USA > Georgia > The history of the State of Georgia from 1850 to 1881, embracing the three important epochs: the decade before the war of 1861-5; the war; the period of Reconstruction, v. 1 > Part 16
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Your obedient servant,
JOSEPH E. BROWN, Governor .and Commander-in-Chief."
An additional order was issued by the Adjutant-General, Henry C. Wayne, in regard to the details. There was a spirited rivalry among the volunteer companies of Savannah to participate in this duty. De- tails from the Chatham Artillery, under Captain Joseph S. Claghorn: Savannah Volunteer Guards, under Captain John Sereven, and Ogle- thorpe Light Infantry, under Captain Francis S. Bartow, amounting to 134 men, 50 each being taken from the infantry companies and 34 from the artillery, were made of a force to seize the fort. The seizure was made on the morning of the 3d of January, 1860. The writer was a member of the Oglethorpe Light Infantry, and was one of the detail
147
FORT PULASKI.
from that company for this duty. The seizure created the greatest ex- citement over the whole South. It was in accord with the spirit of the hour, and Governor Brown received unstinted encomiums for his deci- sive conduct. Its effect on the other Southern states was electrical and wide-spread. It stimulated the war spirit, and immediately gave Georgia the prestige that she held to the end of the conflict.
Col. Lawton in communicating the occupancy of the fort made the following statement of an incident that was regarded as an unpleasant complication, but which Gov. Brown promptly settled:
" On steaming down the river this morning I ascertained with regret that certain un- authorized persons had taken possession of the United States revenue cutter, Dobbin, and are now exercising control over her in the waters of Georgia."
Col. Lawton stated that he had taken the cutter, and expressed re- gret that such embarrassing questions should be presented by unauthor- ized persons at that critical time. Gov. Brown immediately notified Mr. John Boston, collector of the port, that the cutter was at his dis- posal, regretting the lawless seizure of the vessel, and the cutter was delivered to the captain.
The fort contained when thus taken, twenty thirty-two pounder guns in bad condition, and very little ammunition. Every effort was made to put the fort in order. The garrison of gentleman soldiers was put under strict military discipline. The guns were properly mounted and ammunition supplied. Drilling and practice firing were daily done. The cartridge bags for the heavy guns were furnished by the deft fin- gers of the Savannah ladies. Some lady sent down to the fort a fine fruit-cake iced beautifully and the word "Secession " wrought in with sugar, while another more practical, sent down a package of lint. Gov. Brown remained long enough in Savannah to see the seizure com- pleted, and returned to the seat of government. He telegraphed an account of his proceedings to the Governors of Florida, Alabama, Mis- sissippi and Louisiana, and received strong endorsements of his course in reply, and the intimation that his example should be immediately fol- lowed. Gov. Moore of Alabama immediately seized the forts aud arse- nals in that state. The minute men of Macon passed unanimously some resolutions of Charles J. Harris, Esq., approving the seizure, and plede- ing themselves to sustain Gov. Brown at any sacrifice. The state con- vention that niet soon after passed this resolution:
" This convention highly approves the energetic and patriotic conduct of Gov. Brown in taking possession of Fort Pulaski by Georgia troops, and requests him to hold pos- session nutil the relations of Georgia with the Federal government Le determined by this convention."
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148
WAR SPIRIT IN MACON.
The Governor on his way to Milledgeville was received all along the line of railroad with demonstrations of approval of his course. On his arrival in Milledgeville, a large number of citizens with music and torches went to the executive mansion and serenaded him, and he made a short talk that was cheered with a hearty good will. The press was very emphatic in approval of the Governor's action. Said the Augusta Democrat : "He has exhibited an intelligence, firmness and compre- hensive statesmanship, equaled by few and surpassed by none in the annals of the state." The Southern journals generally commended his course. The Alabama Spirit of the South thus paid him tribute:
" We cannot but admire the skillful and energetic manner in which Gov. Brown man- ages and controls the public affairs of Georgia. He takes counsel of no man's fears ; lis- tens to no timid suggestions of delay ; waits for no co-operation or compromise. He turns neither to the right hand nor the left, but proceeds right onward to vindicate the honor and protect the rights of his government. He executes his plans with the nerve of a soldier and the skill of a statesman. He defies the threats of Federal power, and laughs his enemies to scorn. He is full of Jacksonian will and courage ; possessing wisdom to de- vise and boldness and sagacity to execute. He has much administrative capacity, and in our opinion is better fitted for President of a Southern confederacy than any man in the South."
