The Confederate Nation: 1861 to 1865 (21 page)
Read The Confederate Nation: 1861 to 1865 Online
Authors: Emory M. Thomas
Tags: #History, #United States, #American Civil War, #Non-Fiction
Abrasive ambition surfaced in the military high command days after the victory at Manassas, and subsequent defeats only served to increase the discord. P. G. T. Beauregard, on July 29, 1861, wrote a letter to his friend and congressman William Porcher Miles complaining about the decision not to advance on Washington after the battle and blaming the lost opportunity on the administration. Miles read the letter on the floor of the House, and the second-guessing began in public. Davis sent Beauregard a mild rebuke, Beauregard apologized, and the rift appeared at an end. In October, however, Beauregard issued a detailed report of the battle to the War Department and the newspapers. The report overlooked few opportunities to congratulate its author, and Davis charged the General with trying “to exalt yourself at my expense.” This time Beauregard did not apologize and the feud raged in the press for some time.
Tempers also flared between Davis and his other commander at Manassas, Joseph E.Johnston. On the last day of August the President asked the Senate to confirm a list of five men as full generals in the Confederate army. Johnston ranked fourth in seniority on the list behind Samuel Cooper, Albert Sidney Johnston, and Robert E. Lee, and ahead of Beauregard. Adjutant and Inspector General Cooper, the army’s chief administrator, and A. S.Johnston were old friends of Davis; Lee was a new friend who had won the President’s confidence. J. E. Johnston had outranked all three in the United States army, and he interpreted Davis’ action as a severe affront. He wrote the President a long and bitter letter, and Davis sent a curt reply in which he told Johnston that his insinuations were unbecoming. Perhaps even more unbecoming were the semipublic quarrels between the Confederate Commander-in-Chief and two of his key subordinates.
55
Southern men had no monopoly on highly placed dissension. Varina Davis had a difficult period as first lady of Richmond’s official society. Some Virginians resented the intrusion of any “official society” into a long-established social set, and within government circles Mrs. Davis had tiffs with Mesdames Wigfall, Johnston (Mrs. Joseph E.), and Myers. The Quartermaster-General’s wife called the first lady from Mississippi a “western woman” and as the feud progressed changed “woman” to “squaw.”
56
Southern newspapers had been enthusiastic in their support of the new nation. Even those editors who had opposed secession for the most part accepted the
fait accompli
and offered support to the Confederate government. Even in the face of the military reverses of late 1861 and early 1862, the press remained generally sanguine. There were, however, significant exceptions, and eventually the press began to reverberate with criticism and carping over the conduct of Confederate statecraft and military affairs.
57
In Charleston, the
Mercury,
edited by Robert Barnwell Rhett, Jr., began earnest editorial opposition to the Davis government in February 1862. One of the
Mercury’s
correspondents, George William Bagby, editor of the
Southern Literary Messenger,
who signed his material “Hermes,” recorded his private sentiments in his journal: “We have reached a very dark hour in the history of this struggle. I do not say the cause will fail, but the chances are all against us…. Cold, haughty, peevish, narrow-minded, pig-headed,
malignant,
he [President Davis] is the cause…. While he lives, there is no hope for us. God alone can save us. Will He?”
58
And in Richmond, John M. Daniel’s
Examiner
was only slightly more restrained on February 24, when the paper began its open opposition to the administration. “The Confederacy,” the editor stated, “has had everything that was required for success but one; and that one thing it was and it is supposed to possess more than anything else, namely
talent.
“ Then Daniel continued his attack upon the War and Navy Offices and explained his change of policy: “In common with all conscientious Southern men, we have long kept silence…. But there is no longer room to doubt the propriety of saying and doing all that can be said and done to surround the President with the first men in the land. We must get more talent in that Confederate government or be ruined.”
59
It was a short step from criticizing the President’s bad advisors to criticizing the President himself—a step the
Examiner
soon took.
60
Naturally, semiprivate quarrels and public dissent coupled with military failures affected the morale of the Southern people. Undoubtedly Jefferson Davis had the flagging spirits of his countrymen on his mind when he wrote his inaugural address. On February 22, birthday of that other revolutionary leader, Davis took the oath of office as permanent president of the Confederacy. He wrote a good speech. He was candid with his fellow citizens, he admitted that “the tide for the moment is against us,” and he confessed that it was “at the darkest hour of our struggle [that] the Provisional gives place to the Permanent Government.” Then he offered hope for the future, faith in the devotion of the people, and commitment of his own energies. If he promised little in the way of specific policy changes, Davis’ resolve to do better had a sincere ring.
