It is one thing to be elected President of the United States,--that
means triumph, honor, power: it is quite another thing to perform the
duties of President,--for that means labor, disappointment, difficulty,
even danger. Many a man envied Abraham Lincoln when, in the stately pomp
of inauguration and with the plaudits of the spectators ringing about
him, he took the oath of office which for four years transforms an
American citizen into the ruler of these United States. Such envy would
have been changed to deepest sympathy if they could have known what lay
before him. After the music and cannon were dumb, after the flags were
all furled and the cheering crowds had vanished, the shadows of war fell
about the Executive Mansion, and its new occupant remained face to face
with his heavy task--a task which, as he had truly said in his speech at
Springfield, was greater than that which rested upon Washington.
Then, as never before, he must have realized the peril of the nation,
with its credit gone, its laws defied, its flag insulted. The South
had carried out its threat, and seven million Americans were in revolt
against the idea that "all men are created equal," while twenty million
other Americans were bent upon defending that idea. For the moment both
sides had paused to see how the new President would treat this attempt
at secession. It must be constantly borne in mind that the rebellion in
the Southern States with which Mr. Lincoln had to deal was not a sudden
revolution, but a conspiracy of slow growth and long planning. As one
of its actors frankly admitted, it was "not an event of a day. It is not
anything produced by Mr. Lincoln's election.... It is a matter which has
been gathering head for thirty years." Its main object, it must also
be remembered, was the spread of slavery. Alexander H. Stephens, in
a speech made shortly after he became the Confederate Vice-President,
openly proclaimed slavery to be the "corner-stone" of the new
government. For years it had been the dream of southern leaders to
make the Ohio River the northern boundary of a great slave empire, with
everything lying to the south of that, even the countries of South and
Central America, as parts of their system. Though this dream was never
to be realized, the Confederacy finally came to number eleven States
(Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, South Carolina, North Carolina,
Florida, Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia), and to cover
a territory of more than 750,000 square miles--larger than England,
Scotland, Ireland, France, Spain, Germany and Switzerland put together,
with a coast line 3,500 miles long, and a land frontier of over 7,000
miles.
President Buchanan's timidity and want of spirit had alone made this
great rebellion possible, for although it had been "gathering head for
thirty years" it was only within the last few months that it had come to
acts of open treason and rebellion. President Buchanan had opportunity
and ample power to crush it when the conspirators first began to show
their hands. Instead he wavered, and delayed, while they grew bold
under his lack of decision, imagining that they would have a bloodless
victory, and even boasting that they would take Washington for their
capital; or, if the new President should thwart them and make them
fight, that they would capture Philadelphia and dictate the peace they
wanted from Independence Hall.
By the time Mr. Lincoln came into office the conspiracy had grown beyond
control by any means then in the hands of a President, though men on
both sides still vainly hoped that the troubles of the country might
be settled without fighting. Mr. Lincoln especially wished to make very
sure that if it ever came to a matter of war, the fault should not lie
with the North.
In his inaugural address he had told the South that he would use the
power confided to him to hold and occupy the places belonging to the
Government, and to collect the taxes; but beyond what might be necessary
for these objects, he would not use force among the people anywhere. His
peaceful policy was already harder to follow than he realized. Before
he had been President twenty-four hours word came from Major Anderson,
still defying the conspirators from Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor,
that his little garrison was short of food, and must speedily surrender
unless help reached them. The rebels had for weeks been building
batteries to attack the fort, and with Anderson's report came the
written opinions of his officers that it would require an army of 20,000
men to relieve it. They might as well have asked for twenty thousand
archangels, for at that time the entire army of the United States
numbered but 17,113 men, and these were doing duty, not only in the
Southern and Eastern States, but were protecting settlers from Indians
on the great western frontier, and guarding the long Canadian and
Mexican boundaries as well. Yet Anderson and his men could not be left
to their fate without even an attempt to help them, though some of the
high military and naval officers hastily called into council by the
new President advised this course. It was finally decided to notify the
Confederates that a ship carrying food, but no soldiers, would be sent
to his relief. If they chose to fire upon that it would be plainly the
South, and not the North, that began the war.
