THE WANDERER: THE LAST AMERICAN SLAVE SHIP

THE WANDERER: THE LAST AMERICAN SLAVE SHIP AND THE CONSPIRACY THAT SET ITS SAILS , By Erik Calonius, REVIEWED BY KIMBERLY PALMER

From the  The Washington Times -- On July 4, 1858, a ship called the Wanderer left Charleston, S.C., and set sail for the Congo. Disguised as a luxury cruise ship, the Wanderer had first raised suspicion when it docked in Long Island and loaded far more supplies than usual for a casual cruise. Officials surmised (correctly, as it turned out) that the ship was a slave ship.

In “The Wanderer,” Erik Calonius brings to light the tale of the last known ship that brought slaves to the United States from Africa. Using newspaper accounts, letters and legal documents, Mr. Calonius, formerly a London correspondent for the Wall Street Journal and Miami bureau chief for Newsweek, reconstructs the journey in painstaking detail.

Where little or no evidence remains of the Wanderer’s voyage — including the brief excursion into Africa and the slave market where the ship’s crew purchased the slaves — Mr. Calonius writes that he used eyewitness accounts of the slave trade to describe what the slaves and the crew of the Wanderer likely experienced.

The result is a compelling and heartrending record of a journey that helped push the nation to the brink of the Civil War.

Transporting slaves from Africa was outlawed in 1820, but nearly four decades later, the practice — profitable but risky — continued. The Wanderer’s crew eluded the law by charming officials who were not all that interested in enforcing it.

When the ship reached the 3,000-mile long African shoreline, patrolled by 28 British and American ships, one of the British patrol ships spotted it. The Wanderer’s captain — William C. Corrie, a well-connected Southerner — invited the crew aboard. “After months of tedious Africa duty, the British were more than happy to explore this luxury yacht,” writes Mr. Calonius.

Corrie invited the crew to stay for dinner as well as after-dinner champagne and cigars on the deck. The British patrollers said goodbye after deciding the Wanderer was simply a cruise ship and not a slaver.

Soon after that meeting, the crew rolled up the ship’s luxury carpets and put away its library books in preparation for nearly 500 slaves. Each one was given a space that measured just 12 inches in width, 18 inches in height, and less than five feet in length — smaller than a typical slave ship.

Corrie purchased the slaves from a dealer and had them branded with a hot iron. During the return voyage, 80 slaves perished because of the harsh conditions below deck. Those that survived were unloaded in Georgia. After the Africans were spotted by locals, federal prosecutors started to build a case against the Wanderer’s owners.

Prosecutors soon found themselves up against the powerful, pro-slavery networks of Georgia. One of the ship’s owners, Charles Lamar, a wealthy Savannah resident, reminded witnesses that he could make life miserable for anyone who testified against him. Lamar was a “fire-eater” who wanted the slave trade to flourish and who hoped that the South would eventually split from the North. The nationally publicized trials of those implicated in the Wanderer scheme helped cause that rift.

“If they fail to hang the men,” wrote the New York Times of the South, “if their officials are so lax, or their juries so perjured, as to permit this trade to be carried on with impunity, in face of all our laws against it — they will suffer all the consequences of an actual complicity in the proceeding itself… . the entire population of the North will wage upon [the South] a relentless war of extermination.”

As Mr. Calonius notes, that prediction proved prophetic indeed. The defendants in the Wanderer trials were found not guilty, the abolitionist John Brown was hanged not long after and war soon broke out.

The threat of the Civil War looms throughout the narrative. In the 1850s, the South had not yet embraced the industrial revolution. Agricultural life, which depended on the labor of slaves, was idealized for its slow pace and comfortable lifestyle. At the same time, the South’s economy was slipping further and further behind the more industrialized North.

By 1860, New England was manufacturing three times as many goods as the South. In the meantime, the South, which had grown dependent on the cheap labor of slaves, had to deal with the reality that as fewer slaves were shipped from Africa, the cost of owning slaves increased. Few businesses, Mr. Calonius writes, were more profitable than the illegal transportation of slaves from Africa to the United States.

