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had got into the rebel army, and had been captured by our troops and imprisoned. He drew an affidavit setting forth what he knew about the man, particularly mentioning extenuating circumstances which seemed to entitle him to the generosity or leniency of the government. General Creswell found the President very happy. The Confederacy had collapsed. The scene at Appomattox had just been enacted. He was greeted with: "Creswell, old fellow, everything is bright this morning. The war is over. It has been a tough time, but we have lived it out,—or some of us have," and he dropped his voice a little on the last clause of the sentence. "But it is over; we are going to have good times now, and a united country."
After a time, General Creswell told his story, read his affidavit, and said, "I know the man has acted like a fool, but he is my friend, and a good fellow; let him out, give him to me, and I will be responsible that he won't have anything more to do with the rebs."
"Creswell," said Mr. Lincoln, "you make me think of a lot of young folks who once started out Maying. To reach their destination, they had to cross a shallow stream, and did so by means of an old flatboat. When the time came to return, they found to their dismay that the old scow had disappeared. They were in sore trouble, and thought over all manner of devices for getting over the water, but without avail. After a time, one of the boys proposed that each fellow should pick up the girl he liked best and wade over with her. The
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masterly proposition was carried out, until all that were left upon the island was a little short chap and a great, long, gothic-built, elderly lady. Now, Creswell, you are trying to leave me in the same predicament. You fellows are all getting your own friends out of this scrape; and you will succeed in carrying off one after another, until nobody but Jeff Davis and myself will be left on the island, and then I won't know what to do. How should I feel? How should I look, lugging him over? I guess the way to avoid such an embarrassing situation is to let them all out at once."
A somewhat similar illustration he made at an informal Cabinet meeting, at which was being discussed the disposition of Jefferson Davis and other prominent Confederates. Each member of the Cabinet gave his opinion; most of them were for hanging the traitors, or for some severe punishment. Lincoln said nothing. Finally, Joshua F. Speed, his old and confidential friend, who had been invited to the meeting, said, "I have heard the opinion of your Ministers, and would like to hear yours."
"Well, Josh," replied Mr. Lincoln, "when I was a boy in Indiana, I went to a neighbor's house one morning and found a boy of my own size holding a coon by a string. I asked him what he had and what he was doing. He says, 'It's a coon. Dad cotched six last night, and killed all but this poor little cuss. Dad told me to hold him until he came back, and I'm afraid he's going to kill this one too; and oh, Abe, I do wish he
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would get away!' 'Well, why don't you let him loose?' 'That wouldn't be right; and if I let him go, Dad would give me hell. But if he would get away himself, it would be all right.' Now," said Mr. Lincoln, "if Jeff Davis and those other fellows will only get away, it will be all right. But if we should catch them, and I should let them go, 'Dad would give me hell.'"
The President of the Southern Confederacy was, however, afterwards captured and imprisoned at Fortress Monroe, charged with treason, etc., and at length admitted to bail,—Mr. Horace Greeley, the great Radical journalist, becoming one of his bondsmen.
Mr. Davis was never brought to trial, and eventually the charges against him were ignored. He was a prisoner of State at Fortress Monroe for two years; in the year 1867 he was released on bail, went to Canada, but subsequently returned to the State of Mississippi, where he lived in retirement until his death.
On the night of the 3d of March, 1865, Mr. Lincoln, with several members of his Cabinet, was in attendance at the Capitol, awaiting the final passage of bills by Congress, in order that they might receive the Presidential signature. In the intervals between the reading, considering, and approving of these bills, the military situation was freely discussed. Every one appeared to be happy at the prospect of the early re-establishment of peace, General Grant having just telegraphed a glowing account of his successes and his control of the situation, and expressing the hope that a very few days would find
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Richmond in the hands of the national forces and the army of General Lee disbanded or captured. While the members were felicitating one another on the approaching cessation of hostilities, a second dispatch from General Grant was handed to Mr. Stanton, who, having read it, handed it to the President and became absorbed in thought. The telegram advised the Secretary of the receipt of a letter from General Lee, requesting an immediate interview, with a view to the re-establishment of peace between the two sections. The dispatch having been read by others of the party, Mr. Lincoln's spirits rose to a height rarely witnessed since the outbreak of the war. All the better and kindlier impulses of his nature were aroused. The cry, "What is to be done with the rebels when this cruel war is over?" ceased to ring in his ears. He was unable to restrain himself from giving expression to the natural impulses of his heart, or from foreshadowing the magnanimity with which the Confederates were now to be treated. He did not hesitate to express himself as favorably disposed towards granting the most lenient and generous terms to a defeated foe.
