re: 150 years ago this day...

Wednesday, 14 June 1865

Confederate Lieutenant James Iredell Waddell has worked the C.S.S. Shenandoah free of the dangerous ice field that had provided him a safe breakwater in the icy storm by running out warps "...on the floe and grapnels hooked to large blocks of ice...One gathers experience under certain circumstances, and becomes accustomed to certain situations which create anxiety at first."

After meeting increasingly heavy drift ice that flowed to the westward, Waddell became convinced that to continue sailing in that direction would be useless. "She was therefore run to the eastward and after knocking about till the 14th of June, I left the sea of Okhotsk and entered the North Pacific Ocean by the fiftieth parallel passage of Amphitrite Strait, and steering N.E. with a cracking southwester after us."

"When I gave the course N.E. it was to run the ship midway of the most western of the Aleutian and the most eastern of Komandorski Islands, because currents about islands are irregular in direction as well as in force. In a few hours after leaving Amphitrite Strait the wind hauled more to the south and then east of south, producing a condensation of the atmosphere which closed around the Shenandoah an impenetrable mist."

So the Confederate commerce raider leaves the Sea of Okhotsk and heads Northeast with a strong southwester putting a bone in her teeth. Hours later, the wind would shift around from the South and eventually from the Southeast. Once again, dense fog will envelop the Shenandoah. The Aleutians lay ahead.

Actions break out with Indians including at Horse Creek, in the Dakota Territory, where reportedly 2,000 Sioux attack and kill 4 Yankees, wounding 4 others. The Federals circle the wagons but the Indians withdraw.

Colonel Carroll H. Potter, 6th United States Volunteer Infantry, assumes the command of the Federal South Sub-District of the Plains, Dakota.

Rear Admiral Cornelius Kinchiloe Stribling is reducing his squadron to thir­teen steam vessels: Powhatan, Muscoota, Paul Jones, Talla­poosa, Mahaska, Sagamore, Clyde, Hendrick Hudson, Hi­biscus, Honduras, Marigold, Spirea, and Yucca. Other ships will be sent North as soon as possible.

According to information reaching Tallahassee today, George A. Trenholm, former Confederate Secretary of the Treasury, was arrested near Columbia, South Carolina, and is temporarily lodged in the city jail at Charleston. Stephen R. Mallory of Florida, former Confederate Secretary of the Navy, is also in prison.

You're a legend for keeping this up. Why do you still do it?

Friday, 16 June 1865

This morning, President Andrew Johnson receives five prominent Negro men from Richmond, Virginia at a conference at the White House. Led by Fields Cook, a former slave and Baptist minister, they explained how they were at the mercy of their former masters and the slave codes now that slavery had formally ended. Although Johnson did not make a formal response, he noted the change in military and civilian leadership in Richmond that seemed to ease their concerns.

For two days the C.S.S. Shenandoah had sailed northward in fog that fortunately lifted partly just in time to enable her to miss running hard aground as she passed west of the Aleutians. Three days later, half way across the world, Commander James Dunwoody Bulloch writes to Lieutenant James Iredell Waddell, ordering him to desist from further destruction of United States property upon the high seas and all offensive operations against U.S. citizens. These were orders that could not be delivered for many weeks under the best conditions. Therefore, whalers were destined to suffer disastrous blows.

Sunday, 18 June 1865

Railroad and telegraph lines are rapidly being restored throughout Florida and mail and commer­cial shipments are being resumed.

Madame Achille Murat, whose late husband was the nephew of the Emperor Napoleon of France, is reportedly so impoverished by the War that she has re­quested commissary stores and medicine from the Union commander in Tallahassee. Without sufficient labor she is unable to cultivate her Leon County plantation and she is encouraging her former slaves to grow their own food­stuffs.

A boat operating under a flag of truce arrives at Cairo, Illinois, containing 7,454 former Confederate soldiers, of which 686 are officers belonging to former Confederate Brigadier General M. Jeff Thompson. The former general had made the trek from Arkansas as far as Memphis, where he awaits President Andrew Johnson’s decision in regards to Thompson’s pardon application. The remainder of his command was also sent north to Cairo.

Tuesday, 20 June 1865

The Powder River Indian Expedition gets underway, in the Dakota Territory, with Major General Grenville M. Dodge, USA, commanding the Department of the Missouri, and United States Forces in Kansas and the Territories report that the construction of the Union Pacific Railroad is progressing; law and order has mostly been restored with the partisans, guerrillas, irregulars and bushwackers laying reportedly down their weapons.

