According to the Library of Congress photographer Andrew J. Russell spent some time at the corner of Carey and Governor streets 150 years ago this month.
“Ruins in Richmond, cor. Carey and Governor Sts.” (May 1865, Library of Congress)
“Ruins in Richmond, Va.” (May 1865, Library of Congress)
An editorial wasn’t too happy that William T. Sherman kept reporters away from General Johnston’s April 26, 1865 surrender; apparently General Sherman thought the Confederate officers would be embarrassed giving up in front of the gawking Yankee press. America would never be reconstructed if the North remained servile to the South. The nation needed to be re-founded on mutual respect.
From The New-York Times May 10, 1865:
Rebel Sensitiveness.
Our government was conducted for eighty years on the principle that the great object of its existence and the first duty of every good citizen at the North was to keep Southerners in good humor. To say anything that hurt their feelings, to refuse them anything they demanded, to hint even in the mildest manner that the Free States could exist without them, that the withdrawal of their custom or countenance would not ruin everybody at the North and bring up the grass in all our streets, came at last to be considered little short of fratricidal. The theory of the advocates of this policy was, that it was thus and only thus that brotherly feeling between the people of the two sections could be kept up and the Union be preserved.
still high-toned Southern ladies? (by Alfred R. Waud in Harper’s Weekly, June 3, 1865)
The actual result was that the mass of the Southern people conceived for the people of the North a contempt and hatred, for which there are few, if any, parallels in history. The very name of “Yankee” came to be a synonym in the Slave States for meanness and cowardice; and by a diligent nursing of these feelings on the part of the leaders, the whole South worked itself up into the belief, first, that it was impossible to live under the same government with such miserable wretches, and second, that there would be no difficulty in breaking-loose from them.
Now, although we have taken in these columns the strongest ground against all displays of vindictiveness against the Southern people, and although we would not willingly see the slightest trace of conquest linger either in our legislation or our manners, we have no hesitation in predicting, that unless Northern generals and politicians, and the Northern public, make up their minds that the “feelings” of the people in South Carolina or Virginia are of the same degree of respectability as those of the people in Massachusetts or Ohio, and no greater, and do not deserve and ought not to receive one whit more consideration, we shall never be able to live together in peace and harmony. There can be no sure and lasting foundation for union except mutual respect. It there is to be on our side the old fawning and servility and deference, and on the side of the South the old arrogance and assumption which fawning and servility always either breed or nurse, mutual respect cannot grow up, and we can never become in feeling, as we are in fact and in law, one people.
sensitivity training (General Sherman and staff, May 1865)
These remarks have been suggested to us by the extraordinary precaution adopted by Gen. SHERMAN to save the feelings of the officers of JOHNSTON’s army from being “hurt,” by refusing newspaper correspondents permission to be present at the formal surrender. These officers, have, without the smallest provocation, and in defence of a cause in which the civilized world, has been for very shame, if for no better reason, compelled to set the seal of execration, deluged this continent for four years in blood; have slain and crippled the flower of our young men, have witnessed, if not with approval with perfect indifference, the slow torture of unarmed prisoners, and have, during all that period, we venture to say, never put pen to paper without pouring out a flood of abuse on this people and government. They have protracted their resistance, too, as long as was possible. They lay down their arms now, simply and solely because the further prolongation of hostilities would entail their total destruction. Our armies have hunted them down; the people of the North have kept the ranks of these armies full; have supplied without stint everything that the struggle called for; have fought on for four long years in silence, under a great cloud of misrepresentation and misconstruction, with the whole of Europe uniting with the Confederacy in reviling and slandering them, without ever abating one jot of heart or hope.
what the surrender house looked like (photo c.1904)
And now, when the long agony is over, when this desperate horde has been driven to the wall, and forced with the bayonet at their throats, to agree to go home and earn a peaceful livelihood and obey the laws, their nerves are discovered to be so exceedingly delicate, their temperament so sensitive, and their pride a thing so tender, so worthy of our respect and consideration, that a newspaper cannot be permitted to report how they looked when they signed the capitulation, or even to describe the house in which it took place. And what makes this squeamishness all the more singular is that these very men, whose surrender has to be made pleasant for them in this way, are persons for whose “feelings” Congress has had so little respect as to confiscate their property, to declare them incapable of holding office, and who are, under the late President’s proclamation, stripped of all civil rights, and exposed to all the pains and penalties of treason. Can there be anything more maudlin than the tenderness which shrouds in mystery the surrender of his sword by a rebel, whom you have already outlawed, and on the atrocity of whose crime the press, the pulpit, and every member of the government, from the President down, have for years past been incessantly ringing changes?
no remorse (Library of Congress, Music Division.)
