoat, damp from the snow. She was in-
clined to say that of course the time was inopportune, she and her apartment
looked a mess, and she was glad to have him here in her own domain without
his possessive elder daughter looking on. Instead, as she did whenever she felt
nervous, Anna let herself pour forth a cascade of small talk about grand
strategy.
She took his wet hat and coat and heaved them up onto the brass hatstand,
chattering about the likelihood of a battle on the Rappahannock, which
struck her as being blown out of all proportion by the war correspondents.
"They should be out West with Grant, focusing attention on Vicksburg. Why
is Lincoln sending John McClemand, a hack politician playing general if
there ever was one, down the Mississippi with a force to assault Vicksburg
from the river side? That's doomed. The fortress can only be taken from the
back, on land, by siege."
"I'm sure you know more about that than anyone, my dear lady," he said
heavily, sinking into the only chair in the sitting room suitable for a big man.
"As you know, the war appears to be drawing to a successful close. Even
Seward admits that."
That was news to her; Anna doubted this would be a war lasting less than
two years. The emancipation policy had not worked, and Lincoln seemed to
be backing away from it; Orville Browning told her he hoped a way would be
found to delay the proclamation's effect past the New Year's deadline.
Chase's hopes for a quick Northern victory seemed misplaced to her, but
Anna did not want to argue; perhaps he had come on other business and was
making preliminary conversation.
"With McClellan finally gone, and some new spirit finally in our troops,"
Chase was saying, "we should be in Richmond in a matter of weeks."
She wondered about his optimism; did Stanton agree? That was not what
she was hearing from young Bates at the telegraph office. The operator re-
ported that "Hosanna"that was the Union code name for Jefferson Davis,
although the operators were more accustomed to hearing Lincoln call his
counterpart "Jeffy D"was confident enough about the defense of Richmond
to make a visit to Murfreesboro to attend a wedding. The thought of that
Tennessee city reminded her of "Old Rosey" Rosecrans, the new Federal
commander facing Bragg and Breckinridge there, and she was glad to be able
to pass on a tasty piece of political gossip to Chase.
"Whenever the war ends, Governor, I hear the Democrats intend to run
every general they can lay their hands on for every major office in the North."
"I've heard those rumors about McClellan for President"
"I've heard the Democrats want Rosecrans for Governor of Ohio." She
knew that thought would worry him; Ohio was home territory for Chase, his
base of political power, and she had this information from no less an Ohioan
than Senator Ben Wade. She sat back to hear what it was he had come for,
telling herself to restrain her tongue and to remain self-possessed, as if pro-
posals of marriage came regularly. The fact that the governor had come
calling without notice was a hopeful sign; maybe he did not wish to hold back
an overdue impulse.
"As the war ends, I must give serious thought to how best I can serve the
nation," he said. "The Republican convention is no more than eighteen
months away. Mr. Lincoln, happily, is not likely to be given much consider-
ation for renomination. Seward must be stopped at all costshe and the
Biairs would subvert the cause for which the war has been fought.,"
She nodded, forcing herself to listen without comment to a dubioas analy-
sis, wondering what would bring him around to a more personal subject.
"As Senator Wade has undoubtedly confided in you," he went on, "there is
talk of urging Lincoln to remove Seward. Perhaps of precipitating a resigna-
tion of the Cabinet en masse, and reconstituting it with myself as a sort of
Premier."
She remembered that was what Secretary Seward had tried and failed to do
at the start of the Lincoln administration. Didn't Chase realize that Lincoln
was too smart, or too strong-willed, to permit anything of the sort? Perhaps
he thought Lincoln had been weakened by two years of war. But now, evi-
dently, a great victory on the road to Richmond was expected; the prospect of
impending peace would hardly cause the President to panic and turn over the
reins to his strongest Republican rival. Just the opposite: victory would end
the military necessity for sudden emancipation, allow Lincoln to regain his
popularity as a man of moderation, and ensure his renomination. Anna
frowned at the flaw in Chase's analysis, then caught herself, lest a frown be
construed as disapproval, and smiled brightly.
"Whatever happens, the next year or two will be a time of great political
activity for me," he was saying, "and because of that, I am duty-bound to
curtail all other interests and activities."
She nodded. A busy time it would surely be for everyone.
"Which means, my dear lady, that I will have to curtail all social activi-
ties," he said, shifting in his chair. "I will be working later than ever. I will be
traveling more. I will not be able to avail myself of the comfort and the
stimulation of social intercourse that other men may indulge in."
What was the man getting at? She looked at him sharply. "Say what you
mean."
"What I mean is that we cannot see each other as often as before. It means
also," he added, as if in reassurance, "that I will be seeing none of the other
friends who, unlike you, have little interest in public affairs." Anna took that
to mean that Adele Douglas and a few other women friends of Salmon P.
Chase were to be cast aside totally, along with her. Small solace there.
"I would think that at such a time," she countered, "you would need more
than ever the companionship and counsel of someone who cares for your
future and cares for you."
He shook his handsome head gently but firmly. "I have always conducted
myself as a man of honor. I cannot honorably suggest to any woman, espe-
cially one for whose intellect I have the greatest respect, the possibility of
sharing a life that, in the end, cannot be shared."
She was about to engage that argument and then stopped herself. This was
not a discussion in which intelligent refutation of an opposing position would
do any good. He was announcing a decision, and it was not the one she had
hoped for. She took a deep breath, gave him the benefit of the doubt, and said
only, "I do not understand."
"Let me be frank, then. If we were to continue to see each other as in the
recent past, we would surely reach the point of considering a more formal
and lasting relationship."
She nodded for him to go on.
"Of course, I have no way of knowing what your decision would be to my
suit, but I cannot honorably allow matters to go that far. I will let nothing
not my personal happiness in a life that has seen such grief in marriage
nothing cause me to swerve from my path of duty."
Chase had buried three wives, she knew; certainly that affected his thinking
about marrying again. But couldn't he see that in her case, she would be a
political help, not a hindrancean active and useful ally, not a dead anchor?
The thought occurred to her that his daughter Kate had pressed him to stop
seeing his women friends, but celibacy was an unnatural state for a virile man,
especially one determined to compete for power. She knew he wanted her
completely, as she did him.
What path of duty was he talking about? He was strong enough to deal
with a possessive daughter. Instead of analyzing all he said for some hidden
motive, she told herself to consider another possibility: it could be that this
man, unlike all the others she had known in political life, was being sincere in
seeking not to hurt her as others had. She would feel better if that were the
reason, and she badly wanted to feel better.
"I will support you in every way I can," she said, "and if that has to
include not seeing you, so be it."
Well put, she said to herself; she had a lifetime's experience in farewells
without acrimony. She would not let herself think his withdrawal from imme-
diate contact was final. At least this was not a bitter occasion; after Chase
succeeded and was President, or failed and was not, perhaps there would be
time for being together. She had learned not to close doors; men in public life
suffered great changes in fortune that caused greater changes in mind, or else
they found other ways to redress their emotional wrongs.
"The Native American Party people" he began, and she smiled that
away.
"I'll talk to my old friend Millard Fillmore in New York," she said. "He
hates Seymour and cannot work with Seward. I think you can count on our
Know-Nothings." She put her finger alongside her nose and then touched
thumb to forefinger, making a zero, the old signal for "nose-nothing."
After the Treasury Secretary left the room, a tender kiss on her forehead
his only expression of regret, Anna Carroll shook her head in wonderment at
the gentleness of her own reaction to her latest disappointment. She actually
felt more sorry for the man than for herself. She would miss a great deal, but
he would be missing more. The pity was, he might find out too late to do
either of them much good.
She looked out the window at his carriage pulling away in the snow and
hurried to put on her overcoat, the good one that Lizzie Keckley had de-
signed three years ago. Since her job was now apparently to be her life, she
had to plunge into it with new zest: the first place she wanted to visit was the
War Department. Reverend Bob Breckinridge had written her with news
passed on by his daughter, Margaret Elizabeth, the Union nurse who had
been captured and released in Tennessee: John Breckinridge's son was miss-
ing in action and the family was looking for some word of the whereabouts of
the body, if hope had gone that he was a prisoner.
Anna Ella Carroll was a personage in Washington, she reminded herself,
one of the few women who knew whom to see and what could be done and
how to ask for it. Being busy on important work always helped dispti disap-
pointment, as would the realization that her loss of a married future was
small compared to the loss being felt by the Kentuckian she had known so
well so long ago.
CHAPTER 27
JOHN HAY'S DIARY
DECEMBER 12, 1862
I could not believe the words I was hearing.
"Everything can be the same as before," she said, as if she had not just
turned my world inside out. "We can remain friends, perhaps be closer than
ever."
"You are becoming another man's wife," I told her, as if explaining a
mistaken step to a child, "and you are doing it for money, nothing else. For
the money, and the position that Sprague family money can buy. Nothing will
ever be the same, for you or for me."
"And who are you to talk about selling your soul for an illustrious future?"
she demanded, hating herself through me. "You're an able-bodied young man
hiding behind your desk in the Executive Mansion while brave men your age
are fighting and dying. You'll stick close to your beloved Father Abraham
until the war is almost over, writing your Uttle diary that you can use later to
twist history to suit your ends and make your fortune. And when the rebels
are on the run, then you'll rush into uniform, with a high rank and a safe job,
so that you can pretend to your children you were in the War when the
bullets were flying."
I told her, I regret to say, that my children would not be sired by a drunk
who had bought his wife. In the heat of the moment, I thought she deserved
my cruel riposte; she cannot compare her unnatural attachment to her father
to my respect for a great man. But then she started to crynot the sniffles
and tears from a child, but great sobs from a woman unaccustomed to crying,
shaking her head in mortification at her weakness, forcing herself to face her
shame.
"It isn't so terrible," she insisted when she could speak again. "It's a mar-
riage of convenience, to help the family; the French do it all the time. If you
loved me, you'd understand the sacrifice I'm making."
I will give her credit for composing herself quickly, lest some of the pas-
sersby in Lafayette Park notice a blubbering young lady amidst the statuary
of General Washington's foreign helpers; she extended her gloved hand and
gathered what was left of her dignity to bid me goodbye. "I wish you success
in your chosen profession," I said coolly, a remark as cruelly accurate as it
was felicitously phrased. Now I wish I hadn't said it.
She walked eastward in the late December afternoon, with that gait of
independence and grace that I will not soon forget, the heavy woolen skirt
concealing the long, slim, muscled legs that some damnable sot will soon
know better than 1. I have the memories of the kisses and suppressed love
cries, the sketches in my mind that one day I will transcribe to poetry or
prose, and the comfortable weight of melancholy that only the savored expe-
rience of rejection can bestow. And what does Kate have? Sprague, servants,
and a bite at the apple of discord.
I suppose I might have frozen to death, sitting on the bench in the park
across from the Mansion for an hour or so of such wallowing in my misery,
but for the sight of Anna Ella Carroll bustling along Pennsylvania Avenue
past the Mansion on the way to the War Department. I hallooed and waved
to her to join me; she hallooed back and pointed straight ahead. I ran to catch
up to her.
"You always told me Kate was a shrew and a vixen, entirely unworthy of a
boy from Illinois," I said, with an attempt at lightheartedness, "and I want
you to know that I was wrong and you were right."
She immediately slowed her pace and listened to my news. It affected her
more than I thought it would; evidently this fine woman has more of an
affection for me than I had hitherto believed. Women are not universally
betrayers; Anna Carroll is a good egg.
"When did you learn of her engagement to Governor Sprague?"
"The boy governor is now the boy senator. She told me the happy news of
her engagement an hour ago."
The timing seemed to mean something to Anna. She smacked her gloved
fist into her palm and muttered some imprecation that, had Miss Carroll been
a man, I would have taken as "that son of a bitch!" I assumed she meant that
Kate had been acting the bitch in heat, which was all too true, and I agreed
that the young lady had used me badly.
We ducked inside the front entrance of the War Department and remained
downstairs, out of the cold but in a spot where we could talk privately. I told
her the only saving grace of this dismal experience was that it had happened
behind a screen of discretion; at least nobody would know of my rejection
when the world learned of Kate's infamous match. I had not even told Nico-
lay. Anna's response was curious: "Tell me how Kate broke the news to you.
Was she cold, or genuinely upset? Could you tell?"
I recounted the conversation in some detail as I have put it down in this
diary, perhaps with more detail about her looks because the pain was fresher
in my mind. When I finished, Miss Carroll startled me with a wholly unex-
pected reaction.
"You'll get over this in a week, Johnyour pride is hurt, and that's not all
badbut my heart goes out to that poor young woman."
I stood agape, wondering if I had explained it all wrong, or left out the
most important part.
"He's letting her do this for him," she said with great conviction. "The
impetus comes from Chase. He needs the Sprague fortune, and he induced his
daughter to do this."
When I suggested the idea more likely originated with her, and her father
was merely the bystanding recipient of good fortune, Anna Carroll shook her
head with the certitude that makes her difficult to argue with. "Kate is a
bright, ambitious girl. But Governor Chase is a grown man who knows right
from wrong. He could have stopped her from ruining her life for him. He
chose to encourage this."
"How can you be sure it wasn't her doing?"
"I know exactly the bargain he offered." She did not reveal the information
that might have been so fascinating, and I did not inquire. "John, it is really
most important that President Lincoln know how desperately Chase is trying
to undermine him. I know for a fact that Chase hopes to enlist the Senate in a
push to make Chase the dominant force in the government."
"Mr. Lincoln likes to say that when the presidential grub gets in a man, it
hides well," I told her.
"What's a grub?"
"Some sort of chigger, I think, gets under your skin and you can't get it
out." (I hate it when people ask me to explain some of the Tycoon's Kentucky
figures of speech and I don't know them.) I asked her if Chase had hinted
when and how he would make his move for this rather unlikely coup.
"It will be aimed at Seward," she said slowly, "but Lincoln will be the
target. Now that the radicals have McClellan's scalp, they want more. Essen-
tially, they want Seward and the Biairs out, Lincoln turned into a eunuch,
and Chase in charge. If you think the West Point clique around McClellan
was a problem, you may find the radicals behind Chase a real threat."
Something about the way she spoke took my mind off my pain and gave the
strange scheme weight. Miss Carroll is an intimate of the Wades, and had
been close to Chase; she ought to know whereof she speaks about radical
cabals. I resolved to tell the Tycoon about this right away, or as soon as he
can get his mind off the battle he has caused to be joined at Fredericksburg.
Of late, when we turn to talk of politics, he has been worrying about the peace
movement on one flank more than the radicals on his other flank. His prob-
lem may be more Chase in his own backyard than Seymour up in New York.
"Tell the President that Seward took the blame for ending the Chiriqui
deportation plan," she told me. Miss Carroll had been assigned to work on
that scheme for months, to assuage the worry of Northern workers that
Emancipation Day would inundate the North with blacks. "Seward elicited
an objection from the ambassadors from Central America to the colonization
there of our negroes, and wrote back to them saying the whole deportation
plan was off. Lot of people are angry at his high-handed ways. Chase and
Wade will use that."
Anna beckoned me to follow her upstairs to help on an errand, and I hoped
it was not to present her bill for pamphleteering services rendered because I
have been told to stay out of that. Fortunately, her quest was to find out
whether some secesh soldier had been identified as dead by any of our grave
details. I went in with her to one of Stanton's aides, and my presence led him
to believe the Prsdt was interested in Miss Carroll's quest, but even in that
cooperative state the lists he provided could corroborate nothing. She asked
to see our prisoner lists, looked through the B's, found nothing. Nobody was
much interested in helping, what with the battle shaping up at any moment in
Virginia.
We walked back slowly and she left me in front of the Mansion. I told her
of my gratitude for her understanding and her absolute confidence, and she
had some advice for me.
"You're too quick to condemn women, John. You call Mrs. Lincoln 'the
Hellcat,' and you may not mean to be cruel, but you are. She is a troubled
woman who needs help, not scorn. And with Kate"she saw my warning
scowl and ignored it completely"count yourself fortunate you never misled
yourself into thinking that you and she might share a life together."
To make myself feel better, I said maybe Kate had been too old for me.
That may not have been the right thing to say to Miss Carroll, because she
snapped, "Then it's for you to grow up. Stop feeling sorry for yourself, John,
you're enjoying it too much."
We walked along in silence until she added, "And when you see Kate
again, be a man. A boy can be mean, but a man should be kind. She will
learn, in good time, that the husband she chose is a disaster, and the father
she is throwing away her life for is a sanctimonious fraud. As she grows older,
Kate will see your success, and that will be all the vengeance you needand
by then, if you're like a good strong man I used to know, you won't need
any."
She said she had another idea about the prisoner lists and whirled around
to return to the War Department, leaving me with food for thought: I really
should withdraw my first-flush-of-anger oratory. Perhaps a nice note is called
for, showing real maturity and wishing her well, which will remove my sense
of petty recrimination even as it makes her feel worse. Good idea. Meanwhile,
my new philosophy: the sins of the daughters shall be visited on the fathers.

CHAPTER 28

FREDERICKSBURG I
WITH LINCOLN
Lincoln was well aware that these last two weeks of the year could make or
break the Union and his administration.
In sixteen days, if Burnside pushed back Lee and if Rosecrans pushed back
Bragg, he would be standing in the East Room at the New Year's reception,
shaking the hands of thousands of admiring countrymen, seeing in their eyes
the approval that could come only from military success. Perhaps that suc-
cess would be swiftly followed by some response to the proposal, in his annual
message, to amend the Constitution to bring about abolishment by the year
1900, with full compensation to owners. In that case, he would have to con-
sider postponing the January I emancipation edict to see if the South was
ready to end the rebellion on suitable terms. With military success, his would
be the whip hand.
Or that day that would begin 1863 might be draped in defeat. In that case,
the gloom following setbacks in Virginia and Tennessee would be exaggerated
by the holiday period if the generals he had hand-picked failed him and
brought the wrath of public sentiment down on the head of the commander in
chief. Following so soon on the rejection of his party at the polls, military
defeat would cause conservatives to demand he postpone the date of effect of
the proclamation for a different reasonlest the Northern resentment of his
radical act topple the government and defeat his entire purpose. If he acqui-
esced to that and stayed the political blow at the South, he would be ~bowing
weakness everywhere, unable to carry the day in the field or carry-out his
threat in the political arena.
So much depended on at least a modest victory somewhere. To achieve his
central purpose, Lincoln knew he had first to overcome the pervasive weari-
ness of war; now as never before, he needed the infusion of optimism that
only a military excuse for a political thunderbolt would bring.
Of that central purpose Lincoln was in no doubt. The nearly two years of
war had shaken him, drained him, aged and hardened him, but he was dead
certain that he was right in his basic idea: if the experiment of this republic
was to work, the majority had to ruleall the time, with no exceptions. That
was the essence of self-government. If a city, or state, or section that was in
the minority on any question could just pick up and go when the majority
ruled the other way, then there would be no hope for democracy here or
anywhere in the world. And if democracy could not take root in the New
World, where the people had shown they had the will to overpower kings,
then government by the people would stand revealed as an absurdity. Con-
stant subdividing would lead to anarchy, followed by a return to monarchs,
dictators, and despotism. He was certain of that in his soul.
The success of the American experiment rested on the willingness of the
minority to acquiesce in electoral defeat. True, the Republican candidate in
1860 had been the choice of a plurality and not a majority, but Abraham
Lincoln had been duly elected according to the Constitution, and was bound
by more than his oath to beat down the notion that the losers could set up
shop for themselves. He was certain that if he failed to hold the Union intact,
using its blood as its glue, not only would the dream of the nation's founders
be dissipated, but the cause of human freedom throughout the world would
be set back for centuries. The stakes in this struggle could not be higher or the
core idea clearer: upon the outcome of this war of brothers hinged the ability
of people to be their own masters.
He rolled out of bed, took up the pitcher, and poured it over his head into
the basin. That need to enforce the rule of the majority, he reminded himself,
justified bending the Constitution occasionally. That justified opposing aboli-
tion last year when such restraint helped win the war, or supporting abolition
this year when such radicalism helped win the war.
He had plunged the nation into war to put the flag back, not to put down
slavery. Last year, to have undertaken abolition would have smacked of bad
faith and weakened the cause of the Union. He had told his closest supporters
that abolition's thunderbolt would keep. Now he needed a thunderbolt to
energize and save the Union.
Certainly it took a load off his mind to be able, finally, to use that thunder-
bolt in a way that served rather than harmed the central goal: now he was in
the happy position of being able to advocate both the preservation of the
Union and an end to slavery. His previous position of promising not to strike
at slavery where it existed, merely to prevent its extension, had not overly
troubled himhe had been carrying out the contract of the founders and his
own campaign promises. But his preliminary proclamation had opened a new
vista: he was at last persuaded that his personal wish to end slavery would
advance and not retard the saving of the Union. After the disastrous elections
and the rise of Seymour and the peace movement, however, Lincoln needed at
least a modicum of military progress to be sure.
He finished dressing and straightened his hair with his fingers, ignoring the
mirror. He thought about looking in on Mary in the bedroom across the hall
and decided against it. She needed her rest, which came best in the mornings
for her, and the sight of her ashen face these days with its pursed-lipped
mouth made him sad.
He remembered back to the days in Springfield, when her women's prob-
lems that came just after the birth of Tad had ended their passion, such as it
was, and they had agreed it would be safer and more comfortable to sleep
apart. The year he ran for the Senate against Douglas, and lost, they had the
house remodeled and separate bedrooms put in. In those days she would
come in and wake him, sometimes with coffee; now he rarely saw her in the
mornings, and he worried about what went on in her troubled mind after
those late sessions with mediums and seers, or after the debilitating bouts
with the sick headaches. Mary was usually a burden now, but not always;
sometimes she was a source of strength, when he was afflicted with the hypo
and could talk to nobody else. And he would not forget that when he was an
awkward and woman-fearing young man, the well-bred Mary Todd had
helped civilize and socialize him.
On the way down the hall to his office, the President banged on Nicolay's
door; though it was not yet six o'clock, his first secretary was already half
dressed. Lincoln told him to get a horse and ride down to Fredericksburg to
see if General Burnside had finally got his pontoon bridge across the Rappa-
hannock. The damned pontoons had been delayed and Burnside would not
consider any other way of getting his men and wagons across the river.
Lincoln told his senior secretary he was worried that the general was going
to be too busy to keep the War Department informed of the attack on Lee.
"Maybe Chase was right," said Nicolay, stuffing his shirt in his pants.
"Maybe Joe Hooker would have been better."
"Burnside is better," Lincoln said with more certainty than he felt, "be-
cause he is the better housekeeper."
The expected look of puzzlement crossed Nicolay's serious face. Nicolay
was better than young Hay when it came to predictable reactions. "Do you
need a housekeeper or a general?"
"I tell you, Nicolay, the successful management of an army requires a good
deal of faithful housekeeping. More fight will be got out of well-fed and well-
cared-for soldiers and animals than can be got out of those that are required
to make long marches with empty stomachs."
"Yes, Mr. President. I'll write a pass for you to sign."
Lincoln strode to his office and wrote the pass himself: "Major General
Burnside, My dear Sir: The bearer, Mr. J. G. Nicolay, is, as you know, my
private Secretary. Please treat him kindly, while I am sure he will avoid
giving you trouble." He signed it and soon sent Nicolay on his way with an
admonition to stay out of the line of fire. Lincoln hated these days when a
battle was raging nearby and he had to depend on busy or uncaring generals
to send him news. He would likely spend the day and night at the telegraph
office, hearing nothing. If the newspapers could afford a correspondent on the
scene, so could the President of the United States.
He put his fists on his hips and stretched his long body, wishing he could
get some exercise. So much rested with Burnside, more daring than -McClel-
lan, more cautious than Hooker. He had chosen the fellow with the weird
whiskers partly because he was known to be a McClellan man, not eager to
replace Little Mac, and thus would be least likely to provoke an army coup.
Lincoln knew that Burn had had more than his share of disappointments in
life; he had even brought a girl to the altar of marriage, only to hear her say
"no" at the crucial moment; the President shook his head to clear it of doubt.
He had provided Bumside with every available man and gun, more than he
had ever done for McClellan. The Union force was said to be 170,000, more
than double the size of Lee's army and, thanks to the preceding commander,
far better equipped.
Lincoln could not put the Young Napoleon out of his mind; the ousted
general had planned to attack Lee in a place that might have had Stonewall
Jackson's division far from Longstreet's; Bumside preferred a direct assault
across the river. Was that wise? Lee surely was aware of the impending at-
tack, delayed by the damned pontoons, and might have ordered Longstreet to
dig in on the heights. Lincoln shook that thought off, too: Bumside could be
counted on to smash the rebels now, before the end of the year.
Nothing to do but wait for news from the front. He contemplated the
papers on his desk. The Sioux had risen in the West, massacring white set-
tlers; the order to hang three hundred warriors was prepared for his signa-
ture. He wrote a note to the general asking him to select only those Indians
who had actually participated in the killing of innocents in a massacre. That
way, he estimated, he would approve the hanging of only about thirty.
The North was poised for a victory. Halleck was confident; General Haupt,
the quartermaster, was equally certain of victory, and had gone down to the
front to observe the battle after promising to hurry back to Lincoln with news
of the first decisive engagement. The rebels under Lee had already been
beaten a few months ago; the Army of the Potomac had never been better
prepared for the strike that would have them eating Christmas dinner in
Richmond. Then, on New Year's Day, he would sign the proclamation free-
ing the slaves under his war power.
He looked in the outer office for Hay or Stoddard; neither was at work yet.
Lincoln trotted down the stairs and went to the front door to see if the
newsboy had arrived yet with the Intelligencer.

CHAPTER 29

FREDERICKSBURG II
NOT A CHICKEN ALIVE
General James Longstreet, on his horse atop Marye's Heights, looked
through his telescope down on the city of Fredericksburg, now being invested
and looted by Federal troops. Behind them was the Rappahannock, which the
men in blue had crossed on a pontoon bridge, taking some casualties from
Confederate sharpshooters. He could see flashes of artillery from a wide arc
facing him, as the Federals laid down one of the largest and longest barrages
of the war. The incoming balls were not doing much damage to the Confeder-
ate position, where the troops were properly entrenched, but the barrage
announced that the Army of the Potomac was massing for an assault up a
long, sloping field toward the butternut troops on the heights.
"Pete, does our artillery cover that field?" General Lee asked him.
"My artillery chief assures me, sir," Longstreet replied, "a chicken could
not live on that field when we open on it."
Never had the Confederate forces been in a more advantageous position to
punish an attacking force. On Jeff Davis's orders, Lee had ordered entrench-
ment; beyond that, a sunken road ran parallel to the expected line of attack,
providing invisible cover for defending infantry. The field guns were ready
with canister to inflict maximum casualties.
"That sure isn't McClellan over there," he observed to General Lee. They
had seen the order relieving their old adversary, replacing him with Burnside.
The inventor of the best saddle had been replaced by the inventor of the best
breech-loading rifle, and it apparently made a big difference in the way the
battle would be fought.
"In a way, I regret to part with McClellan," said Lee. "We always under-
stood each other so well. I fear they may continue to make these changes till
they find someone I don't understand."
"The men don't like digging in, sir. They think it's cowardly work, unfit for
white men. They call you 'the King of Spades'."
"My army is as much stronger for these new entrenchments," Lee said
evenly, "as if I had received reinforcements of twenty thousand men."
They would need that advantage, because the oncoming Union Army was
a sight to behold, massing as the morning fog lifted, for the onslaught up the
long hills. Longstreet did not need his spyglass to see the polished arms and
bright blue uniforms in array, battle flags fluttering, as on a holiday occasion.
"They are massing very heavily," Lee said, which Longstreet took to be his
commander's way of noting that the opposing army outnumbered the Con-
federate troops by two to one.
"If you put every man in the Union Army on that field," Longstreet re-
plied, "to approach me over the same line, and give me plenty of ammunition,
I will kill them all before they reach my line. Jackson over there may be in
some danger, but not my line."
He wondered why Burnside would be so foolhardy as to step into this trap.
McClellan would never have put himself in this position, and if he found
himself there, would have had the good military sense to swing around and
concentrate his assault on Jackson's position and then try to roll up the line.
Burnside was coming straight ahead, the whole of his army against the whole
of the Confederate line.
Maybe the Union general was acting under direct orders from Lincoln. If
Jeff Davis ever gave him an order like that, Longstreet vowed, he would
resign rather than try to force his men to commit suicide against the enemy in
its stronghold. Or maybe Burnside was acting on his own, trying to make up
for his indecision and delay at the bridge over the Antietam; whatever the
reason, the result was command stupidity on a scale never before seen in this
war.
"They're coming," General Lee said.
That was not an order to fire; Lee left such decisions to his lieutenants.
Longstreet waited until the massed blue troops came forward into the open
field, almost within range of the 2,500 men in Cobb's brigade, hidden in the
sunken road behind a long stone wall. He raised and dropped his arm, order-
ing his artillery to open fire. A sheet offlame seemed to lash down the hill and
the carnage began.
"It is well that war is so terrible," General Lee observed; "we would grow
too fond of it."
Longstreet watched the decimated ranks of blue resolutely march forward,
maintaining a steady step and closing up broken ranks with more determina-
tion than he had ever seen in battle, until they came within range of General
Cobb's muskets. A storm of lead swept through the advancing ranks from
Confederates hidden behind a long stone wall.
No army, no matter how valiant, could long maintain discipline in the face
of such crossfire. The massed muskets and artillery blasting grapeshot were
chewing up the Union front and flank, while other artillery was devastating
the rear. Longstreet thought ahead; if the Army of the Potomac kept sending
wave upon wave of men to their death, the war could be ended today; if they
fell back, perhaps a Confederate bayonet charge down from the heights could
pin the remaining Federals against the river behind them. He wanted to talk
to Generals Hood and Pickett about that. It was just possible that Lincoln
and his new general had, in a gamble against impossible odds, thrown away
the war.
"I wish," he heard Lee say, in a kind of justification of the slaughter but
also an offhand summary of his personal goal in the war, "I wish these people
would go away and let us alone."

CHAPTER 30

FREDERICKSBURG III
WITH NICOLAY
John Nicolay was frightened. He had cheerfully accepted the assignment to
come down to Fredericksburg to observe the battle and to keep the President
informed, but he had not realized the extent to which it might mean risk of
life.  He was a lawyer, not a soldier, and was willing to risk his eyesight
studying late nights for his admission to practice before the Supreme Court,
but physical exposure to enemy fire was not in his line.
The city of Fredericksburg was in Union hands but that offered no comfort
because rebel guns were in position on the heights facing the city. It was
Sunday morning, gray and foggy, but no church bells were ringing: the
churches were closed. Most of the Virginia city's inhabitants had fled, and
many Federal soldiers not at the front were busy stealing valuables from
Virginian homes. A bombardment could begin at any moment if General Lee
saw fit to destroy Southern property occupied by Federal forces. Nicolay saw
no need to stay for the shelling.
The day before, he had learned, a great battle had begun. Late Saturday
night, when the President's secretary arrived at Bumside's headquarters from
Washington, he had found it difficult to determine the outcome. The Federal
opening attack had been beaten back, and the talk was of terrible losses on
both sides, but General Burnside was undaunted, which Nicolay supposed
augured well. The secretary wondered whether he should have sent a tele-
gram to the President, who was probably famished for news, but Nicolay
could not figure out, in all the confusion and disagreement at headquarters,
who was winning. It had been hard to tell anything from Bumside's head-
quarters, located north of the Rappahannock across from Fredericksburg and
out of sight of the fighting. Better to remain silent, he had decided, than to
transmit a wild guess that might later come back to haunt him.
When the thunder of artillery woke him at dawn, he had hurried to the
telegraph operator to see what Bumside was reporting to Washington. The 4
A.M. dispatch was encouraging: "I have just returned from the field. Our
troops are all over the river. We hold the first ridge outside the town, and
three miles below. We hope to carry the crest today."
But at a pre-breakfast council of war that Bumside allowed the President's
representative to attend, a wholly different picture emerged.
"Any movement to my front is impossible at present," General Franklin
told his optimistic commander. "The truth is, my left is in danger of being
turned."
Franklin had been a McClellan favorite, Nicolay knew, and was not one of
the more aggressive generals. Eyes swung to General Hooker, but "Fighting
Joe" had as httle taste for more battle. "I lost as many men yesterday as your
orders required me to lose," he said bitterly. "There has been enough blood
shed to satisfy any reasonable man, and it is time to quit."
Nicolay had understood from Stanton that no love was lost between
Hooker and Bumside, rivals for the command of McClellan's army. Nor was
Hooker a Lincoln man"Fighting Joe" was famous for his frequent calls for
a dictator, and his visits to the Chase home. Bumside was unlikely to heed
Hooker's advice, even when it was the opposite of rash.
The crushing statement came from old General Sumner, leader of the
Third Grand Division of Bumside's force. He had been in the army when
Bumside was a child, and his reputation as ajoyous warrior was approaching
legend. Nobody doubted his courage or zest for combat; Bumside, it was said,
had ordered him to remain at headquarters the day before lest the old man
get killed leading charges.
"General, I hope you will desist from this attack," said Sumner. "I do not
know of any general officer who approves of it, and I think it will prove
disastrous to the army."
That shook Bumside for a moment, but he evidently knew what Lincoln
had appointed him to do. "Assemble my old brigade. They know me, they
will follow me anywhere. I will lead them myself in a charge against the
center, against the sunken road, and I will break Lee's line or die in the
attempt."
That struck Nicolay as foolhardy, even crazy, but he knew it was more
than bravado; Bumside made it clear he had not come this far for a standoff,
and was willing to do what none of his subordinates was ready to do. The
others disagreed with the commander's desperate plan, and Bumsid<- agreed
to reconsider; the council broke up with no decision made.
The telegraph operator came in with a message from Lincoln to Nicolay.
Five stem words: "What news do you have?" With that impetus Nicolay
summoned what personal courage he had and rode across the pontoon bridge
into the city of Fredericksburg. The town had been badly battered, the streets
streaming with men carrying the wounded on litters to the chamel houses
that the schools and churches had become. Nicolay stayed long enough to
ride through two of the principal streets and to find a place where he could
observe the heights from below. An officer lent him a small spyglass and
angrily pointed to the area in front of the sunken road and low stone wall.
Nicolay, to his horror, saw a long mound of blue bodies, with rebel soldiers
creeping among them, pulling shoes off dead men's feet.
The officer invited him into one of the larger houses, its roof partially caved
in, for a cup of coffee with some of his comrades. Nicolay asked them what he
should report to the President, hoping they would hurry and let him go
before the bombardment began anew.
"Tell Lincoln we might as well have tried to take Hell."
"We've lost more than two men to their one," said a lieutenant from Ohio.
"If we have to go up that hill again, we'll lose the whole damn army. At least
with Little Mac, we had a chance. We were on the attack at Antietam, but
Lee lost as many men as we did, and he had to leave the field."
"Lincoln doesn't give a hoot how many of us he loses," a man with a
bandaged hand told Nicolay. "He figures there's more of us than of them, and
after a few years we'll grind 'em down. Burnside's his boy, and he'll shovel us
in again today or tomorrow."
"That's not the worst of it," said the first officer. "If Bobby Lee finds out
the shape we're in, he'll send Jackson's division down here and catch us up
against the river. The whole army will have to surrender, and there won't be a
blue coat between here and Washington."
Nicolay nodded quickly and headed back across the bridge, past the heavy
artillery emplacements near the headquarters, back to Washington. He de-
cided against answering the President's telegram with one of his own, because
he could not legitimately advise whether Bumside was crazy or the rest of the
generals were, like him, afraid for their lives.

