SUNDAY
JULY 24, 1864
THE DAILY PICAYUNE (LA)

The Annual Scare on the Border.
[From the New York Tribune of the 16th.]

The Pennsylvanians and Marylanders have now had their annual “scare.” All the bells in the two States have been duly run; all the citizens have duly assembled in the market places, and duly volunteered to arrive for as many days as the rebels might choose to stay on Northern soil; the annual “war meeting” has been held in Independence Square in Philadelphia, and the male members of the audience have made their yearly offer “to fly to arms;” the clergy have, as is their annual custom, duly “worked on the fortifications under a broiling sun.” The Governor has issued his annual call to arms, containing his annual reminder of the necessity of driving “the insolent invader” from the sacred soil, and letting the invader see what 25,000 undisciplined and enraged Pennsylvanians are capable of achieving.

The “reliable gentleman” and “well-known citizen” have come in from the front, as is their wont, and made us all acquainted with the doings of the rebel cavalry–the cattle lifting, horse stealing, house burning, to which these gentlemen are in the habit of treating themselves every summer during the hot weather in the neighborhood of Philadelphia and Baltimore. In short, the annual tribute from Pennsylvania and Maryland to the rebel commissariat had been duly paid, and by this time Early and his raiders are across the Potomac with at least the greater part of their booty. Of course the new levies are hard on their track, and are “surrounding” and “cutting them off,” and “getting in their rear,” and slaughtering them, as is their annual custom. It is well known, that after each Pennsylvania levy en masse, the butchery of the rebels is frightful.

If there be any men in the world who are justly chargeable with all their own misfortunes, who may be ably said to deserve the worst that may befall them, and for whom we have neither sympathy nor pity, it is undoubtedly the Southern traitors. But bad as they are, they are still our countrymen; they and we have common ancestors, a common tongue, common history, etc., etc., etc., so that it is impossible for us to witness their exposure to the annual rising of the Pennsylvania militia without horror and compassion. True, they are invaders, but they are still men; and were they the hordes of Tamerlane or Genghis Khan, we could not not avoid a shudder of pity on hearing that the “war meeting” had assembled in Independence Square, and to hear that “the clergy had volunteered to work on the fortifications,” and that “the citizens were being mustered in by companies.” Fortunately the unhappy rebels by this time know what is coming, and when they read Gov. Curtin’s proclamation, generally try to save themselves from the infuriated volunteers by flying to the mountains. The fate of those that are not so prudent is, of course, awful.

What we want to see now is what will happen after the rebels are fairly gone. Will these forlorn and remorseless levies, these men of blood who have been digging ditches and throwing up barricades round their houses, hang up their dripping swords and return to the plough and the counter till this time next year, or will they stand to their arms and breathe out threatenings and slaughter against all who menace their peace during the remainder of the year? This is a question we are all of us interested in having answered, because, in spite of the sublimity of the spectacle which the Pennsylvanians present when the enemy are fairly at their doors, there is something rather painful in the state of unreadiness in which he invariably finds them. ->

Their wrath is fearful, once they are fairly roused, but it must be confessed that the difficulty of rousing tem is very great, and that a good many sheep, cattle, hogs and greenbacks disappear while they are rubbing their  eyes and buckling their armor on.

Somebody, it is evident, must stay under arms ready to repel these raids into Maryland and Pennsylvania. There is no means of making positively sure that they shall never occur again. Grant may be defeated–Julius Caesar and Napoleon were both defeated on more than one occasion. All the men we can possibly raise for the United States army will be only too few for the work of subduing the rebellion. Somebody must protect Northern homes from being outraged by bands of marauders, and this I especially and peculiarly the duty of the militia. If the militia cannot do this, it is good for nothing, and the militia of each State is undoubtedly bound to protect its own frontier, and hold the enemy in check until its neighbors can come to its aid.

But this is a duty which the Pennsylvanians seem very unwilling to perform. The first organized bodies of militia which show themselves in this State, during the annual scare, are generally from New York or New Jersey. We really should like to know whether this is going to occur again, and whether, now that the danger is past for the present, Gov. Curtin’s 25,000 en are going to go home quietly, return their muskets to the arsenals, and wait for the actual appearance of the enemy before taking arms again?

•••••

Affairs in the South.
[From the Richmond Whig, July 8.]

Getting Rid of the Old Women.

We congratulate the community upon the fact that there is now a prospect of the city being relieved of its superabundance of old women. The military authorities have determined to give passports to all the old women who may wish to go to Yankee land. Joy go with them.

No Meal for the Poor.

Owing to the destruction of the different lines of railway leading to the city, the regular supply of meal for the poor has failed. It is proposed to relieve the present necessities of the poor by subscriptions of money.

Union Deserters.
[From the Richmond Examiner, July 9.]

Yesterday about one hundred of the Yankee deserters held at the Castle were transferred to the Libby, and their status changed from deserters to that of prisoners of war. It is at last the deliberate conviction of the Confederate Government that deserters cannot become of any services to us, either in the army or workshop, and that it is better to get man for man by exchange of them under the cartel.

