Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 12.djvu/297

Rh briefly the events which occurred early in 1865, and the directions given by President Johnson to the military officers of the United States. First, I would mention the death of Mr. Lincoln himself, which was regarded as the greatest calamity that could have happened to the people of the South. The arrest and imprisonment of President Davis and many of the Confederate soldiers and statesmen have been already related. The treatment of Mr. Davis was very harsh indeed, complicity in the assassination of Mr. Lincoln being cruelly imputed to him, and a large reward offered for his capture. He was placed in prison and shackled with irons in the strongest fortress in the Union, and a military guard placed over him day and night. Every town, village and district was occupied rapidly by the Union troops as the Confederate resistance melted away, and all civil government was ignored. The governors of most of the seceded States attempted to call their legislatures together to conform to the results of the war and take steps for their restoration to the Union. They did this, believing that the American principle of government the sovereignty and indestructibility of the States would be respected and that these prompt proceedings would be favored as the constitutional plan of restoration. They did this also believing it absolutely necessary to preserve civil government, and to show by legislative enactment complete submission to the results of the war in repealing their ordinances of secession and in accepting the freedom of the negro. The order issued by General Wilson, of the United States army in Georgia, when the legislature was called to meet, was to this effect: "Neither the legislature nor any other political body will be permitted to assemble under the call of the rebel State authorities." The spirit of this order was carried out in all the seceded States. Existing civil government was ignored everywhere, and military rule inaugurated in municipal and