Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs Volume II Part 4

Lincoln as a tyrant and as its enemy. Hence he was influenced with hatred for Mr. Lincoln. Finally he had become maddened by an ambition to rival, or to excel Brutus. The influence of his possession is to be seen in the entries in his diary in the days following the 14th of April:

"I can never repent it, though we hated to kill. Our country owed all our troubles to him, and G.o.d simply made me the instrument of his punishment.

"The country is not what it was. This forced union is not what I have loved. I have not desired to outlive my country. . . . After being hunted like a dog through swamps, woods, and last night being chased by gunboats till I was forced to return wet, cold, and starving with every man's hand against me, I am here in despair. And why? For doing what Brutus was honored for--what made Tell a hero. And yet I for striking down a greater tyrant than they ever knew, am looked upon as a common cut-throat. My action was purer than either of theirs. One hoped to be great. The other had not only his country's, but his own wrongs to avenge. I knew no private wrong. I struck for my country and that alone. A country that groaned beneath this tyranny, and prayed for the end, and yet now behold the cold hand they extend to me.

"G.o.d cannot pardon me if I have done wrong, yet I cannot see my wrong except in serving a degenerate people. The little, the very little I left behind to clear my name, the Government will not allow to be printed. So ends all. For my country I have given up all that makes life sweet and holy, brought misery upon my family, and am sure there is no pardon for me in Heaven since man so condemns me.

"I do not repent of the blow I struck. I may before my G.o.d but not to man. I think I have done well. Thought I am abandoned with the curse of Cain upon me, when if the world knew my heart that one blow would have made me great, though I did desire no greatness."

Finally, he writes:

"I bless the entire world. Have never hated or wronged anyone. This last was not a wrong unless G.o.d deems it so; and it is with him to d.a.m.n or bless me."

These extracts from Booth's diary reveal the influences that controlled him in the great tragedy in which he became the princ.i.p.al actor.

The death of Booth was only a lesser tragedy than the death of Mr.

Lincoln.

Following the murder and escape of Booth a small military force was organized hastily under the direction and command of Colonel Lafayette C. Baker, a detective in the service of the War Department. The force consisted of about thirty men chiefly convalescents from the army hospitals in Washington. Colonel Everton G. Conger was in command of the expedition, and his testimony contains a clear account of what transpired at Garrett's Farm, where Booth was captured and shot.

Conger reached Garrett's Farm on the night of the 25th of April, or the early morning of the 26th. The men were posted around the tobacco shed in which Booth and Herold were secreted and their surrender was demanded by Conger. Booth refused to surrender and tendered, as a counter proposition, a personal contest with the entire force. Herold surrendered. Upon Booth's persistent refusal to surrender, a fire was lighted in a corner of the building. Booth then came forward with his carbine in his hand and engaged in a conversation with Lieut. L. Byron Baker. While so engaged a musket was fired from the opposite side of the shed and Booth fell, wounded fatally in the neck, at or near the spot where Mr. Lincoln had been struck. Conger had given orders to the men not to shoot under any circ.u.mstances. The examination disclosed the fact that the shot was fired by a sergeant, named Boston Corbett.

When Colonel Conger asked Corbett why he shot without orders Corbett saluted the colonel and said: "Colonel, Providence directed me."

Thus the parallel runs. Booth claimed that he was the instrument of the Almighty in the a.s.sa.s.sination of Lincoln, and Boston Corbett claimed that he acted under the direction of Providence when he shot Booth.

Booth was shot at about three o'clock in the morning of April 26, and he died at fifteen minutes past seven. During that time he was conscious for about three fourths of an hour. He asked whether a person called Jett had betrayed him. His only other intelligible remark was this:

"Tell my mother I died for my country."

During the afternoon preceding the a.s.sa.s.sination of Mr. Lincoln, Booth met John Matthews a brother actor, and requested him to hand a letter to Mr. Coyle, of the _National Intelligencer,_ the next morning.