MONDAY
JULY 25, 1864
THE CHARLESTON MERCURY (SC)

Startling Decline in the Shipping of the United States.

The Florida, while sending to the bottom some Yankee vessels, has been the means of bringing to the top some statistics which show a startling decline in the shipping of the nation. From the first place in the maritime world the United States has descended to about the fifth. The New York World says:

In 1860 the total tonnage of the United States, exclusive of whaling and steam tonnage, was five million two hundred and nineteen thousand and eighty-one tons. In 1864 it is in the neighborhood of one million six hundred and seventy-four thousand five hundred and sixteen tons. That is, we have lost in four year three million five hundred and four thousand six hundred and sixty-five tons.¹ We say nothing of the loss through the involuntary idleness of our vessels–nothing of the number of ships that lie rotting at our wharves ad at foreign ports. We would simply ask, at the rat given above, how long a  time must elapse before our commercial marine will be entirely wiped out, and the American flag unknown in any foreign port, or even on our own seas, save as seen upon ships-of-war? From being actually greater than that of any other nation on the face of the earth, our tonnage has dwindled below the standard of the third rate maritime powers.

More than nine hundred vessels that in 1860 were owned by citizens of the United States, and floated the Stars and Stripes, are now in the hands of foreign owners and sailing under foreign flags. On Thursday morning last we published a list of the names and owners of six hundred of these vessels–having an aggregate tonnage of three hundred and twenty eight thousand six hundred and sixty-five tons–sold during the single year of 1863 to British owners, as compiled from British authority, and to which list the reader can easily turn. Foreigners will not ship goods in American bottoms, and so our vessels either rot in port or become the property of people of other nationality. Not a single American steamer crosses the ocean at the present time–our steamships doing a pitiful duty as coasters, and even then with no sense of security. Foreign steamers carry our mails and freight, and transport such of our citizens whom business or pleasure calls upon a foreign shore.

•••••

A Characteristic Yankee Trick.–It appears from the annexed note that a quantity of forged Confederate bonds of £20 each have been put in circulation in this country:

“I have discovered that a large amount of counterfeit Confederate $100 bonds have been sent here from New York and sold. I know of one batch of $72,000 sold here to go to Holland. I have no doubt an enormous amount has been put in circulation. Of course, the trade will continue. It certainly is the duty of somebody to make this thing known, and to caution the public to avoid all bonds coming from doubtful sources. I have now before me five $100 counterfeits, purporting to be of July, 1862 per Act of Congress, August 19, 1861, and dated 7th and 8th of May, 1862. The engraver of the genuine (B. Duncan) is here, and pronounces them counterfeit beyond question.”–London Times (City Article), June 15.

•••••

The Rebels at Hagerstown.

The following interesting statement of the “outrageous doings” of the rebels at Hagerstown is taken from the Chambersburg (Pa.) Repository:

On Tuesday afternoon the rebel advance drove our pickets into the town. On Wednesday afternoon General McCausland, the successor General Jenkins, entered the town with about one thousand five hundred cavalry. He levied twenty thousand dollars upon the town, and seized Mr. Thomas A. Belt, a silversmith, and, we believe, a member of the Council, to be held as a hostage for the payment of the money. The money was raised and paid in Maryland funds–rebel currency being contemptuously refused. There were large Government stores in various places in town, and General McCausland didn’t seem to have an appetite for applying the torch, so he placed Mr. Isaac Nesbit, Clerk of the Courts, under heavy bonds to have the stores destroyed. ->

The bond was given, and the stores burned after the rebels departed. An additional ransom of one thousand five hundred dollars was paid by Messrs. Nesbit, Hamilton, and a few others to save the warehouses of Messrs. Thurston & Eichelberger, as their destruction would have periled private property seriously. Zeller & Co., having no Government stores in their warehouse, it was not disturbed, although taken possession of by the rebel officers. There was a large amount of private corn, oats, &c., in it; but, when they were satisfied that it was all owned by individuals, it was not moved or injured. . .

Considering that Mr. Zeller was one of the most earnest Union men in the place, he was treated rather fairly. The Government stores, however, more than supplied their wants, and any injury to Mr. Zeller would have been wanton destruction of private property. . . About 2 a.m. on Thursday morning, McCausland’s command left.

Scouting parties still hovered in and about the town, and about daylight of the same day, Gen. Imboden came in with about one hundred and eighty men, to supply his command with certain articles not to be had conveniently in the dominions of Jeff Davis. The hat store of Messrs. Ronskulp and Updegraff, and the shoe store of Mr. Knoble, did a large trade with them–the trade being wholly on the side of the rebels, and Judge Small’s show store narrowly escaped by the rebels being called off suddenly by the startling cry that “the Yankees are upon us!” The only property burned was the rail road water tank and wood house.