We could excuse this scrupulous deference to their pride and fastidiousness, if their surrender were really an expression of contrition. We should be sorry to advocate, for anybody’s gratification, the exposure of any penitent to the gaze of unfriendly curiosity. But neither LEE nor JOHNSTON, nor any of their officers, have given the smallest sign of repentance. They have never uttered one expression of regret for the breach of their oaths, the desertion of their colors, and their four years’ struggle to destroy the government under which they were born, which educated them, and from which they had received nothing but kindness and consideration. They boast to this hour that they give up their swords only in obedience to stern necessity; because fighting has become useless, defeat certain. Under all these circumstances, we confess we can see in the pains taken to conceal the final evidence of the triumph of the law from the gaze of the public nothing but an unworthy and unbecoming revival of the flunkeyism which so long disgraced us, and something very like an impertinence to the army and the people.
CSA’s death “gave freedom to the slave.” ( Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Alfred Whital Stern Collection of Lincolniana. )
![Interesting questions & answers relative to the 7-30 U. S. Loan ... For sale by Jay Cooke & Co., at the Philadelphia and Washington Office ... [1865]. (LOC: http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/AMALL:@field%28NUMBER+@band%28rbpe+2350210a%29%29)](https://www.bluegrayreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/7-30-loan-qa.jpg)
7-30 Q&A (( Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections Division.)
… by a whole lot of debt
A British publication related the American Civil War debt to the “the safety and expediency of democratic rule.” – especially given a democracy’s aversion to free trade. From The New-York Times May 8, 1865:
THE FINANCIAL PROBLEM IN AMERICA.
From the London Times, April 25.
The war excitement in America being now at an end, the finance question becomes the grand one. During the next three months the most extensive speculative operations of the two hemispheres will depend upon it, and a correct resume of its present position in therefore a critical requirement. On the 31st ult. the United States debt was £473,000,000, of which £290,000,000 bears interest payable in coin, and £105,000,000 consists of currency. Of this total £70,000,000 had been created during the preceding five months, and as there are immense arrears due to the army and in other quarters, and the existing rate of expenditure cannot be immediately stopped, it may be assumed as a moderate estimate that, even supposing everything now to progress quietly toward a general adjustment, the aggregate must on the winding up be raised to at least £550,000,000. At present the portion of debt consisting of currency bears no interest, but it is admitted that a large part of this must be funded, and even if we allow £50,000,000 to be kept out, we have a total of £500,000,000 left, on which, under the most favorable circumstances, it is impossible to calculate that an interest less than six per cent. will have to be paid. The annual burden, therefore, will be equal to that of a three per cent. debt of a thousand millions sterling, or about one-fourth more than that of Great Britain. Thus, supposing the disposition and ability of the people of each country to meet their obligations be the same, the United States would still stand at a great disadvantage. It is next to be borne in mind that the South having been vanquished, more than one-fourth of the population of the rehabilitated Union will be in the position of having to pay interest on a debt created exclusively for their own subjugation, and that this pressure will have to be sustained not only under the suffering occasioned by the destruction of their principal cities and public works, but by the non-recognition of their own property in the shape of Confederate currency and bonds, as well as by the extinction of slave labor, and the consequent peril of results in that respect more or less analogous to those that for a time fell upon our West India Islands. And while one section of the people will have to contribute under these circumstances, the entire Union will, according to English notions, be compelled to struggle under hindrances and disabilities to which even such difficulties would seem light. Although negro slavery is abolished, the Union throughout its whole extent is bound in the shackles of protection and prohibition. The leaders of free trade have been accustomed to paint these as far more destructive to human advancement than any other form of evil that tyranny or selfishness could devise; but the worst shape in which they ever existed in this country was mild in comparison with the fiscal theories now in operation at Washington. Next to these obstacles to the ability to pay, we have to consider the disposition of the people. Of course the natural resources of the United States are such that if the people are prepared to submit to any hardship