61
Of course, speeches would not reverse the tide of Confederate failure or lighten the nation’s “darkest hour” for long. Even as Davis invoked the blessing of Providence upon his undertaking, Providence seemed to spurn the invitation by baptising the new government in a continuous downpour of cold rain. The Vice-President, when asked for a few words, said nothing, and the Richmond
Examiner
found the inaugural address so insignificant that “it might, in fact, have been omitted from the ceremony had not custom required that the President should say something on such an occasion.”
62
Deeds, not words, were required if the Southern nation were to live. Nor was time on the Southern side. The 1862 spring campaigns were at hand, and in Washington, Abraham Lincoln had issued President’s General War Order Number One ordering a “general forward movement” to begin on February 22, the same day on which Davis inaugurated his government.
The Confederacy to this point had been an incarnation of the Old South, and as such the Old South had been tried and found wanting. Southerners found that Confederate national survival and rigid adherence to ante-bellum Southern ideology were mutually exclusive. The ante-bellum South could not metamorphose into the “bellum” South without some fundamental alterations in its cherished way of life. Haltingly and to a large degree unconsciously, the Confederate South emerged a significant mutation of the South the nation had been called into being to preserve. To fulfill Southern nationalism, Confederate Southerners had to slaughter some of the sacred cows and overturn some of the shibboleths that had previously defined them as a people.
1
The best general accounts of the battle of Roanoke Island are Rush C. Hawkins, “Early Coast Operations in North Carolina,” and Ambrose E. Burnside, “The Burnside Expedition,” in Robert Underwood Johnson and Clarence Clough Buel (eds.),
Battles and Leaders of the Civil War,
5 vols. (New York, 1883–1887), I, 632–670.
2
A good map of the region is in the report of Flag-Officer L. M. Goldsborough, February 18, 1862,
Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion,
31 vols. (Washington, D.C., 1894–1927), ser. I, VI, 554, reprinted in Hawkins, “Early Coast Operations,” 641.
3
Huger to Davis, March 5, 1862,
War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies,
70 vols, in 127 (Washington, D.C., 1880–1901), ser. I, IX, 113–114; Reports of Wise, February 21, 1862,
O R.
ser. I, IV, 123–124.
4
Wise Reports,
O.R.,
ser. I, IX, 126–129.
5
Ibid.,
129; Burnside, “Expedition,” 670. The standard biography of Wise is still Barton H. Wise,
The Life of Henry A. Wise of Virginia, 1806–1876
(New York, 1899).
6
Wise Reports, O.R., ser. I, IX, 132–142; Burnside, “Expedition,” 660–662; Lynch to Mallory, January 22, 1862, in Wise Reports,
O R.,
ser. I, IX, 147–148.
7
Wise Reports,
O R.,
ser. I, IX, 147; Report of Colonel H. M. Shaw, February 24, 1862,
O.R.,
ser. IV, I, 170–173.
8
Report of Flag-Officer Lynch, February 18, 1862, 0. R. N., ser. I, VI, 594–597; Report of Flag-Officer Goldsborough, February 18, 1862,
O.R.N.,
ser. I, VI, 550–555; Report of Colonel H. M. Shaw, February 24, 1862,
O.R.
ser. I, IX, 170–173; Wise to Huger, Feb. 10, 1862 in Wise Reports,
O R.,
ser. I, IX, 155–157; Burnside, “Expedition,” pp. 666–668, 670; Hawkins, “Early Coast Operations,” 640–645.
9
Richmond Enquirer,
February 25, 1862; Wise Reports,
O R.,
ser. I, IX, 122–65; Report of the Investigating Committee, Confederate House of Representatives,
O.R.,
ser. IV, I, 183–191.
10
Few historians of the Confederacy have sufficiently emphasized the period between July 1861 and the spring of 1862. Bell I. Wiley in
Road to Appomattox,
Atheneum edition (New York, 1968), does point out the depressing effect on public morale (pp. 49–59).
11
See Martin H. Hall,
Sibley’s New Mexico Campaign
(Austin, Tex., 1960); David Westphall, “The Battle of Glorieta Pass: Its Importance in the Civil War,”
New Mexico Historical Review,
XLIV (1969), 137–154; and Jerry Don Thompson,
Colonel John Robert Baylor: Texas Indian Fighter and Confederate Soldier
(Hillsboro, Tex., 1971).
12
Albert Castel, General Sterling Price and the Civil War in the West (Baton Rouge, La., 1968), pp. 39–47.
