by John Boyko
Jefferson Davis had ridden to Manassas Junction and arrived in time to see the Union troops in their mad flight back to Washington. He urged General Beauregard, the hero of Fort Sumter, to pursue them, but the general said his men needed rest and water. It was over.
Lincoln had heard the thundering artillery from the White House. Now he stood at the window watching bedraggled soldiers stumbling their way to safety. Darkness brought rain. Through heavily lidded eyes, the melancholy president glimpsed soldiers huddled beneath dirty, sodden blankets and curled in nightmare-filled sleep on the capital’s rain-drenched lawns.
Reaction throughout the north was swift and harsh. The Democratic New York Herald blamed the administration and Lincoln in particular. The New York Tribune removed the masthead “Forward to Richmond,” which for some time had festooned its front page. Its publisher, Horace Greeley, composed a letter to Lincoln urging the president to begin peace negotiations with Davis. The New York Times sought not to affix blame but rather to consider consequence. Its editorial stated, “It is pretty evident now that we have underrated the strength of the resources and the temper of the enemy.”51
Lincoln did as he had always done and put his thoughts on paper. He made a nine-point list of things that needed to be done and then immediately set out to do them. He called for thirty-five-year-old George McClellan, who had done good work in Virginia, was well respected by the troops and was known as a crack military organizer, to take control of the Army of the Potomac. Lincoln ordered a more stringent military blockade. And he declared that all three-month recruitment agreements would now last for three years.
The battle that the North called Bull Run and the South called Manassas was only hours old but, like the New York Times—and like Davis—Lincoln understood its message. The war was real. It would be long and it would be bloody. Those who had believed the Union would easily defeat the Confederacy were cowed. Davis wrote to his governors asking for more men. Lincoln did the same.
Britain’s reaction to Bull Run was captured by a long article in the London Times written by journalist William Russell, who had travelled throughout the South and, even before the battle, had concluded that the North could never win the war.52 The battle served to prove the validity of his thesis. The article was so critical of the North’s leadership and military that Lincoln denied his request to embed himself with McClellan’s forces.
Palmerston agreed with Russell’s assessment. He wrote to the Foreign Office: “It is in the highest degree likely that the North will not be able to subdue the South, and it is no doubt certain that if the Southern union is established as an independent State it would afford a valuable and extensive market for British Manufacturers, but the operations of the war have as yet been too indecisive to warrant an acknowledgement of the southern Union.”53 In other words, Britain’s policies regarding the Civil War, including the paramount question of recognition for the South, would be ultimately determined not by the diplomats but by the soldiers.
THE ANTI-AMERICAN ELECTION OF 1861
The Canadian legislative assembly was in session when news of Bull Run arrived. Two government members burst into the chamber and, with no attempt to hide their glee, announced the Union defeat. Three cheers arose for the Confederacy.54 Most of the government members joined in the hurrahs, while most of the opposition remained silent.
The fissures seen in the assembly reflected those of the nation. Class, race, ethnicity, region and religion were dividing Canadian loyalties well before decisions had to be made regarding support for the North or South. The various elements of Canada’s nascent civil society were slowly coalescing into the complexity that would become its defining characteristic. The divisions came crashing to the fore in every election and, because of Canada’s unstable political structure, there were plenty of them. But the election that took place in the summer of 1861 all but ignored the usual issues and focused on one—anti-Americanism.
Canadian elections were not for the faint-hearted. The secret ballot was deemed “unmanly,” and so voters, all men, had to stand and publicly declare their choice. Voting took place over a number of days and voting lists were shabby at best, so it was common for wagonloads of those promising to vote for a particular candidate to be plied with liquor and then rushed from one polling place to another to exercise their franchise over and over again. Polling stations were often in bars.