Mathews had a part in the play at Ford's Theater. When the shot was fired and Mathews was changing his dress to leave the theater, he discovered the letter, which for the time he had forgotten. When he reached his rooms he opened the letter. It contained an avowal of Booth's purpose to murder the President, and he named three of his a.s.sociates. Booth referred to a plan that had failed, and he then added: "The moment has at length arrived when my plans must be changed." These statements were made by Mathews from recollection.

Mathews destroyed the letter under the influence of the apprehension that its possession would work his ruin.

The records seem to warrant certain conclusions:

1. That the Confederate authorities at Richmond made a plan for the capture of Mr. Lincoln, and that Booth, Mrs. Surratt and others--who were implicated finally in the murder--were concerned in the project to abduct the President and to hold him a hostage.

2. That the undertaking failed.

3. That following Lee's surrender and the downfall of the Confederacy, Booth originated the plan to murder the President, under the influence of the motives and reasons that are set forth in his diary and in the letter to Mr. Coyle.

4. His influence over the persons who were involved in the conspiracy to abduct Mr. Lincoln, was so great that he was able to command their aid in the commission of the final crime.

When the investigations were concluded there remained in the possession of the Committee on the Judiciary a quant.i.ty of papers, affidavits, letters and memoranda of no value as evidence. These were placed within a sealed package. The package was deposited with the clerk of the House of Representatives. The preservation of the papers may have been an error. They should have been destroyed by the committee. Some doubts were expressed however as to the authority of the committee.

Further investigations were suggested as not impossible. I am the only person living who has knowledge of the papers. They are now in the possession of the House of Representatives. It is not in the public interest that the papers should become the possession of the public.

MR. LINCOLN AND THE ATTACK ON FORT SUMTER

The testimony of John Minor Botts of Virginia, given before the Joint Committee on Reconstruction, February 18, 1866, presents Mr. Lincoln as a diplomatist at the outset of his experience as President.

Mr. Botts had been a leading member of the Whig Party and he was a Union man from the beginning of the contest to the end of the war. As the work of secession was advancing in the Gulf States Mr. Lincoln became anxious for the fate of the border States and especially for Virginia and Kentucky, which promised to serve as barriers to the aggressive movements of the South in case of war. Mr. Botts came to Washington at the request of Mr. Lincoln in the early days of April, 1861, and they were together and in private conversation during the evening of the 7th of April from seven to eleven o'clock. In the conversation of that evening the President gave Mr. Botts an account of the steps that he had taken to prevent a collision in the harbor of Charleston.

Mr. Summers and Mr. Baldwin of Virginia had been delegates in the Peace Congress and they had been counted among the Union men of the State.

Soon after the inauguration the President was informed that the small garrison in Fort Sumter was nearly dest.i.tute of provisions and that an attempt to add to the supply would be resisted. The President, Mr. Summers and Mr. Botts had served together as Whigs in the Thirtieth Congress and the President invited Mr. Summers by letter and by special messenger to a conference in Washington. To this invitation no answer was given by Mr. Summers until the 5th of April, when Mr.

Baldwin appeared and said that he had come upon the request of Mr.

Summers. Mr. Lincoln said at once: "Ah! Mr. Baldwin, why did you not come sooner? I have been expecting you gentlemen to come to me for more than a week past. I had a most important proposition to make to you. I am afraid you have come too late. However, I will make the proposition now. We have in Fort Sumter with Major Anderson about eighty men and I learn from Major Anderson that his provisions are nearly exhausted . . . I have not only written to Governor Pickens, but I have sent a special messenger to say that if he will allow Major Anderson to obtain his marketing at the Charleston market, or, if he objects to allowing our people to land at Charleston, if he will have it sent to him, then I will make no effort to provision the fort, but, that if he does not do that, I will not permit these people to starve, and that I shall send provisions down,--and that if fires on that vessel he will fire upon an unarmed vessel, loaded with nothing but bread but I shall at the same time send a fleet along with her, with instructions not to enter the harbor of Charleston unless the vessel is fired into; and if she is, then the fleet is to enter the harbor and protect her. Now, Mr. Baldwin, that fleet is now lying in the harbor of New York and will be ready to sail this afternoon at five o'clock, and although I fear it is almost too late, yet I will submit anyway the proposition which I intended for Mr. Summers. Your convention in Richmond, Mr. Baldwin, has been sitting now nearly two months and all they have done has been to shake the rod over my head.