Mr. Stanton could now no longer restrain himself; he was in a towering rage, and turning to the President, his eyes flashing fire, he exclaimed: "Mr. President, you are losing sight of the paramount consideration at this juncture, namely, how and by whom is this war to be closed? To-morrow is Inauguration Day; you will then enter upon your second term of office. Read again this
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dispatch: don't you appreciate its significance? If you are not to be President of an obedient, loyal, and united people, you ought not to take the oath of office,—you are not a proper person to be empowered with so high and responsible a trust. Your work is already achieved,—all but reconstruction. If any other authority than your own be for a moment recognized; or if terms of peace be agreed upon that do not emanate from yourself, and do not imply that you are the supreme head of the nation,—you are not needed. You should not consent to act in the humiliating capacity of a mere figure-head, to aid in the acquisition of that fame for others which rightfully belongs to yourself. By thus doing, you will scandalize every true friend you possess in the country."
It was now Mr. Lincoln's turn to become thoughtful. He sat at the table for a few minutes, absorbed in deep reflection, and then, addressing himself to the Secretary of War, said: "Stanton, you are right; this dispatch did not, at first sight, strike me as I now consider it." Upon this he took pen and paper and hurriedly wrote the following dispatch, handing it to Stanton, and requesting him to date, sign, and send it at once. The dispatch ran as follows:—
"The President directs me to say to you that he wishes you to have no conference with General Lee, unless it be for the capitulation of Lee's army, or on some minor and purely military matter. He instructs me to say that you are not to decide, discuss, or confer on any political questions; the President, holding the decision of these questions in his own hands, will submit them to no military conference or convention.
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In the mean time you are to press, to the utmost of your ability, your military advantage."
The above dispatch was read, signed, and sent by Mr. Stanton immediately, without one word of comment, and soon afterward the entire party left the Capitol for their respective homes, there to await further developments. At the same time, the Secretary of War sent the following telegram to General Grant:—
Washington, March 3, 1865.
Lieutenant-General Grant, — I send you a telegram written by the President himself, in answer to yours of this evening, which I have signed by his order. I will add that General Ord's conduct in holding intercourse with General Longstreet upon political questions not committed to his charge, is not approved. The same thing was done, in one instance, by Major Keys, when the army was commanded by General McClellan, and he was sent to meet Howell Cobb on the subject of exchanges; and it was in that instance, as in this, disapproved. You will please, in future, instruct officers appointed to meet rebel officers to confine themselves to the matters specially committed to them.
(Signed) Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War.
On the succeeding day a dispatch was received from General Grant in cipher, of which the following is a translation:—
City Point, March 4, 1865.
Hon. E. M. Stanton, Secretary of War:
Your dispatch of the 3d, midnight, received. I have a letter to General Lee, copy of which will be sent you by to-morrow's mail. I can assure you that no act of the
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enemy will prevent me pressing all advantages gained to the utmost of my ability. Neither will I, under any circumstances, exceed my authority, or in any way embarrass the government. It was because I had no right to meet General Lee on the subject proposed by him, that I referred the matter for instructions.
U. S. Grant, Lieutenant-General.
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CHAPTER XVI.
CONFLICT BETWEEN CIVIL AND MILITARY AUTHORITY.
The execution of the Fugitive Slave Law in the District of Columbia became a question much discussed in Congress, and was a frightful scandal to the Radical members. The law remained in force; and no attempt was made by Congress to repeal it, or to provide for the protection of the Executive officers whose duty it was to enforce it.
The subject gave Mr. Lincoln great concern, but he could see no way out of the difficulty except to have the law executed. The District had become the asylum of the runaway slaves from the Border States, particularly from the rebel State of Virginia and the quasi-loyal State of Maryland. So far as the State of Virginia was concerned, she was still, according to the theory of the Administration, one of the United States; and all Congressional laws on the statute book were enforced in regard to her as well as to States not in rebellion, which made the question one of great embarrassment. The Confiscation Act, which gave liberty to all slaves that had been employed by the rebels for insurrectionary purposes, had gone into effect in the month of August, 1861. The military governor of the District assumed that by virtue of this law all
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slaves that came into the District from whatever section had been thus employed, and consequently were free, and it became his duty to give them military protection as free persons.
