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- Herausgeber: Krill Press
- Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
- Sprache: Englisch
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Seitenzahl: 541
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015
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GREAT BRITAIN AND THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR: VOLUME TWO
Ephraim Douglass Adams
FIREWORK PRESS
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Copyright © 2015 by Ephraim Douglass Adams
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE
CHAPTER X: KING COTTON
FOOTNOTES:
CHAPTER XI: RUSSELL’S MEDIATION PLAN
FOOTNOTES:
CHAPTER XII: THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION
FOOTNOTES:
CHAPTER XIII: THE LAIRD RAMS
FOOTNOTES:
CHAPTER XIV: ROEBUCK’S MOTION
FOOTNOTES:
CHAPTER XV: THE SOUTHERN INDEPENDENCE ASSOCIATION
FOOTNOTES:
CHAPTER XVI: BRITISH CONFIDENCE IN THE SOUTH
FOOTNOTES:
CHAPTER XVII: THE END OF THE WAR
FOOTNOTES:
CHAPTER XVIII: THE KEY-NOTE OF BRITISH ATTITUDE
FOOTNOTES:
Great Britain and the American Civil War: Volume Two
By
Ephraim Douglass Adams
Great Britain and the American Civil War: Volume Two
Published by Firework Press
New York City, NY
First published 1925
Copyright © Firework Press, 2015
All rights reserved
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PREFACE
THIS WORK WAS BEGUN MANY years ago. In 1908 I read in the British Museum many newspapers and journals for the years 1860-1865, and then planned a survey of English public opinion on the American Civil War. In the succeeding years as a teacher at Stanford University, California, the published diplomatic correspondence of Great Britain and of the United States were studied in connection with instruction given in the field of British-American relations. Several of my students prepared excellent theses on special topics and these have been acknowledged where used in this work. Many distractions and other writing prevented the completion of my original plan; and fortunately, for when in 1913 I had at last begun this work and had prepared three chapters, a letter was received from the late Charles Francis Adams inviting me to collaborate with him in preparing a “Life” of his father, the Charles Francis Adams who was American Minister to Great Britain during the Civil War. Mr. Adams had recently returned from England where he had given at Oxford University a series of lectures on the Civil War and had been so fortunate as to obtain copies, made under the scholarly supervision of Mr. Worthington C. Ford, of a great mass of correspondence from the Foreign Office files in the Public Record Office and from the private papers in the possession of various families.
The first half of the year 1914 was spent with Mr. Adams at Washington and at South Lincoln, in preparing the “Life.” Two volumes were completed, the first by Mr. Adams carrying the story to 1848, the second by myself for the period 1848 to 1860. For the third volume I analysed and organized the new materials obtained in England and we were about to begin actual collaboration on the most vital period of the “Life” when Mr. Adams died, and the work was indefinitely suspended, probably wisely, since any completion of the “Life” by me would have lacked that individual charm in historical writing so markedly characteristic of all that Mr. Adams did. The half-year spent with Mr. Adams was an inspiration and constitutes a precious memory.
The Great War interrupted my own historical work, but in 1920 I returned to the original plan of a work on “Great Britain and the American Civil War” in the hope that the English materials obtained by Mr. Adams might be made available to me. When copies were secured by Mr. Adams in 1913 a restriction had been imposed by the Foreign Office to the effect that while studied for information, citations and quotations were not permissible since the general diplomatic archives were not yet open to students beyond the year 1859. Through my friend Sir Charles Lucas, the whole matter was again presented to the Foreign Office, with an exact statement that the new request was in no way related to the proposed “Life” of Charles Francis Adams, but was for my own use of the materials. Lord Curzon, then Foreign Secretary, graciously approved the request but with the usual condition that my manuscript be submitted before publication to the Foreign Office. This has now been done, and no single citation censored. Before this work will have appeared the limitation hitherto imposed on diplomatic correspondence will have been removed, and the date for open research have been advanced beyond 1865, the end of the Civil War.
Similar explanations of my purpose and proposed work were made through my friend Mr. Francis W. Hirst to the owners of various private papers, and prompt approval given. In 1924 I came to England for further study of some of these private papers. The Russell Papers, transmitted to the Public Record Office in 1914 and there preserved, were used through the courtesy of the Executors of the late Hon. Rollo Russell, and with the hearty goodwill of Lady Agatha Russell, daughter of the late Earl Russell, the only living representative of her father, Mr. Rollo Russell, his son, having died in 1914. The Lyons Papers, preserved in the Muniment Room at Old Norfolk House, were used through the courtesy of the Duchess of Norfolk, who now represents her son who is a minor. The Gladstone Papers, preserved at Hawarden Castle, were used through the courtesy of the Gladstone Trustees. The few citations from the Palmerston Papers, preserved at Broadlands, were approved by Lieut.-Colonel Wilfred Ashley, M.P.
The opportunity to study these private papers has been invaluable for my work. Shortly after returning from England in 1913 Mr. Worthington Ford well said: “The inside history of diplomatic relations between the United States and Great Britain may be surmised from the official archives; the tinting and shading needed to complete the picture must be sought elsewhere.” (Mass. Hist. Soc. Proceedings, XLVI, p. 478.) Mr. C.F. Adams declared (ibid., XLVII, p. 54) that without these papers “... the character of English diplomacy at that time (1860-1865) cannot be understood.... It would appear that the commonly entertained impressions as to certain phases of international relations, and the proceedings and utterances of English public men during the progress of the War of Secession, must be to some extent revised.”
