Peace conference of 1864.
Francis P. Blair, Sr., conceived the idea that through his personal acquaintance with most of the
Confederate leaders at
Richmond he might be able to effect a peace.
So, without informing the
President of his purpose, he asked
Mr. Lincoln for a pass through the
National lines to the
Confederate capital.
On Dec. 26, the
President handed
Mr. Blair a card on which was written, “Allow
Mr. F. P. Blair, Sr., to pass our lines to go South and return,” and signed his name to it. This self-constituted peace commissioner went to
Richmond, had several interviews with
President Davis, and made his way back to
Washington in January. 1865, with a letter written to himself by
Jefferson Davis, in which the latter expressed a willingness to appoint a commission “to renew the effort to enter into a conference with a view to secure peace to the two countries.”
This letter
Mr. Blair placed in the hands of the
President, when the latter wrote a note to
Blair which he might show to
Davis, in which he expressed a willingness now, as he had ever had, to take proper measures for “securing peace to the people of our common country.”
With this letter
Blair returned to
Richmond.
Mr. Lincoln's expression, “our common country,” as opposed to
Davis's “the two countries,” deprived the latter of all hope of a negotiation on terms of independence for the
Confederate States.
But there was an intense popular desire for the war to cease which he dared not resist, and he appointed
Alexander H. Stephens.
John A.
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Campbell, and
R. M. T. Hunter commissioners to proceed to
Washington.
they were permitted to go on a steamer only as far as
Hampton Roads, without the privilege of landing, and there, on board the vessel that conveyed them, they held a conference (Feb. 3, 1865) of several hours with
President Lincoln and
Secretary of State Seward.
That conference clearly revealed the wishes of both parties.
The Confederates wanted an armistice by which an immediate peace might be secured, leaving the question of the separation of the
Confederate States from the
Union to be settled afterwards.
The President told them plainly that there would be no suspension of hostilities and no negotiations, except on the basis of the disbandment of the Confederate forces and the recognition of the national authority throughout the republic.
He declared, also, that he should not recede from his position on the subject of slavery, and the commissioners were informed of the adoption by Congress three days before of the Thirteenth Amendment to the
Constitution.
So ended the peace conference.
In a speech at a public meeting in
Richmond on Jan. 6,
Davis, in reference to the words of
President Lincoln— “our common country” —said, “Sooner than we should ever be united again, I would be willing to yield up everything I hold on earth, and, if it were possible, would sacrifice my life a thousand times before I would succumb.”
The meeting passed resolutions spurning with indignation the terms offered by the
President as a “gross insult” and “premeditated indignity” to the people of the “
Confederate States.”
Davis declared that in less than twelve months they would “compel the
Yankees to petition them for peace upon their own terms.”
He spoke of “his Majesty Abraham the First,” and said that “before the campaign was over,
Lincoln and
Seward might find they had been speaking to their masters.”
At a war-meeting held a few days afterwards at
Richmond, it was resolved that they would never lay down their arms until their independence was won.