CHAPTER 31

FREDERICKSBURG IV
JOHN HAY'S DIARY
DECEMBER 14, 1862
Poor Nico got back from the front at dusk Sunday, much the worse for wear,
to have the Tycoon bark at him, "What news do you have?"
My rattled associate brought forth some isolated details about the battle
scene and some second-guessing of the military commanders by low-level
officers in a bar that was about to be blown to smithereens by rebel artillery.
Maybe he was not the right observer to send. I might not have been much
better.
At times like these, the Prsdt is especially short-tempered because he
thirsts for information. Strategy can be obtained in great dollops from Hal-
leek, who is in his office at 16th and Eye street, scratching, always scratching,
but specific information is supposed to come from the generals at the front.
Lincoln has been to the telegraph office across the street four times today, and
once in the middle of the night last night, to see if he could suck some news
through the wires.
Earlier today, the Hellcat came in to my office. Since her husband did not
want to go to church, she wanted Stod to send a carriage for Orville Brow-
ning. That defeated senator from the political disaster land we used to call
Illinois needs not so much a ride to church but a ticket to a permanent place
in government. Both Lincolns want him to stay in Washington, but it is
getting difficult to appoint the hometown crowd to more of anything.
After church, Browning came by the office to express his worry about
casualties in the rumors that were floating up from Virginia. He asked the
Tycoon about the strength of our army, considering the losses we were sup-
posedly taking.
"With Sigel's corps, which has just joined Burnside," the Prsdt told him,
"it numbers 170,000 men." He sighed and added, "But that's darkie arithme-
tic."
When his friend asked what "darkie arithmetic" was, Lincoln interrupted
his pacing to relax into a story. "Two young contrabands, as we have learned
to call them, were seated together when one said, 'Jim, do you know
'rithmetic?' Jim answered no. It's when you add up things,' said the first.
'When you have one and one and puts them together, they makes two. When
if you have two and takes one away, only one remains.' Jim replies, ' Tain't
true den; it's no good. S'pose three pigeons sit on that fence, and somebody
shoot one of dem, do t'other two stay dar? No, sar, dey flies away quicker'n
odder feller falls.'
"And Orville, trifling as the story seems, it illustrates the arithmetic you
must use in estimating the number of troops we have and the losses we are
supposed to take in battle." He obviously hoped Browning would take back
the point of the story to the worriers in Congress. "Don't believe the count of
killed, wounded, and missing at the first roll call after a battle. It always
exhibits a greatly exaggerated total, especially in the column of missing."
He may be cheering himself up, readying himself for the worst. It is true
that many of the men at first listed as missing later return, and Lincoln
carries around figures in his hat to prove it, but every attempt to prepare
himself, his friends, and the public for bad news has failed.
I refuse to join the general gloom; perhaps I lack the necessary sense of
foreboding. The Army of the Potomac, which has never scored a decisive
victory, may yet find its first on the banks of the Rappahannock.
7 P.M.: My optimism, and Burnside's, may be misplaced. I have just joined
the general gloom. No substantial word from the generals, but the first re-
ports from the newspaper correspondents are coming into the telegraph office
for censorship and Stod says that Homer Bates says it does not look so good.
Most of the press is all too delighted to emphasize the negative, however; it
makes one wonder which side they are on. I sent word to Homer to keep an
eye out for any dispatches from the Tribune. Uncle Horace's journal, at least,
did a fair-minded job at Antietam.
9 P.M.: Quartermaster General Herman Haupt, the railroad man who
makes the army's trains run on timeStanton thinks of him as a logistical
genius, and Anna Can-oil agrees, so I guess he iscame in to the War De-
partment from the battlefield and Stanton sent him over here.
"Extremely heavy losses," he reported solemnly, "with no substantial gains
of the high ground to show for them."
Lincoln took him to the map table, and Haupt laid out in some detail the
order of battle and the progress made so far. Lincoln pressed him on the
counsel that Bumside was receiving, and on his state of mind. Haupt thought
that the subordinate generals were wise in wanting to stop the slaughter, but
that Bumside was determined to make a final, decisive assault, and that he
was of sound mind and bodybrave, too; ready to lead the men up the hill.
Lincoln wanted specifics, and for the better part of an hour the quartermaster
read from his notes on the disposition of our forces and the relative strengths
of the rebel positions.
They were interrupted by Senator Henry Wilson, who came in to worry
about what a defeat would do in the Senate. He fears that anti-Seward senti-
ment is growing in the august body in which he serves, and all those who
would like to stick a thumb in the President's eye by going after his closest
adviser are looking for an event to trigger a crisis. Wilson says that a big
defeat at this point could topple the President, whatever that is supposed to
mean.
"What makes you think we face defeat?" I asked, since neither Lincoln nor
Haupt wanted to volunteer the bad news or register false optimism.
"I've just come from the bar at Willard's," he said, "Smalley of the Tribune
is there. He's fresh in from the battlefield and sent his dispatch to New York
only a few minutes ago. Says we took a terrible licking."
"Get his dispatch from the telegraph office," Lincoln said to me, and then
told Senator Wilson to fetch the reporter from the bar at Willard's and bring
him to the Mansion.

CHAPTER 32

FREDERICKSBURG v
WITH LINCOLN
Lincoln wondered why the Tribune dispatch had not yet been received at the
telegraph office. Probably there was an interruption down the line in Virginia.
Fredericksburg was only forty-five miles away, halfway between Washington
and Richmond, and a man riding hard could make that in a few hours,
beating his own dispatch.
Henry Wilson showed up with correspondent George Smalley in tow. The
President did not let on that he had been searching for his message to the
Tribune in New York, nor did he show his concern about a possible setback.
The Tribune man was in his battlefield dress, romantically grimy, smelling
of tobacco and whiskey. He was obviously embarrassed about being
dragooned into the presence of the commander in chief in such a state of
dishevelment. Smalley looked to Lincoln like an aristocrat, unlike most of the
war reporters who called themselves the Bohemian Brigade. He stood straight
and tall in front of the President, weaving just a little, when Wilson presented
him in the second-floor reception room.
"I am much obliged to you for coming," said Lincoln, pumping Smalley's
hand heartily, "for we are very anxious and have heard very little."
When Hay said his dispatch had not yet arrived in Washington for censor-
ship, Smalley looked a little guilty, hemmed and hawed, then finally admitted
that it was his plan to avoid the telegraph entirely, since he had had so much
trouble with that method of communication during the battle at Antietam. "I
sent it by special messenger on the night train to New York," he confessed,
"to make sure it got there in time."
Lincoln read the ulterior motive immediately: the correspondent wanted to
circumvent Stanton's censorship. Smalley would have kept that from almost
anyone on earth, but Lincoln had learned it was hard for most men to lie
directly to the President.
"What is the news, then?" Senator Wilson pressed. "Have we won the
fight?"
"Bumside is defeated and in a terrible plight," Smalley reported with cer-
tainty. "The worst of it is that he doesn't know it."
The President, who had learned not to accept the immediate judgments of
newspapermen, would not let himself believe that. He asked the correspon-
dent to say only what he knew from his personal knowledge, and to tell him
in general outline what had happened. Smalley, from exhaustion and the
drinks he had imbibed at Willard's after sending his dispatch, talked in a
slurred voice butLincoln was dismayed to admitwith a vast command of
the facts.
The three Grand Divisions under Hooker, Franklin, and Sumner had at-
tacked the heights, which were defended by Jackson on the right and Long-
street in the center and left. Old General Sumner had struck hard and been
repulsed with devastating losses, leaving nearly a third of his men dead or
bleeding on the field in his retreat. General Franklin attacked feebly and soon
withdrew. General Hooker had done all that bravery and devotion could do,
Smalley said, having objected at first to the suicidal charge he had been
ordered to make, but having followed his orders until the withering fire from
the entrenched positions had driven his men back. "At the day's end," Smal-
ley concluded, "we were back where we had started, thoroughly and bloodily
repulsed."
"Casualties?" asked Wilson.
"I don't say in my dispatch," the correspondent stated carefully, "but for
your private information, I should guess between twelve and fifteen thousand
men. It was a slaughter."
"I hope it is not so bad as all that," said the President. He then proceeded
to question the Tribune man in detail for more than a half hour. What were
Longstreet's defenses? How vulnerable was the rebels' present artillery com-
mand of the town and river? What were the physical condition and morale of
the Union troops before and after the fight? What were the chances of success
of another attack from each wing? What was the feeling about a renewal of
the attack among the general officers?
Smalley laced his answers with censure of Bumside, but Lincoln was care-
ful not to imply criticism of the commander in any of his questions. He also
discounted Smalley's praise of Hooker; Thurlow Weed had told him after
Antietam that the Tribune reporters were mainly Chase-Hooker men.
"Mr. President," Smalley said, when the questioning was at an end, "it is
not for me to offer advice to you, and the truth is that I am not feeling very
well at the moment and may regret my presumption later."
Lincoln waited for him to say what was on his mind.
"It is not only my conviction, but that of every general officer I saw before
and after the fighting, that success is impossible." Lincoln's judgment was
that the man was sincere. "The worst disaster yet suffered by our forces in
this war will befall the Army of the Potomac if the attack is renewed, and
unless the army is withdrawn at once to the north side of the river."
Retreat. Did the reporter know what he was counseling? What would the
country say? If Grant had listened to that despairing advice at Shiloh after
the first day, the West would be lost today.
Lincoln thanked him, giving no hint of his opinion of the advice. Senator
Wilson assisted Smalley out. Hay volunteered to get word to Horace Greeley
to treat his correspondent's dispatch the way he had a similar report of
disaster at first Bull Runthat is, by editing out the worst of the news, which
otherwise might cripple morale in the nation's largest city and feed red meat
to the Seymour forces.
At midnight, Hill Lamon brought in word that Governor Curtin of Penn-
sylvania had sent in word that he had just returned from a visit to his state's
troops at Fredericksburg and wanted urgently to see the President. Lincoln
lifted Tad off the couch in the office where the boy had been sleeping, handed
him to Mrs. Keckley, and told Lamon to fetch Curtin. He knew the Penn-
sylvanian to be a cool and sensible Union man, among the most stalwart of
the "war governors," a regular provider of troops.
Governor Curtin entered with General Haupt. "Mr. President, it was not a
battle, it was a butchery," the governor said bluntly. He recited what he had
seen in grim detail and this time Lincoln had no questions. The President,
listening, felt his control of the war and the country slipping from him.
Lincoln sat on the couch, head in his hands, breathing deeply, in no mood
to put up a brave front to General Haupt and Governor Curtin. This was his
defeat, a bloody refutation of Abraham Lincoln's military judgment, and it
would open the gates for all his enemies in the Congress and in the peace
movement to move in for the political kill. The demands in the next few days
for a negotiation to settle the war would be loud and strident, and they could
not be ignored. If the disaster worsened, if Bumside's army attacked and
failed again, if Lee counterattacked and took tens of thousands of prisoners
that would surely be the end. Everyone would say it could never have hap-
pened under McClellan, and to Lincoln the worst of it wasthat was the
truth. Even assuming the army could be withdrawn without further disaster
and the extent of the losses could be concealed for some time, the political
storm could not be averted.
He raised his red-rimmed eyes to look at Curtin, who had not realized that
his harsh recital came as the culmination of a day of hammer blows. The
governor sat on the couch next to the President, took his large hand in his,
and made a belated effort to soften the blow. Lincoln had not felt so stricken
after Pope's defeat; this was of a different order of magnitude of despair, a
wave of depression he had not felt since Willie died.
"I am deeply touched, Mr. President, at the distress I have caused you,"
Curtin was saying. "It may not be as bleak as I saidno doubt my impres-
sions are colored by the sufferings I have seen."
Lincoln nodded, not looking up. He felt the shortness of breath, the pain in
his head and chest that signaled the onset of the hypo.
"It could well be that matters will look brighter when later reports come
in," the governor added. "I wish1 would give everything I have to rescue
you and our nation from this terrible war."
Lincoln leaned back, jammed his fingers through his hair, and forced the
blackness away from him. The trick to containing the fear and grief was to
tell a story. "Reminds me, Governor, of an old farmer out in Illinois I used to
know."
He told the hog story, about the man who bought a prize hog and put it in
a pen. His two sons taunted the hog, who broke out of the pen and drove one
boy up a tree and was closing in on the other boy. The only way the boy could
save himself was by holding on to the hog's tail. "The hog wouldn't give up
his hunt nor the boy his hold," said Lincoln, animation returning to his face
in recounting the familiar story, "and after they had made a good many
circles around the tree, the boy's courage began to give out, and he shouted at
his brother, 1 say, John, come down quick, and help me let this hog go!' "
That was the hog story, and Lincoln added the point, in case anybody
missed the need for Bumside to disengage from Lee's victorious army: "Now,
Governor, that is exactly my case. I wish somebody would come and help me
let this hog go."
Curtin forced a chuckle, which Lincoln appreciated, and took his leave.
The President, slightly refreshed and determined not to slip back down,
paced the corridor for a while and asked Haupt to walk with him to General
Halleck's office. The general was sure to be there on the night of a great
battle.
At Halleck's, the President told Haupt to repeat what he had learned at the
battlefront, and to repeat the reports of Smalley and Curtin about the danger
to the troops now under the rebel guns. When the precise engineer concluded,
Lincoln said to his general-in-chief, "I want you to telegraph orders to Burn-
side right now to withdraw his army to the north side of the river."
"I will do no such thing," said General Halleck. Into the stunned silence,
he spoke again: "If such orders are issued, you must issue them yourself. I
hold that a general in command of an army in the field is the best judge of
existing conditions."
Lincoln found the situation hard to believe. There they all werein the
middle of the night, with the fate of the army and the nation hanging in the
balanceat an impasse. Lincoln made no reply to the insubordinate state-
ment by this military clerk, whose only job it was to pass along orders
couched in military language to the commanders in the field. As Lincoln had
checked his depression by force of will, he now checked his impatience. He
stood at the fireplace saying nothing, lest Halleck become a devastating wit-
ness before Wade's committee when all this was over.
Herman Haupt moved to resolve the tension. "Perhaps the situation is not
as critical as we imagine it to be," he said, pointing to the limitations of the
Tribune correspondent's view, and the relatively few people that Curtin had
spoken to. Battles, he said, had their ebbs and flows; in the view of this
afternoon's observers, the Federal forces had looked defeated, but tomorrow
might be different. At any rate, Bumside was not a rash commander, no
matter how he sounded to some of his men on this day; he could be trusted to
act in character in the end.
"What you say," Lincoln sighed, "gives me a great many grains of comfort.
Still .  .  ." Smalley had been accurate about Antietam. Curtin had a keen eye
and a good head. He walked back to the Mansion three blocks away, gulping
in the frigid air, wondering if he should intervene in the battle and order
Bumside to get back across those damned pontoons.
Homer Bates, on duty through the night at the War Department telegraph
office, looked up and saw the President in the doorway. He appeared more
haggard than usual. Bates looked to see if any late dispatches had come in
from Bumside, but found none that had not been sent to the Mansion earlier.
"Is there a message you wish to send, Mr. President?"
Lincoln sat down at Major Eckert's desk, where he had spent so much time
working on his proclamation, and fiddled with a pen for a moment. After a
while he put down the pen, rose and without a word walked out, down the
hall, down the steps and across the street to the White House.
A few hours later, just before dawn, clacking came from the headquarters
of the Army of the Potomac. Bates quickly worked out the cipher: Bumside
had decided to use the cover of a storm to withdraw his army to the north
side of the Rappahannock.
The telegrapher thought that important enough to run over to the Mansion
himself. He found Lincoln sleeping on the couch in his office, hesitated a
moment, then woke him with the news of the safe retreat. Lincoln read the
telegraph message, smiled his sad smile, patted Bates on the shoulder, and
went off to his room to go to bed.

CHAPTER 33
GET SEWARD

Anna Carroll darted under the scaffolding supporting the men at work on the
Capitol dome and found her way to the office of the Chairman of the Joint
Committee on the Conduct of the War. Ben Wade, his bulldog features seem-
ing only slightly more ferocious than usual, skipped his customary warm
greeting and announced: "Seward must go!"
She cocked her head in puzzlement: what had the Secretary of State to do
with the debacle at Fredericksburg? In her opinion, if any Cabinet officers
deserved blame, they were Chase and Stanton; those two radicals were re-
sponsible for the mistaken removal of McClellan and his replacement by an
incompetent.
"Did you see this?" Wade went on, thrusting a sheaf of papers at her. She
read the innocuous title page of the disbound government document: "Diplo-
matic correspondence of the United States, 1861." Wade jabbed a stubby
finger at a paragraph circled in red.
"This proves where Seward's heart is," the senator stormed. "Can you
imagine the gall of a man to write a thing like that at the start of the war, a
week before Fort Surnter? And then to rub our noses in it by publishing it this
week?"
Anna read the offending paragraph by Seward in a letter to an American
diplomat abroad. The Secretary of State had held in April of 1861 that Lin-
coln was not likely to force the seceding states to remain in the Union. "Only
an imperial or despotic government," Seward had written, "could subjugate
thoroughly disaffected or insurrectionary members of the state."
"That was not the Lincoln policy at the time," she said mildly. That veri-
fied what Old Man Blair had told her: only the Biairs had supported the
President in the Cabinet when the new President decided to provision Sum-
ter. If put to a Cabinet vote, there would have been no war and no Union. "I
guess the President overruled Seward and decided to defend the fort."
"Goddamn Buchananism, that's what it was!" Wade roared. "That viper
Seward, who now rubs our noses in the proof he didn't want to fight seces-
sion, has been the power behind the throne for nearly two years. And look
right heresee this drivel? This is why we haven't had a proclamation of
freedom yet, and why we probably won't have one on New Year's Day."
The sentence that enraged the senator, and surely would release pent-up
fury in the Joint Committee when it met, jumped out at her: "It seems as if
extreme advocates of African slavery and its most vehement opponents were
acting in concert," read the Seward letter of July 5, 1861, "together to precip-
itate a servile warthe former by making the most desperate attempts to
overthrow the Federal union, the latter by demanding an edict of universal
emancipation . . ."
Seward's statement was, to say the least, impolitic in equating the aboli-
tionists of the North with the secessionists of the South, blaming both equally
for bringing on the war. Anna could not understand Seward's reason for
putting all this out at this time, when the anger of the divisions within the
Republican ranks did not need further aggravation. She had agreed with
Seward's anti-abolition sentiments at the time, but at least she had the good
sense to keep her mouth shut about all that now. Times had changed; the
center of gravity within the party was shifting; one did not admit now to what
one had thought then.
"McClellan in the field and Seward in the Cabinet," said Wade, taking back
the papers and plopping them on his desk, "have brought our grand cause to
the very brink of death. Seward must be got out of the Cabinet. He is Lin-
coln's evil genius."
Anna shook her head; that was going overboard. If anything, the printed
correspondence proved that Seward's influence over Lincoln was not nearly
so great as most people in Washington believed.
Her demurral stimulated another outburst from her friend Wade. "Seward
has been the de facto President. He has kept a sponge saturated with chloro-
form to Uncle Abe's nose all the while, except for one or two brief spells."
"During which Lincoln decided to fight a civil war, and to free the slaves.
Come on now, Benyou've been talking to Chase again."
He glowered, the tucks at the corner of his mouth making him look more
pugnacious; that was the visage that made witnesses tremble. She mock-
glowered back and he settled down a bit. "Some of us pushed Lincoln into
doing the right thing from time to time," he said. "Has Stanton paid your bill
yet?"
She shook her head; she had forwarded to the War Department letters from
Edward Everett and Horace Binney, both respected lawyers, praising her war
powers pamphlet. In a more subtle move, she had placed on the President's
desk her memorial showing how his proposed emancipation edict could be
justified by a loose interpretation of the war power; it was better than any-
thing he would get from his Attorney General. But she was becoming re-
signed to the likelihood that she would not be paid until the war ended.
Thurlow Weed had steered a paying assignment to her, and somehow she was
able to make ends meet. At least, she told herself, she would not have to
support poor Salmon Chase.
"That's not why I'm here," she said. "I want you to get the committee's
attention away from this back-and-forth business between here and Rich-
mond, and focus on where the war can be won."
He did not agree. "The real war this week is right here in Washington.
Forget all your military logistics and strategy, my dear lady. Either the Con-
gress runs this country or Lincoln does. This week, within forty-eight hours,
there is going to be a showdown."
She could tell that the senator was serious, but there was a logical inconsis-
tency in his present anger at the President. "He got rid of McClellan, as you
wanted," she said. "He's freeing the slaves, as you demanded. What is Lin-
coln doing that you want to force a showdown about?"
"We're not to blame for Fredericksburg!" Wade replied sharply, and the
alacrity of his response to an accusation she had not made startled her. Then
the outline of political maneuvering began to come clear: The slaughter on
the Rappahannock was being blamed on Stanton's War Department, and on
the radicals' insistence on replacing McClellan; deservedly so. To take the
heat off themselves, Stanton and Chasewith the active cooperation of the
radical faction in Congresswere trying to direct the public dissatisfaction at
William Henry Seward. She knew Stanton to be a master manipulator who
once before had conspired with Chase to reduce Lincoln's power; Chase had
told her all about that attempted coup that might have succeeded but for
Navy Secretary Welles's refusal to go along.
Evidently Stanton and Chase had been visiting Wade, and probably Zack
Chandler and Maine's William Fessenden too. Wade and the radical Republi-
cans, embarrassed at the failure that followed their replacement of McClellan,
saw that they would soon be placed on the political defensive unless they
attacked again, reasserting their control of the war and its ultimate purpose.
This time the anti-Lincoln forces in the Cabinet were joining with the anti-
Lincoln radicals in the Congress, making the movement more formidable;
and at a time of much greater turmoil, they had chosen a target much closer
to Lincoln. The President had always been ambivalent about McClellan, but
Seward was his closest confidant and political ally.
"You think you can force Seward out?" She was certain of her political
analysis; it was now what she enjoyed most in life.
"Damn right, Anna. Billy Bowlegs is a lukewarm man. Lukewarm on the
war, lukewarm on abolition. Do you really think he'll let Lincoln go through
with the proclamation? Not on your life."
She had some firsthand experience that testified to Lincoln's genuine inter-
est in emancipation. "The President feels pretty strongly that a military ne-
cessity exists for recruiting slaves. And he has the war power."
He waved that off. "Did you read that pusillanimous Message to Congress
couple of weeks ago? Very big on oratory'we cannot escape history' and all
but when it comes to action, maybe the slaves get freed in the year nineteen
hundred. That weaseling was Seward's doing, I'm sure. Seward and Blair."
And Blair. The radical senators were going after the conservatives in the
Lincoln Cabinet. "Not Bates?" she inquired.
"The Attorney General is lukewarm, too."
The senators wanted a wholesale cleaning-out of the Cabinet, the removal
of all who opposed their views. That was an ambitious strike for supreme
power. It meant the end of the coalition of Republicans that Lincoln had put
together soon after his election. If successful, the pressure from the abolition
senators would mean that they would be in the Republican saddle and Lin-
coln would become a figurehead, his power flowing to Chase along with the
next presidential nomination.
"Who do you have in mind to replace Seward?"
"Fessenden." Wade added, "He may not know it yet. And if you tell any-
body, I'll strangle your pretty neck with my bare hands."
William Fessenden of Maine, chairman of Senate Finance, was Chase's
close friend. Cool, principled, eloquent, elegantnot roughhewn like Wade
or Chandler, he had shown himself to be every bit as tough-minded. With
Stanton and Chase in the Cabinet and some shrewd opportunist hke Ben
Butler to replace Blair, Fessenden would help the Cabinet dominate the Presi-
dent. The Senate Finance Chairman was known to favor a parliamentary type
of government, in which Cabinet members served in the Congress. Anna was
familiar with his often expressed view that votes taken in the Cabinet should
determine executive decisions.
She decided to share Wade's confidence. She liked and admired Ben, and
knew she could count on him if all others failed her, but Wade was on the
wrong side of a fight that would weaken the presidency, perhaps bring about
a division of the North, and most likely lead to a negotiated peace. That was
an outcome neither of them wanted. "You know, Ben, this is not the first time
Chase and Stanton have tried to take over from Lincoln."
He dismissed that with a shrug. "Not interested in palace intrigues. This is
fundamental to our democracy. No Presidentespecially not this one,
elected by a flukecan be allowed to flout the will of the people's Congress."
She believed that he believed what he said, and that his profound concern
for human freedom outweighed all considerations of government structure or
personal position. He was a good man with a good brain and good instincts,
but that did not put him above ambition: Benjamin Franklin Wade was presi-
dent pro tern of the Senate, and if the Senate became the preeminent force in
American government, then Wade would be running the country.
She planted her feet squarely and pointed a finger at him. "I think you're
wrong, Ben. It's for the President to set national policy." She knew that in the
overheated state of public opinion after this bloody defeat, Wade and his
powerful clique had a good chance of forcing Lincoln to accede to their
wishes: a dominant Senate might not be so bad, but she was sure that a
reconstituted Cabinet with Chase the leader would undermine the character
of the country.
He shook his head. "It does not belong to the President to devise a policy
for the country."
She was stunned at his conception of an impotent Chief Executive. "If you
force Lincoln to appoint a Cabinet to the Senate's liking, you'll cripple the
presidency forever."
"Better that than let him cripple the country," Wade replied solemnly.
"First he tried to usurp the power of Congress to wage war, and I had to put
a stop to that. You and your pamphlets, you egged him on, and now he thinks
he can decide what this war is all about. No. He's not a dictator. Congress
dictates."
"Nobody should dictate" she began, but the senator would not be inter-
rupted.
"I wouldn't mind his seizure of power if he used it to free the slaves," Wade
said, "but he's using it to keep the damned status quo. He's getting set to back
out of that proclamation, you'll seehis message last week was the signal.
Nineteen hundred, my foot! He's weak, Annaweak on the great moral issue
of our time. He thinks the presidency is a balancing act. We have to knock
him off balance, push him forward."
"You cannot get too far ahead of the country, Ben. The army won't fight
for abolition; they'll pack up and go home."
"The Union Army will fight if it's led to fight!" He stood at attention. "The
people will follow if they're led on the path of righteousness."
She put her hands on his shoulders and pushed him back to his chair. "The
people just spoke in an election. We lost, remember?"
"We lost at the polls because we've been losing on the battlefield, can't you
get that through your head? And the reason we're losing the damn war is that
we've been led by scoundrels who want to appease the slaveocracythey run
the army and they run the President."
"So now you want to run the President, you and Chase and Stanton."
"If we have to do it, Anna, then, by God, we will. Our boys have not been
dying by the tens of thousands for nothing. Lincoln has been pushed this way
and that, giving us something, giving Seward and his ilk something, as if he's
still at the Chicago convention. The politicking is over, Anna. Lincoln has to
be one thing or the other. We're going to damn well see to it that he's going to
fight this war to a finish and strike down slavery forever. No compromise."
"Who elected you, Ben Wade, to decide that the President of the United
States cannot try for compromise?" He started to reply, but she rolled on.
"You represent a minority. You have no call to demand your way or none.
That's what the Southern traitors did, and that's what Seward meant when he
wrote that the country was being whipsawed between you and them. Don't
you go get purple in the face at meI'm not calling you a traitor, I'm saying
you're just as wrong as they are."
"Young woman, you are straining the bonds of our friendship"
"Those bonds can take it, or they're not worth anything. Chase was in here
bending your ear about Lincoln never freeing the slaves, whipping you up
don't look surprised, it's not such a secretand now you're going to help him
stage a coup. This democracy cannot take that kind of strain, Ben. If you
cripple the presidency, if you make it the creature of the Cabinet or the tool
of the Congress, you'll destroy this government."
"The form of this government is not as important as the cause of human
freedom," he buried back. "If freedom continues to be denied, this democ-
racy will die. If we win this fight for the soul of this nation, then all your
concerns about Cabinets and Presidents and Congresses won't amount to a
tinker's dam."
She could not get through to him with reason, so she jabbed him where it
most hurt. "Chase's puppet, that's what everyone will call you. And they'll be
right. Chase and Stanton are using you to overturn the results of the 1860
convention and election. And you're too bullheaded to see it."
"I love you dearly," Wade said through gritted teeth. "Now get the hell out
of here and shut up about what I told you."
Had she pushed Wade too hard? He was her main congressional protector,
the source of what leverage she had with the other radicals and the cause of
her employment by Weed and Blair. She needed his friendship. She knew, too,
that Wade needed Chase's support in Ohio next month to be reelected senator
by the state legislature.
She laid a hand on his arm and he pulled it away with a curt "Don't touch
the puppet."
"Chase uses people," she warned. "Then he runs out on them."
"You don't have to warn me about him. Some causes are bigger than
individual differences."
She thought the moment had come for her to leave. "If you do go ahead
with this," she told him, "Ben Wade should not be in the lead." She did not
want the coup to succeed, but if it failed, she did not want him to suffer.
"I have Jake Collamer for that. Nobody can call old Jake a radical."
That dismayed Anna further: the radicals' assault on Lincoln's authority
was evidently well planned. If a conservative like Senator Collamer could be
drawn in, perhaps on the issue of senatorial prerogatives, and persuaded to
take a front position, the pressure on Lincoln would be infinitely stronger.
Coming after the slaughter at Fredericksburg and the national disgust with
the military and political leadership responsible, the plot to turn the President
into a figurehead could not be better timed.
She saw the consequences clearly: if Chase and Stanton, working behind
the back of the man who entrusted them with power, could lead the large
senatorial bloc into forcing Lincoln to replace his Secretary of State, the
President would be permanently crippled. If Seward's replacement were Fes-
senden, Chase's closest Senate ally, then Lincoln would be President in place,
but Chase would be President in fact.
A clear and timely warning to the Biairs in Silver Spring would at least give
Lincoln and his loyalists in the Cabinet a chance to plan a counter-coup
strategy. She picked up her large bag and slung it over her shoulder.
"This has been a very successful year for you, Ben," she told him, looking
for a way to regain favor without giving up principle. "The Homestead Act
was yours, and history will remember you as the best friend the American
farmer ever had."
"Be remembered for the Morrill Act," he growled.
"The Wade-Morrill Act is what it should be called," she agreed enthusiasti-
cally. "Thirty thousand acres to every state for every representative it has in
Congress, to endow agricultural colleges. The federal government aiding edu-
cation in America, first time, and Ben Wade's doing. What an achievement!"
"Pretty good for Chase's puppet."
"I only said that is what everybody else is going to think." She could not
leave on that half apology. "You are a great man, Ben, but when a great man
is wrong, he is greatly wrong. Think again, that's all I ask." Anna did not
trust his political judgment, but she trusted him in everything else; he would
be a friend through life even if she could do nothing for him, which was more
than she would say about any other man she knew. She kissed him an(
invited herself to dinner at the Wades' that night.
"Eat with Caroline," he nodded, "I'll be late. Tonight, right after adjourn
ment, the senators meet."