A reporter who witnessed “the whole rebel movement in Hagerstown,” and was present at several conversations between Gen. McCausland and the citizens, says:

The spokesman of the Council and citizens was Col. Schley, aided by Mr. Seyster and several others who occupy a conservative position–so conservative, indeed, that they lean a little over perpendicular on the rebel side. When the demand was made for twenty thousand dollars, Messrs. Schley and Seyster called upon General McCausland and declared their inability to raise the money and the clothing. The insurgent chief answered them in the following rather emphatic than poetical manner: “By ---, if you don’t have the money and clothing by half-past eight o’clock this evening, I will burn every house in town, if it costs me my own life and that of all my command!” Schley was almost equally emphatic in returning compliments with the rebel chief. He intimated that he was a thief and a freebooter, but it did not disturb the guerrilla’s equanimity, nor lessen his taste for plunder. The demand was for fifteen hundred suits of clothing in addition to the twenty thousand dollars, but the clothing could not be found.

The rebel General was inexorable, and whether the clothing was there or not, he must have it. Finally, all the clothing that could be found was gathered up–including children’s shoes and many other articles entirely useless to the army–and when about everything was got that could be found, [the] “Southern brethren” of “My Maryland” were content. It was remarkable that they made no discrimination between rebel sympathizers and Union men. Mr. Bell, druggist, who has a brother in the rebel army, and who is said to lean that way himself, had his stock “confiscated” in the most approved freebooter’s style, and when a rebel sympathizer expostulated with them for robbing their friends–one who had a brother in the service–they politely answered that if Mr. Bell was their friend, he should be with his brother in their army. The rebel sympathizers generally were very indignant at the indiscriminate propensities for stealing manifested by their constitutional friends, and curses loud and deep might have been heard on every corner from the disappointed and humiliated allies of treason.

TUESDAY
JULY 26, 1864
THE SPRINGFIELD REPUBLICAN (MA)

From the 100 Day Boys at Readville.

Readville, July 23, 1864.

Readville is a funny place. It is a hamlet on the Providence railroad, supposed to be in the town of Dedham, ten miles south of Boston. Perhaps we should define the location better by saying that it is near Punkeypog. Of course, you know where Punkeypog is. Punkeypog has a pond and several houses. Boston is in sight of Blue Hill, which is at Punkeypog. We had the good fortune to witness a pic-nic of the Punkeypogians at the pond, the other day, where the wit of Punkeypog was festively eating cake, and the beauty of Punkeypog singing “When This Cruel War is Over.”

The Readville station contains our headquarters, and the headquarters contain a living brigadier, a colonel and  a provost marshal, with the attendant post adjutant quartermaster, &c. A mile or so away is the camp of which this station is the visible head. Here is seen a most beautiful illustration of a great military principle. The profundity which locates a camp in one part of the country and its headquarters in another is admirable, and so favorable to the great object of military education, which is to accomplish the smallest results with the greatest labor. The companies, when they arrive, amuse themselves with backing all their clothing and supplies from the depot to the camp. And then the circumlocution of carrying such a distance a sergeant’s morning report, or an order for a corporal’s guard, is most magnificent. Greenhorns find fault, but never a military man. A soldier, who has handled red tape at Washington, would never be troubled by anything one state could do. The great test of a tried and true soldier is not enthusiasm, nor endurance, nor precision, nor obedience, but simple serenity. We are serene.

The “material” of the camp is younger than is usual, with less “style” among the line officers than would have been seen three years ago, most of them being veterans. Boys make the best soldiers if they are not so boyish as to break down physically. They obey the orders of young officers better, are more enthusiastic, and anxious for adventure. They are livelier, braver and more unquestioning than middle-aged men. In regard to men, there is nothing else different from all other camps. We have the usual number of recruits with feet so large that they can’t right face without breaking the ranks, and amateur buglers who by the noise they make might be mistaken for fish-peddlers.

All that can be said about the time of our departure is that we go when we get ready–or rather when Boston gets ready.

•••••

The Drouth Broken.—Thanks to a Providence that is always better to us than our fears, the drouth that was almost without a parallel, both in length and severity, has been broken at last. It was a rare and pleasant sight to see the rain descending all day Monday in copious and gentle showers, and there were very few who were not profoundly grateful for the weeping clouds. The damage done to the growing crops by the long continued drouth has been very great, though in many instances greatly overestimated. ->

The hay crop throughout New England was hardly half of an average crop in quantity, though the quality was good and the weather has been such that it was stored in the best possible order. The crops at the West have been generally good in spite of the drouth, and now that the rain has come in time to revive corn and potatoes, which were beginning to languish, it doesn’t look as though we had been entirely forgotten and forsaken by the Higher Powers.

The failing springs will be replenished, and the comfort of both man and beast will be materially increased. The numerous and destructive fires that have recently occurred–one of the most disastrous of them in our own midst–were all far more distressing than they would have been in an ordinary season and with a fair supply of water. Numerous and fervent were the prayers offered Sunday for rain, for everybody felt that the continuance of health and the security of property depended altogether upon relief from the clouds. The rain came, and let all men rejoice.