rather than make default to the public creditor, no mistakes of fiscal or other policy can render them unable to do so. But while it is pleasant to anticipate a course of noble fortitude, we must reason not from sentiment, but experience. Previously to the commencement of the war, five of the thirty-three States of the Union, North and South, had for more then a quarter of a century persisted in the practice of open repudiation, and the total for which this discredit in the eyes of the whole world was deliberately incurred was only about four or five millions sterling. Since the commencement of the war Pennsylvania, the second State in the Union, has distinctly legislated for repudiation by repealing the law under which all her debts were contracted, and by which she was bound to pay interest in coin. In the Western States protests have been put forth that the war debt, having for the most part been raised to promote the gains of the protected manufacturers and contractors of the New-England States, will not be regarded as binding whenever a question on the subject can be discussed, and in New-York the principal and most respectable journals have for weeks past been engaged in pointing out that unless some means can be devised for clearing off the whole debt in two or three years it will certainly be repudiated, since the people will never bear the hopeless continuance of such a weight. Meanwhile, California, whose power and wealth are growing rapidly, wholly ignores all the Federal currency orders, and the Washington government find it prudent not to enforce them. Hence, however much we may desire to feel confidence, it is plain that the prospects of a harmonious determination on the part of Congress for the future to uphold the public credit are not encouraging. It may be urged that the fact of the debt being to a great extent held in small amounts among the American people themselves is favorable, but at least sixty or one hundred millions sterling are held in Europe, and even among the Americans the number of holders compared with non-holders is slight. Already the customs’ duties are inadequate to meet the interest of the proportion if the debt payable in gold, and excise duties and direct taxation of all kinds must not only be continued but greatly increased to supply other wants. It is a peculiar feature of the war that its cessation must be followed, not by lightening, but by a tremendous increase of taxation. Hitherto loans have been obtained for all emergencies, but these must now be discontinued, and in the face of their cessation it is impossible to conceive how the government is to obtain an adequate revenue. All these considerations present themselves, even supposing that henceforth the South is no longer troublesome, that, as far as the internal quiet of the country is concerned, no exceptional expenditure will again be necessary, and that there will be no outlay or armaments to overawe Mexico or Canada. In any case, they form such a combination of trials to be surmounted as has never vet been encountered by any people, and should they be honorably overcome, every friend of civilization will have not merely to rejoice, but to dismiss for the future all fears with regard to the safety and expediency of democratic rule. Hitherto democracies have disappointed their most ardent champions by their uniform and uncompromising hostility to free trade and their proclivities to war; but if the democracy of America now rise to the height of the obligations before them they will set an example of prudence, honesty and self-denial such as the world has never yet witnessed.
Jay Cooke on stimulating subscriptions to the loan (Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections Division)
From The New-York Times
OUR POPULAR LOAN.; A WONDERFUL WEEK’S WORK. More than Forty Millions of Dollars Taken in Six Days–More than Twenty-eight Thousand Subscribers for Small Sums:
PHILADELPHIA, Sunday, May 7.
The country will hear with pride as well as with surprise, that the voluntary subscriptions of the people to the seven-thirty loan for the six workingdays of the last week amounted to the immense sum of $40,387,000.
The amounts daily subscribed throughout the country and reported to JAY COOKE & CO’s agency, were as follows: May 1, $5,175,900; May 2, $5,231,100; May 3, $7,261,300; May 4, $6,103,200; May 5, $7,457,100; May 6, $9,158,400; total, $40,387,100. The number of fifty dollar, one hundred dollar and five hundred dollar contributions to the above amount was 28,240.
The daily subscriptions of working men and women for the week were in number as follows: May 1, 3,625; May 2, 3,652; May 3, 5,081; May 4, 4,271; May 5, 5,210; May 6, 6,401; total, 28,240.
The largest single subscriptions of Saturday were $700,000 from Philadelphia; $350,000 from the National Bank of the Republic, of Boston; $300,000 from the National Bank of the Metropolis, of Washington; from New-York, the Fourth National Bank, $500,000; from the First National Bank of Providence, $140,000; from the Second National Bank of New-Haven, $100,000; from the First National Bank of Baltimore, $100,000.