In addition to the new English materials I have been fortunate in the generosity of my colleague at Stanford University, Professor Frank A. Golder, who has given to me transcripts, obtained at St. Petersburg in 1914, of all Russian diplomatic correspondence on the Civil War. Many friends have aided, by suggestion or by permitting the use of notes and manuscripts, in the preparation of this work. I have sought to make due acknowledgment for such aid in my foot-notes. But in addition to those already named, I should here particularly note the courtesy of the late Mr. Gaillard Hunt for facilities given in the State Department at Washington, of Mr. Herbert Putnam, Librarian of Congress, for the transcript of the Correspondence of Mason and Slidell, Confederate Commissioners in Europe, and of Mr. Charles Moore, Chief of Manuscripts Division, Library of Congress, for the use of the Schurz Papers containing copies of the despatches of Schleiden, Minister of the Republic of Bremen at Washington during the Civil War. Especially thanks are due to my friend, Mr. Herbert Hoover, for his early interest in this work and for his generous aid in the making of transcripts which would otherwise have been beyond my means. And, finally, I owe much to the skill and care of my wife who made the entire typescript for the Press, and whose criticisms were invaluable.
It is no purpose of a Preface to indicate results, but it is my hope that with, I trust, a “calm comparison of the evidence,” now for the first time available to the historian, a fairly true estimate may be made of what the American Civil War meant to Great Britain; how she regarded it and how she reacted to it. In brief, my work is primarily a study in British history in the belief that the American drama had a world significance, and peculiarly a British one.
EPHRAIM DOUGLASS ADAMS.
November 25, 1924
CHAPTER X: KING COTTON
FOR TWO WEEKS THERE WAS no lightening of Southern depression in England. But on June 28 McClellan had been turned back from his advance on Richmond by Lee, the new commander of the Army of Virginia, and the much heralded Peninsular campaign was recognized to have been a disastrous failure. Earlier Northern victories were forgotten and the campaigns in the West, still progressing favourably for the North, were ignored or their significance not understood. Again, to English eyes, the war in America approached a stalemate. The time had come with the near adjournment of Parliament when, if ever, a strong Southern effort must be made, and the time seemed propitious. Moreover by July, 1862, it was hoped that soon, in the cotton districts, the depression steadily increasing since the beginning of the war, would bring an ally to the Southern cause. Before continuing the story of Parliamentary and private efforts by the friends of the South it is here necessary to review the cotton situation—now rapidly becoming a matter of anxious concern to both friend and foe of the North and in less degree to the Ministry itself.
“King Cotton” had long been a boast with the South. “Perhaps no great revolution,” says Bancroft, “was ever begun with such convenient and soothing theories as those that were expounded and believed at the time of the organization of the Confederacy.... In any case, hostilities could not last long, for France and Great Britain must have what the Confederacy alone could supply, and therefore they could be forced to aid the South, as a condition precedent to relief from the terrible distress that was sure to follow a blockade[654].” This confidence was no new development. For ten years past whenever Southern threats of secession had been indulged in, the writers and politicians of that section had expanded upon cotton as the one great wealth-producing industry of America and as the one product which would compel European acquiescence in American policy, whether of the Union, before 1860, or of the South if she should secede. In the financial depression that swept the Northern States in 1857 De Bow’s Review, the leading financial journal of the South, declared: “The wealth of the South is permanent and real, that of the North fugitive and fictitious. Events now transpiring expose the fiction, as humbug after humbug explodes[655].” On March 4, 1858, Senator Hammond of South Carolina, asked in a speech, “What would happen if no cotton was furnished for three years? I will not stop to depict what everyone can imagine, but this is certain: England would topple headlong and carry the whole civilized world with her save the South. No, you dare not make war on cotton. No power on earth dares make war upon it. Cotton is King[656].” Two years later, writing before the elections of 1860 in which the main question was that of the territorial expansion of slavery, this same Southern statesman expressed himself as believing that “the slave-holding South is now the controlling power of the world.... Cotton, rice, tobacco and naval stores command the world; and we have sense enough to know it, and are sufficiently Teutonic to carry it out successfully[657].”
These quotations indicative of Southern faith in cotton might be amplified and repeated from a hundred sources.
Moreover this faith in the possession of ultimate power went hand in hand with the conviction that the South, more than any other quarter of the world, produced to the benefit of mankind. “In the three million bags of cotton,” said a writer in De Bow’s Review, “the slave-labour annually throws upon the world for the poor and naked, we are doing more to advance civilization ... than all the canting philanthropists of New England and Old England will do in centuries. Slavery is the backbone of the Northern commercial as it is of the British manufacturing system[658]....” Nor was this idea unfamiliar to Englishmen. Before the Civil War was under way Charles Greville wrote to Clarendon:
“Any war will be almost sure to interfere with the cotton crops, and this is really what affects us and what we care about. With all our virulent abuse of slavery and slave-owners, and our continual self-laudation on that subject, we are just as anxious for, and as much interested in, the prosperity of the slavery interest in the Southern States as the Carolinan and Georgian planters themselves, and all Lancashire would deplore a successful insurrection of the slaves, if such a thing were possible[659].”
On December 20, 1860, South Carolina led the march in secession. Fifteen days earlier the British consul at Charleston, Bunch, reported a conversation with Rhett, long a leader of the Southern cause and now a consistent advocate of secession, in which Rhett developed a plan of close commercial alliance with England as the most favoured nation, postulating the dependence of Great Britain on the South for cotton—"upon which supposed axiom, I would remark,” wrote Bunch, “all their calculations are based[660].” Such was, indeed, Southern calculation. In January, 1861, De Bow’s Review contained an article declaring that “the first demonstration of blockade of the Southern ports would be swept away by the English fleets of observation hovering on the Southern coasts, to protect English commerce, and especially the free flow of cotton to English and French factories.... A stoppage of the raw material ... would produce the most disastrous political results—if not a revolution in England. This is the language of English statesmen, manufacturers, and merchants, in Parliament and at cotton associations’ debates, and it discloses the truth[661].”
