The American Annual Cyclopaedia and Register of Important Events of the Year, 1861-1865, vols. 1-5. New York: Appleton & Co., 1868.

Confederate States in 1864, Part 1: Arkansas through Missouri

SOUTHERN STATES - CONFEDERATE – 1864

ARKANSAS. The organized rebel force in Arkansas and its vicinity, at the commencement of 1864, was large. It was at several points as follows:–Princeton, 800; Tulip, 400; Rockport, 4,000; Washington and vicinity, 3,000; Camden, 1,200; its vicinity, 4,000; near Lake Providence, in Louisiana, 300; on the Red River, 8,000—total, 21,700. On the retreat of General Banks from the Red River country, this force concentrated against General Steele, and put him on the defensive at Little Rock. The positions within the State held by Federal troops were gradually surrendered, until only Little Rock, Pine and Duvall's Bluffs, Fort Smith and Van Buren, were retained. Before the close of the year, Van Buren, and one or two others, were evacuated. The limited Federal force in the State compared with the strength of the enemy, offered an opportunity for the invasion of Missouri by General Price. With the exception of the military posts, the State became as completely under rebel control as when occupied by a Confederate army. It was unsafe to go outside of any posts, and even at Little Rock, in the presence of a large army, lurked in undesirable proximity. he communications between the posts were dangerous and liable to interruption. Heavy details were required for escort duty, and men and horses were worn out in the unprofitable service. As the military occupation was not sufficiently strong to afford security to the inhabitants, the Unionists became scarce, and gradually lost their energy and hope.

At the beginning of the year a Union State Government was organized. The movement was based on the amnesty proclamation of President Lincoln, issued December 8th, 1863. Under this authority a Convention to revise the State Constitution assembled on January 8th. Representatives were reported to be present from forty-two out of fifty-four counties. In fifteen counties they had been elected at the ordinary precincts, without the presence of a soldier. The election was called by mass meetings. The Constitution amended by the Convention, forever prohibited the existence of slavery in the State. Isaac Murphey was appointed Provisional Governor; C. C. Bliss, Lieut.-Governor; and R. J. T. White, Secretary of State. These officers were inaugurated on January 22d. The Convention ordered the Constitution to be submitted to a vote of the people on March 14th, and State officers to be chosen at the same time.

These proceedings were somewhat in conflict with the order prescribed by President Lincoln. This was settled by the following letter and address:

                                                    Washington, February 18, 1864.

To William Fishback :

When I fixed a plan for an election in Arkansas I did it in ignorance that your Convention was at the same work. Since I learned the latter fact I have been constantly trying to yield . plan to theirs. I have sent two letters to General Steele and three or four despatches to you and others, saying that he (General Steele) must be master, but that it will probably be best for him to keep the Convention on its own plan. Some single mind must be master, else there will be no ºff.". on any thing; and General Steele, commanding the military and being on the ground, is the best man to be that master. Even now citizens are telegraphing me to postpone the election to a later day than either affixed by the Convention or me. This discord must be silenced.

                                                                 A. LINCOLN.

HEADQUARTERS LITTLE ROCK, February 29, 1864.

To the People of Arkansas :

It affords the General Commanding the highest gratification to be able to say that by the conduct of the army under his command, in connection with the wise administration of the Government by its officers at Washington, peace has been so far restored in your midst as to enable you to institute proceedings for the restoration of the civil government, by which order may be firmly established, and the rights of persons and property secured against violence and the danger of anarchy. The Convention of your citizens, held at Little Rock during the last

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* Annual Cyclopædia, 1868, p. 16. Page 30

month, has adopted a constitution and submitted it to you for your approval or rejection. That constitution is based upon the principles of freedom, and it is for you now to say, by your voluntary and unbiased action, whether it shall be your fundamental law. While it may have defects in the main, it is in accordance with the views of that portion of the people who have been resisting the fratricidal attempts which have been made during the last three years. The Convention has fixed the 14th day of March next on which to decide this question, and the General Commanding is only following the instructions of the Government when he says to you that every facility will be offered for the expression of your sentiments, uninfluenced by any considerations save those which affect your own interests and those of your posterity... If you will institute a government of your own, he feels great confidence in assuring you that quiet and security will soon be restored to tour entire State. Those who have been unwisely ed, by the counsel of bad men, to engage in this unjustifiable, and wicked rebellion, will speedily return and acknowledge the rightful sovereignty of the State, as well as the supremacy of the National Government over the whole domain, and peace will }. throughout the land. The election will be held and the return be made in accordance with the schedule adopted by the Convention, and no interference from any quarter will be allowed to prevent the free expression of the loyal men of the S. on that day. The schedule will be hereto appended to render the election valid. There must be cast five thousand four hundred and six votes.

                                              FRED. STEELE,

                                   Major-General Commanding.

The popular vote on the Constitution as returned, was 12,177 in its favor, and 226 against it. There was also chosen at said election a Governor, Lieutenant-Governor, Secretary of State, Auditor, State Treasurer, Attorney-General, three Supreme Court Judges, three members of Congress, six out of nine Circuit Judges, seven of nine Prosecuting Attorneys, twenty-three out of twenty-five State Senators, fifty-nine out of seventy-five members of the Assembly. The counties also elected Sheriffs, County and Circuit Clerks, County and Probate Judges, Treasurers, Coroners, School Commissioners, Surgeons, Justices, and Constables. The Legislature assembled on April 25th, and elected William Fishback and Elisha Baxter Senators to Congress in Washington. The question relative to their admission to seats was discussed, but not decided by the Senate.

On September 22d, the rebel Legislature of the State assembled. Thirteen members were present in the Senate, and forty in the House. A message was delivered by the rebel Governor Hannigan, and A. P. Garland was elected to the Congress at Richmond—Albert Pike being the opposing candidate.

FLORIDA. With the exception of two or three points on the coast, Florida has been abandoned by the Federal forces during nearly the whole of 1864. The disastrous expedition of General Seymour (see ARMY OPERATIONS), early in the year, resulted in retaining possession only of Jacksonville. Fernandina has been constantly occupied since its first capture. Pilatka was also held a short time. At all points, however, the enemy were found in some force. The organization of the State militia, as recommended by the Governor in 1863, brought every man and boy capable of bearing arms into the field for home defence. They were not subject to be ordered into the Confederate army, or to be sent away from their ordinary pursuits, except to repel invasions and to maintain suitable police regulations. During the spring the regular army force in the State was large. The body of the enemy near Jacksonville was estimated at ten thousand infantry and about four thousand cavalry. At the same time there was a large camp at Baldwin, the junction of the Florida and Cedar Keys Railroad.

During the winter of 1863–64 the extensive salt works at Lake Ocola and in West Bay, in the neighborhood of St. Andrew's Sound, were destroyed by orders from acting Rear-Admiral Bailey. The works at Ocola made one hundred and fifty bushels per day, and those of the Confederate Government at West Bay four hundred bushels. The private works down the bay were also destroyed, and the entire damage was estimated at three millions of dollars.

About July 20th a raid was made by General Birney, under orders of General Foster, from Jacksonville to the mouth of Trent Creek. Two bridges over one of the forks of the creek were destroyed, and the force pushed forward to Callohan station, on the Fernandina Railroad, and destroyed two cars, a telegraph office, and other public property. A few days afterward, the same force with others embarked on transports at Jacksonville, and moved to Whitesville, a point on the south fork of Black Creek. Here a skirmish ensued with a body of the enemy, who disputed their passage, but were driven off and disappeared. At the same time another small body marched to the south fork of the St. Mary's River, and cut the trestlework, and destroyed a bridge about twelve miles in the rear of Baldwin. Subsequently a force from Jacksonville occupied Baldwin and Camp Milton, a point beyond which other movements of a similar character were made with some loss of life on both sides, but without any important military result.

On May 18th a convention was called by Page 379 in Jacksonville, on the ground “that Florida was still a State of the Union, and had a right to a voice in the great councils of the people,” to appoint delegates to the Presidential Convention at Baltimore, on June 7th. The convention assembled on the 24th, and appointed as delegates: Buckingham Smith, of St. Augustine; John W. Price, of Jacksonville; C. L. Robinson, of Fernandina; John S. Sammis, of Jacksonville; Philip Frazer, of St. Augustine; Paran Moody, of Jacksonville.

The affairs of the State, as a member of the Confederacy, presented nothing of unusual importance during the year.

GEORGIA  For military affairs in Georgia during 1864, see ARMY OPERATIONS.

As the armed hosts came within the northern limits of Georgia, which was the granary of the State, dissatisfaction with the Confederate Government and its conduct of the war began to appear and increase. Perhaps no person manifested more of this disaffection than the Governor of the State. In his message to the Legislature in March, Governor Brown declared that the action of Congress in funding seven hundred millions of dollars in forty days at a less rate of interest than that pledged on the full notes resembled repudiation and bad faith, and that it had shaken the confidence of the people in the justice and capacity of that body. Its discussions in secret sessions, he declared to be a blighting course, convenient for canvassing what will not bear the light. The new military bill he considered to be unconstitutional, and that conscription would not fill the army. The act to suspend the writ of habeas corpus conferred powers on the president which were denied by the constitution, and he urged the Legislature to take prompt action to stamp it with the seal of their indignant rebuke. He reviewed the causes of the war, exonerated the northern democrats and moderate republicans, and declared that the responsibility rested exclusively with the “wicked republicans” who denied the compact of the constitution, and demanded an “anti-slavery bible and an anti-slavery God,” and said: “We should keep before the Northern people the idea that we are ready to negotiate when they are ready, and will recognize our right to self-government and the sovereignty of the States.”

A special message was sent to the Legislature at a later day, in opposition to the conscription act. The Supreme Court of the State had decided the act to be constitutional, but it had not declared, as the Governor said, that the Confederate Government had the power to enroll the whole population of the State who remain at home, so as to place all the people under its military control. He insisted that if all between the ages of seventeen and fifty were placed in the army a sufficient number would not remain to raise subsistence. At a later day he defended the State against attacks for permitting General Sherman to march unmolested through it, by saying she was abandoned to her fate, and neglected by the Confederate authorities, while her army of able-bodied sons were held for the defence of other States, and thus she was compelled to rely only upon a few old men and boys.

The Legislature hardly responded to the sentiments of the Governor. They passed resolutions recommending, after every signal success, an official tender of peace to the Federal Government upon the principle adopted in 1776, and condemned the act suspending the habeas corpus, also the act turning over to the Confederate authority all persons between seventeen and eighteen and forty-five and fifty ; they also expressed confidence in the president and thanks to the armies.

The militia law of the State called into ser. vice all between sixteen and sixty years of age, and divided them into two classes. The first was composed of those between seventeen and fifty years of age, constituting what is called the militia proper; and the second class, those between sixteen and seventeen years of age, and between fifty and sixty years of age, constituting what is to be known as the militia reserve. The only exemptions provided for in the bill were those created by the constitution in reference to all officers and members of the executive, legislative, and judicial departments of government.

On the march of General Sherman through the State, an act was passed authorizing the conscription of every free white male inhabitant of the State for forty days. The Governor, however, exempted the clergy, who were in charge of parishes. After Atlanta had been captured by General Sherman, he sent a messenger, William King, to Vice-President Stephens and to Governor Brown, inviting them to a conference with himself. The invitation, as received, was thus described by Governor Brown:

Mr. William King, who represented himself as the bearer of a message from General Sherman, called upon him and stated, in substance, that General Sherman had requested him to say to the Governor that he would be pleased to receive a visit from him and other distinguished Georgians, with a view to a conference upon the state of the country and the settlement of our difficulties; that he would give the Governor a passport through his lines with an escort, if desired, to go and return at such time as might be agreeable to him : that he (General Sherman) recognized him (Governor Brown) as the Governor of the whole State, and as over one hundred miles of the territory of the State is now behind his lines, he (General Sherman) would allow the Governor to go and visit his people in the rear if he desired to look after their condition, and return at his pleasure; that he would receive him and other distinguished Georgians at his headquarters, and treat them with the respect and consideration due their positions during the conference which he invited; that he did not wish to be compelled to overrun and desolate more of the territory of the state.

                    Mr. Stephens replied as follows:

                                            Crawfordsville (GA.), October 1, 1864.

