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

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Pledges to men had to yield to the public interest. It was evident that there were those in the Cabinet who could not be trusted. Dangers were thickening. Fortunately, the President listened to his new counselors, Secretary Holt and General Scott; and it was resolved to send troops and supplies to Fort Sumter by a more secret method than had yet been devised. Instead of employing a vessel-of-war for the purpose, the stanch merchant-steamer Star of the West, built to run between New York and Aspinwall, on the California route, was chartered by the Government and quickly laden with supplies. She was cleared for New Orleans and Savannah, in order to mislead spies. She left her wharf at New York at sunset on the 5th of January, and far down the bay she received, under the cover of thick darkness, four officers and two hundred and fifty artillerists and marines, with their arms and ammunition. She crossed the bar at Sandy Hook at nine o'clock the same evening, and proceeded to sea under her commander, Captain John McGowan.

In consequence of the reception of a letter from Major Anderson, stating that he regarded himself secure in his position, and intelligence that the

The Star of tie West.

insurgents had erected strong batteries at the mouth of Charleston harbor that could destroy an unarmed vessel, the Government, with the concurrence of General Scott, countermanded the order for the sailing of the Star of the West.¹ The countermand was sent by the General-in-chief to Colonel H. L. Scott, of his staff, then in New York, by telegraph, but it reached that city after the vessel had left. It is a pity that it was too late. The American people will ever recur to the page of their history on which the record of that expedition is written with regret and humiliation, because it tells the fact that their powerful Government was so weakly administered, that it seemed necessary to resort to clandestine acts in the maintenance of its rightful authority.

The South Carolinians, meanwhile, were making preparations to attack Fort Sumter and strengthen their position. They affected to regard the refusal of the President to hold further intercourse with their arrogant representatives as an insult to their “Sovereign State.” Every man int