EXODUS OF SOUTHERN SOCIETY FROM THE FEDERAL CITY
In the winter of ’9 and ’0 it became obvious to everyone that gaiety at
the capital was waning. Aside from public receptions, now become
palpably perfunctory, only an occasional wedding served to give social
zest to the rapidly sobering Congressional circles. Ordinary “at-homes”
were slighted. Women went daily to the Senate gallery to listen to the
angry debates on the floor below. When belles met they no longer
discussed furbelows and flounces, but talked of forts and fusillades.
The weddings of my cousin, Miss Hilliard, in 1859, and of Miss Parker,
in 1860, already described, were the most notable matrimonial events of
those closing days of Washington’s splendour.
To Miss Hilliard’s marriage to Mr. Hamilton Glentworth, of New York,
which occurred at mid-day at old St. John’s, and to the reception that
followed, came many of the Senatorial body and dignitaries of the
capital. A procession of carriages drawn by white horses accompanied the
bridal party to the church, where the celebrated Bishop Doane, of New
Jersey, performed the ceremony. The bride’s gown and that of one of the
bridesmaids were “gophered,” this being the first appearance of the new
French style of trimming in the capital. One of the bridesmaids, I
remember, was gowned in pink crêpe, which was looped back with coral,
then a most fashionable garniture; the costume of another was of
embroidered tulle caught up with bunches of grapes; and each of the
accompanying ushers—such were the fashions of the day—wore inner vests
of satin, embroidered in colour to match the gown of the bridesmaid
allotted to his charge.
Notable artists appeared in the capital, among them Charlotte Cushman,
and there were stately, not to say stiff and formal, dinners at the
British Embassy, now presided over by Lord Lyons. This Minister’s
arrival was looked upon as a great event. Much gossip had preceded it,
and all the world was agog to know if it were true that feminine-kind
was debarred from his menage. It was said that his personally chartered
vessel had conveyed to our shores not only the personages comprising his
household, but also his domestics and skilful gardeners, and even the
growing plants for his conservatory. It was whispered that when his
Lordship entertained ladies his dinner-service was to be of solid gold;
that when gentlemen were his guests they were to dine from the costliest
of silver plate. Moreover, the gossips at once set about predicting that
the new-comer would capitulate to the charms of some American woman, and
speculation was already rife as to who would be the probable bride.
Lord Lyons began his American career by entertaining at dinner the
Diplomatic Corps, and afterward the officials of our country, in the
established order of precedence, the Supreme Court, the Cabinet, and
Senate circles leading, according to custom. His Lordship’s invitations
being sent out alphabetically, Senator Clay and I received a foreign and
formidable card to the first Senatorial dinner given by the newly
arrived diplomat. My husband’s appearance at this function, I remember,
was particularly distinguished. He was clad in conventional black, and
wore with it a cream-coloured vest of brocaded velvet; yet,
notwithstanding my wifely pride in him, we had what almost amounted to a
disagreement on our way to the famous feast. We drove to Lord Lyons’s
domicile with Senator and Mrs. Crittenden, and my perturbation furnished
them with much amusement. For some reason or for lack of one I was
obsessed by a suspicion that the new Minister, probably being unaware of
the state of feeling which continually manifested itself between
Northern and Southern people in the capital, might assign to me, as my
escort to table, some pronounced Republican.
“What would you do in that event?” asked Senator Clay.
“Do?” I asked, hotly and promptly. “I would refuse to accept him!”
My husband’s voice was grave as he said, “I hope there will be no need!”
Arriving at the Embassy, I soon discovered that, as had been rumoured,
the maid ordinarily at hand to assist women guests had been replaced by
a fair young English serving-man, who took charge of my wraps, and knelt
to remove my overshoes with all the deftness of a practised _femme de
chambre_. These preliminaries over, I rejoined my husband in the
corridor, and together we proceeded to our host, and, having greeted
him, turned aside to speak to other friends.
