Confederate alliance with Missouri; More newspapers seized

Confederate bond

• In Charleston, Missouri, the Battle of Charleston (Bird's Point) is a minor clash in which Union forces led by Col. Henry Dougherty destroy a Confederate camp. This skirmish is the culmination of several skirmishes in the Charleston and Bird's Point area for the past week between pro-Union forces and secession groups./1861
• Newspaper offices in Easton and West Chester, Pennsylvania, are seized by the Lincoln Administration for their supposed Southern sympathies. The editor of the Essex County Democrat in Haverhill, Massachusetts, is tarred and feathered for his pro-Confederate feelings/1861 
• Trying to settle the political and military chaos in Missouri, the Confederate Congress in Richmond, Virginia, agrees to an alliance with Missouri's secessionist government The Congress also passes an Act authorizing the sale of Confederate Bonds. /1861 
• US Assistant Secretary of the Navy Gustavus V. Fox orders 200 US Marines to report to Commander Dahlgren at the Washington Navy Yard for duty on board ships of the Potomac Flotilla for the purpose of scouting the Maryland countryside—especially Port Tobacco—for locations suspected of being Confederate depots for provisions and arms to be used for invading Maryland./1861
• In Washington, Henry Halleck is promoted to Major General./1861

Related articles

• Lincoln moves to curb freedom of New York press (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)
• August 13, 1861: The Swamp Fox maneuvers in SE Missouri (gathkinsons.net)
• August 15, 1861: Affairs at Cairo (gathkinsons.net)
• Sunday, July 21, 1861 (blogs.the-american-interest.com)
• Sunday, June 23, 1861 (blogs.the-american-interest.com)

Unionist Virginians meet, Kansas City ordnance seized

Wheeling, western Virginia

• The people of western Virginia were not particularly in favor of Virginia’s secession. The mountainous region had social and cultural differences with the southern and eastern parts of the state. Virginians disloyal to their state meet today in the border areas with Pennsylvania and Ohio --  Wheeling, Kingwood, and Preston County to fight secession by seceding from Virginia./1861
• The Missouri Volunteer Militia seizes the United States ordnance stores at Kansas City, Missouri./1861

Lincoln suspends writ of habeas corpus

Page 1 of Lincoln Proclamation 94 suspending writ

• After Vice President Alexander Stephens' speech to the Virginia Convention yesterday, Virginia today issues a formal invitation to the Confederate Government to make its capital at Richmond and move it from Montgomery, Alabama./1861 
• Thomas J. Jackson and the Virginia Military Institute cadets had reported to Richmond for duty. Jackson had been given a desk job, Major of Engineers, but today Major General Robert E. Lee of the Virginia Militia reassigns him to command Confederate forces at Harper’s Ferry and the lower Shenandoah Valley./1861

Image via Wikipedia

Page 2 of Proclamation 94: Suspension of writ

• In a bold offense to inalienable human rights and affront to the Constitution, President Lincoln suspends the writ of habeas corpus in an area stretching from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Washington, D.C., to protect troops from pro-Confederate mobs.   This suspension will continue until after the war even though a Supreme Court case rules against it on May 27.  He assigns General Winfield Scott to supervise incidents arising from the suspension. This area has had much secessionist turmoil centered in Baltimore, Maryland, and has caused severe disruption of troops moving into Washington./1861
• In addition, Lincoln extends the naval blockade to the ports of Virginia and North Carolina./1861 
• With the need to establish the national allegiance of all members of the US Army in light of the numbers of resignations by Southern officers, all United States Army officers are required to take the oath of allegiance to the United States. Lincoln also makes several department appointments in the Army: Brig, Gen. Benjamin Franklin Butler, Massachusetts militia, is assigned to the command of the Department of Annapolis, Maryland. US Col. Joseph K. F. Mansfield, is assigned to command the Department of Washington, D.C., and Maj. Gen. Robert Patterson, to the Department of Pennsylvania. For fear of the secession of Maryland, the Naval Academy at Annapolis, Md., is ordered to be removed to Fort Adams, Rhode Island./1861