13
See two articles by Arthur R. Kirkpatrick, “Missouri’s Secessionist Government, 1861–1865,”
Missouri Historical Review
XLV (1951), 124–137, and “The Admission of Missouri to the Confederacy,”
Missouri Historical Review,
LV (1961), 366–386.
14
See Albert Castel, “A New View of the Battle of Pea Ridge,”
Missouri Historical Review,
LVII (1968), 136–151; and Homer L. Kerr, “Battle of Elkhorn: The Gettysburg of the Trans-Mississippi West,” in William F. Holmes and Harold W. Hollingsworth (eds.),
Essays on the American Civil War
(Austin, Tex., 1971).
15
Thomas L. Connelly,
Army of the Heartland: The Army of Tennessee, 1861–1862
(Baton Rouge, La., 1967), pp. 46–99; Wilson P. Shortridge, “Kentucky Neutrality in 1861,”
Mississippi Valley Historical Review,
IX (1923), 283–301.
16
See Richard O. Curry, A House Divided: A Study of Statehood Politics and the Copperhead Movement in West Virginia (Pittsburgh, 1964).
17
Douglas S. Freeman,
R. E. Lee,
4 vols. (New York, 1934–35), I, 541–587; Frank E. Vandiver,
Mighty Stonewall
(New York, 1957), pp. 204–207.
18
Daniel Ammen, “DuPont and the Port Royal Expedition,” in Johnson and Buel (eds.),
Battles and Leaders,
I, 671–691.
19
See James M. Merrill,
Battle Flags South: The Story of the Civil War Navies on Western Waters
(Rutherford, N.J., 1960), pp. 15–110; H. Allen Gosnell,
Guns on the Western Waters
(Baton Rouge, La., 1949), pp. 1–69; John D. Milligan
Gunboats Down the Mississippi
(Annapolis, Md., 1965), pp. 3–51.
20
Connelly,
Army of the Heartland,
pp. 78–85, 102–106; Vincent J. Esposito (ed.),
The West Point Atlas of American Wars,
2 vols. (New York, 1959), I, map 25.
21
Connelly,
Army of the Heartland,
pp. 106–108; Esposito (ed.),
West Point Atlas,
I, map 26.
22
Connelly
, Army of the Heartland,
pp. 108–125; Esposito (ed.),
West Point Atlas,
I, maps 27–30; Lew Wallace, “The Capture of Fort Donelson,” in Johnston and Buel (eds.),
Battles and Leaders,
I, 401–429; James J. Hamilton,
The Battle of Fort Donelson
(New York, 1968); and Merrill,
Battle Flags South,
pp. 82–107.
23
See Archer Jones,
Confederate Strategy from Shiloh to Vicksburg
(Baton Rouge, La., 1961), pp. 33–36.
24
See Frank J. Merli,
Great Britain and the Confederate Navy
(Bloomington, Ind., 1971); Wilbur D.Jones,
The Confederate Rams at Birkenhead
(Tuscaloosa, Ala., 1961); and Richard I. Lester,
Confederate Finance and Purchasing in Great Britain
(Charlottesville, N.C., 1975); William N. Still, Jr.,
Confederate Shipbuilding
(Athens, Ga., 1969), pp. 3–20. Bulloch recounted his and others’ adventures in his
The Secret Service of the Confederate States in Europe,
2 vols. (London, 1883).
25
Virgil Carrington Jones,
The Civil War at Sea,
3 vols. (New York, 1960), I, 165–166, 332; II, 247. Mallory to Davis, February 27, 1862;
O.R.N.,
series II, II, 149–53.
26
William H. Still, Jr.,
Iron Afloat: The Story of the Confederate Armorclads
(Nashville, Tenn., 1971), pp. 11–17, 47–51, 79.
27
Ibid.,
pp. 13–25; John M. Brooke, “The
Virginia
or
Merrimac:
Her Real Projector,”
Southern Historical Society Papers,
XIX (1891), 3–34.
28
J. Thomas Scharf,
History of the Confederates States Navy,
2nd edition (Albany, N.Y., 1894), pp. 154–155 and n.; Still,
Iron Afloat,
pp. 23–29.
29
Still,
Iron Afloat,
pp. 29–32; T. Catesby Jones, “The Iron-Clad
Virginia,” Virginia Magazine of History and Biography,
XLIX (1941), 297–303.
30
Catesby R.Jones, “Services of the
Virginia, “ Southern Historical Society Papers,
XI (1183), 70–71; Still;
Iron Afloat,
pp. 32–33.
31
On the
Monitor,
see William C. White and Ruth White,
Tin Can on a Shingle
(New York, 1957).