Presently Senator Brown, Mr. Davis’s confrère from Mississippi, made his
way to me. Senator Brown was one of the brightest men in Congress. As he
approached, my misgivings vanished and I smiled as I said, “Ah! you are
to be my gallant this evening!”
“Not so,” replied he. “I’m to go in with Mme. ——, and shall be compelled
to smell ‘camphired’ cleaned gloves for hours!”
[Illustration:
LORD LYONS
British Ambassador to the United States
]
He left my side. Presently he was replaced by Mr. Eames, ex-Minister to
Venezuela. Again I conjectured him to be the man who was destined to
escort me; but, after the exchange of a few words, he, too, excused
himself, and I saw him take his place at the side of his rightful
partner. In this way several others came and went, and still I stood
alone. I wondered what it all meant, and gave a despairing look at my
husband, who, I knew, was rapidly becoming as perturbed as was I.
Presently the massive doors slid apart, and a voice proclaimed, “Dinner,
my Lord!” Now my consternation gave way to overwhelming surprise and
confusion, for our host, glancing inquiringly around the circle, stepped
to my side, and, bowing profoundly, offered his arm with, “I have the
honour, Madam!” Once at the table, I quickly regained my composure,
assisted, perhaps, to this desirable state, by a feeling of triumph as I
caught from across the table the amused glance of my erstwhile
companion, Mrs. Crittenden.
Lord Lyons’s manner was so unconstrained and easy that I soon became
emboldened to the point of suggesting to him the possibility of some
lovely American consenting to become “Lyonised.” His Lordship’s prompt
rejoinder and quizzical look quite abashed me, and brought me swiftly to
the conclusion that I would best let this old lion alone; for he said,
“Ah, Madam! do you remember what Uncle Toby said to his nephew when he
informed him of his intended marriage?” Then, without waiting for my
assent, he added, “Alas! alas! quoth my Uncle Toby, you will never sleep
slantindicularly in your bed more!”
I had an adventure at a ball in 1859, which, though unimportant in
itself, turns a pleasing side-light upon one of the more courteous of
our political opponents. A dance had been announced, the music had
begun, and the dancers had already taken their places, when my partner
was called aside suddenly. Something occurred to detain him longer than
he had expected, and the time for us to lead having arrived, there was a
call for the missing gallant, who was nowhere to be seen. I looked about
helplessly, wondering what I was to do, when Anson Burlingame, who was
standing near, seeing my dilemma, stepped promptly forward, and, taking
my hand in most courtly manner, he said, “Pardon me, Madam!” and led me,
bewildered, through the first steps of the dance!
Lost in amazement at his courtesy, I had no time to demur, and, when we
returned to my place, the delinquent had reappeared. Bowing politely,
Mr. Burlingame withdrew. The circumstance caused quite a ripple among
those who witnessed it. Those who knew me best were amused at my
docility in allowing myself thus to be led through the dance by a rank
Abolitionist; but many were the comments made upon “Mr. Burlingame’s
audacity in daring to speak to Mrs. Clement Clay!”
Such were the scenes, both grave and gay, that preceded what was surely
the saddest day of my life—January 21, 1861—when, after years of
augmenting dissension between the Sections, I saw my husband take his
portfolio under his arm and leave the United States Senate Chamber in
company with other no less earnest Southern Senators. For weeks the
pretense of amity between parties had ceased, and social formalities no
longer concealed the gaping chasm that divided them. When the members of
each met, save for a glare of defiance or contempt, each ignored the
other, or, if they spoke, it was by way of a taunt or a challenge. Every
sentence uttered in Senate or House was full of hot feeling born of many
wrongs and long-sustained struggle. For weeks, men would not leave their
seats by day or by night, lest they might lose their votes on the vital
questions of the times. At the elbows of Senators, drowsy with long
vigils, pages stood, ready to waken them at the calling of the roll.
