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On February 23, Hotze gleefully informed the Confederate State Department that his attempts to cultivate the press had succeeded far beyond his initial expectations. After only three weeks in London he had placed his first editorial in an English newspaper—a feat Henry Adams had failed to achieve in nearly a year. Furthermore, the newspaper was the Morning Post, Lord Palmerston’s own mouthpiece. “With this I have acquired the secret of the ‘open sesame’ of the others I may need,” he wrote from his new lodgings in Savile Row. He had expected weeks, if not months, of disappointment. “Although this success is due to an accidental combination of fortunate circumstances which I could not have concerted … it has nevertheless greatly encouraged me.”64

In the days running up to the debate, Hotze and James Spence helped several of the Southern supporters with their speeches. Meanwhile, the American legation was still frantically putting together a rebuttal of the Confederates’ statistics. Benjamin Moran spent every waking hour with William Forster coaching him on his answers, hoping that Forster’s debating skills were more polished than his manners. Moran was flabbergasted to discover that the MP was married, and his wife “a nice and ladylike person.”65

On Friday, March 7, the combatants assembled in the Commons to watch their proxies fight. The Confederates appeared confident despite the news in the previous day’s papers of the Federals’ double victories at Roanoke and Forts Henry and Donelson. The House was more crowded than normal for a Friday evening and from his vantage point in the Diplomatic Gallery, Moran noticed there were a large number of ministers present. William Gregory’s pro-Southern speech was in his usual ebullient style. Every cheer from the House brought a smile to the Confederates and a grimace to their opponents. His claim that Britain was supporting an illegal blockade to the detriment of her own workers appeared to strike home with many members. After he sat down, a large number left for dinner, evidently having decided there was no need to listen to any more speeches in support of the motion. Forster was well into his speech when the House refilled. “We watched closely,” recorded Mason, “as Forster went on with his exposé, and reduced the tables down almost to nil.” To his surprise, Forster’s speech received an even more favorable reception than Gregory’s. Palmerston appeared to be listening intently, and Gladstone had actually turned around to watch Forster.

After Forster sat down, however, the Federal and Confederate observers realized that the ministry had merely been biding its time while it waited for the supporters of both sides to declare themselves. Sir Roundell Palmer now rose to speak on behalf of the government. A thin, pale man with an unfortunate lisp and squeaky voice, Palmer was no one’s choice as a debater, but as the solicitor general he was more qualified than anyone else present to speak on the legality of the blockade. Palmer’s shyness had always made him seem devoid of emotion—“bloodless,” his critics called him. Tonight, though, unmistakable moral outrage against the South and all that it represented ran through his speech. The government would remain neutral, he declared, because “honour, generosity and justice” demanded it “and because it was the only course consistent with the Divine law, that we should do to others as we would wish others to do to ourselves.” Years later, at the end of a long and illustrious career, he remembered the debate with pride. “The speech … gained me more applause than, perhaps, any other which I ever made.”66

There were more speakers—Thurlow Weed had primed at least twenty to speak on the North’s behalf—but it was obvious to all except Mason that the Confederates had lost the debate. When Gregory rose for the second time, it was to withdraw his motion. Weed was immediately surrounded by a dozen MPs who came over to shake his hand, while only a couple sauntered over to commiserate with Mason.67

Ill.17 Punch