This as contemporary comment, outside of State bias, will afford some conception of how this self-reliant and resolute Executive of Georgia in that troublous day impressed impartial public judgment. A little episode occurred at this time that will exemplify the popular feeling as well as Governor Brown's spirit. The officers of the volun- teer companies of Macon, Captain R. A. Smith, Captain E. Smith, Cap- tain E. Fitzgerald, Captain T. M. Parker, Captain L. M. Lamar and Lieutenant Wm. H. Ross telegraphed to Governor Brown, asking him "if he would sanction the movement of Georgia volunteers going to the aid of South Carolina." This was the prompt response:
" I will not. Your first duty is to Georgia. South Carolina is able at present to take care of herself. You may be needed at home very soon. " JOSEPH E. BROWN."
On the 9th day of January, 1860, the State of Mississippi followed the example of South Carolina and formally seceded from the Union. On the 11th of January, Florida and Alabama withdrew. Each day as it dawned brought some new contribution to the war spirit. The Fed- cral steamer "Star of the West " attempted to run in to Fort Sumter and was fired upon by the Carolina troops in Fort Morris and driven back. It was a rising flood of combative feeling. The sense of coming conflict pervaded the most thoughtless, and serious people thrilled under
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149
THE SECESSION SPIRIT IN GEORGIA.
the moving stimulus. Richard R. Cuyler, the President of the power- ful Central Road Company, patriotically notified Gov. Brown that his bank was ready to take one hundred thousand dollars of the bonds for the defence of the State at par. Secession cockades and badges were made by the thousand and worn openly and gaily. Some lady wore a bonnet made of white and black Georgia cotton, covered with a net- work of black cotton, the streamers ornamented with Palmetto trees and Lone Stars embroidered with gold thread, while the feathers were formed of white and black worsted.
The Georgia Convention assembled on the 16th day of January, 1861. The eyes of the whole Union were upon this most august body. There was an interest in its deliberations, both profound and wide-spread. It was felt to be the turning point of the real commencement of the revo- lution. If staid, self-poised, deliberate powerful Georgia held back from the work of disintegration it would have been such a substantial check to the destructive movement as would have done much to stop it. Georgia's cooperation rendered the revolution sure. The Federal ad- ministration looked anxiously to our State as the crucial agency of the agitation. The people of the North focalized their attention upon this arbiter of an impending and incalculable convulsion. It was known that a majority of the people of Georgia favored secession, but the minority in favor of cooperation and delay was a very large and power- ful body of public sentiment, ably and patriotically headed. The vote taken in the election for members of the convention showed an aggre- gate of 50,243 for secession and 31,123 against, giving a majority of only 13,120 for immediate disunion, out of 82,366. This was a much smaller majority than Gov. Brown had obtained in his last election. In many counties the anti-secessionists had heavy majorities. Such strong counties as Baldwin, Floyd, DeKalb, Cass, Franklin, Gordon, Gwinnett, Lumpkin, Murray, Walker, Walton and others went some of them over- whehningly against disunion. In many counties it was the closest sort of a shave, giving either way only a vote or two. The most one-sided secession county in the whole State was Cobb, which gave 1,035 votes for and only seven against disunion. Chatham was also nearly unan- imous for secession. In a very few counties no opposition candidate to secession was run. In Taliaferro and Tattnall no secession candidate was put up. These statistics will show how much the people were divided on this issue, and yet in the crazy fever of the war excitement and the more noisy demonstration of the secession champions, the op- position was almost unheard and absolutely impotent. A few brave
150
PERSONELLE OF THE SECESSION CONVENTION.
spirits spoke out fearlessly, and courageously endeavored to stem the rushing and turbulent tide of disunion. But the generality of conser- vative men feeling powerless to do anything, and unwilling to incur a certain odium that clung to men alleged to be lukewarm or opposed to Southern interest, went quietly along simply voting in the opposition.