Not a Southern woman but felt, with her husband, the stress of that
session, the sting of the wrongs the Southern faction of that great body
was struggling to right. For forty years the North and the South had
striven for the balance of power, and the admission of each new State
was become the subject of bitter contention. There was, on the part of
the North, a palpable envy of the hold the South had retained so long
upon the Federal City, whether in politics or society, and the
resolution to quell us, by physical force, was everywhere obvious. The
face of the city was lowering, and some of the North agreed with us of
the South that a nation’s suicide was about to be precipitated.
Senator Clay, than whom the South has borne no more self-sacrificing
son, nor the Nation a truer patriot, was an ill man as that “winter of
national agony and shame” (_vide_ the Northern witness, Judge Hoar)
progressed. The incertitude of President Buchanan was alarming; but the
courage of our people to enter upon what they knew must be a defense of
everything they held dear in State and family institution rose higher
and higher to meet each advancing danger. The seizure by South Carolina
of United States forts that lay, a menace, within her very doorway,
acted like a spur upon the courage of the South.
“We have been hard at work all day,” wrote a defender of our cause from
Morris Island, January 17, 1861, “helping to make, with our own hands, a
battery, and moving into place some of the biggest guns you ever saw,
and all immediately under the guns of old Anderson.[16] He fired a shell
down the Bay this afternoon to let us know what he could do. But he had
a little idea what _we_ can do from his observation of our firing the
other morning,[17] at the ‘_Star of the West_,’ all of which he saw, and
he thought we had ruined the ship, as Lieutenant Hall represented in the
city that morning.... We learn to-day that in Washington they are trying
to procrastinate. That does not stop our most earnest preparation, for
we are going to work all night to receive from the steamboat three more
enormous guns and place them ready to batter down Fort Sumter, and we
can do it. We hope the other points are as forward in their preparations
as we are. If so, we can _smoke him out_ in a week. We are nearest to
him, and he may fire on us to-night, but if he were to kill everybody in
the State, and only one woman was left, and she should bear a child,
that child would be a secessionist. Our women are even more spirited
than we are, though, bless the dear creatures, I have not seen one in a
long time.”
Yet, despite these buoyant preparations for defense, there was a
lingering sentiment among us that caused us to deplore the necessity
that urged our men to arms. My husband was exceedingly depressed at the
futility of the Peace Commission, for he foresaw that the impending
conflict would be bloody and ruinous. One incident that followed the
dissolution of that body impressed itself ineradicably upon my mind.
Just after its close ex-President Tyler came to our home. He was now an
old man and very attenuated. He was completely undone at the failure of
the Peace men, and tears trickled down his cheeks as he said to Senator
Clay, with indescribable sadness, “Clay, the end has come!”
In those days men eyed each other warily and spoke guardedly, save to
the most tried and proved friend. One evening early in 1861, Commander
Semmes, U. S. N., called upon us, and happened to arrive just as another
naval officer, whose name I have now forgotten, was announced. The
surprise that spread over the faces of our visitors when they beheld
each other was great, but Senator Clay’s and my own was greater, as hour
after hour was consumed in obvious constraint. Neither of the officers
appeared to be at ease, yet for hours neither seemed to desire to
relieve the situation by taking his departure. Midnight had arrived ere
our now forgotten guest rose and bade us “good night.” Then Commander
Semmes hastened to unbosom himself. He had resolved to out-sit the other
gentleman if it took all night.
“As my Senator, Mr. Clay,” he said, “I want to report to you my decision
on an important matter. I have resolved to hand in my resignation to the
United States Government, and tender my services to that of the
Confederate States. I don’t know what the intention of my brother
officer is, but I could take no risk with him,” he added. Many a scene
as secret, as grave, and as “treasonable,” took place in those last
lowering weeks.
I have often mused upon the impression held by the younger generation of
those who were adverse to the South, viz.: that she “was prepared for
the war” into which we were precipitated practically by the admission of
Kansas; that our men, with treasonable foresight, had armed themselves
individually and collectively for resistance to our guileless and
unsuspicious oppressors. Had this been true, the result of that terrible
civil strife would surely have been two nations where now we have one.