Related articles

• Lee offered US Army command, VA militia takes Harper's Ferry
• Virginia secedes
• Lincoln Suspends Writ of Habeas Corpus; Jackson to the Valley (civilwardailygazette.com)
• April 25, 1861: Lincoln writes to Winfield Scott - let the Maryland legislature meet (civilwar-online.com)
• Lincoln nervous, Lee takes Virginia command (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)
• ... and as for Marylanders and 1861... (cenantua.wordpress.com)

Lee resigns, Norfolk Navy Yard burned

R.E. Lee's resignation from the US Army

• Robert E. Lee resigns his commission, only a few weeks old, as Colonel of the United States Army, showing his loyalty to and love for his gallant State of Virginia and his beloved Southland./1861
•  President Jefferson Davis, in his Post Sumter Address to Congress today, says: "All we want is to be left alone."/1861 
• In a move to prevent naval property from falling into the hands of the Confederacy, Federal troops under orders from Commandant Charles S. McCauley scuttle ships and set fire to the Federal Gosport Naval Yard and evacuate Norfolk, Virginia, hauling out the U.S.S. Cumberland. McCauley’s instructions are to destroy what could not be saved, which results in several ships being burnt at their moorings. One of them is the USS Merrimac. She is partly burned, then sunk. She will rise again, under as the ironclad CSS Virginia. McCauley’s action angers Union officials because it makes more difficult the implementation of the naval blockade./1861
• President Lincoln issues a military order for regiments coming to Washington to bypass Baltimore, Maryland, because of the civil unrest there as Federal troops begin to pour into the Washington, D.C., region. In Maryland, Confederate sympathizers destroy several railroad bridges on the Northern Pennsylvania Railroad to prevent the passage of troops to Washington as well as wires and tracks in Delaware and Pennsylvania. The 4th Mass. Regiment commanded by Brig. Gen. Ebenezer W. Pierce arrives at Fortress Monroe, Virginia, to protect Washington from attack, since it is only accessible by water now as the rail line from Harper’s Ferry, Virginia is controlled by Virginia troops and Maryland secessionists have burned the railroad bridges from Baltimore. General Butler's command arrives at Annapolis, Maryland./1861
• Confederate sympathizers in Missouri seize the United States arsenal at Liberty, Missouri./1861

• A secession meeting attended by several local militia companies and a large number of county residents in the town of Guyandotte (now West Virginia), an island of secessionism in far western Virginia near Ohio, calls for the state to approve the secession actions of the Virginia legislature and secession convention. A newly sewn state flag was raised by two of the town's oldest citizens "amid the enthusiastic applause of the multitude and the rejoicing of the ladies, a large number of whom were present." One of many speeches given that day was interrupted by the arrival of a steamer, which brought the official news of Virginia's break with the Union. The already upbeat mood turned jubilant, and salutes were fired to the Confederacy and to President Jefferson Davis. Albert Jenkins, who had given up his congressional seat, arrived and led some of the volunteer companies to his farm at Greenbottom, where they began drilling in preparation for war. Known as the Border Rangers, these local men soon joined a Confederate force at Camp Tompkins in the Kanawha Valley./1861

Related articles

• Lee offered US Army command, VA militia takes Harper's Ferry (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)
• Virginia secedes (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)
• April 18, 1861: The U.S. Armory at Harper's Ferry is burned (civilwar-online.com)
• April 19, 1861: Harper's Ferry burned (gathkinsons.net)

Gods and Generals - I Will Not Lead Them
Tags: Gods and Generals - I Will Not Lead Them

