Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/416

378 given notice to Governor Pickens, of South Carolina, that Fort Sumter would be relieved &quot; peaceably or by force.&quot; He states in his indignant letter to Mr. Seward that the same paper informed him that Mr. Fox, who had been allowed to visit Maj. Anderson, on the pledge that his purpose was pacific had, on returning to Washington, presented a plan for reinforcing Fort Sumter which had been considered several days by the Cabinet, had been adopted and was being actually put in execution at the moment when Mr. Seward had declared to him &quot; Faith as to Sumter fully kept.&quot; Judge Campbell disclosed that in the first conference between himself, Justice Nelson and Mr. Seward, he was much pleased with the Secretary s observations as to the course of the administration. At that interview the general subject of the withdrawal of Maj. Anderson being under consideration, and a proposition being made by Judge Campbell to write to Mr. Davis, the exact words of Mr. Seward in his answer were, &quot; before this letter reaches him Fort Sumter will have been evacuated. Mr. Stephens, whose information may be accepted, gives his opinion that President Lincoln changed his policy as to the inauguration of coercion, and that in the first days of his administration he intended to withdraw the garrison from Fort Sumter. This view is supported by the statement made by an equally observant and intelligent actor in the events of the time, Mr. John Sherman, who says in his &quot; Recollections, &quot; page 442, &quot; The period between the 4th of March and the 12th of April was the darkest in the history of the United States. It was a time of humiliation, timidity and feebleness.&quot; Rumors were getting abroad that the administration was about to surrender to the South. The war faction in the Republican party was becoming restive on account of the inactivity of the government. Mr. Douglas was ably arguing in the Senate in favor of his resolution of March 15 for amendment to the Constitution and against a war of subjugation. Breckinridge