Great Britain and the American Civil War

by Ephraim Douglass Adams

In this same letter Lyons dwelt upon the Northern elation over recent military successes. The campaign in the West had been followed in the East by a great effort under McClellan to advance on Richmond up the peninsula of the James river and using Chesapeake Bay as a means of water transportation and supply. This campaign had been threatened by the appearance of the iron-clad ram Merrimac and her attack on the wooden naval vessels operating in support of McClellan, but on March 9 the Monitor, a slow-moving floating iron-clad fortress, drove the Merrimac from her helpless prey, and removed the Southern threat to McClellan's communications. More than any other one battle of the Civil War the duel between the Merrimac and the Monitor struck the imagination of the British people, and justly so because of its significance in relation to the power of the British Navy. It "has been the main talk of the town," wrote Adams, "ever since the news came, in Parliament, in the clubs, in the city, among the military and naval people. The impression is that it dates the commencement of a new era in warfare, and that Great Britain must consent to begin over again[587]." The victory of the Monitor was relatively unimportant in British eyes, but a fight between two completely armoured ships, and especially the ease with which the Merrimac had vanquished wooden ships on the day previous, were cause of anxious consideration for the future. Russell was more concerned over the immediate lessons of the battle. "Only think," he wrote, "of our position if in case of the Yankees turning upon us they should by means of iron ships renew the triumphs they achieved in 1812-13 by means of superior size and weight of metal[588]."

This, however, was but early and hasty speculation, and while American ingenuity and experiment in naval warfare had, indeed, sounded the death-knell of wooden ships of war, no great change in the character of navies was immediately possible. Moreover British shipbuilders could surely keep pace in iron-clad construction with America or any other nation. The success of the Monitor was soon regarded by the British Government as important mainly as indicative of a new energy in the North promising further and more important successes on land. The Government hoped for such Northern success not because of any belief that these would go to the extent of forcing the South into submission, for they were still, and for a long time to come, obsessed with the conviction that Southern independence must ultimately be achieved. The idea was, rather, that the North, having vindicated its fighting ability and realizing that the South, even though losing battle after battle, was stubborn in the will to independence, would reach the conclusion that the game was not worth the price and would consent to separation. Russell wrote in this vein to Lyons, even though he thought that the "morale of the Southern army seems to be ruined for the time[589]." He believed that the end of the war would be hastened by Northern victories, and he therefore rejoiced in them.

Of somewhat like opinion up to the end of March, 1862, Lyons, in April, began to doubt his previous analysis of Northern temper and to write warnings that the end was not near. Grant's hard-won victory in the West at Shiloh, April 6-7, the first great pitched battle of the war, called out such a flood of Northern expressions of determination to drive the war to the bitter end as to startle Lyons and cause him, in a remarkably clear letter of survey, to recast his opinions. He wrote:

"The general opinion is that the Campaign of this Spring will clear up most of the doubts as to the result of the War. If the Military successes of the North continue, the determination of the South, will (it is asserted) be at last really put to the test. If notwithstanding great Military reverses, the loss of the Border States, and the occupation of the most important points on the Coast, the Southern men hold out, if they destroy as they threaten to do, their cotton, tobacco and all other property which cannot be removed and then retire into the interior with their families and slaves, the Northern Conquests may prove to be but barren. The climate may be a fatal enemy to the Federal Armies. The Northern people may be unable or unwilling to continue the enormous expenditure. They may prefer Separation to protracting the War indefinitely. I confess, however, that I fear that a protraction of the War during another year or longer, is a not less probable result of the present posture of affairs, than either the immediate subjugation of the South or the immediate recognition of its independence[590]."

This itemization of Southern methods of resistance was in line with Confederate threats at a moment when the sky looked black. There was indeed much Southern talk of "retiring" into a hypothetical defensible interior which impressed Englishmen, but had no foundation in geographical fact. Meanwhile British attention was eagerly fixed on the Northern advance, and it was at least generally hoped that the projected attack on New Orleans and McClellan's advance up the peninsula toward Richmond would bring to a more definite status the conflict in America. Extreme Southern sympathizers scouted the possibility of any conclusive Northern success, ignoring, because ignorant, the importance of Grant's western campaign. They "were quite struck aback" by the news of the capture of New Orleans, April 25. "It took them three days to make up their minds to believe it[591]," but even the capture of this the most important commercial city of the South was not regarded as of great importance in view of the eastern effort toward Richmond.

News of the operations in the peninsula was as slow in reaching England as was McClellan's slow and cautious advance. It was during this advance and previous to the capture of New Orleans that two remarkable adventures toward a solution in America were made, apparently wholly on individual initiative, by a Frenchman in America and an Englishman in France. Mercier at Washington and Lindsay at Paris conceived, quite independently, that the time had come for projects of foreign mediation.

French opinion, like that expressed in England, appears to have been that the Northern successes in the spring of 1862 might result in such a rehabilitation of Northern self-esteem that suggestions of now recognizing the facts of the situation and acknowledging the independence of the South would not be unfavourably received. In this sense Thouvenel wrote to Mercier, privately, on March 13, but was careful to state that the word "mediation" ought not to be uttered. His letter dilated, also, on French manufacturing difficulties at home due to the lack of cotton[592]. This was in no way an instruction to Mercier, but the ideas expressed were broached by him in a conversation with Seward, only to be met with such positive assertions of intention and ability soon to recover the South as somewhat to stagger the French Minister. He remarked, according to his report to Thouvenel, that he wished it were possible to visit Richmond and assure himself that there also they recognized the truth of Seward's statements, upon which the latter at once offered to further such a trip. Mercier asserted to Thouvenel that he was taken by surprise, having foreseen no such eager acquiescence in a suggestion made without previous thought, but that on consideration he returned to Seward and accepted the proposal, outlining the substance of what he intended to say at Richmond. He should there make clear that the anxiety of France was above all directed toward peace as essential to French commercial interests; that France had always regarded the separation of North and South with regret; that the North was evidently determined in its will to restore the Union; and, in repetition, that France wished to aid in any way possible the early cessation of war. Seward, wrote Mercier, told him to add that he, personally, would welcome "the presence in the Senate" of any persons whom the South wished to elect[593].

Mercier, writes Bancroft, "from the first had been an impatient sympathizer with the Confederacy, and he was quite devoid of the balance and good judgment that characterized Lord Lyons." "Quite unnecessarily, Seward helped him to make the trip[594]." A circumstance apparently not known to Bancroft was Mercier's consultation with Lyons, before departure, in which were revealed an initiative of the adventure, and a proposed representation to the authorities in Richmond materially different from the report made by Mercier to Thouvenel. These merit expanded treatment as new light on a curious episode and especially as revealing the British policy of the moment, represented in the person of the British Minister in Washington[595].

On April 10 Mercier came to Lyons, told him that he was about to set out for Richmond and that he had "been for some little time thinking of making this journey." He told of making the suggestion to Seward, and that this "rather to his surprise" had been "eagerly" taken up.