Naval blockade, Baltimore massacre

• In Washington, President Lincoln in another of his infamous warmongering actions and without a Constitutionally required Congressional declaration of war, surprises many and proclaims a bold naval blockade of all Southern ports. The Blockade will become a major part of Winfield Scott’s Anaconda Plan. The primary reason the President gives for the blockade is that “the laws of the United States for the collection of the revenue cannot be effectually executed therein.” In response to Jefferson Davis’ April 17 offer to authorize Southern privateers, Lincoln’s proclamation also declares that all privateering would be considered piracy. The Department of the Navy finds itself under immediate orders to place ships at all critical ports of the Confederacy. The blockade is initially spotty since the navy has 42 usable ships, 555 guns, and 7,600 sailors scattered around the world to block 3,500 miles of Atlantic and Gulf coastline.   However, it will be increased to 264 ships, 2,557 guns, and 22, 000 sailors by the end of 1861 and increase steadily thereafter until at the end of the war it will have 626 ships and 51,500 sailors. The US Supreme Court will later hold that Lincoln’s Blockade is the legal beginning of the War, giving further evidence that Lincoln, not the seceded states, fomented this war. /1861 
• From Baltimore, Maryland, an important city for supply and defense of Washington, D.C., Mayor George W. Brown informs President Lincoln "that it is not possible for more soldiers to pass through Baltimore unless they fight their way at every step. In Baltimore, Southern sympathizers cut telegraph lines and bridges to Washington, D. C. Carrying Confederate flags, they attack the 6^th Massachusetts Regiment as they pass through the city toward Washington. The 6^th Massachusetts responds by opening fire on the crowd. When the dust settles, four soldiers and between nine and eleven civilians are dead and many wounded, 17 from the 6^th Massachusetts. They are among the first casualties of the War Between the States, and earning the incident the sobriquet of the Baltimore Massacre. The 6^th Massachusetts then proceeds to the District and is quartered for the night in the U.S. Senate Chamber. The US Navy will now be employed to ferry troops from Philadelphia and Annapolis to Washington, bypassing Baltimore./1861
• Virginia State Militia assumes command of the destroyed Federal Arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia./1861

• ·         The Northern States, misunderstanding that the South seceded because they wanted to be left alone, are shocked by fearful rumors. False reports circulate concerning a Southern troop movement toward Washington. Troops from Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, and the New England states begin to assemble. Even Quebec sends 600 men. Federal marshals seize the records of telegraphs sent from major Northern cities, leading to the arrest of Southern sympathizers. President Lincoln assigns Maj. Gen. Robert Patterson, Pennsylvania militia, to military command of the States of Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and District of Columbia. The city of brotherly love, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, appropriates $1,000,000 to equip volunteers and support their families to subdue the South./1861

Related articles

• 4 ways we're still fighting the Civil War (cnn.com)
• April 15, 1861: Abraham Lincoln calls for troops to put down rebellion (civilwar-online.com)
• April 15, 1861: Lincoln calls for troops (gathkinsons.net)
• Lincoln: 75,000 to quell 'insurrection' (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)

Lee offered US Army command, VA militia takes Harper's Ferry

Col. Robert E. Lee, USA, 1861

• Major Robert Anderson and his Fort Sumter garrison arrives in New York to a hero’s welcome while President Lincoln in Washington listens to an eyewitness account from Mr. Wiley of New York of what he saw in Charleston Friday night, April 12, 1861, during the battle of Fort Sumter. Lincoln then retires early but upon being awakened by John Hay, his assistant secretary, to inform him of a possible plot against his life, Lincoln grins./1861
• F.B. Blair, Sr., presents orders to Colonel Robert Edward Lee, USA, from General of the Army, Winfield Scott. On personal orders from President Lincoln, Scott offers command of the entire US Army to Colonel Robert E. Lee to coerce the South, and a terrible dilemma confronts Lee: Fame or Service to his State. /1861
• Virginia militia under command of Brig. Gen. William H. Harman chases out of Harper's Ferry, Virginia, the Union garrison under command of Lieutenant Jones who destroys as much as possible beforehand to prevent its falling into the possession of the Confederate or Virginia governments./1861 
• Colonel Cake with 400 men, four companies, of the Twenty-fifth Pennsylvania Volunteers arrives in Washington, D. C., the first volunteer troops to enter the city for its defense. On the way, the companies must change trains in Baltimore, Maryland, and march through the city where pro-secession flags fly from buildings on Federal hill. Southern sympathizers cat call, sneer, and make rude remarks. But the tension in Baltimore is decidedly rising./1861