To the last, alas! too few of our people realised that war was
inevitable. Even our provisional Secretary of War for the Confederate
States,[18] early in ’1, publicly prophesied that, should fighting
actually begin, it would be over in three months! It must be apparent to
thinkers that such gay dreamers do not form deep or “deadly plots.”
Personally I knew of but one man whose ferocity led him to collect and
secrete weapons of warfare. He was Edmund Ruffin, of Virginia, with whom
I entered into collusion. For months my parlour was made an arsenal for
the storing of a dozen lengthy spears. They were handsome weapons, made,
I suspect, for some decorative purpose, but I never knew their origin
nor learned of their destination. On them were engraved these
revolutionary words:
“Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck the flower of safety.”
As Senator Clay’s unequivocal position as a Southern man was everywhere
understood, our parlours were frequently the gathering-place of
statesmen from our own section and such others as were friendly to our
people and believed in our right to defend the principles we had
maintained since the administration of the first President of the United
States. Among the last mentioned were Senators Pendleton and Pugh, and
the ardent member of Congress from Ohio, Mr. Vallandigham. Often the
“dread arms” deposited by Mr. Ruffin proved a subject of conjecture and
mirth, with which closed some weightier conversation. As the day drew
near, however, for the agreed upon withdrawal of our Senators, the
tension under which all laboured made jests impossible, and keyed every
heart to the utmost solemnity. Monday, January 21st, was the day
privately agreed upon by a number of Senators for their public
declaration of secession; but, as an example of the uncertainty which
hobbled our men, until within a day or two of the appointed time several
still awaited the instructions from their States by which their final
act must be governed. Early on Sunday morning, January 20th, my husband
received from a distinguished colleague the following letter:
“WASHINGTON, Saturday night, January 19, 1861.
“_My Dear Clay_: By telegraph I am informed that the copy of the
ordinance of secession of my State was sent by mail _to-day_, one to
each of two branches of representation, and that _my_ immediate
presence at —— is required. It thus appears that —— was expected to
present the paper in the Senate and some one of the members to do so
in the House. All have gone save me, I, alone, and I am called away.
_We have piped and they would not dance, and now the devil may
care._
“I am grieved to hear that you are sick, the more so that I cannot
go to you. God grant your attack may be slight.”
And now the morning dawned of what all knew would be a day of awful
import. I accompanied my husband to the Senate, and everywhere the
greeting or gaze of absorbed, unrecognising men and women was serious
and full of trouble. The galleries of the Senate, which hold, it is
estimated, one thousand people, were packed densely, principally with
women, who, trembling with excitement, awaited the denouement of the
day. As, one by one, Senators David Yulee, Stephen K. Mallory, Clement
C. Clay, Benjamin Fitzpatrick, and Jefferson Davis rose, the emotion of
their brother Senators and of us in the galleries increased; and, when I
heard the voice of my husband, steady and clear, notwithstanding his
illness, declare in that Council Chamber:
“Mr. President, I rise to announce that the people of Alabama have
adopted an ordinance whereby they withdraw from the Union, formed under
a compact styled the United States, resume the powers delegated to it,
and assume their separate station as a sovereign and independent
people,” it seemed as if the blood within me congealed.
As each Senator, speaking for his State, concluded his solemn
renunciation of allegiance to the United States, women grew hysterical
and waved their handkerchiefs, encouraging them with cries of sympathy
and admiration. Men wept and embraced each other mournfully. At times
the murmurs among the onlookers grew so deep that the Sergeant-at-Arms
was ordered to clear the galleries; and, as each speaker took up his
portfolio and gravely left the Senate Chamber, sympathetic shouts rang
from the assemblage above. Scarcely a member of that Senatorial body but
was pale with the terrible significance of the hour. There was
everywhere a feeling of suspense, as if, visibly, the pillars of the
temple were being withdrawn and the great Government structure was
tottering; nor was there a patriot on either side who did not deplore
and whiten before the evil that brooded so low over the nation.
