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re: 150 years ago this day...
Posted on 12/14/13 at 10:27 pm to BadLeroyDawg
Posted on 12/14/13 at 10:27 pm to BadLeroyDawg
Tuesday, 15 December 1863
There were those who fought their parts of the American War Between the States, and had as much, or more, effect as a great many who marched and fired guns, but who never came near battlefields. One such person was United States Ambassador to England Charles Francis Adams. Confederate Captain Barron wrote today from London to Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen Mallory. Barron was in a cold rage. Spies, he wrote bitterly, “...are to be found following the footsteps of any Confederate agent in spite of all the precautions we can adopt.” Anywhere Southern agents went to arrange for ship repairs, fuel supplies, or armaments purchases, one of these “spies” would get word to Adams and shortly thereafter the promised work or purchase would be cancelled. And it wasn’t just in London that this happened; it was hard to get work done in any port in Europe. The shrewd U.S. diplomat moved time and again to frustrate Southern efforts in Europe.
Captain Raphael Semmes, after cruising for some time in Far Eastern waters, determined to change his area of operations. Leaving the island of Condore in CSS Alabama, he wrote: "The homeward trade of the enemy is now quite small, reduced, probably, to twenty or thirty ships per year, and these may easily evade us by taking the different passages to the Indian Ocean...there is no cruising or chasing to be done here, successfully, or with safety to oneself without plenty of coal, and we can only rely upon coaling once in three months...So I will try my luck around the Cape of Good Hope once more, thence to the coast of Brazil, and thence perhaps to Barbados for coal, and thence? If the war be not ended, my ship will need to go into dock to have much of her copper replaced, now nearly destroyed by such constant cruising, and to have her boilers overhauled and repaired, and this can only be properly done in Europe." The cruise of the most famous Confederate commerce raider went into its final six months.
Admiral Buchanan wrote Commander C. ap R. Jones regarding the CSS Tennessee: "The Tennessee will carry a battery of two 7-inch Brooke guns and four broadsides, 6.4 or 9 inch...There is a great scarcity of officers and I know not where I will get them. I have sent the names of 400 men who wish to be transferred from the Army to the Navy, and have received only about twenty. Jones replied, "Strange that the Army disregard the law requiring the transfer of men."
President Lincoln's Amnesty Proclamation was under consideration in the Confederate Congress. Mr. Foote presented the following preamble and resolution:
Whereas a copy of the truly characteristic proclamation of amnesty recently issued by the imbecile and unprincipled usurper who now sits enthroned upon the ruins of constitutional liberty in Washington City, has been received and read by the members of this House; now, in token of what is solemnly believed to be the most undivided sentiment of the people of the Confederate States:
Be it resolved, That there never has been a day or an hour when the people of the Confederate States were more inflexibly resolved than they are at the present time, never to relinquish the struggle of arms in which they are engaged, until that liberty and independence for which they have been so earnestly contending shall have been at least achieved, and made sure and steadfast beyond even the probability of a future danger; and that, in spite of the reverses which have lately befallen our armies in several quarters, and cold and selfish indifference to our sufferings thus far, for the most part evinced in the action of foreign powers, the eleven millions of enlightened freemen now battling heroically for all that can make existence desirable, are fully prepared, alike in spirit and in resources, to encounter dangers far greater than those which they have heretofore bravely met, and to submit to far greater sacrifices than those which they have heretofore so cheerfully encountered, in preference to holding any further political connection with a government and people who have notoriously proven themselves contemptuously regardless of all the rights and privileges which belong to a state of civil freedom, as well as of all the most sacred usages of civilized war.
Mr. Miles regretted that the gentleman from Tennessee had introduced such a resolution. The true and only treatment which that miserable and contemptible despot, Lincoln, should receive at the hands of this house was silent and unmitigated contempt. This resolution would appear to dignify a paper emanating from that wretched and detestable abortion, whose contemptible emptiness and folly would only receive the ridicule of the civilized world. He moved to lay the subject on the table.
Mr. Foote was willing that the preamble and resolution should be tabled, with the understanding that it would indicate the unqualified contempt of the House for Abraham Lincoln and his message and proclamation alluded to.
Mr. Miles said there would be no misunderstanding about that.