•••••

A Warning to the Inland Towns.—A citizen of Western Massachusetts writes to the Republican from Boston as follows:

“The towns on the coast of Massachusetts propose to escape the draft by a process which I think it becomes us of the rural districts to understand, and which I hope you will expose fully in your paper. During the first year of the war, when business was dull, many sailors, having no residence nor any fixed place of abode, shipped in the navy. They shipped wherever they happened to be, if there was a shipping-office handy. Many shipped at Boston, New Bedford, Cape Ann and other places. Probably not one in twenty, if as many, ever was in any proper or legal sense a resident of the place where shipped. It is now proposed to convert enough of these men into citizens, by certificates of selectmen and municipal authorities, to exempt the towns and cities where they happened to ship from the coming draft. These men ought no doubt to be counted on the quota of the state, and only bona fide citizens of any town be counted on the town quota. The manufacture of citizens to order ought not to be an exclusive privilege of a few maritime places; nor ought any town, seacoast or inland, by procuring a list of names from a shipping agent, to be allowed to figure itself out of the draft, as several of the coast towns expect to do. The commissioners, who are appointed to attend to this business, ought to understand how it is, and act in good faith with the inland towns, and not exempt one place because the municipal authorities bring in a list of names obtained from shipping agents, and swear that to the best of their knowledge and belief the men were residents of the town or city that they represent.”

WEDNESDAY
JULY 27, 1864
NEW HAMPSHIRE PATRIOT & STATE GAZETTE

The War.

The Confederate forces lately in occupation of Maryland appear to have made a safe retreat with all their vast plunder. The telegraph has given reports of severe conflicts with them and the capture of a large number of their wagons, but these appear to have had no foundation.

The Army of the Potomac remains “quiet,” the reports say. No important movements have been made of late, so far as the public have been informed.

From the West we have reports of active operations and severe fighting. It is stated that on the 20th, Gen. Hood, having succeeded Gen. Johnston in command of the Confederate forces at Atlanta, made an assault upon the corps of Howard and Hooker, but was repulsed with loss. Our loss was 2000. On the 21st, Gen. McPherson, commanding our left wing, extended his line to the west and south of Atlanta, and on the 22d he was assaulted by a heavy force of the enemy and was driven back, but the enemy were finally repulsed with great loss and driven into their works in front of the city. During the battle Gen. McPherson was killed by a sharpshooter, and his command devolved upon Gen. Logan.

An expedition from Memphis, under Gen. A. J. Smith, sometime since sent against Gen. Forrest in Northern Alabama, returned to Memphis last week. The report says they “whipped the enemy five times,” and returned for want of supplies. Their loss is reported at 500, and the rebel loss is guessed to have been 3000.

A large portion of Missouri appears to be overrun by guerrillas. They have recently been especially active and destructive, and our Government has not sufficient force there to clean them out. One of their chiefs, Col. Thornton, is said to have a force of 15,000 in Caldwell county.

•••••

“Negotiating with Rebels.”–The Boston Journal’s special dispatch from Washington, July 20, says:

Edmund Kirke, author of “Among the Pines,” and Col. Jaquess of the 8th Illinois regiment, have just returned from Richmond, whither they have been on a secret mission of political importance. They were received and treated with marked respect by the Confederate authorities during their stay in Richmond.

So it seems that Lincoln has been “negotiating with rebels!” What does this mean? For three years his supporters have constantly denounced all idea of negotiation with the Richmond authorities; yet now we are told that Lincoln has secretly been negotiating with them. In the account of his “mission” it is stated that these agent of the Administration remained three days in Richmond, where they were quartered at the “crack hotel” and “fared sumptuously every day.” They were fed on chicken, turkey, mutton and all the viands of a well-appointed hotel, and entertained with fie brandies and costly wines,” at the expense of the rebels. They had “two prolonged interviews with President Davis” and with his Secretary of State, Mr. Benjamin, and other officers. They also visited the prisons and “were agreeably disappointed by the comparatively comfortable condition in which they found our Union captives.” They describe Jeff Davis as “hale and hearty in appearance.” The precise object of this mission is not stated, but it is alleged that they met with considerable success in impressing their views upon Mr. Davis, who was very “warm and cordial” in his expressions of respect for their character and aims.

The Negro Trade.–It will be seen that the Legislature has authorized the Governor to enter into the Negro trade in the South–to purchase Negroes at $500 a head to fill our quota in the army. This is well, as things now are. Next to the abolitionists, the Negro is most properly called upon to fight this was for his benefit. But there seems to be much room for doubt as to the success of this new Negro traffic. In this business the first step is the same as the first in the famous recipe for cooking a rabbit, viz: “First, catch the rabbit.” So here, the first step in Negro recruiting is to catch the Negro. Now it is feared that this will be no easy matter. It is reported that Negroes are not very plenty in the territory held by our forces. Gen. Grant has found a few, and Gen. Sherman reports a scarcity in the country held by him; and other sections have been pretty well “cleaned out,” and it is doubtful whether this new Negro speculation will pay. Besides, it is said Gen. Sherman protests against these Negro-traders going into his department, on the ground that they will increase the number of idle non-combatants to feed without rendering any service. It is probable that the true reason is, he knows these fellows will be political emissaries sent to make votes for Old Abe, whose presence and proceedings will stir up strife and make trouble in the army. Other commanders will doubtless follow his example. On the whole, therefore, it is very doubtful whether this new Negro speculation will pay.

