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The new British minister, Sir Frederick Bruce, informed London of the development. “There is no doubt that the Confederacy as a political body is at an end,” he wrote to Lord Russell. He strongly advised that Britain refuse port entry to the two Confederate cruisers still at large unless she desired to irritate the U.S. government. “The moment is a critical one,” Bruce warned on May 16.45 CSS Stonewall had tried to obtain coal at Nassau and been sent on her way. The ship managed to make it to Havana, where its presence embarrassed the authorities for a few days until definitive news arrived of the Confederacy’s collapse.38.7

Ill.64 Jefferson Davis bidding farewell to his escort two days before his capture, by Frank Vizetelly.

Bruce had been in Washington since April 8, although he had not yet been presented to Lincoln when the president was assassinated on April 14. Since then, Bruce had waited anxiously to learn what the new administration’s attitude would be toward Britain. A large banner had been draped across the State Department building proclaiming PEACE AND GOOD WILL TO ALL NATIONS, BUT NO ENTANGLING ALLIANCES AND NO FOREIGN INTERVENTIONS, which did not inspire him with confidence.47 He was relieved when President Johnson went out of his way to reassure him of his cordial feelings toward Britain.48 “I have not been accustomed to etiquette,” Johnson admitted when Bruce was presented to him, “but I shall be at all times happy to see you and prepared to approach questions in a just and friendly spirit.”38.8 Charles Sumner had offered to be an intermediary between the British legation and the president, but Bruce was loath to call upon him despite his admiration for the senator’s historic battle against slavery. There was something about Sumner’s insistence that no one else in Washington was capable of discussing foreign affairs that made Bruce doubt his motives. “It struck me,” wrote Bruce, “that the drift of his conversation was to lead me to the conclusion that I should enter into confidential communication with himself. This I am reluctant to do, as long as there is hope of Mr. Seward being able shortly to resume his duties.” He disliked “the want of frankness in him” and suspected that Sumner was trying to discover his weaknesses in order to exploit them later.50

Bruce could see that the overwhelming desire in the country was for peace, and he no longer feared for the safety of Canada, although there were still serious frictions between Britain and America that remained unresolved. “The feeling against blockade runners, and foreigners who have served in a civil or military character in the South, is so strong as to make a fair trial almost hopeless,” he wrote to Russell. “These cases require great delicacy in handling—for to insinuate unfairness on the part of the officers composing their Military Commissions, would render the execution of a sentence only more certain.” Reflecting on Colonel Grenfell, who had been the only defendant in the Chicago conspiracy trial to receive the death sentence, Bruce thought that people were “against leniency where a foreigner is concerned and the Government will not openly thwart the popular sentiment in that respect.”51 Bennet Burley’s trial would take place soon, and Bruce expected a similar outcome.

Bruce felt pity for the defeated South, but his overriding fears were for the colored population of the United States, whose future seemed so uncertain. “The antagonism [against] the Negro breaks out constantly,” he wrote to Lord Russell. In Manhattan, a delegation of black New Yorkers was denied the right to walk behind Lincoln’s funeral cortege. When the White House intervened, a police escort had to protect the black marchers from the violence of the mob. “At Philadelphia,” continued Bruce, “though the Abolition element is strong, the pretension of the coloured people to ride in the railway cars [is] strenuously resisted, and threaten[s] to end in serious riots.” He had also heard that Tennessee had barred the testimony of black witnesses except