The motion was unanimously adopted.
Similar resolutions, offered by Mr. Miller of Virginia, went the same way.
There was yesterday in the Libby Prison and its dependencies at Richmond, Virginia, over ten thousand abolition captives. In this number are included nine hundred and eighty-three commissioned officers, domiciled at the Libby under the immediate supervision of Major Thomas P. Turner. By the record it appears that nine were received on the fourteenth instant. Twelve died the same day. The arrivals for several day's past have not been very numerous. On last Friday night, Captain Anderson, of the Fifty-first Indiana cavalry (Streight's command), Lieutenant Skelton, of the Nineteenth Iowa regiment, (a redheaded, bullet-eyed, pestilential abolitionist), escaped from the hospital of the Libby Prison by bribing the sentinel, one Mack, a member of the Tenth Virginia battalion of heavy artillery. This person was purchased for four hundred dollars.
This night, about eight o'clock, Rosser's brigade, of Stuart's Confederate cavalry, came upon the Orange and Alexandria Railroad, from the south, near Sangster's Station, Virginia, and destroyed two bridges over Pope's Run.
Authentic information having been received that Acting Masters John Y. Beall and Edward McGuire, together with fifteen men, all belonging to the Confederate States navy, are now in close confinement in irons at Fort McHenry, to be tried as pirates, our efficient and energetic Agent of Exchange, Judge Ould, notified General Meredith that Lieutenant Commander Edward P. Williams and Ensign Benjamin H. Porter and fifteen seamen, now Yankee prisoners in our hands, have been placed in close confinement and irons, and will be held as hostages for the proper treatment of our men.
A list of steamers destroyed on the Mississippi River since the beginning of the war, was made public. Over one hundred and seventy-five were burned or sunk.
There were those who fought their parts of the American War Between the States, and had as much, or more, effect as a great many who marched and fired guns, but who never came near battlefields. One such person was United States Ambassador to England Charles Francis Adams. Confederate Captain Barron wrote today from London to Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen Mallory. Barron was in a cold rage. Spies, he wrote bitterly, “...are to be found following the footsteps of any Confederate agent in spite of all the precautions we can adopt.” Anywhere Southern agents went to arrange for ship repairs, fuel supplies, or armaments purchases, one of these “spies” would get word to Adams and shortly thereafter the promised work or purchase would be cancelled. And it wasn’t just in London that this happened; it was hard to get work done in any port in Europe. The shrewd U.S. diplomat moved time and again to frustrate Southern efforts in Europe.
Captain Raphael Semmes, after cruising for some time in Far Eastern waters, determined to change his area of operations. Leaving the island of Condore in CSS Alabama, he wrote: "The homeward trade of the enemy is now quite small, reduced, probably, to twenty or thirty ships per year, and these may easily evade us by taking the different passages to the Indian Ocean...there is no cruising or chasing to be done here, successfully, or with safety to oneself without plenty of coal, and we can only rely upon coaling once in three months...So I will try my luck around the Cape of Good Hope once more, thence to the coast of Brazil, and thence perhaps to Barbados for coal, and thence? If the war be not ended, my ship will need to go into dock to have much of her copper replaced, now nearly destroyed by such constant cruising, and to have her boilers overhauled and repaired, and this can only be properly done in Europe." The cruise of the most famous Confederate commerce raider went into its final six months.
Admiral Buchanan wrote Commander C. ap R. Jones regarding the CSS Tennessee: "The Tennessee will carry a battery of two 7-inch Brooke guns and four broadsides, 6.4 or 9 inch...There is a great scarcity of officers and I know not where I will get them. I have sent the names of 400 men who wish to be transferred from the Army to the Navy, and have received only about twenty. Jones replied, "Strange that the Army disregard the law requiring the transfer of men."
