A World on Fire_ Britain's Crucial Role in the American Civil War - Amanda Foreman [42]
But six weeks after the prince had sailed away to the strains of “God Save the Queen,” Lyons confided to the Duke of Newcastle that all their exertions might have been for naught. “It is difficult to believe that I am in the same country which appeared so prosperous, so contented, and one may say, so calm when we travelled through it,” he wrote. “The change is very great even since I wrote to you on the 29th October. Our friends are apparently going ahead on the road to ruin with their characteristic speed and energy.”58
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2.1 From the outset, Abraham Lincoln promoted himself as representing the middle ground. He believed that whites were superior to blacks, but that this did not give one human being the right to deprive another of his liberty. “As God made us separate, we can leave one another alone, and do one another much good thereby.”
2.2 The English were furious that U.S. sympathy for the Russians had extended to military aid, in the form of a steamship built for the Russian government by a private firm and revolvers supplied by Samuel Colt, as well as practical help from American doctors and engineers who volunteered their services.3
2.3 According to a well-known anecdote, Russell was chatting to the Duchess of Inverness at a party one winter evening when he suddenly stood up, went over to the far corner, and began a conversation with the Duchess of Sutherland. A short time later, one of his friends asked him what on earth had happened. He had been sitting too close to the fire, Russell explained. “I hope,” the friend remarked, “that you told the Duchess of Inverness why you abandoned her.” After a pause he replied, “No, but I did tell the Duchess of Sutherland.”
2.4 Small quantities of Australian wine were on display at the Great Exhibition of 1851.
2.5 Lewis’s sardonic humor is best remembered in his quip “Life would be tolerable were it not for its amusements.”
2.6 On hearing the news that Gladstone had joined the government, Charles Sumner claimed, with his customary humility, that he had always known Mr. Gladstone would join the Liberals. “Mr. Gladstone’s fame seems constantly ascending,” he wrote to the Duchess of Argyll. “When I first met him at Clifton, at a time when he was out of office and much abused, I predicted what has taken place, though I hardly thought it would come so soon.”12
2.7 Shortly after Seward departed, a report arrived from China that the U.S. Navy commodore in command of the American squadron had come to the aid of the Royal Navy during a fierce battle to capture the Taku forts in northeastern China. The U.S. commodore explained his decision to join the fight by declaring “blood is thicker than water.” This unexpected display of Anglo-American solidarity lent a rosy glow to Seward’s visit. If the traditional enmity between the two navies could be overcome, then anything was possible—even a friendly White House under a Republican administration.
2.8 John Adams and John Quincy Adams, the second and sixth presidents of the United States, also served as minister to the Court of St. James’s, from 1785 to 1788 and 1815 to 1817, respectively.
2.9 The biggest Anglo-American controversy in the early months of 1860 had been the bare-knuckle prizefight between the Englishman Tom Sayers and the American John Heenan on April 17. Billed as the world’s first international boxing contest, the match dragged on for thirty-seven rounds, until Heenan’s supporters broke into the ring. The contest was declared a draw, which led to the claim by furious supporters of Sayers that he had been robbed of his