The secession convention was the ablest body ever convened in Georgia. Its membership included nearly every leading public man in the State, the leaders of all parties and shades of political opinion. The President of the Convention was George W. Crawford, who had been Governor of the State from 1843 to 1847, a gentleman of large influence and command- ing ability, and for years a recognized popular leader. There was Robert Toombs, United States Senator, and for a short time Secretary of State in the Confederate Administration ; the two famous Stephens brothers, Alexander H. Stephens, Vice President of the Confederate States, and Linton Stephens, Judge of the Supreme Court. Ex-Governor Herschel! V. Johnson, candidate for Vice President on the Douglas ticket and ex- United States Senator; Eugenius A. Nesbit, ex-Member of Congress and ex-Judge of the Supreme Court ; Benjamin H. Hill, present United States Senator ; Alfred II. Colquitt, the present able and popular Gov- ernor of Georgia; Henry L. Benning and Hiram Warner, ex-Judge and ex-Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. There was also Augustus H. Kenan, Washington Poe, David J. Bailey, ex-President of the Georgia Senate, Gen. W. T. Wofford, Francis S. Bartow, Thos. R. R. Cobb, Dr. 1I. R. Casey, Judge R. H. Clark, II. P. Bell, member of Congress since the war, Dr. J. P. Logan of Fulton county, one of the most eminent and scientific physicians in the State, Wm. IT. Dabney, D. P. Hill, Goode Bryan, Judge W. B. Fleming, Henry R. Harris, member of Con- gress since the war, Thos. P. Saffold, Judge Augustus Reese, Pur- metas Reynolds, Arthur Hood now Judge, Willis A. Hawkins, since Judge of the Supreme Court, T. M. Furlow, A. H. Hansell, S. B. Spencer, since Mayor of Atlanta, P. W. Alexander, C. W. Styles, N. A. Cars- well, now Judge of the Superior Court, and John L. Harris, since then a Judge.
Among these gentlemen two were the most potential and unexpected workers for secession. Judge Eugenius A. Nesbit, the author of the Ordinance of Secession, had always been a very conservative public man. He was a small gentleman, though of great personal dignity. He possessed unusual culture and crudition. He was a christian of pro- found piety. He had been a Congressman and a Judge of the Supreme Court, and was known for eloquence, learning, ability, classical educa-
151
DR. JOSEPHI P. LOGAN.
tion, and a moral and social character of exquisite purity. The other of these two unlooked-for disunion advocates was Thos. R. R. Cobb, like Judge Nisbet, an earnest, fervent christian worker, but who, unlike his distinguished colleague, had never taken any part in political life. He was a lawyer of marvelous industry and acumen. The secession issue aroused all the fervor of his earnest soul. The election of Lincoln threw him into the political arena, the most intense, unwearied cham- pion of secession in the state. All of the powerful energies of his mind and will were bent upon this mission of withdrawing Georgia from the Union and establishing a Southern Confederacy. He was, as Mr. Stephens fitly called him, a sort of Peter the Hermit in this' secession crusade, pursuing it with an unquenchable enthusiasm.
Nothing could more vividly show the engulfing fever of the day than the fact that such men as Dr. J. P. Logan were drawn into public activity. Leading the medical profession, he was a scientific enthusiast in his high calling. A gentleman of imposing figure and a noble face, with genial dignity of manner, combining every christian grace of character with decisive manhood, high intellectuality and rare medical skill and erudition, his interest in the movement showed how the solid strata of our best citizens was stimulated to zeal in this agitation.
Mr. Albert Lamar was made the Secretary of the Convention. Gov. Brown and ex-Gov. Howell Cobb were invited to seats upon the floor. The convention was addressed by Hon. James L. Orr, Commissioner from South Carolina, and Hon. John G. Shorter, Commissioner from Alabama, explaining the attitude of those states and seeking the cooperation of Georgia in disunion. On the 18th of January Judge Nisbet introduced a resolution declaring in favor of secession and for the appointment of a committee to report an ordinance of secession. This precipitated the issue. For this resolution ex-Gov. II. V. Jolinson, acting in concert with Mr. Stephens, offered a substitute written by ex-Gov. Johnson, reciting Georgia's attachment to the Union; the assaults that had been made upon slavery and the insecurity they begat in the Southern mind; the peril that threatened the South from a hostile majority, a peril aug- mented by the recent secession of several Southern states; and that while Georgia could not abide permanently in the Union without new and ample constitutional guarantees, yet she was not disposed to with- draw hastily or without consultation with her Southern Confederates, whose counsel and cooperation she invoked to secure our rights in the Union if possible, or to protect them out of the Union if necessary. The substitutes proposed an ordinance that Delaware, Maryland, Vir-
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152
DISCUSSION OF GIANTS OVER SECESSION.