The historical student will find but few such British utterances at the moment, and these few not by men of great weight either in politics or in commerce. The South was labouring under an obsession and prophesied results accordingly. So strong was this obsession that governmental foreign policy neglected all other considerations and the first Commission to Europe had no initial instructions save to demand recognition[662]. The failure of that Commission, the prompt British acquiescence in the blockade, were harsh blows to Southern confidence but did not for a long time destroy the faith in the power of cotton. In June, 1861, Bunch wrote that there was still a firm belief that “Great Britain will make any sacrifice, even of principle or of honour, to prevent the stoppage of the supply of cotton,” and he enclosed a copy of an article in the Charleston Mercury of June 4, proclaiming: “The cards are in our hands, and we intend to play them out to the bankruptcy of every cotton factory in Great Britain and France, or the acknowledgment of our independence[663].” As late as March, 1862, Bunch was still writing of this Southern faith in cotton and described the newly-made appointment of Benjamin as Secretary of State as partly due to the fact that he was the leader of the “King Cotton” theory of diplomacy[664]. It was not until the war was well nigh over that British persistence in neutrality, in spite of undoubted hardships caused by the lack of cotton, opened Southern eyes. Pollard, editor of a leading Richmond newspaper, and soon unfriendly to the administration of Jefferson Davis, summed up in The Lost Cause his earlier criticisms of Confederate foreign policy:
“‘Cotton,’ said the Charleston Mercury, ‘would bring England to her knees.’ The idea was ludicrous enough that England and France would instinctively or readily fling themselves into a convulsion, which their great politicians saw was the most tremendous one of modern times. But the puerile argument, which even President Davis did not hesitate to adopt, about the power of ‘King Cotton,’ amounted to this absurdity: that the great and illustrious power of England would submit to the ineffable humiliation of acknowledging its dependency on the infant Confederacy of the South, and the subserviency of its empire, its political interests and its pride, to a single article of trade that was grown in America[665]!”
But irrespective of the extremes to which Southern confidence in cotton extended the actual hardships of England were in all truth serious enough to cause grave anxiety and to supply an argument to Southern sympathizers. The facts of the “Lancashire Cotton Famine” have frequently been treated by historians at much length[666] and need here but a general review. More needed is an examination of some of the erroneous deductions drawn from the facts and especially an examination of the extent to which the question of cotton supply affected or determined British governmental policy toward America.
English cotton manufacturing in 1861 held a position of importance equalled by no other one industry. Estimates based on varying statistics diverge as to exact proportions, but all agree in emphasizing the pre-eminent place of Lancashire in determining the general prosperity of the nation. Surveying the English, not the whole British, situation it is estimated that there were 2,650 factories of which 2,195 were in Lancashire and two adjacent counties. These employed 500,000 operatives and consumed a thousand million pounds of cotton each year[667]. An editorial in the Times, September 19, 1861, stated that one-fifth of the entire English population was held to be dependent, either directly or indirectly, on the prosperity of the cotton districts[668], and therefore also dependent on the source of supply, the Confederate South, since statistics, though varying, showed that the raw cotton supplied from America constituted anywhere from 78 to 84 per cent. of the total English importation[669].
The American crop of 1860 was the largest on record, nearly 4,000,000 bales, and the foreign shipments, without question hurried because of the storm-cloud rising at home, had been practically completed by April, 1861. Of the 3,500,000 bales sent abroad, Liverpool, as usual, received the larger portion[670]. There was, then, no immediate shortage of supply when war came in America, rather an unusual accumulation of raw stocks, even permitting some reshipment to the Northern manufacturing centres of America where the scarcity then brought high prices. In addition, from December, 1860, to at least April, 1861, there had been somewhat of a slump in demand for raw cotton by British manufacturers due to an over-production of goods in the two previous years. There had been a temporary depression in 1856-57 caused by a general financial crisis, but early in 1858 restored confidence and a tremendous demand from the Far East—India especially—set the mills running again on full time, while many new mills were brought into operation. But by May, 1860, the mills had caught up with the heavy demands and the rest of the year saw uncertainty of operations and brought expressions of fear that the “plunge” to produce had been overdone. Manufactured stocks began to accumulate, and money was not easy since 1860 brought also a combination of events—deficient grain harvest at home, withdrawal of gold from England to France for investment in French public works, demand of America for gold in place of goods, due to political uncertainties there—which rapidly raised the discount rate from two and one half per cent. in January, 1860, to six in December. By the end of April, 1861, the Board of Trade Returns indicated that the cotton trade was in a dangerous situation, with large imports of raw cotton and decreased exports of goods[671]. The news of war actually begun in America came as a temporary relief to the English cotton trade and in the prospect of decreased supply prices rose, saving many manufacturers from impending difficulties. A few mills had already begun to work on part-time because of trade depression. The immediate effect of Lincoln’s blockade proclamation was to check this movement, but by October it had again begun and this time because of the rapid increase in the price of raw cotton as compared with the slower advance of the price of goods[672].
In substance the principal effect of the War on the English cotton trade for the first seven or eight months was felt, not in the manufacturing districts but in the Liverpool speculative and importing markets of raw cotton. Prices rose steadily to over a shilling a pound in October, 1861. On November 23 there was a near panic caused by rumours of British intervention. These were denounced as false and in five days the price was back above its previous figure. Then on November 27 came the news of the Trent and the market was thrown into confusion, not because of hopes that cotton would come more freely but in fear that war with America would cause it to do so. The Liverpool speculators breathed freely again only when peace was assured. This speculative British interest was no cause for serious governmental concern and could not affect policy. But the manufacturing trade was, presumably, a more serious anxiety and if cotton became hard, or even impossible to obtain, a serious situation would demand consideration.
