150 Years Ago in Charleson, South Carolina

[PetePaolillo]

December 21, 1860

Taken from Mary Boykin Chesnut's diary from Dec 21st 1860

December 21st. - Mrs. Charles Lowndes was sitting with us to-day, when Mrs. Kirkland brought in a copy of the Secession Ordinance. I wonder if my face grew as white as hers. She said after a moment: "God help us. As our day, so shall our strength be." How grateful we were for this pious ejaculation of hers! They say I had better take my last look at this beautiful place, Combahee. It is on the coast, open to gunboats.

We mean business this time, because of this convocation of the notables, this convention. In it are all our wisest and best. They really have tried to send the ablest men, the good men and true.) South Carolina was never more splendidly represented. Patriotism aside, it makes society delightful. One need not regret having left Washington
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On December 21, 1860 President-elect Abraham Lincoln reacted to the news of South Carolina's secession by firing off two letters, one to Francis P. Blair, Sr. and one to Congressman Elihu P. Washburne: both concerned the Charleston forts and General Winfield Scott.


Confidential
Hon. F. P. Blair, Ser. Springfield, Ills.
My dear Sir Dec. 21. 1860

Yours giving an account of an interview with Gen. Scott, is received, and for which I thank you. According to my present view, if the forts shall be given up before the inaugeration, the General must retake them afterwards.

Yours truly
A. LINCOLN
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Confidential

Hon. E. B. Washburne Springfield, Ills.
My dear Sir: Dec. 21. 1860

Last night I received your letter giving an account of your interview with Gen. Scott, and for which I thank you. Please present my respects to the General, and tell him, confidentially, I shall be obliged to him to be as well prepared as he can to either hold, or retake, the forts, as the case may require, at, and after the inaugeration.

Yours as ever
A. LINCOLN

[PetePaolillo]

December 21, 1860 CONTINUED

WAR DEPARTMENT,
Washington, December 21, 1860.

Major ANDERSON,
First Artillery, Commanding Fort Moultrie, S.C.:

SIR: In the verbal instructions communicated to you by Major Buell, you are directed to hold possession of the forts in the harbor of Charleston, and, if attacked, to defend yourself to the last extremity. Under these instructions, you might infer that you are required to make a vain and useless sacrifice of your own life and the lives of the men under your command, upon a mere point of honor. This is far from the President’s intentions. You are to exercise a sound military discretion on this subject.

It is neither expected nor desired that you should expose your own life or that of your men in a hopeless conflict in defense of these forts. If they are invested or attacked by a force so superior that resistance would, in your judgment, be a useless waste of life, it will be your duty to yield to necessity, and make the best terms in your power.

This will be the conduct of an honorable, brave, and humane officer, and you will be fully justified in such action. These orders are strictly confidential, and not to be communicated even to the officers under your command, without close necessity.

Very respectfully,
JOHN B. FLOYD

[PetePaolillo]

December 22, 1860

The below snippet was found printed in the New York Times

INFORMATION.--
Published: December 22, 1860

The Charleston Mercury commends Mr. BUCHANAN's good sense in avoiding war by not reinforcing the forts in Charleston. It denies that South Carolina has any wish to seize them prematurely, and gives this intimation of the contingency on which she will act:

"When the State is out of the Union; when the forts are demanded and refused to be delivered up to those in whom is vested the title of eminent domain, and for whose protection and defence alone they were ceded and built up; and when, the Federal Government showing a hostile purpose, it shall become necessary and proper for us to obtain possession; then it will be light for the world and Black Republicanism to expect that the State, by her authorities, will move in the premises. The people will obey the call for war, and take the forts."

The Mercury is very savage on Gen. CASS, styling him a "hoary trickster and humbug;" and saying that "his present imbecility equals his past treachery to the South." The ex-Secretary will survive the abuse.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F5071FFD3859127A93C0AB1789D95F448684F9&pagewanted=print

[PetePaolillo]

December 26th 1860

No. 1.

Reports of Maj. Robert Anderson, U.S. Army, of the evacuation of Fort Moultrie, S.C.

No. 11.] FORT SUMTER, S. C., December 26, 1860—8 p. m.
(Received A.G.O., December 29.)

COLONEL: I have the honor to report that I have just completed, by the blessing of God, the removal to this fort of all of my garrison, except the surgeon, four non-commissioned officers, and seven men. We have one year’s supply of hospital stores and about four months’ supply of provisions for my command. I left orders to have all the guns at Fort Moultrie spiked, and the carriages of the 32-pounders, which are old, destroyed. I have sent orders to Captain Foster, who remains at Fort Moultrie, to destroy all the ammunition which he can- not send over. The step which I have taken was, in my opinion, necessary to prevent the effusion of blood.

Respectfully, your obedient servant,
ROBERT ANDERSON,
Major, First Artillery, Commanding.