CHAPTER 34
SENATE COUP
Senator Ben Wade's considered judgment was that Lincoln meant well but
lacked backbone.
To the senior senator from Ohio, Lincoln's emancipation policy seemed to
promise immediate freedom one day, a delay to the end of the century the
next. His crackdown on traitors was fiercely proclaimed one day and carried
out languidly the next. The Old Capitol Prison and Fort Lafayette bulged
with seditionists, as Wade thought it damn well should, but the traitorous
likes of Clement Vallandigham and Horatio Seymour were permitted to hold
public office as Congressman and governor.
Worse, Wade suspected Lincoln was losing his determination to fight the
war to the finish. The President was two-faced: he would assure good radical
Republicans that no peace without union and abolition was possible, but tell
some confounded conservatives to look into the peace feelers. As a result,
Wade concluded, nobody seemed to be in command, the country was adrift,
the war was being lost by incompetence if not by design, and something
drastic had to be done.
Thus, with the army cowering on the banks of the Rappahannock and the
President's chair occupied by a man afflicted with moral paralysis, it was up
to the Senate of the United States, and to Benjamin Franklin Wade in particu-
lar, to take charge of the conduct of the war at a time of unprecedented peril.
Anna Can-oil's point about crippling the presidency had troubled him for a
few moments. But weakness in the institution of the presidency, such as it
was since Andy Jackson left the office, did not necessitate weakness in the
execution of policy set by the Congress; it simply meant that Congress would
have more to do. The senator was certain that no special "war power" existed
in the Chief Magistrate; the very thought was slavish and un-American.
Wade found his original conviction unshakable: Lincoln was little better
than Buchanan. With the Executive floundering, the Legislature was forced
to take control not just of policy but its execution. Let those of faint heart and
pettifogging constitutionality call that extreme, but when the nation's life was
at stake, extreme measures were necessary and became right. As Lincoln had
written in his most recent message to Congressthe damnable back-tracking
document setting up a postponement of the proclamation of freedom"we
must think anew and act anew, and then we shall save our country."
To Ben Wade, thinking anew meant extending the power of the Congress,
especially the Upper Chamber. When the Executive branch was gripped by
fear, the Legislative branch, with its constitutional power to advise, must
advise the Chief Executive to throw out the lukewarm men around him. The
time had come to turn to those with the passion to vigorously prosecute the
war and to end the abomination of human slavery. Wade was sure that most
members of the Senate agreed with him that Lincoln had failed. With the
army falling apart in Virginia, and Bragg and the traitor Breckinridge in
Tennessee likely to strike back up toward Ohio any moment, further delay
meant disaster.
The Senate had to exert its inherent power. The President had demon-
strated he would bend in the direction that the wind blew strongest. Wade
had backed Lincoln into a corner on McClellan, and the President had acqui-
esced and belatedly fired the pro-slavery coward. Now the time had come to
force him to toss Seward overboard.
Wade was confident his consecutive approach would work. First the army,
then the Cabinet, and finally, if need be, the Senate would replace the vacillat-
ing elected leader with a temporary dictator. Ben Wade would not flinch from
his duty: step by step, control in this emergency would devolve upon the
institution dominated by the men who represented the best instincts of the
American people.
In the high-ceilinged Senate reception room, Wade nodded to Lyman
Trumbull of Illinois, chairman of Judiciary, who called the meeting of Repub-
lican senators to order. No helpers or reporters were present. This was a
secret caucus.
Trumbull, lean, tall, with gold spectacles and a demonstrated willingness to
denounce the automatic Lincoln supporters within Republican ranks as
"courtiers" and "sycophants," was Wade's choice to take the lead. He was a
better debater than Wade, came from Lincoln's state, and made no bones
about wanting to subjugate the slavocracy. Wade recalled with satisfaction
the way he branded Breckinridge a traitor and engineered his expulsion.
Trumbull had a trick of tearing up little pieces of paper while listening, which
disconcerted those debating him.
"This meeting has been called," said Trumbull, "to ascertain whether it is
our duty to take any action with regard to the present condition of the coun-
try. As we all know, the terrible disaster at Fredericksburg has occasioned
great excitement. Many of us believe that now is the time for the Senate to
take some action to quiet the public mind."
Wade could count votes. In the Thirty-seventh Senate, Republicans held
thirty-one seats, which he divided into seventeen radicals and fourteen con-
servatives, though someold Jake Collamer of Vermont, for example, the
best lawyer in the Senatedrifted between the camps. Some senators voted
mainly on radical-conservative lines, where Wade's Committee on the Con-
duct of the War held sway; other Senate votes were influenced by sectional
pressures, East against West, and Wade also chaired the pivotal Territories
Committee. In the new Senate Chamber, the conservatives might ally them-
selves with Democrats to slow down the radical moves toward a war for
human freedom, but here in the Republican caucus, Wade held the whip
hand.
Deploying his senatorial troops like a general the Union Army never had,
Wade signaled Wilkinson of Minnesota, a born pessimist, to express his feel-
ings.
"In my opinion, the country is ruined and the cause is lost," he announced
gloomily. "Maybe the Senate could save it, but I can't see us uniting on
anything unanimously, and without unanimity we're stuck." He looked at his
colleagues in dismay, started to sit down, caught Wade's glare, then added:
"Of course the source of all our difficulties is obvious. The man who exercises
a controlling influence on the mind of the President is Secretary Seward, who
never believed in this war."
"The country is by no means lost," added Foster of Connecticut. "But no
improvement can be made with Seward in the Cabinet. The answer is to get
him out."
Not one of the conservative bloc in the ensuing discussion, Wade noted
with satisfaction, had a good word to say for the Secretary of State. Not even
Preston King of New York, a fat, waddling toady with hanging chops who
made his home in Thurlow Weed's pocket, resisted the tide in the room. Wade
caught the eye of Grimes of Iowa and indicated it was time to put in the first
resolution, one he knew was too extreme to succeed. That down-the-line
radical rose to offer a resolution "that the Senate expresses a want of confi-
dence in the Secretary of State and advises that he be removed from the
Cabinet."
Wade heaved himself out of his chair and raised his arm to call for recogni-
tion. "The way this war has been conducted is a disgrace. The President is
directly responsible and there is no blinking that away. Lincoln has placed
our armies under the command of Democratic generals and Southern sympa-
thizers, who do not believe in the policy of the government."
His direct attack on their Republican President was more than this party
caucus could swallow, he was well aware, and so was his next recommenda-
tion. But Wade pursued his strategy: by leaning hard to the radical extreme,
which happened to reflect his true opinion, Wade would shift the center of
gravity of his party over to the radical side. To take charge of the Executive,
he needed more than a slim majority of Republican senators; he had to have a
general consensus.
"What is needed now is a lieutenant general," he proposed, "of higher rank
than any officer now in service, endowed with absolute powers to crush the
rebellion and its pernicious institutions."
Wade knew that this group was not yet ready for a Republican general
given emergency despotic power, but earlier that day, over in the House,
Vallandigham of the peace movement had introduced a bill making it a high
crime for anyone to propose to "clothe any federal officer with arbitrary or
dictatorial power." This was his answer to that miserable little traitor. Wade
restrained his fury and directed his point to the matter at hand.
"I do not believe it is advisable to strike directly at the President at this
time." That, for Wade, was being the very soul of reason and patience. "How-
ever, we must tell him he must remove the evil genius of his procrastination.
Seward must go!"
As arranged, Jake Collamer of Vermont followed Wade with a less impas-
sioned speech. Collamer, at seventy, was regarded with respect and even
affection by his peers; Sumner liked to call him the "Green Mountain Socra-
tes." He was no firebrand and was known to harbor a genuine affection for
the President.
"I believe, gentlemen, that the difficulty is to be found in the fact that the
President does not have a Cabinet, not in the true sense of the word." Wade
had to lean forward to hear Collamer's reedy voice. "Yet a real Cabinet
council is traditional in both the theory and practice of our government."
Collamer reviewed the development of the Cabinet system, concluding "it is
notorious that this President has departed from that tradition. He does not
consult his Cabinet councillors on important decisions. Indeed, I understand
that he has said on occasion, 'My policy is to have no policy,' and to let each
Cabinet member attend to the duties of his own department. This is unsafe
and wrong. The Senate has a responsibility to set it right."
Bill Fessenden's turn. The Finance Committee chairman from Maine was
an inside man, seldom in the newspapers but always in the most important
Senate decisions. Wade could never warm up to the austere money expert,
who liked to think of himself as a "moderate," but he knew him to be reliable
when it came to the dominance of the Congress.
"The Senate can no longer content itself with the discharge of its constitu-
tional duties," said Fessenden. "A crisis has arrived that requires an active
interposition in the execution of the laws. I have been told by one member of
Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet"Wade and just about everyone in the room knew he
meant his friend Chase"that there is a backstairs influence which often
controls the apparent conclusions of the Cabinet itself."
Howard of Michigan interrupted. "Is the name of that backstairs influence
William Seward?"
"No name was given," said Fessenden. He preferred to remain mysterious
about his source, although Chase had been using that same word picture,
"backstairs influence," to describe Seward to most of the senators present.
"At any rate," Fessenden continued, "I have no doubt that measures must be
taken now to make the Cabinet a unityto remove anyone who does not
agree heartily with our views in relation to the war."
Wade looked for the opposition to the resolution from Seward's only sup-
porter among Senate Republicans. Preston King promptly provided it.
"As a senator from New York," said the man who, Wade suspected, would
soon rush over to Seward's house with the news of this caucus, "I must
protest against this proceeding. It is unjust, unwise, hastyand all predicated
on mere rumors. Perhaps it would be wiser to appoint a committee to have an
interview with the President."
Such a direct confrontation was precisely what Wade wanted. Orville
Browning of Illinois, considered by Wade to be a contemptible pro-slavery
friend of the President's, but without the courage to defend Seward to his
fellow senators, seconded King's suggestion.
Wade looked at Browning's ruffled shirt with distaste. The recently de-
feated senator, grubbing for appointive office from the President, would not
be missed in the Senate; he had been afflicted with fits of the constitutional
ague when it came to stripping rebels of their property. Wade believed that
even a Democrat would be better than Lincoln's resident bootlicker. He
asked Browning if his proposal of a meeting of the Senate delegation with the
President meant that he supported the retention of Seward.
Browning hastened to disavow such an unpopular intent. It was not a
matter of purpose but of seemliness. Perhaps the caucus's goal could be
achieved in a way that did not embarrass the President. "This would be war
between the Congress and the President, and knowledge of this antagonism
would injure our cause greatly in the country. However, a deputation from
the Senate to the President, as Senator Wade suggests, is in order."
Wade figured if the President's best friend in the Senate was that reluctant
to defend the Secretary of State, it meant that the radicals had Seward on the
run. But Wade wanted that deputation to have a written ultimatum to read
and to place in Lincoln's hands. That way, the Senate's point could not be
filibustered by the President with his interminable jokes.
"Let's vote on the resolution," said Fessenden.
Wade signaled no. The votes were not in his pocket for the extreme resolu-
tion, and Wade did not want to put anything to a vote that would lose. The
resolution was grossly insulting as it stood. Now was the time to let the
conservatives water it down enough to make them think they had won some-
thing for Lincoln.
"I have a substitute resolution," Ira Harris said. He had taken Seward's
New York seat in the Senate when Bowlegs moved into the Cabinet. "We
don't have to name names." To the accompaniment of Turnbull tearing slips
of paper, he read it out: "Resolved, that in the judgment of the Republican
members of the Senate, the public confidence in the present administration
would be increased by a reconstruction of the Cabinet."
That picked up wider support, but John Sherman of Ohio, who had
stepped into Chase's seat in the Senate, said he did not like it. "That could be
construed as saying we want all present members of the Cabinet out. Nobody
wants Mr. Chase to leave the Treasury. I say we march directly into the
President's office and tell him what's wrong with his Cabinet and himself."
Wade shook his head again. He wanted to go into the President's office to
present a united Republican Senate front in writing, which Lincoln could not
wriggle away from.
Charles Sumner of Massachusetts, a special hater of Seward, pleased Wade
with his prompt move to wed Sherman's march-in-there proposal to the Har-
ris resolution to remake the Cabinet. "Resolved, that a committee be ap-
pointed to wait upon the President in behalf of the senators here present and
urge upon him changes in conduct and in the Cabinet which shall give the
Administration unity and vigor." Excellent. Lincoln was directed not just to
throw out Seward, but to change his own conduct. "Unity" meant an end to
the balancing act.
"Let's have the resolution amended," added Fessenden, "to 'partial' recon-
struction of the Cabinet." That made sure Chase stayed in. The Harris and
Sumner proposals were merged and the Fessenden amendment accepted.
Wade then called for a vote, looking hard at Orville Browning, who averted
his glance.
Twenty names were read out, and twenty said "aye." The twenty-first was
Lincoln's friend Browning, who hesitated and said "aye." The twenty-third
was Preston King of New York, who owed his place to Seward and could
hardly be expected to vote for the resolution to ruin him. But King had
already slipped out of the caucus room: He would not go on record as calling
for his patron's resignation, but he could not spoil the unanimity of the
caucus with a vote against the historic resolution. Collamer recorded him as
"not voting."
Wade sighed his satisfaction; his caucus strategy had worked perfectly. In
all, twenty-eight Republican senators cast votes to direct the President to end
the coalition Cabinet and replace its conservatives with radicals satisfactory
to the senators. Never in nearly a century of American history had there been
such a bold move to shift executive power; all that remained was Lincoln's
acquiescence to the inevitable.
Browning said he would take the written resolution to Lincoln immediately
and bring back a time for the confrontation. Wade agreed to that; he thought
it would be a good idea for Lincoln to learn of the Senate's new strength and
resolve from one of his own wishy-washy friends.
"What's the matter, Henry?" Wade said to Henry Wilson of Massachusetts
as they filed out of the Senate reception room. "You look sick."
"I'm glad you and Collamer and Fessenden and Sumner are the deputa-
tion," said the worried Wilson. "That's not a meeting I want to be part of. If
Lincoln agrees, he's finished; if he doesn't agree, God knows what will hap-
pen next. Impeachment, maybe. Right in the middle of a civil war. What's to
become of us?"
Wade told him to cheer up. He had never felt more sure of himself or the
rightness of what he was doing. With more than a little gratification, he
watched Browning race down the steps of the Capitol to his carriage.
Orville Browning had often seen Lincoln looking haggard and anguished,
but never like this. In the days after Willie's death, the man was in despair,
but now he seemed driven to distraction.
"What news from our army?" the senator asked. He instantly regretted the
question, because the subject was hardly one to reassure the President.
"I don't know what is to become of it," Lincoln said hopelessly. "One
hundred and seventy thousand men, including SigeVs corps. It crossed the
Rappahannock, fought a battle with an entrenched enemy at great disadvan-
tage, and with great loss." He dug his fingers in his wiry hair. "And without
accomplishing any valuable result. Now it cannot advance, or even stay
where it is."
"Senator Wade intends to visit General Bumside soon," Browning told the
President, which seemed to deepen rather than diminish his gloom.
After a moment, Lincoln looked up at him. "Were you at the caucus?"
Browning was surprised that Lincoln knew of the secret session before-
hand. He hoped nobody had revealed his failure to vote against the resolu-
tion. He said yes, he had been there. Lincoln was evidently waiting for his
report.
"What do those men want?"
"I hardly know, Mr. President, but they are exceedingly violent toward the
Administration." Browning felt the need to explain why he had gone along
with the resolution. "What we did was the gentlest thing that could be done.
We had to do that or worse."
He recounted the details of the secret caucus without minimizing the hos-
tility of the senators toward Lincoln which was being directed through
Seward. It pained Browning to deliver this harsh news to Lincoln in his
current state of anguish, but the President had a right to know the force of his
party's move against him. Browning concluded with a reading of the demand
of the Senate Republicans to meet with Lincoln at once "for the purpose of
getting him to change his policy and to reconstitute a portion of his Cabinet."
One purpose, two actions.
"They wish to get rid of me," Lincoln said bitterly, "and I am sometimes
half-disposed to gratify them."
"Some do, that's true, but"
"We are now on the brink of destruction." Lincoln sat forward, hands
limply hanging over his knees, staring at the floor. "It appears to me the
Almighty is against us, and I can hardly see a ray of hope."
This was no time for Lincoln to sink into the hypo. If the President took
that familiar emotional plungeand it seemed to Browning that his friend
was already on the way down into that emotional morassthat would take
him out of action for at least three days. Lincoln could not afford three days
of despair and numb resignation while the Senate seized his power.
"Do not let them drive you from your post," Browning told him. That was
what the senators, led by Wade and Fessenden, secretly urged on by Chase
and Stanton, were trying to do. "To relinquish the helm now would bring
upon us certain and inevitable ruin." He did not add what it would do to his
own hopes for appointment to the Supreme Court.
Did Lincoln, in his present state of mind, understand the danger? "Those
men," as the President defensively called them, were staging a coup. They
were trying to drive him out of the presidency, and Lincoln's only response
was to say he was half-inclined to let them do it.
Browning was sure he knew the cause of it all. By appeasing Wade and his
crowd with an emancipation proclamation, the President had won no sur-
cease of radical pressure; at the same time, the attempt to placate the left had
been rebuffed by the electorate. Now the same men, abolitionists he had
appeased, were demanding more. "You ought to have crushed the ultras last
summer," Browning told him. "You could have done it then and escaped
these troubles."
Lincoln looked up at him in such visible pain that Browning was compelled
to stop telling him how wrong he had been. The President did not need
political instruction or recrimination at this point. Rather, he needed plain
sympathy. "But that is past. Let us be hopeful," Browning said, hand on his
friend's arm, "and take care of the future. Mr. Seward appears now to be the
especial object of their hostility." Lincoln nodded numbly. "I believe Seward
has managed our foreign affairs as well as anyone could have done," Brown-
ing went on, an opinion he knew he had failed to express in the caucus. "Yet
some of them are very bitter upon him." He had to add, "And some of them
very bitter on you."
"Why will men believe a lie," Lincoln cried, "an absurd lie that they could
not impose upon a child?" He seemed not to be able to imagine why the
senators held the conviction that Seward exercised a malign influence over
him. "They cling to it and repeat it in defiance of all evidence to the con-
trary."
Browning felt it would be unkind to state the obvious: that the senators
based their belief of Seward's malign influence over him on the testimony of
Salmon Portland Chase, repeated over and over again, substantiated by Ed-
win Stanton. Chase was the instigator; if Lincoln did not know it, Browning
was not going to be the one to break the news that a viper was nestled in his
bosom. Certainly Lincoln must know it; the man was simply not strong
enough, under the battering of the war, to admit the duplicity of Chase to
anyone, including himself.
Worse, Lincoln seemed to miss the point. The supposed belief held by some
about the "malign influence" was not the problem; that was merely the device
that Lincoln's attackers were using to get at the President himself.
Browning rose to leave. Lincoln did not get up. He asked the Pngident:
"You will see the deputation of senators?"
"Not right away. Tomorrow night."
"Seven o'clock, then. Lincoln, I hope I have not distressed you by the
account of the proceedings of the caucus. It is important you know the truth
about the senators' state of mind."
"I don't want to talk about it. Maybe we can just keep things along."
"You can't keep them along," Browning told him. "The Cabinet will go to
pieces."
"I have been more distressed by this," Lincoln said, at the end of his rope
not coming to grips with the danger, "than by any event of my life."
Browning bade him good night and left feeling helpless to prevent thi
destruction in store.

CHAPTER 35
YOUR CONSTITUTIONAL ADVISERS
Lincoln was startled by Nicolay's hand on his shoulder. "I knocked, sir, but
you didn't hear. Senator King is here, with Secretary Seward's son, Freder-
ick."
"What time is it?" He had dozed at his desk, not a habit with him, and he
felt a clutch of guilt at escaping to sleep in the face of adversity. The gaslight
was on; it was still night. "News from the front?"
"Ten o'clock, sir. No news from Burnside's headquarters, all quiet there. I
told Preston King and Fred Seward you were about to retire for the night, but
they said it was urgent. I can tell them to come back in the morning."
Lincoln rubbed his face, pushed his fingers through his hair, started to rise,
then sat back again. "Send them in."
Seward's son was a serious-minded soul, with little of his father's sprightii-
ness and self-assurance, but Lincoln liked him. He wished his own son Robert
wanted to work closely with his father, but all that young man wanted was to
get into uniform. He envied Seward for being able to weather these storms
with his son at his side as Assistant Secretary of State. Other than Thurlow
Weed, there were few men William Henry Seward could trust. Why did such
a good man attract such a swarm of bitter enemies?
Pasty-faced Preston King was out of breath. Father Blair wanted King to
replace Stanton at the War Department, and was pressing hard for such a
switch, but that would tip the fine balance in the Cabinet over to the conser-
vatives. Besides, Lincoln relied on Stanton as a lightning rod for criticism of
military affairs, and never so much as now. Orville Browning had already
reported to Lincoln about what had happened at the Senate caucus; what was
King so excited about?
"I have just come from Secretary Seward's home," Senator King puffed,
"where I told him of the perfidious action of my fellow senators."
Seward would surely keep cool about it all, Lincoln assumed; the Secretary
had long since grown accustomed to the hostility of his fellow Republicans.
"And what did he say?"
"My father said that in view of the current misfortunes," Seward's son put
in, "the senators were thirty for a victim. He said he was not going to let
them put the President in aTalse position on his account."
Lincoln nodded; Seward was like a rock.
"He immediately wrote out his resignation," said King, "and told me to
bring it to you." The senator handed the paper to Lincoln.
"He told me to submit mine as well," said Frederick Seward.
Lincoln was stunned. Just when he needed most the people he could trust,
the Cabinet member most trusted felt it a point of honor to remove himself.
Maybe, like Lincoln, Seward was half-inclined to oblige his enemies. He read
the paper: "Sir, I hereby resign the office of Secretary of State, and beg that
my resignation may be accepted immediately."
There it was, in Seward's hand, but Lincoln could not grasp the import of
what he read. "What does this mean?" he asked the two men.
"It means that he believes he can serve you best," said Senator King, "by
going home, and taking some of the poison out of the air."
A fresh wave of desolation washed across Lincoln's general distress. He
needed Seward's presence and counsel, especially now; he had come to trust
the New Yorker as nobody else over the past eighteen months; after the rough
beginning, they had worked out a relationship of mutual loyalty that could
not be replaced. He would not permit the Secretary of State to quit aity more
than he would permit himself the luxury of standing aside.
Lincoln unwound from his chair, picked up his tall hat, and signaled to the
others to follow him. Marshal Lamon fell in step behind as they headed
across Lafayette Park to the Seward home.
William Seward was standing in front of the fire, elbow on the mantel,
cigar in hand, making an effort to look his usual imperturbable self.
"What does this mean?" Lincoln repeated, holding out the resignation.
"It's to the point, and should be self-explanatory," Seward said.
Lincoln could see that his Secretary of State was inwardly in turmoil but
was determined to present a faade of calm self-sacrifice. Not even New York
politics, which Lincoln was prepared to concede were the most fractious in
the nation, prepared a man for the sort of relentless vilification Seward had
been taking. The President knew what it was to be patronized, held in con-
tempt, dismissed as a bumpkin elected on a fluke; but Seward was seen as
smart and sophisticated and evil by his rivals, which made him preeminently
an object of hatred.
"Frankly, Lincoln, it will be a huge relief to be freed from official cares."
"Ah yes, Governor, that will do very well for you," Lincoln said, "but I am
like the starling in Sterne's story. 1 can't get out.' "
Seward smiled tightly at Lincoln's literary reference; the President had
read the story at Seward's suggestion. Lincoln could talk in a personal code
like that with his Secretary of State; nobody else could supply that kind of
intellectual intimacy.
"That," said Seward, pointing to the paper Lincoln held, "frees you from
all embarrassment. It is a weapon you can use as you see fit, or be your peace
offering to Senator Wade and his ever thirsty friends."
"I cannot accept this," Lincoln told him.
"You must. In my judgment, I am more an albatross around your neck
than a help at this point. It is time to go. Frederick, look to the packing."
Lincoln did not try to argue. He was not reacting quickly anymore and
needed time to think it over, just as Seward needed time to cool down. The
trouble was that enough time was not available for deliberation or the natural
ebbing of a man's anger. Events were crowding in at the worst moment for
decisions. At this time, the commander in chief should be devising a way out
for Bumside and the Army of the Potomac; and on the political front, the
nation's political leader should be concerning himself with a way to contain
the hurricane of public indignation certain to come when the still-censored
correspondents made known the terrible story of Fredericksburg and its four-
teen thousand boys lost for no gain. But Lincoln had no chance to marshal
his thoughts. His instinct was to hold his Cabinet together.
Outside the Seward house, the President was surprised to find a carriage
waiting, the horse breathing puffs of vapor into the December air. Father
Blair was in the back, motioning Lincoln and Lamon in. There was no room
for the corpulent Preston King, so they left him behind.
Lincoln was not surprised at the Old Man's presence. The Biairs had a
network to alert them to high-level machinations, and Blair knew that Lin-
coln valued his judgment.,
"What would your Jackson have done?" Lincoln grunted, jamming himself
in the carriage seat and pulling the blanket across his lap.
"If confronted by a congressional challenge?" The elder Blair was certain:
"Same thing he would have done with anybody who challenged his authority
within the party. He would have shown the senators the door, told them to go
straight to hell. That's what Andy Jackson would have done."
But President Jackson had not served in the midst of a civil war, losing
battles on top of losing midterm elections. How would Old Hickory act in
circumstances that afflicted Lincoln now? As if reading his thoughts, the Old
Man added, "Of course, times are different now. You don't have the luxury of
telling off the radicals. You have to outmaneuver them. Seward quit just now,
didn't he?"
Lincoln nodded confirmation. The Biairs were no friends of Seward, with
the roots of their political enmity running deep through the years, but they
had been on the same conservative side of late, and in politics one's useful
friends are one's current friends.
"I thought he would," Blair nodded, "he's too damn proud. But it will help
you in the counterattack."
Lincoln made himself look interested. Although he was deeply troubled at
the prospect of the loss of the key member of his coalition, and heartsick at
the loss of a man who had become a confidant, he had to think ahead.
"First, take McClellan back to the Army of the Potomac." When Lincoln
did not reject that advice out of hand, the Old Man continued: "We must look
to the Army as a great political as well as war machine. The soldiers are to
give us success in the field and at the polls. McClellan is dear to them. He can
bring them to the support of the country and to you."
Hire McClellan again? After Burnside's failure? What a colossal admission
of error that would be, making the President appear hopelessly indecisive,
weakening him when he most needed strength. But the older Biair's counsel
was usually sound; Lincoln did not know what to think.
"After that, get rid of Stanton. He has aligned himself with Chase and the
ultras. Replace him at the War Department with Preston King, or, if you
need a Democrat, John Dix."
Everybody was remaking his Cabinet, including members of the Cabinet
and their families. Ultras like Chase wanted it remade their anti-slavery way,
conservatives like Blair wanted it remade on a "Union as it was" basis. Lin-
coln wishedvainly, he now fearedthat he could keep the Cabinet as it
was. Up to now, he had been able to maintain control by playing each group
against the other, all in his sight, easily watched, in balance. Now it seemed
impossible to hold that position, with the country in an uproar and more bad
news on the way; one side or the other had to triumph.
If the victors were Chase and Wade, they would effectively take over the
government and put in somebody like General Hooker as dictator. If it were
the Biairs and Seward, the same thing might happen in the other direction,
with "McNapoleon" as dictator. Either way, if the momentum to break up
the coalition became unstoppablewhether pushed by the senators led by
Wade, or by the Biairs and others in their suggested counterattackthe result
would be an end to civilian rule. That was as bad as an end to majoritl;rule; it
would mean that democratic self-government was indeed an absurdity, that
the American experiment had failed. The bottom was out of the tub, the dirty
water slopping over everything.
"Pardon my zeal," said the elder Blair as the carriage drew up in the snow
in front of the Mansion. "It is love for the cause and you. No selfish prompt-
ings."
Lincoln took that with a grain of salt. Father Blair never plotted any
strategy without considering how it could help his two sons.
Nicolay and Hay were waiting at the door. Lincoln thanked the Old Man
for the advice, bid him good night, and went inside with Lamon. He felt
bone-wearily alone. Nicolay had something for him to sign about putting off
until after Christmas the execution of the Indians who had led the Minnesota
uprising, and Hay had something about an order supposedly issued by Gen-
eral Grant about expelling all Jews from the area of his command. It was past
midnight. He waved them away and stumbled upstairs, Lamon behind him.
He stopped on the landing, hand on the wooden railing.
"I have a white elephant on my hands." That did not express his travail
vividly enough. "I have a fire in my front and in my rear."
"Richelieu," said Lamon, a secret student of history. "It was said of him
that he was the first man in Europe, but no hero in his own country."
"Far from it!" Lincoln argued, figuring he had it much worse than the
French cardinal. "Richelieu never had a fire in his front and rear at the same
time. He had a united constituency, which it has never been my good fortune
to have." His own constituency was the United States, riven before he took
office; his specific voting constituency was the Republican Party, of which the
abolitionist half wanted to force his resignation and the other half was allied
with the "Union as it was" Democrats. Cardinal Richelieu never knew what
real trouble was.
He trudged up the stairs feeling sorrier for himself with each step. "This
improvised vigilance committee to watch my movements and keep me
straight," he said, the picture of Ben Wade's angry-bulldog face in front of
him, "appointed by Congress and called the Committee on the Conduct of
the War, is a marplot. Its greatest purpose seems to be to hamper my action
and obstruct the military operations."
Now Wade, the chief marplotter, would go down to Fredericksburg and
interview Bumside. Would the general admit that the frontal assault was his
own idea, not Lincoln's? Probably. Bumside was good about accepting re-
sponsibility, which meant that Lincoln could not blame him for anything and
would have to treat the disaster as an unavoidable accident. But the country
would not hold still for that.
He hoped to find cessation of despair in sleep. This was no time for the
hypo to descend on him, Lincoln reminded himself, not with the Senate
coming down on his head the next evening. "This state of things shall con-
tinue no longer, Hill," he said with more assurance than he felt, "I will show
them at the other end of the Avenue whether I am President or not."
But Seward had resigned and would have to be replaced. The Senate would
confirm only the nomination of one of the ultras to head the State Depart-
mentthe unctuous Sumner, probably, or that cold fish Fessendenand that
would mean the end of his coalition, followed by a general smashup.
Who could govern this country then? A military dictator was a solution as
bad as the problem itself. What new coalition, what political deal? A thought
crossed his mind that perhaps he should stop courting the radicals and reach
out in the opposite directionnot merely to the conservative Republicans
and War Democrats, but beyond them to the Peace Democrats. Perhaps he
could make some sort of an arrangement with Horatio Seymour in New York
to take the anti-war pressure off now in return for an orderly transfer of
power later.
He paused with his hand on the doorknob of his bedroom. He still had a
card or two to play. His support in the presidential election of 1864 was one;
if he could not be king, he could be Warwick, the kingmaker. The Emancipa-
tion Proclamation was another card; if the radicals deserted him, or tried to
seize his power, he could postpone the edict in return for support elsewhere
on continuance of the war. Maintaining the Union came before everything
the slaves, his second term, the lives of tens of thousands of soldiers, every-
thing. Whatever he would do must be done with that goal fixed in his mind.
A dramatic political deal across partisan lines began to take shape in his
mind. For that, he needed the shrewdest deal-maker he could find, a man
intimately acquainted with the state of New York, and someone who could
keep a secret forever.
"Weed," he said aloud. "Hill, I want you to tell Nicolay to send for Thur-
low Weed in Albany."
"Wasn't he on his way back to London?"
Lincoln nodded, and said, "But he's still in Albany. First thing tomorrow,
send for him. Not directly from me, but in confidence through Nicolayhe
knows how."
A few weeks before, Seward had intended to send Weed abroad again to
help keep Britain and France from recognizing the Confederacy. The editor
had packed his bags and gladly booked passage to London, but Greeley and
his radicals had raised the roof about "Seward's wirepuller" abroad, which
forced Sewardwho had sensed impending weaknessto rescind the assign-
ment. Thurlow Weed, grumpy about that rebuff from the same Republicans
who lost the state of New York because they wouldn't listen to his advice, was
still in New York.
Lincoln thought he might get Weed to prevail on Seward to stay. At the
same time, perhaps the old wirepuller had a private wire of communication
into the Seymour camp through the Democratic boss, Dean Richmond.
Those two were not above doing a little business together.
Lincoln's hopes, rising at that thought, sank again. Weed could not get
down to Washington before the confrontation with the senators. At best, even
if he came and agreed to act as agent in a desperate scheme, what Lincoln had
in mind was a long-range answer to what was an immediate emergency.
Lincoln dreaded the meeting with the senators scheduled for the next eve-
ning. He had no powerful arguments, could call no surprise witnesses, and
faced a hostile jury. The President of the United States could merely listen,
and delay, and let the prosecution take its time making the case. Maybe then
he could come up with an idea for the defense.
He bade Lamon good night. He had long since given up attempts to dis-
suade the bodyguard from sleeping at his door. Lincoln slept badly that night
and wasted most of the next day worrying.
William Pitt Fessenden of Maine followed Jacob Collamer of Vermont into
the presidential office promptly at seven in the evening, followed by Trum-
bull, Grimes, and Wade. Sumner made his entrance breathlessly a moment
later.
At the President's cordial invitation, the deputation from the Senate Re-
publican caucus sat themselves in the wooden armchairs around the long
black walnut table in the center of the room. Fessenden noted the disarray of
the office: maps and papers piled on the President's desk and on the sofa
nearby. He fumed; that was not the way the nation's principal executive office
should look. Then again, the present occupant was hardly an executive.
The President greeted each of them with what Fessenden thought was his
usual urbanity. The senator counted Lincoln as a shrewd if limited lawyer
and put no credence in the newspaper folderol about "Honest Abe," the
country bumpkin. He counted on the President's good sense and practicality,
especially in light of his seriously weakened position in the country, to resolve
the crisis without undue acrimony. Lincoln's recognition of the locus of real
power was painful but necessary if the Cabinet was to be remade and the war
policy reset.
Collamer solemnly read the resolution that the Republican caucus had
passed the night before. "The theory of our government is that the President
should be aided by a Cabinet council," the Vermonter intoned, "and that all
important public measures and appointments should be the result of their
combined wisdom and deliberation."
Lincoln's eyebrows rose slightly, as if that theory was new to him. Fes-
senden was aware that such a reading rested on a brief discussion at the
Constitutional Convention, a century before, of a privy council. Against that
theory was the fact that the founders had put nothing about a Cabinet in the
Constitution, and no presidents had heretofore been bound by majority votes
of their principal aides. On the contrary, the tradition of arguing advisers was
set by George Washington, who liked the creative tension that developed
when he balanced Hamilton against Jefferson.
But such diversity was disruptive in wartime. In Fessenden's view, the
American system of government was flexible enough to take the change from
an advisory board to a directory board right now. Traditions had to have a
beginning, and there was no time like a civil war to start one. In his eyes,
much mischief could have been avoided if the founders had stuck to their
original intention of having Congress appoint the Executive.
Fessenden watched Lincoln listen impassively to Collamer's unity charge.
"The Cabinet should be exclusively composed of statesmen who are the reso-
lute, unwavering supporters of a vigorous and successful prosecution of the
war." It was well known that Seward was lukewarm; he had to go.
"In the present crisis of public affairs," Collamer concluded, with all the
weight of the united majority party of the Senate behind his words, "the
Republican senators of the United Statesidentified as they are with the
success of your administrationbelieve that changes in the membership of
the Cabinet should be made. This will secure to the country a unity of pur-
pose and action."
Lincoln made no response. He sat in his chair at the end of the table,
waiting for more.
Since the President seemed immobilized, Fessenden took the floor. He ex-
pressed the confidence of the Senate in the patriotism and integrity of the
President, and disclaimed any wish on the part of the senators to dictate to
him with regard to the Cabinet. He felt that such a disclaimer would make
the fact of their dictation more palatable. Fessenden had no wish to unneces-
sarily humiliate a man who was, after all, being forced to give up a significant
part of his powers.
"We are your constitutional advisers," he reminded the President. He was
on unassailable ground with that; little could be done in appointing anyone to
any executive office against the advice and consent of the Senate. "We claim
the privilege laid down in the Constitution to tend you our friendly counsel
when, in our judgment, an emergency of sufficient importance renders it
necessary."
Now to the point. "A belief exists that you do not consult the Cabinet as a
council. In fact, it is well known that many important measures are decided
by you without the knowledge of its members."
He awaited a response on which he could build an argument; Lincoln just
looked back at him. Fessenden became more specific: "It is believed that the
Secretary of State is not in accord with the majority of the Cabinet. In fact,
we believe he exerts an injurious influence upon the conduct of the war. Such
is the common rumor." That was a grave charge to make in the midst of a
civil warhe had given "injurious influence" much thought, short of imput-
ing treasonbut it did not get a rise out of the President.
"The war is not sufficiently in the hands of its friends," Fessenden said with
greater severity, hoping to get through the seeming numbness of his target.
"You have systematically disgraced every anti-slavery general officer in the
Army. General Frtmont, General Hunter are but two. It is time to change
this state of affairs, and to let the war be conducted by its friends."
He knew he was making an effective case. The other senators were as one
with him as he attacked the President to his face, but with the utmost respect
and civility. "Let us face it, Mr. President, we are going to get no help in
waging this war from the Democrats. General McClellan has been used by
them for party purposes, and is even now preparing an attack on us in the
court-martial of Porter"
The mention of McClellan seemed to wake up Lincoln. With the immedi-
ate subject no longer Seward, the President rose and produced a large bundle
of papers that was evidently his correspondence with the deposed general.
Taken aback, Fessenden allowed Lincoln to develop the case, which was of
great interest to Wade. That, he soon realized, was a mistake.
For close to half an hour, Lincoln read from this correspondence, showing
how McClellan had been sustained by the government to the utmost. Fes-
senden knew what Lincoln was doing: changing the subject and pretending
the attack was on his dealings with his already dismissed general rather than
with his Cabinet. The President went on and on, defending a position which
was not under attack.
Senator Sumner at last interrupted to refocus on Seward. He complained
about the Secretary of State's correspondence. "He has subjected himself to
ridicule in diplomatic circles at home and abroad," charged the chairman of
the Foreign Relations Committee. "He has uttered statements offensive to
Congress and has spoken of it repeatedly with disrespect in the presence of
foreign ministers. He has written offensive dispatches which you, Mr. Presi-
dent, could not possibly have seen or assented to."
"It is Seward's habit to read dispatches to me before they are sent," said
Lincoln mildly, "but they are not submitted to a Cabinet council, that's true."
"What of this infamous dispatch of July the fifth, of last year, in which"
"I just don't recollect that one," Lincoln said, which Fessenden thought
unbelievable; Seward's insulting equivalence of "abolitionist" with "secession-
ist" was hardly something he would forget. For the better part of three hours,
the meeting dragged on, with the senators making the same basic accusation
that the Cabinet was divided, and that Lincoln had to fire the lukewarm
membersand Lincoln ducking, changing the subject, arguing obliquely,
playing for time.
Fessenden was certain that everyone in the room, including the evasive
Lincoln, knew that the Senate's information was correct. It had been pro-
vided by Treasury Secretary Chase, who ought to know because he sat in the
councils that were divided and had reported unequivocally that Lincoln over-
rode and often ignored the Cabinet's advice.
"You know why the Republican Party lost the election last month, Lin-
coln?" The harsh voice was Wade's. "I'll tell you why: you placed the direc-
tion of the war in the hands of bitter and malignant Democrats."
"That reminds me of a story," Lincoln began, but Ben Wade was having
none of that.
"That's all it is with youstory, story, story!" Wade rose and leaned across
the table to look Lincoln in the eye. "You are the father of every military
blunder that has been made during the war. You are on your road to hell, sir,
with this government, by your obstinacy. You're not a mile off the road to hell
this minute!"
"A mile," said Lincoln softly. "Senator, that's about the distance from here
to the Capitol, is it not?"
The attempted witticism drew no laugh. Wade snorted that the meeting
was a waste of time, grabbed up his hat and cane, and slammed the door on
his way out.
To the others, in the ensuing silence, Lincoln dropped his attempts at
humor and said, "I will examine and consider very carefully the paper you
have submitted. I want to express my satisfaction with the tone and temper of
the committee."
The President was in trouble and he knew it, Fessenden judged. Wade
should not have blown up, but that was Wade, and Lincoln had successfully
provoked him. The Senate had made its case forcefully; Lincoln had stalled.
Now the next move was up to him. Fessenden was hopeful that the rumors of
Seward's resignation were true; that would demonstrate the party's power
while saving the President's face.
Fessenden left with the others, gratified at a good night's work changing
the nature of the relation between Congress and the President. Lincoln was
proving to be a tougher bird than he had thought. The President gave you
nothing, not even a loss of temper, to help your case. But this would be
decided by the application of power, not argument, and the senators had the
upper hand. At the next meeting, which Fessenden supposed would be the
next night, the surrender of autocratic power would have to be tendered, and
it  would be  graciously  accepted.  The  Presidentsoon to be primus inter
pares, first among equals, the Chairman of the Council of State, but no longer
Chief Executivewould be treated with all due respect by the men who had
stripped him of misused power.
George Smalley, at the New York Tribune office in Washington, had not felt
so frustrated since he could not get his copy filed from Antietam.
"Seward has resigned, I'm sure of it," the correspondent fairly shouted at
Adams Hill, the bureau chief, "and the whole Cabinet is splitting up. And we
cannot move the story?"
"Telegraph censorship," said Hill. "Stanton is treating it like news of a
battle."
"But the senators were in with Lincoln tonight telling him how to set up
his Cabinet. The Administration is in crisishell, in extremis. They're ad-
ministering extreme unction. Greeley will break out the champagne when he
hears of Seward quitting. It's been his fondest wish for years."
"I've been at the War Office, the telegraph room," said Hill wearily. "I
argued with Eckert. I told him this is not what military censorship was
supposed to do, that this was political newsbut when Stanton says no, it's
no. They will not pass it."
Smalley did not know who was worse, the censors in Washington or his
editor in New York. A few days before, his exclusive story about the debacle
of Fredericksburg had been at first softened by the censor, then finally killed
in New York. The Tribune editornot newsman Sydney Gay, but the pohti-
cian-editor Horace Greeleyhad been at the forefront of the clamor for
McClellan's scalp and could not bring himself to print a heart-stopping report
on the disaster that had befallen his replacement.
"I'll take the story up on the train," Smalley volunteered. "The govern-
ment is coming apart. At least Sydney Gay should know about it. Maybe he
can talk Greeley into running something. This isn't our fault."
"They know about it in New York already, I'll bet," said Sam Wilkeson,
another Tribune reporter who had sauntered in. "Seward probably sent word
up last night. He'd tell Thurlow Weed right away."
"Why hasn't it been in the paper, then?" Smalley wanted to know. Some
newspaper would be interested; if not the Tribune, then Bennett's Herald.
Wilkeson had a theory about that. "Soon as word gets out, stocks are going
to drop," said the worldly reporter, "and the price of gold is going to shoot
up. Lot of money can be made by people in the know on the news of an
upheaval in the Cabinet. And if I know Seward and Weed, they're cashing in
right now."
CHAPTER 36
ARRAIGNMENT