In the generally accepted view of a “short war,” there was at first no great anticipation of real danger. But beginning with December, 1861, there was almost complete stoppage of supply from America. In the six months to the end of May, 1862, but 11,500 bales were received, less than one per cent. of the amount for the same six months of the previous year[673]. The blockade was making itself felt and not merely in shipments from the South but in prospects of Southern production, for the news came that the negroes were being withdrawn by their masters from the rich sea islands along the coast in fear of their capture by the Northern blockading squadrons[674]. Such a situation seemed bound in the end to result in pressure by the manufacturers for governmental action to secure cotton. That it did not immediately do so is explained by Arnold, whose dictum has been quite generally accepted, as follows:
“The immediate result of the American war was, at this time, to relieve the English cotton trade, including the dealers in the raw material and the producers and dealers in manufactures, from a serious and impending difficulty. They had in hand a stock of goods sufficient for the consumption of two-thirds of a year, therefore a rise in the price of the raw material and the partial closing of their establishments, with a curtailment of their working expenses, was obviously to their advantage. But to make their success complete, this rise in the price of cotton was upon the largest stock ever collected in the country at this season. To the cotton trade there came in these days an unlooked for accession of wealth, such as even it had never known before. In place of the hard times which had been anticipated, and perhaps deserved, there came a shower of riches[675].”
This was written of the situation in December, 1861. A similar analysis, no doubt on the explanations offered by his English friends, of “the question of cotton supply, which we had supposed would speedily have disturbed the level of their neutral policy” was made by Mason in March, 1862. “Thus,” he concluded, “it is that even in Lancashire and other manufacturing districts no open demonstration has been made against the blockade[676].” Manufactures other than cotton were greatly prospering, in particular those of woollen, flax, and iron. And the theory that the cotton lords were not, in reality, hit by the blockade—perhaps profited by it—was bruited even during the war. Blackwood’s Magazine, October, 1864, held this view, while the Morning Post of May 16, 1864, went to the extent of describing the “glut” of goods in 1861, relieved just in the nick of time by the War, preventing a financial crash, “which must sooner or later have caused great suffering in Lancashire.”
Arnold’s generalization has been taken to prove that the immediate effect of the Civil War was to save the cotton industry from great disaster and that there immediately resulted large profits to the manufacturers from the increased price of stocks on hand. In fact his description of the situation in December, 1861, as his own later pages show, was not applicable, so far as manufacturers’ profits are concerned, until the later months of 1862 and the first of 1863. For though prices might be put up, as they were, goods were not sold in any large quantities before the fall of 1862. There were almost no transactions for shipments to America, China, or the Indies[677]. Foreign purchasers as always, and especially when their needs had just been abundantly supplied by the great output of 1858-60, were not keen to place new orders in a rising and uncertain market. The English producers raised their prices, but they held their goods, lacking an effective market. The importance of this in British foreign policy is that at no time, until the accumulated goods were disposed of, was there likely to be any trade eagerness for a British intervention in America. Their only fear, says Arnold, was the sudden opening of Southern ports and a rush of raw cotton[678], a sneer called out by the alleged great losses incurred and patriotically borne in silence. Certainly in Parliament the members from Lancashire gave no sign of discontent with the Government policy of neutrality for in the various debates on blockade, mediation, and cotton supply but one Member from Lancashire, Hopwood, ever spoke in favour of a departure from neutrality, or referred to the distress in the manufacturing districts as due to any other cause than the shortage in cotton caused by the war[679].
But it was far otherwise with the operatives of Lancashire. Whatever the causes of short-time operation in the mills or of total cessation of work the situation was such that from October, 1861, more and more operatives were thrown out of employment. As their little savings disappeared they were put upon public poor relief or upon private charity for subsistence. The governmental statistics do not cover, accurately, the relief offered by private charity, but those of public aid well indicate the loss of wage-earning opportunity. In the so-called “Distressed Districts” of Lancashire and the adjoining counties it appears that poor relief was given to 48,000 persons in normal times, out of a total population of 2,300,000. In the first week of November, 1861, it was 61,207, and for the first week of December, 71,593; thereafter mounting steadily until March, 1862, when a temporary peak of 113,000 was reached. From March until the first week in June there was a slight decrease; but from the second week of June poor relief resumed an upward trend, increasing rapidly until December, 1862, when it reached its highest point of 284,418. In this same first week of December private relief, now thoroughly organized in a great national effort, was extended to 236,000 people, making a grand total at high tide of distress of over 550,000 persons, if private relief was not extended to those receiving public funds. But of this differentiation there is no surety—indeed there are evidences of much duplication of effort in certain districts. In general, however, these statistics do exhibit the great lack of employment in a one-industry district heretofore enjoying unusual prosperity[680].
The manufacturing operative population of the district was estimated at between 500,000 and 600,000. At the time of greatest distress some 412,000 of these were receiving either public or private aid, though many were working part-time in the mills or were engaged on public enterprises set on foot to ease the crisis. But there was no starvation and it is absurd to compare the crisis to the Irish famine of the ‘forties. This was a cotton famine in the shortage of that commodity, but it was not a human famine. The country, wrote John Bright, was passing through a terrible crisis, but “our people will be kept alive by the contributions of the country[681].” Nevertheless a rapid change from a condition of adequate wage-earning to one of dependence on charity—a change ultimately felt by the great bulk of those either directly or indirectly dependent upon the cotton industry—might have been expected to arouse popular demonstrations to force governmental action directed to securing cotton that trade might revive. That no such popular effect was made demands careful analysis—to be offered in a later chapter—but here the fact is alone important, and the fact was that the operatives sympathized with the North and put no pressure on the Cabinet. Thus at no time during the war was there any attempt from Lancashire, whether of manufacturers or operatives, to force a change of governmental policy[682].