Mr. Calonius challenges the popular belief that most Southerners rallied to fight for slavery. According to him, the South seceded because a few powerful men wanted to keep slavery alive, and they persuaded many others to support their fight against what they saw as Northern interference.

Most farmers and merchants, he writes, had no stake in slavery whatsoever and even less interest in breaking up the country over it. In Savannah, the vast majority of residents did not own slaves. To garner support for slavery, the rich plantation owners who needed slaves to maintain their wealth started a campaign to convince people that if slaves were freed, they would plunder and steal throughout the region.

“It was not the first time in history that a group of radicals had overwhelmed the will of a weak and unfocused majority, nor would it be the last,” writes the author.

For most of the book, Mr. Calonius focuses on the saga of the ship and not the slaves themselves. But one of the most compelling tales comes at the end, when he recounts what happened to Cilucangy, a slave brought over on the Wanderer as a boy.

After the Civil War, Cilucangy worked in Georgia as a basket weaver. Despite his desire to return to Africa as an adult, he failed to amass the necessary funds. He started a family in Georgia, and his descendants include lawyers and teachers.

Margret Higgins, Cilucangy’s great-granddaughter, lives near the Uniondale exit of the Long Island Expressway. Her grandson was named Alexander Cilucangy Valenti, in honor of the courage and resiliency of his forebear. (source: The Washington Times)

Click here to watch author Erik Calonius talk about his book The Wanderer: The Last American Slave Ship and the Conspiracy That Set Its Sails, on C-Span's BookTV.

Georgia's Last Slave Ship The Slave Ship Wanderer

 Jekyll Island

From Golden Isles Georgia, "The Wanderer: Georgia's Last Slave Ship" -- The vessel Wanderer, built as a racing schooner in 1857, instead achieved a notorious record in the brutal and illegal transport of slaves to America.

At 114 feet in length and 234 tons, the Wanderer was built for speed, winning its first regatta off the coast of Brunswick in 1858. Soon after, the vessel was sold to William Corrie of Charleston, SC, who, seeing a profit to be made in the outlawed slave trade, outfitted it for human cargo.

The Wanderer, Georgia's Last Slave Ship

In September of 1858, aided by its owner's trickery and deceit, the Wanderer sailed to the west coast of Africa and took on board some 490 slaves. With the speed to elude capture, the Wanderer reached American waters off Georgia's Cumberland Island and on November 28, 1858, the slave ship sailed into the St. Andrews Sound south of Jekyll Island. On board were roughly 400 enslaved Africans who were illegally imported to the United States in one of the most sensational and controversial moments in Jekyll Island history – and brought the island into the middle of the most heated moment in our country’s history. The captives aboard the slave ship Wanderer, which landed on the south end of Jekyll Island, GA in 1858, were one of the last known groups of enslaved Africans sold into captivity in America. From Jekyll Island, many were sold to South Carolina. Having received a large payment for the slaves (perhaps as much as $600 each), Corrie totally refurbished the vessel and outfitted it as a pleasure craft.

The Wanderer subsequently changed hands; first to Charles Lamar and then to David Martin, both of whom sought to profit by returning the craft to illegal slave-trading. However, the outbreak of the Civil War saw the Wanderer seized by the Union Army and outfitted with deck guns. Her huge fresh water tanks and remarkable speed, once so important to success in transporting slaves, were now used to supply blockade ships and for dispatching urgent messages. After the war, the Wanderer was briefly used in the West Indian fruit trade until she crashed against the rocks of Cape Maisi in Cuba in 1871 and sank.

Today, you can visit The Wanderer Memorial at St. Andrews Picnic Area on the south end of Jekyll Island. This memorial is dedicated to the roughly 400 enslaved Africans who were illegally imported upon the Wanderer to the United States in one of the most controversial moments in Jekyll Island history. (source:  Golden Isles Georgia)

The Slave Ship Wanderer by Tom Jefferson Wells

On November 28, 1858, the Wanderer sailed into the St. Andrews Sound south of Jekyll Island. On board were roughly 400 enslaved Africans who were illegally imported to the United States in one of the most sensational and controversial moments in Jekyll Island history – and brought the island into the middle of the most heated moment in our country’s history.