•••••

A Federal soldier who escaped from Americus, Ga., where the rebels now send Federal prisoners, reports that a stockade in an open field, without shade, and partly a swamp, contains nineteen thousand Union soldiers, without a blanket, overcoat or cooking utensil.–Boston Journal.

This is probably an exaggerated statement;² yet there is no doubt that our prisoners in the rebel hands, probably 40,000 in number, suffer greatly. And the people will naturally ask why they are not exchanged, since we have some 60,000 rebels in our hands. The answer is, because the “everlasting Negro” is in the way. Our unfeeling rulers will not consent to exchange white men for white, but insist upon having Negroes put upon the same footing with white men. This the Confederate authorities will not consent to; and so our poor soldiers are left to suffer as described.

•••••

National Exhaustion.–Allison, the historian, ascribes the overthrow of Napoleon to his overtaxing the energies of the French by diverting so large a proportion of them into the army. He says a nation cannot stand a diversion of more than one to one hundred. During the past year one in thirty-three of our population have been drawn into the army. How long will it take, at this rate, to exhaust the North?

THURSDAY
JULY 28, 1864
THE PITTSFIELD SUN (MA)

Peace Negotiations.

The correspondence on our first page–relative to negotiations for a cessation of hostilities between the Northern and Southern States, and the initiation of measures for a permanent peace–will be read with interest  and in some particulars regret it.

It appears from an article in the Rochester Democrat that previous to the correspondence published, Mr. George N. Sanders wrote from the Clifton House, Niagara, to Horace Greeley, stating that the Hon. C. C. Clay, Jr., of Alabama, Hon. Jacob Thompson, of Mississippi, and Hon. J. P. Holcombe, of Virginia, were there, duly recognized Commissioners of the Confederate Government, and desired to know what terms could be made for terminating the war between the two sections. He added, however, that these commissioners were not specially authorized to negotiate for a cessation of hostilities or a restoration of the Union, but that they would like to have an informal conference with such persons as the U. States Government might indicate to meet them. These facts having been presented to Mr. Lincoln, he requested Mr. Greeley to act in the matter as he thought advisable under the peculiar circumstances, and stated that he (Mr. L.) should at any time be pleased to receive propositions from those who had been in arms against the government for a return to their allegiance and duty as citizens of the Union. He also stated that he should be pleased to see the Union restored upon any terms consistent with the present and future safety, welfare and honor of the government. Mr. Greeley. Having settled all preliminaries with Mr. Lincoln, proceeded to Niagara and took up quarters at the International Hotel. A correspondence was at once opened with the commissioners, and, as a final result, they made the following propositions, and gave it as their opinion that the Richmond Government would approve and ratify the same. The restoration of the Union in statu quo upon this basis:

First–All Negroes which have been actually freed by the war, to be secured in such freedom.

Second–All Negroes at present held as slaves to remain so.

Third–The war debt of both parties to be paid by the United States.

Fourth–The old doctrine of State rights to be recognized in reconstructing the Union.

This proposition was laid before Mr. Lincoln by Mr. Greeley. The President at once telegraphed to Mr. Greeley the terms upon which he would propose a settlement and reconstruction, and which are given in the dispatch “to whom it may concern,” in which the President proclaims that the “abandonment of slavery” is a condition precedent to peace! The Constitution authorizes the President (to use the words of the Albany Atlas and Argus):

“To enforce the laws, to uphold the Constitution, to suppress insurrection–but he puts himself above the Constitution, and in the character of an infamous despot, announces that States shall not return to the Union, that rebels shall not become loyal citizens, until the State constitutions are altered, and slavery abolished. Where does he get his authority to make such a condition? Not from the Constitution–nowhere, except in his own despotic will.

“This war is now confessedly waged to abolish Negro slavery. For this our fellow-citizens are dragged to the field of battle; for this their bodies rot and their bones bleach upon Southern soil; for this a half-million more are to be conscripted for privation, wounds and death. Will the people give Mr. Lincoln a new four years lease to desolate the country and murder its noble sons and brothers–and all on a quixotic crusade against Negro slavery?

“In the correspondence which we publish–as every where–Mr. Lincoln appears as the marplot of all effort in the right direction. Providence may, perhaps, chastise the nation, by permitting him to curse it till the end of his present term, but God grant that the infliction may not be longer extended.”

•••••

The Jim Crow of the N. Y. Times is constrained to say the following.³ It is both significant and important: “We do not mean to say that it will be eventually found possible to end the war and restore the Union without the ‘abandonment of slavery;’ but we do say that this abandonment need not be exacted by the President as a condition without which he will not receive or consider proposals for peace. The people do not require him to insist upon any such condition. Neither his oath of office, nor his constitutional duty, nor his personal or official consistency, requires him to insist upon it. That is one of the questions to be considered and arranged when the terms of peace come to be discussed. It is not a subject on which terms can be imposed by the Government, without consultation, without agreement, or without equivalents.”

The War News.

