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TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, MARCH 31, 1862
MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN.
MY DEAR SIR: — This morning I felt constrained to order Blenker's division to Fremont, and I write this to assure you I did so with great pain, understanding that you would wish it otherwise. If you could know the full pressure of the case, I am confident that you would justify it, even beyond a mere acknowledgment that the commander-in-chief may order what he pleases.
Yours very truly,
A. LINCOLN.
GIFT OF SOME RABBITS
TO MICHAEL CROCK. 360 N. Fourth St., Philadelphia
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, April 2, 1862.
MY DEAR SIR: — Allow me to thank you in behalf of my little son for your present of white rabbits. He is very much pleased with them.
Yours truly,
A. LINCOLN.
INSTRUCTION TO SECRETARY STANTON
EXECUTIVE MANSION, April 3, 1862
The Secretary of War will order that one or the other of the corps of General McDowell and General Sumner remain in front of Washington until further orders from the department, to operate at or in the direction of Manassas Junction, or otherwise, as occasion may require; that the other Corps not so ordered to remain go forward to General McClellan as speedily as possible; that General McClellan commence his forward movements from his new base at once, and that such incidental modifications as the foregoing may render proper be also made. A. LINCOLN.
TELEGRAM TO GENERAL McCLELLAN
WASHINGTON, April 6, 1862
GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN:
Yours of 11 A. M. today received. Secretary of War informs me that the forwarding of transportation, ammunition, and Woodbury's brigade, under your orders, is not, and will not be, interfered with. You now have over one hundred thousand troops with you, independent of General Wool's command. I think you better break the enemy's line from Yorktown to Warwick River at once. This will probably use time as advantageously as you can.
A. LINCOLN, President
TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN
WASHINGTON, April 9, 1862
MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN.
MY DEAR SIR+ — Your despatches, complaining that you are not properly sustained, while they do not offend me, do pain me very much.
Blenker's division was withdrawn from you before you left here, and you knew the pressure under which I did it, and, as I thought, acquiesced in it certainly not without reluctance.
After you left I ascertained that less than 20,000 unorganized men, without a single field battery, were all you designed to be left for the defense of Washington and Manassas Junction, and part of this even to go to General Hooker's old position; General Banks's corps, once designed for Manassas Junction, was divided and tied up on the line of Winchester and Strasburg, and could not leave it without again exposing the upper Potomac and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. This presented (or would present when McDowell and Sumner should be gone) a great temptation to the enemy to turn back from the Rappahannock and sack Washington. My explicit order that Washington should, by the judgment of all the Commanders of corps, be left entirely secure, had been neglected. It was precisely this that drove me to detain McDowell.
I do not forget that I was satisfied with your arrangement to leave Banks at Manassas Junction; but when that arrangement was broken up and nothing substituted for it, of course I was not satisfied. I was constrained to substitute something for it myself.
And now allow me to ask, do you really think I should permit the line from Richmond via Manaasas Junction to this city to be entirely open, except what resistance could be presented by less than 20,000 unorganized troops? This is a question which the country will not allow me to evade.
There is a curious mystery about the number of the troops now with you. When I telegraphed you on the 6th, saying you had over 100,000 with you, I had just obtained from the Secretary of War a statement, taken as he said from your own returns, making 108,000 then with you and en route to you. You now say you will have but 85,000 when all enroute to you shall have reached you. How can this discrepancy of 23,000 be accounted for?
As to General Wool's command, I understand it is doing for you precisely what a like number of your own would have to do if that command was away. I suppose the whole force which has gone forward to you is with you by this time; and if so, I think it is the precise time for you to strike a blow. By delay the enemy will relatively gain upon you — that is, he will gain faster by fortifications and reinforcements than you can by reinforcements alone.
And once more let me tell you it is indispensable to you that you strike a blow. I am powerless to help this. You will do me the justice to remember I always insisted that going down the bay in search of a field, instead of fighting at or near Manassas, was only shifting and not surmounting a difficulty; that we would find the same enemy and the same or equal entrenchments at either place. The country will not fail to note — is noting now — that the present hesitation to move upon an entrenched enemy is but the story of Manassas repeated.
I beg to assure you that I have never written you or spoken to you in greater kindness of feeling than now, nor with a fuller purpose to sustain you, so far as in my most anxious judgment I consistently can; but you must act.
Yours very truly,
A. LINCOLN.
TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, April 9, 1862
MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Saint Louis, Mo.: If the rigor of the confinement of Magoffin (Governor of Kentucky) at Alton is endangering his life, or materially impairing his health, I wish it mitigated as far as it can be consistently with his safe detention.
A. LINCOLN.
Please send above, by order of the President. JOHN HAY.
PROCLAMATION RECOMMENDING THANKSGIVING FOR VICTORIES,
APRIL 10, 1862
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A Proclamation
It has pleased Almighty God to vouchsafe signal victories to the land and naval forces engaged in suppressing, an internal rebellion, and at the same time to avert from our country the dangers of foreign intervention and invasion.