32
For accounts of the famous battle and its significance, see John Taylor Wood, “The First Fight of Iron Clads,” Johnson and Buel (eds.),
Battles and Leaders,
I, 692–711 ; Jones, “Services of the
Virginia, ”
65–75; Robert W. Daly,
How the Merrimac Won
(New York, 1957); and E. B. Potter and Chester W. Nimitz (eds.),
Sea Power: A Naval History
(Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1960), pp. 262–272.
33
Still,
Iron Afloat,
pp. 34–40. Tom Henderson Wells, in
The Confederate Navy: A Study in Organization
(University, Ala., 1971), pp. 97–98, points out the problems involved in trying to move the
Virginia
up the James and blames constructor John L. Porter for supplying inaccurate information regarding the ship’s least possible draught.
34
Still,
Iron Afloat,
pp. 79–88; T. C. DeLeon,
Belles, Beaux and Brains of the 60
’s (New York, 1909), pp. 415–416.
35
Journal of the Congress of the Confederate States of America, 1861–1865, 7 vols. (Washington, D.C., 1904–1905), V, 47.
36
Jefferson Davis to Speaker of the House of Representatives, March 4, 1862,
O.R.,
ser. IV, I. 969–970.
37
Frank E. Vandiver,
Ploughshares into Swords: Josiah Gorgas and Confederate Ordnance
(Austin, Tex., 1952), pp. 84–104.
38
Ibid.,
pp. 105–109.
39
Ibid.,
pp. 82, 105–111.
40
Richard D. Goff,
Confederate Supply
(Durham, N.C., 1969), pp. 34–39.
41
Mary Boy kin Chesnut,
A Diary from Dixie,
ed. by Ben Ames Williams (Boston, 1949), p. 99.
42
Benjamin to Davis, February—, 1862,
O R.
, series IV, I, 955–964.
43
Cited in Frank E. Vandiver,
Basic History of the Confederacy
(Princeton, N.J., 1962), p. 121. See also Albert Burton Moore,
Conscription and Conflict in the Confederacy
(New York, 1924), pp. 6–11.
44
Journal of Congress, V, 25–26.
45
Louis H. Manarin, Richmond at War: The Minutes of the City Council, 1861–1865 (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1965), pp. 104–107; Emory M. Thomas, The Confederate State of Richmond: A Biography of the Capital (Austin, Tex., 1971), pp. 70–74.
46
Richard Cecil Todd,
Confederate Finance
(Athens, Ga., 1954), pp. 39–41, 105, 130–135, 198.
47
See Wiley,
Road to Appomattox,
pp. 43–59.
48
See James Z. Rabun, “Alexander H. Stephens and Jefferson Davis,”
American Historical Review,
LVIII (1953), 290–321.
49
Cited in Wiley, Road to Appomattox, p. 83.
50
Journal of Congress, V, 15, 45–46, 48–49, 57, 66, 107–108; Proceedings of the Confederate Congress Southern Historical Society Papers, XLIV-LII, 1923–1959; XLIV, 23–28, 69–71, 80, 84–85.
51
See Thomas B. Alexander and Richard E. Beringer,
The Anatomy of the Confederate Congress
(Nashville, Tenn., 1972), pp. 35–73, 335–339; David W. Potter, “Jefferson Davis and the Political Factors in Confederate Defeat,” in David Donald (ed.),
Why the North Won the Civil War
(Baton Rouge, La., 1960), pp. 94–112; Alvy L. King,
Louis T. Wigfall: Southern Fire-eater
(Baton Rouge, La., 1960), pp. 127–140.
52
Cited in Wiley,
Road to Appomattox,
pp. 100–101.
53
Hammond to Boyce, March 17, 1862, in Rosser H. Taylor (ed.), “Boyce-Hammond Correspondence,”
Journal of Southern History,
III (1937), 349.
54
Boyce to Hammond, March 17, 1862, and April 12, 1862, Taylor (ed.), “Boyce-Hammond,” 349–352.
55
See Wiley,
Road to Appomattox,
pp. 87–92.
56
Chesnut,
Diary,
pp. 99–109.
57
SeeJ. Cutler Andrews,
The South Reports the Civil War
(Princeton, N.J., 1970), pp. 448–449.
58
George W. Bagby Journal, Virginia Historical Society Library.
59
Richmond
Examiner,
February 24, 1862.
60
See
ibid.,
March 30, 1862.
61
Dunbar Rowland (ed.), Jefferson Davis, Constitutionalist: His letters, Papers, and Speeches, 10 vols. (Jackson, Miss., 1923), V, 198–203.
62
Richmond
Examiner,
February 24, 1862.