William King, Sr., Esq.;

Sir : I have considered the message you delivered me yesterday from General Sherman with all the seriousness and gravity due the importance of the subject. The message was a verbal invitation, by him through you, to me to visit him at Atlanta, to see if we could agree upon some plan of terminating this fratricidal war without the further effusion of blood.

The object is one which addresses itself with peculiar interest and great force to every well-wisher of his country—to every friend of humanity—to every patriot—to every one attached to the principles of self-government established by our common ancestors. I need not assure you, therefore, that it is an object very dear to me. There is no sacrifice I would not make, short of principle and honor, to obtain it; and no effort would I spare, under the same limitations, with any reasonable or probable prospect of success. But, in the present instance, the entire absence of any power on my part to enter into such negotiations, and the like absence of any such power Page 406 on his part, so far as appears from his message, necessarily precludes my acceptance of the invitation thus tendered.

In communicating this intention to General Sherman, you may also say to him that, if he is of opinion that there is any prospect of our agreeing upon any terms of adjustment to be submitted to the action of our respective Governments, even though he has no power to act in advance in the premises, and will make this known to me in some formal and authoritative manner (being so desirous for peace himself as you represent him to have expressed himself), I would most cheerfully and willingly, with the consent of our authorities, accede to his request thus manifested, and enter with all the earnestness of my nature upon the responsible and arduous task of restoring peace and harmony to the country, upon the principles of honor, right, and justice to all parties. Does not seem to me to be at all impossible, if truth and reason should be permitted to have their full sway.

                              Yours, most respectfully

                                        ALEXANDER. H. STEPHENS.

The reply of Governor Brown was as follows:

Please make to General Sherman an acknowledgment of my obligation for the personal courtesies which you say he proposes to extend to me. But as he is only a general commanding an army in the field, and I the governor of a State, neither the constitution of his country nor of my own confers upon us any power to negotiate a treaty of peace. He probably hold but few sentiments in common; but if we should agree in every particular, we would have power to bind no one by any compact we might make. As our interview could therefore result in nothing practical, I must decline the invitation. While the portion of the State now in the rear of General Sherman's army is held by him, and the execution of the laws of the State is suspended by armed force, I know of no service which I could render to the people of that section by a personal visit. If I could better their condition or mitigate their sufferings, I would, on their account, cheerfully go at the expense of any inconvenience or personal sacrifice which the trip might cost me.

To the remark that General Sherman does not wish to be compelled to overrun and desolate more of the territory of Georgia, I reply that no compulsion rests upon him to attempt this, unless it be the cruel orders of his Government. If he makes the effort, he will find much greater difficulties in the way of his advance for the next hundred miles than those encountered during his march from Dalton to Atlanta. Georgia may possibly be overrun, but never can be subjugated, and her people will never treat with a conqueror upon her soil. As a sovereign State she had the undoubted right to dissolve her connection with the Government of the United States when the compact had been violated by the other States of the confederacy, and to form a new compact, which she has done. She is as sovereign to-day as she was the day she seceded from the old Union, and has the same power, by a convention of her people, which she then had to resume all delegated powers and all the attributes of sovereignty, and then to declare war, negotiate treaties of peace, and do all other acts which a sovereign State may do. While this power rests on her people, who are the original source of all sovereignty, her constitution, formed by them, has conferred no such power upon her Governor.

The fact must not be overlooked, however, that while Georgia possesses the sovereign power to act separately, her faith, which never has, and I trust never will be violated, is pledged by strong implication to her Southern sisters, that she will not exercise this power without consent on their part, and concerted action with them. . In league with her Southern sisters, she entered into this contest with full knowledge of all the responsibilities which attached to the act; and come weal or woe, she will never withdraw from it in dishonor. However unequal may be the proportion of suffering or sacrifice which her people may have to endure, she will never make separate terms with the enemy which may free her territory from invasion and leave her confederates in the lurch....Whatever may be the opinion of her people as to the injustice done her by the Confederate administration, she will triumph with her Confederate sisters, or she will sink with them in common ruin. The intelligent people of Georgia already understand, and our enemy will soon learn, that the independent expression of condemnation of the administration is one thing, and disloyalty to our sacred cause is another and quite a different thing. While the people of Georgia think for themselves, and will not blindly applaud the mismanagement of their rulers, they will never violate principle for expediency, nor accept dishonor for reward. he foundation of our Government and the liberties of the people rest upon the sovereignty of the States as their chief corner stone. Destroy the sovereignty of the States and the whole fabric falls to the ground, and centralized power with military despotism takes the place of constitutional liberty.

When the passions of the people North and South have subsided we may make peace by negotiation, but never by the sword.

If Mr. Lincoln would have peace, and prosperity reestablished upon a firm basis, let him stop the war, and, planting upon the principles of the Declaration of Independence of 1776 let him recognize the sovereignty of the States, and agree to leave each sovereign. State to determine for herself by a convention of her people, whose delegates shall be fairly chosen by the legal voters of the State, with. out military interference or intimidation, what shall be her future connection—whether she will remain in, or, if out, return to the old Union, or adhere to her present league.

There may be doubts whether Kentucky, Missouri, and probably other States, desire to continue their connection with the United States, or to cast their lot with the Confederate States. The only just mode of solving these doubts is the one above indicated. If these or any other of the Southern States should in solemn convention, decide to go with the Unit States, neither the Confederate Government nor the other States can object. We cannot govern Kentucky, for instance, against her will, unless we can subjugate her. This we have no power to do with the Northern States at her back; and if we had the owner we have no right to coerce a sovereign State into a connection which is not of her own choice. If this were done we must, in future, govern her people by the bayonet, which would convert our patriotism into the worst species of despotism. So it must be with the North if Mr. Lincoln should succeed in his policy of conquering us.

If we were overrun, and for a time subdued, our territory is so vast in extent, and our population so large, that it would take a regular army of two hundred thousand men to govern and hold us in subjection. The support of such an army would not only continue the country in bankruptcy, but in the hands of the Executive it would soon be used to subvert even the form of the Government, and change it from a republic to a monarchy. Thus to destroy our liberties must cost the Northern people, their own, and the republicanism of America must in future be a reproach and a byword among all nations.

If President Lincoln and President Davis will agree to stop the war and transfer the settlement of the issues from the battle-field to the ballot box, leaving each sovereign State to determine for herself what shall be her future connection, and who her future allies, the present devastation, bloodshed, and carnage will cease, and prosperity will be restored to the whole country.

On the other hand, if this is not done the war will last for years to come, till both sides are exhausted and overwhelmed with debt and taxation, when it Page 407 may degenerate into a guerilla strife, the end of which may not be seen by the present generation, and the hate engendered by which will last through many future generations.

Neither General Sherman nor I can control this, however much we may deplore it.

If those on both sides who have the constitutional power of negotiation, from obstinacy or ambition refuse to recognize the sovereignty of the States and to leave the settlement of the question to the States when they cannot themselves agree, and insist on continual effusion of blood to gratify their caprice all the States, North and South, in their official capacity may then be justifiable in taking the matter into their own hands and settling it as sovereigns in their own way.

The views of the Governor on the manner of settling the difficulties were subsequently stated to the Legislature more briefly in his message at the session in November. The plan was openly advocated by several newspapers in Georgia and Alabama, which claimed most of the leading men in Georgia and several other States as favoring it.

From Chattanooga to Marietta, a distance of one hundred and fifty miles, the country was totally swept of its able male inhabitants. A few old and decrepit men, gaunt and half-starved women and children were occasionally to be seen. All along the railroad appear black and charred timbers, and chimneys standing alone that show where houses have been burned down. The few little villages are deserted, and fences and crops have disappeared. Large hotels and stores remain with doors off their hinges, the panes of glass broken, and the furniture removed, from cellar to garret. Appropriations were made by the Legislature to feed the destitute inhabitants of several counties.

LOUISIANA. The proceedings relative to the formation of a State Government for Louisiana were continued early in the year. The basis of this State Government was the proclamation of President Lincoln of December 8th, 1863. On January 11th, 1864, Major-General Banks issued his proclamation providing for the election of State Page 476 officers under the old constitution of the State on February 22d, and for the election of delegates to a convention for the revision of the Constitution in April. (See ANNUAL CYCLOPEDIA, 1863, p. 592.) On February 3d his general order relative to compensated labor plantations were issued. (See ANNUAL CYCLOPÆDIA, 1863, pp. 594-5.) On February 13th General Banks issued the following proclamation prescribing the qualifications of voters:

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT of THE GULF,

New ORLEANS, February 18, 1864.

General Orders No. 24:

1. Every free white male twenty-one years of age, who has been a resident of the State twelve months, and six months in the parish in which he offers to vote, who is a citizen of the United States, and who shall have taken the oath prescribed by the President in his Fº of the 8th December, 1st; 3, shall have the right to vote in the election of State officers on the 22d day of February, 1864.

2. Citizens of the State who have been expelled from their homes by the public enemy on account of their devotion to the Union, and who would be qualified voters in the parishes to which they belong, will be allowed to vote for State officers only in the election precincts in which, for the time being, they may reside.

3. Citizens of the State who have volunteered for the defence of the country in the army or navy, and who are otherwise qualified voters, will be allowed to vote in the election precincts in which they may be found on the day of election. And if the exigencies of the public service be such as to prevent their attendance at any established precinct, then commissioners fairly representing the interests involved in the election will be appointed to receive their votes wherever they may be stationed for that day, and to make due returns thereof, as well as of their own votes, to the Military Governor of the State as provided for other commissioners of election.

4. The Commissioners of Election, at any election precinct, are authorized to administer the oath of allegiance, as prescribed by the President, to any person otherwise qualified to vote, and to register the name of such voter in New Orleans where a register is required, or to receive it in other parishes where no register is required, at any time before the polls are closed on the day of election.

5. The Commissioners of Election in the several parishes will make prompt returns of the votes given to the sheriff of the parish, as provided by law, or in his absence to the provost marshal, who will immediately return the same to the Military Governor of the State.

6. The sheriffs of the several parishes, and in their absence, the provost marshals, will take especial care that the polls are properly opened, and that suitable Judges of Election and other officers are appointed. It is desirable that all persons properly qualified shall vote, but it is more important that illegal or fraudulent votes shall not vitiate the election.

7. The situation of Louisiana is not identical with that of other States designated by the President, but the test of loyalty required by him as a basis for the restoration of Government is unequivocal. Full opportunity has been given to the people for the suggestion of any obligation more in accordance, if possible, with the condition of this State, but no general unity of sentiment  to exist as to the test of fealty which should be demanded. The inference is irresistible that all parties prefer the form prescribed by the President to any other than their own.

8. The oath prescribed by him offers amnesty and pardon only to those who have committed treason. To all others it is a simple pledge of continued fealty to the Government. The oath of allegiance cannot be materially strengthened or impaired by the language in which it is clothed, but it may be accompanied by such explanations as to make known tº the public the sense in which it is administered and received. Allegiance cannot be more or less than unreserved, unconditional loyalty.

9. The repetition of an oath once taken, or when unnecessarily clothed in unusual language, may well cause hesitation, but if it be identified with the restoration of a government, at a time when secret evasions and reservations have sapped public integrity, and endangered the safety of the nation, it is an unsound patriotism that criticizes the form or hesitates at its removal.

10. In times of danger the Government has a right to demand an unreserved declaration of the purposes of all its people, and to provide, if necessary, an iron-clad defence against the weapons of its enemies. Those who seek its favor and protection must yield to its just demands. An exemption from all duties and an enjoyment of all privileges at the same time is a greater degree of happiness than is accorded to any man in this life. Let the People of Louisiana look at things as they are and base their political action upon a declaration of loyalty that cannot be misunderstood or misinterpreted. Upon this depends the restoration of peace and of private and public prosperity.

                               By command of Major-General BANKS.