Image by Allen Gathman via Flickr

Missouri Gov. C.F. Jackson

• Governor Claiborne F. Jackson, of Missouri, in rejecting President Lincoln’s demand for a state quota of troops to fight the seceded states, declares the requisition is “illegal, unconstitutional, revolutionary, inhuman, diabolical and cannot be complied with.”/1861

• Georgia Governor Joseph E. Brown, in response to the Federal call for troops, calls on all Georgia men to volunteer for military service with this statement, “Let us all, with one accord, prepare to welcome the invaders with "bloody hands to hospitable graves." We have to deal with an enemy wily and treacherous, base, malignant and full of hate. It is impossible to know what are the full designs of Lincoln and his black band. Of one thing we may be assured: they will strike any and all the harm they have the power to do. Therefore we can lose nothing by being fully and thoroughly prepared at every point, and for any emergency. Now we recommend that every man capable of bearing arms, regardless of age, and every boy sixteen years old and upwards, begin immediately to train and drill. ..../1861

• Arkansas troops seize U.S. stores at Napoleon, Arkansas./1861

Virginia secedes

28th Virginia flag

• Less than two weeks ago Virginia voted down secession. But now everything has changed with Lincoln inaugurating war on the South and his call for troop quotas of militias from each state in the Union to supply a total of 75,000 volunteers to subdue the insurrection he has declared. Virginia Governor John Letcher rejects Lincoln’s requisition of troops to quell rebellion, and the Virginia Secession Convention meeting at Richmond approves on a first vote of 88-55 the wording of an ordinance of secession to be approved by statewide referendum on May 23. A second vote to ratify the Provisional Confederate Constitution was 103-46 in favor of joining the Confederacy, becoming the eighth state to secede and join the Southern Confederacy. For all intents and purposes, most view Virginia as a seceded state though several formalities must be completed. “AN ORDINANCE to repeal the ratification of the Constitution of the United States of America by the State of Virginia, and to resume all the rights and powers granted under said Constitution.
  
  The people of Virginia in their ratification of the Constitution of the United States of America, adopted by them in convention on the twenty-fifth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-eight, having declared that the powers granted under said Constitution were derived from the people of the United States and might be resumed whensoever the same should be perverted to their injury and oppression, and the Federal Government having perverted said powers not only to the injury of the people of Virginia, but to the oppression of the Southern slave-holding States:
  
  Now, therefore, we, the people of Virginia, do declare and ordain, That the ordinance adopted by the people of this State in convention on the twenty-fifth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-eight, whereby the Constitution of the United States of America was ratified, and all acts of the General Assembly of this State ratifying and adopting amendments to said Constitution, are hereby repealed and abrogated; that the union between the State of Virginia and the other States under the Constitution aforesaid is hereby dissolved, and that the State of Virginia is in the full possession and exercise of all the rights of sovereignty which belong and appertain to a free and independent State.
  
  And they do further declare, That said Constitution of the United States of America is no longer binding on any of the citizens of this State.
  
  This ordinance shall take effect and be an act of this day, when ratified by a majority of the voters of the people of this State cast at a poll to be taken thereon on the fourth Thursday in May next, in pursuance of a schedule hereafter to be enacted.
  