The news from General Sherman’s army indicates that he has possession of a part of Atlanta, and is fighting to obtain undisputed possession of the whole of it. In one of these engagements, on Friday, Maj. General McPherson was killed. General Sherman lost a most able officer, and one who can scarcely be replaced. General McPherson was a Major General of volunteers, and Brigadier General in the regular army, having been promoted to the vacancy occasioned by the retirement of General Harney. He entered the army from West Point  in 1853, and at the commencement of the war was a captain of engineers.

There is evidently considerable dissatisfaction among the rebels at the substitutions of Gen. Hood for Johnston, and if disaster befalls them they will probably inveigh against the Richmond junta as loudly as they did when Pemberton lost Vicksburg, and charge the misfortune to the incompetence of the general. They now entertain hopes that Gen. Sherman’s rear will be cut, and that he will thus be compelled to relax his grasp upon Atlanta. All accounts agree, however, in stating that his rear is well protected, and that it is the rebel rear and flank which is endangered. General Sherman fought a battle in front of Atlanta on Wednesday last, in which he achieved a decided success. The enemy was met in an open field, and defeated, leaving four hundred dead and four thousand wounded upon the ground.

The Baltimore correspondent of the N. Y. World predicts a grand invasion by the rebels soon, with a view to effect the capture of Washington, which was not the purpose of the last invasion. Also that Pennsylvania and Ohio, or Indiana, are to be invaded at an early date, and the theatre of war transferred to those States from the South.

A guerrilla attack has been made upon Henderson, Ky., a few miles below Evansville, Ind., on the Ohio river. Gunboats have been sent to protect the place.

It is alleged that a plot has been discovered in St. Louis having for its object the establishment of a northwestern confederacy and a renewal of the steamboat burning on the western waters. Several of the alleged ringleaders have been arrested.

Advices from the Army of the Potomac represent the usual skirmishing and shelling in progress. The statement that General Sheridan has gone on another cavalry raid is incorrect; this branch of the service having to be rested and remounted ere entering upon another expedition.

The people of Rockville and Montgomery Counties, Maryland, were, on Saturday and early Sunday, greatly alarmed in the belief that the enemy were making another invasion into their State. Numbers of citizens came into Washington declaring that they had seen the invaders, that they had artillery, cavalry, and infantry. The probability is, however, that these frightened Marylanders saw the Union troops returning from the pursuit of General Early’s column, and, mistaking them for the raiders, were not slow in making known the cause of their fright.

It is reported that Gen. Rousseau has captured Montgomery, the capital of Alabama. If this is true, a most important success has been attained, which will greatly enhance the value of Gen. Sherman’s operations.

The cavalry forces connected with Gen. Sherman’s army have, it appears, raided over all the railroads in Alabama, to the east and west of Montgomery, and as far as Covington. The work of destruction has probably been thoroughly accomplished.

Gen. Slocum’s expedition has returned to Vicksburg, after defeating Wirt Adams at Grand Gulf on the 17th. The rebels met with severe loss, and retreated, leaving their dead and wounded on the field.

FRIDAY
JULY 29, 1864
THE CALEDONIAN (VT)

The Rebellion Inexcusable.
By Alexander H. Stephens.

[It is well known that Alexander H. Stephens, now Vice-President of the Confederacy, at first set himself resolutely against the rebellion. His utterances at that time, so terribly confirmed by what has since taken place, deserve record as showing its utterly inexcusable folly and guilt. We think we have printed his speech before, but some may not have read it all, and others will be glad to reperuse it, noting the gradual and certain fulfilling of his worst predictions. In the Georgia convention of January, 1861, pending the question of secession, he said:]

“This step, secession, once taken can never be recalled, and all the baleful and withering consequences that must follow, as you will see, will rest on this convention for all coming time. When we and our posterity shall see our lovely South desolated by the demon of war which this act of yours will inevitably provoke, when our green fields and waving harvests shall be trodden down by a murderous soldiery, and the fiery car of war sweeps over our land, our temples of justice laid in ashes and every horror and desolation upon us; who, but him who shall have given his vote for this unwise and ill-timed measure shall be held to a strict account for this suicidal act by the present generation, and be cursed and execrated by all posterity, in all coming time, for the wide and desolating ruin that will inevitably follow this act you now propose to perpetrate?

“Pause, I entreat you, and consider for a moment what reasons you can give that will satisfy yourselves in calmer moments? What reasons can you give to your fellow-sufferers in the calamity that it will bring upon us? What reasons can you give to the nations of the earth to justify it?

“They will be calm and deliberate judges of this case, and to what cause, or one overt-act can you point on which to rest the plea of justification? What right has the North assailed? Of what interest has the South been invaded? What justice has been denied? And what claim founded in justice and right has been unsatisfied? Can any of you name to-day one governmental act of wrong deliberately and purposely done by the government at Washington, of which the South has a right to complain? I challenge an answer.