This state of things caused a fearful responsibility to rest upon the shoulders of the civil executive authorities. The President gave me private instructions to execute the laws until Congress modified or repealed them. "In doing this," Mr. Lincoln said, "you will receive much adverse criticism and a good deal of downright abuse from members of Congress. This is certain to come, but it will be not so much intended for you as for me; as our friend Senator Hale, the other day, said in the Senate, 'We must not strike too high nor too low, but we must strike between wind and water: the marshal is the man to hit.' And I say, we shall have to stand it whatever they send."
Martial law had not been declared; there was not even a temporary suspension of the civil authority, even in exceptional cases, in the District of Columbia. It was conceded by all, that in time of danger the temporary rule of military authority was virtually necessary to the preservation of the federal capital; but at this time there was no pretence of danger. The civil courts of the District being in full power for the adjudication of all cases arising within their jurisdiction, nothing but a pressing military necessity could give countenance or pretext for the suspension of the civil law. It was, therefore, only a question of time—and the time soon
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came—for a conflict to arise between civil and military authority.
The conflict grew out of an order of the military governor to take a female fugitive slave from the custody of the marshal and deliver her into the hands of the military. The deputies to whom the order was shown declined to obey the command, giving as a reason for their refusal that she was held under due process of law, and that they had no authority to give her up without the order of the court. Military officers, with a strong guard, then arrested the deputy marshals, seized the jail, released the slave, and left a military guard in charge of the captured jail.[L]
I was temporarily absent at the time of the seizure. When I returned I arrested the military guard, recaptured the jail, liberated the prisoners placed therein by the military, and held the military guard as prisoners. I was supported by the police and other civil authorities, and by the citizens of Washington; the military governor was supported by forces under his command,
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intended for the defence of the city. The matter was eventually laid before the President. He called to his aid his Attorney-General, who gave a prompt but decisive opinion that in the present state of things in the District of Columbia the civil authority outranked the military; and he gave the further opinion that the military governor's conduct had been misguided and unauthorized, however philanthropic might have been his purposes and intentions.
This decision on the subject of supremacy of authority by no means reconciled or put at rest the perturbed, aggressive spirit in Congress which opposed the President's policy. The enthusiastic adherents of this opposition made the District jail an objective point in the furtherance of their ends. They made personal visits to that institution, and examined all the inmates whose color was not of orthodox Albino-Anglo American tint. They would learn the story of their wrongs and injuries, then straightway proceed to the halls of Congress and make known their discoveries. Detectives were employed by them to make daily reports of the "cruelty" shown to colored inmates of the jail, which reports were soon dressed up in pathetic and classic language for the occasion. Professional and amateur demagogues made sensational speeches (sometimes written for them by department clerks and professional speech-writers), and "Rome was made to howl" in the halls of the American Congress. "Lincoln and his beastly negro catchers" were denounced in unmeasured terms.
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The jail was now by the necessities of its surroundings made the receptacle for prisoners of all kinds,—civil, military, and State. Orders from the War Department were issued to the custodian of the jail to allow no person whatever to communicate with the military or State prisoners without an order from the War Department. The chairman of the District Committee in the Senate, and certain others of that Committee, claimed the right, by virtue of their position, to go into the jail and to examine all the prisoners, in the face of the orders of the Secretary of War; and this was repeated almost daily.
The situation became unbearable, and I sent in my resignation. This, however, was not accepted. The professional opinion of the Attorney-General was again invoked by the President, and he gave his views as to the duties of the custodian of the heterogeneous mass of prisoners in the jail,—which resulted in the request of the President to the Attorney-General to prepare such an order as was proper for the marshal to sign, giving notice of what would be required for admission of visitors to the jail. The paper was prepared in the Attorney-General's office, signed and sent forth; and before the close of the day on which it was signed, resolutions were passed in Congress declaring the marshal guilty of contempt of that body for having presumed to issue what it deemed a contemptuous restriction of its rights, and a committee was appointed to wait upon the President to demand the instant dismissal of that insolent officer. The President showed the committee my resignation
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already in his hands, and informed them that he would neither accept the resignation nor dismiss me from office, and gave his reasons for this action.