As the lack of employment developed in Lancashire public discussion and consideration were inevitably aroused. But there was little talk of governmental interference and such as did appear was promptly met with opposition by the leading trade journals. July 13, 1861, the Economist viewed the cotton shortage as “a temporary and an immediate one.... We have—on our hypothesis—to provide against the stoppage of our supply for one year, and that the very next year.” Would it pay, asked Bright, to break the blockade? “I don’t think myself it would be cheap ... at the cost of a war with the United States[683].” This was also the notion of the London Shipping Gazette which, while acknowledging that the mill-owners of England and France were about to be greatly embarrassed, continued: “But we are not going to add to the difficulty by involving ourselves in a naval war with the Northern States[684]....” The Times commented in substance in several issues in September, 1861, on the “wise policy of working short-time as a precaution against the contingencies of the cotton supply, and of the glutted state of distant markets for manufactured goods[685].” October 12, the Economist acknowledged that the impatience of some mill-owners was quite understandable as was talk of a European compulsion on America to stop an “objectless and hopeless” quarrel, but then entered upon an elaborate discussion of the principles involved and demonstrated why England ought not to intervene. In November Bright could write: “The notion of getting cotton by interfering with the blockade is abandoned apparently by the simpletons who once entertained it, and it is accepted now as a fixed policy that we are to take no part in your difficulties[686].” Throughout the fall of 1861 the Economist was doing its best to quiet apprehensions, urging that due to the “glut” of manufactured goods short-time must have ensued anyway, pointing out that now an advanced price was possible, and arguing that here was a situation likely to result in the development of other sources of supply with an escape from the former dependence on America. In view of the actual conditions of the trade, already recounted, these were appealing arguments to the larger manufacturers, but the small mills, running on short order supplies and with few stocks of goods on hand were less easily convinced. They were, however, without parliamentary influence and hence negligible as affecting public policy. At the opening of the new year, 1862, Bright declared that “with the spinners and manufacturers and merchants, I think generally there is no wish for any immediate change[687].”
Bright’s letter of November, 1861, was written before news of the Trent reached England: that of January, 1862, just after that controversy had been amicably settled. The Trent had both diverted attention from cotton and in its immediate result created a general determination to preserve neutrality. It is evident that even without this threat of war there was no real cotton pressure upon the Government. With Northern successes in the spring of 1862 hopes were aroused that the war would soon end or that at least some cotton districts would be captured to the relief of England. Seward held out big promises based on the capture of New Orleans, and these for a time calmed governmental apprehensions, though by midsummer it was clear that the inability to secure the country back of the city, together with the Southern determination to burn their cotton rather than see it fall into the hands of the enemy, would prevent any great supply from the Mississippi valley[688]. This was still not a matter of immediate concern, for the Government and the manufacturers both held the opinion that it was not lack of cotton alone that was responsible for the distress and the manufacturers were just beginning to unload their stocks[689]. But in considering and judging the attitude of the British public on this question of cotton it should always be remembered that the great mass of the people sincerely believed that America was responsible for the distress in Lancashire. The error in understanding was more important than the truth.
In judging governmental policy, however, the truth as regards the causes of distress in England is the more important element. The “Cotton Lords” did not choose to reveal it. One must believe that they intentionally dwelt upon the war as the sole responsible cause. In the first important parliamentary debate on cotton, May 9, 1862, not a word was said of any other element in the situation, and, it is to be noted, not a word advocating a change in British neutral policy[690]. It is to be noted also that this debate occurred when for two months past, the numbers on poor relief in Lancashire were temporarily decreasing[691], and the general tone of the speakers was that while the distress was serious it was not beyond the power of the local communities to meet it. There was not, then, in May, any reason for grave concern and Russell expressed governmental conviction when he wrote to Gladstone, May 18, “We must, I believe, get thro’ the cotton crisis as we can, and promote inland works and railroads in India[692].” Moreover the Southern orders to destroy cotton rather than permit its capture and export by the North disagreeably affected British officials[693]. Up to the end of August, 1862, Russell, while writing much to Lyons on England’s necessity for cotton, did not do so in a vein indicative of criticism of Northern policy nor in the sense that British distress demanded special official consideration. Such demands on America as were made up to this time came wholly from France[694].
It was not then cotton, primarily, which brought a revival in July of the Southern attack on the Government through Parliament[695]. June had seen the collapse of Lindsay’s initial move, and Palmerston’s answer to Hopwood, June 13, that there was no intention, at present, to offer mediation, appeared final. It was not cotton, but McClellan’s defeat, that produced a quick renewal of Lindsay’s activities. June 30, Hopwood had withdrawn his motion favouring recognition but in doing so asked whether, “considering the great and increasing distress in the country, the patient manner in which it has hitherto been borne, and the hopelessness of the termination of hostilities, the Government intend to take any steps whatever, either as parties to intervention or otherwise, to endeavour to put an end to the Civil War in America?” This was differently worded, yet contained little variation from his former question of June 13, and this time Palmerston replied briefly that the Government certainly would like to mediate if it saw any hope of success but that at present “both parties would probably reject it. If a different situation should arise the Government would be glad to act[696].” This admission was now seized upon by Lindsay who, on July 11, introduced a motion demanding consideration of “the propriety of offering mediation with the view of terminating hostilities,” and insisted upon a debate.