Chase had been given a full report from Senator Bill Fessenden, whom he
trusted completely, of the confrontation between the Republican senators and
Lincoln. He had heard from Stanton that the New York Tribune correspon-
dent was trying to telegraph to Greeley the news of the resignation of Secre-
tary of State Seward.
The Treasury Secretary had good reason to be pleased. The snowball he
had given the first push to was gathering speed and weight. Seward was
already out, and the senators were demanding moreit would not be long
before Blair and Bates volunteered to step down, and finally it would be
possible to force out Navy Secretary Welles, who seemed to put personal
loyalty to the President before all common sense.
At that point, Chase was certain that with Stanton's help he would be in
effective control of the Cabinet. That newly unified and rejuvenated Cabinet
council would, by majority vote, determine the national policy. From there to
the Republican nomination and the Presidency were only a few short steps.
The nation would at long last be in firm and capable hands. The precedent of
a council wielding executive power did not trouble him; as President, Chase
would make sure to appoint as department heads those of like minds, who
would reflect his own vision.
He was not surprised to receive the message from George Nicolay that the
Cabinet was being called into extraordinary session at ten-thirty that morn-
ing. In the future, he was certain, Cabinet meetings on all important matters
would be the order of the day. Lincoln, put in his proper place, would no
longer be able to take action without the approval of the nation's governing
council.
Chase showed up promptly and was gratified to see the Secretary of State's
place empty. Chase prepared his face to greet any seeming revelations of news
with innocent surprise.
"What I have to communicate," said Lincoln, looking more forlorn than
usual, "should not be the subject of conversation outside this room."
The President reported to his colleagues that he had first received Secretary
Seward's resignation, and had then been visited by a committee of senators.
"While they said they believed in my honesty, they seemed to think that when
I had in me any good purposes, Mr. Seward contrived to suck them out of me
unperceived."
Montgomery Blair asked the President if Senator Wade and the committee
had been looking for any more scalps beyond Seward's. Lincoln said no.
"Some not very friendly feelings were shown toward one or two others," the
President allowed, and Chase knew that specifically included Blair, "but no
wish that any but Seward should leave."
Lincoln then read aloud the secret paper left by the Republican senators
calling for a unified Cabinet pledged to vigorous prosecution of the war.
Chase knew it almost by heart; he and Fessenden had gone over it often
enough, tempering Wade's fulminations until this reasoned document had
emerged.
"A plural Executive is really not our system of government," Bates offered,
but Chase and Stanton frowned him silent.
"What sort of mood were these senators in," Montgomery Blair wanted to
know. "Angry?"
"Earnest and sad, I should say," Lincoln answered with what Chase con-
sidered an earnest sadness of his own. "Not malicious or passionate." That
was not what Chase had heard about Wade's remarks from Fessenden. "See
here," Lincoln added fervently, "I don't want any of you to take this as a hint
to retire also. To be frank, I cannot afford to lose you. I don't see how I can
get along with any new Cabinet, made of new materials."
Chase was almost embarrassed for Lincoln, at the way the man clung to
the Cabinet he had begun with, as if the loss of Seward and the other luke-
warm members would leave him disconsolate. The coalition Lincoln had so
laboriously put together last year was finished, dead, a thing of the past,
because it had always been inherently unstable. Why couldn't Lincoln adjust
to the new reality?
"I told them how we have always gone on harmoniously," the President
went on, with what seemed to Chase a pleading note in his high voice, "what-
ever had been our previous party feelings. I said I had been sustained and
consoled by the good feeling and the mutual and unselfish zeal that pervaded
the Cabinet. I do not see how it is possible for me to go on, if faced with the
total abandonment of old friends."
Hogwash. If Lincoln could not get on without Seward and Blair and Bates,
then he should step down right away. No; that would mean Hannibal Hamlin
at the head of the table, and Chase preferred the tamed Lincoln. He looked
portentously at Stanton, the other man in the room he knew agreed that this
sentimental drivel about a harmonious Cabinet was an insult to what intelli-
gence existed among the divided group around the table.
The President was floundering; it seemed obvious to Chase that the man
simply did not know what to do next. He could not choose a new Secretary of
State without the senators' advice and consent, and they would insist on a
Chase-approved selection. Lincoln was neatly boxed in. Chase was beginning
to enjoy the play of executive power.
After some desultory conversation, Lincoln suggested that the Cabinet
should join him that evening in meeting with the committee of senators.
"No," said Chase abruptly. "I do not believe that would be appropriate at
all." Better that the congressional pressure should remain directly on the
President alone. This was a fight between the Senate Republican caucus and
the Republican President; for the Cabinet to mix in would be unseemly and
might help the President get off the hook. Because Lincoln had not used the
Cabinet as an effective force to govern, he did not deserve its defense against
those who demanded unified leadership. Let Lincoln face his critics in the
solitude he had sought.
"I don't see that any good would come of our being there," agreed Bates.
Chase nodded vigorously at this unexpected support from the Attorney Gen-
eral.
"I really think the President is right," Montgomery Blair said to Bates. "It
would be well for all of us to be present when he meets the senators. Seward
won't be there during the discussion, which will be largely about him, so
there won't be any personal embarrassment."
Chase looked at Stanton to refute Blair, but evidently the Secretary of War
did not see any harm in the department heads being present at the political
capitulation of the Chief Magistrate. Chase did not like that, but he told
himself he was being unduly wary. And he could not deny a lively interest of
his own in seeing the long-arrogant Lincoln in the dock.
"If the President wishes us to attend, gentlemen," said Navy Secretary
Welles into his long beard, "then it is our duty to do so."
Chase wondered if Lincoln had any tricks up his sleeve. Before he could
think of a good reason to block the joint meeting, the distraught President
said with feeling, "Good. Half past seven this evening."
The Postmaster General picked his way over the frozen mud of Pennsylva-
nia Avenue to the Blair house opposite the Mansion to consult with his
father. The Old Man kept pulling on his arthritic fingers, cracking his knuck-
les, listening to his son's summary of the Cabinet meeting. Monty Blair could
not recall ever having seen his father so tense.
"The President stressed the need for secrecy," Montgomery said, "so
maybe he thinks he can talk Seward into changing his mind."
"That's not the point," the Old Man snapped. "Seward wants to stay. He
wants Lincoln to reject his resignation, but Lincoln can't do that, not now.
He has to have a good reason to hang on to Seward, something that will
satisfy Wade and his crowd, or something to make them back off."
"Why can't Lincoln just tell the Senate to go to hell?" Montgomery knew
that was impossible in the weakened state of the government after the Freder-
icksburg debacle, but he wanted to hear the answer from his father, who liked
to counsel presidents privately at times like this.
"They have the tickets," the elder Blair said, using the old word for "bal-
lots"; he liked those archaic political terms. "At this stage, the radicals can
cripple Lincoln, impeach him, free the slaves, do whatever they want. That's
why he's being so nice and respectful. I bet he wanted to throw Wade out the
window."
Montgomery added an afterthought about the Cabinet session: "We're get-
ting together with the senators tonight."
The Old Man looked up sharply. "Whose idea was that? To have the
Cabinet there."
"Lincoln's. I suppose he wanted company in the lions' den."
"Did anybody object? Stanton?" The Old Man seemed to pounce on what
his son thought was a point not all that consequential.
"Stanton didn't say anything either way, Father." After a pause, he re-
membered: "Chase objected."
The elder Blair thought that over, as his son marveled at the essence of
political calculation that appeared on the wizened features. When a grin
finally crossed his face, the Old Man looked positively Machiavellian.
"I think I see the plan. Oh, Monty, he's a cunning bastard, is Honest Abe."
The grin disappeared. "Now, son, here is your position in that meeting with
the senators: the Cabinet is the soul of harmony, never any bickering. All is
mutual respect."
"But you know that's not true, Father." When that objection did not seem
to make an impression, he added: "I believe, and so do you, that the President
rules, not the Cabinet."
"Sure, Monty, but sometimes it is important to deny a little reality in order
to uphold a great institution. Rememberif Lincoln wants to preach har-
mony, you become part of the choir. Deny any dissension, cut the ground out
from under the senators."
"It won't work, Father. They know the truth as well as we do."
"The truth has nothing to do with this!" His small father reached up and
took his lapels in his hands and shook him. "I think the plan is to embarrass
Chase, to flush out the sanctimonious bastard. To make him lie in front of his
friends rather than take on Lincoln directly. Divide and conquer, the way the
Lincoln men did at the Wigwam. Oh, that cunning bastard. I hope it works."
"Wade's the problem. He'll force the Cabinet division out in the open."
"You're right, Monty. Fessenden is the brains of the crowd, and Collamer
has the necessary gray hairs, but that son of a bitch Wade has the backbone."
He thought about that, pacing the room slowly. "Maybe we could get a friend
of Wade's to urge him to go to the front immediately, to see General Burn-
side. I'll work on that. I don't want him in that meeting with Lincoln tonight.
Remember, Montyharmony. When they complain about disunity in the
Cabinet, you give them the sweetest smile you can muster and say, 'What
disunity?' "
Montgomery Blair enjoyed the startled expressions on the faces of the
senators entering the room. They expected to be meeting privately again with
the President, but found themselves facing Lincoln and his entire Cabinet.
Only Seward, the ostensible target of their attack, was absent.
"I have asked the Cabinet to join us tonight," said Lincoln, taking his place
at the head of the black walnut table and getting right to business, "to demon-
strate to you its unity."
Blair was amazed and amused; Lincoln was prepared to profess that black
was white, just as his father had predicted.
"The necessities of the times, of course," Lincoln went on, "prevent fre-
quent or long sessions of the Cabinet, and not every question is submitted for
detailed discussion. But although these men could not be expected to think
and speak alike on all subjects, they have all acquiesced and come together
once a matter has been decided."
Blair did not believe Lincoln could get away with this argument. The
senators were lawyers, mainly; they had been in courtrooms, and seen defense
attorneys spin a tale wholly divorced from the facts.
Jake Collamer was the committee chairman. He apologized for Ben Wade's
absence, explaining that the chairman of the Joint Committee on the Conduct
of the War had found it necessary to be with Burnside in the field. Blair
wondered how his father had been able to arrange that, but was thankful that
Wade was not present to bellow the truth back at the President.
"There is truth in the maxim," said Collamer, "that in a multitude of
advisers there is safety. What we want is united counsels, combined wisdom,
and energetic action. It is the feeling of my colleagues, Mr. President, based
on" he hesitated"reports, that you do not employ the Cabinet in such a
manner."
"Indeed," Senator Fessenden put in, "we have been informed by the most
reliable authority"Blair noted that he did not look in Chase's direction
"that the Cabinet rarely meets and is not consulted on the gravest questions
of the war and of the abolishment of slavery. You take those decisions your-
self."
"And what would be wrong with that?" Blair heard himself asking.
"Everything, as the management of the war has demonstrated," Fessenden
replied, "and as the delay in abolishing slavery suggests. The President is not
a monarch. He is primus inter pares, and he cannot presume to run the
country single-handed. That is not our constitutional tradition."
Blair did not want to turn this into a debate if Lincoln's strategy was to
appear conciliatory, but that unsupported assertion could not go unchal-
lenged. "Where is the tradition that has the President answering to the Cabi-
net?"
"It was my honor to serve with John Quincy Adams in the House of
Representatives," said Fessenden. "You will recall that he returned to the
House after he had been defeated for reelection as President by Andy Jack-
son. A measure came up on the House floor that was passed during President
Adams's administration, and he told me that the measure was adopted
against his wishes and opinion, but he was outvoted in Cabinet council by
Henry Clay and others. That was how the country was governedby com-
bined wisdom."
"Perhaps that was why John Quincy Adams was so readily defeated by
General Jackson," said Blair. When Lincoln shot him a look of caution, Blair
added, "Though in his later years in the House, Mr. Adams grew in stature
opposing slavery." No sense offending the radicals on their favorite subject.
"Wait a minute," Trumbull interjected. "Lincoln here says the Cabinet is
unified, and approves of all decisions. You say it isn't important whether the
Cabinet agrees or not. Mr. Chase, tell usdoes this Cabinet count in the
President's deliberations or not?"
That put the fat in the fire. Would Chase testify to the deep division of
philosophy in the Cabinet, and of the fiercely conflicting goals of the men who
made it up, as he had been surely telling the senators all weekor would he
loyally lie in support of the President and the Administration of which he was
a part?
He did both. "I endorse the President's statement fully and entirely," the
Treasury Secretary said ponderously, and then qualified that support with
"though I regret that there is not a more full consideration of every measure
in open Cabinet."
Some of the senators began to squirm. Chase was the instigator of this
coup, and it was hard for them to believe he would refuse to take a solid
position on the central complaint.
"That was not our understanding, Chase," said Trumbull ominously. "We
were informed unequivocally that this Cabinet was split down the middle,
and that it was treated with contempt when it came to making great deci-
sions."
Chase reddened, showing both his embarrassment and annoyance. "I
would not have agreed to come here tonight," he said, "if I had known I was
to be arraigned before a committee of the Senate."
Blair thought "arraigned" was the perfect word. The meeting, sought by
the senators to force Lincoln to bow to senatorial pressure, was turning into a
preliminary trial of Chase's veracity. Arranging the full-dress confrontation
had been a brilliant idea. Either Chase would have to back up Lincoln, agree-
ing that the Cabinet was carefully consulted and essentially unifiedwhich
was a lieor disagree with Lincoln to his face, showing himself to be the
disloyal Cabinet member, which Blair suspected Chase did not have the stom-
ach to do.
Fessenden came to Chase's aid. "Nobody is being arraigned here. Indeed,
Mr. President, it was no movement of ours that brought your Cabinet to this
meeting. When you suggested such a meeting with the Cabinet the other day,
we did not think it was a good idea. We did not suspect or come here for that
purpose."
Lincoln remarked innocently how it seemed a good idea to him for every-
one to get together. He looked at Chase, as if the Treasury Secretary had been
rudely interrupted.
"I would answer yes, that questions of importance had generally been
considered by the Cabinet," said Chase, choosing to be the loyalist, "though
perhaps not so fully as may be desired."
"Unity?" Trumbull glared at him.
Chase swallowed as he thought about how to handle that. "There has been
no want of unity in the Cabinet," he said finally. "We have generally acqui-
esced on public measures. Once the President has decided on a measure, no
Cabinet member has opposed it. To that extent, there has been unity."
Lincoln moved in at that point, smoothly admitting, "There have been
occasions in which important action was taken without consultation with my
Cabinet." Blair liked the subtle use of the possessive in reference to his Cabi-
net, and the disarming way Lincoln conceded a point that could not be de-
nied. "Placing the army under McClellan's command after his return from
the Peninsula, for example. The Banks expedition, too."
The President had chosen to send General Banks to New Orleans, where
he could help Grant pose a threat to the Mississippi River forts rather than
reinforce the hapless Bumside in Virginia. Having failed so dismally in the
East, Lincoln was now looking to the Westto Grant and Sherman around
Vicksburg, to Rosecrans in Tennesseeto save the Federal Army's reputa-
tion. The President had said nothing to the Cabinet that Blair could recall
about that sudden shift in military plans.
Chase, who normally sat upright, slumped in his chair as Lincoln em-
barked on a long speech about harmony in the Cabinet, about Seward's ear-
nestness in the prosecution of the war, about how Seward and Chase had
often worked closely together on official correspondence. He called on any
Cabinet member to speak out if there had been any want of unity or sufficient
consultation, and Blair noticed how Chase looked in suppliance at Stanton,
who looked away. Not even Caleb Smith, who had flatly opposed the Eman-
cipation Proclamation"th-th-there goes Indiana!"had a word to say after
Chase had refused to wash the Cabinet's dirty linen in front of the Senate.
Though it was growing late, Lincoln went on and on, not rambling, never
taking the slightest umbrage at what seemed so obvious to Blair was the
Senate's attempted usurpation of executive power, but holding to the shaky
hypothesis that the senators were misinformed about the lack of consultation
or absence of unity. He refused to take up the real challenge, ignoring it as he
construed the senators' complaints much more narrowly. He refused to dis-
pute their presumption to dictate, preferring to correct their reasons for dic-
tating.
The more Lincoln leaned on Secretary Chase's words, emphasizing the
grudging "unity" admission and minimizing the qualifiers attached, the more
Chase looked pained and Trumbull looked furious. Blair was glad that Wade
was not at the meeting to thunder at the trickery of the President and the
hypocrisy of the Treasury Secretary; had Anna Carroll persuaded him to visit
the front that day?
"As for the proclamation of freedom," Lincoln concluded, "Mr. Seward
had fully concurred in it after I had resolved on it. Isn't that so, Governor
Chase?"
Chase was obliged to nod in agreement. "As a matter of fact, it was Seward
who suggested amendments to strengthen the proclamation," he volunteered,
"such as the pledge to maintain the freedom of those emancipated. 'Maintain'
was Seward's word, and it gives force to the document."
Lincoln, in his long speech, had evidently worn Chase down; the Treasury
Secretary was no longer trying to straddle honor and loyalty. In front of his
Cabinet colleagues and the President, he could not be forthright to his senato-
rial friends about his true feelings. Chase's backstabbing was limited to small
gatherings with Lincoln not present.
Fessenden, the intellectual leader of the party's Senate group, backed off
slightly on one point after the President had finished. "I never said that the
President was bound by any decision made by his Cabinet. I maintain only
that all important questions must be discussed in Cabinet council."
Blair sensed the beginnings of senatorial retreat and thought of himself as
harassing cavalry. "The Cabinet has no voice, and should have no voice," he
said, "except when the President calls for it. Unlike you, we have no constitu-
tional mandate. We are a creature of the presidency, an extension of him,
deriving our authority from his powers and with no independent power."
Fessenden started to object but Blair was not finished. "He might require
our opinion in writingmy father informs me that was what President Jack-
son preferred, Senator Fessendenbut he is under no obligation to defer to
what we think. In a Cabinet vote, the only vote that counts is the Presi-
dent's."
Lincoln gave him no signal to stop, so Blair went on. "Now about Gover-
nor Seward. I have differed sharply with Seward over the years, as you all
know, and I have my differences with him today. But I believe him as earnest
as anyone in this war. The charge that he is lukewarm' is sheer nonsense. I
think it would be injurious to the public service to have him leave the Cabi-
net, and with all due respect, gentlemen, I would add this: the Senate had
better not meddle with matters of this kind."
Lincoln shook his head at that last point, and hastened to assure one and
all he did not think the senators were meddling. Blair had said it; Lincoln
could disavow it and remain conciliatory, but Blair was certain it would help
Lincoln to have the Senate leaders know that their overreaching was recog-
nized as such.
"Seward's presence is what is injurious," said Grimes.
Senator Sumner picked that up and launched into a condemnation of
Seward as a diplomatist. "The correspondence he has had in the name of this
administration is an abomination, and its publication was a deliberate insult
to all of us who have stood foursquare for the Union and against slavery."
Sumner spoke longer than Lincoln had, listing all of Seward's shortcomings.
The theme of the meeting had changed from a general disapproval of the way
Lincoln was executing his office to a specific demand for the ouster of the
Secretary of State, who had already resigned.
"Not all the senators present have given me their opinions on that," said
Lincoln, looking around the table.
"You have mine," said Grimes. "Out."
"I'm not prepared to say," Jake Collamer wavered.
Blair understood what the President was looking for: any lack of unanim-
ity. He thought that taking a kind of vote on Seward was a tactical mistake,
but at this stage Blair was willing to trust Lincoln's political sagacity.
"I studied law in Seward's office," said Pomeroy of Kansas, "but I've lost
confidence in him. He ought to go."
"Considering the state of the parties in New York," said Ira Harris of that
state, who was not a Seward man but who, Blair assumed, was worried about
Democrat Horatio Seymour's leadership of the peace movement there, "and
Governor Seward's popularity with the anti-Seymour forces, I'd have to ad-
vise against his removal."
Lincoln looked at Fessenden, who shook his head. "I do not think it is
proper to discuss the merits or demerits of a member of the Cabinet in the
presence of his associates."
Chase was out of his chair like a shot. "I think the members of the Cabinet
had better withdraw."
Blair hated to leave, but Lincoln seemed in control of himself and his
presidency now that Chase was exposed to his own allies as all too ready to
flinch. The Postmaster General politely held the door for Chase, Stanton,
Smith, and Bates, threw a half salute at the President, and closed the door on
the senators.
Fessenden knew he had been outmaneuvered by the lawyer from Illinois.
Chase had been placed in a near impossible position, and his understandable
equivocation had weakened the force of the senatorial move. Sneaking the
Cabinet in, unbeknown to the senators, was a trick, but Fessenden could not
charge Lincoln with anything more than discourtesy.
"I wish to know," he said with the Cabinet members gone, "whether you,
Mr. President, intend to follow the wishes of the Republican senators on the
Seward matter, when ascertained."
Lincoln, to Fessenden's disgust, told a long and vulgar story that was not
to the point. Its lengthy recounting served only to give the President a chance
not to answer the question, and no Wade was present with the equivalent
boorishness to shut him up. Fessenden did not laugh and nod sagely, as
others did, when the President tried to show how the story applied to the
situation at hand.
Fessenden then used the information he had not yet admitted he knew: that
the decision facing Lincoln was not to oust Seward, but to accept the resigna-
tion Seward had already submitted.
"There is a current rumor that Secretary Seward has already resigned."
"I thought I told you last evening," said Lincoln disingenuously, "that Mr.
Seward had tendered his resignation." Fessenden did not remind Lincoln he
had told them no such thing. That highly relevant fact weakened the Presi-
dent's position, and he was giving the Senate nothing. "I have his resignation
in my pocket but have not yet made it public. Or accepted it."
"The question, then," stated Fessenden, "is whether Mr. Seward should be
requested to withdraw his resignation."
Lincoln did not evade the question. "Yes."
"As the fact of his resignation cannot be concealed," Fessenden told him,
"and its cause will be well understood, then all the harm done in dividing the
Republicans in New York has already been done. No withdrawal of his resig-
nation will heal that breach. I strongly advise that you accept it."
Lincoln nodded, which Fessenden could not tell meant that he understood
or agreed.
The senator from Maine played his last card. "Shall I canvass my fellow
senators on whether you should accept Mr. Seward's resignation?" Lincoln
had, after all, been canvassing the senators in this room tonight on whether to
fire Seward, but he had been careful not to obligate himself to follow the
views he had solicited. If Lincoln agreed to that casually made suggestion,
Fessenden could take the question of accepting a Seward resignation to an
advisory caucus vote which Lincoln would be forced to treat as a Senate
decision. That not only would lock out Seward, but would establish a new
order in the Senate's relationship with the President. And not just for now;
perhaps for the life of the Republic. Fessenden was aware of the stakes.
"I think not." Lincoln's reply matched the informality of Fessenden's sug-
gestion. Not a blunt "no," not some sort of indecisive evasion, but a casually
decisive "I think not"as if to say he would just as soon hold on to his
power, if the senators and the Republican Party would not mind.
It was I A.M. Fessenden was convinced that nothing more could be ex-
tracted from this man. The President had seemed to gain strength as the night
wore on, as the others faded in fatigue. Fessenden rose, aware of the senators'
defeat. "I take it you will make no change in your Cabinet?"
"If I let Seward go, I have reason to fear a general smashup."
"And why is that?"
"Chase would withdraw too, and I cannot do without him at the Trea-
sury."
Fessenden shook his head in wonderment. Now Lincoln was telling a group
of senators, including the man known to be Chase's closest friend, that he was
expecting a resignation from Chase. That would surely get around and put
pressure on Chase to quit. Fessenden thought it would be a good idea to leave
before Lincoln came up with any other tricks.
On the way out, Trumbull took Fessenden by the arm. "Your friend Chase
sang a different tune when he was alone with us," he said bitterly. "How in
hell could he sit there and say that all was sweet harmony in the Cabinet?"
Fessenden did not want to reply, but old Judge Collamer answered quietly
for him. "He lied." Fessenden, who had until that night counted himself
Chase's main ally in the Senate, could not disagree.
"I think I'll just tell the President that right now," said Trumbull, whirling
and heading back toward Lincoln's office. Fessenden made no effort to detain
him. Had Chaseand Stantonproved brave and true, great good might
have come of this, but the only good result of this long night's work, he told
himself coldly, was that it unmasked some selfish cowards.
Navy Secretary Welles returned to the President's office next morning as
soon as he thought Lincoln would be finished with breakfast. He wanted to
say that he believed Seward should not be allowed to resign. Welles knew that
the Secretary of State did not want to leave the Cabinet, regretted his impul-
sive act, and was piqued that Lincoln had discussed the resignation with the
senators.
Chase and Stanton were already there, waiting for Lincoln. Welles told
them what was on his mind: "To yield a presidential prerogative to the Senate
would be an evil example. It would be fraught with incalculable injury to the
government and the country."
His two Cabinet colleagues, standing in front of the fire, met this with sour
looks, but Lincoln, walking in, said he quite agreed: "If I let the senators have
their way, the whole government must cave in. It could not stand."
The President stood next to the fireplace, arm on the mantelpiece, along-
side the disgruntled radicals, as Welles took a seat on the sofa near the east
window, in the morning sunshine.
"The session last night," Chase complained, "was a harrowing experience.
It had come as a total surprise to me," he said, which Welles knew was
untrue, "and affected me most painfully." That part was true.
Lincoln offered no sympathy and waited for him to go on.
"In fact, I have even prepared my own resignation as Secretary of the
Treasury."
Chase was not resigning, Welles noted; merely hoping to shock Lincoln by
saying he had "prepared" a resignation.
Lincoln's face lit up. "Where is it?"
Chase was taken aback. "I brought it with me," he answered, tentatively
taking a sealed envelope from his breast pocket but not offering it up. "I
wrote it this morning, but"
"Let me have it," said Lincoln eagerly. He reached his long arm across the
fireplace and held out his hand. Chase was reluctant to hand it over. Lincoln
fairly snatched the paper out of Chase's fingers, tore open the envelope, and
glanced at the paper inside.
The President let out a whoop, slapped the letter on his leg, and turned to
Welles. "This cuts the Gordian knot!" He plunked himself down in the chair,
motioning for Chase and Stanton to sit. "I can dispose of this subject now
without difficulty. I see my way clear."
Welles fully understood the reason for Lincoln's delight. All of Washington
was reshuffling the Lincoln Cabinet, and Stanton's censorship could not keep
it out of the newspapers much longer. He did not have enough public senti-
ment behind him to refuse Seward's resignation. But by inducing Chase to
resign as well, he could refuse bothmaintain his Cabinet without change
and retain his position as the fulcrum of the contending forces in his party.
Welles observed the dismay on Chase's handsome face, and the contrasting
total lack of concern on Lincoln's part for the pain he was causing the Trea-
sury Secretary. Stanton, who, Welles suspected, was using Chase as a stalking
horse, huffed, "I wish you, sir, to consider my resignation at this time in your
possession."
"You may go to your department," the President said impatiently, since
Stanton seemed to miss the whole point, "I don't want your resignation. This
is all I want," he waved the letter in his hand. "I will detain neither of you
longer."
That was as peremptory a dismissal as Welles had heard come from the
President's lips since he had known him. The two trooped out.
"Now I can ride," said Lincoln with relief. "I have got a pumpkin in each
end of my bag." Welles found that word picture amusing: a farmer riding to
market with pumpkins in each saddlebag, balancing his load as Lincoln was
balancing the interests of the factions in his administration. He would now
publicly make known the two resignations, and refuse to accept either.
Seward would be relieved and grateful, somewhat less imperious in the future,
and even more of a Lincoln man; Chase might still be angling for the Republi-
can nomination in 1864, but would be weakened with the radicals who had
seen him wither under fire.
"A masterstroke," Welles told him without any hint of flattery.
"I do not see how it could have been done better," Lincoln agreed. "If I
had yielded to that storm and dismissed Seward, the thing would have
slumped over one way"Lincoln dropped a shoulder and slumped to illus-
trate"and we would have been left with a scant handful of supporters.
When Chase gave in his resignation just now"he held up the paper in
triumph"I saw that the game was in my hands. Now I have the biggest half
of the hog."
He went to his desk to write out the two refusals. Welles was astounded at
the way this man, assumed by all to have been politically devastated and in
such a depressed mental state, could have shown such resilience in the face of
a vigorous challenge from the assembled powers of his party. Native shrewd-
ness, he supposed, combined with some hidden sources of strength and divine
obstinacy.
The Navy Secretary was satisfied that the President could survive the polit-
ical attacks from within his party, whether in Congress or in his Cabinet. He
wished he could be as certain that Lincoln could survive the blunders of his
generals, and the continued staggering losses to his forces in the field. Public
sentiment had never been so low. Something had to be done to resist the
rising pressure of the defeatists and copperheads, who were angrily clamoring
for peace and were all too willing to pay its price of disunion.

