Lincoln was averse to being put up as a military hero.
When General Cass was a candidate for the Presidency his friends sought
to endow him with a military reputation.
Lincoln, at that time a representative in Congress, delivered a speech
before the House, which, in its allusion to Mr. Cass, was exquisitely
sarcastic and irresistibly humorous:
“By the way, Mr. Speaker,” said Lincoln, “do you know I am a military
hero?
“Yes, sir, in the days of the Black Hawk War, I fought, bled, and came
away.
“Speaking of General Cass’s career reminds me of my own.
“I was not at Stillman’s defeat, but I was about as near it as Cass to
Hull’s surrender; and like him I saw the place very soon afterwards.
“It is quite certain I did not break my sword, for I had none to break,
but I bent my musket pretty badly on one occasion.
“If General Cass went in advance of me picking whortleberries, I guess I
surpassed him in charging upon the wild onion.
“If he saw any live, fighting Indians, it was more than I did, but I had
a good many bloody struggles with the mosquitoes, and although I never
fainted from loss of blood, I can truly say that I was often very
hungry.”
Lincoln concluded by saying that if he ever turned Democrat and should
run for the Presidency, he hoped they would not make fun of him by
attempting to make him a military hero.
“SURRENDER NO SLAVE.”
About March, 1862, General Benjamin F. Butler, in command at Fortress
Monroe, advised President Lincoln that he had determined to regard all
slaves coming into his camps as contraband of war, and to employ their
labor under fair compensation, and Secretary of War Stanton replied to
him, in behalf of the President, approving his course, and saying,
“You are not to interfere between master and slave on the one hand, nor
surrender slaves who may come within your lines.”
This was a significant milestone of progress to the great end that was
thereafter to be reached.