150 Years Ago: More Tensions

On Monday, April 8, 1861, R. S. Chew, Lincoln's emissary from the State Department, arrived in Charleston and fulfilled his mission, informing South Carolina Governor Francis Pickens that a relief expedition was coming to Fort Sumter.  Pickens informed General P. G. T. Beauregard, who placed all Confederate forces in the harbor on alert.  The supplies for the fort left New York harbor on this day aboard the Harriet Lane.

Meanwhile, Confederate Secretary of War Leroy Walker approved General Braxton Bragg's request to open fire if an attempt were made to reinforce Fort Pickens at Pensacola.

William T. Sherman had been offered a job in the War Department.  On this date he had turned it down, leading many to believe that he planned to join the Confederate Army.

150 Years Ago: Tensions Mount at the Forts

On Sunday, April 7, 1861, Lieutenant John Worden on the U.S. Navy was sent to Pensacola with orders for Captain H. A. Adams to reinforce Fort Pickens with the troops aboard the Brooklyn.  Meanwhile, General Braxton, the Confederate commander at Pensacola, wired his War Department requesting permission to open fire if any attempt was made to reinforce Pickens.

At Charleston, Confederate General P. G. T. Beauregard informed Major Robert Anderson, the commander at Fort Sumter, that there would be no more interaction between the fort and the town.  The fort was now cut off, only reachable by sea.

In Washington, Secretary of State William Seward seemed to be trying to convince himself that the Fort Sumter situation would be resolved peacefully, and he was later seen to have been deceiving Southern emissaries as well.  On this date, he received a letter from Justice John Campbell.  Campbell had heard the rumors of an expedition, knew that it couldn't be going to Fort Sumter because Seward had assured him that the fort would not be reinforced.  Campbell wanted reassurance from Seward, and Seward obliged him, replying, "Faith as to Sumter fully kept -- wait and see."

150 Years Ago: Snafus

On Saturday, April 6, 1861, the U.S. government was trying to solve two snafus.  Neither was serious, and both were caused by trying to do things too quickly and not making sure that everyone involved knew what was going on.

The U.S.S. Powhatan, a strong warship, was to be part of the Fort Sumter expedition.  In fact, Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles had specified that she be the flagship of the force.  But Secretary of State William Seward wanted the Powhatan for the Fort Pickens expedition, and he wanted Lieutenant David Porter in command.  He sent the orders to Lincoln, who signed them.  Welles was not in on the decision and tried to get the orders reversed, but Porter set sail for Pensacola.

In the end, it didn't matter.  The war would have started at Charleston harbor whether the Powhatan was there or not.

On March 12, the President had decided to reinforce Fort Pickens and the War Department had sent orders to Pensacola to land the troops aboard the Brooklyn. Then it seemed like everyone just forgot about it, assuming the orders would be carried out. But the commander of the fleet at Pensacola, Captain H. A. Adams had orders from Gideon Welles not to do anything to change the status quo there.  Adams didn't feel that orders from the War Department superceded his orders from the Department of the Navy, and refused to land the troops.

On this date, Washington finally discovered that the fort had never been reinforced.  Welles sent new orders to Adams and the troops were finally landed.

Also on this date, R. S. Chew of the State Department left for Charleston.  He was Lincoln's emissary to South Carolina Governor Francis Pickens, sent to inform him that Washington would be resupplying Fort Sumter.

150 Years Ago: Scott's Memorandum

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On Thursday, March 28, 1861, General-in-Chief Winfield Scott gave President Abraham Lincoln a disturbing memorandum expressing his views of Forts Sumter and Pickens.

Up until this time, Scott had been declaring that an attempt to reinforce Fort Sumter was virtually impossible, but was all for reinforcing Fort Pickens.  Now, suddenly, he was opposed to reinforcing Sumter and Pickens, and was basing his opposition on political, not military grounds.

"Our Southern friends, however, are clear that the evacuation of both the forts would instantly soothe and give confidence to the eight remaining slaveholding states, and render their cordial adherence to the Union perpetual...indeed, the giving up of Forts Sumter and Pickens may be best justified by the hope that we should thereby recover the State to which they geographically belong by the liberality of the act, besides retaining the eight doubtful states."

After a state dinner at the White House -- the first for the new administration -- Lincoln called an emergency cabinet meeting.  After Lincoln read the memo and the initial shock wore off, Postmaster General Montgomery Blair, the only cabinet member heretofore wholeheartedly in favor of reinforcing Sumter despite the consequences, declared that Scott was out of line, "playing the part of a politician, not a general." 

The cabinet would meet again the next day.  In the meantime, the members would once again put their ideas on the subject of reinforcing the forts down on paper.

Whether or not Scott's memorandum was the culprit, the cabinet had made an almost complete turnaround from their earlier thoughts on the matter.  Now everyone agreed that Fort Pickens should be reinforced regardless of the consequences.  On Fort Sumter, the opinions were a little more varied, but almost everyone agreed that the attempt should be made.