After this the opposition became more and more acrimonious and offensive toward Mr. Lincoln and his Administration. The leaders of the opposition now resorted to every means in their power to oppose him for his want of respect, and for his disobedience to the behests of the co-ordinate branch of the government,—forgetting that, Congress having made the offensive laws, it was the President's duty to execute them.
Soon the marshal's office was made the subject of legislation in Congress, to shear it of its power and reduce its emoluments. The custody of the jail and prisoners was soon given to a warden; and, shortly after, an Act was passed relieving the marshal from the duties of attending the Supreme Court of the United States, and providing a special marshal for that Court,—thus leaving the office still one of great responsibility, but without remuneration commensurate with its duties.
Before the appointment of the warden, the District court had sentenced three men to be hanged for murder, on a day subsequent to the change of custody. On the day set for the execution, I refused to act as the hangman. Congress again passed a resolution denouncing my conduct, and instituted an investigation into the facts.
The facts were that the order of the court was that the marshal should hang the condemned men, but Congress had unconsciously relieved him from that painful
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duty! The warden had no order for their execution, and could not perform the service with any more propriety than the marshal. The result of this blundering legislation, superinduced by hasty, factious zeal to injure an object of their dislike, was that Congress had nullified the solemn acts of the United States District Court, and restored to life and liberty and immunity from punishment three miscreants whose lives had been forfeited and who should have been hanged!
This legislative jail-delivery was a source of great annoyance and of some amusement to Mr. Lincoln. In speaking of certain members of Congress and the part they had taken in this and other petty acts, he said: "I have great sympathy for these men, because of their temper and their weakness; but I am thankful that the good Lord has given to the vicious ox short horns, for if their physical courage were equal to their vicious dispositions, some of us in this neck of the woods would get hurt."
The opposition was continued to the last, and Mr. Lincoln adhered to his policy to the end. But he was so outraged by the obloquy thrown upon his worthiest official acts, so stung by the disparagement with which his purest and most patriotic motives were impugned,—his existence, in a word, was rendered so unhappy by the personal as well as political attacks of those for whose sympathy and support he might naturally have urged the most logical and valid plea,—that life became almost a burden to him.
As illustrative of the amenities of language with which,
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at this epoch of his life, the Chief Magistrate of our Republic was habitually characterized, it will suffice to adduce such an expression as this,—"That hideous baboon at the other end of the Avenue, whom Barnum should exhibit as a zoölogical curiosity." Mr. Lincoln's existence was so cruelly embittered by these and other expressions quite as virulent, that I have often heard him declare, "I would rather be dead than, as President, thus abused in the house of my friends."
In the summer of 1861, shortly after the inglorious repulse of the Union army at Bull Run, Rev. Robert Collyer, the eminent divine, was on a visit to the federal capital. Participating in the prevailing sentiment in regard to the incapacity or inefficiency of the general government in the conduct of military affairs, he chanced to pass through the White House grounds on his way to the War Department.
Casting a cursory glance at the Executive Mansion as he passed, his attention was suddenly arrested by the apparition of three pairs of feet, resting on the ledge of an open window, in one of the apartments of the second story, and plainly visible from below. The reverend gentleman paused, calmly surveyed the grotesque spectacle, and mentally addressed to himself the inquiry whether the feet, and boots belonging to them, were the property of officers of the Executive government,—at the same time thinking that if not, they would have proved sturdy pedestals to the bearers of muskets upon the recent battle-field. Resuming his walk, he accosted a rustic employee
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whom he found at work about the grounds, and pointing to the window, with its incongruous adjuncts, he requested of the man what that meant. "Why, you old fool," replied the rustic, "that's the Cabinet that is a settin'; and them thar big feet's old Abe's."
Some time after, in referring to this experience of his visit to the national capital in a lecture at Boston, the reverend gentleman commented on the imbecility of the government, and satirically added: "That's about all they are good for in Washington,—to project their feet out of windows and jabber away; but they go nowhere, and accomplish nothing." But he subsequently, on more than one occasion, rendered full justice to the President's able and zealous discharge of his high trust, saying: "I abused poor Lincoln, like the fool that the rustic called me, while his heart was even then breaking with the anxieties and responsibilities of his position."
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CHAPTER XVII.
PLOTS AND ASSASSINATION.
