MR. BUCHANAN'S TRUCE
[Sidenote] 1860.
The concession yielded by Mr. Buchanan, instead of tending to
conciliate the conspirators only brought upon him additional demands.
It so happened that the principal Federal ships of war were absent
from the harbors of the Atlantic coast on service in distant waters.
But now, as a piece of good fortune amid many untoward occurrences,
the steam sloop-of-war _Brooklyn_, a new and formidable vessel of
twenty-five guns, which had been engaged in making preliminary surveys
in the Chiriqui Lagoon to test the practicability of one of the
proposed interoceanic ship canals, unexpectedly returned to the Norfolk
navy yard on the 28th of November, less than a week before the meeting
of Congress. She had until recently been under the command of Captain
Farragut, afterwards famous in the war of the rebellion, and was, with
trifling exceptions, ready for sea.
In the Cabinet, where the feasibility of collecting the customs revenue
at Charleston on shipboard had already been discussed as a possible
contingency, and especially where the forcible protection of the public
property had also received serious consideration, this sudden
appearance of the _Brooklyn_ must have furnished a conclusive reason in
favor of both these propositions. Be this as it may, when the President
affirmed these duties in his message, the conspirators realized that he
held the means of practical enforcement at instantaneous command. With
a ship of war ready at Norfolk, with troops at Fortress Monroe, might
not a careless _émeute_ at Charleston bring the much-dreaded
reënforcements to Moultrie, Sumter, and Pinckney, precipitate a
_dénouement_, and prematurely ruin all their well-concocted schemes?
There was urgent need to prevent the sailing of the steamer on such an
errand.
[Sidenote] Buchanan to Burnwell, Adams, and Orr, Dec. 31, 1860. W.R.
Vol. I., p. 116.
On Saturday, December 8, four of the Representatives in Congress from
South Carolina requested an interview of President Buchanan, which he
granted them, in which they rehearsed their well-studied prediction of
a collision at Charleston. One of their number has related the
substance of their address with graphic frankness:
[Sidenote] Hon. Wm. Porcher Miles, Statement before the South
Carolina Convention, "Annual Cyclopedia," 1861, pp. 649-50.
"Mr. President, it is our solemn conviction that if you attempt
to send a solitary soldier to these forts, the instant the
intelligence reaches our people (and we shall take care that it
does reach them, for we have sources of information in Washington
so that no orders for troops can be issued without our getting
information) these forts will be forcibly and immediately
stormed.
"We all assured him that if an attempt was made to transport
reënforcements, our people would take these forts, and that we
would go home and help them to do it; for it would be suicidal
folly for us to allow the forts to be manned. And we further said
to him that a bloody result would follow the sending of troops to
those forts, and that we did not believe that the authorities of
South Carolina would do anything prior to the meeting of this
convention, and that we hoped and believed that nothing would be
done after this body met until we had demanded of the general
Government the recession of these forts."
Here was an avowal to the President himself, not only of treason at
Charleston, but of conspiracy in the Executive departments at
Washington; a demand coupled with a menace; a proposal for a ten days'
truce supplemented by a declaration of intention to proceed to
extremities after its expiration. Instead of meeting these with a
stern rebuke and dismissal, the President cowered and yielded to their
demand. The sanctity of the Constitution, the majesty of the law, the
power of the nation, the patriotism of the people, all faded from his
bewildered vision; his irresolute will shrank from his declared
purpose to protect the public property and enforce the revenue laws.
He saw only the picture of strife and bloodshed which the glib tongues
of his persecutors conjured up, and failed to detect the theatric
purpose for which it was employed.
[Sidenote] Buchanan to Commissioners, Dec. 31, 1860. W.R. Vol. I.,
p. 117.
He hastened to assure his visitors that it was his determination "not
to reënforce the forts in the harbor, and thus produce a collision,
until they had been actually attacked," or until he had "certain
evidence that they were about to be attacked." Though this was only
another concession, much like the first in outward semblance, it was
nevertheless in its vital essence a fatal hurt to the rapidly
shrinking Federal authority. The conspiracy had won the choice of
position; when the combat should come it was in the attitude necessary
to deal the first blow.
[Illustration: LEWIS CASS.]
The main point secured, there was an exhibition of abundant diplomatic
politeness between the parties. The President suggested that "for
prudential reasons" it would be best to put in writing what they had
said to him verbally. This they readily promised, and on Monday, the
10th, gave him, duly signed by five of the South Carolina
Representatives, this important paper:
[Sidenote] W.R. Vol. I., p. 116.
WASHINGTON, December 9, 1860.
In compliance with our statement to you yesterday, we now express
to you our strong convictions that neither the constituted
authorities nor any body of the people of the State of South
Carolina will either attack or molest the United States forts in
the harbor of Charleston previously to the action of the
convention, and we hope and believe not until an offer has been
made through an accredited representative to negotiate for an
amicable arrangement of all matters between the State and Federal
Government, provided that no reënforcements shall be sent into
those forts, and their relative military status shall remain as
at present.
[Sidenote] Buchanan to Commissioners, Dec. 31, 1860. Ibid.
When President Buchanan came to look at the explicit language of this
document, he shrank from the definite programme to which it committed
him. "I objected to the word 'provided,' as it might be construed into
an agreement on my part which I never would make. They said nothing
was further from their intention; they did not so understand it, and I
should not so consider it." There followed mutual protestations that
the whole transaction was voluntary, informal, and in the nature of a
mediation; that neither party possessed any delegated authority or
binding power. They were not frank enough to explain to one another
that the true object of each was delay--of the President, "that time
might be gained for reflection"; of the Members, that time might be
gained for the unmolested meeting of the convention, for passing the
ordinance of secession, for further organizing public sentiment, and
pushing forward military preparations at Charleston.
