“On May 18th, just after the bloody struggle at Spottsylvania, a spurious proclamation, announcing that Grant’s campaign was closed, appointing a day of fasting and humiliation, and ordering a new draft for 400,000 men, appeared in the New York ‘World’ and ‘Journal of Commerce,’ newspapers avowedly hostile to the Administration. The other journals, knowing that this was a forgery, refused to publish it. By order of the President, the offices of these two publications were closed; and, this action being denounced as an outrage on the liberty of the press, Governor Seymour attempted to have General Dix and others indicted for it.” The real authors of the forgery were two men named Howard and Mallison, their object being stock-jobbing purposes.
When General Sigel was defeated, he was relieved by General Hunter, who, at first successful, was at last obliged to retreat before the rebel Early, with very great loss. This placed Hunter in such a position that he could not protect Washington. Early, finding himself unopposed, crossed Maryland, plundered largely, fought several battles with the militia, burned private houses, destroyed the trains on the Washington and Baltimore railroads, and threatened both cities. Then there was great anxiety in the North, for just at that time Grant was in the worst of his great struggle. But when Early was within two miles of Baltimore, he was confronted by the 6th Corps from the Potomac, the 19th from Louisiana, and large forces from Pennsylvania, and driven back. During this retreat, he committed a great outrage. Having entered Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, a peaceful, unfortified town, he demanded 100,000 dollars in gold, to be paid within an hour, and as the money could not be obtained, he burned the place. Meanwhile, Sheridan had made his famous raid round Lee’s lines, making great havoc with rebel stores and lines of transit, but in no manner infringing on the rules of honourable warfare.
During July, 1864, Admiral Farragut, of the Union navy, with a combination of land and sea forces, attacked Mobile. A terrible conflict ensued, resulting in the destruction of a rebel fleet, the capture of the famous armour-ship Tennessee, four forts, and many guns and prisoners. This victory was, however, the only one of any importance gained during this battle-summer. It effectually closed one more port. But the feeling of depression was now so great in the North, owing to the great number of deaths in so many families, that President Lincoln, by special request of the Congress—which adjourned July 4th, 1864—issued a proclamation, appointing a day of fasting and prayer. But two days after, public sorrow was “much alleviated,” says Raymond, “by the news of the sinking of the pirate Alabama” (June 19th) by the Kearsage, commanded by Winslow. Yet for all the grief and gloom which existed, the Union-men of America were never so obstinately determined to resist. The temper of the time was perfectly shown in a pamphlet by Dr. C. J. Stille of Philadelphia, entitled, “How a Free People conduct a long War,” which had an immense circulation, and which pointed out in a masterly manner that all wars waged by a free people for a great principle have progressed slowly and involved untiring vigour. And President Lincoln, when asked what we should do if the war should last for years, replied, “We’ll keep pegging away.” In short, the whole temper of the North was now that of the Duke of Wellington, when he said at Waterloo, “Hard pounding this, gentlemen; but we’ll see who can pound the longest.”
During the summer of 1864, two self-styled agents of the Confederate Government appeared at Clifton, Canada, in company with W. Cornell Jewett, whom Raymond terms an irresponsible and half-insane adventurer, and George Sanders, described as a political vagabond. Arnold states that expeditions to rob and plunder banks over the border, and to fire Northern cities, were subsequently clearly traced to them; “and that there is evidence tending to connect them with crimes of a still graver and darker character.” These men were employed by the Confederate Government, to be acknowledged or repudiated according to the success of their efforts. They induced Horace Greeley to aid them in negotiating for peace, and he wrote to President Lincoln as follows—“I venture to remind you that our bleeding, bankrupt, almost dying country, also longs for peace; shudders at the prospect of fresh conscriptions, of further wholesale devastations, and of new rivers of human blood. I fear, Mr. President, you do not realise how intensely the people desire any peace, consistent with the national integrity and honour.”