  Adopted by the convention of Virginia April 17,1861./1861

• By 2 o'clock in the morning of April 17, US Colonel Harvey Brown begins a second reinforcement of Fort Pickens at Pensacola Bay, Florida. Throughout the day, troops, supplies, and horses transfer from ships to the fort. The powerful war steamer Powhatan also arrives in the early morning despite being delayed by "heavy gales, head winds, and defective boilers." US Lieutenant David Dixon Porter decides to "run the gantlet" into Pensacola Harbor disguised as an English steamer and flying British colors.  Colonel Brown, recognizing the Powhatan, sends Meigs to stop Porter from barreling into the Harbor inviting attack from Confederate guns, and interfering with the fort’s reinforcement, putting the Union command in danger of an unwanted battle. Porter recklessly ignores signals obviously intended for him, forcing Meigs to put a ship directly in Porter's path to block his entry into Pensacola Harbor. Meigs forces the Powhatan to drop anchor near the Atlantic. A few days later, Porter sends a letter to Washington protesting that Meigs had prevented him from carrying out his orders. He addresses the letter, not to Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles, but to Secretary of State William Seward, requesting him to give the information to President Lincoln. In spite of Porter’s loose cannon antics, Fort Pickens will have a garrison of around 1100 soldiers and laborers and six months’ provisions after all the ships of the expedition arrive./1861

• In Baltimore, Maryland, secessionists convene a meeting to push for Maryland to secede from the Union. Lincoln is terrified of the prospect of District of Columbia being surrounded by seceded states./1861
• Militia aboard the Confederate Army steamer General Rusk off the coast of Texas take the Star of the West, famous for being fired on in a relief expedition sent by President Buchanan./1861
• In Montgomery, Alabama, anticipating a Union naval blockade and without a viable Navy, Confederate President Jefferson Davis responds to Lincoln’s call for 75,000 troops by issuing a proclamation calling for all owners of sea-going vessels to volunteer them for use in defending the Confederate States against "aggression" from the United States. He also announces that the Confederate government will accept applications for letters of marquee and reprisal, which are authorizations to fit out an armed ship and use it to attack, capture, and plunder enemy merchant ships in time of war, a policy known as privateering./1861
• In response to Lincoln’s call for militia, Pennsylvania sends five companies. Known as the “First Defenders” the men depart from Philadelphia to Washington, which requires them to pass through Baltimore where pro-secession flags fly on several buildings on Federal Hill in Baltimore. The men, unarmed, untrained and unprepared, received dirty looks, scowls and a few rude remarks./1861

Related articles

• Tying Up Loose Ends with the Powhatan, Lincoln, Seward and Welles (civilwardailygazette.com)
• Lincoln's confusion, bungling, and lies (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)

Relief expedition heightens tensions

Inside Fort Sumter

·       In Washington this afternoon, the Confederate peace commissioners telegraph the Confederate government in Montgomery, Alabama, saying they have been formally notified by US Secretary of State William Seward that the United States has refused recognition, reception, or negotiation with them. The Confederate Secretary of War Leroy Pope Walker promptly alerts General Braxton Bragg, and repeats an order given earlier in the day to prevent the reinforcement of Fort Pickens at "every hazard." Meanwhile on Pennsylvania Avenue, with both the Fort Sumter and Fort Pickens expeditions in the process of departing New York, Lincoln writes the governor of neighboring Pennsylvania, saying that the necessity of being ready "increases. Look to it."/1861

Anderson's quarters at Fort Sumter

·         Meanwhile at Fort Sumter, Major Anderson drafts a response to Lincoln's letter of April 4, expressing surprise at a relief expedition. He explains that Ward H. Lamon's visit had convinced him that Fox's plan would not be carried out, and he warns President Lincoln that an effort to relieve the fort under these circumstances "would produce most disastrous results throughout our country," adding that Fox's plan is impracticable and would result in a loss of life which would far outweigh the benefits of maintaining a position of no military value unless the surrounding Confederate positions were taken as well. Anderson concludes that his garrison would, nevertheless, "strive to do our duty, though I frankly say that my heart is not in the war which I see is to be thus commenced. That God will still avert it, and cause us to resort to pacific measures to maintain our rights, is my ardent prayer." But the imperial-minded Lincoln is not so inclined. Anderson's letter will never make it to Washington. It would be seized by South Carolina authorities following Confederate government orders to stop his mail./1861 