You can read a 2012 analysis of American Civil War debt here: the debt crisis was political; the American people were willing to be heavily taxed to pay down the debt.
“Wilderness battlefield, April 1866 ” (Library of Congress)
After waxing poetical about the horrors of May 1864, an editorial from 150 years ago seemed to be thankful for peace and quite certain that a positive result of the war was that foreign nations would never dare invade the re-united United States.
From a Seneca County, New York newspaper in May 1865:
London Punch, September 3, 1864
Peace.
What different month of May from the last now breaks upon the woods and valleys and streams of the Wilderness and Spottsvlvania. Where peace now reigns alone in blossom and song, there the armies ef [sic] the Potomac and Virginia, in one continued “red shock of battle blent,” together strewed the field, and crowded the hospital, with the wrecks of fifty thousand men. What a contrast now to that high carnival of death in which the rifle proved more deadly than the cannon, in which men shot at each other with deliberate aim, or in sweeping volley, from amidst thickets of brushwood, from behind sheltering trees, from across narrow brooks – in which hundreds fell at a blow, and blows ceased not for hours, and the fire flashed less in jets than in sheets of flame, and the bullets raised a tempest from side to side, wherein nothing mortal could live, until at last the storm was exhausted by its fury, with its purpose unfulfilled. And yet all that was month’s work of a four year’s war.
London Punch, March 25, 1865
It is a privilege beyond all estimate that we are at last permitted to reckon this war among the things of the past. God grant that this fair continent may never again be reddened by the like of it – that the peace which we have no conquered shall be perpetual against rebellion and all internal violence. Foreign invasion can never happen to us. A wall of brass, reaching to the clouds, could not shield us from that more completely than will the memory of American prowess displayed in this war. There will never be blood stains here that are not made by our own rebellious hands. After the horrors which have been experienced, how can that be? It seems beyond the utmost limits of human madness. – Elmira Gazette.
Fifty-four years later, in the introduction to From the Rapidan to Richmond and the Spottsylvania Campaign (page xii), Thomas Nelson Page agreed that the Civil War developed America’s military prowess but not just to defend itself – America had been able to proactively rescue the world at war:
London Punch, April 29, 1865
Thus, it came about that I promised that when he [William Meade Dame, D.D.] should be ready to publish his reminiscences I would write the introduction for them. My introduction is for a story told from journals and reminiscent of a time in the fierce Sixties when, if passion had free rein, the virtues were strengthened by that strife to contribute so greatly a half century later to rescue the world and make it “safe for Democracy.”
It was the war—our Civil War—that over a half century later brought ten million of the American youth to enroll themselves in one day to fight for America. It was the work in “the Wilderness” and in those long campaigns, on both sides, which gave fibre to clear the Belleau Wood. It was the spirit of the armies of Lee and Grant which enabled Pershing’s army to sweep through the Argonne.
Rome, March 27, 1919.
The cartoons from London Punch would seem to indicate that Britain was aware of America’s increasing might. Nevertheless, in its May 6, 1865 issue it was able to commiserate with America in mourning the assassination of President Lincoln:
cousinly love
“Yellow Jack monster”
From The New-York Times May 7, 1865:
THE YELLOW FEVER PLOT.; Judicial Investigation at St. George’s–The Evidence Against Blackburn Conclusive.
HALIFAX, N.S., Saturday, May 6.
The Bermuda papers contain long accounts of the judicial investigation, now being held at St. George’s, of the attempt of Dr. BLACKBURN to introduce yellow fever into New-York, Philadelphia and other Northern cities.
BLACKBURN visited Bermuda ostensibly on a philanthropic mission in connection with the causes of yellow fever.
The evidence shows that be collected while there, bedding and clothing taken from fever patients; that he purchased and infected new clothing, which he packed in trunks and left in charge of parties with orders to forward them to New-York in the Spring.
One witness testified that BLACKBURN represented himself as a Confederate agent, whose mission was the destruction of the Northern masses. It was also shown that several persons connected with the agency of the Confederate States were cognizant of these facts.
