A World on Fire_ Britain's Crucial Role in the American Civil War - Amanda Foreman [183]
13.2 Mackay had been a foot soldier in the army of underpaid hacks until 1843, when, at the age of twenty-nine, he made his reputation with a book called Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds. But in his heart he always considered himself a poet rather than a journalist. He did not intend to do any traveling for The Times. Mackay had toured the United States in 1858 and felt that he had experienced enough trains and American hotels to last him a lifetime.
FOURTEEN
A Fateful Decision
British reaction to Antietam—Gladstone’s Newcastle speech—Battle in the cabinet—The emperor proposes joint intervention—Russell turns tail
Britain did not receive word of Antietam until the very end of September. “I hope more than I dare express,” wrote Adams in his diary on the twenty-ninth. “For a fortnight my mind has been running so strongly on all this night and day, that it seems to almost threaten my life.” His son Charles Francis Jr., now Lieutenant Adams in the 1st Massachusetts Cavalry, had last written to the family to say that his regiment was joining the Army of the Potomac in Maryland. The following day, on the thirtieth, the legation heard that Lee’s advance had been stopped. “But [McClellan] failed to follow it up and let them escape,” raged Benjamin Moran.1 Adams was also disappointed. Nor were his fears allayed about his son. It was several more days before they received a letter from Charles Francis Jr. His regiment had sat on their horses in readiness while shells exploded on the surrounding hills, but McClellan never sent them into battle.
Reports of the terrific slaughter at Antietam shocked the nation; the 25,000 casualties on a single day seemed almost inconceivable, especially when compared to the 25,000 Britain suffered during the entire Crimean War.2 “The Federals in their turn have had a victory; and so it goes on; when will it end? Fanny Kemble says not until the South is coerced back into the Union,” wrote Henry Greville, reflecting the horror felt by many people at the thought that the war might continue for many months more.3 Five days later, on October 5, 1862, there was a second uproar in the press, this time over Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. As Seward had feared from the outset, the Proclamation was widely denounced as a cynical and desperate ploy. Charles Francis Adams understood its symbolic importance, but even pro-Northern supporters could not understand why Lincoln had allowed the border states to keep their slaves, unless the emancipation order was directed against the South rather than slavery itself. “Our people are very imperfectly acquainted with the powers of your Federal Government,” explained the antislavery crusader George Thompson to his American counterpart William Lloyd Garrison. “They know little or nothing of your constitution—its compromises, guarantees, limitations, obligations, etc. They are consequently unable to appreciate the difficulties of your president.”4
The Spectator declared itself to be disappointed with the Proclamation: “The principle is not that a human being cannot justly own another,” it insisted, “but that he cannot own him unless he is loyal to the United States.”5 For the radical Richard Cobden, the moral contradiction proved that “the leaders in the Federal government are not equal to the occasion.”6 The Times went further and accused Lincoln of inciting the slaves in the South to kill their owners, imagining in graphic terms how the president “will appeal to the black blood of the African; he will whisper of the pleasures of spoil and of the gratification of yet fiercer instincts; and when blood begins to flow and shrieks come piercing through the darkness, Mr. Lincoln will wait till the rising flames tell that all is