CHAPTER 37
CHIROPODIST, PEACEMAKER, SPY
For Isachar Zacharie, in the most exciting time of his life, being a Jew was
both a help and a hindrance. Seated in the New Orleans home of the mer-
chant Martin Gordon, a fellow Israelite and an official enemy of the United
States, the foot doctor looked at both sides of that coin:
Less than a month before, Lincoln had given him a letter to take to Gen-
eral Nathaniel Banks, who had taken command of the Army of the Gulf from
Ben Butler. Although phrased as a letter of introduction, Lincoln's letter
hinted at his assignment: "Dr. Zacharie, whom you know as well as I do . . .
might be of service to you in his peculiar profession"by that the President
meant foot-doctoring, which Zacharie understood was merely a cloak for his
other activities"and secondly, as a means of access to his countrymen, who
are quite numerous in some of the localities you will probably visit."
By "numerous countrymen," the President referred to the many Israelites
long resident in New Orleans. What was left unsaid was the common knowl-
edge that the most renowned Jew from Louisiana was Judah Benjamin, the
Confederate Secretary of State.
That channel to the Confederate elite was the helpful part of being a Jew.
He could establish contact quickly with family and friends in Union-occupied
New Orleans, and then to their connections in Richmond, with the purpose
of discovering if any possibility existed of a peaceful solution to the conflict.
The difficulty of being a Jew was alluded to in the conclusion of Lincoln's
letter to Banks: "excepting his case from a general prohibition which I under-
stand to exist."
That "general prohibition" the President had heard about was the result of
General Ulysses Grant's hatred of Jews. Zacharie understood the cause of the
general's animus: some Jewish cotton traders were stealing the Army blind.
Gentile cotton traders were not doing badly at that business either, but the
Jews always stood out. Worse, Grant's father, Jesse Grant had been in busi-
ness with a Jew to take advantage of the Army quartermaster. Grant could
not get even with his father, so he took it out, Zacharie supposed, on the Jew
who was his father's partner, and, as so often happened, on Jews in general.
Six weeks before, in early November, Grant had issued an order to his
transportation officer in Jackson, Tennessee, forbidding Jews from using any
railroad in a southward direction. As a result, it had become common knowl-
edge that Jews were unwelcome visitors to the Western theater of war. This
would have made the coming of Isachar Zacharie to New Orleans, and his
activities there, slightly difficult to explainwere it not, as Lincoln's note
indicated, for his convenient profession. Every army needed a foot doctor.
Zacharie was not unduly troubled by the President's tacit understanding of
Grant's policy or Lincoln's willingness to leave undisturbed the effect of
Grant's detestation of members of the Hebrew race. Like most Northern
Jews, he was embarrassed and angry at the predations of the salesmen of the
reclaimed-wool material called "shoddy," and eager to dissociate himself
from those rotten apples.
So long as the "general prohibition," as Lincoln described it, was unwritten
and informalstrictly a personal act by one general taken on an emergency
basisand was directed at stopping Jewish traders from coming into the war
zone rather than driving local Jews out, Zacharie felt he could live with the
Grant policy. Harsh and unfair, yes, but making scapegoats out of Jews was
nothing new, and Zacharie justified his own acceptance of the worrisome
precedent by telling himself that everybody suffered in wartime.
Not that he liked it, he reminded himself, any more than he liked the
wording of the Sabbath Order that Lincoln had issued about the same time to
pander to the Christian clergy around election time. Over Stanton's objection
that it would interfere with the conduct of the war, Lincoln ordered Sunday
work in the Army and Navy reduced to strict necessity, to preserve "the
sacred rights of Christian soldiers and sailors, a becoming deference to the
best sentiments of a Christian people." Zacharie knew that Lincoln was no
religious zealot, did not attend church on the Christian sabbath himself, and
signed the order only to gather political support; still, he should not have
made Jews feel like outsiders, guests of a "Christian people." The idea of
mentioning that to Lincoln occurred to him at the time but was swiftly put
aside; that was a matter for more self-conscious Israelites to bother their
heads about. Zacharie was not about to jeopardize his professional and per-
sonal relationship with the President of the United States over parochial
interests.
"I want you to mingle freely with people of all classes, especially with your
own countrymen," General Banks had told him when formally explaining his
assignment. Banks was a good man, a Massachusetts politician but not a
radical like Sumner, self-made, like himself; the "Little Bobbin Boy" was his
sobriquet, attesting to Banks's start in the cotton mills he now owned. Banks
was an all-out Union man, dead set against secession; generally anti-slavery
but not a wild-eyed abolitionistmuch like Lincoln. The foot doctor thought
that Banks would make an excellent President one day, and was resolved to
help bring that happy event about by crediting him with making the peace
between North and South.
That was another reason he could use for not taking offense at the general
prohibition against Jews. Nathaniel Banks was not the sort to fuss about
formal "rights" of individuals when it came to winning the war and saving
the Union. With great pride, Banks had told Zacharie of the day in the
secession summer of a year ago when the legislature of Maryland was sched-
uled to meet to vote their state out of the Union. Lincoln had ordered Mc-
Clellan to arrest the secessionist members before they arrived to vote, and
Banks and Dix had been given the command to carry out the President's
order. As Banks related the episode to Zacharie, he had struck ruthlessly and
effectively, and never mind "states' rights." Obviously, the foot doctor con-
cluded, it would be foolish to complain to such a man about the inconve-
nience being felt by a few Jews; as Lincoln liked to say, you can't make an
omelet without breaking eggs.
"You will ascertain and report the nature of public opinion here," was
another part of his charge from the general. Easy enough. The people here
were eager to pour their past troubles with "Beast" Butler into a sympathetic
Northern ear. "You will pay particular attention to gaining information about
the location and number of enemy troops, the extent of their supplies and
ammunition, and whether his troops are conscript or otherwise." Not so easy;
that was spying. If Zacharie's primary purpose was to establish contact with
the Confederate Cabinet, the sideline of spying might undermine his peace-
making. Not to mention making it much more dangerous. A peace emissary
could be rejected, but a spy could be executed. No matter, Zacharie thought,
he could do it all.
"May victory be our reward," Zacharie had told the general with all due
solemnity.
"Lose no time and spare no expense." Banks had handed him an envelope
containing what Zacharie knew to be five thousand dollars in Confederate
bills. He had resolved to account for every cent, but not in writing.
His contact with the Confederacy was to be Martin Gordon, a New Or-
leans merchant of some prominence in whose stately home he now was visit-
ing. Gordon was registered as an official enemy of the United States. That
status meant that Gordon's business dealings in New Orleans were sharply
circumscribed, but he was not under arrest and could travel safely in the
Confederacy.
"The time is not ripe for a peace offer," his host was saying. "Not after
Fredericksburg. They hear in Richmond that Lincoln's government is falling
apart. Seward out, Chase"
"That's not true, Martin. President Lincoln is a very determined man."
Zacharie knew how important it was to send word to Judah Benjamin
through his sister in New Orleans that the rumor of a breakup of Lincoln's
Cabinet was just newspaper talk. "I discussed this with the President myself,
for hours. He will hold his Cabinet together, he will hold the Republican
Party together, he will hold his Army together, and in the end he will hold
the Union together. Holding things together is very important to him, more
important than anything."
"You and Lincoln talked for hours?" Gordon was not being sarcastic, but
the doubt was in his voice.
Zacharie had never found it difficult to exaggerate, or even to make up
stories completely when necessary. He knew he had a talent for making
people believe his stories; why could he not persuade people that he was
telling the truth when he told the truth?
He had spent long evenings in the President's presence, not counting the
sessions cutting his corns, just talking about life, the world, families. Obvi-
ously Lincoln enjoyed his company; Zacharie laughed at his jokes, but, more
important, the foot doctor had a keen eye for detail, a true ear for the way
people were talking, a thorough grounding in the Old Testament, andper-
haps most needed by Lincolna capacity for understanding the suffering that
some some strong men inflicted on themselves. But who on the outside would
ever believe that the President of the United States spent time discussing the
future with a Jewish corncutter? He pushed forward his only credential, the
note written by Lincoln and countersigned by Seward attesting to his skills as
a practitioner of foot medicine.
"It's kind of a code," Zacharie said conspiratorially. "You'll understand."
At least the commercial endorsement proved that he knew the man and the
man knew him. Gordon could not produce the same evidence of personal
contact with Jeff Davis. Zacharie took back the precious document and re-
turned it to his wallet.
Impressed, Gordon reported that Richmond thought it now had an excel-
lent chance to win the war. "The British Parliament convenes next month,
and Gladstone has already said that the South has made a nation. After last
week at Fredericksburg, and next week at Murfreesboro, the desire of the
European powers to recognize the South will be irresistible."
Zacharie reminded himself that spying was one of his jobs. "Murfrees-
boro?"
"Big celebration going on there now," Gordon told him. "It started at the
wedding of one of the generalsMorgan, the cavalry raider, even Jeff Davis
cameand it will last up to Christmas. Forrest's raiders are hitting Grant in
the West and Morgan, the bridegroom, has just been sent on some secret raid
northward."
Zacharie made mental notes; it would not do to take out a pencil. But the
Stones River area of Tennessee, just south of Nashville, was familiar to him;
bunions, mainly. "I hear that Lincoln is desperate after his defeat in Vir-
ginia," Martin Gordon told him, "and is demanding that his man Rosecrans
go on the attack in Tennessee. If he comes after Bragg in Murfreesboro, the
Federals will get beaten again and the British will recognize the South. That's
the best time to start the peacemaking."
"No." They did not understand Lincoln. He might compromise on emanci-
pation, even delay his proclamation a few months or years if the South
showed signs of coming around, but on secession Lincoln would never com-
promise. War to the knife on that.
"Isachar, my friend, be realistic. All they hear in Richmond is the glorious
victory over the Army of the Potomac, and the call for peace by Seymour and
Vallandigham, and the talk ofSeward's being forced to resign. With all that in
the air, Richmond will not hear of talk of peace without secession."
The time for his great effort was not ripe, Zacharie ruefully agreed. If
Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in ten days, as scheduled, the
South's leaders would be more inclined to fight on. Military fortunes would
have to changeone way or the otherbefore his peacemaking move could
be made. Zacharie's job now was to establish trust, to set up lines of commu-
nication between Lincoln in WashingtonGeneral Banks in New Orleans,
and Secretary Benjamin in Richmondwhich would instantly be used when
one side or the other began to see the futility of further slaughter.
Murfreesboro could be important. He would pass what he had heard just
now to General Banks for transmission to Rosecrans (sounded like a Jewish
name) in Tennessee. It occurred to him that, with all the famous rebel cavalry
racing off to other places, this might not be a bad time for the Union general
to attack Bragg, but that was not really his business.
For the remainder of their meeting, he and Gordon did the sort of business
that would be preliminary to any peace undertakings: trading that established
trust. Gordon submitted a list of grievances of New Orleans families harassed
by the previous Union occupiers, which Zacharie knew he could alleviate
quickly, and asked for information about the whereabouts of General Breck-
inridge's son, missing in action and not reported captured. The chiropodist
promised to forward that query to General Dix, and then wondered aloud
about the drug traffic from New Orleans into the Southern lines.
"No Southern lady worth her salt would hesitate to take a bag of quinine
under her bustle," said Gordon. "You can't search them all, and I'd advise
Banks not to search any."
Zacharie turned to the business of exchange rates between Confederate and
Union currency, which could never be formalized but had to be unofficially
established if New Orleans merchants were to be able to do any business in
the South. After some enjoyable dickering, Zacharie shook Gordon's hand on
a fair deal. The foot doctor departed with the expectation that one day
perhaps not until a military stalemate was established, but one daythey
could be conducting business on the highest levels.
On his arrival at his room at the military headquarters, the chiropodist was
met by a delegation of ashen-faced members of the group that Gentiles would
call his "fellow countrymen."
Zacharie had seen nervous Israelites before, and discounted their fears; he
knew that whatever orders had been put in place by Ben Butler could be
countermanded. He brought them into his office with a generous wave of the
hand.
"Which is the foot that hurts?" he said cheerily.
"Show him the order."
He drew on his glasses and looked at the heading: from Grant's headquar-
ters at Holly Springs, Tennessee, General Orders No. II. "General Orders"
meant it was important, a statement of policy to be carried out in every part
of the army commanded by Grant. The document was dated December 17,
three days ago.
A sense of dread entered his soul as he read the opening words: "The Jews,
as a class . . ."
He went to the window and studied the order. "The Jews, as a class violat-
ing every regulation of trade established by the Treasury Department and also
department orders, are hereby expelled from the department within twenty-
four hours from the receipt of this order."
Expelled. Every Jew, whether or not engaged in trade. As a class. Banished
from Tennessee, from sections of Mississippi, from every city and town under
the control of the armies of Grant and Sherman. That was a third of the
Union-controlled Union. Zacharie, unbelieving, read on: "Post commanders
will see that all of this class of people be furnished passes and required to
leave, and anyone returning after such notification will be arrested and held
in confinement until an opportunity occurs of sending them out as prison-
ers . . ."
At that moment, Zacharie realized he was not an American, not a presi-
dential agent, not a member of the medical profession, but merely a Jew, to be
rounded up and shipped off at the whim of an angry man in uniform.
"There must be some mistake," he said to the others, trying not to let the
dread in his heart show on his face.
"I've just come from Oxford, Mississippi," said a gaunt man. "They didn't
let us sell anything or take anything with us. We were loaded on a cart and
told to get moving. I'm not a cotton trader, I didn't do any business with the
army. My son is serving with the army under Burnside. Nobody would listen.
Orders are orders, they said."
"What next, Zacharie? Will General Banks order the Jews out of New
Orleans? Where will we go then, back to Germany?"
He did not know what to tell them. Banks was no Grant, but this sweeping
order could hardly have been issued without some approval from the War
Department in Washington. He recalled how Charles Dana, Stanton's eyes
and ears in the field, had returned with tales of the infamous speculation in
cotton by army quartermasters and Jews, which had infuriated Stanton and
Halleck.
"The President cannot know about this," said the man from Mississippi.
"Lincoln would never permit it if he knew." On that, there was a general
murmur of agreement.
But Zacharie knew that Lincoln did knowif not of the expulsion order,
certainly of the "general prohibition" of Jews by Grant throughout his com-
mand. And if the President tacitly approved of the one, who could say he
would not look the other way at the next step of expulsion? The foot doctor
felt a terrible personal responsibility. When Lincoln had discussed Grant's
problems with Jews, when he had written of the prohibition in his letter to
Banks, Zacharie had not uttered a word of protest. He had said nothing. It
must have seemed to Lincoln that he approved, and that individual loyal Jews
would not be stricken with fear at the thought of being treated "as a class," to
be arrested the way fugitive slaves used to be. His heart sank further at that
thought. Fugitive slaves now had more rights within the Union lines than
Jews who had lived there all their lives.
"You have to go to see Lincoln immediately, tonight, Zacharie. You say
you know him. He trusts you. Get him to stop this right away."
Zacharie shriveled inside. He could not do it. He was the wrong man,
having acquiesced without objection in the general prohibition to which he
had been an exception. Why, he asked himself in anguish, had he gone along
with such unfairness when he could have spoken up for his people? He knew
why. He was slightly ashamed of his people, the crooked ones, and had not
imagined the restriction against them would get out of hand.
On his conscience at that moment were all the suppressed doubts of the
past few months at the way Stanton and his men had been hacking away at
the freedom of loyal Northerners to complain about the government. He
thought of the arrests of the editors, of the way they were shipped to jail in
silence, and of how he had said nothing. He thought of Watson, Stanton's evil
right-hand man, saying, "Let them prove themselves innocent." That was
wrong, not the way of law in America. Zacharie had known how Stanton had
sent General Stone to imprisonment at Fort Lafayette without trial, because
he was McClellan's friend and to satisfy Senators Wade and Chandler. That
was a terrible scandal, and nobody but a few copperheads like Seymour and
Vallandigham had raised their voices against it.
Should Isachar Zacharie have said something, put a word in the President's
ear when he was working on his foot? He had not wanted to become involved
in other people's injustices, not because he was ignorant of them, but because
that sort of involvement would get him branded a troublemaker, possibly
disloyal. And if that reputation attached to him, he could never do the great
work of making peace. That was how he had reasoned his way into silence.
And now the sudden arrests, the terror of unbridled authority, was coming
after his own people, "as a class." He was afraid not only of what could
happen, but also of his own guilt in not having tried to stop it.
He could not go to Lincoln because Lincoln knew that Zacharie had proof
in writing that Lincoln had known in advance of Grant's policy. The Jewish
leader to see Lincoln would have to be someone who did not know this, who
would believe that no President of the United States could tolerate such
bigotry by an officer of the United States Army. Then Lincoln could profess
ignorance, surprise, and countermand the order with no loss of dignity.
"Kaskel," he said with certainty. "Cesar Kaskel of Paducah, he's the man
to lead a delegation to the President. And he can get there overnight by rail,
whereas it would take me days to sail around the Gulf."
"But you can get right to the President"
"This cannot wait. I'll get a message to the Kaskels by telegraph, and send
another message to Lincoln's secretaries."
"We are not permitted to use the telegraph, Zacharie," said the gaunt man.
"I tried to send a message to General Grant. They would not accept it from a
Jew."
At least, Zacharie knew, he had access to the military telegraph. Cesar
Kaskel was a strong man, the leader of a family that commanded respect
among Jews and Gentiles in Kentucky and Ohio. Lincoln would see him,
unless Stanton or Halleck blocked the way. And if Lincoln saw him,
thenZacharie would not let himself think about what might happen. Grant
was a Lincoln favorite, despite his drunken rages, despite his strange behavior
at Shiloh, because he was a fighter. Perhaps Lincoln would not want to
interfere.
The foot doctor thought of sending a personal message to the President
through John Hay but decided against it. Too presumptuous. If a Jew could
be the one to help make the peace, he told himself, that lifesaving act would
win more respect for Jews in America than anything else one man could do.
Let Cesar Kaskel be the one to see Lincoln to stop the expulsion of Jews; his
own mission, Zacharie persuaded himself, was even more important. Leaving
to send a telegraph message, he hoped the feeling of shame would soon pass.