    Richard B. Irwin, A. A. General

Three candidates for Governor were nominated: B. F. Flanders, Michael Hahn, and J. Q. A. Fellows. Mr. Hahn was the candidate of those who approved the measures of General Banks; the dissentients supported Mr. Flanders. The former was hostile to the admission of the men of African descent to the privileges of citizenship; the latter were generally in favor of it. Mr. Fellows was in favor of the “Constitution and the Union with the preservation of the rights of all inviolate.” The election took place on February 22d. The Federal lines at that time embraced the parishes of Plaquemines, St. Bernard, New Orleans, Jefferson, St. Charles, St. John the Baptist, St. James, Ascension, Assumption, Lafourche, Terrebonne, that portion of St. Mary's east of Bayou Teche, the portions of Iberville, East Baton Rouge and West Baton Rouge, immediately on the river bank; and the portion of East Feliciana and of St. Tammany, on which the troops were encamped. In all the parishes above St. John the Baptist, fronting on the river, there were guerrilla bands, which rendered the life of every man unsafe who was known to have taken an oath of allegiance to the United States. In the following parishes above named, the control was strictly limited to the surface occupied by the camps: St. Mary, Iberville, East Baton Rouge, West Baton Rouge, East Feliciana. The population of the State by the census of 1860 was 708,902; the population within the Federal lines, 233,185; balance outside the lines, 575,617. The vote of New Orleans for Governor was:

Michael Hahn.................3,625

B. F. Flanders………….1,697

J. Q. A. Fellows………..1,189

The total number of votes was 10,270, including 107 cast by soldiers at Pensacola in Florida Mr. Hahn received a majority of the votes cast. Page 477 The inauguration of Mr. Hahn, as Governor, took place on March 4th. The ceremonies on the occasion are thus described:

The dawn of yesterday was ushered in by the clangor of the iron-tongued bells, and the roar of artillery, waking the slumberous echoes from their lairs, and proclaiming to a disenthralled people the glad tidings of the reëstablishment of civil liberty. The early 㺠was unpromising for the comfortable carrying out of the programme of inauguration, but the sun came out and chased away the mists and clouds like the scattered remnants of a broken battle host, and by eight o'clock the anxious multitude were assured of as bright and fair a day for the interesting ceremony as could be desired.

At an early hour, the multitude began to assemble in the region of Lafayette Square. Sentinels and policemen were posted at the entrance, to keep back the crowd until i. scholars had entered, and anxious committee-men ran hither and thither, perfecting arrangements and taking a general supervision of affairs, looking all the time considerably worried and hurried, and red in the face with excitement and heat. Then the school children began to arrive from all directions, marching in two ranks, marshalled by their teachers. They were of all sizes, from the lisping five year old to the radiant maiden of sixteen, just É. into glorious womanhood, with a proper proportion of young American manhood, in short jackets and saucy-looking hats, their bosoms swelling with the mingled pride of statesmen and warriors. Neatly dressed, and their cheeks flushed with excitement, they made a beautiful and imposing appearance.

Entering the Square through the St. Charles Street gate, beneath a painted bust of Washington, over which was the inscription, “A Free Government— the dearest object of my heart,” a grand and magnificent coup d' ail burst upon the enraptured vision. There was the immense amphitheatre, in which were seated six thousand gaily dressed children. Around the back of the amphitheatre had been erected a frame-work which was covered with flags stretched around, forming a silken wall of red, white, and blue, from which shone the bright silver stars of American freedom—a “joy forever” to the heart of every American freeman which has not been blighted and blasted by the canker of treason. At intervals around this wall of bunting, handsomely emblazoned on heraldic shields, were displayed the coats of arms of the thirty-four different States—South Carolina in loving proximity to Massachusetts. In the centre of the amphitheatre was a large painted banner, representing a prolific pelican feeding a brood of fledglings from her torn and bleeding breast, and just above, a patient phoenix sitting upon its funeral pyre, gazing proudly and fearlessly into eternal space, and only awaiting the slow process of combustion to “rise from its ashes.” Underneath the pelican was the inscription, “All Hail to the Chief,” and on either side the inscriptions, “The Star of Louisiana as she was in 1860,” and “So stands she now in the Bright Galaxy of 1864.” Around the flag wall were displayed the following inscriptions, in large letters: “Admiral Farragut, , the Bravest of the Brave;” “Major-General Nathaniel P. Banks, the Noble Citizen and Dutiful Soldier;” “Michael Hahn, the First Free State Governor of Louisiana;” “Major-General N. P. Banks, the Hero of Port Hudson, and of Freedom in Louisiana.”

Immediately in front of the amphitheatre were seated the members of the immense orchestra, composed of nearly three hundred instruments, and the forty anvils to be used in beating out the metallic accompaniment to the “Anvil Chorus.” of the orchestra was a circular raised platform, from the centre of which arose a tall flag-staff, held to its perpendicular by numerous ropes, trimmed with evergreens, which radiated in all directions from the In front common centre, and found attachments to the neighboring trees in the square. From the sustaining ropes hundreds of signal flags of all shapes, sizes, an colors, waved in undulating grace and beauty. This platform was dedicated to the solemn and impressive ceremony of administering the oath to the newly elected officers of the Free State of Louisiana. In front of the platform, hung suspended a banner fringed with arbor-vitae-sprigs, with the words “Michael Hahn, our Governor,” tastefully wrought in evergreens.

About 11 o'clock, General Banks, accompanied by a number of distinguished warriors and civilians, and the officers of the new Government, arrived and took his seat on the platform. Among those present we recognized General Reynolds, commander of New Orleans defences; General Hamilton, Military Governor, of Texas; Generals Stone, Arnold, Ransom, Cameron and Bowen; Hon. Christian Roselius, Judges Peabody, Hiestand, and Howell; Captains Hoyt, McClure, and others. All seemed º impressed with the solemnity of the occasion. The Governor, arrayed in a suit ºf black, with white vest and soft, mouse colored felt hat, looked grave and thoughtful, but self-possessed and dignified.

The oath of office was, after some preliminary ceremonies, administered as follows:

I, Michael Hahn, do solemnly swear, in the presence of Almighty God, that I will henceforward faithfully support, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and the Union of States thereunder, and that I will in like manner abide by and faithfully support all Acts of Congress passed during the existing rebellion with reference to slaves, so long and so far as not repealed, modified, or held void by Congress, or by decree of the Supreme Court, and that I will in like manner abide by and faithfully support all proclamations of the President made during the existing rebellion, having reference to slaves, so long and so far as not modified or declared void by the Supreme Court.

And I do further solemnly swear, that I am qualified according to the Constitution of the State to hold the office to which I have been elected, and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent on me as Governor of the State of Louisiana, according to the best of my abilities and understanding, agreeably to the Constitution and Laws of the United States, and in support of and according to the Constitution and laws of this State, so far as they are consistent with the necessary military occupation of the State by the troops of the United States for the ". of the rebellion, and the full restoration of the authority of the United States. So help me God.

                                                           MICHAEL HAHN.

Addresses were made by the Governor and General Banks, and the city was illuminated in the evening, and an inauguration ball closed the day. On March 15th the following letter was addressed to Governor Hahn :

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, March 15, 1864.

His Excellency, Michael Hahn, Governor of Louisiana:

Until further orders, you are hereby invested with the powers exercised hitherto by the Military Governor of Louisiana.

                Yours

                     ARAHAM LINCOLN.

On March 11th, Major-General Banks issued an order relative to the election of delegates to the State Convention. The conditions were such as had been previously recommended by a committee to whom the General had referred the subject. One of the most important provisions Page 478 was that which defined the qualification of electors. The constitution of the State under which Governor Hahn exercised his powers prohibited soldiers, seamen, or marines, from voting at elections.

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE GULF,

NEW ORLEANS, March 11, 1864.

General Orders No. 35.

1. An election will be held on Monday, the 27th day of March, at 9 o'clock, A. M., in each of the election precincts established by law in this State, for the choice of delegates to a Convention to be held for the revision and amendment of the Constitution of Louisiana.

2. The several parishes shall be entitled to elect the number of delegates herein assigned to each upon the basis of white population ... by the census of 1860, to be chosen in each parish on one ticket by the qualified voters of the parish, except in the parish of Orleans, in which parish the election shall be held in the several representative districts established by law, for the number of delegates herein assigned to each district, to be chosen on one ticket, by the qualified voters of the district. *

3. Any parish not now within the limits of the army shall be entitled to select delegates as herein specified, at any time before the dissolution of the convention, should such parish be brought within the lines of the army.

4. Every free white man, twenty-one years of age, who has been a resident of the State twelve months, and six months in the parish in which he offers to vote, who is a citizen of the United States, and who shall have taken the oath prescribed by the President in his proclamation of the 8th December, 1863, shall have the right to vote in the election of delegates. 

5. Citizens of the State who have been expelled from their homes by the public enemy on account of their devotion to the Union, and who would be qualified voters in the parishes to which they belong, will be allowed to vote for delegates in the election precincts in which, for the time being, they may reside.

6. Citizens of the State who have volunteered for the defence of the country in the army or navy, and who are otherwise qualified voters, will be allowed to vote in the election precincts in which they may be found on the day of election.

7. The Commissioners of Election appointed to the polls at the election of State officers, February 22d, 1864, are authorized and directed, in the absence of other orders, to fulfil and discharge all the duties of Commissioners of Election in their respective precincts, for this election.

9. The Commissioners of Election, at any election precinct, are authorized to administer the oath of allegiance, as prescribed by the President, to any person otherwise, qualified to vote, and to register the name of each voter in New Orleans, where a register is required, or to receive it in other parishes where no register is required, at any time before the polls are closed on the day of election.

10. The commissioners in the several parishes will make prompt returns of the votes given to the sheriff of the parish, as provided by law, or in his absence to the Provost Marshal, who will immediately return the same to the Secretary of State in the same manner and form as for members of the General Assembly.

11. The sheriffs of the several parishes, and in their absence the Vº marshals, will take especial care that the polls are properly opened, and that suitable judges of election and other officers are appointed. It is desirable that all persons properly qualified shall vote, but it is more important that the i. of the election shall not be vitiated by illegal or fraudulent acts.

12. The delegates duly elected to the Convention shall meet at Liberty Hall, Executive Building, in the city of New Orleans, at 12 o'clock, M., on Wednesday, the 6th day of April, 1864. In case any vacancy occurs by resignation or death after the organization of the Convention, a writ of election shall be issued by the Convention to fill the vacancy.

                            By command of Major-General BANKS.

             Richard B. Irwin, A. A. General.

On March 16th Governor Hahn issued his proclamation to the sheriffs, authorizing the election. He said:

Whereas, By General Orders No. 85, under date of March 11th, 1864, Major-General N. P. Banks, com: manding the Department of the Gulf, has ordered that an election “be held on Monday, the 28th day of March next, at 9 o'clock, A. M., in each of the election precincts established by law in this State, for the choice of delegates to a Convention to be held for the revision and amendment of the Constitution of the State of Louisiana,” and has directed that the several parishes shall be entitled to elect the number of delegates herein assigned to each, upon the basis of the white population exhibited by the census of 1860, to be chosen in each parish on one ticket by the qualified voters of the parish, excepting the parish of Orleans, in which parish the election ...]". held in the several representative districts established by law, for the number of delegates herein assigned to each district, to be chosen on one ticket by the qualified voters of the district.

Now, therefore, I have thought proper to issue this my proclamation, notifying the qualified electors throughout the State of the election aforesaid, and commanding all sheriffs, commissioners of election, and other officers therein concerned, to hold said election for delegates in their respective parishes, and in the parish of Orleans, in the Representative districts as aforesaid, and to give the proper public notice thereof; and I enjoin upon them care that said election be held and conducted at the places and in the manner designated by law and the General Orders aforesaid, and that the returns be promptly made to the Secretary of State at New Orleans. For all of which this proclamation, without further notice, will serve as authority. Given under my hand and seal of the Statº the

Executive Building, city of New Orleans; [L. s.] this 16th day of March, A.D. 1864, and of the independence of the United States of America the eighty-eighth.

                                                      Michael HAHN.

By the Governor:

S. WROTNOWSKI, Secretary of State.

The election was held on the 28th. The number of members returned as elected was ninety-seven, of whom two were rejected cause of irregular returns. No return of the votes was published. A Committee of the House in Congress, on the application of the persons from Louisiana for seats in Congress, reported that the Parish of Orleans was represented by sixty-three members, leaving to the country parishes thirty-two:

“From all that is known of the balloting it appears that the Parish of Ascension, wit." the Federal lines, and neighboring to New 9. leans, and which in 1860 had a white population of 3,940, elected her delegates by sixty-on” votes; that Plaquemines, with a white Population in 1860 of 2,529, cast 246; and in the Parish of Madison, Montague was elected by a vote of 28.