“On the other hand, let me show the facts (and believe me, gentlemen, I am not here the advocate of the North, but I am here the friend, the firm friend and lover of the South and her institutions, and for this reason I speak thus plainly and faithfully for yours, mine, and every other man's interest, the words of truth and soberness), of which I wish you to judge, and I will only state facts which are clear and undeniable, and which now stand in the authentic records of the history of our country. When we of the South demanded the slave trade, or the importation of Africans for the cultivation of our lands, did they not yield the right for twenty years? When we asked a three-fifths representation in Congress for our section was it not granted? When we demanded the return of any fugitive from justice, or the recovery of those persons owing labor or allegiance, was it not incorporated in the Constitution, and again ratified and strengthened in the fugitive slave law of 1850? Do you reply that in many instances they have violated this law and have not been faithful to their engagements? As individuals and local committees they may have done so, but not by the sanction of government, for that has always been true to the Southern interests. Again, look at another fact. When we asked that more territory should be added that we might spread the institution of slavery did they not yield to our demands by giving us Louisiana, Florida and Texas out of which four States have been carved, and ample territory left for four more to be added in due time, if you do not by this unwise and impolitic act destroy this hope, and perhaps by it lose all and have your last slave wrenched from you by stern military rule, or by the vindictive decrees of a universal emancipation which may reasonably be expected to follow.

“But again gentlemen, what have we to gain by this proposed change of our relation to the general government? We have always had the control of it and can yet have if we remain in it and are as united as we have been. We have had a majority of the presidents chosen from the South as well as the control and management of most of those chosen from the North. We have had sixty years of Southern Presidents to their twenty-four, thus controlling the executive department. ->

So of the judges of the supreme court, we have had eighteen from the South and but eleven from the North. Although nearly four-fifths of the judicial business has arisen in the free States, yet a majority of the court has been from the South. This we have required so as to guard against any interpretation of the constitution unfavorable to us. In like manner we have been equally watchful in the legislative branch of the government. In choosing the presiding Presidents (pro tem.) of the Senate we have had twenty-four and they only eleven; speakers of the house we have had twenty-three and they twelve. While the majority of the representatives, from their greater population, have always been from the North, yet we have generally secured the speaker because he to a great extent shapes and controls the legislation of the country.

“Nor have we had less control in every other department of the general government. Attorney-Generals we have had 14, while the North have had but five. Foreign ministers we have had 86, and they but 54. While three-fourths of the business which demands diplomatic agents abroad is clearly from the free States because of their greater commercial interests, we have, nevertheless, had the principal embassies so as to secure the world's markets for our cotton, tobacco and sugar, on the best possible terms. We have had a vast majority of the higher officers of both army and navy, while a larger proportion of the soldiers and sailors were drawn from the Northern States. Equally so of clerks, auditors, and comptrollers, filling the executive department; the records show for the last 50 years that of the 3,000 thus employed we have had more than two-thirds, while we have only one-third of the white population of the Republic. Again, look at another fact, and one, be assured, in which we have a great and vital interest; it is that of revenue or means of supporting government. From official documents we learn that more than three-fourths of the revenue collected has been raised from the North.

“Pause now while you have the opportunity to contemplate carefully and candidly these important things. Look at another necessary branch of government, and learn from stern statistical facts how matters stand in that department, I mean the mail and post-office privileges that we now enjoy under the General Government, as it has been for years past. The expense for the transportation of the mail in the free States was by the report of the postmaster-general for 1860, a little over $13,000,000 while the income was $19,000,000. But in the Slave States the transportation of the mail was $14,716,000, and the revenue from the mail only $8,000,265, leaving a deficit of $6,715,735 to be supplied by the North for our accommodation, and without which we must have been cut off from this most essential branch of the government.

“Leaving out of view for the present the countless millions of dollars you must expend in a war with the North, with tens of thousands of your brothers slain in battle, and offered up as sacrifices on the altar of your ambition--for what, I ask again? Is it for the overthrow of the American Government, established by our common ancestry, cemented and built up by their sweat and blood, and founded on the broad principles of right, justice and humanity? I must declare to you here, as I have often done before, and it has also been declared by the greatest and wisest statesmen and patriots of this and other lands, that the American Government is the best and freest of all governments, the most equal in its rights, the most just in its decisions, the most lenient in its measures, and the most inspiring in its principles to elevate the race of men that the sun of heaven ever shone upon.

“Now for you to attempt to overthrow such a government as this under which we have lived for more than three-quarters of a century, in which we have gained our wealth, our standing as a nation, our domestic safety while the elements of peril are around us with peace and tranquility accompanied with unbounded prosperity and rights unassailed is the height of madness, folly and wickedness to which I will neither lend my sanction nor my vote.”

SATURDAY
JULY 30, 1864
COLUMBIAN WEEKLY REGISTER (CT)

Loyalty Then and Now.

If any one now speaks against the draft, by which persons, whether minors, apprentices of not, may be conscripted into the army of the United States, he is in danger of being bastilled in Fort Lafayette. But during the war of 1812, a war for “free trade and sailors’ rights,” when it was proposed in Congress to pass a conscription law not half so exacting as the present one, the late Chief Justice Daggett, who was then a Senator from this State, denounced the proposition as unconstitutional and oppressive, and declared in the U. S. Senate Chamber that if it was enacted it would be resisted in the New England States as an unconstitutional enactment. For this he was applauded as a statesman and a patriot by all the leading federal papers, and by none more so than by the Journal of this city and the Courant of Hartford, which now denounce such doctrines as the worst sort of copperheadism.

