[
618]
M. Forbes and
Colonel Ritchie,
Massachusetts had received from
England a number of heavy guns, which the
Governor wished to have placed in position, with proper earthworks, on
Long Island Head.
On the 2d of March, the
Governor wrote to
John M. Forbes, who was then in
Washington, inclosing him a copy of some memoranda made by
Colonel Browne, of a conversation had with
General Totten, in
Boston, in September, 1863, which bore directly on the point of the construction of a work on
Long Island Head to receive our guns.
The Governor asked
Mr. Forbes to consider the propriety of getting the
Engineer Bureau to design an earthwork for us to erect there at our own cost, with an estimate of the necessary outlay.
The Governor said,—
I wish that you could get General Dyer to take our guns, and have carriages constructed for them, and mount them.
The Ordnance Bureau would need no special appropriation for such carriages, but could, out of existing appropriations, authorize Major Rodman, U. S. A. [then in command of the United-States Arsenal at Watertown], to build them.
We do not ask them to say that they will pay for the guns, and we do not ask them to build the earthworks.
We simply want to have the benefit of the defensive power of those guns in position.
It seems to me that the United-States Government ought to stick to something, especially when it would incur no expense in so doing.
We have no doubt that what was asked for by the
Governor would have been granted, had not the
Rebellion, in a few weeks after the letter was written, been suppressed.
The following letter, although it has no special bearing upon the war, we cannot refrain from quoting, as it shows in a practical manner the catholic and liberal spirit which ever animated the mind and action of our truly great Governor.
On the 7th of March,
Governor Andrew wrote to
Governor Smith, of
Vermont,—
I have already proposed Good Friday to the Executive Council, who do not consent to it, but favor Thursday, the day previous.
If, however, you and others adopt Good Friday, perhaps they may be willing to change, in view that that day, on the whole, more convenient.
It was objected to, as being a possibly improvident act, tending to create the suspicion of conceding a Puritan custom to fast on Thursday,