It is stated that there were ten trunks, three of which have been found and their contents buried by the Board of Health.
BLACKBURN is well known in these Provinces as a leading and ultra rebel.
Luke Pryor Blackburn was a physician and Confederate sympathizer from Kentucky. In 1864 he worked in Bermuda to help victims of a major Yellow Fever outbreak. Bermuda was a base for Confederate blockade runners. A Confederate double agent in Canada accused Dr. Blackburn of the plot to send contaminated clothing to the northern United States. Bermuda authorities found trunks of contaminated clothing in a hotel in St. George’s. Dr. Blackburn had allegedly contracted with the hotel owner to temporarily store the trunks. The Times report must be about the hotel owner’s trial in Bermuda. Canadian authorities arrested Dr. Blackburn on May 19, 1865. He was acquitted; much later in his life he said the charges were “preposterous”. Historians disagree about the strength of the charges.
The doctor would later serve as Kentucky’s 28th governor. In 1900 Walter Reed proved that yellow fever was caused by mosquitoes, not contact with contaminated clothing.
Bennett House where Johnston surrendered
The Democrat Reveille found some kind words to write about Abraham Lincoln after his death. It seems that Southerners and Northern Democrats appreciated President Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address and the lenient terms of surrender offered Southern armies. Here a presumably Democrat newspaper (and probably the Reveille) pinned the entire blame for the war on Abolitionism and was certain that Reconstruction would go much better because Andrew Johnson was president. Unlike Abraham Lincoln, Mr. Johnson would not become beholden to the abolitionists.
From a Seneca County, New York newspaper in May 1865:
The War Drawing to a Close.
NY Times 4-29-1865
Thank Heaven this monstrous war is drawing to a close. The surrender of the rebel army under Gen. Johnston, to Sherman, virtually ends the contest so far as military force can end it. The South desire peace and are willing to yield to the Government, when they become convinced that the Government will not be wielded to oppress them. Thus this long, bloody war terminates, by negotiation, by concession and compromise. The same end could have been attained without the shedding of human blood, but Abolitionism in control of the Government willed otherwise. Had Mr. Lincoln and his advisers pledged themselves, upon their accession to power four years ago, to administer the Government as did their predecessors, and in accordance with the decisions of the Supreme Court, Secession and Southern resistance would not have been heard of. What a horrible truth to realize! What an absolute and unavoidable fact, that every life sacrificed and every dollar wasted, was therefore to overthrow the government of Washington, of Jefferson, of Jackson and their successors!
least likely to become a tool of abolitionists (Andrew Johnson)
But the war draws to a close. The Southern States will return to the Union, not as conquered provinces, but as independent sovereignties, possessing all their rights and prerogatives under the Constitution. Abolitionism, thank heaven, has not accomplished its fell purpose, in the subjugation and degradation of the Southern States. Andrew Johnson and not Abraham Lincoln is President. We have little doubt or misgivings in regard to the course of President Johnson. He, above all other men in the country, is least likely to become a tool of the abolitionists in the work of reconstruction. Never before had any man such a splendid opportunity to write his name upon the brightest page of his country’s history as he. He stands between the living and the dead. He steps upon the stage of action when his country lies torn and bleeding at every pore. His task is to pacify that country – to bind up its wounds and heal its sores, regardless of all interests of party, of all personal feelings and of all past differences. He knows just what this country needs to secure its instant pacification. He must be President of the whole country, and not of the one third, and all will be well.
The reign of monstrous faction that has drenched the country with blood [draws to a close!] ANDREW JOHNSON is President!
mourners in Springfield May 3 0r 4, 1865
From The New-York Times May 5, 1865:
THE BURIAL.; President Lincoln Again at His Western Home. The Mortal, Four Years Absent, Returns Immortal. Close of the Grandest Funeral Procession in History. Two Weeks’ Solemn March Among Millions of Mourners. The Place of Sepulture and the Last Ceremonies. Elequent Funeral Oration by Bishop Simpson. Touching Manifestations by Mr. Lincoln’s Neighbors. SECOND DISPATCH. from the portico of the Capitol. BISHOP SIMPSON’S ADDRESS.
SPRINGFIELD, Ill., Thursday, May 4.