Brigadier General James A. Williamson, USA, is assigned to the command of the Federal District of St. Louis, Missouri.

Major General Jacob D. Cox, USA, assumes temporary command of the Federal Department of North Carolina.

Brevet Major General Thomas H. Ruger, USA, assumes temporary command of the Federal 23rd Army Corps, North Carolina.

Major General George H. Thomas, USA, assumes command of the Federal Military Division of the Tennessee.

The book "The President’s Words" printed by John Wilson and Son of Boston, Massachusetts, which contained selected speeches and writings of the sixteenth President Abraham Lincoln, was published today. It was one of the earliest books written about Lincoln just two months after his assassination.

quote:

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Started it as a lark to simply try and keep a daily journal of what was happening during the War Between the States, a lifelong interest of mine, as the events occurred. It has now become almost a mission to follow through until the end,

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Wow didn't realize you started this long ago, and still doing it.

Wednesday, 21 June 1865

Brigadier General James C. Veatch, USA, is assigned to the command of the Union forces in West Louisiana.

Good visits both. Kennesaw forced Sherman to abandon his frontal assault strategy against Johnston. Old Fort Jackson is a National Historic Landmark and the oldest standing brick fort in the state. Rifled artillery is why those became anachronisms.

Thursday, 22 June 1865

President Andrew Johnson declares the Union blockade of the Southern states' ports, in existence since April 1861, at an end.

The CSS Shenandoah is now cruising off of Cape Navarin in the Gulf of Anadyr, or Anadyr Bay, a large bay on the Bering Sea in far northeast Siberia, in a Northeast current. Blubber was seen in the water so steam was ordered. Shortly two whalers were sighted. The Shenandoah captured the William Thompson and put a prize crew on board. It took two hours to run down and capture Euphrates. She was stripped and burned. Lieutenant James Iredell Waddell would soon light the Arctic skies with burning whalers. He captured and bonded the Milo. The barks Sophia Thornton and Jerah Swift were captured and burned. Their crews were transferred to the Milo and she was told to sail for San Francisco.

Full report: The CSS Shenandoah, commanded by Lieutenant James Iredell Waddell, cruising off Cape Navarin, found "...a current setting to the N.E. and soon after seeing blubber we concluded the whale vessels south of us were cutting out, and steam was ordered." This calculation was correct. Within an hour they sighted two American whalers which were the first spoken since entering the Bering Sea. Coming up on the two New Bedford whalers in close proximity, he captured and placed a prize crew on board the William Thompson and then stood in pursuit of Euphrates. After a two hour chase, she was captured, stripped of supplies and set ablaze. Waddell then returned to the William Thompson and subjected her to the same fate. The following day which, as her log recorded, remained the 22nd as the Shenandoah had crossed the international date line, Waddell continued to light the Arctic skies with the flaming hulks of American whalers. He first captured the ship Milo of New Bedford. It was from this vessel that Waddell first heard rumors that the South had surrendered and the War had ended. The Confederate captain sought documentary evidence from the master to authenticate these rumors. "He had none, but 'believed the war was over.' I replied that was not satisfactory..." Waddell bonded Milo, took most of her crew to insure against escape, and gave chase to two other whalers in the vicinity. They entered the ice flow seeking to escape, but he soon cut out the bark Sophia Thornton, placed a prize crew on board with orders to keep company with Milo, and continued in pursuit of the Jerah Swift. Waddell recorded in his memoirs: "We chased her for three hours before getting in shelling distance of her, but Captain Williams, who made every effort to save his bark, saw the folly of exposing the crew to a destructive fire and yielded to his misfortune with a manly and becoming dignity." The Shenandoah burned the two barks and transferred all prisoners to the Milo for passage to San Francisco.

The Shenandoah also captured the Susan Abigail, recently from San Francisco. A newspaper was found on board dated April 17, 1865. It told of the capture of Richmond but also contained President Jefferson Davis' Danville Proclamation declaring that the War would be continued with renewed vigor. Moreover, the raider's captain observed: "Three of the Susan Abigail's crew joined the Shenandoah, which was good evidence at least that they did not believe the War had ended." The master of the prize stated that in San Francisco, "Opinion is divided as to the ultimate result of the War. For the present the North has the advantage, but how it will all end no one can know, and as to the newspapers they are not reliable." After burning the trader, Waddell continued northward to the Bering Strait, the northern exit to the Arctic Sea.