To Mr. Lincoln, who firmly believed that the best means of attaining peace was to conquer it, such language seemed out of place. Neither did he believe that these agents had any direct authority, as proved to be the case. After an embarrassing correspondence, the President sent to these “commissioners” a message, to the effect that any proposition embracing the restoration of peace, the integrity of the whole Union, and the abandonment of slavery, would be received by the Government of the United States if coming from an authority that can control the armies now at war with the United States. In answer to this, the agents declared, through Mr. Greeley, that it precluded negotiation, and revealed in the end that the purpose of their proceedings had been to influence the Presidential election. As it was, many were induced to believe that Mr. Lincoln, having had a chance to conclude an honourable peace, had neglected it.
Meanwhile, Mr. Lincoln had the cares of a Presidential campaign on his hands. Such an election, in the midst of a civil war which aroused everywhere the most intense and violent passions, was, as Arnold wrote, a fearful ordeal through which the country must pass. At a time when, of all others, confidence in their great leader was most required, all the slander of a maddened party was let loose upon him. General M‘Clellan, protesting that personally he was in favour of war, became the candidate of those whose watchword was “Peace at any price,” and who embraced all those who sympathised with the South and with slavery. Their “platform” was simply a treasonable libel on the Government, declaring that, “under the pretence of the military necessity of a war-power higher than the Constitution, the Constitution itself has been disregarded in every part, and public liberty and private rights alike trodden down, and the material prosperity of the country essentially impaired; and that justice, humanity, liberty, and the public welfare demand that immediate efforts be made for a cessation of hostilities.”
It was, therefore, distinctly understood that the question at stake in this election was, whether the war should be continued. The ultra-Abolition adherents of General Fremont were willing to see a pro-slavery President elected rather than Mr. Lincoln, so great was their hatred of him and of Emancipation, and they therefore nominated their favourite, knowing that he could not be elected, but trusting to divide and ruin the Lincoln party. But this movement came to an inglorious end. A portion of the Republican party offered the nomination for the Presidency to General Grant, which that honourable soldier promptly declined in the most straightforward manner. As the election drew on, threats and rumours of revolution in the North were rife, and desperate efforts were made by Southern emissaries to create alarm and discontent. But such thorough precautions were taken by the Government, that the election was the quietest ever known, though a very heavy vote was polled. On the popular vote, Lincoln received 2,223,035; M‘Clellan, 1,811,754. The latter carried only three states—New Jersey, Delaware, and Kentucky, while all the others which held an election went to Lincoln. The total number admitted and counted of electoral votes was 233, of which Lincoln and Johnson (Vice-President) had 212, and M‘Clellan and Pendleton 21.
Of this election, the President said, in a speech (November 10th, 1864)—
“So long as I have been here, I have not willingly planted a thorn in any man’s bosom. While I am duly sensible to the high compliment of a re-election, and duly grateful, as I trust, to Almighty God for having directed my countrymen to a right conclusion, as I think, for their good, it adds nothing to my satisfaction that any other man may be disappointed by the result. May I ask those who have not differed with me to join with me in this spirit towards those who have?”
Those who yet believe that the rebels were in the main chivalric and honourable foes, may be asked what would they have thought of the French, if, during the German war, they had sent chests of linen, surcharged with small-pox venom, into Berlin, under charge of agents officially recognised by Government? What would they have thought of Germany, if official agents from that country had stolen into Paris and attempted to burn the city. Yet both of these things were attempted by the agents of the Confederate Government—not by unauthorised individuals. On one night, fires were placed in thirteen of the principal hotels of New York, while, as regards incendiarism, plots were hatched from the beginning in the South to treacherously set fire to Northern cities, to murder their public men, and otherwise make dishonourable warfare, the proof of all this being in the avowals and threats of the Southern newspapers. Immediately after the taking of Nashville by Thomas, the writer, with a friend, occupied a house in that town which had belonged to a rebel clergyman, among whose papers were found abundant proof that this reverend incendiary had been concerned in a plot to set fire to Cincinnati.