A New Year's Day Retrospect of 1863

Watch television at the end of December or start of January and you are bound to come across a special program or two on the "year in review." Many of us like to look back at the previous twelve months and remember the people, places, and events that made the year unique. Perhaps we are motivated by nostalgia or even a deep-seated sense of history. But whatever the reason, twenty-first century Americans are not alone in reflecting on the past year as they ring in a new one.

"New Year's Day," Harper's Weekly, Jan. 2, 1864 (courtesy of sonofthesouth.net)

On January 1, 1864, the Washington Daily National Republican published "A Retrospect." The paper offered readers a review of Union military gains during 1863:

In taking a retrospect of the past year we find a record of the most brilliant successes yet achieved during the war. If we include Mufreesboro, which commenced by skirmishing on December 29, 1862, and lasted until January 4, 1863, we have among our principal victories Mufreesboro, Vicksburg, Morris Island, Gettysburg, Port Hudson, Chattanooga, Knoxville. History does not furnish a year's victories by the armies of any country in any war that will excel these.

[Braxton] Bragg was completely whipped at Mufreesboro after a week's hard fighting.

At Vicksburg General [Ulysses S.] Grant, by military manoeuvres that have no parallel, captured the rebel stronghold of the Mississippi Valley.

At Port Hudson, the last remaining post on the Mississippi, the navigation of the "Father of Waters" was opened entirely by General [Nathaniel P.] Banks.

At Morris Island General [Quincy] Gillmore astonished the world by his gunnery, captured forts the rebels deemed impregnable, put Charleston under fire, and converted the original city of the rebellion into a purgatory for traitors, where they must live in mortal fear until the town is finally wrapped in ashes.

At Gettysburg the rebels were brought to a stop in their contemplated raid, which was to destroy at one fell swoop Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington. The question of a Northern invasion was settled by this battle, and the future safety of the North secured.

At Chattanooga the invincibility of our armies when rightly handled was established, and the rebels cut off from their most fruitful source of supplies, East Tennessee, the fighting at Knoxville putting a clincher upon this part of the business, and deciding the fate of this most valuable region.

And then may look with satisfaction to the splendid advantages gained by General Banks in Texas; to the demonstrations made by our cavalry, showing that in this arm of the service the rebels no longer excel us.

If we turn to the operations of the navy we behold an equally pleasing record. The blockade has finally been made so nearly perfect that the rebels can no longer depend upon receiving supplies from foreign speculators, and our captures of rebel craft have been very heavy.

Our victories during the year have cost us dearly in the blood of our patriotic countrymen, but this has sanctified our cause and rendered more determined our people in the work of putting down the insurrection. Never will we yield our birthright to traitors, when so many of our kindred have died so nobly in defending it.

The paper closed the retrospect with an excerpt from "To-Day and To-Morrow" by English poet Gerald Massey:

High hopes that burned like stars sublime
 Go down the heaven of Freedom
And true hearts perish in the time
 We bitterliest need them
For never sit we down and say
 There's nothing left but sorrow
We walk the wilderness to-day
 The Promised Land to-morrow

Build up heroic lives, and all
 Be like a sheathen sabre
Ready to flash out at God's call, 
 O chivalry of labor 
Triumph and toil are twins: and aye,
 Joy s[uns] the cloud of sorrow
And 'tis the martyrdom of to-day
 Brings victory to-morrow (emphasis in original editorial).

The Daily National Republican's focus on the military successes of 1863 is not surprising. After all, when compared to a year ago and the disaster at Fredericksburg, the war was going much better for the Union, and people across the country had every reason to look back with pride. Echoing President Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, the newspaper called for a total defeat of the rebellion so that those who died preserving the Union had not died in vain. Within a few months, the pages of the Daily National Republican would carry news of Union advances and high casualties. The war would lead to even more death and destruction during 1864, but "victory to-morrow" would be within reach as the year drew to a close.

**

I'd like to wish everyone a Happy New Year, and thanks for reading in 2013! This past year has been a busy one for the blog and my other Civil War-related pursuits, and 2014 promises to be even busier. The pipeline of posts keeps growing. I also have a couple of speaking engagements later this winter and plan to work with Fairfax County on developing a new Civil War Trails marker. And then there are the multitude of Sesquicentennial activities that will be attracting everyone's attention this year. As always, see you here, and hopefully see you on the battlefield!

Sources

Gerald Massey, The Poetical Works of Gerald Massey (1861); Washington Daily National Republican, Jan. 1, 1864;

Alexandria's Delegate: Unionist for All the Wrong Reasons

Alexandria County sent Unionist George William Brent to the Virginia Convention on February 4, 1861. As the Convention met and debated in Richmond, Brent sought a compromise to keep the Union together and avoid civil war. A resolution he introduced on February 20, 1861 called on the Convention to support the Crittenden Compromise or "any other plan of conciliation equivalent thereto, which has been, or may be hereafter offered, by which harmony may be restored between the people of the different States, and the Union perpetuated." Brent's opposition to secession was not based on any deep-seated concerns over the constitutionality of leaving the Union. In fact, by his own admission, Brent firmly believed in the right of states to secede. However, Brent saw secession as folly mainly because it would lead to the demise of slavery. In his view, preservation of the Union was the best way to ensure the preservation of slavery.