The Wanderer Memorial includes a sculpture by artist Mario Schambon and three text panels describing this event, the sensational trial of the slave runners, and the fate and legacy of many of the enslaved Africans.

The Wanderer Memorial is located on the southern end of Jekyll Island in the St. Andrews Picnic area. It was dedicated on the 150th Anniversary of the ships landing in 2008. The Wanderer Memorial is made possible by the Jekyll Island Authority and the generosity of the Friends of Historic Jekyll Island. (source: Jekyll Island)

Cornerstone Speech: Vice President Alexander Hamilton Stephens, C.S.A.

Cornerstone Speech by Alexander H. Stephens

Savannah, Georgia, March 21, 1861

When perfect quiet is restored, I shall proceed. I cannot speak so long as there is any noise or confusion. I shall take my time I feel quite prepared to spend the night with you if necessary. I very much regret that everyone who desires cannot hear what I have to say. Not that I have any display to make, or anything very entertaining to present, but such views as I have to give, I wish all, not only in this city, but in this State, and throughout our Confederate Republic, could hear, who have a desire to hear them.

I was remarking that we are passing through one of the greatest revolutions in the annals of the world. Seven States have within the last three months thrown off an old government and formed a new. This revolution has been signally marked, up to this time, by the fact of its having been accomplished without the loss of a single drop of blood.

Alexander Hamilton Stephens (February 11, 1812 – March 4, 1883) was an American politician from Georgia. He was Vice President of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. 

This new constitution. or form of government, constitutes the subject to which your attention will be partly invited. In reference to it, I make this first general remark: it amply secures all our ancient rights, franchises, and liberties. All the great principles of Magna Charta are retained in it. No citizen is deprived of life, liberty, or property, but by the judgment of his peers under the laws of the land. The great principle of religious liberty, which was the honor and pride of the old constitution, is still maintained and secured. All the essentials of the old constitution, which have endeared it to the hearts of the American people, have been preserved and perpetuated. Some changes have been made. Some of these I should have preferred not to have seen made; but other important changes do meet my cordial approbation. They form great improvements upon the old constitution. So, taking the whole new constitution, I have no hesitancy in giving it as my judgment that it is decidedly better than the old.

Stephens County, Georgia, bears his name, as does A. H. Stephens Historic Park, a state park near Crawfordville.

Allow me briefly to allude to some of these improvements. The question of building up class interests, or fostering one branch of industry to the prejudice of another under the exercise of the revenue power, which gave us so much trouble under the old constitution, is put at rest forever under the new. We allow the imposition of no duty with a view of giving advantage to one class of persons, in any trade or business, over those of another. All, under our system, stand upon the same broad principles of perfect equality. Honest labor and enterprise are left free and unrestricted in whatever pursuit they may be engaged. This old thorn of the tariff, which was the cause of so much irritation in the old body politic, is removed forever from the new.

Again, the subject of internal improvements, under the power of Congress to regulate commerce, is put at rest under our system. The power, claimed by construction under the old constitution, was at least a doubtful one; it rested solely upon construction. We of the South, generally apart from considerations of constitutional principles, opposed its exercise upon grounds of its inexpediency and injustice. Notwithstanding this opposition, millions of money, from the common treasury had been drawn for such purposes. Our opposition sprang from no hostility to commerce, or to all necessary aids for facilitating it. With us it was simply a question upon whom the burden should fall. In Georgia, for instance, we have done as much for the cause of internal improvements as any other portion of the country, according to population and means. We have stretched out lines of railroads from the seaboard to the mountains; dug down the hills, and filled up the valleys at a cost of not less than $25,000,000. All this was done to open an outlet for our products of the interior, and those to the west of us, to reach the marts of the world. No State was in greater need of such facilities than Georgia, but we did not ask that these works should be made by appropriations out of the common treasury. The cost of the grading, the superstructure, and the equipment of our roads was borne by those who had entered into the enterprise. Nay, more not only the cost of the iron no small item in the aggregate cost was borne in the same way, but we were compelled to pay into the common treasury several millions of dollars for the privilege of importing the iron, after the price was paid for it abroad. What justice was there in taking this money, which our people paid into the common treasury on the importation of our iron, and applying it to the improvement of rivers and harbors elsewhere? The true principle is to subject the commerce of every locality, to whatever burdens may be necessary to facilitate it. If Charleston harbor needs improvement, let the commerce of Charleston bear the burden. If the mouth of the Savannah river has to be cleared out, let the sea-going navigation which is benefited by it, bear the burden. So with the mouths of the Alabama and Mississippi river. Just as the products of the interior, our cotton, wheat, corn, and other articles, have to bear the necessary rates of freight over our railroads to reach the seas. This is again the broad principle of perfect equality and justice, and it is especially set forth and established in our new constitution.