The already large number of visitors who have been called here to view the remains of the late President LINCOLN, was increased last night and this morning by numerous arrivals from all quarters.
The remains will be accompanied to the vault by a military and civic procession.
The ground selected for the burial is exceedingly beautiful.
The weather is clear and calm.
The Lincolns’ Springfield home draped in mourning May 4, 1865
SPRINGFIELD, Ill., Thursday, May 4.
Large numbers have continued to visit the former residence of the late President, on the corner of Eighth and Jefferson streets. It is hung with mourning without, and tastefully decorated within.
Large delegations from the adjoining States and neighboring settlements arrived through the night, and this morning the hotels are overflowing. Some of the visitors are being entertained by the citizens, while thousands of others are unable to find accommodations.
The weather is warm and the sun unclouded. Everybody in Springfield are on the streets. The State House continued to be visited. At 11 o’clock last night, the ladies of the Soldiers’ Aid Society laid upon the coffin a beautiful cross of evergreens, studied with rare flowers. Other similar tokens have been contributed to-day.
Springfield welcomes Mr. Lincoln home
At noon, twenty-one guns were fired, and afterward, single guns at intervals of ten minutes. About noon, the remains were brought from the State House and placed in the hearse, which was from St. Louis, and was used at the funerals of Hon. THOMAS H. BENTON, Gen. LYON and Gov. GAMBLE. The hearse was surmounted by a magnificent crown of flowers. Meanwhile, a chorus of hundreds of voices, accompanied by a brass band, sang the hymn,
“Children of the heavenly King,
Let us journey as we sing,”
The funeral procession was under the immediate direction of Major-Gen. HOOKER, Marshal-in-Chief; Brig.-Gen. COOK and staff, and Brevet Brig.-Gen. OAKES and staff. The military and the firemen made a fine appearance. The guard of honor consisted of Gen. Barnard, Rear-Admiral Davis, and Gens. McCallum, Ramsay, Caldwell, Thomas, Howe, Townsend and Eakin, and Capt. Field, of the Marine Corps. The relations and family friends of the deceased were in carriages. Among them were Judge DAVIS, of the Supreme Court; the officiating clergyman, Bishop SIMPSON; Dr. GURLEY and others. In the procession were the Governors of six or seven States, members of Congress with their officers, the State and municipal authorities, and delegations from adjoining States. The long line of civilians was closed by the Free Masons, Odd Fellows and citizens at large, including colored persons. The hearse was immediately followed by the horse formerly belonging to Mr. LINCOLN. Its body was covered with black cloth trimmed with silver fringe.
Never before was there so large a military and civic display in Springfield. There were immense crowds of people in the immediate vicinity of the Capitol to see the processio nas it passed, and the people for several miles occupied the sidewalks.
The procession arrived at Oakwood Cemetery at 1 o’clock. On the left of the vault in which the remains of the President and his son were deposited immediately on their arrival, was a platform, on which singers and an instrumental band were in place, and these united in the chanting and singing of appropriate music, including a burial hymn by the deceased President’s Pastor, Rev. Dr. GURLEY. On the right was the speaker’s stand, appropriately draped with mourning.
A short time ago, a piece of property containing sight acres, and located in the heart of the city, was purchased by the citizens for $53,400. The ground is improved with several substantial houses, and trees and shrubbery. It was designed to render the site additionally beautiful and attractive, and to erect thereon a monument to the illustrious dead. A vault has been completed for the reception of the remains, but owing to the wishes of ROBERT LINCOLN, the remains were deposited in Oak Ridge Cemetery nearly two miles from the city. The vault at this place is erected at the foot of a knoll in a beautiful part of the grounds, which contains forest trees of all varieties. It has a doric gable resting on pilasters, the main wall being rustic. The vault is fifteen feet high and about the same in width, with semi-circular wings of bricks projecting from the hillsides. The material is limestone, procured at Joliet, Illinois. Directly inside of the ponderous doors is an iron grating. The interior walls are covered with black velvet, dotted with evergreens. In the centre of the velvet is a foundation of brick, capped with a marble slab, on which the coffin rests. The front of the vault is trimmed with evergreens. The “Dead March” in Saul was sung, accompanied by the band, as the remains were deposited.