You have recently taken a vote in the Virginia Convention, on the right of secession, which was rejected by ninety to forty-five, a majority of two thirds, showing the strength of the Union Party in that convention; and, if you will go back to Richmond and get that Union majority to adjourn and go home without pa.s.sing the ordinance of secession, so anxious am I for the preservation of the peace of this country and to save Virginia and the other States from going out, that I will take the responsibility of evacuating Fort Sumter, and take the chance of negotiating with the cotton States, which have already gone out."

This quotation is from the testimony of Mr. Botts and there cannot be better evidence of the facts existing in the first days of April, nor a more trustworthy statement of the position of Mr. Lincoln in regard to the secession movement. At that time the Virginia Convention had rejected a proposed ordinance of secession by a vote of ninety to forty-five, and there can be no doubt that Mr. Lincoln had hopes that his proposition might calm the temper and change the purposes of the secessionists in that State if he did not change the schemes of Governor Pickens, of which, indeed, the prospect was only slight.

In his Inaugural Address, and in all his other public utterances, Mr.

Lincoln sought to place the responsibility of war upon the seceding States. At a later day Mr. Lincoln, in a conversation with Senator Sumner and myself, expressed regret that he had neglected to station troops in Virginia in advance of the occupation of the vicinity of Alexandria by the Confederates, a course of action to which he had been urged by Mr. Chase and others.

Mr. Lincoln's proposition for the relief of Fort Sumter was rejected by Mr. Baldwin, as was the proposition for the adjournment of the convention, _sine die_.

When Mr. Botts appeared the time had pa.s.sed when arrangements could have been made for the relief of Sumter and the adjournment of the convention. Although the situation may not have been realized at the time it was not the less true that Mr. Botts and the small number of Union men in Virginia were powerless in presence of the movement in favor of secession under the lead of Tyler, Seddon and others.

The political side of Mr. Lincoln's character is seen in the fact that he enjoined secrecy upon Mr. Botts. He may have been unwilling to allow his supporters in the North to know how far he had gone in the line of conciliation. In the conversation with Mr. Baldwin, Mr.

Lincoln had given an a.s.surance that upon the acceptance of his two propositions he would evacuate Fort Sumter. When Mr. Lincoln made these facts known to Mr. Botts at the evening interview, Mr. Botts said; "Will you authorize me to make that proposition to the Union men of the convention? I will take a steamboat to-morrow morning, and have a meeting of the Union men to-morrow night, I will guarantee with my head, that they will adopt your proposition." In reply, Mr.

Lincoln said: "It is too late. The fleet has sailed." In truth it was too late for the acceptance of the propositions in Virginia. The Union men were powerless, and the secessionists were dominant in affairs and already vindictive. The charge that Mr. Seward gave a promise that Sumter would be abandoned, may or it may not have been true, but there can be no ground for doubting the statement made by Mr. Botts in regard to the terms tendered by Mr. Lincoln, and which were rejected by Mr. Baldwin.

Mr. Baldwin admitted the interview with Mr. Lincoln, and the nature of it as herein given, to Mr. John F. Lewis, who was a Union man and a member of the convention that adopted the Ordinance of Secession by a vote of eighty-eight to fifty-five.

Of the three witnesses, Baldwin, Botts and Lewis, Mr. Baldwin was the first witness who was examined by the Committee on Reconstruction.

