standing of the meeting mentioned was that he should be secretary of the treasury, declined. The resignation of Thomas was then, January 11, placed in the hands of the president. Dix was appointed the next day, and Holt confirmed at the same time as secretary of war, the vacancy in the department of the interior remaining unfilled. There was an immediate reversal of the attitude of the money power; the ominous financial deadlock was at once broken, and the government put in possession of the funds it so much needed.1

From the time of his appointment to the end of the administration, Dix was a resident of the White House. How different an atmosphere was brought into it is shown in his action regarding the revenuecutters at the Gulf ports. On January 18 he sent a treasury official to New Orleans with orders to provision the cutters and send them to New York. January 29 he received a despatch advising him that the captain of the McClelland refused to obey the order. Dix at once sent a telegram ordering his arrest and the command to be turned over to a lieutenant. The despatch ended with a phrase which was to become a Unionist watchword: "If any one attempts to haul down the American flag, shoot him on the spot." Notwithstanding, however, the two cutters at New Orleans remained in secessionist hands, and were burned a year later to prevent their falling into the hands of Farragut.

1 Dix, Dix, I., 362, 363.

Ibid., 371.

CHAPTER XV

FORT PICKENS AND THE CONFEDERACY

JANUARY, 1861-FEBRUARY, 1861)

HE long show of diplomatic etiquette caused

THE

by the visit of Hayne had one break, in the occupancy, by Lieutenant Slemmer and his company of forty-eight men, of Fort Pickens, a large and important work at the western end of Santa Rosa Island, which forms the south side of the extensive bay of Pensacola. Slemmer acted under orders of the war department, of January 3, 1861, to do his utmost to prevent the seizure of either of the forts in Pensacola harbor by surprise or assault, issued when the president found himself in a more courageous spirit through the resistance to the South Carolina commissioners. With the assistance of the gun-boat Wyandotte and store-ship Supply, after spiking the guns at forts Barrancas and McRee, and destroying ten tons of powder by pouring it into the sea, he transferred the rest of the powder and stores during January 9, 10, and 11.' But the Pensacola navy-yard, seven miles west of the town, with its great store of guns and other material, was 1 1 War Records, Serial No. 1, pp. 334–336.

sacrificed under circumstances to deserve the deepest condemnation, no attempt at resistance being made to the three or four hundred Florida militia who appeared January 12, two days after the secession of the state, at the yard gates, although there was at the yard a guard of forty marines and some sixty other men who could have been armed, besides the steamer Wyandotte, with a crew of sixty men and an armament of four 32-pounders, and the ship Supply, with a crew of thirty-five, a force ample, supported as it was by the Wyandotte's guns, to repel any number of militia brought against it.1

Equal culpability and folly was shown by the secretary of the navy, who did at last act, but too late. For many weeks a strong squadron had been lying at Vera Cruz, for the protection of American interests, including the steamer Powhatan, flag-ship, the steam-gunboat Pocahontas, the sailing frigates Sabine and Cumberland, and the sloop-of-war St. Louis. It was not until December 24 that orders were issued for the St. Louis, and January 5 for the Sabine, to proceed to Pensacola. With the slow mail service of the day, it was not until January 21 that the orders were received by Commodore Pendergrast, who at once despatched the two ships, but, under instructions, retained the most useful and necessary of all, the Powhatan, whose mere presence would have held the place beyond the possibility of attack. Had orders been sent to Vera Cruz by

1 Naval War Records, IV., 16-56.

the Wyandotte even so late as January 3, the Powhatan could have been in Pensacola by January 10, the sailing distance being but eight hundred miles. The president's spasm of energy lasted, however, sufficiently to enable orders to be given, January 21, 1861, for the Brooklyn to carry from Fort Monroe to Fort Pickens Captain Vogdes's company of artillery, with orders for Vogdes to take over the command at Pickens, "as well as that of other forts and barracks which it may be in your power to occupy and defend, with the co-operation of any naval commander or commanders at hand, though it is understood that Fort Barrancas and probably Fort McRee are already in the hands of the seceders." But a postscript nullified the whole spirit of the order: "You are to understand that you are not to attempt any reoccupation or recapture involving hostile collision, but that you are to confine yourself strictly to the defensive." 1

Ex-President Tyler, who had but just arrived in Washington as one of the commissioners from Virginia to the "Peace Conference," heard, January 25, of the despatch of the Brooklyn, and at once sent a note to the president questioning him in the matter. He received reply that the Brooklyn was "on an errand of mercy and relief," and that her movement was in no way connected with South Carolina. But this was not enough for the selfconstituted secession committee of senators. Not

War Records, Serial No. 1, p. 352.

knowing the passive orders given, there was in the Brooklyn's errand a possibility in their minds of a reoccupation of the Pensacola navy-yard, an easy task for such a ship; and Senator Mallory was hurried there to arrange that nothing should occur. All happened as they desired. Despite his repeated declarations that he would make no pledge, which he had but repeated in his message of January 28 commending the Virginia resolution to Congress, the president, on January 29, gave orders in a depatch signed by both the secretary of war and the secretary of the navy that, "In consequence of the assurances received from Mr. Mallory in a telegram of yesterday to Messrs. Slidell, Hunter, and Bigler . . . that Fort Pickens would not be assaulted, and an offer of such an assurance to the same effect from Colonel Chase for the purpose of avoiding a hostile collision, upon receiving satisfactory assurances from Mr. Mallory and Colonel Chase [commanding the Florida forces] that Fort Pickens will not be attacked you are instructed not to land the company on board the Brooklyn unless said fort shall be attacked or preparations shall be made for its attack. The provisions necessary for the supply of the fort you will land. . ... The commissioners of different States are to meet here on Monday, the 4th February, and it is important that during their session a collision of arms should be avoided. . . . Your right. . . to communicate with the Government by special messenger, and its right in the