Mr. G. V. Fox, afterward Assistant Secretary of the United States Navy, had proposed a plan for reënforcing and furnishing supplies to the garrison of Fort Sumter in February, during the Administration of Mr. Buchanan. In a letter published in the newspapers since the war, he gives an account of the manner in which the proposition was renewed to the new Administration and its reception by them, as follows:
"On the 12th of March I received a telegram from Postmaster-General Blair to come to Washington. I arrived there on the 13th. Mr. Blair having been acquainted with the proposition I presented to General Scott, under Mr. Buchanan's Administration, sent for me to tender the same to Mr. Lincoln, informing me that Lieutenant-General Scott had advised the President that the fort could not be relieved, and must be given up. Mr. Blair took me at once to the White House, and I explained the plan to the President. Thence we adjourned to Lieutenant-General Scott's office, where a renewed discussion of the subject took place. The General informed the President that my plan was practicable in February, but that the increased number of batteries erected at the mouth of the harbor since that time rendered it impossible in March.
"Finding that there was great opposition to any attempt at relieving Fort Sumter, and that Mr. Blair alone sustained the President in his policy of refusing to yield, I judged that my arguments in favor of the practicability of sending in supplies would be strengthened by a visit to Charleston and the fort. The President readily agreed to my visit, if the Secretary of War and General Scott raised no objection.
"Both these gentlemen consenting, I left Washington on the 19th of March, and, passing through Richmond and Wilmington, reached Charleston on the 21st."
Thus we see that, at the very moment when Mr. Secretary Seward was renewing to the Confederate Government, through Judge Campbell, his positive assurance that "the evacuation would take place," this emissary was on his way to Charleston to obtain information and devise measures by means of which this promise might be broken.
On his arrival in Charleston, Mr. Fox tells us that he sought an interview with Captain Hartstein, of the Confederate Navy, and through this officer obtained from Governor Pickens permission to visit Fort Sumter. He fails, in his narrative, to state what we learn from Governor Pickens himself,[157] that this permission was obtained "expressly upon the pledge of 'pacific purposes.'" Notwithstanding this pledge, he employed the opportunity afforded by his visit to mature the details of his plan for furnishing supplies and reënforcements to the garrison. He did not, he says, communicate his plan or purposes to Major Anderson, the commanding officer of the garrison, having discernment enough, perhaps, to divine that the instincts of that brave and honest soldier would have revolted at and rebuked the duplicity and perfidy of the whole transaction. The result of his visit was, however, reported at Washington, his plan was approved by President Lincoln, and he was sent to New York to make arrangements for putting it in execution.
"In a very few days after" (says Governor Pickens, in the message already quoted above), "another confidential agent, Colonel Lamon, was sent by the President [Mr. Lincoln], who informed me that he had come to try and arrange for the removal of the garrison, and, when he returned from the fort, asked if a war-vessel could not be allowed to remove them. I replied that no war-vessel could be allowed to enter the harbor on any terms. He said he believed Major Anderson preferred an ordinary steamer, and I agreed that the garrison might be thus removed. He said he hoped to return in a very few days for that purpose."
This, it will be remembered, occurred while Mr. Fox was making active, though secret, preparations for his relief expedition.
Colonel, or Major, Lamon, as he is variously styled in the correspondence, did not return to Charleston, as promised. About the 30th of March (which was Saturday) a telegram from Governor Pickens was received by the Commissioners in Washington, making inquiry with regard to Colonel Lamon, and the meaning of the protracted delay to fulfill the promise of evacuation. This was fifteen days after the original assurance of Mr. Seward that the garrison would be withdrawn immediately, and ten days after his explanation that the delay was "accidental." The dispatch of Governor Pickens was taken by Judge Campbell to Mr. Seward, who appointed the ensuing Monday (1st of April) for an interview and answer. At that interview Mr. Seward informed Judge Campbell that "the President was concerned about the contents of the telegram—there was a point of honor involved; that Lamon had no agency from him, nor title to speak."[158] (This late suggestion of the point of honor would seem, under the circumstances, to have been made in a spirit of sarcastic pleasantry, like Sir John Falstaff's celebrated discourse on the same subject.) The only substantial result of the conversation, however, was the written assurance of Mr. Seward, to be communicated to the Commissioners, that "the Government will not undertake to supply Fort Sumter without giving notice to Governor Pickens."
This, it will be observed, was a very material variation from the positive pledge previously given, and reiterated, to the Commissioners, to Governor Pickens, and to myself directly, that the fort was to be forthwith evacuated. Judge Campbell, in his account of the interview, says: "I asked him [Mr. Seward] whether I was to understand that there had been a change in his former communications. His answer was, 'None.'"[159]
About the close of the same week (the first in April), the patience of the Commissioners having now been wellnigh exhausted, and the hostile preparations of the Government of the United States, notwithstanding the secrecy with which they were conducted, having become matter of general rumor, a letter was addressed to Mr. Seward, upon the subject, by Judge Campbell, in behalf of the Commissioners, again asking whether the assurances so often given were well or ill founded. To this the Secretary returned answer in writing: "Faith as to Sumter fully kept. Wait and see."
This was on the 7th of April.[160] The very next day (the 8th) the following official notification (without date or signature) was read to Governor Pickens, of South Carolina, and General Beauregard, in Charleston, by Mr. Chew, an official of the State Department (Mr. Seward's) in Washington, who said—as did a Captain or Lieutenant Talbot, who accompanied him—that it was from the President of the United States, and delivered by him to Mr. Chew on the 6th—the day before Mr. Seward's assurance of "faith fully kept."