Then, when Congress passed a law which authorized the enlistment of minors into the army of the United States, without the consent of their parents, guardians or masters, the State of Connecticut was almost up in arms against it. The same Journal and Courant which now advocate the conscripting of minors of twenty years of age, whether the parent or guardian consents or not, then denounced the law as an unconstitutional interference with the domestic relations of the several States. Connecticut, in those days, under similar auspices, led off in actual and open nullification, and set the example which has been so mischievously followed by South Carolina and other rebel States. The Legislature of this State, at its special session held January, 1815, while Jackson was winning immortal laurels at New Orleans, passed the following act of nullification:

“Be it enacted, &c., That if any person knowing any one to be a minor, shall persuade him to depart from this State with intent to enlist into the army of the United States, without the consent of his parent, guardian or master, on conviction thereof before the Superior Court, shall be sentenced to pay to the treasurer of this State a fine not exceeding five hundred dollars, or to be imprisoned not exceeding one year.”

Another section imposed a fine not exceeding one hundred dollars, and imprisonment not exceeding three months, for advertising for such enlistments, or for permitting any such advertisement to be stuck upon any one’s house, store, shop or premises. The law of Congress by the same State act was denounced as “repugnant to the spirit of the Constitution of the United States, and an unauthorized interference with the laws and rights of this State.”

The modern doctrine of “military necessity,” which covers all that the administration wants to be done, was not heard of in those days, though the country was invaded by a foreign enemy.

•••••

A Little of Everything.

In France, the waste steam from the locomotive is made to heat the cars in the train behind. It is conducted from the escape pipes through tubes, which inside of the cars are of copper, but outside are of vulcanized India rubber, with couplings which can be readily managed.

The United States has one square mile of coal field to every fifteen square miles of territory; Great Britain one to every thirty miles of surface; Belgium one to every twenty-two and a half, and France one to every two hundred miles of surface. ->

Canadian manufacturers are suffering for anthratic coal. What is dug there is sent to Bermuda for the Confederate blockade runners, and the United States has stopped the exportation from our territory.

A new gunpowder is proposed in England, to consist of forty-seven parts of chlorate of potash, thirty-eight parts of ferrocyanide of potassium, and five parts sulphur. The ingredients after being first pulverized are mixed into a paste with water; when dry, about ten parts of catouche are added, and the compound is complete. One of its peculiar features is that it may be so moulded that the entire charge shall constitute a solid mass, thus greatly facilitating the manufacture of cartridges.

Muggins was one day with a friend, when he observed a poor dog that had been killed, lying in the gutter. Muggins paused and gazed intently at the animal, and at last said, “Here is another shipwreck.” “Shipwreck! Where?” “There, a bark that’s lost forever.” His companion growled and passed on.

A Colonel of one of the regiments attached to the Army of the Potomac was recently complaining at an evening party that, from the ignorance and inattention of the officers, he was obliged to do the duty of the regiment. Said he, “I am my own major, my own captain, my own lieutenant, and my own sergeant, and”–“Your own trumpeter,” said a lady present.

An officer in the army who has paid much attention to the matter, states it as a well ascertained fact that three-fourths of all the dismissals of officers from the army were caused, directly or indirectly, by the use of whisky. Many of the resignations of officers have the same origins.

There are in Massachusetts nearly one hundred thousand more women than there are men–and just as many men who now heartily wish they were women.

The number of Federal prisoners at Andersonville, Ga., is upwards of 27,000. An addition of five acres has been made to the enclosure in which they are confined, but even with this extension the place is much too crowded. The mortality is large, being from fifty to sixty a day.

A gentleman who, a few days ago, was wandering over the ground recently occupied by a portion of Gen. Early’s forces engaged in the “siege of Washington,” picked up the note book of a Confederate soldiers containing, among other matters, the following bit of lyrical poetry:

Quoth Meade to Lee,
“Can you tell me,
In the shortest style of writing,
When people will
All get their fill
Of this big job of fighting?”
Quoth Lee to Meade,
“I can, indeed,–
I’ll tell you in a minute–
When legislators
And speculators
Are made to enter in it.”

¹ The difference is actually 3,544,565, not the stated 3,504,665. At least spelling it out camouflages the expected mistake in arithmetic.

² It is not. This is Andersonville, and the facts cited by the Boston Journal are accurate.

³ The term Jim Crow is believed to have originated around 1830 when a white, minstrel show performer, Thomas “Daddy” Rice, blackened his face with charcoal paste or burnt cork and danced a ridiculous jig while singing the lyrics to the song, “Jump Jim Crow.” Rice created this character after seeing (while traveling in the South) a crippled, elderly black man (or some say a young black boy) dancing and singing a song ending with these chorus words: “Wheel about and turn about and do this so, / Every time I wheel about, I jump Jim Crow.” Some historians believe that a Mr. Crow owned the slave who inspired Rice's act–thus the reason for the Jim Crow term in the lyrics. In any case, Rice incorporated the skit into his minstrel act, and by the 1850s the “Jim Crow” character had become a standard part of the minstrel show scene in America. (Source)