In short the Congress was full of the best talent of the South. It was by far the best Congress that ever assembled under the new government. It was a convention as well as a Congress, since it was charged with the establishment of a Provisional Government. Every one realized the greatness of the crisis that was upon us, and hence the very best men in the community had been selected to meet the emergency. The harmony of the body was equal to its ability, for, in the course of a few weeks, it had put the complicated machinery of a government in motion, and was already taking active measures for defence, in case the Federal power should decide upon making war upon us.
Mr. Davis, the Provisional President, had preceded me to the capital, only a few days, and my next step was to call upon him. I had known him in the city of Washington. He received me kindly, and almost the first question which he asked me, was whether I had disembarrassed myself of my Federal commission. I replied to him that I had done so, as a matter of course, before leaving Washington, and that my allegiance henceforth belonged to the new government, and to the Southern people. He seemed gratified at this declaration, and entered into a free, and frank conversation with me, on the subject of the want of preparation for defence, in which he found our States, and the great labor that lay before us, to prepare for emergencies. Congress, he said, has not yet had time to organize a navy, but he designed to make immediate use of me, if I had no objection. I told him that my services were at his command, in any capacity he thought fit to employ them. He then explained to me his plan of sending me back to the city of Washington, and thence into the Northern States, to gather together, with as much haste as possible, such persons, and materials of war as might be of most pressing necessity.
The persons alluded to, were to be mechanics skilled in the manufacture, and use of ordnance, and rifle machinery, the preparation of fixed ammunition, percussion caps, &c. So exclusively had the manufacture of all these articles for the use of the United States, been confined to the North, under “the best government the world ever saw,” that we had not even percussion caps enough to enable us to fight a battle, or the machines with which to make them, although we had captured all the forts, and arsenals within our limits, except Fort Sumter and Fort McRae. The President was as calm and unmoved as I had ever seen him, and was living in a very simple, and unpretending style at the Exchange Hotel. He had not yet selected all his Cabinet; nor indeed had he so much as a private secretary at his command, as the letter of instructions which he afterward presented me, for my guidance, was written with his own hand. This letter was very full, and precise, frequently descending into detail, and manifesting an acquaintance with bureau duties, scarcely to have been expected from one who had occupied his exalted positions.
On the next day, I attended the joint-session of the two committees above named. These committees were composed, as was to have been expected, of some of the best men of the Congress. Conrad, Crawford, Curry, and the brilliant young Bartow of Georgia were present, among others whose names I do not now recall. But few naval officers of any rank had as yet withdrawn from the old service; Rousseau, Tattnall, Ingraham, and Randolph were all the captains; and Farrand, Brent, Semmes, and Hartstone were all the commanders. Of these there were present before the committees, besides myself, Rousseau, Ingraham, and Randolph; Major Wm. H. Chase, late of the engineers of the Federal Army, was also present. Randolph commanded the Navy Yard at Pensacola, and Chase the military defences. We discussed the military and naval resources of the country, and devised such means of defence as were within our reach—which were not many—to enable us to meet the most pressing exigences of our situation, and separated after a session of several hours. I can do no more, of course, than briefly glance at these things, as I am not writing, as before remarked, the history of the war.
The next morning I called again on the President, received my instructions, and departed Northward on the mission which had been assigned me. I will be brief in the description of this mission also. I stopped a day at Richmond, and examined the State Arsenal, in charge of Capt. Dimmock, and the Tredegar Iron Works; having been especially enjoined to report upon the present, and future capacity of these works for the casting of cannon, shot, shells, &c. The establishment had already turned its attention in this direction, and I was gratified to find that it was capable of almost indefinite enlargement, and that it could be made a most valuable auxiliary to us. The reader will see how confidently we already reckoned upon the support of Virginia.
Reaching Washington again, I visited the Arsenal, and inspected such of its machinery as I thought worth my notice, particularly an improved percussion-cap machine which I found in operation. I also held conferences with some mechanics, whom I desired to induce to go South. Whilst I was in Washington Mr. Abraham Lincoln, the newly elected President of the United States, arrived, for the purpose of being inaugurated. Being purely a sectional President, and feeling probably that he had no just right to rule over the South, he had come into the city by night, and in disguise, afraid to trust himself among a people of whom he claimed to be Chief Magistrate. Poor old General Winfield Scott was then verging toward senility, and second childhood, and had contributed no little, perhaps, to Mr. Lincoln’s alarm. He had been gathering together troops for some days, in the Federal capital, for the purpose of inaugurating, amid bayonets, a President of the United States. It had been the boast of the American people, heretofore, that their Presidents did not need guards, but trusted wholly for their security, to the love, and confidence of their constituents, but the reign of peace, and good will was at an end, and the reign of the bayonet was to ensue. The rumbling of artillery through the streets of Washington, and the ring of grounded arms on the pavements, had sounded the death-knell of liberty in these States for generations. Swarms of visitors from far and near, in the North and West, had flocked to Washington, to see their President inaugurated, and were proud of this spectacle of arms; too stupid to see its fearful significance.
The auspicious day, the 4th of March, at length arrived, and whilst the glorious pageant is being prepared; whilst the windows and the house-tops along Pennsylvania Avenue are being thronged with a motley population of men and women, come to see the show; whilst the President elect, in a hollow square of bayonets, is marching toward the Capitol, the writer of these pages, having again taken leave of his family, was hurrying away from the desecration of a capital, which had been ceded by a too credulous Maryland, and Virginia, and which had been laid out by Washington. As I left the Baltimore depot, extra trains were still pouring their thousands into the streets of Washington. I arrived in New York, the next day, and during the next three weeks, visited the West Point Academy, whither I went to see a son, who was a cadet at the Institution, and who afterward became a major of light artillery, in the Confederate service; and made a tour through the principal work-shops of New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts.
I found the people everywhere, not only willing, but anxious to contract with me. I purchased large quantities of percussion caps in the city of New York, and sent them by express without any disguise, to Montgomery. I made contracts for batteries of light artillery, powder, and other munitions, and succeeded in getting large quantities of the powder shipped. It was agreed between the contractors and myself, that when I should have occasion to use the telegraph, certain other words were to be substituted, for those of military import, to avoid suspicion.
I made a contract, conditioned upon the approval of my Government, for the removal to the Southern States, of a complete set of machinery for rifling cannon, with the requisite skilled workmen to put it in operation. Some of these men, who would thus have sold body, and soul to me, for a sufficient consideration, occupied high social positions, and were men of wealth. I dined with them, at their comfortable residences near their factories, where the music of boring out cannon, accompanied the clatter of the dishes, and the popping of champagne-corks; and I had more than one business interview with gentlemen, who occupied the most costly suites of apartments at the Astor House in New York City. Many of these gentlemen, being unable to carry out their contracts with the Confederate States because of the prompt breaking out of the war, afterward obtained lucrative contracts from the Federal Government, and became, in consequence, intensely loyal. It would be a quasi breach of honor to disclose their names, as they dealt with me, pretty much as conspirators against their government are wont to deal with the enemies of their government, secretly, and with an implied confidence
