A World on Fire: Britain's Crucial Role in the American Civil War (37 page)

General McClellan also called on Seward to give him Joinville’s warning, but the secretary of state did not want to hear bad news—especially from McClellan, whom he disliked. He resented having his expertise questioned and told the general that his information about England was based on ignorance. “I said I thought I was right,” recorded McClellan; “he again contradicted me & I told him that the future would prove the correctness of my story.” McClellan left, inwardly cursing that “so weak and cowardly a thing should now control our foreign relations.”
¹¹
Seward’s unfounded optimism that Britain would not dare make a protest thoroughly depressed Lord Lyons. “I am so worn out with the never ending labour of keeping things smooth,” Lyons wrote to Lord Russell on November 22. He had heard about Seward’s reaction and was beginning to wonder whether the policy of keeping quiet was “leading these people to believe that they may go all lengths with us with impunity.… I am sometimes half tempted to wish that the worst may have come already,” he confessed. “However I do not allow this feeling to influence my conduct and I have done nothing which can in the least interfere with any course which you may take concerning the affair of the ‘
Trent.
’ ”
¹²

There was apparently limited discussion of the
Trent
affair at the cabinet meeting on November 24. Lincoln agreed that they would wait to hear Britain’s response before the government publicly committed itself on the legality of the seizure. No one remarked on the South’s euphoric reaction to the capture or questioned why its press was so quick to agree that the British had been given a studied blow. President Jefferson Davis had laid particular stress on the insult in a speech to the Confederate Congress on November 18. “These gentlemen were as much under the jurisdiction of the British Government upon that ship and beneath its flag as if they had been on its soil,” he said. Wilkes’s act was no different from a kidnapping on Piccadilly.
¹³

After the cabinet meeting, Seward realized that it would be impossible to keep Charles Francis Adams in limbo for two or three more weeks. He composed a dispatch on November 27 saying as little as possible about the affair except to admit that Wilkes had acted without orders. The administration was waiting for Britain’s reaction, he informed Adams. That night, the apotheosis of Wilkes continued. The governor of Massachusetts spoke at a public banquet in his honor, praising him for giving “illustrious service” to the war and for humbling the “British lion” to boot. Gideon Welles ignored Lincoln’s injunction to wait and published a letter of congratulation to Wilkes, which, fortunately, mentioned that the captain had acted on his own initiative.

When Congress reconvened on December 2, Lincoln did not specifically refer to Wilkes in his speech, but the House of Representatives passed a vote of thanks and awarded him a gold medal. In Boston, Anthony Trollope was forced to pronounce on the subject, though he felt there was more farce than force to the affair. “Who ever before heard of giving a man glory for achievements so little glorious?” he asked. Trollope was amused when people quoted obscure legal authorities at him in order to justify the
Trent
affair. “ ‘Wheaton is quite clear about it,’ one young girl said to me. It was the first I had ever heard of Wheaton, and so far was obliged to knock under,” he wrote. “All the world, ladies and lawyers, expressed the utmost confidence in the justice of the seizure.” Yet, Trollope added, “it was clear that all the world was in a state of the profoundest nervous anxiety on the subject.”
¹⁴
As the countdown began for the arrival of newspapers from London, the press began to change its tone as editorials asked: What if the British lion roared back?

—

The “lion” had been roaring since November 27. On Palmerston’s orders, the secretary of state for the colonies, the Duke of Newcastle, advised the governor-general of Canada to prepare for war: “Such an insult to our flag can only be atoned by the restoration of the men who were seized,” he wrote, “and with Mr. Seward at the helm of the United States, and the mob and the Press manning the vessel, it is too probable that this atonement may be refused.” His opinion was shared in both Houses; peace, argued Lord Clarendon (who had been foreign secretary in the 1850s), was not “worth the price of national honour.”
¹⁵

Although the law officers were unanimous that the seizure was unlawful, at a meeting on November 29 the British cabinet was unable to agree on the proper measure of response to the Americans. If it were too strong, argued Gladstone, the Lincoln administration would be denied a graceful exit. Too weak, countered Palmerston, and it would send a false impression of Britain’s intentions. They resolved to leave the drafting of the letter to Lord Russell. He was to state the facts of the case and demand the restoration of the commissioners along with an apology for the outrage. Failure to do so within seven days of receiving the letter would mean the immediate departure of Lord Lyons to Canada and war between the two nations.

When the cabinet reconvened the following day, nobody had a positive comment about Russell’s resulting draft, which was clumsy and overly obsessed with national honor. The three main principles at stake (the rights of neutral countries in time of war, the right to free movement on neutral ships, and the protection of diplomatic correspondence) were not made clear at all.
¹⁶
But the more the cabinet tried to amend the letter, the more defensive Russell became, until finally they agreed that Lord Lyons should receive two letters. The first would outline the case; the second would contain the threat that the United States had seven days to comply with Britain’s demand. The temporary truce collapsed immediately, as they now had not just one but two letters over which to fight. Gladstone incensed Palmerston with his musings on whether the law was entirely on their side.
^8.2
17
Finally there came a point when further discussion was useless, and even though no one was satisfied, the drafts were sent to the Queen and Prince Albert for their approval.