It is therefore recommended to the people of the United States that at their next weekly assemblages in their accustomed places of public worship which shall occur after notice of this proclamation shall have been received, they especially acknowledge and render thanks to our Heavenly Father for these inestimable blessings, that they then and there implore spiritual consolation in behalf of all who have been brought into affliction by the casualties and calamities of sedition and civil war, and that they reverently invoke the divine guidance for our national counsels, to the end that they may speedily result in the restoration of peace, harmony, and unity throughout our borders and hasten the establishment of fraternal relations among all the countries of the earth.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington, this tenth day of April, A.D. 1862, and of the independence of the United States the eighty-sixth.
A. LINCOLN.
By the President: WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.
ABOLISHING SLAVERY IN WASHINGTON, D.C
MESSAGE TO CONGRESS. April 16, 1862
FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES: The act entitled "An act for the relief of certain persons held to service or labor in the District of Columbia" has this day been approved and signed.
I have never doubted the constitutional authority of Congress to abolish slavery in this District, and I have ever desired to see the national capital freed from the institution in some satisfactory way. Hence there has never been in my mind any question on the subject except the one of expediency, arising in view of all the circumstances. If there be matters within and about this act which might have taken a course or shape more satisfactory to my judgment, I do not attempt to specify them. I am gratified that the two principles of compensation and colonization are both recognized and practically applied in the act.
In the matter of compensation, it is provided that claims may be presented within ninety days from the passage of the act, "but not thereafter"; and there is no saving for minors, femmes covert, insane or absent persons. I presume this is an omission by mere oversight, and I recommend that it be supplied by an amendatory or supplemental act.
A. LINCOLN.
TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN
WASHINGTON, April 21, 1862
MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:
Your despatch of the 19th was received that day. Fredericksburg is evacuated and the bridges destroyed by the enemy, and a small part of McDowell's command occupies this side of the Rappahannock, opposite the town. He purposes moving his whole force to that point.
A. LINCOLN.
TO POSTMASTER-GENERAL
A. LINCOLN. EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, April 24, 1862.
Hon. POSTMASTER-GENERAL.
MY DEAR SIR: — The member of Congress from the district including Tiffin, O., calls on me about the postmaster at that place. I believe I turned over a despatch to you from some persons there, asking a suspension, so as for them to be heard, or something of the sort. If nothing, or nothing amounting to anything, has been done, I think the suspension might now be suspended, and the commission go forward.
Yours truly,
A. LINCOLN.
TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN
WASHINGTON, April 29, 1862
MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:
Would it derange or embarrass your operations if I were to appoint Captain Charles Griffin a brigadier-general of volunteers? Please answer.
A. LINCOLN.
MESSAGE TO THE SENATE, MAY 1, 1862
TO THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES:
In answer to the resolution of the Senate [of April 22] in relation to Brigadier-General Stone, I have the honor to state that he was arrested and imprisoned under my general authority, and upon evidence which whether he be guilty or innocent, required, as appears to me, such proceedings to be had against him for the public safety. I deem it incompatible with the public interest, as also, perhaps, unjust to General Stone, to make a more particular statement of the evidence.
He has not been tried because, in the state of military operations at the time of his arrest and since, the officers to constitute a court martial and for witnesses could not be withdrawn from duty without serious injury to the service. He will be allowed a trial without any unnecessary delay; the charges and specifications will be furnished him in due season, and every facility for his defense will be afforded him by the War Department.
A. LINCOLN, WASHINGTON, MAY 1, 1862
TELEGRAM TO GENERAL McCLELLAN
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, MAY 1, 1862
MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:
Your call for Parrott guns from Washington alarms me, chiefly because it argues indefinite procrastination. Is anything to be done?
A. LINCOLN.
TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK
WAR DEPARTMENT, MAY 1, 1862
MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Pittsburgh Landing, Tennessee:
I am pressed by the Missouri members of Congress to give General Schofield independent command in Missouri. They insist that for want of this their local troubles gradually grow worse. I have forborne, so far, for fear of interfering with and embarrassing your operations. Please answer telling me whether anything, and what, I can do for them without injuriously interfering with you.
A. LINCOLN.
RESPONSE TO EVANGELICAL LUTHERANS, MAY 6, 1862
GENTLEMEN: — I welcome here the representatives of the Evangelical Lutherans of the United States. I accept with gratitude their assurances of the sympathy and support of that enlightened, influential, and loyal class of my fellow citizens in an important crisis which involves, in my judgment, not only the civil and religious liberties of our own dear land, but in a large degree the civil and religious liberties of mankind in many countries and through many ages. You well know, gentlemen, and the world knows, how reluctantly I accepted this issue of battle forced upon me on my advent to this place by the internal enemies of our country. You all know, the world knows, the forces and the resources the public agents have brought into employment to sustain a government against which there has been brought not one complaint of real injury committed against society at home or abroad. You all may recollect that in taking up the sword thus forced into our hands this government appealed to the prayers of the pious and the good, and declared that it placed its whole dependence on the favor of God. I now humbly and reverently, in your presence, reiterate the acknowledgment of that dependence, not doubting that, if it shall please the Divine Being who determines the destinies of nations, this shall remain a united people, and that they will, humbly seeking the divine guidance, make their prolonged national existence a source of new benefits to themselves and their successors, and to all classes and conditions of mankind.