“Elections were held only in the parish Page 479 included within the Federal lines, and these lines were the Teche on the one side and the Amites on the other, comprehending the parish or city of Orleans, and the neighboring parishes on the Mississippi. To a question propounded to General Banks as to what portion of the State voted, his reply was:

“‘All as far up as Point Coupee, and there were some men from the Red River who voted at Vidalie.” “And in his statement he announces that: “The city of New Orleans is really the State of Louisiana.’”

In 1860 there were 367,629 whites in the State, of whom 149,063, or much less than one-half, were in New Orleans.

The Convention assembled on April 6th, and was organized on the 7th by the election of E. H. Durell, president, by the following vote: Durell, 43; R. K. Howell, 42. After a session of seventy-eight days the Convention adjourned . on July 25th. A proclamation was immediately issued by the Governor appointing September 5th as the day upon which a vote should be taken on the Constitution. The vote was as follows: yeas, 6,836, for its adoption; nays, 1,566, for its rejection. The vote of New Orleans was: yeas, 4,664; nays, 789. The most important feature of the Constitution was thus described by General Banks:

In a State which held 331,726 slaves, one-half of its entire population in 1860, more than three-fourths of , whom had been specially excepted from the Proclamation of Emancipation, and were still held de jure in bondage, the Convention declared by a majority of all the votes to which the State would have been entitled if every delegate had been present from every district in the State ---

Instantaneous, universal, uncompensated, unconditional emancipation of slaves !

It prohibited forever the recognition of property in man !

It decreed the education of all the children, without distinction of race or color !

It directs all men, white or black, to be enrolled as soldiers for the public defence!

It makes all men equal before the law !

It compels, by its regenerating spirit, the ultimate recognition of all the rights which national authority can confer upon an oppressed race !

It wisely recognizes, for the first time in constitutional history, the interest of daily labor as an element of power entitled to the protection of the State.

At the same election the following persons were chosen members of Congress: 1st district, M. F. Bonzano; 2d, A. P. Field; 3d, W. D. Mann; 4th, T. M. Wells; 5th, R. W. Taliaferro. A legislature was chosen at the same time, the members of which were almost entirely in favor of a Free State. By this body seven electors of President and Vice-President were chosen.

Notwithstanding this formal adoption of a reorganized State government its authority was quite limited. At the end of the year there was more than three-fourths of the State to which it was not safe to send military supplies. On December 27th the following order was issued:

HEADQUATERS DEPARTMENT OF THE GULF,

NEW ORLEANS, December 27, 1864.

Special Order No. 349.

3. Upon the official report of the Attorney-General of the State of Louisiana, that the ordinary courts of justice are insufficient to punish the offenders named by him, and in consideration that the State government and courts of Louisiana owe their present existence to military authority, it is ordered that Michael De Courcey, Benjamin Orr, E. McShane, Y. M. Robinson, A. G. Pierson, and B. Wadsworth, for peculation and other offences, be sent for trial before the Military Commission now in session in the city of New Orleans, and of which Brigadier-General B. S. Roberts, U. S. Vols., is president, and that the Attorney-General of the State of Louisiana be admitted to appear before said commissioner as public prosecutor. 

*     *     *     *     *     *

By command of  Major-General HURLBUT. (Signed).

C. S. SARGENT, 1st Lieut. 3d La. Vols. and A. A. A. General

The Provisional Court established by an order of President Lincoln, issued October 20th, 1862, Judge Peabody presiding, still continued in operation. The validity of the proceedings of this court was called in question both before and after the reorganization of the State Government. The opinion of the Court itself on the question thus raised will be found at the end of this article.

The condition of persons of African descent continues the same as in 1863. A bill was introduced in the Legislature under the new Constitution to give suffrage to such persons, but it was rejected by a large majority. The clause of the Constitution relating to the subject is in these words: “The Legislature shall have power to pass laws extending suffrage to such other persons, citizens of the United States, as by military service, by taxation to support the Government, or by intellectual fitness may be deemed entitled thereto.”

The views of General Banks on granting suffrage to these persons, while he was in command at New Orleans, are thus stated by himself:

It was with much hesitation that the mass of people entered into measures for the organization of government. Some were ready, but others reluctant. evolutions make the mass of men timid. It required the strongest representations of public advantage to induce them to venture again into the stormy sea of politics. Had it been announced that the negroes, who were largely in the majority; against the example, advice, and instructions of all branches of the Government, were to be admitted to the right of suffrage by military order, it would have resulted in an exclusively negro constituency. You might not object to this; but I know perfectly well that, while a Government formed, as heretofore, by white men, may clothe negroes with the right of º a Government, organized by negro voters, that should give the elective franchise to white men, would not be acceptable to the Administration, to Congress, nor to the country, nor any part of it. Such would have been the result in Louisiana, beyond question, under a general order conferring the right of suffrage upon negroes. It would not have secured to colored citizens, now or hereafter, that right. It would have deferred, if not defeated it.

I did not decide upon this subject without very long and serious reflection, weighing the whole subject in every light, with a desire to effect the extension.

Page 480

My plan was consistent with my orders, and would have been as successful in this as in other respects. It was to obtain from the United States Court—following the judicial example both of free and slave States—a decree, fixing the standard of citizenship as to color, and declaring that a man, with a major part of white blood, should possess all the rights of a white man. Upon this decision I should have ordered all persons of that class embraced within the decision of the court to be enrolled as voters. This was the way and the only way to begin. It would have given the right of representation to 30,000 colored people, and have led, without contest, to the immediate extension of the franchise of the race.

I had arranged this with Judge Durell, who was ready to give the case a hearing in the United States Circuit Court, and with one of the most eminent conservative lawyers to argue the question for the Government in favor of the negro; but a few men, who wanted to break the bundle of sticks without loosening the band, defeated it. The President gave me too much to do—more than any other major-general in the army—or it would have been accomplished.... My belief is now, that the question of suffrage will be settled sooner in Louisiana than in any other State.

A board of education for freedmen was established by General Banks, whose duty it was to establish one or more common schools in each school district that has been or may be defined by the Parish Provost Marshals under orders of the Provost Marshal General, to erect schoolhouses, employ teachers, and in all respects exercise the same powers as school officers in the Northern States.

In order to provide the requisite funds for this work the board is empowered to assess and levy a school tax upon real and personal property, including crops of plantations, in each school district. The taxes so levied shall be sufficient in amount to defray the cost and expense of establishing, furnishing, and conducting for the period of one year, the school or schools so established in each district.

In the performance of all their duties the board is to cooperate, as far as practicable, with the Superintendent of Public Education, and the current school year is to be estimated from February 1st, 1864, to February 1st, 1865.

The Superintendent of the Bureau of Free Labor in the Department of the Gulf, for the year ending February 1st, 1865, states that the number of freedmen (orphans, infirm persons, &c.) supported by the Government during the year was 1,416, and the cost $113,426. The number of freedmen on the plantations who were managed by the bureau was 50,000, and the number of plantations under cultivation by military orders, 1,500. On twelve plantations it has been found necessary to seize property for the purpose of securing the payment of the freedmen working them. It having been an exceedingly unprosperous year the planters have found it very difficult to pay their laborers.

The disaster of the past season by the failure of the crops has been so great as almost to ruin nearly every planter in the department. Their estates are so heavily mortgaged that if the crops again fail, as last year, they cannot save themselves, and the old planting aristocracy will disappear. Even with fair crops it will be impossible to prevent a very early change in the ownership of the plantations, and they are even now preparing to give way to new capital and new proprietorship.

In regard to the treatment of the freedmen, the old planters have, as a general rule, paid them more promptly, more justly, and apparently with more willingness than have the new lessees from other parts of the country.

Early in May Major-General R. G. Canby was ordered to assume command of the forces west of the Mississippi and to relieve Major-General Banks. The department was reorganized; some regiments were recruited from the plantations, but no extensive military operations took place within the State during the remainder of the year. (See ARMY OPERATIONS.)

The receipts of Western produce from September 1st to March 8th, in the respective years, compare as follows: […].

The receipts of cotton at New Orleans in 1859–60 were 2,255,448 bales; in 1861–2 they were 38,882 bales; from September, 1862, to March, 1863, 7,865 bales; in 1863–4 the receipts have increased to 84,402 bales.

A large amount of this produce was bought on Government account, and has been moved by the military authorities. New Orleans is thus not even a shadow of its former self. The receipts of Louisiana staples are only a moiety of what they were. The state of trade is thus reported: “Our trade for the supply of the interior with dry goods, hardware, groceries, etc., has fallen off in like proportion with the rest of our commerce. The whole volume of the year's business will barely reach the monthly record of the olden time. Most of our old population is scattered. New firms and new faces meet one at every corner. The memory of our former riches is almost all that remains to remind us of what New Orleans should be, and we may hope will be, after the termination of the war.” Shreveport, in the northwest part of the State, was the seat of the former government, and there a Legislature assembled during the year, but nothing is known of its proceedings.

The validity of the organization of the Provisional Court of Louisiana as well as that of its proceedings, was brought before that court in the cases of the United States vs. Augusta Reiter, and the United States vs. John Louis. The following are the points of the opinion of Judge Peabody, in deciding the questions raised:

These two cases may without inconvenience or danger of confusion be considered together, although Page 481 they have in fact no connection with each other. The same objection to the proceeding of the Court to pronounce sentence upon the accused and in arrest of º is made by both the defendants, and although the objection is urged on different grounds in the two cases, still the it is proper to be considered on all the grounds in each case.

It is urged that this Court is not authorized to try these defendants, and that its proceedings have not the sanction of law in the premises. He accused have been indicted separately and tried separately on charges wholly different and having no connection the one with the other, and the consideration of their cases together rather than separately, now, is a matter of convenience solely. One of the accused, Reiter, has been indicted for murder. The other has been indicted for arson. Each has been tried before a jury of this º and been duly convicted of the offence charged in the indictment, and each is now before the Court on a motion in arrest of  and in each case the arrest is urged on the grounds that the Court is not authorized in law, and has not jurisdiction to try the case.

The first question to be considered is whether the Court has ever had, from the nature of its origin and constitution, authority to try cases like these, and if this question shall be decided in the affirmative it will remain to examine—

The second question, namely, whether the power to try or the jurisdiction over such a case, once possessed by this Court, has been withdrawn or lost— whether the Court in fact has been in any way deprived of it by subsequent events.

It must be conceded that the Court, in its origin and structure, is quite out of the usual course and novel. It has not its origin or foundation in any constitutional or legislative enactment—is not the creature of any regularly organized constitutional or legislative body. This Provisional Court depends for its existence on the law of nations, and on that part of the law of nations relating to war—the law by which parties and neutrals are guided in their treatment of each other in a state of war; and that portion of it which relates to and determines the rights and duties of a  conqueror in the territory of an enemy and holding it in armed occupation. On that law must depend the decision of the question presented by this motion, of the validity in law and powers of this Court.

It was in that law that the President of the United States, pressed by the urgent wants of the community here, found his warrant for the establishment of this Court in the midst of the country of an enemy held by him jure belli in armed belligerent occupation.

The authority of this Court is derived from the President of the United States, the Chief Executive of the nation, and Commander-in-Chief of its forces, military and naval. It is conferred by an order; “Establishing a Provisional Court in Louisiana,' dated October 20, 1862. See, AMER. Cyc., 1863, p. 770. Provisional Court for Louisiana.

This order, by its terms, no doubt embraces cases like these under consideration, as indeed it does, perhaps, all others which can occur in life, or become the .. of judicial investigation. The President then sought to give power to this Court to try and determine cases of this kind, and having made an order to that effect, has given it that power, if he himself had authority to confer it. The authority of the President of the United States to create this Court, and invest it with powers which should embrace these cases, depends, to some extent at least, on the Constitution of the United States, which creates the office exercised by him, and determines its functions. That Constitution, article 2, section l, paragraph 1, declares as follows:

“The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.” It also provides, article 2, section 2, paragraph 1:

The President shall be Commander-in-Chief of the army and navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several States when called into the actual service of the United States.”

As President, Chief Executive, and Commander-in-Chief of the army and navy, he would not ordinarily have power to establish tribunals for the determination of questions civil and criminal, arising in civil life. Was there anything in the condition of affairs existing at the time the order was made which could give him the power to establish them, and if so, what was there in the condition of affairs then existing to give him power in this respect not ordinarily possessed by him as one of the attributes of his office ?