When Senator Clay concluded his speech, many of his colleagues, among
them several from Republican ranks, came forward to shake hands with
him. For months his illness had been a theme of public regret and
apprehension among our friends. “A painful rumour reached me this
morning,” wrote Joseph Holt to me late in 1860, “in relation to the
health of your excellent husband.... While I hope sincerely this is an
exaggeration, yet the apprehensions awakened are so distressing, that I
cannot resist the impulse of my heart to write you in the trust that
your reply will relieve me from all anxiety. It is my earnest prayer
that a life adorned by so many graces may be long spared to yourself, so
worthy of its devotion, and to our country, whose councils so need its
genius and patriotism.... Believe me most sincerely your friend, Joseph
Holt.”
In fact, the news of Senator Clay’s physical sufferings had been
telegraphed far and near, and, merged with the fear for our country,
there was, in my own heart, great anxiety and sadness for him. Our mail
was full of inquiries as to his welfare, many from kindly strangers and
even from States that were bitterly inimical to our cause. One of these
came from the far North, from one who signed himself, “A plain New
Hampshire minister, Henry E. Parker.” Nor can I refrain from quoting a
portion of his letter, which bears the never-to-be-forgotten date of
January 21st, 1861. He wrote as follows:
“I am utterly appalled at this projected dissolution of our Government.
To lose, to throw away our place and name among the nations of the
earth, seems not merely like the madness of suicide, but the very
blackness of annihilation. If this thing shall be accomplished, it will
be, to my view, the crime of the nineteenth century; the partition of
Poland will be nothing in comparison....
[Illustration:
CLEMENT C. CLAY, JR.
United States Senator, 1853–61
]
“Born and educated as we are at the North, sensible men at the South
cannot wonder at the views we entertain, nor do sensible men at the
North think it strange that, born and educated as the Southerner is, he
should feel very differently from the Northerner in some things; but why
should not all these difficulties sink before our common love for our
common country?”
Why, indeed! Yet the cry of “disunion” had been heard for forty
years[19] and still our Southern men had forborne, until the party
belligerents, whose encroachments had now, at last, become unbearable,
had begun to look upon our protests as it were a mere cry of “wolf.” Of
those crucial times, and of that dramatic scene in the United States
Senate, no Southern pen has written in permanent words; and such
Northern historians as Messrs. Nicolay and Hay elide, as if their
purpose were to obscure, the deliberate and public withdrawal of those
representatives, our martyrs to their convictions, their institutions
and their children’s heritages; and would so bury them under the
sweeping charges of “conspiracy” and “treason” that the casual reader of
the future is not likely to realise with what candour to their
opponents, with what dignity to themselves, out of what loyalty to their
States, and yet again with what grief for the nation and sacrifice of
life-time associations, the various seceding Senators went out at last
from that august body!
For months the struggle of decades had been swiftly approximating to its
bloody culmination. Our physical prosperity, no less than the social
security we enjoyed, had caused us to become objects of envy to the
rough elements in the new settlements, especially of the Northwest.[20]
So inimical was the North to us that though the South was the treasury
of the nation; though she had contributed from her territory the very
land upon which the Federal City was built; though her sons ranked among
the most brilliant of whom the young Republic could boast—it was
impossible for the South to get an appropriation of even a few hundred
thousand dollars, to provide for the building of a lighthouse on that
most dangerous portion of the Atlantic coast, the shore of North
Carolina!