Waddell burned most of the ships captured in the northern seas. Earlier in his journal he had discussed the destruction of prizes.

According to the freighting for some ships one could simply "...knock a hole in her bottom from in board below the water line and the vessel sinks rapidly and finally disappears leaving only a few pieces of plank floating over the great abyss which has closed over her."

"It frequently occurs that to destroy a prize, fire must be resorted to, and there is no escape from that ruthless element. However much it may be condemned, it is better than to leave a prize so disabled and injured as to be formidable enough to endanger the navigation of the ocean. Fire serves as a beacon to inform the sailor of danger, but it leaves a small portion of the vessel, the floor and the keel to float upon the surface of the water."

"To prepare a vessel for destruction by fire, first remove all living animals, take out all useful equipment which may be wanted, discover what combustibles are in her hold, such as tar, pitch, turpentine, and see to the removal of gunpowder. All of these things should be thrown into sea. Combustibles are then scattered throughout the vessel, bulkheads torn down and piled up in her cabins and forecastle. All hatches are opened and all halyards let go that the sails may hang loosely and the yards counter braced. Fire is then taken from the galley or cooking stove and deposited in various parts of her hold and about her deck."

"If she is very old she burns like tinder. This painful duty which sometimes became necessary would have been avoided had we been allowed to take our prizes into port for adjudication."

Upon learning of the final collapse of the Confederacy, Master John C. Braine, CSN, took passage for Liverpool, England, from Kingston, Jamaica. On several occasions during the War, Braine had led naval parties in the successful seizures of Federal merchantmen and quite likely would have been prosecuted for piracy had he been apprehended by the Federals. The schooner St. Mary's, which he seized in Chesapeake Bay and had sailed to Nassau, was abandoned in Kingston just prior to his booking passage for Liverpool. Previous to the St. Mary's incident, he had seized the steamers Chesapeake off Cape Cod and the Roanoke off Havana while leading Confederate naval parties masquerading as passengers.

Brigadier General Morgan L. Smith, US Army, is relieved from the command of the District of Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles announces to the naval forces that France and Great Britain had "...withdrawn from the insurgents the character of belligerents." He also announced that the blockade of the coast of the United States would soon be lifted and the belligerent right of search abrogated.

Friday, 23 June 1865 (continued)

Stand Watie--also known as Standhope Oowatie, Degataga, and Isaac S. Watie--was a leader of the Cherokee Nation and a brigadier general of the Confederate States Army during the Civil War.

He was born in Oothcaloga, Cherokee Nation (Calhoun, Georgia) on December 12, 1806, to David Uwatie, a Cherokee, and Susanna Reese, who was of Cherokee and European heritage, and first called Isaac Uwatie. Later, when he grew up, he preferred the English translation of his Cherokee name, Degataga, meaning "Stand Firm," and the "U" was dropped from "Uwatie."

Watie was educated at the Moravian Mission School in Spring Place, Cherokee Nation (now Georgia) and by the time he grew up, his father had become a wealthy slave-owning planter. He would later write for the Cherokee Phoenix newspaper, which led him into the dispute over the Georgia Anti-Indian laws.

When gold was discovered on Cherokee lands in northern Georgia in 1828, thousands of white settlers encroached on Indian lands. In spite of federal treaties that protected them from actions of individual states, Georgia confiscated most of the Cherokee land and the Georgia militia destroyed the Cherokee Phoenix in 1832.

The Federal Government soon stepped in, encouraging the Cherokee to move to Indian Territory and the Treaty of New Echota was signed in January, 1836, which established terms under which the entire Cherokee Nation was expected to move west to the Indian Territory. Although it was signed by a minority Cherokee political faction and not approved by the Cherokee National Council, it was ratified by the U.S. Senate and became the legal basis for the forcible removal known as the Trail of Tears.

The Watie brothers stood in favor of the removal of the Cherokee to Oklahoma and were members of the group that signed the Treaty of New Echota. The Anti-Removal National Party following John Ross refused to ratify the treaty, putting him at odds with the Waties. The family, along with many other Cherokee soon emigrated to the West, where Stand Watie, a slave holder, started a successful plantation on Spavinaw Creek in Indian Territory.

Those Cherokee following John Ross remained on their tribal lands for two years until they were forcibly removed by the U.S. government in 1838 in a journey known as the "Trail of Tears," during which thousands died.

The following year, many of the members who had signed the treaty were targeted for execution and in June, 1839 Stand’s brother Elias Boudinot was murdered outside his home. His cousin and uncle, John and Major Ridge, fell to Cherokee assassins on the same day.