ginia, Kentucky, North Carolina, Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, Ten- nessee and Missouri be invited to send delegates to a congress in Atlanta the 16th day of February, 1861, to consider the situation and devise a course. The independent republic of South Carolina, Florida, Alabama and Mississippi were invited to send Commissioners to said Congress. It was further declared in the ordinance that Georgia pre- sented as indispensable constitutional guarantees before she could re- main in the Union, congressional inability to abolish or prohibit slavery in the territories, surrender of fugitive slaves, punishment of rescue of slaves from officers, protection of slave property like other property in the territories, the admission of new states with or without slavery as the people thereof wish; the right of transit and protection for slaves, and the prohibition of negroes holding Federal office. It was further ordained by the substitute that upon any attempt at coercion of the seceded states Georgia would join them in resistance; that Georgia would hold Fort Pulaski and other Federal property until her final de- cision; that Commissioners be sent to the other slave states; that if all efforts fail she will help form a Southern Confederacy, and that the con- vention adjourn to the 25th day of February, 1861, and concluding with the unalterable determination of Georgia to maintain her rights, equality and safety at all hazards, and to the last extremity.
The discussion over this issue was elaborate, able and eloquent. Judge Nisbet, Gov. Johnson, T. R. R. Cobb, Mr. Stephens, Mr. Toombs, Alexander Means, Augustus Reese, Ben Hill and Francis S. Bartow, all spoke. It was a discussion of giants. The secession champions were Nisbet, Cobb, Toombs, Reese and Bartow, and pitted against them in favor of further attempt at a friendly settlement of troubles, were Johnson, Stephens, Means and Hill. The key-note of the secessionists, as condensed by Mr. T. R. R. Cobb in a speech of remarkable power, was, " We can make better terms out of the Union than in it!" And Mr. Stephens gave it as his opinion, that this single, focal idea of Mr. Cobb, looking to a more certain re-formation of the Union on a higher vantage ground outside of the Union, did more in carrying the state out than all the arguments and eloquence of all others combined. The sound, unanswerable position of the anti-secessionists was enunciated . by Mr. Stephens in the sentence, that "the point of resistance should be the point of aggression." Secession as a remedy for anticipated aggressions was not wise or politie, and these gentlemen opposing seces- sion believed that Georgia, standing firm with the border states in an effort to obtain a redress of grievances, would succeed. It was a grand
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A GRAND DEBATE.
debate over the grandest of themes, this discussion of superior minds, trained to controversy, upon a subject involving the happiness and welfare, not only of the commonwealth, but of the nation with its millions. The debate was historic, and deserves to be pictured for posterity. There is little doubt that it settled the issue-the mighty . and appalling issue of war or peace. The destinies of a nation hung upon it. Had the milder policy prevailed, and Georgia been in the rôle of peace-maker, there is no telling how the end would have been. The conservative course was the wise one. It was too grave an issue and too awful a result to have been decided hastily, and not to have first exhausted every possible means of friendly adjustment in the Union. But a Higher Power was ruling the occasion. The great and mysterious ends of Providence were in process of fulfillment. The frenzy of revolution was on the people: the counsels of prudence were subordi- nated to the honorable resentment of a chivalrie section, and the work of the emancipation of four millions of slaves progressed to its bloody and final consummation.
Ex-Gov. Johnson had moved the reference of the original and substi- tute to a special committee. After the debate the previous question was called and sustained, which brought the convention to a direct vote on Mr. Nisbet's secession resolution. The resolution was passed by a vote of 166 yeas to 130 nays, under all the circumstances a most extra- ordinary vote in its development of anti-secession views. The truth is, that some of the ablest and strongest intellects of the state and the convention opposed secession, and that measure was carried by so small a majority as to demonstrate how reluctant our people were to enter upon a violent course. Mr. Toombs was the undoubted head of the secessionists in the convention. His superb qualities of leadership, and his double leverage as a Senator in the United States and a member of the convention, with all the power and information that such senator- ship gave him, equipped him for hastening the march of the revolution. He had made a speech in the United States Senate on the fth of Janu- ary, 1861, of surpassing power-a speech intended to put upon record the wrong's and the cause of the South-a speech of crushing logic and sublime eloquence. One by one he had in elear, forcible language laid down the demands of the South, and their foundation in solenm consti- tutional guarantees. He candidly made the striking admission, "that a very large portion of the people of Georgia prefer to remain in this Union with their constitutional rights-I would say ninety per cent. of them-believing it to be a good government." Unanswerably arguing
154
COMMITTEE TO DRAFT SECESSION ORDINANCE.
that the Constitution was the compact of union, he discussed every grievance of which the South complained in the light of the Constitu- tion. The speech was full of magnificent bursts of thrilling eloquence. He concluded with this impassioned passage :
" These charges I have proven by the record, and I put them before the civilized wort ;. and demand the judgment of to-day, of to-morrow, of distant ages, and of heaven itselt. upon the justice of these causes. I am content, whatever it be, to peril all in so noble, so holy a cause. We have appealed, time and time again, for these constitutional rights. You have refused them. We appeal again. Restore us those rights as we had them, as your court adjudges them to be, just as our people have said they are ; redress these flagrer .! wrongs, seen of all men, and it will restore fraternity, and peace and unity to all of us Refuse them, and what then? We shall then ask you, ' Let us depart in peace.' Refuse that, and you present us war. We accept it; and inscribing upon our banners the glori- ous words, 'Liberty and Equality,' we will trust in the blood of the brave and the God of Battles for security and tranquillity."
