Between the Lines: Secret Service Stories Told Fifty Years After

by Henry Bascom Smith

FILE IV.

A taste of the Draft Riots, July 13, 1863, when conveying wounded Confederates from Gettysburg to David's Island, New York Harbor—Governor Seymour's questionable conduct—A mysterious Mr. Andrews of Virginia— "Knights of the Golden Circle"—"Sons of Liberty" and a North Western Confederacy—Uncle Burdette—The Laurel incident.

I had a little taste of the draft riots during that memorable week beginning July 13th, 1863. I was ordered to David's Island, New York Harbor, with seven hundred wounded Confederates from Gettysburg. The demonstrations of the mob of onlookers in Philadelphia were so very unfriendly that we had to use the butts of our muskets to control the crowd. They threatened us saying, "to-morrow will be our day." I understood the threat when I learned later of the rioting. We were advised that our train was to be intercepted before reaching New York, and transportation was, therefore, furnished on the steamer "Commodore," by the outside course. After leaving our prisoners at David's Island, we landed at the Battery, and there I addressed my men, cautioning them not to reply to any assault unless ordered by me. We marched up Broadway to the City Hall Barracks (where the New York Post Office now stands) and stacked arms inside the enclosure. I was proud of my men. Each one appeared a giant, steady, firm of step, lips compressed; two-thirds of them were foreign born, yet no better Americans ever paraded Broadway.

Immediately after stacking arms, a lot of rioters who had just overcome their guards, seized our stacks. Our boys jumped on them and I had a big job to keep them from crushing their ribs. Exceeding my orders, I permitted my men to visit their homes, to report back at midnight. The cars were running but had no passengers. I rode on the Eighth Avenue car to 48th Street, my home. Our house was locked, but Cousin Wilbur F. Strong was there alone. He said Brother A. P. had taken the family into the country for safety. A. P.'s loyalty had made him a "marked man," and he had been threatened. After eating, Wilbur and I walked down to John Hardy's, in 35th Street. Stores were all closed, no one on the streets but an occasional corner loafer, who snarled at us. Hardy had been hiding his colored servant in the coal cellar, to save her life. Wilbur afterwards entered the service, and went on the "Hunter raid" up the Shenandoah Valley in 1864. He died from the exhaustion of the marches.

At midnight every man was behind his stacked arms, ready for duty. The city was deserted, as if plague stricken. I shall never forget the desolation.

Ostensibly the draft was the excuse, but with the moving spirits it was but a subterfuge. The ring-leader of the mobs in New York was a mysterious stranger, a "Mr. Andrews" of Virginia. On July 13th, 1863, at 40th Street and Fourth Avenue, while the firemen were at work in Third Avenue, he ascended a shanty which stood opposite the burning ruins. Thousands were assembled behind this shanty in an open space of untilled ground, and the Virginian orator proceeded to address them. He cried out that he wished he had the lungs of a stentor and that there was a reporter present to take down his words; he said he had lately addressed them in Cooper Institute, where he told them Mr. Lincoln wanted to tear the hardworking man from his wife and family and send him to the war; he denounced Mr. Lincoln for his conscription bill which was in favor of the rich and against the poor man; he called him a Nero and a Caligula for such a measure, etc. He then advised the people to organize to resist the draft and appoint their leader, and if necessary he would be their leader (uproarious cheers). Immediately after, the mob destroyed a beautiful dwelling at Lexington Avenue and 47th Street. And they did organize. Mounted leaders were seen to give orders to subordinate leaders of mobs; one of these mounted men rode on horseback into the hardware store of Hiram Jelliffe in Ninth Avenue and seized what arms and powder he had. Mr. Jelliffe afterwards identified him as a clerk in one of the City departments.

Governor Horatio Seymour, in answer to a call from Washington, had hurried off the militia to Pennsylvania. He made a memorable speech standing upon the City Hall steps, in which he addressed the rioters as "my friends." A report of it says: "Standing near him on the steps was a ring-leader of a mob, who had just made an inflammatory speech and who had recently come from an assault on the 'Tribune.'" The "Tribune" (editorially) said practically that: "the sending of the militia out of New York was with a knowledge that it would be desirable to have them away when his (the Governor's) 'friends' wanted to riot." I am aware that Governor Seymour has been a sort of idol with many, and that if I lay my poor weak tongue on his fair name, I will incur their displeasure; but I have always disliked shams.

Not wishing to be tedious, I want to recall that when the war broke out the Confederacy was thoroughly equipped to take its place as a fully organized nation at once. This fact was commented on and efforts were made to explain how it was accomplished. No comprehensive history of the struggle can be written that does not include the secret societies that abetted. They played as important a part as did the army which opposed us, and was vastly more dangerous by reason of the insidious character of its movements.

One State after another swung into line under some mysterious talisman, although there was a strong sentiment against leaving the Union.

In delving into affairs generally, I became possessed of information that, so far as I know, has never been in print. I learned that a secret organization known as the "Knights of the Golden Circle" was the nucleus of the Confederacy. That under its secret fostering the Confederacy was fully developed, ready to take its place among the nations. That the Knights were an outgrowth of the defunct "Know Nothing" society that had become disrupted on the subject of the extension of slavery (which also divided churches). That as soon as the Confederacy was in the saddle, no longer were there any initiations into the "Knights of the Golden Circle," but a subordinate society was organized to do further work, i. e., to further disrupt the Union. This society was known as the "Sons of Liberty."