At that time the committee had no knowledge of the conversation between Mr. Baldwin and President Lincoln. Speaking, apparently, under the influence of the criticisms of Botts and Lewis of his rejection of Mr. Lincoln's propositions, Baldwin introduced the subject with the remark: "I had a good deal of interesting conversation with him (that is with Mr. Lincoln) that evening. I was about to state that I have reason to believe that Mr. Lincoln himself had given an account of this conversation which has been understood--but I am sure _mis_understood--by the persons with whom he talked, as giving the representation of it, that he had offered to me, that if the Virginia Convention would adjourn _sine die_ he would withdraw the troops from Sumner and _Pickens_." As there was no occasion in the conversation between Lincoln and Baldwin for a reference to Fort Pickens, and as the President did not mention _Fort Pickens_ in the account of the conversation that he gave to Mr. Botts, the denial of Mr. Baldwin may fall under one of the forms of falsehood mentioned by Shakespeare.

The evidence is conclusive to this point: That at an interview at the Executive Mansion, April 5, 1861, between President Lincoln and Colonel John B. Baldwin, then a member of the Virginia Convention that finally adopted the Ordinance of Secession, President Lincoln a.s.sured Mr.

Baldwin that he would evacuate Fort Sumter if the fort could be provisioned and the Virginia Convention would adjourn _sine die_.

Colonel Baldwin's voluntary and qualified denial is of no value in presence of President Lincoln's report of the interview as given by Mr. Botts and in presence of the testimony that Mr. Baldwin did not deny the truthfulness of Mr. Botts' limited statement, when it was a.s.serted by Mr. Botts in the presence of Lewis.

ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS AND HIS STATE-RIGHTS DOCTRINES

Upon the death of Mr. Calhoun the task of maintaining the extreme doctrine of State Rights, as that doctrine had been taught by Mr.

Calhoun fell upon Jefferson Davis and Alexander H. Stephens. That doctrine was carried to its practical results in the ordinances of secession as they were adopted by the respective States under the lead of Mr. Davis.

If Mr. Stephens advised against secession, the advice given was not due to any doubt of the right of a State to secede from the Union, but to doubts of the wisdom of the undertaking.

In form of proceedings Mr. Stephens was examined by the Committee on the Judiciary, the 11th and 12th days of April, 1866, but in fact I was the only member of the committee who was present, and I conducted the examination in my own way, and without help or hindrance from others.

It was the opinion of Governor Clifford of Ma.s.sachusetts, that the examination of Mr. Stephens gave the best exposition of the doctrine of State Rights that had been made. I was then ignorant of the fact, that in the convention of 1787 the form of the Preamble to the Const.i.tution was so changed as to justify the opinion, if not to warrant the conclusion that the State-Rights doctrines had been considered and abandoned. In two plans of a const.i.tution, one submitted by Mr. Randolph, and one by Mr. Charles Pinckney, and in the original draft of the Const.i.tution as reported by Mr. Rutledge, the source of authority was laid in the respective States, which were named. This form was adhered to in the Rutledge report, which was made August 6, 1787. On the 12th of September the Committee on Style reported the Preamble which opens thus: _"We the people of the United States, etc."_ This change seems not to have been known to Mr.

Webster, nor have I noticed a reference to it in any of the speeches that were made in the period of the active controversy on the doctrine of State Rights.

Mr. Stephens was a clear-headed and uncompromising expositor and defender of the doctrine of State Rights as the doctrine was accepted by General Lee and by the inhabitants generally of the slave States.

Mr. Stephens did not disguise his opinions: "When the State seceded against my judgment and vote, I thought my ultimate allegiance was due to her, and I prepared to cast my fortunes and destinies with hers and her people rather than take any other course, even though it might lead to my sacrifice and her ruin."

When he was asked for his reason for accepting the office of vice- president in the Confederacy, he said: "My sole object was to do all the good I could in preserving and perpetuating the principles of liberty as established under the Const.i.tution of the United States."

Mr. Stephens advanced to his position by conclusively logical processes. Standing upon the ground of Mr. Lincoln and the Republican Party, he a.s.sumed that, inasmuch as the States in rebellion had never been out of the Union, they had had the opportunity at all times during the war of withdrawing from the contest and resuming their places in the Senate and House as though nothing had occurred of which the existing government could take notice.