Days went on, and by the middle of April the Confederate government
found itself forced to a fatal choice. Either it must begin war, or
allow the rebellion to collapse. All its claims to independence were
denied; the commissioner it sent to Washington on the pretense that they
were agents of a foreign country were politely refused a hearing, yet
not one angry word, or provoking threat, or a single harmful act had
come from the "Black Republican" President. In his inaugural he had
promised the people of the South peace and protection, and offered them
the benefit of the mails. Even now, all he proposed to do was to send
bread to Anderson and his hungry soldiers. His prudent policy placed
them where, as he had told them, they could have no war unless they
themselves chose to begin it.
They did choose to begin it. The rebellion was the work of ambitious
men, who had no mind to stop at that late day and see their labor go for
nothing. The officer in charge of their batteries was ordered to open
fire on Fort Sumter if Anderson refused to surrender; and in the dim
light of dawn on April 12, 1861, just as the outline of Fort Sumter
began to show itself against a brightening sky, the shot that opened the
Civil War rose from a rebel battery and made its slow and graceful curve
upon Sumter. Soon all the batteries were in action, and the fort was
replying with a will. Anderson held out for a day and a half, until his
cartridges were all used up, his flagstaff had been shot away, and the
wooden buildings inside the fort were on fire. Then, as the ships with
supplies had not yet arrived, and he had neither food nor ammunition, he
was forced to surrender.
The news of the firing upon Fort Sumter changed the mood of the country
as if by magic. By deliberate act of the Confederate government its
attempt at peaceable secession had been changed to active war. The
Confederates gained Fort Sumter, but in doing so they roused the
patriotism of the North to a firm resolve that this insult to the flag
should be redressed, and that the unrighteous experiment of a rival
government founded upon slavery as its "cornerstone," should never
succeed. In one of his speeches on the journey to Washington Mr. Lincoln
had said that devoted as he was to peace, it might become necessary to
"put the foot down firmly." That time had now come. On April 15, the day
after the fall of Fort Sumter, all the newspapers of the country printed
the President's call to arms, ordering out 75,000 militia for three
months, and directing Congress to meet in special session on July 4,
1861. The North rallied instantly to the support of the Government, and
offered him twice the number of soldiers he asked for.
Nothing more clearly shows the difference between President Lincoln and
President Buchanan than the way in which the two men met the acts of the
Southern Rebellion. President Buchanan temporized and delayed when he
had plenty of power. President Lincoln, without a moment's hesitation
accepted the great and unusual responsibility thrust upon him, and at
once issued orders for buying ships, moving troops, advancing money
to Committees of Safety, and for other military and naval measures for
which at the moment he had no express authority from Congress. As soon
as Congress came together on July 4, he sent a message explaining his
action, saying: "It became necessary for me to choose whether, using
only the existing means.... which Congress had provided, I should let
the Government fall at once into ruin, or whether availing myself of the
broader powers conferred by the Constitution in cases of insurrection,
I would make an effort to save it with all its blessings for the present
age and for posterity." Congress, it is needless to say, not only
approved all that he had done, but gave him practically unlimited powers
for dealing with the rebellion in future.
It soon became evident that no matter how ready and willing to fight for
their country the 75,000 volunteers might be, they could not hope to put
down the rebellion, because the time for which they had enlisted would
be almost over before they could receive the training necessary to
change them from valiant citizens into good soldiers. Another call was
therefore issued, this time for men to serve three years or during the
war, and also for a large number of sailors to man the new ships that
the Government was straining every nerve to buy, build and otherwise
make ready.
More important, however, than soldiers trained or untrained, was the
united will of the people of the North; and most important of all the
steadfast and courageous soul of the man called to direct the struggle.
Abraham Lincoln, the poor frontier boy, the struggling young lawyer, the
Illinois politician, whom many, even among the Republicans who voted to
elect him President, thought scarcely fit to hold a much smaller
office, proved beyond question the man for the task gifted above all
his associates with wisdom and strength to meet the great emergencies as
they arose during the four years' war that had already begun.
