Wheeling Convention closes; Lincoln: "Protect the gold"

• At the First Wheeling Convention in Wheeling, western Virginia, Unionist Virginians who are so much against Virginia’s secession that they wish to secede from their own state, agree on the third and last day of debate that the Convention should wait until after Virginia’s referendum on secession on May 23 before deciding how to move forward. The convention passes resolutions calling for the election of delegates to their own intrastate secession convention on June 4 and the convening of a Second Convention at Wheeling, Virginia, on June 11./1861
• One month after surrendering Fort Sumter, Robert Anderson is promoted to Brigadier General in the US Artillery./1861

USS Bainbridge off Cuba 1862

• Today the USS Bainbridge is ordered to the Atlantic coast of Panama to guard this major transshipment point for cargo from the American west coast--including the gold mines of California. Lincoln is concerned that California gold shipments would be very attractive to Southern privateers, since the Confederate government desperately needs gold to buy munitions abroad./1861

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