A portrait of one of Alexander Stephens' slaves

Another feature to which I will allude is that the new constitution provides that cabinet ministers and heads of departments may have the privilege of seats upon the floor of the Senate and House of Representatives and may have the right to participate in the debates and discussions upon the various subjects of administration. I should have preferred that this provision should have gone further, and required the President to select his constitutional advisers from the Senate and House of Representatives. That would have conformed entirely to the practice in the British Parliament, which, in my judgment, is one of the wisest provisions in the British constitution. It is the only feature that saves that government. It is that which gives it stability in its facility to change its administration. Ours, as it is, is a great approximation to the right principle.

A portrait of Alexander Stephens' female slaves.

Under the old constitution, a secretary of the treasury for instance, had no opportunity, save by his annual reports, of presenting any scheme or plan of finance or other matter. He had no opportunity of explaining, expounding, enforcing, or defending his views of policy; his only resort was through the medium of an organ. In the British parliament, the premier brings in his budget and stands before the nation responsible for its every item. If it is indefensible, he falls before the attacks upon it, as he ought to. This will now be the case to a limited extent under our system. In the new constitution, provision has been made by which our heads of departments can speak for themselves and the administration, in behalf of its entire policy, without resorting to the indirect and highly objectionable medium of a newspaper. It is to be greatly hoped that under our system we shall never have what is known as a government organ.

Another change in the constitution relates to the length of the tenure of the presidential office. In the new constitution it is six years instead of four, and the President rendered ineligible for a re-election. This is certainly a decidedly conservative change. It will remove from the incumbent all temptation to use his office or exert the powers confided to him for any objects of personal ambition. The only incentive to that higher ambition which should move and actuate one holding such high trusts in his hands, will be the good of the people, the advancement, prosperity, happiness, safety, honor, and true glory of the confederacy.

Alexander Stephens' Family "Servants" or Family Slaves

But not to be tedious in enumerating the numerous changes for the better, allow me to allude to one other though last, not least. The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution African slavery as it exists amongst us the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with, but the general opinion of the men of that day was that, somehow or other in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the constitution, was the prevailing idea at that time. The constitution, it is true, secured every essential guarantee to the institution while it should last, and hence no argument can be justly urged against the constitutional guarantees thus secured, because of the common sentiment of the day. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the government built upon it fell when the "storm came and the wind blew."

Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth. This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all other truths in the various departments of science. It has been so even amongst us. Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well, that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. The errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago. Those at the North, who still cling to these errors, with a zeal above knowledge, we justly denominate fanatics. All fanaticism springs from an aberration of the mind from a defect in reasoning. It is a species of insanity. One of the most striking characteristics of insanity, in many instances, is forming correct conclusions from fancied or erroneous premises; so with the anti-slavery fanatics. Their conclusions are right if their premises were. They assume that the negro is equal, and hence conclude that he is entitled to equal privileges and rights with the white man. If their premises were correct, their conclusions would be logical and just but their premise being wrong, their whole argument fails. I recollect once of having heard a gentleman from one of the northern States, of great power and ability, announce in the House of Representatives, with imposing effect, that we of the South would be compelled, ultimately, to yield upon this subject of slavery, that it was as impossible to war successfully against a principle in politics, as it was in physics or mechanics. That the principle would ultimately prevail. That we, in maintaining slavery as it exists with us, were warring against a principle, a principle founded in nature, the principle of the equality of men. The reply I made to him was, that upon his own grounds, we should, ultimately, succeed, and that he and his associates, in this crusade against our institutions, would ultimately fail. The truth announced, that it was as impossible to war successfully against a principle in politics as it was in physics and mechanics, I admitted; but told him that it was he, and those acting with him, who were warring against a principle. They were attempting to make things equal which the Creator had made unequal.