Thousands of persons were assembled at the cemetery before the arrival of the procession, occupying the succession of green hills. The scene was one of solemnly intense interest. The landscape was beautiful in the light of an unclouded sun.
The religious exercises were commenced by the singing of a dirge. Then followed the reading of appropriate portions of the Scriptures and a prayer. After a hymn by the choir, Rev. Mr. HUBBARD read the last inaugural of President LINCOLN. Next a dirge was sung by the choir, when Bishop SIMPSON delivered the funeral oration. It was in the highest degree eloquent, and the patriotic portions of it was applauded. Then followed another hymn, when benediction was pronounced by Rev. Dr. GURLEY. The procession then returned to the city.
We have followed the remains of President LINCOLN from Washington, the scene of his assassination, to Springfield, his former home, and now to be his final resting-place. He had been absent from this city ever since he left it in February, 1861, for the national Capital, to be inaugurated as President of the United States. We have seen him lying in state in the executive mansion, where the obsequies were attended by numerous mourners, some of them clothed with the highest public honors and responsibilities which our republican institutions can bestow, and by the diplomatic representatives of foreign governments. We have followed the remains from Washington through Baltimore, Harrisburgh, Philadelphia, New-York, Albany, Buffalo, Cleveland, Columbus, Indianapolis and Chicago to Springfield, a distance in circuit of 1,500 or 1,800 miles. On the route millions of people have appeared to manifest by every means of which they are capable, their deep sense of the public loss, and their appreciation of the many virtues which adorned the life of ABRAHAM LINCOLN. All classes, without distinction of politics or creeds, spontaneously united in the posthumous honors. All hearts seemed to beat as one at the bereavement, and, now funeral processions are ended, our mournful duty of escorting the mortal remains of ABRAHAM LINCOLN hither is performed. We have seen them deposited in the tomb. The bereaved friends, with subdued and grief-stricken hearts, have taken their adieu and turn their faces homeward, ever to remember the affecting and impressive scenes which they have witnessed. The injunction, so often repeated on the way, “Bear him gently to his rest,” has been obeyed, and the great heart of the nation throbs heavily at the portals of the tomb.
BISHOP SIMPSON’S ADDRESS
FELLOW-CITIZENS OF ILLINOIS AND OF MANY PARTS OF OUR ENTIRE UNION: Near the capital of this large and growing State of Illinois, in the midst of this beautiful grove and at the open mouth of the vault which has just received the remains of our fallen Chieftain, we gather to pay a tribute of respect and drop the tears of sorrow around the ashes of the mighty dead. A little more than four years ago, from his plain and quiet home in yonder city, he started, receiving the parting words of the concourse of friends who gathered around him and in the middle of the dropping of the gentle shower he told of the pains of parting from the place where his children had been born and his home had been made so pleasant by early recollections. And as he left he made an earnest request in the hearing of some who are present, that as he was about to enter upon responsibilities which he believed to be greater than any which had fallen upon any man since the days of WASHINGTON, the people would offer up their prayers that God would aid and sustain him in the work they had given him to do. His company left your quiet city. But as it went, snares were in waiting for the Chief Magistrate. Scarcely did he escape the dangers of the way or the hands of the assassin as he neared Washington; and I believe he escaped only through the vigilance of the officers and the prayers of the people; so that the blow was suspended for more than four years, which was at last permitted, through the providence of God, to fall. … Many said: Is it possible to save our nation? Some in our country, and nearly all the leading men in other countries, declared it to be impossible to maintain the Union, and many an honest heart was deeply pained with apprehensions of common ruin, and many in grief, and almost in despair, anxiously inquired what shall the end of these things be. In addition, the wives had given their husbands, mothers their sons. In the pride and joy of their hearts, they saw them put on the uniform, they saw them take the martial step, and they tried to hide their deep feelings of sadness. Many dear ones slept on the battle-field, never, never, to return again; and there was mourning in every mansion and in every cabin in our broad land. Then came a feeling to deepen sadness, as the story came of prisoners tortured to death or starved through the mandates of those who are called the representatives of the chivalry, or who claim