Rebellion Record: a Diary of American Events: Poetry and Incidents., Volume 1.
Frank Moore, Ed.

The Journal of Commerce, a few days ago, contained this specious apology for one of the numerous acts of treason to the Union by which Secretary Floyd endeavored to efface from the public mind all recollection of his more despicable, if less note-worthy crimes:

Arms for the South:--The Evening Post, under the head of ‘A Suspicious Proceeding,’ publishes a rumor that ‘five hundred cases of muskets, from the Watervliet arsenal, opposite Troy, have been shipped to this city and put on board the steamer Florida, for Savannah.’ As the Post's paragraph will be copied, with amplifications, into Republican papers throughout the country, it may be well to state the real facts upon which the above ridiculous report is probably based. Several weeks ago, five hundred cases of muskets were shipped to Savannah, to supply, it is said, the legal demand of Georgia for her quota of guns from the United States. There was no mystery about the transaction. The arms came down the Hudson River on a barge, and were taken on board the Savannah steamer like any other cargo. If this shipment had occurred at any other time, it would have caused no remark. Its occurrence now is explained by the fact, that Georgia had previously neglected to draw out the quota of arms to which she was entitled, and which the General Government could not legally or equitably deny to her. Within a week or two, the Adjutant-general of this State has drawn all the arms to which New York was entitled, and no good reason can be given why every other State, as long as it remains in the Union, should not exercise the same right.

It is a little singular that the State of Georgia should be entitled to a quota of ten thousand stand of arms, that being the number contained in five hundred cases, (as I learn from a highly intelligent officer of the service,) when the annual appropriation for arming the militia is only $200,000 per annum. The muskets are worth about $11 50 each, so that the ten thousand would cost $115,000. Now, if we reflect that the State of Georgia constituted, in 1850, only one-thirtieth part of the Union, and that, at the present time, it bears a still smaller proportion to the whole, we shall see how absurd is the pretence that she has only received her proper share of arms. Divide $200,000 by thirty, and we have for her distributive share $6,666; so that the 10,000 muskets would be her quota for seventeen years and more. Perhaps the Journal of Commerce can reconcile these facts with its smooth and plausible statement. It is well known, that besides the arms thus given to the States, Secretary Floyd has been putting others in the Southern arsenals during the summer, in order that the secessionists may arm themselves whenever they see fit to rebel against the Government. There were not more than twenty thousand stand of arms in the Charleston arsenal a year ago; there are now seventy thousand, if the Charleston papers can be relied upon. These arms were sent there to be seized by the State authorities, and no one can feel surprised that the present has been accepted. The mob in Savannah has imitated the Government of South Carolina, and among the latest items of news, we learn that the United States Government has been dispossessed of its armory at that place. Floyd was industriously engaged up to the date of his resignation, in sending arms and munitions of war to all the seceding States. This seems to have been the only public measure in which he took an interest. When not employed in arming the rebel States by disarming the Government which he had sworn to support, his attention seems to have been entirely occupied with various and complicated schemes for depleting the treasury; and I know of no man who will have stronger claims to the gratitude of the rebellious States than he who did so much to bring dishonor [12] and bankruptcy upon the Government of the Union, while he supplied its enemies with the sinews of war.--Times.