Chapter 55:
- The Federal Government and the British Steamyacht Deerhound -- Mr. Seward's despatch, and Mr. Lancaster's letter to the ‘daily news’ -- Lord Russell's reply to Mr. Adams on the subject of his complaint against Mr. Lancaster -- presentation of a sword to the author, by the clubs in England -- presentation of a flag by a lady.
The howl that went up against Mr. Lancaster, the owner of the Deerhound, for his humane exertions in saving my crew and myself from drowning, was almost as rabid as that which had been raised against myself. Statesmen, or those who should have been such, descended into the arena of coarse and vulgar abuse of a private English citizen, who had no connection with them or their war, and no sympathies that I know of, on the one side or the other. Mr. Welles, in one of those patriotic effusions, by which he sought to recommend himself to the extreme party of the North, declared among other things, that he was ‘not a gentleman!’ Poor Mr. Lancaster, to have thy gentility questioned by so competent a judge, as Mr. Gideon Welles! If these gentlemen had confined themselves to mere abuse, the thing would not have been so bad, but they gave currency to malicious falsehoods concerning Mr. Lancaster, as truths. Paid spies in England reported these falsehoods at Washington, and the too eager Secretary of State embodied them in his despatches. Mr. Adams and Mr. Seward have, both, since ascertained that they were imposed upon, and yet no honorable retraxit has ever been made. The following is a portion of one of Mr. Seward's characteristic despatches on this subject. It is addressed to Mr. Adams:— [778]
‘I nave the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your despatch of the 21st of June, No. 724, which relates to the destruction of the pirate-ship Alabama, by the Kearsarge, off Cherbourg. This event has given great satisfaction to the Government, and it appreciates and commends the bravery and skill displayed by Captain Winslow, and the officers and crew under his command. Several incidents of the transaction seem to demand immediate attention. The first is, that this Government disapproves the proceedings of Captain Winslow, in paroling and discharging the pirates who fell into his hands, in that brilliant naval engagement, and in order to guard against injurious inferences which might result from that error, if it were overlooked, you are instructed to make the fact of this disapprobation and censure known to her Majesty's Government, and to state, at the same time, that this. Government, adhering to declarations heretofore made, does not recognize the Alabama as a ship of war of a lawful belligerent power.’Mr. Seward, when this despatch was penned, had hopes that the ‘pirates’ would be given up to him, and the caveat, which he enters, may give some indication of the course the Yankee Government intended to pursue toward the said ‘pirates,’ when they should come into its possession. It did not occur to the wily Secretary, that, if we were ‘pirates,’ it was as competent for Great Britain to deal with us as the United States; and that, on this very ground, his claim for extradition might be denied,—a pirate being hostis humani generis, and punishable by the first nation into whose power he falls. But these mistakes were common with Mr. Seward. Laying aside, therefore, all his trash and nonsense about piracy, let us proceed with that part of his despatch which relates to Mr. Lancaster:—
‘Secondly, the presence and the proceedings of a British yacht, the Deerhound, at the battle, require explanation. On reading the statements which have reached this Government, it seems impossible to doubt that the Deerhound went out to the place of conflict, by concert and arrangement with the commander of the Alabama, and with, at least, a conditional purpose of rendering her aid and assistance. She did effectually render such aid, by rescuing the commander and part of the crew of the Alabama from the pursuit of the Kearsarge, and by furtively and clandestinely conveying them to Southampton, within British jurisdiction. We learn from Paris that the intervention of the Deerhound occurred after the Alabama had actually surrendered. The proceeding of the Deerhound, therefore, seems to have been directly hostile to the United States. Statements of the owner of the Deerhound are reported [779] here, to the effect that he was requested by Captain Winslow to rescue the drowning survivors of the battle, but no official confirmation of this statement is found in the reports of Captain Winslow. Even if he had made such a request, the owner of the Deerhound subsequently abused the right of interference, by secreting the rescued pirates, and carrying them away beyond the pursuit of the Kearsarge. Moreover, we are informed from Paris, that the Deerhound, before going out, received from Semmes, and that she subsequently conveyed away to England, a deposit of money, and other valuables, of which Semmes, in his long piratical career, had despoiled numerous American merchantmen.’There was not one word of truth in this cock-and-a-bull story, of concert between Mr. Lancaster and myself, as to his going out to witness the combat, as to his receiving money or anything else from the Alabama, or as to any other subject whatever. We had never seen each other, or held the least communication together, until I was drawn out of the water by his boat's crew, and taken on board his yacht, after the battle. It was quite natural that Mr. Seward's Yankee correspondents in London and Paris, and Mr. Seward himself, should suppose that money and stealings had had something to do with Mr. Lancaster's generous conduct. The whole American war, on the Yankee side, had been conducted on this principle of giving and receiving a ‘consideration’ and on ‘stealings.’ Armies of hired vagabonds had roamed through the Southern States, plundering and stealing—aye, as the reader has seen, stealing not only gold and silver, but libraries, pianos, pictures, and even the jewelry and clothing of women and children! The reader has seen into what a mortal fright the ladypassengers, on board the captured steamship Ariel, were thrown, lest the officers and crew of the Alabama should prove to be the peers of Yankee rogues, epauletted and unepauletted. These men even laid their profane hands on the sacred word of God, if it would pay. Here is a morceau, taken from the Journal of Commerce of New York, a Yankee paper, quite moderate in its tone, and a little given, withal, to religious sniffling. It shows how a family Bible was stolen from a Southern household, and sold for a ‘consideration’ in the North, without exciting so much as a word of condemnation from press or people:— [780]
An Old Bible Captured from a Rebel.—H. Jallonack, of Syracuse, New York, has exhibited to the editor of the “Journal” of that city a valuable relic—a Protestant Bible, printed in German text, 225 years ago, the imprint bearing date 1637. The book is in an excellent state of preservation, the printing perfectly legible, the binding sound and substantial, and the fastening a brass clasp. The following receipt shows how the volume came in Mr. Jallonack's possession:—‘Semmes, in his long piratical career,’ scarcely equalled these doings of Mr. Seward's countrymen. He certainly did not send any stolen Bibles, published in the Netherlands or elsewhere, to the Deerhound, to be sold to pious Jallonacks for $150 apiece. But to return to Mr. Lancaster, and the gross assault that was made upon him, by the Secretary of State. Mr. Lancaster, being a gentleman of ease and fortune, spent a portion of his summers in yachting, as is the case with a large number of the better classes in England. Being in France with his family, he ordered his yacht, the Deerhound, to meet him, at the port of Cherbourg, where it was his intention to embark for a cruise of a few weeks in the German Ocean. A day or two before the engagement between the Alabama and the Kearsarge, a steam yacht, under British colors, was reported to me, as having anchored in the harbor. Beyond admiring the beautiful proportions of the little craft, we paid no further attention to her; and when she steamed out of Cherbourg, on the morning of the engagement, we had not the least conception of what her object was. With this preface, I will let Mr. Lancaster tell his own story. He had been assaulted by a couple of Yankee correspondents, in the London ‘Daily News,’ a paper in the interests, and reported to be in the pay of the Federal Government. He is replying to those assaults, which, as the reader will see, were the same that were afterward rehashed by Mr. Seward, in the despatch already quoted. [781]
Mark how a plain tale shall put him down. There could not be a better illustration of this remark, than the above reply, proceeding from the pen of a gentleman, to Mr. Seward'scharges against both Mr. Lancaster and myself. Mr. Adams having complained to Lord Russell, of the conduct of Mr. Lancaster, the latter gentleman addressed a letter to his lordship, containing substantially the defence of himself which he had prepared for the ‘Daily News.’ In a day or two afterward, Lord Russell replied to Mr. Adams as follows:—
The royal yacht squadron, as well as the Government, sustained their comrade in what he had done, and a number of officers of the Royal Navy and Army, approving of my course, throughout the trying circumstances in which I had been placed—not even excepting the hurling of my sword into the sea, under the circumstances related—set on foot a subscription for another sword, to replace the one which I had lost, publishing the following announcement of their intention in the London ‘Daily Telegraph’:—
This design on the part of the officers of the British Navy and Army was afterward carried out, by the presentation to me of a magnificent sword, which was manufactured to their order in the city of London, with suitable naval and Southern devices. I could not but appreciate very highly this delicate mode, on the part of my professional brethren, of rebutting the slanders of the Northern press and people. I might safely rely upon the judgment of two of the principal naval clubs in England,—the United Service, and the Junior United Service, on whose rolls were some of the most renowned naval and military names of Great Britain. The shouts of the multitude are frequently deceptive; the idol of an hour may be pulled down in the succeeding hour; but the approbation of my brethren in arms, who coolly surveyed my career, and measured it by the rules which had guided the conduct of so many of their own soldiers by sea and by land, in whose presence my own poor name was unworthy to be mentioned, was indeed beyond all price to me. To keep company with this sword, a noble English lady presented me with a mammoth Confederate flag, wrought with her own hands from the richest silk. There is not a spot on its pure white field, and the battle-cross and the stars, when unfolded, flash as brightly as ever. These two gifts shall be precious heirlooms in my family, to remind my descendants, that, in the words of Patrick Henry, ‘I have done my utmost to preserve their liberty.’