to be the honorable ones of the earth; and as we read the stories of frames attenuated and reduced to mere skeletons, our grief turned partly into honor and partly into a cry for vengeance. Then the feeling was changed to one of joy. There came signs of the end of this rebellion. We followed the career of our glorious Generals. We saw our army under the command of the brave officer who is guiding this procession, climb up the heights of Lookout Mountain and drive the rebels from their strongholds. Another brave General swept through Georgia, South and North Carolina, and drove the combined armies of the rebels before him; while the honored Lieutenant-General held LEE and his hosts in a death grasp. Then the tidings came that Richmond was evacuated, and that LEE had surrendered. The bells’ rang merrily all over the land. The booming of cannon was heard. Illuminations and torchlight processions manifested the general joy, and families were looking for the speedy return of their loved ones from the field of battle. Just in the midst of the wildest joy, in one hour — nay, in one moment — the tidings rang throughout the land that ABRAHAM LINCOLN, the best of Presidents, had perished by the hand of an assassin. And then all that feeling which had been gathering for four years in forms of excitement, grief, honor and joy, turned into one wail of woe — a sadness inexpressible; anguish unutterable. … Though the evening was Good Friday, the saddest day in the calendar for the Christian church — henceforth in this country to be made sadder if possible by the memory of our nation’s loss. And so filled with grief was every Christian’s heart that even all the joyous thought of Easter Sunday, failed to remove the crushing sorrow, under which the true worshiper bowed in the house of God. But the great cause of this mourning is to be found in the man himself. Mr. LINCOLN was no ordinary man, and I believe the conviction has been growing on the nation’s mind, as it certainly has been on my own, espcially in the last years of his administration. By the hand of God, he was especially singled out to guide our government in these troublesome times, and it seems to me that the hand of God may be traced in many of the events connected with his history. …
[The report is unfinished in consequence of the bad working of the wires.]
From a Seneca County, New York newspaper in 1865:
When J. Wilkes Booth played in Buffalo three years ago, he broke a plate glass window in the store of O.E. Sibley, where a lot of rebel trophies were exhibited. He was arrested, paid the damage and a fine of fifty dollars, and the affair was kept out of the newspapers. He broke the window in his rage at seeing the exhibition of weapons taken from the rebels.
![Satan tempting Booth to the murder of the President ([Philadelphia] : J[ohn] L. Magee, pub., 305 Walnut St. Philada., c1865.; LOC: LC-DIG-ppmsca-23846)](https://www.bluegrayreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/23846r.jpg)
“Satan tempting Booth to the murder of the President” (Library of Congress)
“Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase” (Library of Congress)
From The New-York Times May 2, 1865:
AN IMPORTANT MISSION.; Chief Justice Chare Reorganizing the Southern Courts-The Freedom of Commerce.
Special Dispatch to the New-York Times.
WASHINGTON, Monday, May 1.
Chief Justice CHASE was one of a small party who left here at 8 o’clock this evening, in a special vessel, to visit the seaboard cities as far as Galveston if it be found accessible, and thence back to New-Orleans and up the Mississippi.
Chief Justice CHASE’s mission is an important one, and includes, among other things, the reorganization of the United States Courts in the South.
W.P. MELLEN, General Supervising Agent of the Treasury Department, left upon the same vessel, with instructions to see that the President’s proclamation, removing restrictions upon commercial intercourse, etc., be fully and promptly carried out.
Another pleasing coincidence, given that I took the Richmond Daily Dispatch for fours years, until earlier this month. During the federal occupation of Richmond the Confederate flag flying over the newspaper’s office was captured and brought north to Rochester, New York.
From a Seneca County, New York newspaper in April 1865:
A REBEL FLAG IN ROCHESTER. – The rebel flag which floated over the office of the Richmond Dispatch, was captured by Capt. Remington of Gen. Weitzel’s staff, who brought it to Rochester where it is now on exhibition.
According to the National Archives Captain John E. Remington (fourth from left) is in the following photograph of General Weitzel and staff. There seems to be a discrepancy in dates, but it is possible that Captain Remington has his hand on the shoulder of Johnston de Peyster (De Pryster), who is credited with raising the first Union flag over Richmond on April 3, 1865.
“General Godfrey Weitzel and Staff of Nin[e]teen…”
four flags of the CSA (image c1896)