An era of discovery and expansion preceded the outbreak of the war. By
means of costly embassies to the Eastern countries, new avenues of
commerce had been opened. The acquisition of Cuba and of the Mexican
States became an ambition on the part of Mr. Buchanan, who was anxious
to repeat during his Administration the successes of his predecessors,
Presidents Fillmore and Pierce. So long ago as ’5, the question of the
purchase of the island of St. Thomas from the Danish Government was a
subject that called for earnest diplomacy on the part of Mr. Raasloff,
the Danish Minister; and the gold fever which made Northern adventurers
mad carried many to rifle the distant Pacific coast of its treasures. By
this time the cotton gin had demonstrated its great worth, and the greed
of acquisition saw in our cotton fields a new source of envy, for we had
no need to dig or to delve—we shook our cotton plants and golden dollars
dropped from them. Had the gathering of riches been our object in life,
men of the South had it in their power to have rivalled the wealth of
the fabled Midas; but, as was early observed by a statesman who never
was partisan, the “Southern statesmen went for the honours and the
Northern for the benefits.” In consequence, wrote Mr. Benton (1839),
“the North has become rich upon the benefits of the Government; the
South has grown lean upon its honours.”
From the hour of this exodus of Senators from the official body, all
Washington seemed to change. Imagination can scarcely conjure up an
atmosphere at once so ominous and so sad. Each step preparatory to our
departure was a pang. Carriages and messengers dashed through the
streets excitedly. Farewells were to be spoken, and many, we knew, would
be final. Vehicles lumbered on their way to wharf or station filled with
the baggage of departing Senators and Members. The brows of
hotel-keepers darkened with misgivings, for the disappearance from the
Federal City of the families of Congressional representatives from the
fifteen slave-holding States made a terrible thinning out of its
population; and, in the strange persons of the politicians, already
beginning to press into the capital, there was little indication that
these might prove satisfactory substitutes for us who were withdrawing.
“How shall I commence my letter to you?” wrote the wife of Colonel
Philip Phillips to me a month or two after we had left Washington. “What
can I tell you, but of despair, of broken hearts, of ruined fortunes,
the sobs of women, and sighs of men!... I am still in this _horrible
city_ ... but, distracted as I am at the idea of being forced to remain,
we feel the hard necessity of keeping quiet.... For days I saw nothing
but despairing women leaving [Washington] suddenly, their husbands
having resigned and sacrificed their all for their beloved States. You
would not know this God-forsaken city, our beautiful capital, with all
its artistic wealth, desecrated, disgraced with Lincoln’s low soldiery.
The respectable part [of the soldiers] view it also in the same spirit,
for one of the Seventh Regiment told me that never in his life had he
seen such ruin going on as is now enacted in the halls of our once
honoured Capitol! I cannot but think that the presentiment that the
South would wish to keep Washington must have induced this desecration
of all that should have been respected by the mob in power.... The Gwins
are the only ones left of our intimates, and Mrs. G—— is packed up ready
to leave. Poor thing! her eyes are never without tears.... There are
30,000 troops here. Think of it! They go about the avenue insulting
women and taking property without paying for it.... Such are the men
waged to subjugate us of the South.... We hear constantly from
Montgomery. Everything betokens a deep, abiding faith in the cause.
“I was told that those _giant_ intellects, the Blairs, who are acting
under the idea of being second Jacksons, wishing to get a good officer
to do some of their dirty work (destroying public property), wished
Colonel Lee sent for. ‘Why, he has resigned!’ ‘Then tell Magruder!’ ‘He
has resigned, too.’ ‘General Joe Johnston, then!’—‘He, too, has gone
out!’ ‘Smith Lee?’ Ditto!
“‘Good God!’ said Blair. ‘Have all our good officers left us?’
“I hear these Blairs are at the bottom of all this war policy. Old
Blair’s country place was threatened, and his family, including the
fanatical Mrs. Lee, had to fly into the city. This lady was the one who
said to me that ‘she wished the North to be deluged with the blood of
the South ere Lincoln should yield one iota!’
“Do not believe all you hear about the Northern sympathy for Lincoln.
The Democrats still feel for the South. If Congress does not denounce
Lincoln for his unlawful and unconstitutional proceedings, I shall begin
to think we have no country!”