The prince lay ill with typhoid fever when the letters arrived at Windsor Castle on November 30. He had been kept informed of the cabinet’s discussions and had rightly feared that the official response would be pompous and aggressive. In the last of the prince’s many services to his adopted country, he roused himself from his bed and composed a memorandum (though he could hardly hold a pen in his hand) on what the letter ought to say. There should be “the expression of a hope,” he wrote,

that the American captain did not act under instructions, or, if he did, that he misapprehended them—that the United States Government must be fully aware that the British Government could not allow its flag to be insulted, and the security of her mail communications to be placed in jeopardy; and Her Majesty’s Government are unwilling to believe that the United States Government intended wantonly to put an insult upon this country.

Gone were the peremptory demands and in their place were merely polite statements of expectation.
^8.3
18

Russell conceded that the changes were necessary, but even so he doubted that they would temper Seward’s reaction or produce an apology.
¹⁹
He therefore composed a third letter to Lyons, describing how the demands should be presented. Russell wanted him to be tactful but unequivocal; the release of the prisoners would negate the need for atonement, but no words or species of apology would appease Britain’s anger if the prisoners were retained.
²⁰
With any luck, Seward would realize that retreat was preferable to war, but it would be up to Lyons to make the secretary of state understand that there could be no amateur dramatics, no clever little feints or attempts at bargaining. Only a straightforward answer would do.

The postmaster general, Lord Stanley, was keeping his wife informed of the cabinet’s deliberations. “The accounts from America,” he wrote on December 2, had confirmed their fears; Northern public opinion could be summed up as “great exaltation at the insult to England, great satisfaction at the capture of Mason and Slidell and the deification of Capt. Wilkes.”
²¹
The next day Captain Conway Seymour boarded the Boston-bound
Europa
with the cabinet’s letters.
²²
Lord Stanley chafed when he realized how long it would be until they received a reply: “It cannot get to [Lord Lyons] in less than 12 days & another 12 days to return will be the earliest we can get any intelligence of its reception.” As soon as the messenger left, however, Russell began to suffer misgivings about the plan. “I cannot imagine their giving a plain yes or no to our demands,” he wrote. “I think they will try to hook in France, and if that is, as I hope, impossible, to get Russia to support them.”
²³
At the bottom of Russell’s anxiety was the sense that the Americans had misunderstood his actions and that he was being wrongly blamed for reasons he still could not understand. “Not a word had been spoken, not a deed done by him but what showed the friendliest feeling,” Lady Russell wrote loyally about her husband’s dealings with the North.
²⁴

Palmerston thought that the United States would not even bother with negotiation. The “masses,” he categorically stated, will “make it impossible for Lincoln and Seward to grant our demands; and we must therefore look forward to war as the probable result.” George Cornewall Lewis, the secretary for war, complained that they were doing France’s dirty work, which was rather ungrateful of him considering that Napoleon III had promised his support. “It is quite certain that the French Govt wish for war between England and America,” wrote Lewis. “The blockade of the South would be raised, and they would get the cotton which they want.”
²⁵

Late on December 3, Russell and Palmerston called another cabinet meeting. The Treasury had received an alarming report that a Federal agent had bought up the country’s entire saltpeter reserves—about 4.5 million pounds. Most of it was due to be shipped the following day. The cabinet agreed to an immediate export ban; lacking sufficient mines of their own, the Federals would be hard-pressed to manufacture gunpowder without this precious commodity.
²⁶
The Admiralty issued a worldwide alert to every station. Admiral Milne’s instructions to ready his squadron reached him in Bermuda, where he replied: “The ships’ companies are in a high state of excitement for war, they are certainly all for the South. I hear the Lower Decks to-day are decorated with the Confederate colours.”
²⁷

The next day, the fourth, Stanley scribbled to his wife, “I write from the Cabinet where it has been decided to issue another Order in Council, prohibiting the exportation of arms & munitions of war, in addition to the former order prohibiting the exportation of saltpetre. I fear that the prospects of a satisfactory & amicable settlement are small.”
²⁸
One or two of his colleagues had protested against the ban, fearing that it would ruin Britain’s arms trade, but Stanley was entirely with Palmerston and Russell. “If we are to be at war it is as well not to let them have improved rifles to shoot us with.”
²⁹
“If this goes on,” added Stanley, “a Brigade of Guards will go out, one Battalion out of each Regiment.” His younger son, Jonny, would be among the first to go.

The cabinet agreed to form a six-member war committee. Military experts were called in, and at the War Office, strategic plans drawn up during previous periods of tension were taken out for revision. Maine was to be the first target, with simultaneous actions by the Royal Navy to blockade Boston, New Bedford, Newport, Long Island, New York, and the Delaware River. If necessary, some of these ports would be bombarded into submission. “War has no doubt its honours and its evils,” Admiral Milne reminded the secretary of state for the navy, who deprecated such wanton destruction, “but to make war felt it must be carried out against the Enemy with energy, and every place made to feel what war really is.”
³⁰

The strategic difficulties were indeed formidable. The Canadian border was more than 1,500 miles long, thinly fortified and connected by only the most basic roads and waterways. It would require a minimum of 10,000 regular troops and 100,000 militia volunteers to repel an invasion.
³¹
Moreover, as
The Times
had pointed out, “We can sweep the Federal fleet from the seas, we can blockade the Atlantic cities; but we cannot garrison and hold 350,000 square miles of country.” If the Americans chose to attack Montreal or Quebec, they would face a paltry British force of less than 5,000. Canada’s only real defenses were snow and bad weather.
³²
Their best option was to launch the first strike and capture Maine. “Do not be surprised if you hear of us all being made prisoners of war before the end of February,” one of the departing officers wrote pessimistically.