Since this is the story of Mr. Lincoln's life, and not of the Civil
War, we cannot attempt to follow the history of the long contest as
it unfolded itself day by day and month by month, or even to stop to
recount a list of the great battles that drenched the land in blood. It
was a mighty struggle, fought by men of the same race and kindred, often
by brother against brother. Each fought for what he felt to be right;
and their common inheritance of courage and iron will, of endurance and
splendid bravery and stubborn pluck, made this battle of brothers the
more bitter as it was the more prolonged. It ranged over an immense
extent of country; but because Washington was the capital of the Union,
and Richmond, Virginia, the capital of the Confederacy, and the desire
of each side was to capture the chief city of the other, the principal
fighting ground, during the whole war, lay between these two towns, with
the Alleghany Mountains on the west, and Chesapeake Bay on the east.
Between the Alleghanies and the Mississippi River another field of
warfare developed itself, on which some of the hardest battles were
fought, and the greatest victories won. Beyond the Mississippi again
stretched another great field, bounded only by the Rocky Mountains and
the Rio Grande. But the principal fighting in this field was near or
even on the Mississippi, in the efforts made by both Unionists and
Confederates to keep and hold the great highway of the river, so
necessary for trade in time of peace, and for moving armies in time of
war.
On this immense battle-ground was fought one of the most costly wars
of modern times, with soldiers numbering a million men on each side; in
which, counting battles and skirmishes small and great, an average of
two engagements a day were fought for four long years, two millions of
money were used up every twenty-four hours, and during which the unholy
prize of slavery, for which the Confederate States did battle, was
completely swept away.
Though the tide of battle ebbed and flowed, defeat and victory may be
said to have been nearly evenly divided. Generally speaking, success was
more often on the side of the South during the first half of the war;
with the North, during the latter half. The armies were equally brave;
the North had the greater territory from which to draw supplies; and the
end came, not when one side had beaten the other, man for man, but
when the South had been drained of fighting men and food and guns, and
slavery had perished in the stress of war.
Fortunately for all, nobody at the beginning dreamed of the length of
the struggle. Even Lincoln's stout heart would have been dismayed if he
could have foreseen all that lay before him. The task that he could
see was hard and perplexing enough. Everything in Washington was in
confusion. No President ever had such an increase of official work as
Lincoln during the early months of his administration. The halls and
ante-rooms of the Executive Mansion were literally crowded with people
seeking appointment to office; and the new appointments that were
absolutely necessary were not half finished when the firing on Fort
Sumter began active war. This added to the difficulty of sifting the
loyal from the disloyal, and the yet more pressing labor of organizing
an immense new army.
Hundreds of clerks employed in the Government Departments left their
desks and hurried South, crippling the service just at the time when
the sudden increase of work made their presence doubly needed. A large
proportion of the officers of the Army and Navy, perhaps as many as
one-third, gave their skill and services to the Confederacy, feeling
that their allegiance was due to their State or section rather than to
the general government. Prominent among these was Robert E. Lee, who had
been made a colonel by Lincoln, and whom General Scott had recommended
as the most promising officer to command the new force of 75,000 men
called out by the President's proclamation. He chose instead to resign
and cast his fortunes with the South, where he became the head of
all the Confederate armies. The loss to the Union and gain to the
Confederate cause by his action is hard to measure, since in him the
Southern armies found a commander whose surpassing courage and skill
inspired its soldiers long after all hope of success was gone. Cases
such as this gave the President more anxiety than all else. It seemed
impossible to know whom to trust. An officer might come to him in the
morning protesting devotion to the Union, and by night be gone to the
South. Mr. Lincoln used to say at this time that he felt like a man
letting rooms at one end of his house while the other end was on fire.
The situation grew steadily worse. Maryland refused to allow United
States soldiers to cross her territory, and the first attempt to bring
troops through Baltimore from the North ended in a bloody riot, and the
burning of railroad bridges to prevent help from reaching Washington.
For three days Washington was entirely cut off from the North, either by
telegraph or mail. General Scott hastily prepared the city for a siege,
taking possession of all the large supplies of flour and provisions
in town, and causing the Capitol and other public buildings to be
barricaded. Though President Lincoln did not doubt the final arrival
of help, he, like everyone else, was very anxious, and found it hard
to understand the long delay. He knew that troops had started from the
North. Why did they not arrive? They might not be able to go through
Baltimore, but they could certainly go around it. The distance was not
great. What if twenty miles of railroad had been destroyed, were the
soldiers unable to march? Always calm and self-controlled, he gave no
sign in the presence of others of the anxiety that weighed so heavily
upon him. Very likely the visitors who saw him during those days thought
that he hardly realized the plight of the city; yet an inmate of the
White House, passing through the President's office when the day's work
was done and he imagined himself alone, saw him pause in his absorbed
walk up and down the floor, and gaze long out of the window in
the direction from which the troops were expected to appear. Then,
unconscious of any hearer, and as if the words were wrung from him by
anguish, he exclaimed, "Why don't they come, why don't they come?"