Coming to Georgia with these grim words of war upon his eloquent lips, echoing their stern spirit over the whole country, and flaming men's hearts everywhere in the broad land, he took his seat in the sov- ereign convention of his great state, and there resumed the fiery mission of a nation's severance. It was a wonderful work, this disintegration of a gigantic government. And looking back from a twenty years' stand- point of time, one wonders that no prescience of the immeasurable mis- eries that followed were vouchsafed to the architects, the undoubtedly patriotic and pure-souled architects of that act of colossal ruin and destruction. God for his own good reasons allowed no prophetie reve- lations of the terrible future, and the revolution went on in which a noble people, in a sacred cause of self-government, were crucified for a humanitarian wrong, for which they were not responsible. Thus inscrutably does Providence forge out its great plans.
The secession battle was fought and whipped over Judge Nisbet's resolution. After its passage the colonial flag of Georgia was raised amidst a wild excitement. It was a short work to complete the act. Judge Nisbet promptly moved that the committee to report an ordinance of secession consist of seventeen members. It was carried. The Presi- dent appointed the following gentlemen:
E. A. Nisbet, chairman; Robert Toombs, H. V. Johnson, F. S. Bartow, H. L. Benning, W. M. Brown, G. D. Rice, T. H. Trippe, T. R. R. Cobb. A. H. Kenan, A. H. Stephens, Jas. Williamson, D. P. Hill, B. H. Ilill. E. W. Chastain, A. H. Colquitt, Aug. Reese. Immediately after the appointment of the committee a message was received from Governor Brown in response to a resolution calling on him for any information
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155
THE GEORGIA SECESSION ORDINANCE.
in his possession that would facilitate the action of the body, furnish- ing the ordinance of Georgia ratifying the Constitution of the United States, and also a copy of resolutions of the New York legislature ten- dering aid to the President to uphold the Union. The committee reported the following Ordinance of Secession:
" AN ORDINANCE
" To dissolve the Union between the State of Georgia and other States united with her under a compact of Government entitled, 'The Constitution of the United States of America.'
"We the people of the State of Georgia, in Convention assembled, do declare and ordain, and it is hereby declared and ordained ;
" That the ordinance adopted by the people of the State of Georgia in Convention on the second day of January, in the year of our Lord 1788, whereby the Constitution of the United States of America was assented to, ratified and adopted ; and also all acts and parts of acts of the General Assembly of this State ratifying and adopting amendments of the said Constitution, are hereby repealed, rescinded and abrogated.
"We do further declare and ordain, That the union now subsisting between the State of Georgia and other States, under the name of the United States of America, is hereby dissolved, and that the State of Georgia is in the full possession and exercise of all those rights of sovereignty, which belong and appertain to a free and independent State."
On motion of Mr. Toombs the ordinance was twice read. Ben. Hill moved, as a substitute for the ordinance, the preamble and resolutions that had been offered by ex-Gov. II. V. Johnson. On this motion the vote stood 133 yeas to 164 nays, a slight gain in the anti-secession vote, though the motion was lost. Mr. Nisbet then moved the passage of the ordinance, and the vote stood 208 yeas to 89 nays, showing that 44 of the anti-secession members voted for the ordinance under the idea that its passage was a foregone conclusion and further opposition was useless, while it was necessary to give all the moral force possible to the act. Ben. H. Hill voted on this ballot for secession. But H. V. Johnson, the Stephens brothers, Gen. Wofford and Hiram Warner still voted against it. The announcement of the President, Mr. Crawford, that it was his pleasure and privilege to declare that the State of Georgia was free, sovereign and independent, was followed by an applause that was tempered by the gravity of thoughtful men over a step of serious and unknown import. The hour of the passage of this momentous ordinance was two o'clock r. M., the 19th day of January, 1861. The Atlanta Intelligencer a year after, recalling the event, thus described it:
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