Thus while the first week of June seemed to have quieted rumours of British mediation, the end of the month saw them revived. Adams was keenly aware of the changing temper of opinion and on June 20 presented to Russell a strong representation by Seward who wrote “under the President’s instructions” that such recurrent rumours were highly injurious to the North since upon hopes of foreign aid the South has been encouraged and sustained from the first day of secession. Having developed this complaint at some length Seward went on to a brief threat, containing the real meat of the despatch, that if foreign nations did venture to intervene or mediate in favour of the South, the North would be forced to have recourse to a weapon hitherto not used, namely to aid in a rising of the slaves against their masters. This was clearly a threat of a “servile war” if Great Britain aided the South—a war which would place Britain in a very uncomfortable position in view of her anti-slavery sentiments in the past. It is evidence of Adams’ discretion that this despatch, written May 28, was held back from presentation to Russell until revived rumours of mediation made the American Minister anxious[697]. No answer was given by Russell for over a month, a fact in itself indicative of some hesitancy on policy. Soon the indirect diplomacy of Napoleon III was renewed in the hope of British concurrence. July 11, Slidell informed Mason that Persigny in conversation had assured him “that this Government is now more anxious than ever to take prompt and decided action in our favour.” Slidell asked if it was impossible to stir Parliament but acknowledged that everything depended on Palmerston: “that august body seems to be as afraid of him as the urchins of a village school of the birch of their pedagogue[698].”
Unquestionably Persigny here gave Slidell a hint of private instructions now being sent by Napoleon to Thouvenel who was on a visit to London. The Emperor telegraphed “Demandez au gouvernement anglais s’il ne croit pas le moment venu de reconnaître le Sud[699].” Palmerston had already answered this question in Parliament and Thouvenel was personally very much opposed to the Emperor’s suggestion. There were press rumours that he was in London to bring the matter to a head, but his report to Mercier was that interference in America was a very dangerous matter and that he would have been “badly received” by Palmerston and Russell if he had suggested any change in neutral policy[700].
In spite of this decided opposition by the French Minister of Foreign Affairs it is evident that one ground for renewed Southern hopes was the knowledge of the Emperor’s private desires. Lindsay chose his time well for on July 16 the first thorough report on Lancashire was laid before Parliament[701], revealing an extremity of distress not previously officially authenticated, and during this week the papers were full of an impending disaster to McClellan’s army. Lyons, now in London, on his vacation trip, was concerned for the future mainly because of cotton, but did not believe there was much danger of an immediate clash with America[702]. But the great Southern argument of the moment was the Northern military failure, the ability of the South to resist indefinitely and the hopelessness of the war. On the morning of July 18 all London was in excitement over press statements that the latest news from America was not of McClellan’s retreat but of the capture of his entire army.
Lindsay’s motion was set for debate on this same July 18. Adams thought the story of McClellan’s surrender had been set afloat “to carry the House of Commons off their feet in its debate to-night[703].” The debate itself may be regarded as a serious attempt to push the Ministry into a position more favourable to the South, and the arguments advanced surveyed the entire ground of the causes of secession and the inevitability of the final separation of North and South. They need but brief summary. Lindsay, refusing to accede to appeals for postponement because “the South was winning anyway,” argued that slavery was no element in the conflict, that the Southern cause was just, and that England, because of her own difficulties, should mediate and bring to a conclusion a hopeless war. He claimed the time was opportune since mediation would be welcomed by a great majority in the North, and he quoted from a letter by a labouring man in Lancashire, stating, “We think it high time to give the Southern States the recognition they so richly deserve.”
Other pro-Southern speakers emphasized Lancashire distress. Gregory said: “We should remember what is impending over Lancashire—what want, what woe, what humiliation—and that not caused by the decree of God, but by the perversity of man. I leave the statistics of the pauperism that is, and that is to be, to my honourable friends, the representatives of manufacturing England.” No statistics were forthcoming from this quarter for not a representative from Lancashire participated in the debate save Hopwood who at the very end upbraided his fellow members from the district for their silence and was interrupted by cries of “Divide, Divide.” Lindsay’s quoted letter was met by opponents of mediation with the assertion that the operatives were well known to be united against any action and that they could be sustained “in luxury” from the public purse for far less a cost than that of a war with America.
But cotton did not play the part expected of it in this debate. Forster in a very able speech cleverly keeping close to a consideration of the effect of mediation on England, advanced the idea that such a step would not end the war but would merely intensify it and so prolong English commercial distress. He did state, however, that intervention (as distinct from mediation) would bring on a “servile war” in America, thus giving evidence of his close touch with Adams and his knowledge of Seward’s despatch of May 28. In the main the friends of the North were content to be silent and leave it to the Government to answer Lindsay. This was good tactics and they were no doubt encouraged to silence by evidence early given in the debate that there would be no positive result from the motion. Gregory showed that this was a real attack on the Government by his bitter criticisms of Russell’s “three months” speech[704].
At the conclusion of Gregory’s speech Lindsay and his friends, their immediate purpose accomplished and fearing a vote, wished to adjourn the debate indefinitely. Palmerston objected. He agreed that everyone earnestly wished the war in America to end, but he declared that such debates were a great mistake unless something definite was to follow since they only served to create irritation in America, both North and South. He concluded with a vigorous assertion that if the Ministry were to administer the affairs of the nation it ought to be trusted in foreign affairs and not have its hands tied by parliamentary expressions of opinion at inopportune moments. Finally, the South had not yet securely established its independence and hence could not be recognized. This motion, if carried, would place England on a definite side and thus be fatal to any hope of successful mediation or intervention in the future. Having now made clear the policy of the Government Palmerston did not insist upon a division and the motion was withdrawn[705].
On the surface Lindsay’s effort of July 18 had resulted in ignominious failure. Lyons called it “ill-timed.... I do not think we know here sufficiently the extent of the disaster [to McClellan] to be able to come to any conclusion as to what the European Powers should do.” But the impression left by the debate that there was a strong parliamentary opinion in favour of mediation made Lyons add: “I suppose Mercier will open full cry on the scent, and be all for mediation. I am still afraid of any attempt of the kind[706].” Very much the same opinion was held by Henry Adams who wrote, “the pinch has again passed by for the moment and we breathe more freely. But I think I wrote to you some time ago that if July found us still in Virginia, we could no longer escape interference. I think now that it is inevitable.” A definite stand taken by the North on slavery would bring “the greatest strength in this running battle[707].”
