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[415] made distinctly on my mind that they, and the army generally, desired peace on the conditions of the convention of the 18th, and regretted the rejection of those terms by the President of the United States.

The pacification was announced by me to the States immediately concerned, by the following telegram, addressed to their governors:

The disaster in Virginia, the capture by the enemy of all our workshops for the preparation of ammunition and repairing of arms, the impossibility of recruiting our little army opposed to more than ten times its number, or of supplying it except by robbing our own citizens, destroyed all hope of successful war. I have made, therefore, a military convention with Major-General Sherman, to terminate hostilities in North and South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. I made this convention to spare the blood of this gallant little army, to prevent further sufferings of our people by the devastation and ruin inevitable from the marches of invading armies, and to avoid the crime of waging a hopeless war.

It was also published to the Confederate army, in general orders No. 18 of April 27th, as follows:

By the terms of a military convention made on the 26th instant by Major-General W. T. Sherman, United States Army, and General J. E. Johnston, Confederate States Army, the officers and men of this army are to bind themselves not to take up arms against the United States until properly relieved from that obligation; and shall receive guarantees from the United States officers against molestation by the United States authorities, so long as


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