USRC Harriet Lane

·      [SEIGE OF FORT SUMTER] As the tug Yankee and the Federal revenue cutter Harriet Lane departs Brooklyn, New York, Navy Yard for Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina, US State Department clerk Robert S. Chew and Captain Theodore Talbot arrive in Charleston about 6 o'clock in the early evening and read a letter from President Lincoln to Governor Pickens of South Carolina stating that President Lincoln is sending food, and not soldiers to Fort Sumter, providing Pickens with a copy. This, however, is a blatant lie. Two hundred men are on board the fleet to reinforce Fort Sumter. Governor Pickens calls in General Beauregard and reads him the same message. Beauregard refuses Talbot's request to return to his post at Sumter or to communicate with Major Anderson, saying he is under orders to permit no communication with Fort Sumter, unless it conveyed an order for its evacuation. 

With the meeting over, Chew and Talbot are escorted to the railroad depot and leave Charleston at 11 p.m. Then Pickens and Beauregard forward Lincoln’s threatening letter to President Davis in Montgomery that "provisions would be sent to Sumter peaceably, otherwise by force." Accordingly, Davis orders Confederate forces under Beauregard to ready its forces around Charleston Harbor for military action and that "under no circumstances" was he to allow provisions to be sent to Fort Sumter."/1861

• President Jefferson Davis requests troops from the seceded states of the Confederacy./1861
• Georgia Governor Joseph E. Brown orders the Georgia Militia to take possession of the United States Mint located in Dahlonega./1861

Related articles

• Lincoln's confusion, bungling, and lies (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)
• "...if on your arrival there the flag of the United States shall be flying over Fort Sumter, and the fort shall not have been attacked, you will procure an interview with Governor Pickens, and read to him as follows..." - Operations in Charleston Harbor (dotcw.com)
• Fort Sumter's courtesies cut off (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)
• Orders issued to relieve Fort Sumter (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)
• Lincoln to Seward: "I'm the decider" (wbts-calendar.blogspot.com)
• Tying Up Loose Ends with the Powhatan, Lincoln, Seward and Welles (civilwardailygazette.com)

Lincoln inaugurated; Stars & Bars adopted

First National Confederate Flag (7 star)

• The Confederacy adopts its first flag, the Stars and Bars, designed by O.R. Smith of Louisburg, NC./1861
• President Davis appoints Stephen R. Mallory Secretary of the Navy/1861 
• The U.S. Senate considers the Peace Convention resolutions in the waning moments of its session but rejects them decisively, 28-7./1861 

• 

  US Capitol on Lincoln's Inauguration

  It is the big day in Washington. Abraham Lincoln is inaugurated the sixteenth President of the United States with 30,000 in attendance. After a dreary morning with sharp, chilly winds out of the northwest and some rain, a bright sun comes out by noon on this cold day. Outgoing President James Buchanan accompanies Lincoln on the traditional carriage ride up Pennsylvania Avenue to Capitol Hill. A flag-draped platform constructed at the east portico of the Capitol serves the Inauguration ceremony. With threats against the President’s life, security is tight with guards and troops everywhere, and the Capitol itself has been carefully searched. 

In his inaugural address, Lincoln emphasizes that he is not opposed to slavery where it is established, assuming that slavery was the only issue that brought states to the point of secession. He says the seceded states are in error, since the Union is perpetual, ignoring the meaning and raison d’être for the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution.