CHAPTER 38
OFFER TO SUCCEED
Weed was sitting in the Secretary of State's office after a poor night's sleep on
the train, and he had not removed his overcoat. It was cold in Seward's office.
"Thurlow, you look positively grumpy," said Seward. "What took you so
long to get down here? Washington is lovely at Christmastime."
Weed had good reason to be out of sorts. His political partner had impetu-
ously and foolishly submitted his resignation as Secretary of State without
consulting him. Weed well remembered moving heaven and earth, and the
President-elect, to secure that post for Seward two years ago, and he did not
consider it partnerly for Seward to jeopardize the post in such cavalier fash-
ion. Luckily, Lincoln had been able to euchre a resignation out of Chase,
making possible his simultaneous, triumphant turndown of both.
"It's true the swamp here doesn't smell so awful in the winter," Weed
allowed, "but I prefer Albany. Or London."
That was another reason for his grumpiness. Seward had sent word to
Weed only a month before to prepare for a mission to London and Paris at
year's end, and Weed had made all arrangements for the voyage. He told all
his friends of the vast importance of the mission. Then some criticism by
Greeley and Chase of the use of the "king of the lobby" for wartime diplo-
macy had panicked Seward into canceling the trip. This profoundly embar-
rassed Weed by making it appear that he was being punished for not working
hard enough to stop the election of Democrat Horatio Seymour as governor
of New York. The Oreeley crowd had thrown away the most important state
in the Union, and now Weed was being blamed. Frankly, he was glad Sey-
mour had won; teach the damn black Republicans a lesson.
"Sorry about London, Thurlow," said Seward, reading his mind as alter
egos should. "And I apologize, too, for acting peremptorily this week. You
should have had a voice in my decision. But it all happened so fast."
What also rubbed Weed the wrong way was an unjust accusation of corrup-
tion. Word was out in New York that Seward's friends had made a killing in
the Gold Room, acting on advance news of the breakup of Lincoln's Cabinet.
Weed had not even been given enough advance warning by his political part-
ner to make such a killing, and to be accused of doing what he had not time
to do was especially galling.
"I cannot be angry at you for more than a few moments, my good friend,"
Weed said in candor. "It is like being angry with myself. And what of you
now that it's all over, are you all right?"
"I confess to having been somewhat disturbed at the time, Thurlow. Lin-
coln should never have taken my resignation under advisementa true friend
would have rejected it immediately. And he should never have allowed the
senators to come in to vilify me, dignifying their anti-constitutional bid with a
hearing. But he did. And it came out all right. Now, curiously, I feel re-
freshed." He inhaled and exhaled, patting his narrow chest. "The entire epi-
sode has not only proved harmless, but rather reinvigorating."
"And what of the President, Governordid he find the Cabinet crisis
reinvigorating too?"
"Only temporarily. He's a curious fellow. A few days ago, after the terrible
news of Fredericksburg, he was on the verge of1 don't know what. De-
claiming that idiotic poem about the spirit of mortals, quoting bloody scenes
from Macbeth, reciting from the Book of Job, pacing around like a madman
all night long, and then sleeping away the morning in his office. I feared for
his sanity, Thurlow."
Weed wondered aloud how, in that condition, Lincoln had been able to
cope with the assault of the senators.
"That was the most amazing part," Seward replied. "When his authority
came under challenge, every bit of cunning and shrewdness and ruthlessness
came to the fore. He rose to the crisis, met it squarely with no hint of the
hypo showing, and showed them who is master."
"Like you, then, he's feeling his oats?"
"Oh, no, not a bit. Quite the contrary, Thurlow. Lincoln is gloomy, preoc-
cupied. The euphoria wore off in a few hours. That's why he sent for you."
That did not square with what Weed knew. "He started sending for me
before the Cabinet crisis. But I've been sulking for the better part of three
days."
Seward grinned at his half apology. "Don't take off your coat, we're going
to see the President now. Come along. Tell me what you know about Sey-
mour. What sort of inaugural address do you expect from him in Albany?"
Weed observed how they both had stopped calling Lincoln "Lincoln" and
between each other had begun to call him the "President." To the President's
face, of course, he was still "Lincoln." They passed up the carriage and chose
to walk to the Mansion. The mud had frozen and the footing in the snow was
not slippery.
Lincoln shooed his secretaries out of his office, calling for Marshal Lamon
to join him with Seward and Weed.
Weed was not accustomed to meeting with Lincoln except in private, and
frowned slightly as he glanced at Lamon. The President explained that a
point of contact might be needed on a mission he had in mind, and that he
wanted Hill Lamon to know the details. Weed signaled he understood.
Lamon was part bodyguard, part company-keeper and friend, trusted to sleep
at the President's door or to do political errands, and to forget what might be
embarrassing to remember. Not as clever as Hay or as organized as Nicolay,
but more tight-lipped than both.
"Lincoln here was asking me about the man who will soon occupy my old
chair in the governor's office in Albany," Seward began, legs crossed, toe
turning, as if making idle conversation. "We both agree that you were right
about Horatio Seymour from the start, Thurlow. Undignified campaign all
over the state and the like. You saw the disaster coming, and you were the
only one."
Weed, mollified, assumed that the governor was making a difficult subject
easier for the President to broach.
"What will Seymour do about conscription?" Seward wanted to know.
Weed had connections across political lines to Seymour through Dean Rich-
mond, the Democratic leader upstate, and it was natural for Seward and the
President to assume that Weed knew what the governor-elect was thinking.
"He'll oppose the draft," Weed told them. "Don't count on a big contin-
gent of troops from New York." That was what came from basing a Republi-
can campaign on abolition and social revolution, rather than sticking to the
Union as it was, Weed thought.
"We need those troops," said Lincoln.
Weed was tempted to say he should have thought of that on September 22,
and again on September 24. The first proclamation promised to extend black
freedom in the South, the second immediately restricted freedom for whites in
the North. As if on purpose, the pairing of the proclamations infuriated all
but the minority of abolitionists.
"Do you suppose Governor Seymour would interpose state police and mili-
tia," asked Seward, "in order to block the effect of the President's habeas
corpus proclamation?"
"I wouldn't try any disloyalty arrests in New York for a while," Weed
replied. "Seymour made a big issue of that in the campaign, and the fear
many people have of getting clapped into Fort Lafayette for speaking out
against the war helped him win. You heard what Seymour had to say about
dictatorship, Lincoln."
He knew the President would recall the hot words that had passed between
the two men on the subject of the need to restrict each citizen's freedom to
preserve the nation's security. The recent election showed that most New
York voters agreed with Seymourwith what Breckinridge used to say, for
that matterthat treating every dissenter as a traitor corrupted the basis of
the Union and made it less worthy of blood sacrifice.
"Seymour and Femando Wood are already talking about putting out lines
for a negotiated settlement to the war. That means," Weed put it delicately,
"pursuing the suggestions you made in your excellent annual message this
month about gradual, compensated emancipation, rather than in the procla-
mation you have in mind for next week."
"We have some lines out that may be more useful than anything F'nandy
Wood can come up with," said Seward abruptly. That was news to Weed, and
grounds for hope. Perhaps Lincoln would return to reason, stop exaggerating
the power of the radicals in the party, and start to settle the war without
demanding the abject surrender of the South. "Tell us, Thurlowwhat sort
of governor will Seymour be?"
"He is an honorable man," Weed said after a moment's thought. "Seymour
will support the war so long as its purpose is solely to maintain the Union,
and so long as it's conducted within the limits of the Constitution. If it is not,
he won'tsimple as that. Frankly, I think that is being a good governor."
Weed thought he had surprised them with that candid, anti-abolitionist
opinion, but was surprised himself by his partner's next question:
"What sort of President would he be?"
Weed wanted to be sure he was hearing correctly. "Did you ask what sort
of President would Horatio Seymour be? Of the United States?"
"Yes, Thurlow, that's my question precisely."
"He'd be a Democratic President, and we're Republicans." Strange ques-
tion. What was Seward, speaking for Lincoln, getting at? The President had
obviously talked this over with Seward, and Weed knew how Seward's mind
worked, but this line of questioning led into a dense forest. Weed knew Hora-
tio Seymour to be the high-minded sort, burdened with principle, who could
never be seduced into crossing over into the Republican ranks.
"Would he be inclined to preserve the Union," asked Lincoln, "and if so,
would he be able to?"
Weed chewed that over in each of its parts. The President was evidently
considering some far-reaching proposal, and Weed wanted to be sure to con-
vey his best information. "The story that is making the rounds," he said at
last, "is that the Peace Democrats in New York and the West would be
willing to let the South secede. Then what's left of the Union would split up,
with New York and the West joining the South in 'the old Union as it was,'
and letting the abolitionists around Massachusetts have their own country."
"We've heard that story," said Seward. "Any truth in it?"
Weed shook his head. "Not as far as Seymour is concerned. I think he
would resist that, and he's the one Democrat capable of resisting it success-
fully. He's pledged to hold the Union together, in all its sections, and I think
he'd stick to that. Not with abolition, though."
Lincoln nodded agreement of that assessment. Seward seemed to wait for
the President to say something and, when he did not, added a fact to what
little Weed knew about secret communication between the opposing parties.
"Our Democratic friend in New York, Barlow," said Seward, "sent a man in
to see the President not long ago. We assume it was with Seymour's knowl-
edge."
"Sam Barlow is a powerful Democrat." Weed did not add he was the man
trying to persuade George McClellan to run for President on the Democratic
ticket in 1864.
"He wanted the President to abate his emancipation policy, which Lincoln
declined to do, but Barlow's man was told that military law might be made to
relent if some national unity could be achieved." Weed knew instantly what
Seward was getting at. Lincoln, with his own party split, wanted to blur the
partisan lines between Democrats and Republicans.
"I said that issues are swept away so fast by overtopping events," Lincoln
put in, "that no political party will have time to mature until after the war."
Having said that, Lincoln rose and went to the fireplace, poked the logs
with a black fire iron until the flames shot up.
"Governor Seymour has greater power just now for good," said the Presi-
dent matter-of-factly, "than any other man in the country."
"More than you, Lincoln?" asked Seward, giving Weed the impression that
the two of them had gone through this before.
"Yes. Governor Seymour can wheel the Democratic Party into line, and,
because of that, he has the ability to put down the rebellion and preserve the
government."
Long pause, deep sigh, and Lincoln took the plunge. "Weed, tell Seymour
for me that if he will render this service to his country, I shall cheerfully
make way for him as my successor."
Weed always thought that he himself had as good a poker face as any man,
but that offer caused his jaw to drop. For someone already in the presidency
to stand aside for another was the ultimate political sacrifice.
The Albany politician knew how Lincoln had longed to be the first Presi-
dent since Jackson to achieve reelection. And although the war news was
dreadful and the party split, Lincoln had just demonstrated he was not the
sort to fear Chase's bid for the Republican nomination in 1864. Nor was
Lincoln the sort to worry about beating McClellan or whoever the Democrats
put up against him in the next election. Weed assumed that Lincoln felt in his
bones he could take on one after the other and win.
"However stunned my partner may look, Lincoln," Seward was saying,
"the irony of the moment is not lost upon him. Only this summer a cabal in
your Cabinet tried to seize power from you, an aborted undertaking that I am
sure you knew about as well as I, and that was turned aside. A few months
ago the military was on the verge of installing their beloved 'Young Napo-
leon' in your office, and somehow that never materialized. And only yester-
day your party in the Senate gathered its forces in great array and assaulted
your presidency, to no avail. If nothing else, you have proved you cannot be
dislodged."
"And yet," Weed concluded, "having won all those battles over those who
would replace you, you are now prepared to renounce your right to run for
reelection."
"Beyond that," said Seward, delighting in the scheme's daring, "he is pre-
pared to support the leader of the opposition party. That is something this
republic has never seen. In effect, he is choosing his successor, because with
Lincoln's support, the Democrat could not lose."
Instinctively Weed shied away. "I don't like it. It would say to the world
that you cannot win the war without Seymour's help, and for that help you
are willing to pay anything. Everything."
Lincoln nodded slowly. His offer had not been lightly made.
"Come now, Thurlow, it need not say anything of the sort," Seward cau-
tioned. "The world need not know about it yet. The deal would be a gen-
tlemen's agreement known but to the three of us, and to Seymour. Complete
secrecy is essential."
"And if the proposition is declined?" Weed did not want to rush into such
an unprecedented scheme. The Republican Party was only six years old and
this would surely finish it.
"If Seymour declines," said Seward airily, "and I cannot imagine that any
man in his right mind would decline, then we must be in a position to deny
that the offer was ever made. That is why the President has chosen the most
discreet political person in the nation for this assignment."
Weed remembered the day, thirty years before, when he rose to make his
first speech in the New York State Assembly. He had found himself unable to
talkhe was literally speechlessand in his humiliation and chagrin had
vowed never to seek public office or make a public speech again for the rest of
his life. He took that vow because he saw no other course open to him. But
Lincoln, a most resilient political man who had rebounded from defeat to the
House and defeat to the Senate, did not have to undertake an act of political
self-immolation.
"There is another way," Weed said quickly. "Sweep Chase and Stanton and
the other ultras out of your administration and rally the conservative Repub-
licans. Bring back McClellan and dare Wade to impeach you. Give in to the
Democrats on the arrests, and delay your emancipation edict until you can
get a couple of Confederate states to adopt your December proposal"
Lincoln shook his head. Weed looked to Seward, who could not possibly go
along with this final crushing of any hopes left to him to be President one day.
Seward said only, "It's a sacrifice. But it is Lincoln's considered judgment
that only an alliance with Seymour and his peace movement will preserve the
Union, and he is prepared to sacrifice anything for that."
"The conditions are substantially these," said Lincoln, getting specific
about his offer and passing a quill and inkwell across the table to Weed to
write them down. "Governor Seymour is to withdraw his opposition to the
draft. Second, he is to use his authority and influence as governor in putting
down any riots in New York against the war." He slowed down to let Weed's
writing catch up. "Finally, the Governor of New York is to cooperate in all
reasonable ways, including recruitment and financial assistance, with the Ad-
ministration in the suppression of the Southern rebellion."
That, the Albany editor calculated, was asking a lot of Horatio Seymour.
On the other hand, Lincoln was offering even morenothing less than the
presidency in 1864. The proposition boasted a symmetry of conflicting inter-
ests required for a sweeping political deal.
If Seymour went for it, the arrangement would certainly sustain a war of
any length to maintain the Union. A reduction of partisanship in the North
would surely discourage the leaders of the South, who were counting on
rising internal bickering in the North to lead to war weariness and pressure to
let the "wayward sisters" depart. No chance of that if Lincoln and Seymour
came to an understanding about resolute prosecution of the war through this
presidential term and the next as well.
"Seymour will accept, won't he?" Seward was trying to sound certain.
Weed put himself in Seymour's shoes, anticipating the governor-elect's
questions when the proposition was put to him. "Does this mean he would
have to go along with your suspension of habeas corpus in New York?"
Seward nodded. "As the President said, he would be committed to cooper-
ate in all reasonable ways with the Administration's suppression of the rebel-
lion."
That meant yes. The only leeway Weed was being given in the negotiation
was in that hint sent to Barlow that, by degrees, the military edict of emanci-
pation might be made into the gradual, compensated sort that Lincoln had
long espoused. His instructions were clear enough, but Weed wanted to be
absolutely sure before undertaking such a far-reaching political mission that
Lincoln was not acting as a result of depression or miscalculation.
"Perhaps you are unduly shocked by the catastrophe at Fredericksburg,"
he wondered aloud. "It is true that we lost half again as many men as the
enemy, and such bloodshfed is being laid directly at your door. Still, there
have been bloody battles before"
Lincoln shook his head; that was not the problem. "If the same battle were
to be fought over again, every day, through a week of days," the President
said dispassionately, "the army under Lee would be wiped out to its last man,
the Army of the Potomac would still be a mighty host, the war would be
over, the Confederacy gone."
Seward uncrossed his legs uncomfortably and crossed them again at such a
cold-blooded assessment of the carnage, but Lincoln went on: "No general
yet found can face the arithmetic, but the end of the war will be at hand when
he shall be discovered."
Weed had his answer. Lincoln was making this political decision clearhead-
edly, and was not panicked at the news of staggering military losses. He was
prepared to accept the sacrifice of tens of thousands of men to foil secession; it
should not be surprising that he was prepared to make a personal poUtical
sacrifice for the same end.
"I will put the proposition to him," said Weed finally.
"See if you can get Seymour to come down here," said Seward, "this week,
right after Christmas, well before his inauguration." And before any procla-
mation on New Year's Day, Weed understood. "Put it to him at one of your
breakfasts at Willard's, and then if he shows interest, bring him to the Man-
sion."
Lincoln directed Lamon to take Weed to the telegraph office across the
street, to see that his message of urgent summons was sent immediately to
Seymour, and to await a reply.
Weed followed the burly marshal to the War Department. He composed a
telegraph message to Seymour at his temporary office in Albany, where the
Governor-elect was preparing his inaugural address and choosing a Cabinet.
The telegraph operator, a young fellow who, Lamon attested, was entirely
discreetwhich meant he would not show the message to Stantonput the
message through without delay. It called on Seymour to come to consult with
Weed in Washington on a matter of the utmost urgency. Seymour would
know that meant the President wanted him to know something that could not
be sent in writing. Weed added that he awaited a reply at the telegraph office
in the War Department.
A half hour later, the return message came through. Bates handed it to
him. Weed read it and frowned. "Seymour says the distance from Albany to
Washington is the same as from Washington to Albany," he muttered to
Lamon. "I'll have to go see him there." He consulted the watch in his pocket.
"We can catch the noon train to New York."
"The noon train will leave for New York as soon as we get to the station,"
said Lamon. Weed grunted his assent; that was presidential service.
CHAPTER 39
THE PREACHER BRECKINRIDGE
Anna Carroll, on the river steamer Charlie Bowens from Memphis up to
Louisville, consulted her list of things to do.
Get paid for her three pamphlets. That was always at the top of the list and
was never crossed off. It amounted to $6,250 and Stanton's man at the War
Department had told her the most they could pay without a warrant from
Congress was $750. Could she take that without giving up her claim to the
rest? She did not want to think about that now.
Memorial about Vicksburg. She was certain that the Confederate fort
maintaining control of the Lower Mississippi was the single most important
military objective of the war. She would write Lincoln about ignoring the
river fortifications, abandoning all the costly and impractical plans for a wa-
terside assault on the fort overlooking the river, and taking Vicksburg by land
from the rear.
The third item was colonization. That project, duly authorized and con-
tracted for, was the excuse for her current travels. With emancipation loom-
ing, the President wanted a report extolling the prospects for negroes in
Panama. Some felt Lincoln was insincere about this, and Seward certainly
had not helped matters with his abject acquiescence to the protests of Nicara-
gua, Honduras, and New Granada, who did not want an exodus of blacks in
their direction. But to her mind, and to Lincoln's, there remained the clear
need for evidence of serious activity to ship the future freedmen to more
congenial climes. She liked that phrase, "congenial climes"; it implied that
the temperate zone of North America was uncongenial to blacks. In further-
ance of that, she was soon to see the Reverend Robert J. Breckinridge, the
senior agent of the American Colonization Society, a voluntary organization
that had been doing successfully in Liberia what Lincoln hoped could be done
in Central America.
The next item, listed as "boy alive?" was one she could also discuss with
the Breckinridge who was a Presbyterian minister. She had known him as
Reverend Bob all her life. Twenty years ago, when he was preaching in
Maryland, Anna had taken to him all her adolescent fears. Through her
formative years, before his return to his native Kentucky, he had been her
spiritual adviser. Nobody, not even her governor-father, had been closer to
her or more of an inspiration. Robert Breckinridge had been the first of a line
of much older men who had profoundly attracted her, and while there had
been no romance between the preacher and the girl just beginning to stand in
her own shoes, she had daydreamed about him as husband or lover. Years
later, when his tall nephew John was elected to Congress, the Reverend Bob
had commended the young politician to her; then the impossible daydreams
of her youth had been redeemed in another Breckinridge.
The Reverend Bob met her at the landing in Cairo, Illinois, at the junction
of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, to drive her in his carriage to his house in
nearby Paducah, Kentucky. At dockside were nearly five hundred "contra-
bands." The word had been coined by Ben Butler to make legitimate the
freeing of runaway slaves and was now used in sarcasm to describe all newly
free blacks. They sat in the rain, in four rows, wearing leg-irons but otherwise
unchained, awaiting official permission to enter. They were ragged, silent,
soaked, and shaking in the cold; many seemed ill. Anna knew that a month
before, Illinois voters, fearful of losing their jobs to workers who would take
any wage an employer offered, had passed a law to prevent the admission of
more free negroes into the state. When the Federal military authorities ig-
nored the state law, forcing Illinoisans to accept what many feared would be a
wave of black migration, Lincoln's popularity had plummeted in his home
state. Not even a man known to be one of his closest friends could carry
Lincoln's old congressional district.
She had not expected the radical change in Robert Breckinridge's appear-
ance; the twenty years had "whitened his hair and wizened his face. They rode
through the freezing rain almost as strangers. In bringing each other up to
date on mutual friends, some long dead, he alluded to the special pain being
felt in the Breckinridge family, split like their state into rebels and loyalists.
He did not mention his nephew John, and she, though hungry for news about
the man who so moved and infuriated her, felt it wiser not to ask.
At home, at a table in front of the great iron stove throwing off heat in the
kitchen of the well-to-do preacher, the aging Breckinridge went to the heart
of her ostensible reason for visiting him: "Colonization won't work."
"I just cannot understand that, coming from you," she said. "Your society
started work colonizing Liberia forty years ago. You raised the money to buy
slaves, set them free, and gave them a new life in Africa." When he shook his
head, no, she pressed: "In his annual message a few weeks ago, the President
praised the achievements of the Liberians, and only last week, he signed the
treaty recognizing Liberia as an independent nation. You have every reason,
especially now, to be proud of your life's work."
"Did you manumit your own slaves, Anna?"
"I did, and raised the money to buy the freedom of those who were mort-
gaged. You were the one who inspired me to do that, by the example you set."
And I'm still trying to pay those debts, she added to herself.
"Did the slaves you freed want to go to Liberia, or Chiriqui, or Hayti?"
"Well, no, they had family in Maryland, and"
"Forty years the Society has been colonizing Liberia, and do you know
what we have to show for it? Maybe three thousand colonists, total."
"That's a beginning."
"That's the end. Those were people who were often savagely mistreated
here, who had reason to hate their lives in America. They took colonization
as the only hope of escape from unspeakable cruelty. But the slaves being
emancipated now will be free here in America. What reasons do they have to
rip up their roots and go across an ocean to find heaven knows what?"
She would not crumble in the face of that experience. Colonization had to
be made to work. "The reasons would be to find work and to have a land of
their own."
"White men's promises. Anna, I've seen what it is like, over a lifetime, to
move a mere three thousand people from slavery here to freedom there." He
leaned forward and held up three fingers. "You're talking about moving three
or four million or morea thousand times as manyfrom freedom here to
possible starvation overseas. It is impossible. And once you understand that,
as the President must, then to raise the hopes of frightened whites that the
objects of their fear are going to vanish overnightthat is hypocritical."
"And if a little hypocrisy makes it easier to end a great crime and cruelty,
is that hypocrisy such a great sin?"
Anna surprised herself with that retort; as a girl, she had taken instruction
from him with absolute faith. Their relationship had changed, his unques-
tioned authority was gone; she felt no guilt for anything she was doing, from
justifying the extension of the President's war powers to persuading conserva-
tives that colonization was a solution. She knew what side she was on.
"The means, Anna, have a way of becoming the ends."
"Now you sound like your nephew." That was cruel, and she wished she
could recall the words when she saw the pain in the eyes of her old mentor.
"My nephew is a traitor to his country," he said finally, "and I am not."
She hastened to assure him that many in Washington knew of Robert
Breckinridge's staunch loyalty to the Union, and of the way he led his branch
of the family to outspoken support of Lincoln in a state inclined toward the
Peace Democrats. "And even though my pamphlet A Reply to Breckinridge
reduced the position of your nephew to dust and ashes, I made it clear to
everyone that many members of the Breckinridge clan were patriots." That
was true; she hoped he would believe it. Nor, for that matter, had she
dreamed that her widely read paper would contribute to the Senate passion
that resulted in the expulsion of John Breckinridge from that body, branding
him a traitor who would deserve a death sentence.
"Compose your soul, my dear girl. I know how fiercely you oppose my
nephew's views, as I do." He adjusted his spectacles and looked directly at
her. "But I also know how you feel about John himself."
That made her wonder if Breck had said anything to his uncle about the
depth of their friendship. Not likely. The nephew knew that Robert Breckin-
ridge was a stern moralist who would be angered by any relationship between
a married man and an unmarried woman, especially if they were his favorite
nephew and his spiritual ward. Anna was certain that nobody suspected any
attachment of any kindespecially after her attack on him in printyet the
old man seemed serenely confident that she shared his closeness to, and fond-
ness for, Breckinridge the traitor.
"I have been in touch with my young niece, Margaret," he explained. "She
told me of your mutual quest."
That was it; Anna's concern subsided. If Breck's missing son had not been
killed, there was a chance that he would have assumed another name in the
Union prison camps. At the War Department, Anna had scoured the lists for
the name Cabell, which she judged would be the most likely last name taken
by General Breckinridge's son. She had found a prisoner named Cabell listed
as being held at the Johnson's Island prison in Lake Erie.
"I needed the help of someone who would recognize the boy," she ex-
plained, "and someone who could move through the horror of those prison
camps without fainting."
Margaret Breckinridge, in her early twenties now, had always been a gen-
tie, frail young woman, but unlike any in her Kentucky family, she was a
burning abolitionist. Her anger at slavery drove her to do as a field nurse
what most women found too nauseating, and Anna admired that. "My old
friend John Dix has been most helpful, as has Mary Livermore." Anna had
fallen into the habit of mentioning the names of important people who would
do favors for her. She knew it was a bad habit, but she did not have so many,
and this one gave her pleasure. She hoped he knew that General Dix was in
charge of prisoner exchange, and that Mary Livermore headed the army
nurses in the Sanitary Commission. "Have you heard from Margaret?"
"Not for weeks. But you've given us hope," he added, "and perhaps the
family grapevine has passed that hope along to John and his wife, who must
be suffering."
"What news of your nephew?" She tried to make the question sound ca-
sual, not only to conceal the depth of her own interest, but also because she
was aware that a family's communication with traitorous members often led
to charges of treason. Mary Lincoln had not been able to mourn a nephew's
death.
Reverend Bob reached over to the sink, pulled a couple of newspapers off
the counter and pushed them across the table. "Louisville Journal says he was
in Murfreesboro, with Jeff Davis, not long ago, celebrating Colonel Morgan's
wedding. Now Morgan and his raiders are doing their own celebrating, driv-
ing up this way burning and looting, and making Grant look helpless."
Anna felt a sense of dread. At the War Department, she had heard Halleck
and Stanton talking about an attack by Rosecrans in Tennessee. That would
be against Bragg and Breckinridge, now devoid of eyes and ears as their
cavalry went off marauding, delighting the hearts of copperheads. If Breck
went into battle believing his cause was lost and his son was dead, he might
well ride at the head of some suicidal charge and throw his life away. She
read the newspaper article to the end. "What a waste," she sighed. "John
Breckinridge could have been President one day."
"If the South wins," said his uncle bitterly, "he may yet be. But not of the
United States."
"Why did he go wrong? Breck always said he stood firm for the Union, and
I believed him."
"He was against disunion, Anna. Probably still is."
She shook her head, uncomprehending. "Then is he weak, or stupid? He's
not fighting for slavery, he told me as much. And he's not fighting for inde-
pendence, because he believes in one nation. What is he fighting for? Ken-
tucky? Kentucky stayed in the Union. He seems to be fighting for the sake of
fighting, just because his friends are fighting, but he's a man who hates to
fight. Can you figure it out?"
"Did he tell you about his arguments with Lincoln, at the tea table, last
year in the White House?"
She nodded wearily. "Yes. After every one, he recited the entire debate,
both sides. And the more Breck described them, the more I agreed with
Lincoln."
"Why? What persuaded you?"
"Lincoln had one single, great, overriding purpose: to prevent disunion. He
was and is absolutely clear about that. Remember when Lincoln wrote the
letter to Greeley? He wrote that if he could save the Union by not freeing a
single slave, he would do it, and if he could save the Union by freeing all the
slaves, he would do it. Well, the abolitionists pretend now that he didn't really
mean that, he was only teasing Greeley, that he's really been for emancipa-
tion from the start. But the fact isLincoln was telling the truth. That's the
way he thinks."
"I'm told he favors black freedom."
She waved that aside. "That's not the point. He'll stretch the Constitution,
he'll usurp the power of Congress and the courts, he'll change the system
from a collection of states to a national power, he will free or not free the
slaves, he'll grab at every idea I can make up to justify greater war powers, all
to one purpose: to block forever the ability of a minority to break up the
Union."
"You make it seem his obsession, Anna."
She bobbed her head up and down; Lincoln was surely a man possessed by
a single idea. "What else is democracy but majority rule? If secession suc-
ceeds, the majority does not rule. If democracy fails here, it will fail every-
where. Lincoln sees that, and he is willing to do anything to defend it."
"Any means."
"Yes, any means, including getting us all killed. Emancipation is a means, a
military means, to save the Union. He makes no bones about that. He may be
wrong, of courseThurlow Weed and the Biairs think emancipation is a
means to losing the warbut his purpose is pure, clear, unwavering. That's
why I am with him." The logical extension of that occurred to her, and she
spoke it aloud: "John Breckinridge was never able to say what his purpose
was, except to complain about the way Lincoln was doing what he was sworn
to do."
She tried to remember Breck's central theme, and could not; the Ken-
tuckian was complex, tortured, halting, uncertain, a Hamlet who could never
be king. Yet John Breckinridge was no Fillmore, certainly no Buchanan; he
inspired others with confidence in his judgment; he held his own with the best
in debate. It stung her to be so drawn to a man who could not clearly identify
his cause, as Lincoln did, even when Lincoln had to cloak the cause of union
in the garment of emancipation.
"Let me explain something about the family," said the preacher. "Do you
remember my middle name?"
The Reverend Robert J. Breckinridge. "Jefferson," she remembered.
"My fatherJohn's grandfather and namesakewas allied with Jefferson
against John Adams and the Federalists. Jefferson and Breckinridge despised
the notion of a powerful central government, believing it would subvert the
people's freedom."
She shook her head. "A strong executive need not endanger any freedom."
"But in their lifetime, Anna, it did. In a time of great anger and loud
dissent, President Adams proposed and the Congress passed the Alien and
Sedition acts. A citizen could not criticize the government. In the name of
preserving the public order, tyranny took root. At that moment, the first John
Breckinridge put forward the Kentucky Resolutions, challenging and in effect
nullifying the national government's odious attack on the Bill of Rights. He
got away with it. And ultimately the Alien and Sedition acts withered and
died."
He walked to the comer of the kitchen, drew out a ladleful of water, put it
in a pan with ground coffee beans, and set it on the stove. "That was our
proudest moment, but let me tell you a family secret, something my nephew
John doesn't know. His grandfather never wrote those resolutions; he
couldn't write that eloquently."
"Jefferson wrote them?"
"Exactly. And later, when Jefferson became President, he made the so-
called author of those Kentucky Resolutions his Attorney General. So this
Breckinridge family is bred to the bone in the tradition of Jefferson's democ-
racy, in the revulsion toward what you call a 'strong executive' and what we
call a tyrant."
With an effort of will, she did not respond; it was more important, this time
at least, to understand than to refute.
"To young John, the way that a government governs, especially in an
emergency, determines the kind of government it will always be. The proce-
dure is sacred, the Constitution is a covenant. When anybody abuses that
covenant, for whatever endeven when it seems to be for the noble end of
saving the nation's life itselfthen the government has broken faith with the
people."
That was enough; that was sophistry. "There is a commandment that goes,
'Thou shalt not kill,' but murder is permissible before God in self-defense,"
she responded. "That is what secession isthe murder of a nationand
Lincoln's war is self-defense."
"Of course, you're right, my dear Anna," Robert Breckinridge assured her.
He was, after all, a loyal Union man. "But I thought you wanted to know
why John, who has never drawn a traitorous breath in his life, took the path
that we all know to be treason."
She nodded. She was thinking less of the argument than of his evocation of
the family lines. The Carrolls of Maryland included John Carroll, first bishop
and archbishop of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States; his
cousin was said to be the richest man in America, the only man to put his
address next to his signature on the Declaration of Independence"Charles
Carroll of Carrollton"so the king would know where to get him if the
revolution failed. Charles Carroll served in the first Federal Congress as
Maryland's senator and later became a sponsor of Henry Clay; her father
became, as if by right, governor of the state. She knew that the Breckinridges
could claim nearly as proud a heritage in the formation of the country. What
a lost opportunity that two such clans could never be joined. She amended
that thought quickly; in a way, they were joined, in a bond that she would not
allow to weaken between her and both the loyal and disloyal Breckinridges.
Reverend Bob did not relent. "John saw the arrest of the Maryland legisla-
tors, the closing of the Kentucky newspapers, the presidential suspension of
habeas corpus, the jailing of protesters, and he judged that the Union was
being saved at the expense of the people's liberty. He thought that was too
great a price to pay, and he refused. Others in the South and in the border
states refused for ignoble reasonsfor slavery, for separation, for spite, for
the foolish glory of battleand they tarnished his cause. I cannot forgive my
nephew for becoming a traitor, but I can understand why he did it. I fight
him, and I suffer with him, and I grieve for him."
"I love that man," Anna heard herself say. She added, ". . . as I love you
and as I love Ben Wade. But I will not suffer for him. Wrong is wrong, and he
chose the wrong side." That said, she continued, "And if you should see him
again, or be in touch with him in some lawful way, tell him I said that. All of
it, the loving him too. The truth is, I miss him, and you."
The preacher nodded and began to make the sounds of ministerial comfort,
but Anna's attention turned to the newspapers on the table. Rosecrans was
advancing on Bragg and Breckinridge south of Nashville; they could be suck-
ing Rosecrans into a trap, and if the Union army in Tennessee suffered the
same kind of defeat inflicted on Bumside in Virginia, Lincoln would have to
either settle the war or agree to the appointment of a dictator. Her eyes fixed
on a headline in the newspaper about Israelites. She asked, "What's this
about Jews here in Paducah?"
"It's a terrible thing Grant is doing," said the Presbyterian minister.
"Throwing them out of here, where families have been for generations
Cincinnati, Louisville, all the way downriver from Cairo to Memphis."
"What's the reason?" She knew Stanton's War Department, and suspected
the reason.
"The predations of the few, taken out on the many," said the Reverend
Breckinridge. "The classic scapegoat people. A friend of mine, an Israelite,
asked for a day's time to sell his belongings, but Grant's headquarters said no.
They confiscated his things and put him and his family on a wagon out of
town. The only Jews left in Paducah are in the hospitals, because they cannot
easily be moved, but I wouldn't give much for their chances of staying long
either. I hope you won't think me disloyal, Anna, but it's a disgrace."
Anna looked at the newspaper masthead: the Louisville Democrat, the pa-
per that took over the presses when the Courier was closed down for being
pro-secesh. She read aloud: "It says 'the Order is certainly the most extraor-
dinary, unwarrantable order we have ever heard ofthat is a Peace Demo-
crat paper, isn't it?"
"Yes, but look at the Journal. It's Republican." He pushed the paper across
the table to her. "Look: 'How many thousand patriotic soldiers of Jewish
descent have laid down their lives upon the altar of this country? And is this
miserable, ungrateful order to be the price of their blood?' That's from a pro-
Union, pro-Lincoln editor."
"You can imagine what Seymour and the copperheads will do with some-
thing like this," she observed. She did not say what she knew: that Grant and
Sherman were not alone in this sweeping decision, but that Halleck and
perhaps Stanton had been encouraging them to go ahead with the policy. It
would surely be taken by them as more evidence that the Constitution was
being flouted by the Administration, that the war was corrupting the Union,
and all the old Breckinridge arguments. Anna was sure that this had been
slipped past Lincoln, much as some military orders on emancipation were put
forward by generals in the field stimulated by mischievous politicians.
"What was the price of cotton," she asked, "when Grant's order went into
effect?"
"Forty cents a pound. I wouldn't ordinarily know that, Anna, but it was
widely remarked that the next day the Army lowered the price to twenty-five
cents a pound."
"Meaning the Jewish cotton traders had to dump their supplies immedi-
ately, at a ruinous loss. Somebody must have made a lot of money on this."
"I hadn't thought of that. I was more concerned with the moral corruption
of stigmatizing all the practitioners of one religion. It's not right. These peo-
ple are Kentuckians."
"What are they doing about it?"
"I hear the Kaskel brothers, the merchants in Paducah and Cincinnati,
have set out to see Congressman Gurley in Washington. I don't think they
have much hope for changing the policy. Lincoln would not want to counter-
mand an order of Grant's, would he? Grant is the only Union general who
seems to win. If Lincoln can put up with his carousing, he can put up with
this."
Grant's Jew Order would have repercussions in New York, she thought;
the newly elected governor, a Peace Democrat, would seize on the issue.
Unless the President reversed this policy quickly, real damage could be done
by all those who delighted in calling him a dictator for the arrests and his
seizure of property with the emancipation edict. But wouldn't Stanton and
Halleck at the War Department resist the embarrassment of a commander in
the field? The last time Lincoln forced a general to rescind an order, it had led
to the Fr6mont uproar.
"Your friends the Kaskels should go directly to Lincoln," she advised.
"This is surely a surprise to him. He won't put up with it."
He fidgeted in his chair, the way he had when she was a girl and he was
trying to think of a way to come to a sensitive personal subject.
She knew what he wanted to know. "And what of you, my dear," she said
in a mock-deep preacher's voice, "why is it that you never married?"
He stopped squirming and beamed. "I would never have asked that. But
now that you brought it up, are you happy, Anna? Are you the woman you
wanted to be when we used to talk at Kingston Hall?"
"What you want to know," she answered crisply but not unkindly, "is: Can
a woman be happy and fulfilled without a husband, without children, without
a real home and roots? Is it enough to be successful and respected, and
listened to on important matters by important men, and financially indepen-
dent?" She threw that last item in, not because it was true, but to round out
the question.
The preacher smiled. "What I sought to know was only what I asked, but I
am also interested in the answer you want to give to the question you have
often asked yourself."
"Life is incomplete without a partner, no denying that, for a woman even
more than a man." Having granted that, at this point in her prepared answer,
she was to have made a strong case for standing in your own shoes, but she
found herself going on into what she had never let herself think aloud.
"I get lonely. And most of the time I wish there was somebody to stand up
for menot part-time like Ben Wade, but all the time. And I know this
sounds silly, but I'm little. I'm a small person, I get jostled in crowds, and I
am frightened on the streets at night, so being alone is a real problem, a
physical problem."
She told herself to stop before she mentioned other physical problems.
Reverend Bob helped with a question that directed her to specifics. "But
you've known some men well, I'm sure. A woman of your attraction cannot
have been alone always. The choice of singleness was yours, was it not?"
"I am my father's daughter," she asserted, "and there are not many men
like Governor Carroll. The kind of men who interested me, who still do, are
engaged in great enterprises."
"Important men."
"Men in important jobs, I've found, are not always important men." She
thought of presidents Fillmore and Buchanan. "Nor are they prepared to
share the important part of their lives with their wives."
She thought of Lincoln, the only one of the three presidents she knew with
whom she had no personal relationship, but who treated her with a mixture
of condescension and affection. Then the tall figure of Chase loomed in her
mind. "Recently I thought there was one man who needed me for what only I
have to offer: political sagacity, powerful contacts, and a zest for accomplish-
ment."
"As well as an upright moral character."
"Yes," she nodded, breathing deep, "and a good figger, too."
"And what happened to him?"
She groped for a way to put it. "He married for money." She laughed at
that. "Look, Reverend Bob, you know me, I'm still the same free-minded
woman you saw when I was such a trial to the family. I'm a lot happier living
the independent life, standing in my own two shoes, doing man's work in a
man's world, than if I had to be the sweet Maryland belle in the house of a
domineering man."
"Pity it has to be that choice," he said, and put his finger on the problem:
"The time is out of joint, as Hamlet said."
"There may come a time for an upstart, disrespectful, pushing, smart
woman next to a great man," she said.
"You're not that way, Anna."
"And now," she said with a sudden rush of savage honesty, "you want to
know if your nephew and I have ever been in love, and if I had illicit relations
with a happily married man younger than myself, and if we ever think of each
other as anything but loyalist and traitor"
He put up his hands in horror. "Sometimes you are that way, Anna!"
CHAPTER 40
JOHN HAY'S DIARY
DECEMBER 28, 1862
Talk about tempests in teapots. You might think, with a battle we cannot
afford to lose shaping up in Tennessee, and with Senators Sumner and Brow-
ning in and out of here every day telling the Tycoon to sign or not to sign the
final emancipation edict, that trivialities would be brushed aside. But the
whole of this dark and bitterly cold morning was spent pouring soothing
syrup over the sensibilities of people in a snit about offenses committed by our
generals in the fieldofficers who are, after all, trying to protect their backs
as they face the enemy.
Our esteemed Attorney General, Mr. Bates, brought in a Missouri constit-
uent, the irate pastor of a Presbyterian church in St. Louis, who had been
kicked out of the state by the occupying military for his sympathy with the
rebellion.
"Here is a military order from General Curtis," said Bates, because his
friend the Reverend MePheters was too sputteringly outraged to know where
to begin, "exiling this clergyman to the South because he is a Southern sym-
pathizer."
"True?" Lincoln, reading the order, asked the man, who was purpling
before our eyes.
"I have signed the Union loyalty oath, as required. I have constantly
prayed in church for the President and the government, just as I did before
the war. It is my position that my personal sympathies are none of the gov-
ernment's business."
The Tycoon did not dispute that. "I don't see that anything specific is
alleged against you. The charges here are all generalthat you have a rebel
wife and rebel relations, that you sympathize with rebels, that you exercise
rebel influence, whatever that means."
"Some Lincoln men in my parish demanded that General Curtis do some-
thing about a churchman who dared to express his yearnings for peace,"
MePheters charged.
"Frankly, I believe this fellow does sympathize with the rebels," the Prsdt
said to Bates, "but the question remains whether such a man, who cannot be
charged with violating his oath, can be exiled upon the suspicion of his secret
sympathies."
"My opinion is that he cannot, on those grounds," said the Attorney Gen-
eral.
Lincoln agreed, and said he would write to General Curtis suspending the
order. He did not go so far as to revoke the military order, but the general
would catch the President's drift. "The U.S. Government must not undertake
to run the churches," Lincoln said. "Let the churches take care of them-
selves."
Our Presbyterian friend left satisfied. Bates remained behind a moment to
submit his written opinion on a proposal, pushed through the Congress by the
Jacobins, to split off the northwestern part of Virginiawhich we now oc-
cupyand admit it to the Union as a separate state. At the instigation of
Bates, Lincoln had asked each member of the Cabinet to submit written
recommendations on this thumb in the eye to General Lee and his ilk. The
Prsdt is especially anxious this week to impress the Senate with how thor-
oughly he consults the Cabinet. I imagine Chase and Stanton will be asked for
more paperwork than they bargained for, and they might not like going on
the record with every opinion.
"I advise a veto of the bill," said Bates. "I understand that Blair and Welles
agree."
True, the three conservatives in the Cabinet stand as one in not infuriating
the South with this punishment of Virginia. But I have the written opinions in
hand of Chase and Stanton, who most vociferously urge the signing of the
legislation setting up a new state of West Virginia. Seward, who knows he is
hanging on to his job by a thread and cannot further offend the radicals, will
side with Chase and Stanton. And Caleb Smith, stumbling out of the Cabinet
to a judgeship next week, has no opinion. That leaves the vote in the Cabinet
three to three, which shows how it would be to run the Executive branch by
committee.
Lincoln will sign the bill if he decides to go ahead with the Proclamation.
That's because the bill admitting West Virginia has in it a requirement that
the state gradually emancipate all slaves within its new borders; no steady
abolition, no statehood. This week, the trick is to ameliorate the abolitionists,
who were rebuffed in their grab for power last week, while not riling up the
Peace Democrats, who fear the Edict of Freedom will prolong the war. The
business of soothing has become the be-all and end-all of government. He
must calm public sentiment at both extremes to keep the rocking ship of state
from capsizing.
"Public opinion is never spontaneous with the people," Bates retorted, "it
is always a manufactured article." When Lincoln looked interested at that
observation, one of the few original thoughts to come through that scraggly
beard for some time, Bates continued, "I would hope you not be overly
influenced by what some peoplewho claim to represent public opinion
might say if you vetoed West Virginia, or modified your Proclamation next
week."
"If I refused to issue that Proclamation," the Prsdt said, "there would be a
rebellion in the North, and a dictator placed over my head in a week." (The
latest radical candidates for dictator, I am told by a gossipy but ravishing
young woman who consoles me for my loss of Jephtha's daughter, are
"Beast" Butler and "Fighting Joe" Hooker; while the conservatives and
Democrats still like McNapoleon.)
"But these two blows at the South, taken together, will make negotiations
impossible," warned Bates. He was aware of a letter sent to Lincoln that week
from General McClernand in Illinois, reporting that a messenger from high
officers in the rebel army had approached him seeking the restoration of
peace. It's a good thing the Femando Wood crowd in New York were not in
touch with the McClernand people in the West to compare peace feelers, or
that both did not know of the probing that the Prsdt has permitted General
Banks in New Orleans. Such a comparison of notes would make it appear
that serious negotiation was in prospect, and that Seymour's honey would
attract more Southern flies than Lincoln's vinegar.
Ah, but now was the time for the hint in the other, more accommodating
direction. "Let the people of the South adopt systems of apprenticeship for
the colored people," the Prsdt said, tossing in that familiar half promise to
delay abolition, "conforming substantially to the most approved plans of
gradual emancipation. Then, with the aid they can have from the general
government, they may be nearly as well off, in respect to this, as if the present
trouble had not occurred."
An awe-inspiring straddle. To those anti-abolition Peace Democrats rock-
ing the boat because they want peace negotiations now, he offers subtle assur-
ances that emancipation means merely a nominal "freeing" of slaves in rebel
states who would then remain indentured apprentices until the end of the
century, with money paid to every slaveholder by the federal government for
property seized. Gentle evolution.
To those at the other extreme, the vindictive Jacobins who want to subju-
gate the damned secesh, he offers freedom for the slaves by virtue of military
necessity and a lopping-off of a huge chunk of disloyal Virginia. Radical
revolution.
And he is doing this balancing act at the moment of his greatest military
and political weakness. Something for everyone; nobody happy, but nobody
so unhappy as to bring about what the Tycoon likes to call the general
smashup. (Good name for a general.)
"I hope to stand firm enough not to go backward," he told Bates, "and yet
not go forward fast enough to wreck the country's cause." Bates left half-
satisfied, which is the most we can do for anybody.
However, the soothing of the Presbyterian minister with treason in his
heart, but only in his heart, was as nothing compared to the soothing needed
to calm the storm that was raised by the next delegation waiting in my
anteroom. General Grant, it seems, has the Hebrews upset. The Israelites,
offended by his policy of excluding them from his area of military operations,
have gone to the press and the Congress to complain.
"The New York Times calls this 'one of the deepest sensations of the war,' "
I told the President as I passed him the paper. Whatever has possessed such a
true-blue loyalist as Henry Raymond to run such stuff? His New York Times
has supported us staunchly even when Greeley wavered. But this editorial
borders on hysteria, perhaps reflecting the population of Israelites in that city,
which, I am told, numbers over ten thousand. "It is a humiliating reflection
that after the progress of liberal ideas even in the most despotic countries has
restored the Jews to civil and social rights, as members of a common human-
ity, it remained for the freest government on earth to witness a momentary
revival of the spirit of the medieval ages . . ."
A Rabbi Wise of Cincinnati had stirred up Ohio Congressmen, and a House
resolution was introduced by Congressmen Gurley and Vallandigham to cen-
sure Grant. Grant's sponsor, Washburne of Illinois, prevailed on Tad Stevens
to stop it on a close vote, 56 to 53. In the Senate, Powell of Kentucky was
angry at what had happened to his constituents in Paducah, and moved the
same resolution, which Sumner was able to table. The voting pulled over
Congressmen who ordinarily did not rise to the usual Seymour-Vallandigham
bait about arbitrary arrests. It gave the Peace Democrats a new weapon to
bludgeon us withreligious persecution.
I detect a delicious irony in all this, evidence of my advancing maturity.
There go Seymour and Vallandigham, who don't give a damn for the freedom
of blacks, taking up the cudgels for the rights of Jews. And there go Tad
Stevens and Charles Sumner, who want to abolish slavery and punish the
slaveholders, defending a general who treats Jews as having as few rights as
slaves. Says something about moralists.
Fortunately, the Prsdt was not on record as approving the Grant policy
banning Jews. We knew about it, of course, and turned a blind eye because the
cotton speculation was of real concern to Grant. When Stanton sent Charles
Dana down to Memphis, that roving Grant-watcher reported the corruption
of the army quartermaster corps was something fierce. I have his report here:
"Every colonel, captain, or quartermaster is in secret partnership with some
operator in cotton; every soldier dreams of adding a bale of cotton to his
monthly pay." Dana blamed Jews and Yankees for corrupting the military;
Grant has nothing against Yankees.
When Lincoln sent Zacharie, the foot doctor, down to New Orleans, he
referred to the "general prohibition" he knew to exist. Banks has the original,
and Zacharie has a copy of that letter, but they are good eggs and should
cause no trouble. It should not be hard to deny knowledge of the policy.
Certainly we did not know Grant was going to make a great public show out
of it. The only part of the policy that the Prsdt even tacitly approved had to
do with prohibition against entry of Hebrews, not expulsion of those Israelites
already in the area.
So here we are, with Congressman Gurley in the anteroom with Cesar
Kaskel, a merchant from Paducah. The Tycoon went out the door, greeted
them heartily with "I'm always glad to see my friends," and brought them in.
Kaskel is a tall fellow, not more than thirty, mustache and no beard, deep
voice, dignified, carries himself like a successful man. (Why isn't he in uni-
form? Why aren't I in uniform?) Quite a different sort from Zacharie, the
only other Hebrew I have ever met. The foot doctor is mercurial, filled with
visions and the excitement of being a presidential agent, eager to please. The
merchant is more distant, very serious, respectful but not obsequious.
"We sent you a telegraph message," Kaskel said after thanking the Presi-
dent for receiving him on short notice. "When we received no answer in
Paducah, my friends delegated me to come to the Congressman here, and Mr.
Gwley brought me to you."
Lincoln looked at me; I had received no telegraph message. Could it be that
it was not forwarded by the War Department? That outfit was not at all
happy with the reaction to Grant's order, especially since it had been issued
with the knowledge of some people here. Probably Halleck, maybe Stanton.
That's irritating; it is not for Stanton to decide which telegraph messages
addressed to the President to deliver. Censorship is supposed to go the other
way.
Kaskel laid on Lincoln's table documents from leading Kentucky citizens,
including the Reverend Robert J. Breckinridge (the loyal Breckinridge, who,
Anna Carroll thinks, should be the next senator from Kentucky), from Re-
publican leaders and military authorities, attesting to the patriotism and war
efforts of the Jews in Paducah.
As the President perused them, Kaskel read from the message that had not
been delivered: "General Orders No. 11 expels all Jews without distinction.
We feel greatly insulted and outraged by this inhuman order, the carrying out
of which would be the grossest violation of the Constitution." He cleared his
throat and went on. "The order places Jewish families as outlaws before the
world. We are loyal, respectable citizens, and pray for your effectual and
immediate interposition."
The Prsdt smiled. "And so the children of Israel were driven from the
happy land of Canaan?"
"Yes," said Kaskel, nicely picking up the biblical tone, "and that is why we
have come unto Father Abraham's bosom, asking protection."
"And this protection they shall have at once." Lincoln wasted no time
writing a short note to Halleck, directing him to telegraph instructions to
Grant to cancel the infamous General Orders No. II. "I don't like to see a
class or nationality condemned on account of a few sinners," he added to
Kaskel, and told me to take Kaskel to General-in-Chief Halleck directly.
The Prsdt did not disclaim knowledge of Grant's policy, but he left the
impression that it all had been news to him, and added specifically that he felt
no prejudice against Israelites. The alacrity with which he acted to counter-
mand the order showed his understanding of the need to defuse this issue
before Seymour in New York or the Peace Democrats in Congress could turn
it into more of a cause c616bre.
I took Kaskel and Gurley down to Old Itchy Elbows, who pretended to
disbelieve that the order had ever been issued. Halleck looked at the paper
from Grant's headquarters as if it were a forgery, and wrote to Grant the
most begrudging recision imaginable. "A paper purporting to be General
Orders No. II, issued by you December 17, has been presented here. By its
terms, it expels all Jews from your department. If such an order has been
issued, it will be immediately revoked."
I gave a copy to Kaskel so he wouldn't be arrested on the way home. Later,
Halleck sent another message to Grant in apology, which he had to show us
since he laid the responsibility on Lincoln: "The President has no objection to
your expelling traitors and Jew peddlers, which, I suppose, was the object of
your order; but as it in terms proscribed an entire religious class, some of
whom are fighting in our ranks, the President deemed it necessary to revoke
it."
That Jew Order was impolitic of Grant, though I suppose he could be
excused for going ahead with the expulsion after nobody complained about
his general prohibition. They are a touchy bunch, the Israelites, and it seems
they have influence in the press and in the legislature beyond what might be
expected from their numbers. Grant's putting the policy in writing was the
bad thing; many understandings are better left unwritten.
Among the things not to be put in writing are communications between
this office and the leadership of the opposition party now taking office in New
York. The Ancient of Days has been playing his favorite game of shut-pan
with Nico and me on this subject, but something has been afoot with wily old
Thurlow Weed as intermediary.
I suspect this because Hill Lamon received a telegraph message delivered
personally by Bates across the street, an unusual procedure neatly circum-
venting Stanton, Nico and me. Lamon took it in to the Prsdt, who looked at
the paper, exploded with an expletive, crumpled it in his large hand, and
threw it angrily in the waste bucket. That was an uncommonly intemperate
response for the Tycoon. He doesn't react that way when we lose elections or
battles. Something of great moment had gone awry. Then he spent a couple of
hours on the draft of the final Proclamation, inclining me to think he will sign
it.
Later, after he had gone to dinner with the Hellcat, curiosity drove me to a
depth of snoopery that I rarely display. I fished around in the bucket next to
the Prsdt's desk and came up with a crumpled telegraph message that was so
cryptic it had needed no encoding:
"Proposition declined. Weed."
After dinner, Mayor Opdyke of New York, a Seymour supporter and gen-
eral political troublemaker, came by to see the Prsdt and made the mistake of
demanding Seward's removal. Lincoln is a man with a temper, but he usually
hides it; this time, he gave his temper full rein and literally threw the mayor
out of the office. That will offend the Seymour Democrats; the Prsdt suddenly
does not seem to care.
At the end of this strange day of smoothing-over and blowing-up, I asked
the Tycoon about General Sam Grant, whom he has never met. Alexander
McClure has been telling the story at dinner parties that when Grant's de-
tractors told Lincoln of Grant's drinking, the Prsdt replied, "Let me know
what brand ofwhiskey he drinks, and I'll send a barrel to my other generals."
Since I knew what the Prsdt's real response was when word came from a
trusted newspaper source that Grant was a drinker (he sent a worried query
to Congressman Washburne to find out how true the charge was) I asked the
Prsdt if send-the-others-a-barrel was a story he had told.
He shook his head and spoke with his accustomed expertness about humor.
"That's a hardy perennial, like most jokes. Dates back to King George III,
who was told that General Wolfe, in command of the English forces in Can-
ada, was stark raving mad. The king said he wished Wolfe would bite some of
his other generals."

CHAPTER 41
STONES RIVER

Bragg was still incensed. The night before, on the eve of a great battle, his
division commanders had refused to stop a display of maudlin sentimentality
that would surely erode the discipline and fighting spirit of the troops.
It had begun with "Yankee Doodle." General Rosecrans's Federal troops,
forty-five thousand of themover ten thousand more than the forces Bragg
could muster, thanks to the unfortunate decision President Davis made to
send men west to defend Vicksburgwere encamped the night before on the
north side of Stones River, just outside Murfreesboro. One of the bands, in
the cold and fog, began playing "Yankee Doodle." In return, one of the
Confederate bands replied by playing "Dixie's Land." Bragg was certain it
must have been under Breckinridge's command, since he was the leader of the
conspiracy to undermine Bragg's authority dating from the execution of the
Kentucky deserter. Then another Union band took up "Hail, Columbia," and
another on the Confederate side (too damned many men with instruments,
who would better serve carrying ammunition) played "The Bonnie Blue
Flag."
That sort of serenading was bad enough, revealing positions unnecessarily,
but when a band in blue played "Home, Sweet Home," the bands in gray had
joined in. Soldiers on both sides of the river could be heard bawling out the
emotional "Be it ever so hum-ble, there's no-o place like home." It was
enough to make a disciplinarian sick.
The battle would be won, he had decided then, by the army that attacked
first. Bragg estimated that the Union general, currying popularity as "Old
Rosey" with his troops, would probably allow his men breakfast before a
day's fighting. Accordingly, Bragg had ordered the attack at daybreak.
Before breakfast, with the first light showing over the Tennessee hills, he
sent Folk's and Hardee's divisions smashing into the Federal right. That was
twenty minutes ago; he could hear the guns and screams but did not have a
way to see the battle.
He held Breckinridge and his six thousand men in reserve. One reason was
that Bragg distrusted the fighting quality of the "orphans," supplemented by
the reluctant riffraff drafted in Kentucky. More to the point, but not to be
admitted to anyone, he placed Breckinridge as his reserve because Bragg was
confident of victory and did not want the Kentucky politician to share the
glory. If Breckinridge were so much as on the field of battle, Bragg was sure
the venal press would pour on him the sort of adulation ordinarily reserved
for Robert Lee, while the dogs of detraction would be loosed on Braxton
Bragg for not caring about the lives of his men.
Casualties would be heavy today. The months of maneuver were past. In
the present order of battle, little of consequence could be accomplished with-
out the expenditure of blood. He was glad that Jeff Davis understood that, if
few others did. Certainly the pack of whiners who were the general officers in
his command did not: "Bishop" Polk was an ass, "Old Reliable" Hardee
could be relied on to move sluggishly, and even the newly promoted fearless
Irishman, Clebume, had been spending all too much time with the chief
malcontent in the Confederate Army, Breckinridge. He trusted none of them;
if the army lost on this day, Bragg was quite prepared to blame the result on
his incompetent division commanders.
v He could not, however, find fault with what remained of his cavalry. Al-
though Forrest and Morgan had been sent elsewhere at Davis's orders, the
horsemen left behind under Joe Wheeler had ridden clear around the oncom-
ing Union Army, ripping up Rosecrans's communications, destroying his
supply and ammunition trains, and capturing enough guns and ammunition
to arm a brigade. His cavalry had returned in time to join the Confederate
attack on a Union Army whose commander mistakenly thought he had time
to take the offensive after breakfast.
A rider came up with good news. "The Federal right has caved, sir.
They've fallen back into a wedge-shape line, with the point at that round
forest. Hardee's been assaulting the point of the wedge but is taking heavy
casualties."
Bragg scowled. He would have to use Breckinridge on the other side to
divert the Union strength from the point. He sent an aide to order a modest
advance by the Kentucky and Alabama troops. In moments, the rider re-
turned with word from Breckinridge that he had been told by cavalry that a
strong force of the enemy was in his front.
The Kentucky politician was a damned coward, Bragg decided; he proba-
bly did not want to attack the Union Kentuckians under Crittenden, his
boyhood chum, facing him across Stones River. Bragg switched a couple of
Breckinridge's reserve brigades to Hardee for his attack on the Federal strong
point, which was resisting furiously in a rutted, wooded area offering good
protection for defenders. He sent word to Breckinridge to stay where he was.
Bragg decided that the round forest into which Union troops had been
forcedhis troops were calling it "Hell's Half Acre"had to be taken at any
cost. He watched as Hardee buried his men in, wave after wave throughout
the interminable afternoon, at more than acceptable loss of life on both sides,
without dislodging the Federals. One of his generalsCheatham, looking
red-faced and drunkshouted "Give 'em hell, boys!" every few moments,
and Bishop Polk, the prissy old fool, echoed with "Give 'em what General
Cheatham says, boys!"
Bragg then calculated that Breckinridge would be useful in wearing down
the salient before darkness closed in; no time for a victory today, but time for
mutual punishment. As Rosecrans began a Union counterattack from Hell's
Half Acre, Bragg ordered in Breckinridge and Cleburne to stop it. The "or-
phans" held together well enough, to Bragg's surprise, pushing the Federals
back into the cedars before stopping to regroup.
The Kentuckian came to him for permission to suspend the attack. On
Bragg's orders, the Kentucky brigades had been fed into the battle piecemeal
and had been chewed up one at a time. "The Federals are supported by
numerous batteries, and we have no artillery we can wheel in there," Breckin-
ridge reported. "Their lines have the protection of the railroad cut, forming
an excellent breastwork. I deem it reckless to continue."
Bragg shrugged his assent; the battle was won, the majority of the field in
Confederate hands, and he was just as glad that Breckinridge was not under-
taking anything heroic; better that he should be quoted in the reports as
having been overly cautious. By nightfall, the fog mingled with the smoke and
the darkness made further attacks impossible. He could permit the exhausted
men to bivouac.
"I expect the Yankees to abandon the field during the night," Bragg told
his commanders triumphantly. "I have notified Richmond that Rosecrans has
been driven from every position except his extreme left, and that tomorrow
our Army of Tennessee will present a great New Year's gift to the Confeder-
acy."
His commanders, characteristically, did not applaud or offer congratula-
tory toasts. Hardee looked disgusted, Polk exhausted, Cleburne glum. Breck-
inridge, probably still smarting at the loss of a few Kentucky conscriptshe
had fussed about legal niceties when Bragg had pressed them into service
made some remark about the screams of the wounded and his hopes of send-
ing out rescue and burial parties in the early morning. He had the temerity to
suggest that the Confederate commanders thought they had the battle won
after the first day at Shiloh.
Not one of the sorry lot caught what Bragg knew to be the significance of
his victory: it applied the crushing blow to Union hopes on the very weekend
before Lincoln's desperate proclamation of abolition on New Year's Day.
When news of this Confederate victory reached London, the British would be
sure to recognize the South and begin active assistance. Let Old Abe "liber-
ate" the western portion of Virginia and play the hypocrite by approving its
secession from Richmond; as Bragg's forces moved north through Kentucky,
that area would soon be back in Southern hands.
Bragg was certain that not a single one of these malcontents under him
appreciated the genius of his decision to despise defensive positions and to
attack the attackers instead, just an hour before their planned assault. These
generals were all envious of him; in his report, he was determined to detail
their weaknesses in carrying out his orders.
"When Rosecrans withdraws tomorrow, be prepared to march north to
recapture Nashville, " Bragg announced. Too many of that city's inhabitants
had welcomed the Yankee invaders; for those disloyal Southerners, the time
for retribution had come. "I want no talk of tired men and burial details. We
march."
To Breckinridge, he added with a certain glee: "President Davis informs
me that next month he will suspend habeas corpus throughout this area. We
will be able to arrest and hold the Northern sympathizers among the civilian
population without the delay of courts."
Bragg grinned up at the tall Kentuckian. "He asked me especially to break
that to you gently."