President Lincoln's Amnesty Proclamation was under consideration in the Confederate Congress. Mr. Foote presented the following preamble and resolution:
Whereas a copy of the truly characteristic proclamation of amnesty recently issued by the imbecile and unprincipled usurper who now sits enthroned upon the ruins of constitutional liberty in Washington City, has been received and read by the members of this House; now, in token of what is solemnly believed to be the most undivided sentiment of the people of the Confederate States:
Be it resolved, That there never has been a day or an hour when the people of the Confederate States were more inflexibly resolved than they are at the present time, never to relinquish the struggle of arms in which they are engaged, until that liberty and independence for which they have been so earnestly contending shall have been at least achieved, and made sure and steadfast beyond even the probability of a future danger; and that, in spite of the reverses which have lately befallen our armies in several quarters, and cold and selfish indifference to our sufferings thus far, for the most part evinced in the action of foreign powers, the eleven millions of enlightened freemen now battling heroically for all that can make existence desirable, are fully prepared, alike in spirit and in resources, to encounter dangers far greater than those which they have heretofore bravely met, and to submit to far greater sacrifices than those which they have heretofore so cheerfully encountered, in preference to holding any further political connection with a government and people who have notoriously proven themselves contemptuously regardless of all the rights and privileges which belong to a state of civil freedom, as well as of all the most sacred usages of civilized war.
Mr. Miles regretted that the gentleman from Tennessee had introduced such a resolution. The true and only treatment which that miserable and contemptible despot, Lincoln, should receive at the hands of this house was silent and unmitigated contempt. This resolution would appear to dignify a paper emanating from that wretched and detestable abortion, whose contemptible emptiness and folly would only receive the ridicule of the civilized world. He moved to lay the subject on the table.
Mr. Foote was willing that the preamble and resolution should be tabled, with the understanding that it would indicate the unqualified contempt of the House for Abraham Lincoln and his message and proclamation alluded to.
Mr. Miles said there would be no misunderstanding about that.
The motion was unanimously adopted.
Similar resolutions, offered by Mr. Miller of Virginia, went the same way.
There was yesterday in the Libby Prison and its dependencies at Richmond, Virginia, over ten thousand abolition captives. In this number are included nine hundred and eighty-three commissioned officers, domiciled at the Libby under the immediate supervision of Major Thomas P. Turner. By the record it appears that nine were received on the fourteenth instant. Twelve died the same day. The arrivals for several day's past have not been very numerous. On last Friday night, Captain Anderson, of the Fifty-first Indiana cavalry (Streight's command), Lieutenant Skelton, of the Nineteenth Iowa regiment, (a redheaded, bullet-eyed, pestilential abolitionist), escaped from the hospital of the Libby Prison by bribing the sentinel, one Mack, a member of the Tenth Virginia battalion of heavy artillery. This person was purchased for four hundred dollars.
This night, about eight o'clock, Rosser's brigade, of Stuart's Confederate cavalry, came upon the Orange and Alexandria Railroad, from the south, near Sangster's Station, Virginia, and destroyed two bridges over Pope's Run.
Authentic information having been received that Acting Masters John Y. Beall and Edward McGuire, together with fifteen men, all belonging to the Confederate States navy, are now in close confinement in irons at Fort McHenry, to be tried as pirates, our efficient and energetic Agent of Exchange, Judge Ould, notified General Meredith that Lieutenant Commander Edward P. Williams and Ensign Benjamin H. Porter and fifteen seamen, now Yankee prisoners in our hands, have been placed in close confinement and irons, and will be held as hostages for the proper treatment of our men.
A list of steamers destroyed on the Mississippi River since the beginning of the war, was made public. Over one hundred and seventy-five were burned or sunk.
1
Posted on 12/15/13 at 9:53 pm to BadLeroyDawg
Wednesday, 16 December 1863
There was a major shuffling of commanders in the Western Theater of the Confederate States of America today. At the headquarters of the Army of Tennessee, Lieutenant General William Hardee was out, General Joseph Eggleston Johnston was in. Hardee’s appointment had only been a temporary one--filling in after Bragg’s departure--anyway. Johnston’s departure from Brandon, Mississippi, left a vacancy at the head of the Army of Mississippi, which was filled by General Leonidas Polk. One promotion was noted on the Union side of the field: John Buford, cavalryman and the Federal savior of the first day at Gettysburg, received a long-overdue promotion to Major General. It is good that this honor was not delayed any further, as six hours after the papers arrived, Buford died of typhoid fever in Washington, D.C.