Lincoln and Buchanan pass Capitol

By taking the stance that secession is an act against the Federal government and therefore "insurrectionary or revolutionary," Lincoln sets a bullying tone at the beginning of his Administration. He vows to uphold and reassemble the Union, thinly veiling his belligerent intent to coerce states by military force, thus violating the very Constitution he only minutes earlier took an oath to uphold.

Then with powerful and persuasive rhetoric, Lincoln spins the national crisis caused by his own election by laying blame for his willful intimidation at the feet of the Southern states threatening, "in your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war.”/1861

Lincoln gives his Inauguration Address

• The new President Lincoln does not have time to celebrate his new job. This morning in the midst of inaugural festivities, Lincoln finds at his office a report from Major Robert Anderson at Fort Sumter, written on February 28, which has reached Washington today. Anderson reports that his examination of provisions has found that the garrison has four to six weeks of supplies remaining. Anticipating reinforcements, Anderson says that he and his staff agree that a considerable land and naval force would be required to relieve Fort Sumter – an estimated "twenty thousand good and well-disciplined men."/1861

Montgomery: Friendly but determined negotiation

Alabama Capitol staircase where Confederate Congress met

• The new Confederate Provisional Congress meeting in Montgomery passes a resolution that the new President-elect Davis should appoint a commission of three persons to be “sent to the government of the United States of America, for the purpose of negotiating friendly relations between that government and the Confederate States of America, and for the settlement of all questions of disagreement between the two governments upon principles of right, justice, equity, and good faith." In the event that peaceful negotiations are not possible, the Congress also resolves to take Fort Sumter at Charleston, South Carolina, and Fort Pickens in Pensacola, Florida, by force if necessary. Delegates from recently seceded Texas arrive in Montgomery to take seats in the Confederate Congress./1861 

• Assistant adjutant-general of the U.S. army, L. Thomas, writes today (received March 1) to the newly appointed army commander in Texas, Colonel C.A. Waite of the U.S. First Infantry, that General-in-Chief Winfield Scott, orders that, in the event of the secession of Texas, Colonel Waite should, "without unnecessary delay, put in march for Fort Leavenworth [Kansas], the entire military force of your department,” sending any supplies they cannot carry with them by water to New York. Scott’s purpose is twofold: to keep federal property out of the hands of a seceded Texas and to punish Texas for their action by leaving the state’s frontier open to Indian attack. By the time the order would arrive (March 1), the Texas state militia and the Commissioners of the Committee of Public Safety of Texas would have received the surrender of all federal property in the state and all US Army personnel would leave by way of the coast./1861

• In Washington, the Peace Conference drags on interminably, discussing and debating every detail of several proposed compromises to the secession crisis, with no real hope for a durable solution, entirely because President-elect Lincoln has indicated his absolute opposition to any compromise with the Southern States./1861

• Raphael Semmes resigns from the United States Navy to defend his state of Alabama/1861 

• On his trip to be inaugurated the sixteenth President of the United States, President-elect Abraham Lincoln, from the Manongahela House balcony in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the longest address of his journey, strangely remarks that “there is no crisis, excepting such a one as may be gotten up at anytime by turbulent men, aided by designing politicians.” After a carriage ride through nearly impenetrable crowds to the train station, Lincoln continues to Cleveland, Ohio, by late afternoon in a rain and snow storm. While having his mid-day dinner with the president of the railroad at Sourbeck’s Hotel in Canton, Ohio, a company of Canton Zouaves stand guard while a band plays national airs, and a gun salute shatters a hotel window during meal, sprinkling glass on Mrs. Lincoln. Again he meets large crowds, though the Democrat-leaning Cleveland Plain Dealer reporter wonders if the warm receptions are thinly veiled requests for political appointments. Welcomed by tens of thousands with military escort, Lincoln says, “"I think that there is no occasion for any excitement. The crisis, as it is called, is altogether an artificial crisis." Later Lincoln’s son, Robert, causes some excitement when he misplaces the President-elect’s satchel of the Inaugural Addresses./1861