George William Brent (courtesy of findagrave.com)

In a lengthy speech to the Convention on March 8, 1861, Brent laid out the reasoning behind his position. He first challenged the assumption that slavery was the main driver of South Carolina's decision to secede. As he alleged:

[I]t has been more a desire to relieve herself of this system of protective tariffs than for protection of the institution of slavery, which has animated her in her political course.

Brent believed that upon a closer examination, arguments for secession based on slavery could not withstand scrutiny. He disputed that the perceived Republican threat to the extension of slavery into U.S. territories was much of a threat at all:

The constitutional right [to own slaves] is valuable and ought to be maintained, but I would ask how far is it available as a question of practical statesmanship? The absolute right is one thing, but the practicability of its exercise is another. In that view I take the ground that it has little real, practical value.

We have in the first place no territory belonging to the United States into which slave labor can profitably go. It will never go into any Territory where it is not profitable

Brent also doubted that the South had the reserve of slaves to spare for the expansion westward:

The truth is, that the South has no slaves to go there. The South has yet vast and valuable cotton lands unoccupied, and the demand upon the slave labor of the South is so great that it is inadequate to meet it.

Brent saved his harshest criticism for those who saw secession as a means to deal with the fugitive slave issue. He observed that the states of the Deep South had little to worry about in the first place, given the buffer of border states like Virginia that could prevent escaped slaves from easily reaching free soil. He then explored the fallacy of the argument linking secession to a resolution of the fugitive slave problem:

But we are told that secession will remedy the escape of our slaves. In what manner? What is the remedy proposed? We have been told. . . that we could establish along the border, a cordon of military posts to intercept the fugitive. Mr. President, the remedy is worse than the disease. You would establish in the midst of the border States, within their very heart a standing army dangerous to the liberties and freedom of the people, and which would entail upon us for its support and maintenance a cost far greater than the value of the slaves lost. Such a policy would invite the establishment of corresponding military posts along the line of the free border States, and strifes and collisions would inevitably ensue. And, finally, Mr. President, the remedy would be ineffectual, for experience has demonstrated that in all countries where no natural barriers intervene, large standing armies have proved ineffectual to resist the escape of fugitives from justice, or the operations of the smuggler. But what would be the effect of secession upon the escape of fugitive slaves? Secession would relieve the Northern States from all constitutional obligations of duty to return our fugitive slaves. It would relieve the negro-stealer from all legal and constitutional restraints, and it would give a secure and safe asylum upon our borders for the escape of the fugitive. As has been well said by some member upon this floor, it would bring Canada down to our very doors. . . .

I think, then, that the evil in the matter of escaped fugitive negroes will be aggravated by secession rather than diminished. (emphasis added.)

Brent rightly predicted that secession would lead to bloodshed and the end of slavery:

I, for one, believe that a peaceful separation of these States cannot be effected. The interests are too great and too pervading to be snapped suddenly asunder without causing irritation, bitterness, strife and civil war. . . . 

If this Union is to be involved in war, the institution of slavery will vanish from our midst. The perpetuity of that institution depends upon peace and upon repose. Let civil war once sound its horrid tocsin in this land, and slavery is at once ended. (emphasis added.)

Brent, hearkening back to his own resolution, called on the delegates to find a solution to the current crisis:

Let, then, Virginia, Mr. President, strive vigorously to remove all causes of discontent between the two sections of the country. . . .

Let her . . . call a conference of the border States. Let them determine upon such amendments to the Constitution as may be deemed necessary for the protection of the South. I care not whether they are the Crittenden amendments, or any other amendments equivalent to them. Let her propose them as the ultimatum upon which the settlement of the questions at issue between the two sections is to be adjusted.

But Brent then warned that:

. . . no attempt should be made, on the part of the Federal Government, to coerce and subjugate the States that have seceded from the Union. Recognizing, as I have always done, the right of a State to secede, to judge of the violation of its rights, and to appeal to its own mode for redress, I could not uphold the Federal Government in any attempt to coerce the seceded States to bring them back into the Union.

Brent concluded by declaring his ultimate allegiance to his state, above all else:

My lot is cast with that of Virginia; come weal, come woe. Beneath her soil repose the remains of those who gave me existence, and of my children, and when my own journey of life shall have been run, my prayer will be that I too may rest in her bosom.

Brent’s Unionist views are disconcerting given their reliance on a pro-slavery rationale. Among Southerners, however, he was in a minority. Those who supported secession distrusted Lincoln and the Federal government to protect the existence of slavery. In their minds, the only way to ensure the protection of their “property” was to leave the Union altogether. Brent did not buy this argument and trusted that the Union and Constitution would function to protect the “peculiar institution.”