In spite of surface appearances that the debate was “ill-timed” the “pinch” was not in fact passed as the activities of Slidell and Mason and their friends soon indicated. For a fortnight the Cabinet, reacting to the repeated suggestions of Napoleon, the Northern defeats, and the distress in Lancashire, was seriously considering the possibility of taking some step toward mediation. On July 16, two days before the debate in the Commons, Slidell at last had his first personal contact with Napoleon, and came away from the interview with the conviction that “if England long persists in her inaction he [Napoleon] would be disposed to act without her.” This was communicated to Mason on July 20[708], but Slidell did not as yet see fit to reveal to Mason that in the interview with Napoleon he had made a definite push for separate action by France, offering inducements on cotton, a special commercial treaty, and “alliances, defensive, and offensive, for Mexican affairs,” this last without any authority from Benjamin, the Confederate Secretary of State. On July 23 Slidell made a similar offer to Thouvenel and left with him a full memorandum of the Southern proposal[709]. He was cautioned that it was undesirable his special offer to France should reach the ears of the British Government—a caution which he transmitted to Mason on July 30, when sending copies of Benjamin’s instructions, but still without revealing the full extent of his own overtures to Napoleon.
JOHN SLIDELL
(From Nicolay and Hay’s “Life of Abraham Lincoln”: The Century Co. New York)
In all this Slidell was still exhibiting that hankering to pull off a special diplomatic achievement, characteristic of the man, and in line, also, with a persistent theory that the policy most likely to secure results was that of inducing France to act alone. But he was repeatedly running against advice that France must follow Great Britain, and the burden of his July 20 letter to Mason was an urging that a demand for recognition be now made simultaneously in Paris and London. Thouvenel, not at all enthusiastic over Slidell’s proposals, told him that this was at least a prerequisite, and on July 23, Slidell wrote Mason the demand should be made at once[710]. Mason, on the advice of Lindsay, Fitzgerald, and Lord Malmesbury, had already prepared a request for recognition, but had deferred making it after listening to the debate of July 18[711]. Now, on July 24, he addressed Russell referring to their interview of February, 1862, in which he had urged the claims of the Confederacy to recognition and again presented them, asserting that the subsequent failure of Northern campaigns had demonstrated the power of the South to maintain its independence. The South, he wrote, asked neither aid nor intervention; it merely desired recognition and continuation of British neutrality[712]. On the same day Mason also asked for an interview[713], but received no reply until July 31, when Russell wrote that no definite answer could be sent until “after a Cabinet” and that an interview did not seem necessary[714].
This answer clearly indicates that the Government was in uncertainty. It is significant that Russell took this moment to reply at last to Seward’s protestations of May 28[715], which had been presented to him by Adams on June 20. He instructed Stuart at Washington that his delay had been due to a “waiting for military events,” but that these had been indecisive. He gave a résumé of all the sins of the North as a belligerent and wrote in a distinctly captious spirit. Yet these sins had not “induced Her Majesty’s Government to swerve an inch from an impartial neutrality[716].” Here was no promise of a continuance of neutrality—rather a hint of some coming change. At least one member of the Cabinet was very ready for it. Gladstone wrote privately:
“It is indeed much to be desired that this bloody and purposeless conflict should cease. From the first it has been plain enough that the whole question was whether the South was earnest and united. That has now for some months been demonstrated; and the fact thus established at once places the question beyond the region even of the most brilliant military successes[717]....”
Gladstone was primarily influenced by the British commercial situation. Lyons, still in England, and a consistent opponent of a change of policy, feared this commercial influence. He wrote to Stuart:
“...I can hardly anticipate any circumstances under which I should think the intervention of England in the quarrel between the North and South advisable....
“But it is very unfortunate that no result whatever is apparent from the nominal re-opening of New Orleans and other ports. And the distress in the manufacturing districts threatens to be so great that a pressure may be put upon the Government which they will find it difficult to resist[718].”
In Parliament sneers were indulged in by Palmerston at the expense of the silent cotton manufacturers of Lancashire, much to the fury of Cobden[719]. Of this period Arnold later sarcastically remarked that, “The representatives of Lancashire in the Houses of Parliament did not permit the gaieties of the Exhibition season wholly to divert their attention from the distress which prevailed in the home county[720].”
Being refused an interview, Mason transmitted to Russell on August 1 a long appeal, rather than a demand, for recognition, using exactly those arguments advanced by Lindsay in debate[721]. The answer, evidently given after that “Cabinet” for whose decision Russell had been waiting, was dated August 2. In it Russell, as in his reply to Seward on July 28, called attention to the wholly contradictory statements of North and South on the status of the war, which, in British opinion, had not yet reached a stage positively indicative of the permanence of Southern independence. Great Britain, therefore, still “waited,” but the time might come when Southern firmness in resistance would bring recognition[722]. The tone was more friendly than any expressions hitherto used by Russell to Southern representatives. The reply does not reveal the decision actually arrived at by the Ministry. Gladstone wrote to Argyll on August 3 that “yesterday” a Cabinet had been held on the question “to move or not to move, in the matter of the American Civil War....” He had come away before a decision when it became evident the prevailing sentiment would be “nothing shall be done until both parties are desirous of it.” Gladstone thought this very foolish; he would have England approach France and Russia, but if they were not ready, wait until they were. “Something, I trust, will be done before the hot weather is over to stop these frightful horrors[723].”