CHAPTER 42
TAIL OF THE ARMY

"This the river steamer to Aquia Creek?"
"That's our run, soldier," the riverboat captain replied. "From our nation's
capital to General Bumside's headquarters, just a couple of hours from peace
to war."
"I should be pleased to go with thee tonight," said James Stradling of
Mechanicsville, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, sergeant in a New Jersey cav-
alry regiment.
"No room. You can see how we're loading up."
Stradling had not anticipated that possibility, and looked perplexed. "Here
are my furlough papers," he said to the boat captain. "Thee will notice that
my furlough expires tomorrow, on the first day of the New Year. I am anx-
ious to get to my unit at the front."
"Should of thought of that beforehand. We have some brass coming on
board tonight. They take up a lot of space. Can't help you."
"But if I remain over here in Washington," the sergeant explained pa-
tiently, "the provost guard will pick me up and hustle me off with a lot of
deserters to the front, and I don't want to go that way."
The captain was as unyielding as he was unconcerned. With an effort,
Sergeant Stradling resisted the impulse to think ill of him. He picked up his
bag, walked awhile up to the Capitol, moved through that half-finished edifice
with his neck craned to see the sights, came out the back facing Pennsylvania
Avenue. He hefted his bag up on his shoulder and walked down the long hill,
wondering what to do.
If he showed up a day late, his lieutenant would be very disappointed, and
might even think he remained in Washington to take part in New Year's Eve
revelries. Stradling had earned a reputation as a responsible soldier, which he
did not want to lose because transportation to the front was hard to come by.
The other Quakers in his regiment would be more severe than the officers,
because his actions reflected on them.
He came to the white house where the President lived, and stopped. A
thought struck him: why not see the President? He would knock on the door,
and if the President was not in, Mrs. Lincoln would probably know how soon
he would be back and would ask a soldier to come in and abide awhile until
Mr. Lincoln returned.
At the front door, however, two policemen were on guard. He had not
expected that and looked at them blankly, shifting his bag off his shoulder to
the ground.
"Well, country boy, what do you want?"
"I want to see the President."
They nodded him into a large room filled with people. The sergeant was
puzzled at the size of the crowd. He asked a man near him if the people had
assembled to hear the President make a speech. The man said that the people
were assembled to see the President, all right, but not to hear a speech.
Everyone had to wait his turn for a personal interview. It was that day of the
week.
The sergeant thanked him, and looked around to see if the crowd contained
anybody he recognized. Presently he saw a tall soldier with flowing blond hair
and a commanding bearing: that was General "Fighting Joe" Hooker. He
recognized him from a parade. General Hooker went to a side door, knocked,
and a guard opened it and passed him inside.
"Where do people land when they go in that side door?" the sergeant
inquired of a guard.
"Why, greeny, that goes to the President's room."
"Well, look, I'm a soldier in distress. Can you help me? I've been home on
furlough, and"
"You want to get it extended, I suppose. I don't think the President will do
that." Sgt. Stradling told him the dilemma. "Oh, that's an Indian of another
skin," said the guard. Stradling asked him what that meant, and the guard
said, "It's like a horse of another color. You are green, aren't you?"
"That's what everybody always says," Stradling admitted, "but if I can get
a chance to put my case before the President, I bet I can get him to help me.
All I want is to get to the front tonight."
"Damn all steamboat captains," said the guard, who, Stradling supposed,
had had difficulty with them himself. He took the furlough papers and went
through the side door.
There followed a long wait, something the Quaker sergeant was accus-
tomed to, having served in the army almost a year. While he was waiting, a
well-dressed, fierce-looking short man came to the side door, showed the
guard his card, and was passed in. Stradling asked who that was and was told
it had been United States Senator Ben Wade of Ohio.
In a half hour, a man about the sergeant's age with a mustache came out
and said, "I'm the President's secretary. I gave your furlough to the Presi-
dent, with a note that you were trying to get to the front instead of away from
it. We don't get many requests like that."
Stradling told him that the fact that the President was warmly inclined
toward soldiers who remained in the army, and stayed near the front, had
trickled down through the army. As the possibility of actually meeting Lin-
coln face to face began to become real, the sergeant began to feel queasy.
Another long wait, during which a couple of other generals slipped in
from Franklin's division, he thought, where most of the ruckus about Bum-
side was being kicked up. Just about everyone in the army knew there was a
feud going on at the top, what with the court-martial of General Porter to
make Little Mac look bad.
"The President will see you in a few minutes," said the pleasant secretary,
who took him inside to what Stradling at first imagined must be the Presi-
dent's office. It did not look as grand as he thought it would. The secretary
went into the other room, leaving the door open, and Stradling could hear the
generals running down old Bumside, calling him incompetent and bungling;
worse, Burn was planning an attack across the river again, which the generals
thought would bring another disaster. It seemed to Stradling that they could
well be right, but it didn't seem fitting for generals to sneak out of camp and
talk to the President behind Bumside's back. He'd hate to have any of the
corporals under him talking that way to the lieutenant.
"General," said a high, strong voice, "we shall expect to hear some good
news from you soon. I shall take what all of you have told me under advise-
ment, and give you my word that this shall be kept in confidence." That must
have been the President himself speaking; Stradling's throat went dry. The
secretary motioned him in as the others left. Stradling saluted them. They did
not look at him.
"Take a seat," said the man with the beard behind the big table.
"I'd rather stand, if you don't mind, sir."
The President then rose, and Stradling did not think he would ever stop
going up. He was the tallest man the sergeant ever saw. He came around the
t~ble and extended a hand that seemed to be fully three times as large as his
own, with a grip on him like a vise.
"What can I do for you, my young friend?"
Stradling coughed, regained his composure, stated his business, and sa-
luted. Lincoln took his furlough papers, and said aloud what he wa~ writing
across them: "To any steamboat captain going to the front, please give bearer
transportation." He handed the papers back, with "If I have any influence
with steamboat captains, that should take you to the front."
The sergeant turned to leave but the President told him to hold on.
"Wade," the President said to a fierce-looking little fellow seated in the corner
of the room, "we have had the heads of the army here a few minutes ago, and
learned from them all they cared to tell. Now we have here the tail of the
army, so let us get from him how the rank and file feel about matters." He
turned to Stradling, adding, "I mean no reflection on you, Sergeant, when I
say the tail of the army."
"I understand what thee are driving at," he told the President.
"A great many men have deserted in the past few months," Mr. Lincoln
told him. "I am endeavoring to learn the cause. There must be some good
reason for it. Either the army is opposed to me, or to the generals, or to the
Proclamation of Emancipation that is supposed to be signed tomorrow." He
turned to the man he called Wade with an aside: "None of the generals desert
or resign, and we could spare a number of them better than we can spare so
many privates."
Stradling was feeling better about everything, and drew himself up to tell
the President what the army thought.
"Mr. President, the army has the utmost confidence in thee, in thy honesty,
and thy ability to manage this war." That was true, no flattery, and a good
beginning. Well launched, he went to the heart of what the President had
been discussing before. "The army has no faith in the ability of General
Bumside. He appears to us as a general with no military genius whatever. He
fights his battles like some people play the fiddly, by main strength and awk-
wardness."
"Were you there at Fredericksburg? Did you see much of the battle?"
The sergeant nodded vigorously, and reported: "When the fog lifted, you
could see nearly the whole line. It was on a long and level plain, what they
call in Virginia bottomland. The rebels were entrenched on the low hills
looking down on the plain where we were. They had filled a sunken road full
of sharpshooters. There was no way of our winning that battle, sir, but Gen-
eral Bumside launched Hooker's corps, the flower of the army, against those
positions. You know the result, for I can observe the great gloom which still
hangs around you on account of that battle."
"That great gloom comes from our fears about another fight entirely," said
the senator in the corner, "in Tennessee. But at Fredericksburg, was there any
excuse for such a blunder?"
"You really want my view?" Stradling did not want to get in trouble with
the lieutenant.
"Go ahead," said the President, "this is very interesting to me, and to
Senator Wade."
"It was open country," the sergeant recalled. "Both flanks of the rebel
army were susceptible of being turned. Ap assault straight ahead was sure to
fail. We knew about that sunken road, because we of the cavalry had been
over that road with General Bayard a few months ago, and he must have told
General Bumside about it. I don't see a whole lot of excuse for that blunder."
"And such a disaster that followed," said the President, "still makes my
heart sick."
"Our duty is not to criticize," Stradling allowed, "but to obey even if we
get our heads knocked off. Which is what happened."
The President passed his big hand across his face, then changed the subject:
"You have said nothing about how the soldiers feel toward the Emancipation
Proclamation."
"I know how thy heart is set on issuing that document, sir. So far as I'm
concerned, I'm all for it. I was born a Quaker, and we're just about all anti-
slavery. When I was a boy, I attended two or three debating societies a week
in Bucks County, and that's where I learned to become a full-blooded aboli-
tionist."
"What about your comrades?" asked the senator in his gruff way.
"Most of them say that if they had known the war was to free the niggers,
they never would have enlisted. That's why so many have deserted." When
Wade made a humphing sound, Stradling added a fact he was sure the senator
did not know: "Others say they won't desert, but won't fight, so they get in
the ambulance corps or the quartermaster's department, to get out of fight-
ing."
"And when the slaves are freed?" Wade asked. "How will that sit?"
Stradling did not know how to lie or even soften the hard truth. "When
you issue that proclamation tomorrow," he told the President, "a lot more is
going to desert. Between that and General Bumside having no respect, it's a
wonder so many of us stays." The sergeant was a little surprised at the firm
sound of his own voice, but he had been invited to the feast and he had his
say.
Senator Wade humphed, and walked to the window, staring out angrily,
hands clasped behind his back. Stradling looked toward the President. Had
he gone too far?
"Sergeant, I am glad indeed to have your views. I shall take this opportu-
nity to make a few remarks which I desire you to convey to your comrades.
"The Proclamation is, as you state, very near to my heart. I thought about
it and studied it in all its phases long before I began to put it on paper. I
expect you're rightthat many soldiers who care nothing for the colored
man will seize on the Proclamation as an excuse for deserting. But I do not
believe the number of deserters will materially affect the army."
"On the contrary," Senator Wade put in, "the issuing of the Proclamation
will probably bring into the ranks many who otherwise would not volunteer."
"I agree," said the President, who seemed to be talking as much to Wade as
to the sergeant. "After I had made up my mind to issue it, I commenced to
put my thoughts on paper, and it took me many days before I succeeded in
getting it into shape so that it suited me."
He looked directly at Stradling, and the sergeant told himself this was
important to remember, so that he could pass it on to the entire company.
"Please explain to your comrades that the Proclamation is being issued for
two reasons," Mr. Lincoln said. "The first and chief reason is this: I feel a
great impulse moving me to do justice to four or five millions of people."
Well, good for him. Man should do what he believes in, and people said
that's what Lincoln wanted all along. Stradling prepared his mind to remem-
ber the second reason because when he wrote all this in a letterJx) John
Gilbert in Mechanicsville, his peacetime boss in the tannery, Johh would
want to know exactly what the President said. It was a pretty big responsibil-
ity, passing along to his comrades in the field and his friends at home what
the President himself thought.
"The second reason I am issuing this Proclamation is that I believe it will
be a club in our hands with which we can whack the rebels. In other words, I
have faith that it will shorten the war by many months." He looked at Wade,
who nodded enthusiastically.
The President extended that giant hand and said, "I trust you will reach
the front in the morning. Remember: first, emancipation does justice; and, it
will shorten the war."
Mr. Lincoln bade him farewell, and the sergeant thought how sad, woebe-
gone, and gloomy-looking the President was. His face did not smile or lighten
up once during the visit. Stradling felt proud that he had gone straight to the
top, and would have much to tell his comrades, but at the same time could
not rid himself of the impression he had been to a funeral.
"Sergeant, hold up." The President's voice caught him at the door. "How
do you suppose your comrades would feel about our arming some of those
freed slaves, and putting them in our army?"
Stradling frowned; that wasn't in the proclamation he'd read about a few
months back. He couldn't see sleeping right next to black men on bivouac,
and it might be, if they were supposed to be holding the flank next to you,
they'd cut and run at the first sound of firing. To be truthful, that's what he
had done the first time, but the second time he'd held his ground.
"My guess is that it would set well," he said, surprising himself. There was
a tune the Irishers sang about it. "If this is going to be a fight for the nigger,
sir, he ought to be in it getting kilt along with the rest of us."
At that, Wade got up and pumped his hand, escorting him outside the
office before he could say anything else.
On the way downstairs, the sergeant thought it curious that the President's
most important reason for freeing the slaves was to do justice to the black
man, and his second reason was to end the war sooner. From all Mr. Lincoln
had said before, that Stradling could remember reading, it was the other way
around. Abolition was always presented as a practical matter, a military
necessity, that just happened to be right, too. He thought it was a good thing
that Mr. Lincoln thought it was right, first, and useful to boot. It struck him
that if you are going to act justly, then it makes no sense to go around
apologizing for it, even if a bunch of malcontents were going to use it as an
excuse to desert.
The guard who had passed his request in was still on duty. "You need not
call me 'greeny' anymore," said the sergeant, "for I have learned more today
than many people learn in fifty years."
He hefted his bag and headed out to look for a food counter, to enjoy his
last meal without hardtack for what would surely be a long while. After that,
he walked to the boat and showed the captain his furlough papers with the
President's notation on it.
The steamboat captain raised his eyebrows at the signature. "Git aboard,"
he said.
CHAPTER 43
HELL'S HALF ACRE

General Pat Clebume worried that his friend Breckinridge might not survive
this battle for Tennessee.
Last night, Bragg had announced a great Confederate victory, but the
Federals under Rosecrans had not crept away from Murfreesboro as they
were supposed to. This morning, there they were, just across Stones River,
wet and freezing, tending their wounded and digging in, waiting for Bragg to
launch another assault.
Why? The word was about that Rosecrans had spotted some fires behind
him, assumed he was surrounded, and had decided to make a last stand.
Clebume wished he could send a man over under a flag of truce to say the
line of retreat was wide open, that those fires were set by a few mischievous
cavalrymen, and would General Rosecrans kindly take his Union Army and
leave.
Clebume was concerned about Breck because the Kentuckian's troops had
been selected by Bragg to bear the brunt of driving the Federals from their
well-prepared positions. The order was to take the high ground to the left of
Hell's Half Acre, and a bloody murderous charge it was sure to be. Clebume
had a theory that he called the Irish Theory of Luck in Battle: If you go into a
battle fearful of being killed, or worse, hopeful of being killed, then killed is
what you get; if you go in positive that you will live, or fiercely determined to
live, then you live. The theory did not apply to everyone, but it had applied to
him very well so far.
What troubled Pat Clebume was that Breck had the look about him of a
man who no longer gave a damn. Bragg's unnecessary execution of the Ken-
tucky boy, intended to send a chill of fear through the Orphan Brigade, had
bred lasting resentment instead, infecting Kentuckians clear up to their com-
mander. Surely that had been a searing experience for Breck, associated in
some way with the dimming of hopes that his missing son might be alive and
a prisoner. The bleakness of personal and national prospects showed in the
man's eyes; Cabell was the future, and Clebume suspected that the Kentucky
boy who was shot for desertion and the Kentucky boy who was missing had
become fused in Breck's mind.
And the famed orator who would expound, after a couple of glasses of
good bourbon, on the dastardly corruption of freedom under the despot Lin-
coln, to the edification and inspiration of his troops and friends, had fallen
silent of late.
Clebume knew why. First there had been the South's military conscription,
even of men in occupied portions of Kentucky, a state that had chosen to stay
in the Union. Then came the pervasive control of the economy, with Confed-
erate Government ownership of the most important commodity, cotton, as
the central government in Richmond declared itself capable of overriding the
decisions of the states. And now the South was treating itself to arbitrary
arrests of citizens by the military for the crime of thinking disloyal thoughts.
All the despotic inroads on individual liberty that come under the abolition of
habeas corpus, which Breck nearly alone had decried in the U.S. Senate, were
coming to pass in the Confederacy. All that and slavery too.
Clebume's personal cause was Southern independence, national freedom,
which he was persuaded had an even chance of being achieved. He worried
for his friend, whose family cause had always been resistance to tyranny.
Personal freedom was not doing so well on either side during the war. How
much freedom must citizens give up to preserve a nation dedicated to free-
dom? Not much, was Breck's answer; let justice be done though the heavens
fall. Plenty, was Lincoln's answer, and Davis's too: a life is never wisely given
to save a limb.
And once the President had war powers, wouldn't he have much-expanded
peace powers too, taken from the people? No wonder Breck looked so dis-
tracted these days. He was not merely a statesman without a state, he had
become a crusader without a cause. In adopting the methods of the Union to
protect itself from the Union, the South had become in a crucial way the
same as the Union, and the requirements of national survival had ground the
bedrock of constitutional principle into shifting sand for men like John
Breckinridge.
Clebume walked over to the Bragg headquarters tent, where Breckinridge
was arguing against the plan to send his division charging up Van Cleve's hill.
With a stick in the dirt, the Kentuckian was trying to show how the assault
could be blown out of the field by the Federal artillery placed alongside the
planned route of the charge. Clebume overheard it all and nodded agreement
with the Kentuckian; such an attack would be suicidal.
"Their ground is higher than mine," Breck was saying, "and the Federal
artillery is placed to hit any direct charge both in the front and in the flank.
It's a trap. That is exactly where they are waiting for us to attack. It would be
a disaster."
"Your division was chosen," Bragg pointed out coldly, "because it suffered
so lightly in comparison with the others day before yesterday."
"I'm not suggesting somebody else undertake this," Breck pleaded, "I'm
saying nobody should be forced to commit suicide. Two rows of infantry
cannot charge fifty guns uphill across an open field."
"Sir, my information is different," Bragg replied. "I have given the order to
attack the enemy in your front and I expect it to be obeyed. I expect you to
lead the charge, General Breckinridge."
Clebume stared mournfully at the lines scratched in the frozen dirt and
came to the conclusion that Bragg wanted Breckinridge dead. He was sur-
prised to hear his own name mentioned. "I am ordering General Clebume to
assist you because he has proved his bravery, and I want that hill taken."
Breck and he were in this together. When their eyes met, it was to acknowl-
edge that the Union grapeshot would rip through a great many of their men
before the attackers came within musket range of the Union lines.
"Polk will open an artillery barrage at three forty-five this aftefi icon, and
fifteen minutes later you will begin the charge," said Braxton Bragg. His
parting words were: "The signal will be a single shot from the. center of my
line."
Clebume walked with Breck back to his headquarters, just in front of his
own. The brigadier, a Kentuckian named Hansen, had a solution to their
problem: "I'll go and kill Bragg. Then you can court-martial and shoot me.
I'll be dead either way, but we'll save thousands of lives." The officer was
serious. They refused to take him seriously.
Muttering a string of Gaelic curses, Clebume returned to break the bad
news to his command. He resolved to approach the charge as an action that,
with luck and grit, and perhaps some heavy artillery support of the South's
own, could succeed by virtue of its daring. It seemed to him to be the whole
war in a nutshell: Southern courage against Northern iron, Confederate des-
peration to win quickly before Union advantage in men and arms could take
effect. And on Emancipation Day, too; that was fitting. If Clebume had had
his way, the blacks would be fighting on the side of the South, but now
Lincoln had beaten them to that vast source of manpower. Clebume was
angry at that but refused to let himself become embittered. He was not af-
flicted with Breck's curse; he had the cause of independence, freedom of the
South and West, to carry him up the hill to Hell's Half Acre.
At his tent, he was met by a Wheeler cavalryman in charge of a group of
forty blue-clad prisoners taken in a sweep behind the enemy lines.
"You're all paroled, ye lucky lads," Clebume called out, as the Yankee
prisoners broke into smiles at the good news, and at the surprise of a Confed-
erate officer speaking in a brogue. "We have no facilities for prisoners here.
Swear you won't take up service again, and be on your way home. War's over
for you."
"Will you be servin' us lunch, General Paddy?"
"General Clebume to you, former soldier, and there'll be no free food for
the likes of Billy-boys. On your wayNashville's thirty miles up that road."
The Union soldiers turned and started tramping up the frozen path, all but
one. It was a woman, not masquerading as a man, but in the full skirt and
apron of an army nurse under her open overcoat. She was tall, very pale, in
her early twenties, and Clebume judged she was on the verge of collapse.
"I will not take a parole, General. I am your prisoner."
"And why is that, dear girl?"
"I wish to be exchanged, and I will serve the Union again another day. The
wounded need me, and this is my calling."
That captivated him. He looked closely at her face, with its prominent
forehead, wide-round eyes, strong jaw. "Why do I think I know you?"
"I am Margaret Elizabeth Breckinridge. My traitor cousin John is in your
camp."
"I will take you to him."
She shook her head, then swayed. He moved to her side and took her arm
to hold her up.                             '
"I am ashamed of him and what he has done to our family," she said when
she could. "I do not want to see him. But I have news about his son, my
cousin Cabell."
Clebume brought the young woman into his warmed tent and sat her
down. If her news was bad, he would keep it to himself and pass it along to
Breck after the battle.
"Reverend Bob asked me to look for Cabell in the prisoner camps. I've
been to Libby and the others," she said, shuddering from the cold or at the
memory, "and a lady who is a friend of General Dix's sent me to Johnson's
Island and I found him there."
"Is the boy well?"
"He took his first name and used it as his last. That's why it was hard
finding him. I don't blame him, changing his name, after bringing disgrace on
us all, him and his damned father."
"Nurse, spare me the family feuding, just sayis the boy all right?"
"He had the camp fever, and he's thin, but he'll survive. General Dix, who,
I think, knows John, said Cabell would be part of the next exchange."
"General Dix served in the Buchanan Cabinet, when your cousin was Vice
President of the United States," Clebume told her, annoyed at her attitude
even as he was relieved at her news. "A great many people that you respect,
who disagreed with his choice of sides in this war, think of your cousin not as
a traitor but as a good man."
She shrugged. "That's what Reverend Bob says, and he's loyal and for
freedom, but I see Cousin John as the Breckinridge who stood for slavery in
the election. He's leading the fight for slavery right now and I despise him for
that."
Clebume checked his temper. "But you agreed to search for his son."
"I agreed to help find the boy, because he was too young to know his own
mind, and he's kin"the young woman's face was as implacable as it was
exhausted"though I will never forgive John Breckinridge for betraying his
country to keep human beings in chains."
A long war it would surely be. That decided him. The abolitionist Union
nurse was not to be the bearer of the good news. Clebume ordered an aide to
let her use his bed and tent, which he would not need soon again. If victorious
that afternoon, Bragg's army would break camp to pursue the enemy, and if
not, the camp would be overrun.
Returning to Breckinridge's headquarters tent, Clebume found the Ken-
tuckian with General Gideon Pillow, the corrupt coward who slipped out of
Fort Donelson. The dastard's political connections in Richmond kept him in
service, if not in command of troops.
"General Pillow is with us in this charge," said Breckinridge, and laid out
the order of battle assignments. Clebume knew exactly what Bragg was do-
ing. Pillow was a dishonored political troublemaker; Bragg wanted him per-
manently out of the way. This charge was to be an execution of generals who
defied Bragg's authority or whom the commanding general considered in-
competent. Clebume considered his own inclusion in the group as a kind of
honor, although he wished Pillow were not a part of itthat skedaddle artist
would probably hide behind the nearest tree when the first bugle blew.
"Breck, I need to see you alone on a personal matter."
"And I you." They walked outside into the sunny, cold, all-too-clear Janu-
ary morning, the sort of weather artillerymen pray for.
Breck spoke first. "Pat, you were born lucky, and you're going to come
through this with your honor brighter than ever, so there is something that I
want you to remember." Breck looked out at the long slope up to the Federal
lines, and Clebume knew he could sense the enfilading fire that would come
from the Union cannon on the left. "This attack is made against my judg-
ment, and by the special orders of General Bragg. Of course we all must try
to do our duty and fight the best we can. If it should result in disaster, and I
be among the slain"this was the first time Cleburne had ever heard his
friend mention the possibility of death before a fight"I want you to do
justice to my memory. I want you to tell the people that I believed the attack
to be very unwise, and tried my damnedest to prevent it."
"It's a lucky thing you're telling me this and not somebody else," said
Cleburne, more heartily than he felt, "but it will sound pretty silly when
we're standing at the top of the hill and the Yankees are running down the
other side."
The Kentuckian smiled. "I'm glad you're with me, Pat, but I'm sorry for
you that you were included among the orphans."
"Cheer up, lad, I have good news for you about your son. Some of Whee-
ler's boys brought in a bunch of Federals, including a cousin of yours who is
an army nurse. She says she saw your boy at the prison in Johnson's Island,
looking fine and healthy, and he'll be exchanged in a week."
"Cabell alive?"
"Not only alive but well, and his good health vouched for by a nurse who
knows him." A slight exaggeration about the boy's condition, Cleburne felt,
was called for. "General Dix sends his compliments, and Miss Carroll too. I
think she had a hand in it. They'll get your son back in jig time."
Breck stood silent for a few moments. He walked over to a tall cedar,
leaned against the trunk, and began to weep. Cleburne followed him over,
standing close, to appear to be in military consultation to any lookers-on.
Damn Bragg would probably consider it evidence of drunkenness or coward-
ice before a battle. Breck could not stop crying, and Cleburne punched him in
the shoulder so he would get control of himself.
After a moment, he did. "Margaret Elizabethis she still here?"
Cleburne shook his head. "Fine lass, set on going back to her wounded, so
I gave her one of my horses. Looks like you, she does, but in a nice way."
"Did she say anything about" Breck stopped, started that again. "The
other side of the family, what do they say about the Senate action?" He was
the first Breckinridge to be officially branded a traitor.
"She said they disagreed with your decision to go South," he lied stoutly,
"but that they all understand your reasons and there's not a man jack among
them who won't defend your integrity. Is one of them a Reverend Bob? He's
especially in your corner."
He would tell the man what he deserved to hear, what should be the truth
rather than what was. After the war, with the South independent and slavery
on the way out, the Breckinridge clan could all make up along those lines
anyway. Cleburne had no doubt that Margaret's bitterness would fade, the
Kentucky family's cleavage would heal, and one day she would feel the way
Cleburne reported she felt in the midst of the war. He was not lying; he
thought of it as merely getting ahead of the truth. The two great nations
would be natural allies, and the border between the Confederacy and the
Union would not separate families and friends.
"I want to send a messenger back to Murfreesboro to tell my wife," Breck
said, signaling for an aide. When the man came running up, the general
hesitated, then sent a message to one of Bragg's aides asking for more artillery
support at three forty-five. To Clebume, he said, "Let's tell Mary after the
battle."
The South's only Irish-born general understood. His friend wanted to be
certain that the news to Mary would show that at least one Breckinridge male
had come back from the dead.

CHAPTER 44
DAY OF JUBILEE
"Happy New Year, Mr. President."
The voice was William's, the spindly colored boy he had brought with him
from Illinois to attend to his needs in the early morning. Lincoln opened his
eyes, focused on the crack in the bedroom ceiling, then turned his head on the
pillow to see William with the large tray. The bowl of hot water for shaving
would be on the tray, along with the breakfast dish of warm corn pone, and
the boiled cabbage. He took a deep breath to draw in the smell of the cabbage.
Food didn't mean much to him but he did look forward to cabbage every day.
Lincoln rolled out of bed and slid his feet into the carpet slippers. It oc-
curred to him that the Israelite corncutter, now in New Orleans with Banks,
would find it difficult to locate any rebel leader willing to talk with him about
peace after the event of today. He sat in his nightshirt for a couple of minutes,
saying nothing, watching William set the bowls on the table and whip up a
lather in a cup for shaving.
"This is the great day for my people," the young servant said cheerily. "Big
jubilee everywhere last night, Jubilee Day today. You ain't changing your
mind?"
"I am a slow walker," Lincoln said, yawning and combing his hair with his
fingers, "but I never walk back. The signing will be right after the levee this
noon, William. You can count on it."
He had put William Johnson on the Treasury payroll as a laborer for six
hundred dollars a year. When the boy finished his service as a valet in the
Mansion in the morning, he worked as a messenger at Treasury in the after-
noon. Lincoln watched him lay a freshly pressed black broadcloth morning
coat on the bed next to the underwear and shirt and silk tie. To properly
impress the diplomatic corps, the Congress, the men in uniform, and just
about everybody else who was passing through town, Lincoln had to dress
carefully for the annual reception from eleven to noon that New Year's Day.
That levee was one of the few national traditions, and it could not be avoided.
Mary would still be wearing her black v'elvet mourning clothes, with the
black gloves and fan, in memory of the light that had gone out in her life. He
shook off the memory of the way Willie would race in andjumpon the bed on
New Year's morning, before that thought of happier times could take hold
and ruin the day.
William had standing orders to wake him at six, so that he could be at the
telegraph office to be in touch with General Burnside in Virginia, and with
General Rosecrans in Tennessee before seven. This morning, Burnside was in
Washington to testify at the court-martial of Fitz-John Porter, and would be
at the Mansion first thing, probably to complain about the way his generals
were complaining about him.
Lincoln had some sympathy for Bumside, who had failed out of ineptitude.
He had less for Porter, who had succeeded all too well in helping his friend
McClellan undermine poor John Pope at Second Bull Run. Had he been
wrong in replacing George on the day after the elections, just as the victor of
Antietam was showing signs of shaking off the slows? He decided not. De-
spite the debacle at Fredericksburg that followed, the President had to estab-
lish the principle that the Army could not set up shop for itself. Orville
Browning had been in the other day to seek clemency again for Major John
Key; Lincoln's answer was again an unequivocal no. And the Porter court-
martial would go forward, driving home the same lesson again. Only one man
could be commander in chief.
More important than Bumside's visit would be any word from Rosecrans,
whose army had finally moved from Nashville toward the rebel concentration
at Murfreesboro. At this moment, with England eager to recognize the Con-
federacy, the Union could ill afford to lose another battle, but last night's
reports about the fighting at Stones River were not encouraging. The newspa-
pers, especially the Times and the Tribune in New York, had been preparing
the nation for a great victory, to wash away the terrible taste of Fredericks-
burg. If disaster lay ahead today at Murfreesboro, public sentiment would
turn even more sour on the war and the pressures to let the wayward sister
states depart in peace would become unbearable.
New Year's Day. Horatio Seymour was being inaugurated as Governor of
New York. In that smoldering state, the Union's prime source of men and
money, a grand jury had been convened to consider the indictment of Secre-
tary Stanton for breaking state law with his arbitrary arrests. The governor-
elect had been going around saying that it was a "high crime" to abduct a
citizen of New York, and he left no doubt he considered Stanton or Lincoln to
be high criminals. That would be a crippling confrontation; he could not fight
a civil war on two fronts.
William was ready to shave him but Lincoln did not move, thinking of the
challenge from New York. Lincoln had done all he could to placate Seymour,
offering a share of political power as no other American President ever had;
what more did the man want? Seymour's peremptory rebuff transmitted
through Weed"proposition declined"still stung.
These copperheads were not interested in a go-slow-on-abolition compro-
mise to save the Union. Rather, Lincoln was convinced, they wanted to pre-
tend that Jeff Davis was ready to restore the "Union as it was" if only he were
allowed to keep slavery. But the copperheads did not know Jeff Davis. He
was just as foursquare for independence, for disunion, as Lincoln was for
union.
Independence, especially for Americans brought up to revere Washington
and Jefferson, was always a more popular cause than union, which smacked
of imposing a yoke on an unwilling minority. As the American colonists
fighting the better-equipped British had demonstrated, wars were ultimately
won or lost by public sentiment, by the fighting spirit of a people. Such public
sentiment could be rallied only by a great cause. If an ideal was attractive
enough, it would define not merely itself but the essence of the opposition. In
that way, the Southern cause of independence was making the Union cause
appear to be anti-independence, and would make Abraham Lincoln look like
a modern George III.
That was why he had come to the conclusion during the summer that
union, seen all too often as anti-independence, was not enough of a cause to
sustain the fighting spirit of the North. By raising high the banner of emanci-
pation, he would define the enemy cause as slavery. Most people, even many
of those against abolition, were disgusted by slavery.
Lincoln knew that was why, little by little, he had let himself be led into the
illegal seizure of property called emancipation. Never mind that a majority of
the North was against it, as the elections showed; and never mind that too
many of Sergeant Stradling's friends would desert rather than "fight for the
nigger"; the political fact was that the most active and articulate faction of
the North demanded an end to slavery with a fierceness and dedication that
would resist all pressures for a settlement.
Time was what he needed, time to wear down the Southern forces by
weight of numbers and mutual casualties. The newly embraced causenot
his original, central cause of majority rule, but the new rallying cause of
human freedomwould bring that time. On the brink of being broken, when
other gamblers were tempted to reduce losses, Lincoln was prepared to
double the stakes.
He moved in his nightshirt from the bed to a chair, drew a sheet around
him, tilted his head back, and stuck out his chin to let William begin the
shaving. The Proclamation was on his mind; he had worked on it again
yesterday, letting the Cabinet make final suggestions, accepting Chase's pious
emendation invoking "the considerate judgment of mankind and the gracious
favor of Almighty God"; that would please the folks who did not want the
soldiers fighting on Sunday.
Lincoln had added his own "warranted by the Constitution upon military
necessity" to satisfy, or at least palliate, those legal minds who doubted the
edict's foundation in law. He admitted to himself that his call upon the freed
slaves, all behind Southern lines, "to abstain from all violence, unless in
necessary self-defense" was more than a little disingenuous; it could be read
on Southern plantations as a call for slaves to defend themselves with violent
means when threatened, as many of them so often were, by the lash. The step
was short from such individual self-defense to a general uprising. He would
not encourage such a race war, indeed would publicly deplore it; but if an
uprising came, it would come, demoralizing the Southern troops at the front
and shortening the time of bloodshed.
One final amendment had been his own surprising adoption of the Chase-
Stanton position on arming freed blacks. In for a dime, in for a dollar. Just as
he swallowed the principle of secession in breaking off West Virginia yester-
day, he could stare down the objections of conservatives to the provision of
guns to former slaves to fire at their former masters. With Seymour and his
ilk hopelessly beyond reach of a deal, he had no more compunctions about
using black men as soldiers. "And I further declare and make known," the
final Proclamation read, "that such persons of suitable condition will be re-
ceived into the armed service . . ."
His Emancipation Proclamation was a weapon, all right, to whack the
rebels with. He would put a weapon in every freed black hand capable of
carrying one. Jeff Davis would surely be drawn into issuing a furious counter-
proclamation. Lincoln was ready to seize on the expected excessive language
to suspend all prisoner exchanges. The exchange of prisoners favored the
South, with its smaller population base. Up to now, he had to consider the
opinion of relatives of captured Northern boys, but an intemperate reaction
by Davis to his Proclamationthe Edict of Freedom, Hay wanted to call it
would give him the moral standing to make a cruel decision.
As he thought about it, Lincoln envisioned his Proclamation as more than
a weapon to cause disruption in the enemy camp. It would be more, too, than
a means of reinvigorating public sentiment in the North, more than a way to
block international intervention, and more than a new source of manpower.
He granted that the hundred-day-long threat of emancipation had not suc-
ceeded in coercing the Southern leaders. He had a hunch, however, that
emancipation as a fait accompli might have a mysterious power of its own.
Lincoln sensed that the Proclamationwhich he always knew would cause
bitter controversy within the North, as it deepened the bitterness between
North and Southmight be of greater import than he had at first imagined.
He no longer felt troubled or defensive about its illegality. An event that
caused a biblical jubilee in the streets of the North, as well as fervent, if silent,
exultation in the slave quarters of the South could have an extraordinary
effect on people everywhere.
The act seemed to be taking on a life of its own. Lincoln could not gauge its
effect through the land, but he realized he had underestimated its effect on
himself. Surely carping would come from the right, holding that it was so
unconstitutional as to be despotic, and the left would argue that it freed only
those slaves that he could not reach, leaving the slaves in the border states
still enslaved. Those arguments missed the point.
The point was that if the war was finally won, this single proclamation
could turn out to be the most memorable act of his administration. The new
birth of freedom might be remembered not merely as the means of gaining
time to keep the Union together, vital as that device was, but as the reason
that the Union had a right to be held together. Although he had to justify his
unprecedented seizure of property in the stilted and formal language of mili-
tary necessity, the freeing of millions of human beings from bondage was a
moral justification for the terrible bloodletting. That was what the abolition-
ists like Garrison had been saying for years, as they heaped abuse upon the
Constitution as "a covenant with death" because it permitted slavery. Those
provocations and threats of abolition might have helped goad the South into
rebellion, but now the fact of abolition was needed to put down that rebellion.
He opened his mouth and stretched his upper lip to aid William's shaving
razor. He knew that his war power, by itself, was inadequate; he had no
power to wage a war for the principle of national cohesion if the people grew
tired of war. But the war power, as the key to unlock the shack's of the
slave, could release a power greater than any President could claim to find in
a Constitution. Right did make might if it disenthralled and inspirited the
populace.
That took him a long way from his old Whig principles, Lincoln realized.
Henry Clay would never approve, and Jefferson would spin in his grave at
this use of an incendiary issue to establish a strong central governmenteven
to save the life of the Union itself. Lincoln's long political apprenticeship had
been spent opposing Jacksonian high-handedness and the central-government
philosophy of Andy Jackson's Democratic successors. But Alexander Hamil-
ton, Lincoln concluded, had been right in The Federalist 23 to argue that the
nation's war powers "ought to exist without limitation," over Jefferson's ob-
jections; and Andrew Jackson had been right to stretch the executive powers,
the sainted Clay and his Whigs to the contrary notwithstanding.
Political kinship with the likes of the centralizing Hamilton and Jackson
made the old-line Whig in Lincoln uncomfortable. As soon as public senti-
ment would permit, a constitutional amendment would be needed to build a
foundation for emancipation less ephemeral than the presidential powers that
disappeared with peace. It bothered Lincoln profoundly that the Democrats,
in opposition, could win elections by embracing the Whig principle of defend-
ing the people from the power of their governmentin plain words, from
him.
Seymour would probably be telling his inaugural throng today that Lincoln
was enslaving the whites to free the blacks. The President bridled at that
unfair but effective catch phrase. He was not taking freedom from the whites
to give freedom to the blacks; on the contrary, he was freeing the blacks to
make it possible to hold the whites together. The issuance of the Proclama-
tion later that day would give him a negotiating tool. The pace of emancipa-
tion was available for compromise, and seizure of slave owners' property
could be changed to purchase at a fair price; the only thing that could not be
negotiated was the dissolution of the Union.
Of course, he was using the issue of black freedom to subjugate white
rebels, but there can be no freedom for any body politic without subjugation
to the will of the majority; the slaves, when they became free in fact as well as
in theory, would learn that. No independence would ever be possible for any
nation that did not hold fast to indivisible union, just as no freedom could be
maintained by any individual unwilling to put his personal sovereignty into
the general pot. A government too weak to maintain its own existence would
hardly be strong enough to maintain the liberties of its citizens.
When William stripped back the sheet, Lincoln washed and looked at his
face in the glass. He looked awful. To cheer himself up, he told the young
manservant the story of the fellow who once presented him with a fine-
looking knife. The man who owned it said it had been given to him as the
ugliest man in the world, and he had promised to pass it along if ever he met
an uglier man, so he was giving it to Lincoln. William dutifully laughed, but
then disagreed about the ugliness. In fact,, Lincoln usually liked the way he
looked, and took special pride in his height as well as the strength in his arms,
but he had to admit that these days his face looked lined and sallow, old for a
man of fifty-three.
Lincoln asked himself: If emancipation was such a cause for jubilee, and if
the hunch was possessing him that it would stave off defeat and carve a niche
for the Lincoln administration in the history of the republic, why was he
burdened with worry and guilt about the New Year's Day ahead?
He told himself he was worried because too much rested on the Army of
the Cumberland facing the onslaught of Bragg and Breckinridge in Tennes-
see. Why did Rosecrans not have the good sense to attack first? Why should
so much depend on Breckinridge, of all rebels, a man he had failed to per-
suade in face-to-face argument here in this house?
He felt guilty because he had to deal with Ambrose Burnside this morning,
who had turned out to be all too right in his modest assessment of himself as
a commander, and had no support from his own generals in an attack he was
planning. The guilt came less from seeing Burnside's insubordinate subordi-
nates yesterday, behind the general's back, than from having to restrain the
commander of the Army of the Potomac from doing what he had been sent to
do in replacing McClellan. Lincoln felt ill at ease worrying about army mo-
rale and the effect of casualties, holding a general back when the man wanted
to smite the enemy. In playing the cautious, wait-for-preparation role with
Burnside, Lincoln saw himself acting like the general he complained of hav-
ing "the slows."
He thanked William and walked down the hall to his office, where Gener-
als Burnside and Halleck were waiting. One look at the bristling Burnside,
fluffing out his muttonchop whiskers, told him nothing good was in store.
"I have attemped a movement upon the enemy," said the commander
without so much as a New Year's greeting, "at your repeated urging, in which
I have been repulsed."
Lincoln nodded; he needed no reminder of Fredericksburg. Burnside had at
least taken full responsibility and not tried to blame him; for good and for
bad, he was no McClellan.
"I am convinced that the army ought to make another move in the same
direction," the general continued, "but I am not sustained in this by a single
grand division commander in my command."
When Lincoln said he was aware of that, Burnside asked how he knew.
Lincoln saw no harm in telling him frankly that several of his generals had
come up to visit him yesterday to predict that Burnside's ideas about re-
newing the attack would lead to disaster.
Burnside looked stunned. "Since my subordinates now have direct access
to the President," he said, "it is impossible to manage my command. I ought
to retire to private life."
"Which generals were here to complain?" asked Halleck, siding with Burn-
side. Lincoln said he would not breach the confidence of the officers who
came to him with their fears, which caused the general-in-chief to say, "They
ought to be arrested and cashiered."
Lincoln waved that aside; niceties about the chain of command did not
trouble him at the moment. "It is my wish that you go with General Burnside
to the ground at Fredericksburg," he told Halleck. "Confer with the officers,
and say that you approve or do not approve of his plan."
Halleck shook his head, no.
Lincoln realized this was not going to be easy. "Your military skill is
useless to me," he pleaded, "if you will not do this."
"I request that I be relieved from further duties as general-in-chief."
The New Year was not starting well. Last week, the Cabinet resignations;
now the heads of the Army. Lincoln told them abruptly he refused both their
resignations and did not want to discuss it further, as he expected all of
Washington in the White House in a few hours for the annual reception.
He could not afford another defeat and would not attack again with Bum-
side. He could not now depend on the Union army to give him a weapon with
which to whack the rebels, nor could he depend on much of his Republican
Party for political support, or the state of New York for troops or money.
Walking downstairs to find his wife, who would be distraught at this first
levee since the loss of Willie, Lincoln felt a curious sense of relief mingled
with satisfaction at one thing he would do this day. He would set free the
rebels' slaves and invite some of them into the Union Army. That would stir
the pot. The worse everything else became, the better that idea looked to him.
Right made might.
If emancipation worked in bringing new hope to the North and new fear to
the South, and if the military picture turned around in some way, the occa-
sion would be remembered as historic. However it had to be wrapped in
military necessity, setting four million human beings free was a noble and
uplifting act. He would rather be remembered for that than for bringing on a
war to avoid disunion.
If emancipation failed, howeverif it unified the South and split the North
he would have no apologies for reaching beyond his powers. His country-
men would know that the sixteenth President of the United States had left no
stone unturned to defeat the enemy.