Between the Government of the United States and a people inhabiting a portion of country lying on the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico, and extending north beyond the northern boundary of the territory in question, and embracing within its borders that section of territory theretofore known, and still most conveniently designated as the State of Louisiana, a war had for some time been waged. It is a matter of public knowledge and notoriety that this war had been pending, and that the country over which the jurisdiction of this Court is in question, had been for a long time previous to, and also since the commencement of this war, inhabited, cultivated, and owned by the same people who had entered into and carried on war with the Government of the United States, and that it was still so inhabited by a people whose relations with the Government of the United States had for some time been and were still those of enmity. That it had, in the course of the war, been by force of the arms of the United States wrested from the enemy, and was at the time the order establishing this Court was made, held by the forces of the United States in armed belligerent occupation.

These institutions having been formed, established, and administered by the Government existing previous to and at the time of the conquest confessedly hostile to the Government of the United States, were the only institutions found there at the time the military authority of the United States was by force of its arms established there. By the conquest of the country, in this case as in others, the previously existing Government and the power by which it was administered were subverted and swept away, and those of the conquering power were substituted in their places. This is the necessary consequence of a conquest of a country—a transfer of the control, government, and sovereignty of it from one party to another. They may be transferred to and adopted by the new governing power and may be used and operated by it. However there may be retained in use by the new governing power some of the features or institutions of the Government which has been supplanted, it is nevertheless wholly, another Government, and derives its life and all its vital qualities from a new source—the new sovereignty installed by the conquest. A º: necessarily operates the extinguishment of the power of the party conquered in the country which is the subject of conquest, and the establishment there of the power of the conqueror. Without this there is no conquest of a country, and there can be none.

When the power previously dominant in a country has been extinguished by that of another party, and rendered, incapable of governing it further, and a new one has been established in its stead, it is both the right and the duty of the party thus coming into power to see to it that a Government wholesome and salutary shall be established and administered; and as in such a case there is only one power, that of the new party succeeding, capable of giving and ad. ministering the Government, it follows that it is the duty as well as the right of that power to do it.

So the Government of the United States having conquered and expelled from the territory of country Page 482 theretofore known as the State of Louisiana, the power by which the Government of it had been theretofore administered, and having beeb established there its own power, was bound by the laws of war, as well as the dº, of humanity, to give to the territory thus bereft a Government in the place and stead of the one deposed or overthrown, such an one as should reasonably secure the safety and welfare of the people thus reduced to subjection; in some manner, not inconsistent, to be sure, with the proper interests of the governing power, and the maintenance of it in its supremacy there.

The power established there was the military power of the United States, and the President of the United States, as we have seen, the Commander-in-Chief of the forces, military and naval, of the United States, was at the head of that power, and had the right and duty to exercise and direct it. It was incumbent on him, representing for this º the sovereignty of the United States, to see that the duty devolving on his Government should be properly performed. He acted in obedience to this duty, and in accordance with this right, when he attempted to establish there a judicial tribunal capable of deciding controversies and administering justice.

But how does this question stand on the authority of adjudged cases. In the case of Cross et al. vs. Harrison, in the Supreme Court of the United States, in 1853, reported in 16 Howard, at page 164, the Court held that a civil Government formed in California, under the direction of the President of the United States, as Commander-in-Chief of the army and navy, shortly after the conquest of the country, and while it was held in military º by the forces under him, was an act warranted by the laws of nations, and that the formation of such a civil Government was the rightful exercise of a belligerent right over a conquered country.

The decision covered the whole ground, that the Provisional Government of the United States there was rightful and legal, and that it continued in force a legal, rightful Government through the time the country was held in military occupation, and after that occupation ceased, and that it was, in fact, in force until some other system was provided according to law to supersede it.

For the doctrine that a conqueror in a conquered country may establish a Government, and courts for the administration of justice, the case of Leitensdorfer et al. vs. Webb, decided by the Supreme Court of the United States, in 1857, reported in 20 Howard, 176, is an authority directly in point. In that case the conduct of the Government of the United States by General Kearny, the officer in command of its forces there, was brought in question. It appeared that after the conquest of that country by the arms of the United States, General Kearny in command of the forces there, established a Government and provisional courts for the administration of justice.

Those courts, in the case referred to, were adjudged to be legal, and their decisions obligatory as warranted by law. The power to establish the Government and the courts was directly in question, and was directly passed upon by the Court, and was sustained on the ground of the right of conquest.

In that case, moreover, it appeared that the country conquered was subsequently, by treaty, ceded to the United States, and it was claimed that by the act of cession the rights of the United States to govern the country and enforce the laws made by the Provisional Government while it was held in military occupation, was terminated.

The Court say: “Of the validity of these ordinances of that Provisional Government there is made no question with ..". to the period during which the territory was held by the United States, as occupying conqueror, and it would seem to admit of no doubt, that during the period of their valid existence and operation, these ordinances must have displaced and superseded every previous institution of the vanquished or deposed political power which was in compatible with them. But it has been contended. that whatever might have been the rights of the occupying conqueror, as such, these were all terminated by the termination of the belligerent attitude of the parties, and that with the close of the contest, every institution which had been overthrown or suspended would be revived and reëstablished.”

“The fallacy of this pretension,” the Court proceed to say, “is exposed by the fact, that the conquered territory never was relinquished by the conqueror, nor restored to its original condition or allegiance, but was retained by the occupant position was matured into absolute, permanent opinion and sovereignty.” The Court then proceed to decide when the institutions of the visional Government would terminate.

They say: “We conclude, therefore, that the ordinances and institutions of the Provisional Government could be revoked or modified by the United States alone, either by direct legislation on the part of Congress, or that of the Territorial Government, in the exercise of powers delegated to it by Congress.” The question there presented was the validity of an ordinance of the Territorial Government, authorizing attachments of property of debtors, enacted by the #. Government, while the country was held in military occupation, and before the cession of it, but sought to be enforced by the Provisional Territorial Court after the cession of the country to the United States, and after the military occupation had ceased. The Court upheld the law in its origin, and also in its continuance in force, and the administration of it by the Provisional Territorial Court after the cession of the country, and after the military occupation had ceased.

In the case of Jecker vs. Montgomery, 14 Howard, 498, decided in 1854, the same Supreme Court of the United States incidentally recognize the legality and powers of those Provisional Courts, and while deciding that, for reasons peculiar to cases of prize, and not at all applicable to any others, they could not legally act in cases of that class, the Court admit their powers and jurisdiction in other cases: making three decisions of the Court of last resort of the Government of the United States quite in point. Either of these should be sufficient authority for such a principle, if indeed a principle so plainly and necessary, can be thought to need authority of precedent at all.

But at the risk of being tedious and doing work of sº which charges I am persuaded might well be maintained against me, I will add to these authorities already commented on, still another one, which has a bearing quite material on this case at more than one point. I mean the case of the United States vs. Rice, 4 Wheaton, 246. That case, as well as those already cited, decides that, by the conquest and military º by one nation of a portion of the territory of another, the portion so acquired passes from the operation of the laws and government of the nation to which it had previously belonged, and comes under the laws and government of the nation making the º: It also decides that while such territory is held by the conqueror, it is the right of the party so holding it to govern it, and for that purpose to make laws by which to govern it. In short, that, by conquest, the sovereignty and right to rule of the conqueror are introduced and established, and the sovereignty and right of rule in the party expelled are ...; and that the duty of allegiance in the people remaining there is transferred in like manner from the vanquished to the victorious party; in fact, that by such an act the change in the sovereignty, and allegiance are complete, and new rights and duties in both parties are created accordingly. I think that all these conclusions certainly follow from what is decided, if, indeed, they are not all actually decided there.

The right, therefore, of a conqueror in a conquered Page 483 country to ordain a system of government for it, and, among other institutions, to erect courts of justice, and maintain them in the discharge of their proper functions, is as well established and free from doubt when considered on authority, as it is in principle.

But it may be said that this reasoning, if correct as to territory foreign to the conqueror, and as to which his rights and duties are simply and solely those of a conqueror by force of arms, is not applicable to the case in question, for this Louisiana is a part of the territory of the United States, over which the powers and duties of the President and the other departments of the Government were already fixed, and are dependent on the constitution and laws of the United States, and limited to the powers and duties conferred by them; and that those laws do not give the President the power to establish a court like this, and therefore that he has not that power.

It is quite certain that, ordinarily, he would have no such power; and hence, instead of looking for it to the Constitution and laws of the United States alone, I have looked elsewhere and to other facts than his merely occupying the place of President at the time. I have invoked also the fact that he was by virtue of that office, as commander of the forces of the United States, holding in armed belligerent .#". the country in which the Court was established, and in which its powers and authority are now brought in question.

It may be said that the act of the United States in this case had not the usual effect of a conquest of foreign territory—that instead of acquiring anew the rights of a conqueror, the United States by this conquest (as I for the sake of convenience have called it), has but removed the obstacles to the enjoyment of its preexisting rights, and has not acquired any new ones of a conqueror.

As we have seen, the foundation of the right of a conqueror to govern conquered territory, and for that purpose to establish provisionally civil institutions in it, is necessity, of that chiefly the necessity of the conquered country and its inhabitants. government of some kind they must have, for no community can exist without it.

The power of the conqueror has overridden and subjected all other power, and this necessity can be supplied from no other source than him, for he holds for the time being all power. Whilst this continues to be the case, what is there in the case in question of Louisiana, which should make it different from a foreign country?

The inhabitants of that country owed allegiance to and were entitled to the protection of the Government of the United States, it is said familiarly, and this is quite true in the sense in which the remark is usually made. But did the United States ever, at any time, or under any circumstances, owe the people of this territory a protection and government which would supply all, or any considerable part of their wants in this respect?

If the Government of the United States should afford, to this country all, the protection, and aid— should perform for it all the governmental offices which it by virtue of the Constitution and laws of the land was ever bound, or had a right to do, how far would this É. toward supplying the wants of the country in that respect? Is it not quite certain, on looking into the law on the subject of the relations, rights, and duties of the ...? Government to the tract of country in question, or any other tract embraced within the State, that with the Federal Government in full function and all its duties fully performed, a very small portion of the governmental necessities of the country would be supplied ?

It is a fact familiar to us all, that under our system of government almost all the governmental aid needed by our people is due to them from the local depositories of power, the State governments—for most purposes within their own territory, sovereign. These governments, under our system, are the repositories of nearly all of the powers of government in ordinary times in familiar use among us, and whether they be applied by, the State itself, by its own officers directly, or be allotted out in parcels to smaller governmental districts, such as counties or parishes, cities, towns, or villages, to be applied by the officers of those localities respectively, still the State and not the Federal Government is the reservoir from which they are drawn, whether it be for distribution or exercise; and the State, and not the Federal power and officers, administer and execute them.

From which Government comes the system of police by which order in society is maintained from one end of the land to the other ? From which the judicial power—the one in question here and now—by which, in ordinary cases, crime is punished and repressed, controversies decided, and the rights of persons and property established and maintained? and what is certainly quite in point, from which source comes the power by which these very unfortunate criminals now before me would ordinarily on a basis of peace be tried, and justice be meted out to them?

It is quite certain that the Government of the United States, remitted to its ordinary constitutional functions within one of the States as in times of peace, could not supply a government at all adequate to the necessities society, and especially could not have taken cognizance of, or punished at all, either of the offences in question by any tribunal it ever had, or had the right to establish.

The necessity for a provisional government here for nearly all the purposes for which a government is necessary, and especially of a provisional tribunal for dispensing justice generally, and in cases like these now under consideration, was the same as, and none other than it would have been if this tract of country in question had been a part of the domain of a government wholly foreign to that of the United States, and over the territory of which it had no other rights than those growing out of war and conquest. Indeed, it may well be doubted whether, in reference to governmental rights and duties in matters of this kind, there is any difference between the citizens of the several States, and those of foreign territory. Certain it is, from what has been said, that this territory is not, by the nature of our system of government, under the dominion of the Federal Government as to most matters of local administration, but is exclusively under the State and local government, and the Federal Government was never bound and never assumed or pretended to furnish government to any section of the States as to their internal or local matters generally, and has not, and never had the duty, right, or power to do so.