TELEGRAM TO FLAG-OFFICER L. M. GOLDSBOROUGH
FORT MONROE, VIRGINIA, MAY 7, 1862
FLAG-OFFICER GOLDSBOROUGH.
SIR: — Major-General McClellan telegraphs that he has ascertained by a reconnaissance that the battery at Jamestown has been abandoned, and he again requests that gunboats may be sent up the James River.
If you have tolerable confidence that you can successfully contend with the Merrimac without the help of the Galena and two accompanying gunboats, send the Galena and two gunboats up the James River at once. Please report your action on this to me at once. I shall be found either at General Wool's headquarters or on board the Miami.
Your obedient servant,
A. LINCOLN.
FURTHER REPRIMAND OF McCLELLAN
TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN
FORT MONROE, VIRGINIA, May 9, 1862
MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:
MY DEAR SIR: — I have just assisted the Secretary of War in framing part of a despatch to you relating to army corps, which despatch, of course, will have reached you long before this will. I wish to say a few words to you privately on this subject. I ordered the army corps organization not only on the unanimous opinion of the twelve generals whom you had selected and assigned as generals of divisions, but also on the unanimous opinion of every military man I could get an opinion from, and every modern military book, yourself only excepted. Of course, I did not on my own judgment pretend to understand the subject. I now think it indispensable for you to know how your struggle against it is received in quarters which we cannot entirely disregard. It is looked upon as merely an effort to pamper one or two pets, and to persecute and degrade their supposed rivals. I have had no word from Sumner, Heintzleman, or Keyes the commanders of these corps are, of course, the three highest officers with you; but I am constantly told that you have no consultation or communication with them; that you consult and communicate with nobody but General Fitz John Porter, and perhaps General Franklin. I do not say these complaints are true or just; but at all events, it is proper you should know of their existence. Do the commanders of corps disobey your orders in anything?
When you relieved General Hamilton of his command the other day, you thereby lost the confidence of at least one of your best friends in the Senate. And here let me say, not as applicable to you personally, that Senators and Representatives speak of me in their places without question, and that officers of the army must cease addressing insulting letters to them for taking no greater liberty with them.
But to return. Are you strong enough — are you strong enough even with my help — to set your foot upon the necks of Sumner, Heintzelman, and Keyes all at once? This is a practical and very serious question to you?
The success of your army and the cause of the country are the same, and, of course, I only desire the good of the cause.
Yours truly,
A. LINCOLN.
TO FLAG-OFFICER L. M. GOLDSBOROUGH,
FORT MONROE, VIRGINIA, May 10, 1862
FLAG-OFFICER GOLDSBOROUGH.
MY DEAR SIR: — I send you this copy of your report of yesterday for the purpose of saying to you in writing that you are quite right in supposing the movement made by you and therein reported was made in accordance with my wishes verbally expressed to you in advance. I avail myself of the occasion to thank you for your courtesy and all your conduct, so far as known to me, during my brief visit here.
Yours very truly,
A. LINCOLN.
PROCLAMATION RAISING THE BLOCKADE OF CERTAIN PORTS
May 12, 1862
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A Proclamation.
Whereas, by my proclamation of the 19th of April, one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one, it was declared that the ports of certain States, including those of Beaufort, in the State of North Carolina, Port Royal, in the State of South Carolina, and New Orleans, in the State of Louisiana, were, for reasons therein set forth, intended to be placed under blockade; and whereas the said ports of Beaufort, Port Royal, and New Orleans have since been blockaded; but as the blockade of the same ports may now be safely relaxed with advantage to the interests of commerce:
Now, therefore, be it known that I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, pursuant to the authority in me vested by the fifth section of the act of Congress approved on the 13th of July last, entitled "An act further to provide for the collection of duties on imports, and for other purposes," do hereby declare that the blockade of the said ports of Beaufort, Port Royal, and New Orleans shall so far cease and determine, from and after the first day of June next, that commercial intercourse with those ports, except as to persons, things, and information contraband of war, may from that time be carried on, subject to the laws of the United States, and to the limitations and in pursuance of the regulations which are prescribed by the Secretary of the Treasury in his order of this date, which is appended to this proclamation.
In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington, this twelfth day of May, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, and of the independence of the United States the eighty-sixth.
A. LINCOLN.
By the President: WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.