In the conflict thus far, success has been on our side, complete throughout the length and breadth of the Confederate States. It is upon this, as I have stated, our social fabric is firmly planted; and I cannot permit myself to doubt the ultimate success of a full recognition of this principle throughout the civilized and enlightened world.

Alexander H. Stephens (1812-1883)

As I have stated, the truth of this principle may be slow in development, as all truths are and ever have been, in the various branches of science. It was so with the principles announced by Galileo it was so with Adam Smith and his principles of political economy. It was so with Harvey, and his theory of the circulation of the blood. It is stated that not a single one of the medical profession, living at the time of the announcement of the truths made by him, admitted them. Now, they are universally acknowledged. May we not, therefore, look with confidence to the ultimate universal acknowledgment of the truths upon which our system rests? It is the first government ever instituted upon the principles in strict conformity to nature, and the ordination of Providence, in furnishing the materials of human society. Many governments have been founded upon the principle of the subordination and serfdom of certain classes of the same race; such were and are in violation of the laws of nature. Our system commits no such violation of nature's laws. With us, all of the white race, however high or low, rich or poor, are equal in the eye of the law. Not so with the negro. Subordination is his place. He, by nature, or by the curse against Canaan, is fitted for that condition which he occupies in our system. The architect, in the construction of buildings, lays the foundation with the proper material-the granite; then comes the brick or the marble. The substratum of our society is made of the material fitted by nature for it, and by experience we know that it is best, not only for the superior, but for the inferior race, that it should be so. It is, indeed, in conformity with the ordinance of the Creator. It is not for us to inquire into the wisdom of His ordinances, or to question them. For His own purposes, He has made one race to differ from another, as He has made "one star to differ from another star in glory." The great objects of humanity are best attained when there is conformity to His laws and decrees, in the formation of governments as well as in all things else. Our confederacy is founded upon principles in strict conformity with these laws. This stone which was rejected by the first builders "is become the chief of the corner" the real "corner-stone" in our new edifice. I have been asked, what of the future? It has been apprehended by some that we would have arrayed against us the civilized world. I care not who or how many they may be against us, when we stand upon the eternal principles of truth, if we are true to ourselves and the principles for which we contend, we are obliged to, and must triumph.

Alexander Hamilton Stephens (Georgia - 1927) and Brigham Young (Utah - 1950)at US Capitol National Statuary Hall, Washington DC

Thousands of people who begin to understand these truths are not yet completely out of the shell; they do not see them in their length and breadth. We hear much of the civilization and Christianization of the barbarous tribes of Africa. In my judgment, those ends will never be attained, but by first teaching them the lesson taught to Adam, that "in the sweat of his brow he should eat his bread," and teaching them to work, and feed, and clothe themselves.

But to pass on: Some have propounded the inquiry whether it is practicable for us to go on with the confederacy without further accessions? Have we the means and ability to maintain nationality among the powers of the earth? On this point I would barely say, that as anxiously as we all have been, and are, for the border States, with institutions similar to ours, to join us, still we are abundantly able to maintain our position, even if they should ultimately make up their minds not to cast their destiny with us. That they ultimately will join us be compelled to do it is my confident belief; but we can get on very well without them, even if they should not.