But this district of territory had been in insurrection against the Government of the United States, had openly withdrawn from all connection with that Government under the forms of law and civil legislation, had allied itself with others hostile and at war with it, and had, by force of arms, for a considerable time maintained this attitude external and hostile, resisting successfully the efforts of the Government to subject it to law and duty. However the act of secession was ineffectual in law, this district had in fact and practically withdrawn from all relations with the Government of the United States, and had arrayed itself in armed hostility to it. Its duties remained unchanged, no doubt, but its rights to the filial relation—its rights to receive from the Federal Government the consideration and care of a parent rather than the imperious commands of a military master, may have been much changed by the events which had transpired, and I think that they had been. Having taken for itself the attitude of a foreign State, and that, too, of one hostile and at war with the United States, and formed and adapted all its civil institutions, and in every respect bent itself to that condition, and claimed and asserted it, and practically Page 484 maintained it by force of arms for a time, and having been at this time overcome and subjected to the arms of the Government of the United States, it may very well be that while it has acquired no new rights by virtue of its pretensions, it has resigned and forfeited old ones, and is no longer entitled to demand the benefits of a relation it has renounced and repudiated, however it may have failed in establishing at that time its freedom from the duties attendant upon it.

The counsel for the prisoners Reiter and Louis, however, take different grounds on this motion. The former insists that the whole structure of the Court in its origin was without warrant in law.

While the learned counsel for the accused insist that these powers have ceased, by reason, as I understand the argument, of the organization of a civil government here which supersedes the military, I pass to consider the question presented by this argument.

If a conqueror in a conquered country have a right to set up a government in it, when does that right cease? Or, rather, if he have such a right, and exercise it, when does the power of the government so set up cease ?

I answer, first, it will terminate necessarily whenever the power which formed it shall terminate, or become unable to support it. And secondly, whenever that power shall for any cause voluntarily bring it to an end.

That the power of the Federal Government here has not been terminated, I need no argument to prove. But on this point, as well as the one to which I have cited the cases above referred to, some of those cases speak as authorities. In two of those cases, at least, in which the power of the provisional government and the provisional courts was sustained by the Supreme Court of the United States, it was so upheld in territory belonging, aside from military occupation and of right, to the domain of the United States, and over which that Government had powers of government full and complete, for all purposes, as any sovereign or State has ordinarily within its own territory; rights, not limited to its external matters alone, or chiefly, as are those of the United States, in territory lying within one of the States, but º; powers for all the details of local administration, legislative, executive, and judicial.

And even there, where the United States had, by the Constitution, powers of government ample for all purposes, the power to continue in force a provisional government long after military occupation had ceased, and when the rights of the United States there depended not at all on military power, or belligerency, but wholly on compact between the former sovereign and itself—even there, in territory confessedly belonging to the United States, and in time of peace, and in the absence of military power or military necessity, the provisional government and the provisional courts were upheld to the fullest extent, and were adjudged to continue legally and practically in force as instruments of the Federal Government until it should, by its constitutional action, through its legislature, otherwise provide.

In the earlier of those cases, Cross vs. Harrison, 16 Howard's Reports, 164, the Court say: “Our conclusion from what has been said is, that the civil government of California, organized as it was, from a right of conquest, did not cease or become defunct in consequence of the signature of the treaty or from its ratification.

“We think it was continued over a ceded conquest, without any violation of the Constitution or laws of the United States, and that until Congress legislated for it, the duties upon foreign goods, &c., were legally demanded and lawfully received by Mr. Harrison, the collector of the port, who received his appointment, &c., &c., from Governor Mason.”

These cases, in deciding that a provisional government may be maintained by the military power of the United States in territory belonging to it, not held in military occupation, or jure belli, go far to prove that the fact that this country belonged for some º: to the United States, aside from the coming from conquest and military occupation did not take it from the application of the general principle that the conqueror, in conquered territory, has the right to govern it and to establish government as he may deem expedient; but that such territory, on the contrary, is on the same footing in that respect as territory strictly and for all purposes foreign.

There is no pretence that the Federal Government has in any manner directly brought, or sought to bring, the labors of this Court to a close. Having established it, and bade it proceed in the performance of its mission, it will continue (the power which established it continuing) until that power shall revoke its commission, or otherwise decree its discontinuance. But it is said that a civil government has been established here, and that therefore the proper functions of the provisional one, and among others the functions of the provisional court, have ceased.

It is quite true that some measures apparently tending to the establishment of a civil government have been taken. Members of Congress were elected in 1862, and were admitted to seats in the national Legislature. Several other officers—a Governor, Attorney-General, and others—have also been elected more recently under the direction of the military authorities. A convention for the revision of the Constitution of the State has been elected and convened. These things look like measures for the organization of a State government, and measures of this kind pursued may in course of time lead to such a consummation, at the pleasure of the Federal Government. That all these things have been done under and by virtue of the fostering care of the Federal Government, as exercised by the military arm of it, no one at all acquainted with the facts will doubt.

Waiving, for the present, however, as unnecessary to be considered here, the question whether these movements have their foundation in and derive their vital principle from the State or from Federal sources  whether in use, as some of them are, they are in fact instruments in the hands of the defunct State, or of the living Federal power, it is quite certain and sufficient for present purposes that the Federal Government has not voluntarily abdicated and resigned to them all, or generally the functions of government, certainly not those of the provisional court.

Such a general surrender alone could have divested the power of this Court, for there is no pretence that the Federal Government has singled out certain powers, and among them the powers heretofore exercised by this Court, and so parted with them as to be unable to recall or exercise them. The whole argument, on the contrary, proceeds on the idea that civil government, as a whole, has been established here, and all the power to exercise it resigned into the hands of State authorities.

In short, that the State is again in possession of all the governmental powers which of right, under our system, belong to the State, in contradistinction to the Federal Government, and that the United States retain only what are designed, under our system of government, ordinarily to be exercised by the Federal Government in all the States in times of peace, and that both parties are, in fact, remitted to their own positions in the constitutional government formerly occupied by them, and the same as are now occupied by the loyal States.

At the time this motion was made (and everything must relate to that time) there was not a court in the part of Louisiana within the Federal lines having any reasonable pretense of authority from any other source than the Federal Government.

The United States District and Circuit Courts there Page 485 in operation here, were and are the constitutional courts of that government. All else were creations of the military power of the Federal Government.

All the governmental functions in exercise here at that time, not only courts of justice but all others, and all the judges, officers, and instruments by which they were performed and operated, were those of the Federal Government, and were appointed, commissioned, animated, sustained, and moved by that power alone.

The Provisional Court for the State of Louisiana– the Court of the Federal Government—retains all the powers it ever had, and will continue to exercise rightfully a jurisdiction commensurate with its charter, so long as the President, or the Government he represents, shall will it, and shall uphold it for that purpose; and whatever other institutions may have been brought, or allowed to come into existence in the mean time, this Court will not cease, or go out of existence, or be shorn of any of its powers or proportions by reason of the fact that some modicum of them, or of other powers of civil government, have been allotted by the common parent—the Federal Government—to other institutions or instrumentalities.

Something was said on the argument about the laws which these courts should administer. The laws of the conquered country, like every thing else connected with its government, are entirely under the control and subject to the will of the conqueror. He makes and adopts them in use at his pleasure. Those found in use at the time of the conquest may be continued in use by him or laid aside at his pleasure. If continued in use, however, they become his, and derive their force and efficacy from him and his adoption of them. In the cases cited above, a new code was made and introduced by General Kearny, representing the government of the conqueror, called the Kearny Code.

In the absence of any provision on the subject, in such a case courts of justice are not bound to adhere to any particular system. This Court is commissioned to administer justice, and no code of laws is prescribed for it. It may adopt such rules as may seem wise and expedient, whether corresponding to the system in use here at the time of the conquest, or differing from it. It has always administered justice according to the Code of Louisiana, and so have all other courts here, not because it was bound by that code, as law of the State, but because it seemed expedient and wise to continue along under the system found in use here, rather than introduce a new one.

In the cases cited above from California, Cross vs. Harrison, 16 Howard R., 164; Leitensdorfer vs. Webb, 20. Howard, 176, and Jecker vs. Montgomery, 14 Howard, 498, the previously existing systems of law were ignored and a new and original system introduced, which course received the sanction of the Supreme Court of the United States in those cases; and in the case cited from Maine, the United States vs. Rice, 4 Wheaton, 254, the British Government made a new and different law and administered it while the territory was held by it, and that course received the sanction of the same court of highest authority, in the case referred to.

I have not cited authority for every thing I have said in this opinion—perhaps not for every doctrine I have declared. I have, !. referred to the court of highest authority in such cases of any tribunal known among men, and to the decisions of that court, quite in point, for every principle and doctrine §§ in this opinion, which is not so plain and evident as to make reference to cases for authority unnecessary and inexpedient, and, for the omission to cite them to such points, I have the very high authority of the Supreme Court of the United States, in the case of the United States vs. Rice, 4 Wheaton, 254, above referred to, that in cases like that “too clear to require aid from authority,” it is not well to encumber an opinion with them. In addition to the cases already commented on, I will refer to several more important bearing on this question, not as establishing any new principle or sustaining any old one not better sustained by more modern and unquestionable authority already referred to, though equally conclusive of the principle with them; but as furnishing, perchance, to some mind some new view, reason, or illustration of a principle better established on authority by cases already introduced. […].

My conclusions, therefore, are: That at the time of the establishment of the Provisional Court for Louisiana, a considerable part of the territory of that State was held by the forces of the United States, in armed belligerent occupation. That in a country so held, the authority of the occupying force is paramount, and necessarily operates the exclusions of all other independent authority in it.

That government from some source is a necessity, and while the power to give and administer government is exclusively with a party occupying a country, there can be no doubt that the right and the duty are his to furnish a government and supply that want.

That the actual military occupation of that territory by the United States has continued from that time to the p. and still continues, and the right and duty of government, therefore, continue with the United States.

That the establishment of the Provisional Court for Louisiana, by the President, as Commander-in-Chief of the forces of the United States, while they held the territory in which it was to exercise its functions, was an act warranted by the law of nations.

That so long as the authority of the United States shall continue, the right and the duty of it as the party dominant there to afford to the country a government will continue.

That said Court has, from the time of its foundation to the present time, rightfully exercised its functions in territory in which the Government of the United States has been by force of its arms sovereign, and will continue rightfully to exercise them there, so long as its commission shall remain unrevoked and the power of the United States shall continue to support it in the exercise of them.

MISSISSIPPI. After the expedition under General Sherman to Meridian at the commencement of the year (see ARMY OPERATIONS), Mississippi was almost entirely abandoned by the Federal forces. All the northern counties were left, and also other parts of the State excepting Vicksburg and Natchez, where garrisons were stationed, and a small force on the Yazoo. The people on the line of General Sherman's march returned to their homes and endeavored to accommodate themselves to the circumstances which existed. Many of the planters without horses and servants were supplied by those in the districts not overrun to such an extent as to enable them to get in a crop sufficient for their necessities. The railroads and telegraphs were repaired with much vigor.

The efforts which were made to employ freedmen on plantations were generally unsuccessful, owing to the hazardous nature of the business, unless a Federal force was close at hand to afford protection against guerrillas. An order was issued by General Slocum on May 19th, declaring that the residents of a district should be made responsible for all the damage caused by guerrillas to lessees. For every lessee killed an assessment of ten thousand dollars was ordered to be levied upon the disloyal people residing within thirty miles, which should be appropriated to the family of the deceased. notwithstanding these provisions for the employment of freedmen, the banks of the Mississippi River were almost lined with their rude huts and cabins, and a vast amount of destitution, starvation, and sickness prevailed. The return of General Sherman brought between ten and eleven thousand, which added to the numbers already at the military posts. In Natchez military orders were issued as a sanitary measure, forbidding any contraband to remain in that city after April 1st, who was not Page 550 employed by some responsible white person in some legitimate business. A limited number only were allowed to occupy a house. They were also forbidden to rent houses and live to themselves, but required to seek shelter from their employers at the contraband camps.

The corn crop of the year was comparatively a failure in the northern counties of the State, and foreshadowed great destitution during the ensuing winter.