CHAPTER 45
RECEIVING LINE
He crooked his arm for Mary, who was trembling, to take hold. He told Tad
to stop poking Roberttheir student son was down from Harvard for the
holidays, and at least was trying to look dignifiedand the Lincolns pre-
pared, as a family, to enter the Blue Room for the annual reception.
He had not held so much as a ten-minute private conversation with his
eldest son since coming to Washington nearly two years before. Lincoln per-
suaded himself that the absence of intimacy was the boy's fault, not his;
Robert just never opened up to him as Willie had or Tad did. He was glad
only that his son had not shown the traits of cruelty and ignorance he remem-
bered in his own father. Robert might not warm up to his presidential father,
but Lincoln was satisfied that the remote young man was at least being pro-
vided with the best education at a time when other boys his age were fighting
and dying. He was determined the boy would have no cause to refuse to
attend his father's funeral, as Lincoln had done so long ago.
His spirits rose as the first wave of guests pressed in. This was the diplo-
matic corps in full costume, medals twinkling, impressed with themsdves and
each other on the cold, brilliantly sunny morning. Lincoln enjoyed-a good
levee, just as he did his twice-weekly "public opinion baths," and thought it
unfortunate that Mary's extended grief for Willie kept them from having
more receptions at the Mansion.
The New Year's greeting of Washington officialdom, however, to be fol-
lowed by the open house to all the public at noon, was not an event that the
first Lady, as the newspapers were calling her, could properly cancel. The
house belonged to the people, and the people had a right to come in as the
year began. Last night, the eve of the New Year, Mary had gone with old
Isaac Newton to see a spiritualist in Georgetown, to commune with the ghost
of their lost boy, and had brought back the spiritualist's prediction that the
Cabinet would soon have to resign. Lincoln wished the spiritualists would
stick to spirits.
He faced these hours of handshaking with equanimity; he would see faces
he wanted to see, perhaps swap a few stories, pick up political gossip. The
duty of receiving offered a respite from the war, from having to restrain
Burnside in Virginia and to exhort Rosecrans in Tennessee"Old Rosey," he
feared, might be destined to preside over the final Union disaster in the field.
Afterward, when the Pennsylvania defachment acting as provost guard
shooed the last of the guests out of the Mansion, he would go upstairs and
sign the controversial Proclamation. No special ceremony, no correspon-
dents; just his necessary co-signer Seward, and whoever else was around.
The diplomatic corps was shepherded by Seward and his son into the Blue
Room and formally introduced, each in turn, by Marshal Lamon. Lincoln
knew his friend Hill liked the task, listening to the whispered names and
booming them out, because it gave him a chance to show off his stentorian
voice while enabling him to stick by the President's side as a mixture of
friends and strangers moved through the house.
England's Lord Lyons, as Lincoln expected, stopped long enough to ask
about the action in Tennessee, saying nothing about the effect of the procla-
mation of freedom on the abolition-minded British people. Lincoln did not
enlighten him on the battle at Murfreesboro because he did not know the
results himself, but he expressed confidence in Rosecrans and reminded the
British ambassador that the rebel general, Braxton Bragg, had not done all
that well hurling attackers at the Hornet's Nest at Shiloh. Lincoln was un-
abashed about anticipating victory; if "Old Rosey" managed to recover and at
least not lose, a great victory was what Lincoln would claim. He could not do
that after Antietam for fear of boosting McClellan, but he was unworried
about making a hero out of Rosecrans. And his Proclamation could cause no
military harm to Rosecrans in Tennessee; Lincoln had exempted the whole
state from the edict. That in effect guaranteed Tennesseans that their property
in slaves would remain untouched.
After the diplomats, the justices of the Supreme Court and of the Court of
Claims filed in. Then the governors and military and naval officers came
through the line, looking grimly optimistic. When Halleck came by, Lincoln
gave him a frigid look and offered no pleasantry. Bumside did not appear.
Pumping away, drawing the person in front of him to his right to move the
line along, the President met the unofficial guests invited in before the public.
Elizabeth Keckley was the first of them to come through the receiving line.
Mary, who had begun to sag, leaning her weight on his left arm, perked up
and told the modiste that she expected to see a great many of her dresses on
the ladies that day. The black hand he held far longer than a moment was
strong and calloused; he liked that hand, and the woman who had been such
a source of strength and comfort to his wife. He recalled how the tall colored
woman had sat up with him some nights when he was afflicted with his hypo.
"We will never forget today," Mrs. Keckley said, looking at him directly,
head high. "We will never forget what you have done."
He swallowed. Mary was saying something about the contraband relief
association that Lizzie had formed, and it occurred to Lincoln that if more of
her race had the intelligence and self-reliance of Mrs. Keckley, little need
would exist for colonization. The opening of opportunity available to her had
been narrow, but she had squeezed through; perhaps others of her race would
as well. The sincerity of her gratitude affected him.
She introduced the man behind her as someone who was a contributor to
her contrabands. Wendell Phillips was a name familiar to Lincoln. He was an
early and outspoken abolitionist oratoran advocate, with editor William
Lloyd Garrison, of separation from the Southand the source of the widely
quoted comment that Lincoln was a "first-rate second-rate man." He bore the
man no grudge for that; it was a well-turned phrase, although entirely wrong.
Phillips thanked him for the coming Proclamation, offering a half promise
of political help: "If we see this administration earnestly working to -~ee the
country from slavery, we will show you how we can run it into another four
years in power."
"Oh, Mr. Phillips, I have long ceased to have any personal feeling or
expectation in the matter," Lincoln white-lied, "so abused and borne upon I
have been."
"Nevertheless," persisted the abolitionist, "what I have said is true. We
hope you will find a use for John Fremont in carrying out your proclamation
in border states."
Lincoln remembered the unpleasant visit with Fremont's wife, and of the
first Republican candidate's premature proclamation of freedom. "I have the
greatest respect for Fr6mont and his abilities," he told Phillips, who struck
him as a second-rate second-rate man, "but the fact is, the pioneer in any
movement is generally not the best man to carry that movement to a success-
ful termination."
Of course, that same principle could be applied to a second Lincoln term.
The unofficial reception line was not yet long, so the President amused him-
self with a biblical simile. "It was so in old times, wasn't it? Moses began the
emancipation of the Jews, but he had to make way for Joshua to complete the
work. The fact is, the first reformer has to meet such a hard opposition, and
gets so battered and bespattered, that afterward, when people find they have
to accept the reform, they will accept it more gracefully from another man."
That man, it occurred to Lincolnthe Joshua leading a reunited Union with-
out slaverycould have been Horatio Seymour. Lincoln was glad now that
the proposition of succession made through Weed had been declined, because
this time Moses was going to be right there on the scene when his people
entered the Promised Land.
He felt Mary grow rigid next to him, and guessed that the next person in
line was either Adele Douglas or Kate Chase.
It was Kate, looking more defiantly lovely than ever on the arm of her
fiance, Governornow Senator, once GeneralSprague. She gave her usual
fish-eye to Mary, which Lincoln thought was getting tiresome, and said to
him, "The Proclamation is a step in the right direction, Mr. President. I hope
you have retained, in the final draft, the reference to the Deity."
So Chase was spreading the word that the high-sounding words in the
Proclamation were his own; soon the Treasury Secretary would be persuading
everyone that he had pressed for its adoption all along. Lincoln recalled how
lukewarm Chase had been in the first Cabinet discussion; no wonder, it took
the wind out of his radical presidential sails. At the last minute, only yester-
day, Chase had submitted an entirely new draft of the Proclamation, avoiding
the statement about violence in self-defense on the grounds that it was too
incendiary, and leaving out any reference to the military employment of
blacks, which he had advocated for months. His new approach, Lincoln
thought, would gut the message of practical, military meaning. Only Chase's
nicely phrased line about the Deity would be in the document he would soon
sign, and Lincoln assured his daughter it would be there.
A hundred handshakes later, Henry Raymond of the New York Times
appeared, looking burdened with news. Lincoln always enjoyed skirmishing
with him, because the editor-politician was strongly pro-Lincoln and anti-
Seymour. Raymond's newspaper did not offset the damage being done to
Lincoln in New York City by Bennett's World, nor did every word of his
editorials weigh a ton, the way Greeley's did in the Tribune, but Raymond
could be relied on. He halted the line and drew the publisher aside to hear the
latest.
"I have been with the army in Virgina," Raymond reported urgently, "and
Burnside's subordinates are standing in the way of a general advance, slan-
dering their commanding general."
"I shouldn't wonder," Lincoln murmured. Slander or not, that army was
not going to assault the heights above Fredericksburg again.
"Burnside has prepared an order dismissing from the service Hooker,
Franklin, Baldy Smith, and six other generals." Lincoln felt his eyebrows
rising; that was something that Burnside had failed to mention earlier that
morning.
"Mr. President, the dismissal order is well grounded in military discipline.
You have no idea of the disparaging way Hooker speaks of his commanding
officer."
Lincoln put his hand on the publisher's shoulder and spoke close to his ear,
returning the confidence: "That is all trueGeneral Hooker does talk badly.
But the trouble is, Hooker is stronger with the country today than any other
man, including me."
The New Yorker looked aghast. "How long would Hooker retain that
strength, if people knew his real character and conduct?"
"The country would not believe anything said against him," Lincoln re-
plied. "They would say it is all a lie." Joe Hooker, the would-be dictator, the
favorite of Chase, was everybody's answer to the failure of Burnside. And
public sentiment could not be ignored in a military crisis.
"But when I told Burnside that Hooker might resist a dismissal order,"
said the journalist, "Burnside said he would 'swing him before sundown.' "
Lincoln biinked. "Burnside said that?"
"Yes. That means he'd hang Hooker for disobedience in the face of the
enemy, and I believe Burn is just furious enough to do that. Beware the fury
of a patient man, and all that. Do you realize all this is happening down there
within a rifle shot of General Lee and his army? I admire your equanimity,
Lincoln, but it really seems as if things are getting out of hand."
Raymond went his way shaking his head. He would be shaking it harder,
Lincoln thought, if he knew that both Burnside and Halleck had just tried to
resign, and that the government did not know what was happening to the
other Union army under Rosecrans at Stones River.
Mary left his side to try to get Tad to stop playing near the huge
punchbowl before the near-hysterical boy fell in. She staggered forward,
swayed, and Lamon caught her before she fell. Fortunately, Elizabeth
Keckley was in sight, and she came forward quickly to take Mrs. Lincoln to
her, room. The line moved on, the President and his son Robert greeting the
guests.
"My dear lady."
Anna Ella Carroll, with her animated face and low-cut dress, pumped his
hand. She was a persnickety woman, and a bother about money, hit she
produced better-written work than any woman he knew, and most men too,
and he had to admire her for that. Her Reply to Breckinridge pamphlet had
come just in time to counter all the talk about abuse of presidential powers)
and her recent report on colonization was impressively voluminous. He com-
plimented her on that, and added that he had signed a contract only the day
before for the transport of five thousand freed slaves to lie i Vache, a depen-
dency of Haiti.
"Will you refer to your colonization plans in your Proclamation today?"
He said no, explaining he could not very well ask negroes to join the Army
and leave the country at the same time. As soon as he had decided to go all
the way with the radicals, arming the freed slaves, the decision about coloni-
zation had taken care of itself. Maybe some would go, maybe not; he could
not solve every problem at once.
She stood on tiptoe and beckoned for him to bend forward, which he did,
glad that Mary was no longer there to glare at him for it. "I'm just back from
the West," she whispered in his ear. "Grant's plan to use gunboats on the
Yazoo River to take Vicksburg is a mistake. The rebels can put logs in those
little streams and foil our gunboats easily. Have to take Vicksburg by land
from the rear."
He nodded noncommittally; Grant would do it his own way, but if his river
plan failed to break the rebel hold on the Mississippi fort, Miss Carroll's
alternative would have to be explored. She had come up with some surpris-
ingly good military ideas before, probably because of her background promot-
ing railroads. Lamon introduced the man with her, a lanky former Congress-
man from Texas named Lemuel Evans, hired by the War Department at Miss
Carroll's suggestion to provide information about Southern plans. Her com-
panion held her arm possessively, which she did not resist; Lincoln assumed
the independent lady had found herself a man, if she wanted one.
The photographer Alexander Gardner came along, his boss Mathew Brady
in tow. Lincoln was glad to see they were still together, though it was sad to
see Brady's need for help in moving about. He had read somewhere that the
German composer Beethoven had gone deaf late in life, and a comparison
could be made to a photographer going blind. Hay had said something about
Gardner and others striking out on their own, in competition with Brady;
Lincoln could understand that, and would surely patronize Gardner, with
whom he. felt more comfortable. He hoped the parting had not been acrimoni-
ous.
The gun on the lawn boomed noon and the people who had crowded
outside were allowed to pile in. The ebullience of the people on the bright,
cold day and their obvious delight at being in the nation's house and shaking
hands with the nation's Chief Magistrate infected Lincoln. He felt they were
with him to a manstrong for Union, pleased enough at the Proclamation,
optimistic about the coming year. Though his giant hand was beginning to
numb, his feet did not hurtthank you, Dr. Zacharieand he was uplifted
at the sentiments sometimes shyly expressed, sometimes boisterously voiced
with a squeeze of the arm. Lincoln hoped Robert would absorb some of this
strength, but he could not tell from the boy's expression whether he grasped
the intensity of the moment or the meaning of the day. Robert made himself
hard to know.
As the time neared for the reception to end, Lincoln extended his swollen
hand to Colonel McKay, an old political ally friend from the West, whom
Lincoln remembered as a good dialect storyteller. McKay said he had heard a
new one, and Lincoln leaned forward to hear.
"Seems a darky preacher was trying to explain the Emancipation Procla-
mation to his congregation as being based on 'military necessity,' " the colo-
nel related, "and an old patriarch with white kinky hair got up and said,
'Bredren, you jes' listen to me. Massa Linkum he eberywhar. He know eber-
yting. He walk de earf like de Lawd.' "
McKay waited for the laugh, but Lincoln did not crack a smile. "It is a
momentous thing," he said as much to his son standing at his side as to his
story-swapping friend, "to be the instrument under Providence for the libera-
tion of a race."

CHAPTER 46
HEART IN HIS BOOTS
John Fomey hurried to keep up with the President's long strides. The New
Year's levee was ended. Before attending to the Proclamation, Lincoln
wanted to know what was happening to the Army of the Cumberland fighting
at Stones River, near Murfreesboro.
Fomey followed Lincoln across the street to the War Department, with its
big Maltese cross over the entrance, two objectives in mind: first, to find out
what was happening to his traitor friend, John C. Breckinridge, who, he
heard, was one of Bragg's commanders in the clash of armies in Tennessee.
And then to get the President to undo an injustice done by General Grant.
"Why don't you get the signing out of the way first?" he asked, trotting to
keep up. "All the morning papers want a copy for tomorrow's editions."
"Not because of any uncertainty on my part," Lincoln said, "but hours of
handshaking is not calculated to improve a man's chirography." Fomey had
never heard the word "chirography" before, and assumed it meant penman-
ship. Why was Lincoln explaining away the shakiness of his handwriting?
In the telegraph office, Lincoln took what Fomey knew to be his regular
position at Major Eckert's desk, next to the window facing Pennsylvania
Avenue. "This is where I wrote the Proclamation," he said, to the proud nods
of the operator, Bates, and the cipher translator, Tinker.
"The South had fair warning," he told Fomey sternly, "that if they did not
return to their duty, I should strike at this pillar of their strength. The prom-
ise must now be kept. I shall never recall one word."
Forneynewspaperman, Senate clerk, President Buchanan's Pennsylvania
crony, abolitionist for decades, and confirmed alcoholicwas not so befud-
died by the four cups of wine punch served that morning as to keep him from
observing how Lincoln felt the need for reassurance. Here was a man who
turned back assaults on his power from the Cabinet cabal, from a near mutiny
by the West Point clique in the Army, and from a majority of his party in the
Senate; who was quite prepared to turn the Constitution on its head to.harass
his enemies; who changed his Union horse for an abolition horse in mid-
stream rather than drownbut who was concerned about the way his signa-
ture would look on a document.
"What news from the front?" Lincoln's favorite question.
Bates shook his head. Nothing yet from Tennessee. The President tilted the
chair against the wall and put his feet up on the table in the center of the
room, a long reach, settling in for a wait.
"You mean we don't know anything," Fomey asked, genuinely surprised at
the lack of information in the nerve center of the war, "after two days'
fighting?"
"As you see, the government is no better informed than you are about the
results of Stones River," Lincoln replied, as if that were the normal state of
affairs. The buoyant mood of the levee was gone. Now he seemed to expect
bad news.
"Do you think we'll win?"
Lincoln startled him further with the lugubrious remark that "I cannot see
how either of our plans, East or West, will succeed." He pulled out a map he
kept in Eckert's desk and showed the plan of campaign against Richmond,
which had been unsuccessful before. He pointed to Grant's position in the
West, seeking to reduce Vicksburg by pushing big gunboats up small streams
near the Mississippi. He said some of his trusted military advisers had told
him the Yazoo approach would never work.
"If you feel so confident of disaster in these movements," Forney asked
him, "why do you permit them to be made?"
"I cannot prevent it."
"You are commander in chief."
"My dear Forney, I am as powerless as any private citizen to shape the
military plans of the government." Lincoln stared out the window at the
throng still assembled on the White House lawn. "I have once or twice at-
tempted to act on my own convictions and found it was impracticable to do
so. I see campaigns undertaken in which I have no faith and have no power to
prevent them. And I tell you that sometimes, when I reflect on the manage-
ment of our forces, I am tempted to despair. My heart goes clear down into
my boots."
Forney did not know what to say. Lincoln had bounded McClellan into
fighting, then pulled him out of the Peninsula, then selected Bumside to
march overland toward Richmond, and was now expected to replace him
with Hooker. The President had involved himself more each month in every
major military decision and now was claiming he had no control at all. Why?
Were his top generals squabbling, or quitting, or letting him down at a time
like this? If that were so, if the military situation was as bleak as the President
painted it, then his Emancipation Proclamation was one enormous bluff. For-
ney wished he had a drink.
"Of course," Lincoln added, "we are speaking in confidence, as friends.
None of this must get into print, or be repeated."
Forney nodded his assurance of secrecy. The President, in his despair, had
said too much. He waited a moment, figuring how best to bring up the subject
of Grant and the newsman, then jumped when he heard the telegraph ma-
chine start to clatter.
The operator said, "Rosecrans headquarters, Army of the Cumberland,"
and Lincoln's feet came down off the table. Forney knew it would take a few
agonizing minutes to receive the message and decode it.
Forney thought of Breckinridge, and of his own prediction a year ago that
his friend of such great promise would go South and never come back to the
Senate. Breck had said the only reason he would cross the lines would be to
retrieve his young son, who had run away to join the rebels. But Senator
Breckinridge got caught up in the rhetoric of his Senate speeches, haranguing
the war hawks about the protections guaranteed by the Constitutionwhen
it was the desperate need to fight a war that had forced Lincoln to tramp all
over civil liberty. Fate made the choice for Breck, Fomey concluded; the big
Kentuckian was doomed to follow the sound of his own voice. Now he was
leading rebel troops on some cold and godforsaken battlefield, and the man
whose election he had so dutifully certified was here waiting for news of the
battle.
But Lincoln made his own choice. Which one made the right decision?
Who had the higher cause? Lincoln did, of course, and the Union did; the
loyal Fomey had never any doubt of that, largely because Lincoln was so
certain that democracy in the world depended on the fight here and now for
majority rule, and that on occasion freedom could be freedom's worst enemy.
Then what could have attracted a good and intelligent man like Breck to
fight against his country, even against most of his home state, just as Fomey
had gloomily foreseen? There must have been a reason. Perhaps Breck's rea-
son had disappeared in the course of the war and left behind only the reluc-
tance to fail one's comrades.
Into the wait for deciphering, Fomey inserted his business: "Sherman ar-
rested another correspondent, court-martialed him as a spy. Grant is going to
throw him out of the war zone or put him in prison." When Lincoln said
nothing, Fomey added, "A committee of correspondents asked me to get you
to revoke the court-martial sentence."
"I'm not on the spot to judge." Lincoln wanted no part of it. Fomey did
not back away; he knew that Lincoln liked most of the reporters he was
acquainted with but had little respect for journalists as a class. In some ways,
Breck had been right about Lincoln: with him, the Union was flesh and
blood; the Constitution, shadow and spirit.
"It's Tom Know of the New York Times. "
That was different; Lincoln knew the man to be a responsible correspon-
dent. The President pulled out a sheet of paper and wrote a message, showing
the sheet to Fomey. "I'm making this conditional on the approval of Grant,"
he said, "but he knows I'm interested."
Fomey was satisfied; with Lincoln these days, except for his fixed idea of no
secession, it was not so much the principle of the thing as it was the practical
end accomplished. War had a way of knocking the comers off a man.
Bates had handed a take to Tinker for decoding, and the boy was working
oa it. "Just tell us," said the President.
"Rosecrans reports that General Van Cleve has turned back a vicious rebel
assault on the hill he was holding." Tinker worked some more on the cipher.
"Six thousand rebels under Breckinridge charged, about half were killed or
wounded." The young man looked up, struck by the weight of hiawords;
three thousand men cut down on a single charge. He continued: "Our Ken-
tucky and Tennessee troops under Crittenden are investing the rebel posi-
tions."
"Our casualties?"
"Not as heavy as yesterday. Our artillery enfiladed the rebel charge and not
many of them made it to our lines. Cannon wiped them away."
The clattering continued. Rosecrans reported his belief that Bragg's army
would now withdraw, but that Federal forces were too exhausted to pursue
them. Lincoln's face darkened at that.
"Any general officers lost?" Fomey asked the operator.
"None of ours, sir. A rebel, Major General Cleburne, was reported killed in
the charge."
"General Breckinridgenews of him?"
"It is thought that Bragg, Breckinridge, and Hardee are planning to set up
a new rebel line, south, at Duck River."
"Cleburne is a big loss for them," said Fomey, relieved at Breck's escape
from the carnage. "They were calling him the 'Stonewall of the West.' Irish-
man."
"Breckinridge was a friend of yours," said the President. When Fomey
nodded, Lincoln said, "I was fond of John and I was sorry to see him take the
course he did. I regret that he sided with the South. It was a mistake."
After a silence, Lincoln wrote a message to be transmitted to Rosecrans.
"God bless you and all with you." He added: "You gave us a hard-earned
victory, which, had there been a defeat instead, the nation could scarcely have
lived over."
The President pulled himself up, squeezed Bates's shoulder, wished the
cipher man a happy New Year, and led Fomey back across the street.

CHAPTER 47
WITHOUT COMPUNCTIONS
Lincoln was pleased to see everything in readiness for the signing. All morn-
ing, through the meeting with the failing generals, through the hours of the
reception, he had felt himself in the presence of an impending event of greater
moment than he had at first imagined. A metallic sound seemed to be in his
head, which could be the glorious striking of shackles or the terrible clash of
bayonets.
Frederick Seward held a large portfolio under his arm. His father told him
to spread the Proclamation sheet out on the Cabinet table for signature by the
President and the Secretary of State. Stoddard, the third secretary, had al-
ready prepared a couple of copies at Lincoln's direction, one to have in the
office and the other to give to the press.,
With William Henry Seward at his side, and about a dozen people in the
room, the President considered the document, flexing the swollen, thoroughly
squeezed fingers of his right hand.
Seward examined the portion of the document that exempted specific coun-
ties of rebel states, now occupied by Union soldiers, from the decree. He
remarked that the President's decision of the day before, to accept the west-
ern counties of Virginia as a separate state, meant that the slaves in that vast
area would not be freed.
Lincoln nodded; he had approved the secession of part of a state from a
state, which seemed to go against his principle of majority rule, but he saw a
clear distinction between secession that helped keep the Union whole and
secession that would break it up. His decision to go along with the dismem-
berment of Virginia pleased the punish-the-rebel crowd, while the loyal peo-
ple in the western portion of that state were glad they could hold on to their
slaves, because the emancipation decree did not run to loyal states. Something
for everybody in that one.
He found himself gripped by a sense of the occasion. Lincoln had signed
thousands of state documents, decrees and appointments and messages and
pardons, but it struck him that not one had been nearly so far-reaching as
this, despite the compromises. He picked up a pen, dipped it in the inkwell,
held it a moment, tried to get his mind around the notion of four million
actual people, and then removed his hand from above the document and
dropped the pen on the table.
He stretched his fingers, rubbing his right hand with his left. "I never in my
life felt more certain that I was doing right," he explained to the friends in the
room, "than I do in signing this paper. If my name ever goes into history it
will be for this act, and my whole soul is in it."
He massaged his right shoulder and upper arm. "But I have been receiving
calls and shaking hands since nine o'clock this morning, and my right arm is
stiff and numb, almost paralyzed. Now this signature will be closely ex-
amined, and if they find my hand trembled, they'll say, 'He hesitated, he had
some compunctions.' "
What was he waiting for? Why was he making excuses for delaying the
moment, he wondered. Here, with a stroke, he would set freein theory,
perhaps one day in actualityfour million human beings. But looked at an-
other way, Lincoln knew he was also seizing more property than any despot
in history, putting forward a bill of attainder that shook the foundation of
common law, and perhaps inciting a wholesale massacre of innocent whites
by blacks emboldened to vengeance that would make this act remembered in
history as among the bloodiest and most monstrous.
Who could be sure of the consequences? He freely admitted to himself that
this Proclamation abolishing the South's cherished institution was his
counter-revolution taken at a time of desperation, his bomb of unknown
power rolled into enemy territory. He knew it would be seen as a device to
recapture the war spirit and would surely end the hopes of a negotiated peace.
As the trial became ever more fiery, he was doubling the stakes with this
Proclamation, lengthening the war, forcing a fight to the finish. At the time
nearly two years agoof his decision to provision Fort Surnter, he had only a
vague idea of the bloody consequences; but now, defying the Union's military
weakness and proclaiming a revolution, he could see the Bloody Lanes filled
with bodies stretching into infinity.
Why, then, was he not paralyzed, as he had pretended for a moment his
fingers were? Why did he feel instead an unaccustomed serenity toc'ay, de-
spite the crowding-in of disaster? The answer was on the table in front'of him.
He recognized that his extra-constitutional device, his seemingly empty threat
of terrible vengeance, his grand subterfuge, was at the same time the greatest
moral act of his life.
If human slavery was not wrong, nothing was wrong. The punishment for
rebellion was the loss of slaves, and the ennoblement of the carnage would be
the emergence of freedom for an entire race. If every drop of blood drawn by
the lash had to be paid for by the sword, that was not the fault of the
President of the United States but was the judgment of God. Lincoln knew he
was risking more blood, years of conflict, permanent hatred, unimaginable
divisions, andhe could not deny ita temporary loss of personal liberty for
many, to attain a fusion of great purposes: a permanent democracy in which
every person would be free.
He placed his hands on either side of the document and looked it over for a
last time. Its roots were not in the cool compromises of the Constitution, but
in the heat and fervor of the Declaration of Independence. He was in the end
at one with the revolutionaries of 1776, at odds with the compromisers of
1789. He had lived with the act of abolition, in all its permutations, for six
months. He had been ready to abandon it at the first sign of some Southern
submission to emancipation's threat, willing to delay the edict if the North's
Peace Democrats were willing to coalesce in a compact to put first the fight
against secession. The Proclamation's threat had failed; he could hope that its
reality would not fail.
The key words leaped up at him: "/ do order and declare that all persons
held as slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, are, and
henceforward shall be free . . . "
Not "forever free"; he had dropped the word "forever" in the final draft.
That was not his phrase originally but had been in David Hunter's premature
order; it was presumptuous, toowho could promise anyone freedom "for-
ever" ? Freedom would have to be reearned, perhaps fought for, down to the
latest generation.
"Anyway, it is going to be done," he said to the small group around the
table. He picked up the pen and dipped it into the ink again.
Slowly, he did his best to lay across the parchment a bold and clear signa-
ture, his whole first name reflecting solemnity. He looked at the freshly inked
name, not completely satisfiedit seemed to quaver a little, but there were no
second chancesthen allowed a smile to light his face. "That will do."