All parties had been waiting since the debate of July 18 for the Cabinet decision. It was at once generally known as “no step at present” and wisdom would have decreed quiet acquiescence. Apparently one Southern friend, on his own initiative, felt the need to splutter. On the next day, August 4, Lord Campbell in the Lords moved for the production of Russell’s correspondence with Mason, making a very confused speech. “Society and Parliament” were convinced the war ought to end in separation. At one time Campbell argued that reconquest of the South was impossible; at another that England should interfere to prevent such reconquest. Again he urged that the North was in a situation where she could not stop the war without aid from Europe in extricating her. Probably the motion was made merely to draw from Russell an official statement. Production of the papers was refused. Russell stated that the Government still maintained its policy of strict neutrality, that if any action was to be taken it should be by all the maritime powers and that if, in the parliamentary recess, any new policy seemed advisable he would first communicate with those powers. He also declared very positively that as yet no proposal had been received from any foreign power in regard to America, laying stress upon the “perfect accord” between Great Britain and France[724].
Mason commented on this speech that someone was evidently lying and naturally believed that someone to be Russell. He hoped that France would promptly make this clear[725]. But France gave no sign of lack of “perfect accord.” On the contrary Thouvenel even discouraged Slidell from following Mason’s example of demanding recognition and the formal communication was withheld, Mason acquiescing[726]. Slidell thought new disturbances in Italy responsible for this sudden lessening of French interest in the South, but he was gloomy, seeing again the frustration of high hopes. August 24 he wrote Benjamin:
“You will find by my official correspondence that we are still hard and fast aground here. Nothing will float us off but a strong and continued current of important successes in the field.
I have no hope from England, because I am satisfied that she desires an indefinite prolongation of the war, until the North shall be entirely exhausted and broken down.
Nothing can exceed the selfishness of English statesmen except their wretched hypocrisy. They are continually casting about their disinterested magnaminity and objection of all other considerations than those dictated by a high-toned morality, while their entire policy is marked by egotism and duplicity. I am getting to be heartily tired of Paris[727].”
On August 7 Parliament adjourned, having passed on the last day of the session an Act for the relief of the distress in Lancashire by authorizing an extension of powers to the Poor Law Guardians. Like Slidell and Mason pro-Northern circles in London thought that in August there had come to a disastrous end the Southern push for a change in British policy, and were jubilant. To be sure, Russell had merely declared that the time for action was “not yet” come, but this was regarded as a sop thrown to the South. Neither in informed Southern nor Northern circles outside the Cabinet was there any suspicion, except by Adams, that in the six months elapsed since Lindsay had begun his movement the Ministry had been slowly progressing in thoughts of mediation.
In fact the sentiment of the Cabinet as stated by Gladstone had been favourable to mediation when “both parties were ready for it” and that such readiness would come soon most Members were convinced. This was a convenient and reasonable ground for postponing action but did not imply that if the conviction were unrealized no mediation would be attempted. McClellan, driven out of the Peninsula, had been removed, and August saw the Northern army pressed back from Virginia soil. It was now Washington and not Richmond that seemed in danger of capture. Surely the North must soon realize the futility of further effort, and the reports early in July from Washington dilated upon the rapid emergence of a strong peace party.
But the first panic of dismay once past Stuart sent word of enormous new Northern levies of men and of renewed courage[728]. By mid-August, writing of cotton, he thought the prospect of obtaining any quantity of it “seems hopeless,” and at the same time reported the peace party fast losing ground in the face of the great energy of the Administration[729]. As to recognition, Stuart believed: “There is nothing to be done in the presence of these enormous fresh levies, but to wait and see what the next two months will bring forth[730].” The hopes of the British Ministry based on a supposed Northern weariness of the war were being shattered. Argyll, having received from Sumner a letter describing the enthusiasm and determination of the North, wrote to Gladstone:
“It is evident, whatever may be our opinion of the prospects of ‘the North’ that they do not yet, at least, feel any approach to such exhaustion as will lead them to admit of mediation[731]....”
To this Gladstone replied:
“I agree that this is not a state of mind favourable to mediation; and I admit it to be a matter of great difficulty to determine when the first step ought to be taken; but I cannot subscribe to the opinion of those who think that Europe is to stand silent without limit of time and witness these horrors and absurdities, which will soon have consumed more men, and done ten times more mischief than the Crimean War; but with the difference that there the end was uncertain, here it is certain in the opinion of the whole world except one of the parties. I should be puzzled to point out a single case of dismemberment which has been settled by the voluntary concession of the stronger party without any interference or warning from third powers, and as far as principle goes there never was a case in which warning was so proper and becoming, because of the frightful misery which this civil conflict has brought upon other countries, and because of the unanimity with which it is condemned by the civilized world[732].”
The renewal of Northern energy, first reports of which were known to Russell early in August, came as a surprise to the British Ministry. Their progress toward mediation had been slow but steady. Lindsay’s initial steps, resented as an effort in indirect diplomacy and not supported by France officially, had received prompt rejection accompanied by no indication of a desire to depart from strict neutrality. With the cessation in late June of the Northern victorious progress in arms and in the face of increasing distress in Lancashire, the second answer to Lindsay was less dogmatic. As given by Palmerston the Government desired to offer mediation, but saw no present hope of doing so successfully. Finally the Government asked for a free hand, making no pledges. Mason might be gloomy, Adams exultant, but when August dawned plans were already on foot for a decided change. The secret was well kept. Four days after the Cabinet decision to wait on events, two days after Russell’s refusal to produce the correspondence with Mason, Russell, on the eve of departure for the Continent, was writing to Palmerston:
“Mercier’s notion that we should make some move in October agrees very well with yours. I shall be back in England before October, and we could then have a Cabinet upon it. Of course the war may flag before that.
“I quite agree with you that a proposal for an armistice should be the first step; but we must be prepared to answer the question on what basis are we to negotiate[733]?”
The next movement to put an end to the war in America was to come, not from Napoleon III, nor from the British friends of the South, but from the British Ministry itself.