In the end, Brent’s speech failed to convince the delegates, who approved an Ordinance of Secession on April 17. Brent voted against the Ordinance, but remained loyal to Virginia, just as he said he would. Brent was soon commissioned as an officer of the 17th Virginia and would later go on to serve Generals Braxton Bragg and P.G.T. Beauregard in the Western Theater.

McLean's Own Confederate General

Last Saturday I decided to explore the old graveyard at the Lewinsville Presbyterian Church when I was out running errands.  I had read about a grave of particular interest on the Historical Marker Database -- the cemetery is the final resting place of Confederate Brigadier General William Whann Mackall.  In 2009, the Laura Ratcliffe Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy ("UDC") installed a commemorative marker in front of the grave.  General Mackall is buried next to his wife, Aminta, who was the sister of Confederate General Moxley Sorrell.  General Sorrell served as General James Longstreet's chief of staff during the war.



William W. Mackall's gravestone and marker.  The gravestone notes: "Brave. Gentle. Modest. Distinguished in the Florida and Mexican Wars and in the War Between the States."  The U.S. flag must in commemoration of Mackall's earlier Federal service!



UDC marker at the Mackall burial plot.  For text of marker and more information, see the Historical Marker Database entry.

Mackall was born in Georgetown, D.C. on January 13, 1817 and grew up in Cecil County, Maryland.  His father eventually moved to Fairfax County in the 1840s and settled on an estate in Langley.  Mackall attended the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, graduating eighth in his class in 1837.  Mackall's early duty included service in the war against the Seminole Indians in Florida.  During the Mexican War (1846-48), Mackall led a battery of horse artillery and earned brevet commissions as captain and major for his performance at Monterrey, Contreras, and Churubusco.  When the Civil War broke out, Mackall was serving as Assistant Adjutant General in the Department of the Pacific.  The War Department planned to make him lieutenant colonel, but Mackall, who was of Southern sympathies, resigned from the U.S. Army and headed to Richmond.

Brigadier General William W. Mackall (courtesy of findagrave.com)

General Joseph E. Johnston, one of the highest-ranking Confederate officers at the start of the war, was Mackall's long-time friend. Johnston exclaimed that he would give his right arm if the Confederate Army would send Mackall to him as major general. Instead, Mackall was commissioned a lieutenant colonel and assigned as chief of staff to General Albert Sydney Johnston in the Western Theater.  General P.G.T. Beauregard recommended that Mackall be promoted to major general, but the Confederate Government awarded him with a brigadier's commission and sent him to the staff of General Leonidas Polk.

"The Gun-Boat 'Carondelet' Running the Rebel Batteries at Island No. 10," Harper's Weekly, April 26, 1862 (courtesy of sonofthesouth.net)

In March 1862, Mackall replaced General John McCown as commander of the Confederate defenses at Island No. 10 on the Mississippi, which was the focus of an active Union military campaign.  At the start of April, Union ironclads overwhelmed the Confederate batteries, and the Federal Army under General John Pope was able to cut off the Confederate's escape route. On April 8, Mackall surrendered Island No. 10. He was sent to Fort Warren prison in Boston and was set free as part of a prisoner exchange in July 1862.  President Jefferson Davis never seems to have forgiven Mackall for the loss of Island No. 10, which was an obvious blow to the Confederacy early in the war.

Returning to service after his release, in December 1862 Mackall was made the temporary commander of the District of the Gulf until a replacement was found.  (The UDC marker makes much more of this service than appears merited.)  In April 1863, Mackall was sent back to the front to serve as chief of staff to stubborn and vindictive Braxton Bragg, commander of the Army of Tennessee.  (Interestingly enough, the UDC marker neglects to mention Bragg by name.)  Mackall helped to manage the infighting surrounding Bragg after the Battle of Chickamauga in September 1863, but even Mackall had seen enough. He tendered his resignation and soon took a brigade command under Joe Johnston in Enterprise, Mississippi.  This assignment gave the men plenty of time to complain about the object of their scorn, President Davis.

Johnston was made commander of the Army of Tennessee in late 1863 after the fall of Chattanooga.  Not surprisingly, he selected Mackall as his chief of staff.  The two served together throughout the Atlanta Campaign in 1864.  Davis replaced Johnston with General John B. Hood in July 1864.  Mackall would soon follow Johnston.  When Bragg was visiting Hood's headquarters, Mackall refused to shake his hand.  This prompted Hood to ask for Mackall's resignation.  Mackall willingly obliged and headed to Macon, Georgia, where he stayed at his brother-in-law's home.  Mackall sought new orders, but his requests went unheeded until he was placed in command of the Confederate post at Macon.  He and three other generals surrendered the city to Federals on April 20, 1865.

Following the Civil War, Mackall briefly lived in Baltimore, then spent the remainder of his days at the family estate in Langley, where he died on August 19, 1891.