[Sidenote] Buchanan to Commissioners, Dec. 31, 1860. W.R. Vol. I.,
p. 117.
The mask of official propriety worn over this pernicious intrigue, the
disclaimers, the implications and mental reservations of which it was
made up--all became absurd in view of the results it produced. The
President, indeed, explains that it was no pledge or agreement. "But I
acted," he naïvely admits, "in the same manner as I would have, done
had I entered into a positive and formal agreement with parties
capable of contracting, although such an agreement would have been, on
my part, from the nature of my official duties, impossible. The world
knows that I have never sent any reënforcements to the forts in
Charleston harbor, and I have certainly never authorized any change to
be made in their 'relative military status.'"
While the conspirators were thus taking effectual steps to bind the
future acts of the Executive in respect to the forts in Charleston
harbor, and to make sure that the rising insurrection in South
Carolina should not be crippled or destroyed by any surprise or sudden
movement emanating from Washington, they were not less watchful to
counteract and prevent any possible hostile movement against them on
the part of Major Anderson and his handful of officers and troops in
Fort Moultrie, undertaken on his own discretion. Their boast of secret
sources of information in Washington, coupled with subsequent events,
furnish presumptive evidence that Mr. Floyd, Secretary of War, though
yet openly opposing disunion, was already in their confidence and
councils, and was lending them such active coõperation as might be
disguised or perhaps still excused to his own conscience as tending to
avert collision and bloodshed.
Shortly before, or about the time of the truce we have described,
Secretary Floyd sent an officer of the War Department to Fort Moultrie
with special verbal instructions to Major Anderson, which were duly
communicated, and the substance of them reduced to writing and
delivered to that officer on the 11th of December, the day following
the conclusion of the President's unofficial truce at Washington. The
importance of this document renders it worthy of reproduction in
complete form.
Memorandum of verbal instructions to Major Anderson, 1st
Artillery, commanding at Fort Moultrie, South Carolina:
You are aware of the great anxiety of the Secretary of War that
a collision of the troops with the people of this State shall
be avoided, and of his studied determination to pursue a course
with reference to the military force and forts in this harbor
which shall guard against such a collision. He has, therefore,
carefully abstained from increasing the force at this point, or
taking any measures which might add to the present excited state
of the public mind, or which would throw any doubt on the
confidence he feels that South Carolina will not attempt by
violence to obtain possession of the public works or interfere
with their occupancy. But as the counsel and acts of rash and
impulsive persons may possibly disappoint these expectations of
the Government, he deems it proper that you shall be prepared
with instructions to meet so unhappy a contingency. He has,
therefore, directed me verbally to give you such instructions.
[Sidenote] Buchanan to Commissioners, Dec. 31, 1860. W.R. Vol. I.,
p. 117.
You are carefully to avoid every act which would needlessly tend
to provoke aggression, and for that reason you are not, without
evident and imminent necessity, to take up any position which
could be construed into the assumption of a hostile attitude. But
you are to hold possession of the forts in this harbor, and if
attacked you are to defend yourself to the last extremity. The
smallness of your force will not permit you, perhaps, to occupy
more than one of the three forts, but an attack on or attempt to
take possession of either one of them will be regarded as an act
of hostility, and you may then put your command into either of
them which you may deem most proper, to increase its power of
resistance. You are also authorized to take similar defensive
steps whenever you have tangible evidence of a design to proceed
to a hostile act.
D.C. BUELL, Assistant Adjutant-General.
FORT MOULTRIE, S.C., December 11, 1860.
This is in conformity to my instructions to Major Buell.
JOHN B. FLOYD, Secretary of War.
[Sidenote] Doubleday, "Forts Sumter and Moultrie," p. 51.
Upon mere superficial inspection these instructions disclosed only the
then dominant anxiety of the Administration to prevent collision. But
if we remember that they were sent to Major Anderson without the
President's knowledge, and without the knowledge of General Scott,[1]
and especially if we keep in sight the state of public sentiment of
both Charleston and Washington and the paramount official influences
which had taken definite shape in the President's truce, we can easily
read between the lines that they were most artfully contrived to lull
suspicion while effectually restraining Major Anderson from any act or
movement which might check or control the insurrectionary preparations.
He must do nothing to provoke aggression; he must take no hostile
attitude without evident and imminent necessity; he must not move his
troops into Fort Sumter, unless it were attempted to attack or take
possession of one of the forts or such a design were tangibly
manifested. Practically, when the attempt to seize the vacant forts
might come it would be too late to prevent it, and certainly too late
to move his own force into either of them. Practically, too, any
serious design of that nature would never be permitted to come to his
knowledge. Supplement these literal negations and restrictions by the
unrecorded verbal explanations and comments said to have been made by
Major Buell, by his disapproval of the meager defensive preparations
which had been made, such as his declaration that a few loop-holes
"would have a tendency to irritate the people," and we can readily
imagine how a faithful officer, whose reiterated calls for help had
been refused, felt, that under such instructions, such surroundings,
and such neglect "his hands were tied," and that he and his little
command were a foredoomed sacrifice.[2]
----------
[1] "The President has listened to him [General Scott] with due
friendliness and respect, but the War Department has been little
communicative. Up to this time he has not been shown the written
instructions of Major Anderson, nor been informed of the purport of
those more recently conveyed to Fort Moultrie verbally by Major
Buell."--Gen. Scott (by G.W. Lay) to Twiggs, Dec. 28, 1860. W.R. Vol.
I., p. 580.
[2] In a Senate speech, January 10, 1861, "Globe," page 307, Jefferson
Davis, commenting on these orders, while admitting that they empowered
Major Anderson to go from one post to another, said, "Though his
orders were not so designed, as I am assured."