The tenor of the 1861 campaign was seen in John A. Macdonald’s Kingston riding. For many elections in a row Macdonald had grown used to winning by wide margins and with little effort. This time, however, George Brown’s friend and fellow Reformer Oliver Mowat announced at the last minute that he was vying for the seat. Macdonald had once brought the young Mowat into his Kingston firm and helped start his law career, but those halcyon days were long gone. Just before the election call, Mowat had been on his feet in the House lambasting Macdonald and accusing him of all kinds of chicanery. In a rage perhaps fuelled by gin, Macdonald had crossed the floor, grabbed the much shorter, stouter Mowat, and shouted, “You damned pup, I’ll slap your chops.”55 He would surely have done so if not pulled away. Now Mowat had local toughs attending Macdonald’s meetings and yelling rude interruptions. Fights sometimes broke out, and more than once rocks were thrown at Macdonald and others on stage.
Elections were often a time for fights, and professions of love for anything as non-British as America or republicanism were fighting words. Thoughts of joining the United States had been a part of the Canadian civic conversation since the early days of the American Revolution. Every period of economic strife brought those thoughts back to the light, but it was always a small minority who seriously advocated annexation. In the late 1850s, new talk of annexation had been sparked by the dominant commercial adventure of the era: railway construction. Many of those who ran and financed the Grand Trunk were trying to woo investors to support the building of the intercolonial railway that the Montreal and Maritime business communities had both been talking about for years. Their efforts were being focused by John Poor, of Maine, who was negotiating to build a line from Saint John, New Brunswick, to Portland. If Poor was successful, Montreal would be hurt and the potential profits of an all-Canadian line to the Maritimes would be dashed.
Grand Trunk’s Alexander Galt brought the railwaymen’s concerns to Macdonald. Poor’s scheme, according to Galt and those who supported him, was little more than a step toward the eventual annexation of Canada.56 In the fog of fear and suspicion that the war had created, and which Seward’s bluster and actions had exacerbated, annexation had become a bogey man that Canadians seeking political or commercial advantage could exploit.
Galt’s warnings found an audience among Canadians increasingly worried by the prominence of the viperous Seward, the threats of invasion and intrigue filling the newspapers, and a war that was obviously going to be bigger and longer than anyone had expected. To a growing number of Canadians, the United States was a failed state, a dangerous place and one with foul intentions on their homes.
Adding to the anxiety that newspapers were stirring up were a number of pamphlets released in the spring and summer of 1861. The most persuasive—and because large portions were reprinted in the Globe, probably the most widely read—was entitled Canada: Is She Prepared for War? It was written by Toronto’s Lieutenant Colonel George Taylor Denison, under the pseudonym “A Canadian Native.” The pamphlet spoke of America’s desire to either annex Canada or take it by force. It outlined Canada’s woefully inadequate preparations for the invasion that it argued was sure to come.57
Macdonald had risen in the Canadian legislature shortly after Fort Sumter had fallen. He did not fan the fears of invasion, which he did not believe would likely occur; nor did he promote annexation, which to him was anathema. He had exploited America’s troubles to promote the idea of a stronger, larger Canadian union that could include the Maritime colonies. The American war and threats on Canada demonstrated why a strong, united state was needed. He further
argued that, with their Constitution, the Americans had committed the fatal mistake of making each state sovereign unto itself, a structure that had led to political collapse and war. This reality, he said, demonstrated why a strong state needed a foundation of British institutions. Canada, Macdonald said, must learn from America’s mistakes and become “an immense confederation of free men, the greatest confederacy of civilized and intelligent men that had ever had an existence on the face of the globe.”58 These were the visionary words of a practical man ready to meet the people in an election in which the United States would be the primary issue. Macdonald fully understood the importance of the election and the grand Canadian vision he was articulating. He wrote to the polymath Egerton Ryerson: “We are on the eve of an election contest which may determine the future of Canada, and whether it will be a limited constitutional monarchy or a Yankee democracy.”59
At that point, George Brown’s Reform Party opposition was composed of a loose amalgam of strange bedfellows. Radicals, Reformers and a group calling themselves Clear Grits were divided on many issues but united in their belief that the current political structure was unfair. The constitutional imperative to split seats evenly between Canada East and West made no democratic sense, they argued, because there were more people in Canada West. Making that point had led to many of them, including George Brown, being labelled anti-French and anti-Catholic. Either the allocation of seats should be changed to reflect the populations of the two sides, the intrepid Reformers argued, or they should be split into two separate entities. Macdonald disagreed. His Liberal-Conservatives drew strength from a number of constituencies but depended upon support from English-speaking Montreal business people, and so he needed the current system to either grow much broader or remain as it was.