In acknowledging resolutions of congratulations and appreciation passed by the Chamber of Commerce of New York for "one of the most celebrated victories of any time" the capture of New Orleans Rear Admiral David G. Farragut wrote: "That we did our duty to the best of our ability, I believe; that a kind Providence smiled upon us and enabled us to overcome obstacles before which the stoutest of our hearts would have otherwise quailed, I am certain."
Thomas Savage, U.S. Consul General at Havana, reported to Commodore H. H. Bell regarding blockade runners in that port: "A schooner under Rebel colors, called Roebuck, 41 tons, with cotton arrived from Mobile yesterday. She left that port, I believe, on the 8th. She is the only vessel that has reached this port from Mobile for a very long time... The famous steamer Alice, which ran the blockade at Mobile successfully so many times, is now on the dry dock here fitting out for another adventure."
The USS Huron, under Lieutenant Commander Stevens, captured the blockade runner Chatham off Doboy Sound, Georgia, with a cargo of cotton, tobacco, and rosin.
The USS Ariel, Acting Master William H. Harrison in charge, captured the sloop Magnolia off the west coast of Florida. She was inbound from Havana with a cargo of spirits and medicines.
A fire broke out this evening in the hospital of the One Hundred and Forty-eighth New York regiment at Yorktown, Virginia, and in a few moments the building was all on fire, and as there were no engines or water near, it was impossible to subdue it. The Government bakery also took fire, and communicated it to the Arsenal. For several hours, the loaded shell stored within exploded, until the magazine was reached, when a terrific explosion took place, scattering the building and shell in every direction. The loss was estimated at one million dollars.
The steamer Chesapeake was recaptured in Mud Cove, Sambro Harbor, Nova Scotia, by the Federal steamer Ella and Anna, under the command of Lieutenant Commander John F. Nichols.
There was a major shuffling of commanders in the Western Theater of the Confederate States of America today. At the headquarters of the Army of Tennessee, Lieutenant General William Hardee was out, General Joseph Eggleston Johnston was in. Hardee’s appointment had only been a temporary one--filling in after Bragg’s departure--anyway. Johnston’s departure from Brandon, Mississippi, left a vacancy at the head of the Army of Mississippi, which was filled by General Leonidas Polk. One promotion was noted on the Union side of the field: John Buford, cavalryman and the Federal savior of the first day at Gettysburg, received a long-overdue promotion to Major General. It is good that this honor was not delayed any further, as six hours after the papers arrived, Buford died of typhoid fever in Washington, D.C.
In acknowledging resolutions of congratulations and appreciation passed by the Chamber of Commerce of New York for "one of the most celebrated victories of any time" the capture of New Orleans Rear Admiral David G. Farragut wrote: "That we did our duty to the best of our ability, I believe; that a kind Providence smiled upon us and enabled us to overcome obstacles before which the stoutest of our hearts would have otherwise quailed, I am certain."
Thomas Savage, U.S. Consul General at Havana, reported to Commodore H. H. Bell regarding blockade runners in that port: "A schooner under Rebel colors, called Roebuck, 41 tons, with cotton arrived from Mobile yesterday. She left that port, I believe, on the 8th. She is the only vessel that has reached this port from Mobile for a very long time... The famous steamer Alice, which ran the blockade at Mobile successfully so many times, is now on the dry dock here fitting out for another adventure."
The USS Huron, under Lieutenant Commander Stevens, captured the blockade runner Chatham off Doboy Sound, Georgia, with a cargo of cotton, tobacco, and rosin.
The USS Ariel, Acting Master William H. Harrison in charge, captured the sloop Magnolia off the west coast of Florida. She was inbound from Havana with a cargo of spirits and medicines.
A fire broke out this evening in the hospital of the One Hundred and Forty-eighth New York regiment at Yorktown, Virginia, and in a few moments the building was all on fire, and as there were no engines or water near, it was impossible to subdue it. The Government bakery also took fire, and communicated it to the Arsenal. For several hours, the loaded shell stored within exploded, until the magazine was reached, when a terrific explosion took place, scattering the building and shell in every direction. The loss was estimated at one million dollars.
The steamer Chesapeake was recaptured in Mud Cove, Sambro Harbor, Nova Scotia, by the Federal steamer Ella and Anna, under the command of Lieutenant Commander John F. Nichols.
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