In 1842 Watie encountered James Foreman, one of his uncle's assassins and shot him dead. He was tried for murder in Arkansas and acquitted as acting in self defense, even though Foreman was unarmed. Stand Watie's brother Thomas Watie was also murdered by Ross partisans in 1845. At least 34 politically related murders were committed among the Cherokee in 1845 and 1846. From 1845, Stand Watie served on the Cherokee Council, part of that time as speaker.

When the Civil War broke out, a majority of the Cherokee Nation voted to support the Confederacy and Watie organized a regiment of cavalry. In October 1861, he was commissioned as colonel in the First Cherokee Mounted Rifles. In December, 1861, he was engaged in a battle with some hostile Indians in the Battle of Chusto-Talasah in present day Tulsa County, Oklahoma.

Later, he would participate in the Battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas in March, 1862, after which General Albert Pike, in his report of this battle, said: "My whole command consisted of about 1,000 men, all Indians except one squadron. The enemy opened fire into the woods where we were, the fence in front of us was thrown down, and the Indians charged full in front through the woods and into the open grounds with loud yells, took the battery, fired upon and pursued the enemy retreating through the fenced field on our right, and held the battery, which I afterward had drawn by the Cherokee into the woods."

Though the Battle of Pea Ridge was a Union victory, Watie's command of his troops was well noted and there was considerable fear by the Union that Indian Territory would be entirely lost to the Confederacy.

The same year, though he was serving in the Confederate Army, Watie was elected principal chief of the Cherokee Nation. Though former Chief John Ross had fled to Washington D.C., his supporters, who by this time were in the minority, refused to recognize Watie’s election and open warfare broke out between the "Union Cherokee" and the "Southern Cherokee."

Confederate General William Steele, in his report of the operations in the Indian Territory, in 1863, said of Colonel Watie that he found him to be a gallant and daring officer. On April 1, 1863, Watie was authorized to raise a large brigade

In June, 1864, he captured the steamboat Williams with 150 barrels of flour and 16,000 pounds of bacon, which Watie would later say was actually a disadvantage to the command, because a great portion of the Creek and Seminole soldiers immediately broke off to carry their booty home. In May, 1864 Colonel Watie was commissioned a brigadier-general and in September he attacked and captured a Federal train of 250 wagons on Cabin Creek and repulsed an attempt to retake it.

At the end of the year 1864 General Watie's brigade of cavalry consisted of the First Cherokee regiment, a Cherokee battalion, First and Second Creek regiments, a squadron of Creeks, First Osage battalion, and First Seminole battalion. To the end of the War, General Watie stood by his colors, becoming the last Confederate general in the field to stand down. When the leaders of the Confederate Indians learned that the government in Richmond, Virginia had fallen and the Eastern armies had been surrendered, most began making plans for surrender. The chiefs convened the Grand Council June 15, 1865 and passed resolutions calling for Indian commanders to lay down their arms. However, Stand Watie refused until June 23, 1865, a full 75 days after Lee's surrender in the East. Finally accepting the futility of continued resistance, he surrendered his battalion of Creek, Seminole, Cherokee, and Osage Indians to Lieutenant Colonel Asa C. Matthews at Doaksville.

After the Civil War ended the "Union Cherokee" and the "Southern Cherokee" sent delegations to Washington D.C., where Watie pushed for recognition of a separate "Southern Cherokee Nation."

Watie was refused, however, and the government negotiated a treaty with the “Union Cherokee” in 1866, declaring John Ross as the rightful Principal Chief. It seemed that open hostilities would break out again in the Cherokee Nation, but, when John Ross died in August, 1866, hostilities calmed down. In the election in 1867, full-blood Cherokee, Lewis Downing, was elected Principal Chief and was able bring about peaceful reunification, though tensions lingered under the surface into the 20th century.

In the meantime, Watie had returned from the Civil War to find his home burned to the ground by Federal soldiers. In financial ruin, he spent his final years farming and trying to restore his once-beautiful Grand River bottomland.

All three of Watie’s sons preceded him in death and in his last years he watched as colossal tracts of land legally deeded to the Cherokee were taken from them as punishment for their support of the Confederacy and given to other tribes. Many believe that Stand Watie died of a broken heart. In one of his last letters to his daughter, he would say “You can’t imagine how lonely I am up here at our old place without any of my dear children being with me.” He died on September 9, 1871 and was buried in the Polson Cemetery in Delaware County, Oklahoma.