Team of Rivals_ The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln - Doris Kearns Goodwin [355]
More important, the tour allowed the skeptical ministers to witness the boundless resources of the North. “Hundreds of factories with whirring wheels,” Fred Seward wrote, “thousands of acres of golden harvest fields, miles of railway trains, laden with freight, busy fleets on rivers, lakes and canals”—all presaged the inevitable triumph of the Union. This clear perception of the Union’s strength contributed to the successful resolution of a troubling controversy with Great Britain and France. Since the previous autumn, the administration had been bedeviled by knowledge that the Confederacy had contracts with European shipbuilders for armored vessels vastly superior to anything in the Union fleet. For months, Seward had coupled diplomatic efforts with strident warnings of war should the ironclads leave Europe. Not until September, several weeks after the diplomatic tour, did he receive trustworthy assurances from the governments of England and France that the rams would not be delivered.
With Seward in upstate New York, Stanton in the mountains of Pennsylvania, Nicolay out west, and Hay setting out for a week’s vacation in Long Branch, New Jersey, Lincoln was left in relative solitude. “The White House,” Stoddard noted, “is deserted, save by our faithful and untiring Chief Magistrate, who, alone of all our public men, is always at his post.” Notwithstanding, Stoddard observed, “he looks less careworn and emaciated than in the spring, as if, living only for his country, he found his own vigor keeping pace with the returning health of the nation.”
CHAPTER 21
“I FEEL TROUBLE IN THE AIR”
THE SUMMER OF 1863 marked a crucial transformation in the Union war effort—the organization and deployment of black regiments that would eventually amount to 180,000 soldiers, a substantial proportion of eligible black males. The struggle to open the door for black recruits had finally ended when Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation flatly declared that blacks would “be received into the armed service of the United States.” Three weeks later, Stanton authorized Massachusetts governor John Andrew to raise two regiments of black troops. Since Massachusetts had only a small black population, Andrew called on Major George L. Stearns to head a recruitment effort that would reach into New York and other Northern states. Stearns approached Frederick Douglass for help.
Douglass was overjoyed. He had long believed that the war would not be won so long as the North refused “to employ the black man’s arm in suppressing the rebels.” He wrote stirring appeals in his Monthly magazine and traveled throughout the North, speaking at large meetings in Albany, Syracuse, Buffalo, Philadelphia, and many other cities, offering a dozen answers to the question: “Why should a colored man enlist?” Nothing, he assured them, would more clearly legitimize their call for equal citizenship: “You will stand more erect, walk more assured, feel more at ease, and be less liable to insult than you ever were before. He who fights the battles of America may claim America as his country—and have that claim respected.”
The black soldiers who initially answered Douglass’s call became part of the famed 54th Massachusetts Regiment. Captained by Robert Gould Shaw, the son of wealthy Boston abolitionists, this first black regiment from the North included two of Frederick Douglass’s own sons, Charles and Lewis. On May 28, thousands of Bostonians poured into the streets cheering the men as they marched past the State House and the Common. At the parade ground, they were reviewed by the governor and various high-ranking military officials. “No single regiment has attracted larger crowds,” the Boston Daily Evening Transcript reported. “Ladies lined the balconies and windows of the houses,” waving their handkerchiefs as the brass band led the proud regiment to the parade ground.
Frederick Douglass attended the ceremonies, proudly extolling