Benson J. Lossing, Pictorial Field Book of the Civil War. Volume 1.

[131] and stirred the hearts of all. Anderson then hoisted the flag to the head of the staff. It was greeted with cheer after cheer, while the band saluted it with the air of “Hail Columbia.”

While this impressive scene was occurring in the fort, a boat was approaching from Charleston. It contained a messenger from the Governor of South Carolina, conveying a demand, in courteous but peremptory phrase, for Major Anderson's immediate withdrawal from Sumter, and return to Moultrie. The Governor said that when he came into office, he found that “there was an understanding between his predecessor and the President, that no re-enforcements were to be sent to any of the forts,” and especially to Sumter ; and that Anderson had violated that agreement by thus re-enforcing it. The demand was refused; and the Major was denounced in the Secession Convention, in the South Carolina Legislature, in public and private assemblies, and in the streets of Charleston, as a “traitor to the South” (he having been born in a Slave-labor State), and an enemy of its people. The South Carolinians felt the affront most keenly, for on the very day when he went from Moultrie to Sumter, a resolution, offered by Mr. Spain, was considered in secret session in the disunion Convention, which requested the Governor to communicate to that body any information he might possess concerning the condition of the forts in the harbor — what work was going on within them, how many men were employed, the number and weight of guns, number of soldiers, and whether assurances had been given that they would not be re-enforced; also, what steps had been taken for the defense of Charleston and the State. It was afterward known that these conspirators intended to seize Castle Pinckney and Fort Sumter within twenty-four hours from that time, but their plans were frustrated by the timely movement of Anderson.

The conspirators in Charleston and Washington were filled with rage. At the very hour when the old flag was flung out defiantly to the breeze over Sumter, in the face of South Carolina traitors, Floyd, the Secretary of War, was declaring vehemently in the Cabinet that “the solemn pledges of the Government had been violated” by Major Anderson, and demanding of the President permission to withdraw the garrison from Charleston harbor. The President refused. A disruption of the Cabinet ensued; and the next communication that Major Anderson received from the War Department, after the angry electrograph of Floyd, was from Joseph Holt, a loyal Kentuckian like himself, whom the President had called to the head of that bureau.

December 31, 1860.

He assured Major Anderson of the approval of his Government, and that his movement in transferring the garrison from Moultrie to Sumter “was in every way admirable, alike for its humanity and patriotism as for its soldiership.” ¹

Earlier than this, words of approval had reached Anderson from the loyal North; and five days after the old flag was raised over Sumter, the Legislature of Nebraska, two thousand miles away toward the setting sun, greeted him, by telegraph, with “A happy New year!” Other greetings from the outside world came speedily, for every patriotic heart in the land made lips evoke benedictions on the head of the brave and loyal soldier. In, many