The History of the Civil War (Complete Edition). James Ford Rhodes
between North and South."55 Later, Lord Palmerston, in his speech at the Lord Mayor's dinner, "gave it clearly to be understood that there is to be no interference for the sake of cotton."56
But meanwhile the American press, apparently with no feeling of responsibility, was carrying on a duel with the English. The irritation caused by the ungenerous criticism of the London journals was vented by our own in bitter recrimination. Chief in attack was the New York Herald. "Let England and Spain look well to their conduct," it said, "or we may bring them to a reckoning."57 "It is unfortunate" wrote John Bright to Sumner on November 20, "that nothing is done to change the reckless tone of your New York Herald; between it and the Times of London there is great mischief done in both countries."
In spite of this skirmish of journalists, the two governments were approaching diplomatically a good understanding when a rash, "ambitious, self-conceited and self-willed"58 naval Captain not only undid in an hour all the advantage Adams, Seward and Lincoln had gained in six months, but brought the two countries to the brink of war.
James M. Mason and John Slidell, commissioners from the Confederate States to Great Britain and France, left Charleston on a little Confederate steamer and, evading the blockade, reached a Cuban port, whence they proceeded to Havana and took the British mail packet Trent for St. Thomas, where direct connection could be made with a British steamer for Southampton. On November 8, next day after leaving Havana, the Trent was sighted in the Bahama Channel by the American man-of-war San Jacinto, under the command of Captain Wilkes. He fired a shot across her bow without result, and then a shell; this brought her to. He ordered a lieutenant, accompanied by other officers and a number of marines, to board and search the Trent, and, if Mason and Slidell were found, to make them prisoners. The British Captain opposed anything like a search of his vessel, nor would he consent to show papers or passenger list. But Slidell and Mason announced themselves, were seized, and despite their protest as well as those of the Captain of the Trent and of a commander of the royal navy in charge of the mails, were taken by force from the Trent to the San Jacinto.
On November 15, Wilkes arrived at Fort Monroe; next day the country had the news. Rejoicing over the seizure as if a great battle had been won, the Northern people completely lost their heads. Having yearned for a victory, they now held in their hands the two Southern men59 whom, next to Davis and Floyd, they hated the worst and they had struck a blow at Great Britain for her supposed sympathy with the South. All the members of the Cabinet, except Montgomery Blair, were elated at the seizure. The Secretary of War read aloud the telegram announcing it to the group of men in his office and led the cheers in which Governor Andrew and the rest heartily joined. Andrew, who thought that in comparison with Mason and Slidell, "Benedict Arnold was a saint," said, at a dinner in Boston in honor of the Captain, that Wilkes had shown "wise judgment" in the act which was "one of the most illustrious services that had made the war memorable"; "we are met tonight," he added, "to congratulate a gallant officer who, to uphold the American flag, fired a shot across the bow of a ship that bore the British lion."60 The Secretary of the Navy wrote to Wilkes a formal letter of congratulation "on the great public service you have rendered in the capture of the rebel emissaries."61 The House of Representatives on the first day of its session passed a resolution, thanking him "for his brave, adroit and patriotic conduct."62
Montgomery Blair denounced the act of Wilkes as "unauthorized, irregular and illegal."63 Senator Sumner, then in Boston, said at once, "We shall have to give them up."64 The President, too, resisted the general infection. On the day that the news came to Washington, he said: "I fear the traitors will prove to be white elephants. We must stick to American principles concerning the rights of neutrals. We fought Great Britain for insisting by theory and practice on the right to do precisely what Captain Wilkes has done."65 The President ought to have acted on his first impulse and had an immediate consultation with Sumner to be sure of his law and history. It is evident from a private letter that Sumner's advice would have been "to act on the case at once and to make the surrender in conformity with our best precedents."66 And it is clear from Seward's subsequent action that, if urged by the President, he too would have consented to the surrender of Mason and Slidell before a demand for them was made. The President might then have adopted Blair's recommendation that Wilkes be ordered to take Mason and Slidell on an American warship to England and deliver them to the British government.67 Such an act would have been graceful, astute, honorable and politic and needed no more courage in breasting popular sentiment than Lincoln had already shown in his treatment of Frémont. He would have had at his back Sumner, Seward, Blair and General McClellan;68 and, if the surrender had been made immediately-before many lawyers and statesmen had fed the public excitement by alleging that the act was justifiable according to international law-the country, tersely and emphatically instructed that we were carrying out the principles for which we had always contended, would doubtless have acquiesced. Yet Lincoln clearly feared to give up Mason and Slidell, although he must have appreciated that their voices were more eloquent from their prison than they would have been in London and Paris. Indeed, as a mere matter of policy, the United States ought to have made it easy for the author of the Fugitive Slave Law to reach London and the champion of filibustering in the interest of slavery to reach Paris, since their pleading could in no way injure the Northern cause, so well was it understood, at any rate in England, that they represented slavery. Slow to act and distrustful of his impulses, Lincoln let the great opportunity slip when with a word he might have won the equivalent of a successful campaign in the field. Alike a leader and a representative of popular sentiment, he in this instance suffered his representative character to overtop the leadership. The fellow-feeling with the American public that in any dispute with Great Britain there is but one side to be considered prevented him from making a brilliant stroke. As he took no action and made no public utterance, his silence was misconstrued, and he was reported falsely as having "put down his foot," with the declaration, "I would sooner die than give them up."69
As there was then no Atlantic cable, England did not receive the news of the seizure of Mason and Slidell until November 27. The opinion was general that it was an outrage to her flag. It "has made a great sensation here," wrote John Bright to Sumner from London, "and the ignorant and passionate and 'Rule Britannia' class are angry and insolent as usual."70 "The excitement is so great," said Adams in a despatch to Seward, "as to swallow up every other topic for the moment."71 Charles Mackay,72 a friend of Seward's, wrote to him for his own and for the President's information: "The people are frantic with rage, and were the country polled I fear that 999 men out of a thousand would declare for immediate war. Lord Palmerston cannot resist the impulse if he would. If he submits to the insult to the flag his ministry is doomed-it would not last a fortnight."73
The English Cabinet decided that the seizure of Mason and Slidell was "an act of violence which was an affront to the British flag and a violation of international law," and that their liberation and "a