In 1861, census results demonstrating that the population gap between the two parts of Canada was actually growing gave credence to Brown’s argument about unfair representation. An opposition motion was presented to adopt a system of representation by population. A number of the speeches on the motion reiterated points that had been made for years, but the war and energized talk of defence were injecting new elements into the old argument.
William McDougall was a member of the legislature, a lawyer and a journalist who had run his own paper and written for the Globe. He was instrumental in the creation of the radical Clear Grit movement that was part of the Reform opposition. The Clear Grits had long advocated greater democracy and spoken of an admiration for the American political system. McDougall’s ideological orientation was in his newspaper’s name—The North American. McDougall made an impassioned speech in favour of representation by population and then, appearing to be carried away by his own oratory, cried out that if the motion was not passed, Canadians should turn away from their current political structure, turn away from Britain, and look to Washington.
The motion was defeated and the election was soon called. The wily Macdonald recognized that with anti-Americanism growing in Canada’s civil society, McDougall had handed him a political gift and a weapon too good to waste. In June, Macdonald wrote a letter to his Kingston constituents announcing his candidacy and his party’s platform. He later used it as the basis of a stem-winding speech at a large and boisterous rally. Deploying his always effective conversational style of address, he spoke to many current issues, but hit his stride with what would be the crux of the summer campaign. He attacked McDougall directly on the matter of the American war and American threats and the need to create a broader, stronger union to respond to the danger and belligerence.
The fratricidal conflict now unhappily raging in the United States shews us the superiority of our institutions and of the principle on which they are based. Long may that principle—the Monarchical principle—prevail in this land. Let there be no “looking to Washington” as was threatened by a leading member of the opposition last session; but let the cry, with the moderate party, be “Canada United as one Province, and under one sovereign.”60
No matter how hard or how often Reform candidates tried to deal with other issues—and there were plenty—the question of American threats and Canada’s alleged yearning for annexation returned. In Whitby, Macdonald supporters hung an effigy of McDougall at the site of a Reform rally. Its hands held signs that said “Look to Washington” and over its heart was a sign saying “annexation.” Before the meeting, it was burned.
The July 1 election saw Macdonald take his riding and the Liberal-Conservatives win a majority. But it was a hollow victory because Macdonald’s support in Canada West—always a problem—had nearly evaporated. Anti-Americanism had won the day, but the fissures within the Canadian nation were made deeper and more divisive than ever.
Throughout the campaign and in the following weeks, much of the American press had maintained a strong anti-British and anti-Canadian bias. Most hostile of all was the New York Herald. Macdonald read it and often commented on its articles. Typical of the Herald’s stance was a July 13 editorial that insulted Canadians as being unable to stand up for themselves against Britain. It concluded: “When they are annexed to the republic, which is only a question of time—a question which may receive its solution before the termination of the present year—we will show them the way to act an independent part, and to assert the dignity of freedom of the Anglo-Saxon race.”61
In response to the American papers, many Canadian newspapers printed equally vituperative articles that reflected the tenor and tone of the election. The London Free Press, for instance, on September 11 published a front-page editorial stating, “At the present moment, the liberties and lives of the people in the United States are subject to the despotism of a mob government.”62 It went on to discuss the espionage taking place in Northern cities, where people expressing anti-government ideas or pro-Southern ideas were considered traitors, and where liberties such as the right of habeas corpus had been suspended. Lincoln and Seward were specifically named as villainous but the American system itself was said to be the culprit: “There is but a step between liberty and despotism under a Republican form of government. Let all British subjects ponder these things, and ask themselves what there is to be gained, after all, by living under a Republic.”63
Back in April Alexander Galt had warned George Ashmun of the growing anti-Americanism among Canadians.64 The election had proven the power and popularity of those sentiments, and in the fall Seward read reports from his consuls in Canadian and Maritime cities that included Canadian newspaper articles and stated that anti-American feelings were becoming more popular, openly expressed and intense.65
The rising tide of anti-Americanism, the increased number of British troops and the eleven British battleships in the Halifax harbour either worried Seward or inspired him to flex some muscle. On October 10 he wrote a circular to all Northern governors. He urged them to do all they could to prepare and protect their canals and harbours so that they would be ready to defend against attack from the Atlantic or across the Great Lakes. A second, more specific circular came days later. Perhaps the circulars were just more bluff and bluster aimed at Britain and Canada and border town insecurities. Regardless of their purpose, they indicated that if a war in Canada was to come, as many expected it would, America would be ready and willing to wage it. All that was needed was a spark to ignite the firestorm—and then it came.