Furl that Banner, for 'tis weary;Mr. Mason, our Commissioner at the Court of London, thanked Mr. Lancaster for his humane and generous conduct in the following terms:—
Round its staff 'tis drooping dreary;
Furl it, fold it, it is best:
For there's not a man to wave it,
And there's not a sword to save it,
And there's not one left to lave it
In the blood which heroes gave it;
And its foes now scorn and brave it;
Furl it, hide it—let it rest. [786]
Furl it! for the hands that grasped it,
And the hearts that fondly clasped it,
Cold and dead are lying low;
And that Banner—it is trailing!
While around it sounds the wailing
Of its people in their woe.
Furl that Banner! true 'tis gory.
Yet 'tis wreathed around with glory,
And 'twill live in song and story,
Though its folds are in the dust
For its fame on brightest pages,
Penned by poets and by sages,
Shall go sounding down the ages—
Furl its folds though now we must.
[787] Subsequently, upon my arrival in Richmond, in the winter of the same year, the Confederate Congress passed a joint resolution of thanks to Mr. Lancaster, a copy of which it requested the Secretary of the Navy to transmit to him. In the confusion incident to the downfall of the Confederacy, which speedily followed, Mr. Lancaster probably never received a copy of this resolution. Thus, with the indorsement of his own government, and with that of the yacht-clubs of England, and of the Congress of the Confederate States, he may safely despise the malicious diatribes that were launched against him by a fanatical and infuriated people, who were thirsting for an opportunity to wreak their vengeance upon the persons of the men whom he had saved. Upon my landing in Southampton, I was received with great kindness by the English people, ever ready to sympathize with the unfortunate, and administer to the wants of the distressed. Though my officers and myself were not to be classed in this latter category, as my drafts on the house of Frazer, Trenholm & Co., of Liverpool, would have been accepted to any extent, and were as good as cash in the market, there were many generous offers of pecuniary assistance made me. I cannot forbear to speak of one of these, as it came from a lady, and if, in doing so, I trespass upon the bounds of propriety, I trust the noble lady will forgive me. This is the only means left me of making her any suitable acknowledgment. This lady was Miss Gladstone, a sister of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who wrote me a long letter, full of sympathy, and of those noble impulses which swell the heart of the true woman on such occasions. She generously offered me any aid of which my sailors or myself might be in need. Letters of condolence for my loss, and congratulation upon my escape from the power of a ruthless enemy, came in upon me in great profusion; and, as for volunteers, half the adventurous young spirits of England claimed the privilege of serving under me, in my new ship. The career of the Alabama seemed to have fired the imagination of all the schools and colleges in England, if I might judge by the number of ardent missives I received from the young gentlemen who attended them. Mr. Mason, Captain Bullock, and the Rev. F. W. Tremlett came post-haste [788] to Southampton, to offer us sympathy and services. The reader will recollect the circumstances under which I became acquainted with the latter gentleman, when I laid up the Sumter at Gibraltar, and retired to London. He now came to insist that I should go again to my ‘English home,’ at his house, to recruit and have my wound cared for. As I had already engaged quarters at Millbrook, where I should be in excellent hands, and as duties connected with the welfare of my crew would require my detention in the neighborhood of Southampton for a week or two, I was forced to forego the pleasure for the present. In connection with the gratitude due other friends, I desire to mention the obligations I am under to Dr. J. Wiblin, a distinguished surgeon and physician of Southampton, who attended my crew and officers whilst we remained there, without fee or reward. The reader may recollect, that previous to my engagement with the Kearsarge, I had sent on shore, through my paymaster, the ship's funds, and the books and papers necessary to a final settlement with my crew. The paymaster now recovered back these funds, from the bankers with whom they had been deposited, paid off such of the officers and men as were with us at Southampton, and proceeded to Liverpool, where he was to pay off the rest of the survivors as fast as they should present themselves. Some of the crew were wounded, and in French hospitals, where they were treated with marked kindness and consideration; some had been made prisoners, and paroled by Captain Winslow, with the approbation of Mr. Adams, under the mistaken idea, as Mr. Seward afterward insisted, that they were prisoners of war, and some weeks elapsed, consequently, before they could all present themselves at the paymaster's table. This was finally accomplished, however, and every officer and seaman, received, in full, all the pay that was due him. The amounts due to those killed and drowned, were paid, in due time, to their legal representatives; and thus were the affairs of the Alabama wound up.