The New York Seventh Regiment was the first to "come." By a roundabout
route it reached Washington on the morning of April 25, and, weary
and travel-worn, but with banners flying and music playing, marched up
Pennsylvania Avenue to the big white Executive Mansion, bringing cheer
to the President and renewed courage to those timid citizens whose
fright during this time had almost paralyzed the life of the town.
Taking renewed courage they once more opened their houses and the shops
that had been closed since the beginning of the blockade, and business
began anew.
The greater part of the three months' regiments had been ordered to
Washington, and the outskirts of the capital soon became a busy military
camp. The great Departments of the Government, especially of War and
Navy, could not immediately handle the details of all this sudden
increase of work. Men were volunteering rapidly enough, but there was
sore need of rations to feed them, money to pay them, tents to shelter
them, uniforms to clothe them, rifles to arm them, officers to drill
them, and of transportation to carry them to the camps of instruction
where they must receive their training and await further orders. In this
carnival of patriotism and hurly-burly of organization the weaknesses as
well as the virtues of human nature quickly showed themselves; and, as
if the new President had not already enough to distress and harass his
mind, almost every case of confusion and delay was brought to him for
complaint and correction. On him also fell the delicate and serious task
of deciding hundreds of novel questions as to what he and his cabinet
ministers had and had not the right to do under the Constitution.
The month of May slipped away in all these preparatory vexations; but
the great machine of war, once started, moved on as it always does, from
arming to massing of troops, and from that to skirmish and battle.
In June small fights began to occur between the Union and Confederate
armies. The first large battle of the war took place at Bull Run, about
thirty-two miles southwest of Washington, on July 21, 1861. It ended in
a victory for the Confederates, though their army was so badly crippled
by. its losses that it made no further forward movement during the whole
of the next autumn and winter.
The shock of this defeat was deep and painful to the people of the
North, not yet schooled to patience, or to the uncertainties of war.
For weeks the newspapers, confident of success, had been clamoring for
action, and the cry, "Forward to Richmond," had been heard on every
hand. At first the people would not believe the story of a defeat; but
it was only too true. By night the beaten Union troops were pouring
into the fortifications around Washington, and the next day a horde of
stragglers found their way across the bridges of the Potomac into the
city.
President Lincoln received the news quietly, as was his habit, without
any visible sign of distress or alarm, but he remained awake and in
his office all that Sunday night, listening to the excited tales of
congressmen and senators who, with undue curiosity, had followed the
army and witnessed some of the sights and sounds of battle; and by dawn
on Monday he had practically made up his mind as to the probable result
and what he must do in consequence.
The loss of the battle of Bull Run was a bitter disappointment to him.
He saw that the North was not to have the easy victory it anticipated;
and to him personally it brought a great and added care that never left
him during the war. Up to that time the North had stood by him as one
man in its eager resolve to put down the rebellion. From this time on,
though quite as determined, there was division and disagreement among
the people as to how this could best be done. Parties formed themselves
for or against this or that general, or in favor of this or that method
and no other of carrying on the war. In other words, the President and
his "administration"--the cabinet and other officers under him--became,
from this time on, the target of criticism for all the failures of the
Union armies, and for all the accidents and mistakes and unforeseen
delays of war. The self-control that Mr. Lincoln had learned in the hard
school of his boyhood, and practised during all the long struggle of
his young manhood, had been severe and bitter training, but nothing else
could have prepared him for the great disappointments and trials of
the crowning years of his life. He had learned to endure patiently, to
reason calmly, never to be unduly sure of his own opinion; but, having
taken counsel of the best advice at his command, to continue in the path
that he felt to be right, regardless of criticism or unjust abuse. He
had daily and hourly to do all this. He was strong and courageous, with
a steadfast belief that the right would triumph in the end; but his
nature was at the same time sensitive and tender, and the sorrows and
pain of others hurt him more than did his own.