Lincoln would quickly decide to reinforce Fort Pickens.  On March 31, Colonel Erasmus Keyes and Captain Montgomery Meigs were charged with submitting a plan to the president before 4 p.m. that same day.  In their haste to meet the deadline they bypassed Scott, but Lincoln sent them back to get the general's approval.  Somehow, in the midst of all of that, Secretary of War Simon Cameron was completely overlooked by everyone involved.  Then, Seward picked the naval officer to command the warship without saying anything at all to Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles about it.

Sometime within the first couple of days of April, Lincoln would decide to reinforce Fort Sumter.

March 12, 1861: A Delay at Fort Pickens

The situation at Fort Sumter appeared to be hopeless, but Fort Pickens at Pensacola, Florida, was different.

Unlike Fort Sumter, which sat in the middle of Charleston harbor and would require a fleet of warships and 20,000 men to relieve it, Fort Pickens was on Santa Rosa Island at the mouth of Pensacola harbor and could be reinforced and supplied without firing a shot.  In fact, a squadron of ships was already at Pensacola, including the U.S.S. Brooklyn with a company of troops aboard, waiting for further developments.

In January, President James Buchanan had reached a status quo agreement with Senator Stephen Mallory of Florida over Fort Pickens.  The state would not attack the fort and the Federal government would not reinforce it.  The Navy Department had sent orders to Captain H. A. Adams, commanding officer of the U.S.S. Sabine and commander of the squadron around Fort Pickens, on January 30.  Adams was not to land troops at Fort Pickens "unless said fort shall be attacked or preparations shall be made for its attack."

Now, Lincoln had finally decided to hold Fort Pickens.  On Tuesday, March 12, 1861, the U.S.S. Mohawk left for Pensacola with orders for Captain Israel Vogdes, captain of the company of regular troops aboard the Brooklyn.

"At the first favorable moment you will land with your company, reinforce Fort Pickens, and hold the same till further orders."

The complication was that Captain Adams was still bound by the January 30 orders from the Navy Department.  He saw the orders the Mohawk had brought and refused to honor them.  What the War Department might write to Captain Vogdes did not affect him.  Adams would have to write to the Navy Department for further instructions, postponing Fort Pickens's relief. 

February 9, 1861: The Confederate President

On Saturday, February 9, 1861, Jefferson Davis of Mississippi was elected provisional president of the Confederate States of America.  Alexander Stephens of Georgia was elected vice president.

There were no nominating conventions and no popular vote.  The executive officers of the Confederacy were chosen in the proverbial smoke-filled rooms by the 38 delegates to the convention of seceded states.  The votes were cast by states; each delegation cast one vote.

By unspoken agreement the delegates shied away from the radical fire-eaters who had done so much to drive the Deep South states out of the Union.  They wanted to show the border states and the world that this was a nation of moderate men who had no choice but to leave the Union and form their own government.

In Tennessee, voters rejected a proposal to call a state convention to consider secession.  The proposal was defeated by a vote of 68,282 to 59,449, with most of the pro-Union vote coming from the mountainous eastern part of the state.

At Pensacola, Florida, the U.S.S. Brooklyn arrived with supplies and reinforcements for Fort Pickens.  These were not landed; the federal government and the State of Florida had reached an agreement that no changes would be made on either side.

January 24, 1861

On Thursday, January 24, 1861, Georgia state troops captured the U.S. Arsenal at Augusta.

Also, Federal troops set sail from Fort Monroe, Virginia, to reinforce the garrison at Fort Pickens in Pensacola, Florida.

January 18, 1861

On Friday, January 18, 1861, the Federal Army garrisoned Fort Jefferson on Dry Tortugas off Key West, Florida.  The fort was used as a federal prison during the war. Dr. Samuel Mudd, Edmund Spangler, Samuel Arnold, and Michael O'Laughlen, co-conspirators in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, would be imprisoned there in 1865.

Florida authorities again demanded the surrender of Fort Pickens at Pensacola and were again refused.

January 12, 1861

On Saturday, January 12, 1861, in Florida, state authorities demanded the surrender of Fort Pickens at Pensacola, but were refused.  State troops took over the other forts and the Navy Yard at Pensacola with no resistance.

Also on this date, the State of Mississippi recalled its representatives from the U. S. House. 

In New York, the Star of the West arrived from Charleston with the supplies and troops for Fort Sumter still aboard.

January 10, 1861

On Thursday, January 10, 1861, Florida became the third state to secede from the Union.  A state convention voted for secession 62 to 7.

At Pensacola, the Federal troops under Lieutenant A. G. Slemmer abandoned Fort Barrancas and moved to Fort Pickens on Santa Rosa Island.

In Louisiana, Braxton Bragg and the state militia seized Forts Jackson and St. Philip and the arsenal at Baton Rouge.  William Tecumseh Sherman, then the head of the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy (later Louisiana State University), called Bragg's actions "an act of war and a breach of common decency."  He resigned his post in protest but agreed to stay on until he could turn the school over to a successor.

In one of the more comic episodes of these final prewar days, the citizens of Smithville and Wilmington, North Carolina came down with secession fever and seized Forts Johnson and Caswell.  A few days later Governor John W. Ellis ordered the forts returned; North Carolina had not seceded and was not really even considering it.  The two caretakers, who had demanded receipts for the property, told the citizens they would take the forts back "if there was none of it broken, or none of the ammunition expended."