The fact that we have in this country a literature of assassination,
"voluminous and vast," suggests a melancholy reflection on the disordered spirit of the times through which we have passed, and on the woful perversity of human nature even under conditions most favorable to intellectual progress and Christian civilization. It is hurtful to our pride as Americans to confess that our history is marred by records so repugnant to the spirit of our liberal institutions, and to the good fellowship which ought to characterize both individual and national life in a free republic. But the appalling fact remains that two of our Chief Magistrates, within as many decades, were murdered in cold blood, and that bulky volumes have been filled with circumstantial accounts of plots and conspiracies by and against men born upon our soil and enjoying the full protection of our laws; and yet, voluminous and extensive as these records are, they are by no means complete.
One most daring attempt upon the life of Mr. Lincoln—the boldest of all attempts of that character, and one which approached shockingly near to a murderous success—was never made public. For prudential reasons
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details were withheld from the press; but as the motives which imposed silence respecting a strange freak of homicidal frenzy no longer exist, it is perhaps a matter of duty to make public the story, together with certain documents which show in what deadly peril Mr.
Lincoln stood during the ceremonies attending his second inauguration at the Capitol in March, 1865. A glance at prior conspiracies will lead to a better understanding of the event to which these documents relate.
The first conspiracy, from motives of policy, had for its object the abduction of President Buchanan. There was intense disgust on the part of certain fiery and ferocious leaders in the secession movement with the conservative temper of the Executive and of the ruling members of his Cabinet. After fruitless attempts to bully the Administration into a change of policy in harmony with his revolutionary scheme, Mr. Wigfall, some time in the month of December, 1860, formed a plan for kidnapping Mr. Buchanan. A number of desperate men were banded together by him at Washington, and the details of the plot were discussed and agreed upon. The plan was to spirit Mr. Buchanan away, install Mr.
Breckenridge in the White House, and hold the captive President as a hostage until terms of compromise could be proposed to conservative Democrats and Republicans in the North. Mr. Wigfall and other choice spirits had no doubt that their plan of accommodation could be enforced through the ad interim Executive. The scheme, however, could not be executed, in its first
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stage, without the concurrence and co-operation of Mr. Floyd, who threw Wigfall into a paroxysm of explosive wrath by flatly refusing to have anything to do with the enterprise. It was accordingly abandoned, so far as Mr. Buchanan was concerned.
When Mr. Lincoln was inaugurated, in March, 1861, the organization of plotters was still intact; but no plan of assassination had, as yet, received the sanction of the conspirators as a body. It was their purpose to kidnap Mr. Lincoln and hold him in captivity, without injury to his person, until such concessions were made to the Southern leaders as their plan of compromise rendered necessary. This second scheme of abduction, having proved as abortive as the first, was abandoned in favor of a more deadly purpose. Some of the more desperate among the conspirators, exasperated by repeated failures, resolved to dispose of Mr. Lincoln by the swifter and surer means afforded by the dagger or the bullet.
Circumstances, in a surprising way, seemed to favor their murderous designs. Against the protest of his friends, who by detective means had obtained from the plotters many of their secrets, Mr. Lincoln made the Soldiers' Home his summer residence. The conspirators thought that either abduction or assassination could be accomplished without difficulty. They resolved upon the latter. They would dispatch him during one of his lonely rides after nightfall from the White House to his summer retreat. The attempt was made.
In the spring and early summer of 1862 I persistently
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urged upon Mr. Lincoln the necessity of a military escort to accompany him to and from his residence and place of business, and he as persistently opposed my proposition, always saying, when the subject was referred to, that there was not the slightest occasion for such precaution. One morning, however, in the month of August he came riding up to the White House steps, where I met him, with a merry twinkle in his eye that presaged fun of some kind. Before he alighted he said, "I have something to tell you!" and after we had entered his office he locked the doors, sat down, and commenced his narration. (At this distance of time I will not pretend to give the exact words of this interview, but will state it according to my best recollection.) He said: "You know I have always told you I thought you an idiot that ought to be put in a strait jacket for your apprehensions of my personal danger from assassination. You also know that the way we skulked into this city, in the first place, has been a source of shame and regret to me, for it did look so cowardly!"
To all of which I simply assented, saying, "Yes, go on."
"Well," said he, "I don't now propose to make you my father-confessor and acknowledge a change of heart, yet I am free to admit that just now I don't know what to think: I am staggered. Understand me, I do not want to oppose my pride