There is a class of persons who have probably been the severest sufferers by the war, of whom comparatively little has been said. These are the white refugees. Their condition in Mississippi was even more deplorable than that of the negroes, for equally with them they have borne the evils of slavery without acquiring the habits of industry which the latter obtained. Many of them were natives of the North, who had become citizens of the Southern States before the war in order to improve their fortunes, and who seized the first opportunity to escape with their lives, leaving every thing else behind. Hundreds of others were deserters from the Confederate army. The greatest sufferers, however, were the more ignorant of these men and women and children. The refugees that returned with General Sherman to Vicksburg, were long compelled to lie in the streets or open squares. The condition of these people is thus described:

Banks' unfortunate expedition brought ruin upon thousands; for the people, feeling confident of his success, openly avowed their attachment to the Union, and after his defeat they were left wholly un|...". Their houses were burned over their heads, and they themselves were compelled to flee for their lives.

On both sides of the river they are crowded together in miserable buildings, and when those fail they lie often with no bed but the damp ground and no covering but the open sky. No wonder that death makes such awful havoc among them. In an old warehouse we found forty-seven in one room. Of this number only twelve were able to stand—they were so sick and weak from exposure and want of food. A sick woman lay on the floor with a babe a week old by her side; at her feet lay a little child two years old, wasted to a skeleton by want and disease, while her four other children lay near her, all too sick to bring even a drink of water. Her husband is a soldier in our army. On a blanket in the corner, with a few old clothes rolled up to the place of a pillow, lay three little children, all very sick. Their mother, a worn, feeble looking woman, sat beside them on the floor, and as I stooped to examine the little ones and inquire into their wants, she burst into tears and exclaimed: “I am afraid my children will all die! I have no medicines and nothing that, they can eat—God knows what is to become of us.” Her look of bitter despair, as she said this, haunted me for days afterwards. I found her husband and son had entered our army more than a year ago, but she had lost all track of them and they knew nothing of her whereabouts. A short distance from the building I have described, in a wretched shed where hogs had always been quartered I found three families in a condition which it is impossible to describe. The building had no floor, and the stagnant water, stood upon the ground in many places, while the air within was so intolerable, that while dealing out the food and medicines I was several times obliged to go out into the open air. Upon the ground lay a mother, a grown daughter, and four other sick children. Close beside them was a woman too far gone to speak or notice us. But I need not dwell longer upon these heart-rending scenes; enough has been said to awaken sympathy in every heart, that contains one spark of feeling on humanity. I know that many have but little sympathy for these refugees, denouncing them all as Secessionists and not worthy our charity. I can only say that such pº either lack heart or they have been superficial in their investigations. My own experience with them has been quite the contrary.

A number of small military expeditions were made from the posts held by the Federal forces during the year. On May 6th a troublesome band of guerrillas, which had plundered and burned almost to the outskirts of Vidalia, retired for shelter to a swamp. Major Smith, of the Sixth U. S. colored artillery, who commanded the post, sent out a force under Colonel Farrar. The enemy were overtaken, and a brief contest, without quarter, ensued. The uncertainty of the number of the assailants caused the enemy to flee with a small loss.

On June 10th an engagement took place at Guntown, in which the enemy obtained considerable success. The Federal force consisted of two brigades of cavalry, under Colonel Grierson, two brigades of infantry in company with the First Illinois light artillery and two regiments of colored infantry, all under General Sturgis. The enemy were commanded by General Forrest, and consisted of Bell's, Lyon's, Rucker's, and Johnston's brigades, and Rice's and Morton's batteries. General Sturgis advanced from Memphis until he encountered the enemy in strong force near Guntown, and after a sharp contest was routed. The enemy pursued Sturgis to Colliersville, and his loss was three thousand men, eight hundred mules, five hundred horses, two hundred wagons, twenty ambulances, one hundred and fifty thousand rations, six hundred thousand rounds of ammunition, and fourteen pieces of artillery all spiked and the wheels cut down. The defeat is ascribed to the exhausted condition in which the Federal infantry were brought into action and the overwhelming force of the enemy.

On October 5th General Albert L. Lee moved from Baton Rouge, in Louisiana, marching through Rocky Hill cross-roads, Osyea, and Greenburg, destroying much property and taking a number of prisoners. He returned to Baton Rouge on the 9th.

On November 14th Colonel Fonda left Baton Rouge and marched to Williams’ Bridge, Liberty, and Brookhaven, Mississippi, capturing a number of prisoners and destroying a bridge, and then returned.

In consequence of the following order, the Catholic Bishop of Natchez was arrested and transported to Vidalia:

                                     HEADQUARTERS U. S. FORCES,

                                               NATCHEZ, Miss., August 12, 1864.

Military authority having been, for the time, vindicated, so much of Special Order No. 11 as requires Reverend William Henry Elder, Bishop of Natchez, to remain within the military lines of the Post of Vidali La., is suspended, and he may return to his home and Page 551 duties until the pleasure of the War Department be known in his case.

And as all solemn appeals to the Supreme Being not proceeding from honest hearts and willing minds are necessarily offensive to Him and subversive of sound morality, so much of Special Order No. 31, June 18, 1864, as requires public prayer to be pronounced in behalf of the President of the United States and the Union, is suspended until further orders; leaving all |. conducting Divine worship liberty to manifest such measure of hostility as they may feel against the Government and Union of these States, and their sympathy with the rebellion, by omitting such supplication, if so minded.

By order of                        Brigadier-General M. BRAYMAN,

J. H. Odlin, Ass’t Adj't General

The Confederate State Government continued undisturbed through the year. At the session of the Legislature all white males between sixteen and fifty-five were made subject to the Governor's orders. Little else is at present known of its proceedings.

MISSOURI. The session of the Legislature of Missouri, commenced immediately after the close of the election in November, 1863. In February, 1864, a bill was passed, which provided simply for a call of a convention to revise the organic law of the State. The election of delegates to this convention was to be held in November ensuing, at the time of the general election. At the same time the people were to vote on the proposition whether they desired a convention or not. If they decided against a convention, then the delegates were not to assemble. If the vote sustained the proposition, then the convention was to meet in St. Louis on Jan 5th, 1865.

The action of the convention in 1863, on the subject of emancipation, was not satisfactory to a portion of the citizens. It provided for gradual instead of immediate emancipation. The latter was sought to be obtained by a new convention, composed of men more recently elected than those of the adjourned convention. The annual election was held on November 8th; previous to which General Rosecrans, in command of the department, issued the following orders:

HEADQUARTER'S DEPARTMENT of THE Missouri, St. Louis, Mo., October 12, 1864. }

General Order No. 195.

Our free government, established and administered by the will of the people, expressed through legal elections, requires from every citizen a sacred regard for the preservation and purity of the elective franchise.

The General commanding expects the united assistance of the true men of all parties, in his efforts to secure a full and fair opportunity for all who are entitled to vote at the approaching election in the State of Missouri, and in excluding from the polls those who by alienage, treason, guerrillaism, and other crimes or disabilities, have no just right to vote.

The laws of the State declare who may vote, and prescribe the times and places of voting. But, in the present, disturbed condition of the country, the civil power is too weak effectually to enforce the execution of those laws, or adequately punish offenders. Wherefore in compliance with his duty as a citizen and department commander, and with the wishes of all true citizens, and in aid of the law, the General commanding orders as follows:

1. Those, and only those, who have the qualifications, and who take the oath prescribed by the State, copies of which are hereunto annexed, shall vote.

From the terms of the oath, it is manifest that it was the intention of the Missouri State Convention that no person should vote who, since the 17th day of December 1861, has wilfully taken up arms or levied war against the United States, or against the Provisional Government of the State of Missouri. This excludes from the right of voting all who, since that date, have been in the rebel army or navy anywhere, and all who, since that date, have been anywhere engaged in guerrilla marauding or bushwhacking. If, therefore, any such person offer to vote, his vote may be challenged, and he shall be immediately arrested. And any judge of election shall be arrested and punished who permits the name of any such person to be recorded in the poll book, or his vote to be received, where such judge has personal knowledge of his true character, or the same is shown to him by lawful evidence before the vote is received.

Voting, or attempting to vote, in contravention of law or orders, is declared a military offence, subjecting the offender to arrest, trial, and punishment, if convicted.

2. No one who has borne arms against the Government of the United States, or voluntarily given aid and comfort to its enemies during the present rebellion, shall act as judge or clerk at an election; nor shall any county judge knowingly appoint any such person to act as judge at an election. Violation of this will be promptly noticed, and the offenders brought to trial by the local military authorities.

3. Outrages, upon the freedom of election by violence or intimidation; attempting to hinder legal, or to procure or encourage illegal, voting; interfering with the legal challenge of voters; acting as officers of election, in contravention of law or orders; wilful neglect to perform their duties, under the laws and these orders, by officers of elections, and especially taking the voters' or officers' oath falsely; and all other acts and words interfering with the purity and freedom of elections, are crimes against the liberties of the people, and are declared military offences, and will be rigorously punished.

4. The laws of the State provide that those of its citizens who are in the army shall not thereby lose the privilege of voting, ºil. the voting is done in the manner prescribed. The commanding General, therefore, directs that, on the day of election, every practicable facility be afforded for taking, in camp, or on the field, the vote of citizens of Missouri who may then be in any company of Missouri volunteers or militia, in the service of the United States or the state.

A copy of the ordinance of this State, providing for elections under the supervision of the commanding officers of companies, is hereto subjoined, for the guidance of all concerned. Such commanding officers will not on any account neglect to make arrangements for, and to hold, such elections, where the condition of their commands will admit of their being held without detriment to the service.

The commanding General deems it better that all citizens of Missouri in the military service in this State should vote in their companies, as authorized by said ordinance; but he does not consider that the uniform of the army should be a badge of exclusion of any soldier from voting at the polls where he, as a citizen, would be entitled to vote, and therefore does not prohibit it. At the same time, he directs that any soldier who abuses the privilege of access to the polls, by any disorderly conduct, or by any unauthorized interference with other citizens in the lawful exercise of the right of voting, shall be punished, and all military officers are especially charged to prevent any such act on the part of any soldier.

5. Wherever there is good reason to apprehend that rebel bushwhackers, or other evil disposed persons, will attempt to control the election . any precinct by their acts, threats or presence, a sufficient Page 552 guard will be detailed to prevent any such control, and keep the peace.

6. District and all subordinate commanders will strictly and carefully enforce this order at the approaching elections, and use all diligence to bring to speedy and condign punishment all civilians, officers, or soldiers who violate any of its provisions.

7. The commanding General earnestly invokes the zealous and active aid of all law-abiding citizens, on the day of the said election, in preserving the peace at the polls, and preventing illegal voting; and he hopes that every newspaper in this State will see proper to º this, order continuously in every issue until the day of the next election.

By command of Major-General ROSECRANS.

FRANK ENO, Assistant Adjutant General.

The vote given by the people for President, was as follows:—

Lincoln, 71,676; McClellan, 31,626. Majority for Mr. Lincoln, 40,050.

The Radical or unconditional Union candidate for Governor, Thomas C. Fletcher, was elected by a majority of about 41,125 over Thos. L. Price.

The total vote relative to a State Convention, was 89,215; of which the majority in favor of a convention, was 37,793. Of the members chosen to the convention, three-fourths belonged to the Radical party. The entire Radical ticket for State officers was elected, also a large Radical majority of the members of the Senate, and three-fourths of the Assembly; eight out of nine Radical candidates were elected to Congress. The Radical ticket was also elected in eighty of the one hundred and fourteen counties in the State.

This was the first election for State officers which had been held in Missouri since the beginning of the war. The acting Governor, after Governor Jackson and Lieut.-Governor Reynolds withdrew from the State, had been chosen by the convention (Gamble), and also the Lieut. Governor Hall who succeeded on the decease of the former.

The Legislature assembled on December 26th. Governor Hall in his message stated that on July 1st, 1864, the State had furnished by volunteer enlistments ten thousand more soldiers for the Federal army than her quota. Since that time eleven new regiments had been recruited and organized.

