“I hereby call attention to the Proclamation of his Excellency Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, under date of the 27th April, 1861, for an efficient blockade of the ports of Virginia and North Carolina, and warn all persons interested that I have a sufficient naval force there for the purpose of carrying out that Proclamation.
“All vessels passing the Capes of Virginia, coming from a distance and ignorant of the Proclamation, will be warned off, and those passing Fortress Monroe will be required to anchor under the guns of the fort, and subject themselves to an examination.
“United States’ Flagship Cumberland, off
“Fortress Monroe, Virginia, April 30, 1861.
(Signed) “G. J. Pendergrast,
“Commanding Home Squadron.”
This proclamation is worth careful perusal for two reasons: The first reason is that it contained an untrue statement. Instead of having “sufficient naval force” “for an efficient blockade of the ports of Virginia and North Carolina,” he had barely enough for Virginia alone. Wilmington was a most important harbor of the South; it eventually became the favorite with blockade-runners, but there was not a ship ready to close it for many weeks after this proclamation was issued.
More important still is the second reason for reading the proclamation carefully—the fact that it was issued at the behest of the Navy Department, and illustrates clearly the department’s idea of a blockade at that time. It is necessary to say here that, owing to the excitement of the times, the government was making a very grave error—it was trying to establish a “paper blockade.” That is to say, there was a determined effort made to interdict trade where there was no blockade de facto—not a ship, or a rowboat even, stationed to close the port. And this was a most remarkable undertaking, because the “free trade” for which the War of 1812 was waged was the freedom to trade in any belligerent port not actually closed by the presence of a warship. The government was sacrificing a great principle for the sake of a temporary advantage.
This was not due to the mistake of a naval officer. It was the deliberate action of the administration, and it is not unlikely that it will come back, some time, to plague us when we are the neutral nation seeking for trade in a belligerent port.
Proof of the fact that the whole Cabinet was involved is found in the correspondence of Mr. Seward relating to the blockade off Charleston. The Niagara had arrived home from Japan on April 24th, and was sent to blockade Charleston as soon as possible, arriving off the bar on May 11th. She remained there four days only, and then went away in search of a ship that was said to be bringing arms from Belgium to a port further south, and there was no warship off that harbor until May 28th (some accounts say the 29th), when the Minnesota came to take the Niagara’s place. The Harriet Lane, a revenue cutter, used as a warship, did lie off the harbor on the 19th, but for thirteen days Charleston was entirely uncovered.
On May 22, 1861, Lord Lyons, the British minister at Washington, in the interest of British ships at Charleston, called the attention of Mr. Seward to the fact that the Niagara had left Charleston on the 15th and that the harbor was thereby opened. Replying to this, Mr. Seward wrote, along with other things, the following:
“The blockade of the port of Charleston has been neither abandoned, relinquished, nor remitted, as the letter of Her Britannic Majesty’s Consul would lead you to infer. We are informed that the Niagara was replaced by the steamer Harriet Lane, but that, owing to some accident, the latter vessel failed to reach the station as ordered until a day or two after the Niagara had left.