Col. S. COOPER, Adjutant-General

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During the night of December 26, 1860, Major Robert Anderson moved his small command from its exposed position at Fort Moultrie to Fort Sumter in the middle of Charleston Harbor. One of Anderson's subordinates was Captain Abner Doubleday, who left a written account of the movement from Moultrie to Sumter:

Bands of secessionists were now patrolling near us by day and night. We were so worn out with guard-duty-watching them-that on one occasion my wife and Captain Seymour's relieved us on guard, all that was needed being some one to give the alarm in case there was an attempt to break in. Foster thought that out of his several hundred workmen he could get a few Union men to drill at the guns as a garrison in Castle Pinckney, but they rebelled the moment they found they were expected to act as artillerists, and said that they were not there as warriors. It was said that when the enemy took possession of the castle, some of these workmen were hauled from under beds and from other hiding-places.

The day before Christmas I asked Major Anderson for wire to make an entanglement in front of my part of the fort, so that any one who should charge would tumble over the wires and could be shot at our leisure. I had already caused a sloping picket fence to be projected over the parapet on my side of the works so that scaling-ladders could not be raised against us. The discussion in Charleston over our proceedings was of an amusing character. This wooden fraise puzzled the Charleston militia and editors; one of the latter said, "Make ready your sharpened stakes but you will not intimidate freeman."

When I asked Anderson for the wire, he said I should have a mile of it, with a peculiar smile that puzzled me for the moment. He then sent for Hall, the post quartermaster, bound him to secrecy, and told him to take three schooners and some barges which had been chartered for the purpose of taking the women and children and six month's supply of provisions to Fort Johnson, opposite Charleston. He was instructed when the secession patrols should ask what this meant, to tell them we were sending off the families of the officers and men to the North because they were in the way. The excuse was plausible, and no one interfered. We were so closely watched that we could make no movement without demands being made as to the reason of it. On the day we left-the day after Christmas-Anderson gave up his own mess, and came to live with me as my guest. In the evening of that day I went to notify the major that tea was ready. Upon going to the parapet for that purpose, I found all the officers there, and noticed something strange in their manner. The problem was solved when Anderson walked up to me and said: "Captain, in twenty minutes you will leave this fort with your company for Fort Sumter." The order was startling and unexpected, and I thought of the immediate hostilities of which the movement would be the occasion. I rushed over to my company quarters and informed my men, so that they might put on their knapsacks and have everything in readiness. This took about ten minutes. Then I went to my house, told my wife that there might be fighting, and that she must get out of the fort as soon as she could and take refuge behind the sand-hills. I put her trunks out of the sally-port, and she followed them. Then I started with my company to join Captain Seymour and his men. We had to go a quarter of a mile through the little town of Moultrieville to reach the point of embarkation. It was about sunset, the hour of the siesta, and fortunately the Charleston militia were taking their afternoon nap. We saw nobody, and soon reached a low line of sea-wall under which were hidden the boats in charge of the three engineers, for Lieutenant Snyder and Meade had been sent by Floyd to help Captain Foster do the work on the forts. The boats had been used in going back and forward in the work of construction, manned by ordinary workmen, who now vacated them for our use. Lieutenant Snyder said to me in a low tone: "Captain, those boats are for your men." So saying, he started with his own part up the coast. When any thirty men were embarked I went straight for Fort Sumter. It was getting dusk. I made slow work in crossing over, for my men were not expert oarsmen. Soon I saw the lights of the secession guard-boat coming down on us. I told the men to take off their muskets, and I threw my own coat open to conceal my buttons. I wished to give the impression that it was an officer in charge of laborers. The guard-ship stopped its paddles and inspected us in the gathering darkness, but concluded we were all right and passed on. My part was the first to reach Fort Sumter.

We went up the steps of the wharf in the face of an excited band of secession workmen, some of whom were armed with pistols. One or two Union men among them cheered, but some of the others said angrily: "Who are these soldiers doing here? what is the meaning of this?" Ordering my men to charge bayonets, we drove the workmen into the center of the fort. I took possession of the guard-room commanding the main entrance and placed sentinels. Twenty minutes after, Seymour arrived with the rest of the men. Meantime Anderson had crossed in one of the engineer boats. As soon as the troops were all in we fired a cannon, to give notice of our arrival to the quartermaster, who had anchored at Fort Johnson with the schooners carrying the women and children. He immediately sailed up to the wharf and landed his passengers and stores. Then the workmen of secession sympathies were sent aboard the schooners to be taken ashore.

Lieutenant Jefferson C. Davis of my company had been left with a rear-guard at Moultrie. These, with Captain Foster and Assistant-Surgeon Crawford, stood at loaded columbiads during our passage, with orders to fire upon the guard-boats and sink them if they tried to run us down. On withdrawing, the rear-guard spiked the guns of the fort, burned the gun-carriages on the front looking toward Sumter, and cut down the flag-staff. Mrs. Doubleday first took refuge at the house of the post sutler, and afterward with the family of Chaplain Harris, with whom she sought shelter behind the sand-hills.

When all was quiet they paced the beach, anxiously watching Fort Sumter. Finding that the South Carolinians were ignorant of what had happened we sent the boats back to procure additional supplies.

The next morning Charleston was furious. Messengers were sent out to ring every door-bell and convey the news to every family. The governor sent two or three of his aides to demand that we return to Moultrie. Anderson replied in my hearing that he was a Southern man, but that he had been assigned to the defense of Charleston Harbor, and intended to defend it.
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