The whole number of men furnished by Missouri under different calls of the President prior to February 1st, 1804, is.................................. 59,676

Number of men furnished since February 1st, 1864, as shown by the reports of the Commissary of Musters, Department of the Missouri, and Assistant Acting Provost Marshal General for Missouri,............ 18,508

Veteran Musters to April 28, 1864,.................... 1,409

The Enrolled Missouri Militia that have served six months and longer reduced to three years standard, by report of Adjutant-General of Missouri of April 18, 1864, ......       2,174

Total number furnished to 30th November, 1864. 81,767

In addition there has been in the field since July 31st, 1861, more than sixty thousand militia, in payment of which more than four millions of dollars. have been expended. On January 1st, 1864, there was due the militia $989,579.05, to provide for which the Governor recommended an issue of bonds. The services of this militia have been of great importance to the welfare of the State.

The revenue of the State for the two years ending September 30th, 1864, was $2,046,567. The balance in the treasury on October 1st, 1862, was $700,101. The amount subject to appropriation, after adding balances transferred from the road and canal funds, was $2,751,899, The expenditures in the two fiscal years, including ordinary and special appropriations, were $961,830; adding the several sums chargeable on the revenue fund, and the expenditures were $2,358,207; balance October 1st, 1864, $393,691. The revenue of the State, in 1863 and 1864 exceeded that of the years 1861 and 1862.

The bonds and interest due up to January 1st, 1865, by the State, including old debt, revenue bonds, and interest due on railroad bonds. issued the State to the various, railroads is as follows :

State bonds, old debt, due in 1862,....... $163,000 1863,.......239,000 | $402,000

Revenue bonds, 1864,... 217,000 1866, ... 214,000 431,000

Interest on Pacific R. R. bonds from July | 1861, to January 1865, inclusive.......... 1,680,000

Interest on Pacific R. R. bonds for Southwest Branch, from July 1861, to January 1865, inclusive...................... 1,120,000

Interest on Platte Co. R. R. bonds from July 1861, to January 1865, inclusive, ... 168,000

Interest on North Missouri R. R. bonds from July 1861 to January 1865, inclusive 1,044,000 Interest on St. Louis and Iron Mountain R. R.” bonds from July 1861, to January 1865, inclusive...................... $40,240

Interest on Cairo and Fulton R. R. bonds from July 1861, to January 1865, inclusive 156,000 5,008,240

Add for money borrowed from the banks by Governor Gamble,.............. 150,000 $5,991.340

There was also contracted a military debt by the State. The Missouri Convention, at its October session, 1861, passed an ordinance appropriating one million of dollars in defence warrants, redeemable and payable into the State treasury for taxes, to enable her authorities to protect the State by organizing and putting into service the loyal militia. These warrants, to the amount of one million three hundred and seventy thousand four hundred and eighty dollars, have been paid out in the State for the organization, support, and maintenance of the State militia. The General Assembly at its last session, by an act to provide means for the payment and support of the enrolled militia, approved March 9th, 1863, appropriated the sum of three millions of dollars, and authorized the issue of three millions of Union military bonds for that purpose. The sum of three millions of these bonds have been issued, and delivered tº the paymasters of the State, and by them paid out to the enrolled militia, making a military debt of the State of four million three hundred and seventy thousand four hundred and eighty dollars. Defence warrants were made receivable for all taxes due the State; Union military bonds were made receivable for 50 per cent of Page 553 State revenue, and for all º and commutation tax, provided for under said act of March, 1863, up to and including the year 1864. There has been paid into the treasury and cancelled and destroyed, up to the 1st of December, 1864, defence warrants amounting to the sum of one million one hundred and thirteen thousand three hundred and sixty-five dollars.

There has been redeemed and paid into the treasury for taxes, etc., up to the first day of December, 1864, Union military bonds, amounting to the sum of one million two hundred and twenty-eight thousand nine hundred and seventy dollars and interest allowed thereon amounting to three thousand four hundred and seventy dollars and seven cents.

During the years 1861 and 1862 the disturbances in all portions of the State utterly suspended and prostrated the common schools in nearly every county. In 1863 many schoolhouse doors were thrown open and children gathered in the schools in all parts of the State. In 1864 nearly all the counties north of the Missouri River had their common schools in full operation, and in many counties south of the river schools were opened. The change about to take place in the condition of the slaves, has already turned attention to their education and to the relations which they shall hold to the institutions of the State.

It was estimated that nearly one-third of the population of 1860 had been lost to the State in consequence of the war. Even at that period the population was hardly sufficient to develop the resources and gather the harvests. Immigration is therefore greatly needed.

The newly-elected State officers were inaugurated on January 6th, 1865. Governor Fletcher in his address says: In point of physical advantage, in the combination of all the elements of wealth, in the invitations that are held out to enterprise, and in the magnificent and swift rewards that wait on industry, no area on the Western Continent containing an equal number of square miles, can compare with our own State. While embracing a greater number of acres of good agricultural land than any other State in the Union, Missouri has more iron than all the other States combined; lead in quantities greater than elsewhere discovered in the world; mines of cobalt and zinc, and lodes of copper; whole districts of country underlaid with strata of coal; almost illimitable forests of the most useful timber, including the giant resiniferous in, inviting the hand of  industry and liberal enterprise to gather its wealth; prairie and forest diversified everywhere by streams affording unequalled water-power; one of the largest rivers o the world flowing through her centre, and another washing the whole length of her border.

The military policy adopted at the present time in Arkansas and Missouri, it is expected, will prevent the return of the Confederate armies to the soil of either State.

That part of the State north of the Missouri River is mostly an agricultural country. Good timber is found in abundance along the streams, and out from one-fourth to half a mile usually, the prairie begins. The land is rich, and the sub-soil is of a loamy clay, making it a very lasting soil. Coal of a good quality for fires and blacksmiths' use, is found in most of the counties. Fine building-stone is found in nearly every county. South of the Missouri River minerals are found, with but little farming land except along the Kansas border and Missouri River, and a small section of the southwest corner of the State. The surface of the country is broken and hilly, the Ozark Mountain range crossing the entire breadth of the southern part of the State. Several rivers, that are at times navigable quite a distance, and numerous mountain streams and great springs, will furnish, when improved, immense power for manufacturing purposes.

The minerals are in great abundance; the coal and wood in close proximity, rendering the cost of working the ore very little. Often iron ore, coal, wood, and water power may be had from the same hillside.

On January 6th the Constitutional Convention assembled in St. Louis. It was organized by the election of Arnold Krekel, of St. Charles, as President. On the 11th, a committee reported the following ordinance of emancipation:

Be it ordained by the People of the State of Missouri in Convention assembled, That hereafter in this State there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except in punishment of crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted; and all persons held to service or labor as slaves, are hereby declared free.

The subsequent proceedings of the Convention are thus reported:

The ordinance having passed to a second reading, Mr. Drake proposed the following amendment:

Sec. 2. That no person can, on account of color, be disqualified as a witness, or be disabled to contract, or be prevented from acquiring, holding, or transmitting property, or be liable to any other punishment for any offence than that imposed on others for a like offence, or be restricted in the exercise of religious worship, or be hindered in receiving education, or be subject in law to any restraints or disqualifications in regard to any F. rights than such as are held upon others under like circumstances.

Mr. Switzler. I desire to offer an amendment to the amendment. I desire to amend the amendment by adding an additional section as follows:

Sec. 4. It shall be the duty of the Legislature to provide by law for apprenticing all slaves emancipated by this ordinance, between the ages of twelve and twenty-one years.

Mr. Drake. That is introducing a new proposition under the name of an amendment, which is in direct contravention to the rules.

The President. I shall rule that proposition out of order under the rules.

A lengthy discussion ensued, in which the subject of negro suffrage was variously handled by members, to cut off which Mr. Budd moved the previous question.

Mr. Drake. What is it?

Mr. Budd. If the question is sustained by a majority of this house, it brings the subject to a yote, first on the first amendment, and second on the second amendment, and third on the original proposition.

The President. The question now before the convention is, on the rejection of the amendment of the gentleman from Franklin; the previous question affects that alone.

Mr. Budd. I withdraw it.

Mr. Drake. The question is on the motion I made  Page 554 to reject the amendment of the gentleman from Franklin.

Mr. Clover. demanded. Mr. Drake. that question.

Mr. Strong. I ask, Mr. President, if it is in order to amend that motion ?

If so, I desire to offer a motion that all amendments be rejected temporarily. The President. I don't think it is proper at this time.

The vote was then taken and resulted : ayes, 58; noes, 4.

The motion to reject the amendment prevailed: ayes, 37; noes, 25.

After the disposal of several points of order the vote was taken on the adoption of the ordinance, resulting—ayes, 59; noes, 4; absent, 2. The noes were Messrs. Gilbert of Platte, Harris, Morton, and Switzler.

The announcement of the vote was received with loud applause and with waving of handkerchiefs and swinging of hats. The president and sergeant-at-arms found it impossible to quell the enthusiasm.

Mr. Owen. I desire to move to reconsider the i. on adopting the ordinance and lay it on the table.

 The motion was agreed to.

Mr. Owen. I understand that the Reverend Mr. Eliot is in the hall, and I move that he come forward and give thanks to Almighty God for the passage of an ordinance of Emancipation in Missouri.

Prayer was then offered by the Reverend Dr. Eliot as follows: Most merciful God, before whom we are all equal, we look up to Thee who hast declared Thyself our Father and our helper and our strong defence, to thank Thee that Thou art no respecter of persons, to thank Thee that Thou didst send Jesus Christ into the world to redeem the world from sin, and that He was the friend to the poor, that He came to break the manacles of the slaves, “that the º might go free.” We thank. Thee that this day the people of this State have hº given them to do as they would be done by. e pray that º blessings may rest upon the proceedings of this Convention, that no evil may come to this State from the wrong position of those who do not agree with the action of to-day, but that we, all of us, may be united to sustain this which is the law of the land. We pray, O God, but our hearts are too full to express our thanksgiving. Thanks be to God for this day; that light has now come out from darkness, that all things are now promising a future of peace and quietness to our distracted State. Grant that this voice may go over the whole land until the Ordinance of Emancipation is made perfect throughout the States. We ask it through the name of our dear Lord and Redeemer. Amen.

Mr. Budd offered the following resolution: And upon it the ayes and noes are Yes, I call for the ayes and noes on

Resolved, That a copy of the ordinance passed by this Convention, freeing all persons in the State heretofore held as slaves, signed "..." President and attested by the Secretary as a true ...]”. , and the same shall be placed in the hands of a special messenger to transmit to the Governor of the State at Jefferson City; and when received by him, he is requested to issue his proclamation, stating that by an irrevocable act of the Convention, slavery is abolished in the State of Missouri now and forever.

The resolution was adopted, and the Convention adjourned.

The news of the passage of the ordinance was immediately sent by telegraph to Jefferson City, where the Legislature was in session, and a scene of great rejoicing ensued. Several spontaneous gatherings of the people were held, “at which the wildest enthusiasm prevailed. At one of the meetings speeches were made by State senators, the chaplain of the House, and Congressmen elect, and the report says: Mr. Bonner, of St. Louis, offered the following resolution, which was adopted:

Resolved, That Colonel Jameson, of St. Louis, Mr. Kutzner of Hannibal, and Mr. Doan, of Grundy, be invited up in front of the speaker's stand and sing “John Brown." The song was sung amid immense . The Lieut.-Governor offered the following resolution, which was adopted:

Resolved, That a committee of seven be appointed by the chair to draft joint resolutions suitable to the importance of the occasion, and that the same be submitted to the General Assembly for its action.

The chairman appointed the committee.

Pending the proceedings of the meeting, which was held at night, every window of the Capitol was illuminated, and the very hills of Jefferson were made to lift up their heads and rejoice.

On the next day a message was received by the Convention from the Governor and Legislature of Illinois, expressing their congratulations on the passage of the ordinance. Afterwards a motion was made in the Convention to pay the loyal owners for their slaves. It was laid on the table—ayes, 44; noes, 4.

A motion was also made to submit the ordinances of the Convention to the people. After some discussion it was laid on the table—ayes, 44; noes, 9.

The number of slaves in Missouri, according to the census of 1860, was 114,931.

Measures were introduced before the Legislature to provide for the welfare of the emancipated blacks. These measures, and also the further proceedings of the State Convention, form a portion of the history of 1865, and will be found in a subsequent volume.

At the close of the year Major-General Pope was ordered to relieve General Rosecrans in command of the military department.


Source: The American Annual Cyclopaedia and Register of Important Events of the Year, 1861-1865, vols. 1-5. New York: Appleton & Co., 1868.