THE TRENT CRISIS
On the warm, turquoise narrows off the Bahama Channel on November 8, 1861, the Trent, an unarmed British mail packet, was steaming from Havana unaware that it was being hunted. Its captain, James Moir, spied a large fifteen-gun sloop off his bow and hoisted the Union Jack. The San Jacinto raised the American flag, and then sent a shell crashing across the Trent’s bow. Moir sped up but was startled by a second, even closer blast. The ships came to and Moir allowed men from the San Jacinto boats to board his vessel. American Lieutenant MacNeill Fairfax announced that he was acting on behalf of Captain Charles Wilkes of the San Jacinto, who suspected the Trent of transporting Confe
derate agents James Mason and John Slidell, and contraband documents to Europe. He demanded the passenger list.
Mason and Slidell immediately stepped forward and identified themselves. Fairfax announced that they were under arrest. Moir protested as Slidell turned to his wife and daughter, bade them goodbye, and promised to see them soon in Paris. Slidell’s wife was not so sanguine. She blasted Fairfax and called him a pirate with no authority to arrest people on a ship under the British flag. She mocked him, saying that she had enjoyed tea with Captain Wilkes just weeks earlier.
Fairfax was unmoved. He told Moir that when the two men and their personal secretaries had been removed, the ship, passengers and crew were free to go. As Mrs. Slidell fumed, her children burst into tears as they watched their father and Mason, and their two personal secretaries, being rowed to the San Jacinto, which then, slowly disappeared over the horizon.
Seven days later, the San Jacinto steamed into the Union naval base at Hampton Roads, Virginia. Telegrams tore across the country announcing the news of the capture. Wilkes was ordered to take his prisoners to Boston, where they joined other Confederates in Fort Warren.
Their fellow prisoners warmly welcomed Mason and Slidell, for they were both well-known. Slidell was a popular Louisiana senator who had led the fight to repeal the Missouri Compromise and had aggressively interviewed John Brown of Harper’s Ferry fame in an attempt to link him to Northern abolitionists. Mason was a well-respected Virginia senator and former chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who had been the principal author of the Fugitive Slave Law. Jefferson Davis had appointed Mason as his agent to England and Slidell to France with identical missions: to lobby for recognition and intervention. They were slated to serve as ambassadors when that happy day arrived.
Captain Wilkes, a renowned explorer and author, became an instant Northern hero. After having suffered months of humiliating battlefield defeats, at last the North could boast of a Union victory. He arrived at New York City to a brass-band welcome and a parade up Broadway. There was a grand reception and lavish dinner at City Hall and then another in Boston. Wilkes proudly told the story again and again of how he had learned of the two trying to run the blockade and had hunted them down. To those pondering the legality of his action, Wilkes explained that it was legal to capture contraband documents and since Mason and Slidell were, in effect, walking contraband, it had been legal to capture them. The New York Times concurred: “We do not believe the American heart ever thrilled with more genuine delight.”66 The New York Herald, always ready to push for a British-Canadian war, editorialized that it was “quite elated” with Wilkes’s action. It was emphatic that the Confederates “should not be surrendered by this government, even if their detention should cause a war with Great Britain.”67 The Philadelphia Sunday Transcript went further: “In a word, while the British government has been playing the villain, we have been playing the fool. Let her now do something beyond driveling—let her fight … she will meet the American people on land and on the seas, as they long to meet her, once again, not only to lower the red banner of St. George … but to consolidate Canada with the union.”68