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| Friday March 29, 1861 |
On July 3, 1861, Lincoln told his friend Orville Browning that he
"himself conceived the idea" of sending supplies "without an
attempt to reinforce," and also giving notice to the governor of
South Carolina.
Lincoln's plan may have been inspired by a number of
considerations. Richard N. Current notes that a variation of this
idea was proposed by the New York newspaper editor, James
Watson Webb, in a letter to Lincoln dated March 12, 1861. Webb
suggested that the government send a relief expedition to Sumter
with both provisions and reinforcements, but that it announce its
destination and purpose. The expedition would use a decoy ship
carrying no supplies or men to draw fire if Confederate troops
attacked. The other ships would then steam into the fort.
Lincoln's thinking may also have been influenced by the visits to
South Carolina by his friends, Hurlbut and Lamon, which took
place shortly after he received Webb's suggestion. Hurlbut
reported to Lincoln that South Carolina would stop even a ship
known to carry "only provisions" to Sumter. And Navy secretary
Gideon Welles recalled that following Lamon's return from
Charleston, "the President declared he would send supplies to the
garrison."
There seems no reason to question Lincoln's claim that it was his
idea to send supplies while holding back reinforcements for
Sumter. He evidently developed his plan in the period after he
received the cabinet's written opinions in the middle of March, and
before the cabinet meeting on March 29. However, the origin of
the portion of Lincoln's plan that required giving notice to the
governor of South Carolina is more controversial. Welles
attributed this idea to Secretary of State Seward. Seward
preferred abandoning Sumter, but when he found that Lincoln
was determined to send a relief expedition, the secretary
suggested that it would "promote harmony to inform the South
Carolina authorities of the intention to send supplies peaceably to
the garrison, and that if not resisted it would not be reinforced." It
was Seward's "particular request," Welles recalled, to inform
South Carolina. Welles considered this idea a military and political
mistake because it undermined the government's rightful claim to
furnish supplies or troops to its own fort, and it gave Confederate
forces time to make preparations to defeat the expedition.
In his study of the secession crisis, David M. Potter agrees that
Seward was responsible for the notification of South Carolina. The
notice to Governor Pickens, Potter argues, "was not planned by
Lincoln himself, but was sent to honor a pledge which had been
almost wrung from Lincoln by Seward, in an effort to avert . . .
aggression." On the other hand, Lincoln's private secretaries,
Nicolay and Hay, basing their statement on Nicolay's personal
memoranda, confirm Lincoln's own claim. According to their
account, toward the end of March, Lincoln "told Mr. Seward" that
the secretary could inform the Confederate commissioners that he
would not attempt to provision the fort "without giving them
notice." Lincoln had weighed the matter and had come to the
"deliberate decision" that giving notice was the best policy.
While there is no way to establish with certainty whether Lincoln or
Seward conceived the idea of notifying South Carolina, it seems
likely that this part of the plan was also Lincoln's. Notification had
been a part of Webb's suggestion, and Seward's first mention of
the proposal to the Confederate commissioners took place after
the cabinet meeting of March 29, when the idea was extensively
debated. It seems likely that Seward seized upon the proposal
and tried to hold Lincoln to it, hoping that notification would
prevent the collision at Sumter he was eager to avoid.