We have all the essential elements of a high national career. The idea has been given out at the North, and even in the border States, that we are too small and too weak to maintain a separate nationality. This is a great mistake. In extent of territory we embrace five hundred and sixty-four thousand square miles and upward. This is upward of two hundred thousand square miles more than was included within the limits of the original thirteen States. It is an area of country more than double the territory of France or the Austrian empire. France, in round numbers, has but two hundred and twelve thousand square miles. Austria, in round numbers, has two hundred and forty-eight thousand square miles. Ours is greater than both combined. It is greater than all France, Spain, Portugal, and Great Britain, including England, Ireland, and Scotland, together. In population we have upward of five millions, according to the census of 1860; this includes white and black. The entire population, including white and black, of the original thirteen States, was less than four millions in 1790, and still less in 76, when the independence of our fathers was achieved. If they, with a less population, dared maintain their independence against the greatest power on earth, shall we have any apprehension of maintaining ours now?

In point of material wealth and resources, we are greatly in advance of them. The taxable property of the Confederate States cannot be less than twenty-two hundred millions of dollars! This, I think I venture but little in saying, may be considered as five times more than the colonies possessed at the time they achieved their independence. Georgia, alone, possessed last year, according to the report of our comptroller-general, six hundred and seventy-two millions of taxable property. The debts of the seven confederate States sum up in the aggregate less than eighteen millions, while the existing debts of the other of the late United States sum up in the aggregate the enormous amount of one hundred and seventy-four millions of dollars. This is without taking into account the heavy city debts, corporation debts, and railroad debts, which press, and will continue to press, as a heavy incubus upon the resources of those States. These debts, added to others, make a sum total not much under five hundred millions of dollars. With such an area of territory as we have-with such an amount of population-with a climate and soil unsurpassed by any on the face of the earth-with such resources already at our command-with productions which control the commerce of the world-who can entertain any apprehensions as to our ability to succeed, whether others join us or not?

It is true, I believe I state but the common sentiment, when I declare my earnest desire that the border States should join us. The differences of opinion that existed among us anterior to secession, related more to the policy in securing that result by co-operation than from any difference upon the ultimate security we all looked to in common.

These differences of opinion were more in reference to policy than principle, and as Mr. Jefferson said in his inaugural, in 1801, after the heated contest preceding his election, that there might be differences of opinion without differences on principle, and that all, to some extent, had been Federalists and all Republicans; so it may now be said of us, that whatever differences of opinion as to the best policy in having a co-operation with our border sister slave States, if the worst came to the worst, that as we were all co-operationists, we are now all for independence, whether they come or not.

In this connection I take this occasion to state, that I was not without grave and serious apprehensions, that if the worst came to the worst, and cutting loose from the old government should be the only remedy for our safety and security, it would be attended with much more serious ills than it has been as yet. Thus far we have seen none of those incidents which usually attend revolutions. No such material as such convulsions usually throw up has been seen. Wisdom, prudence, and patriotism, have marked every step of our progress thus far. This augurs well for the future, and it is a matter of sincere gratification to me, that I am enabled to make the declaration. Of the men I met in the Congress at Montgomery, I may be pardoned for saying this, an abler, wiser, a more conservative, deliberate, determined, resolute, and patriotic body of men, I never met in my life. Their works speak for them; the provisional government speaks for them; the constitution of the permanent government will be a lasting monument of their worth, merit, and statesmanship.

But to return to the question of the future. What is to be the result of this revolution?

Will every thing, commenced so well, continue as it has begun? In reply to this anxious inquiry, I can only say it all depends upon ourselves. A young man starting out in life on his majority, with health, talent, and ability, under a favoring Providence, may be said to be the architect of his own fortunes. His destinies are in his own hands. He may make for himself a name, of honor or dishonor, according to his own acts. If he plants himself upon truth, integrity, honor and uprightness, with industry, patience and energy, he cannot fail of success. So it is with us. We are a young republic, just entering upon the arena of nations; we will be the architects of our own fortunes. Our destiny, under Providence, is in our own hands. With wisdom, prudence, and statesmanship on the part of our public men, and intelligence, virtue and patriotism on the part of the people, success, to the full measures of our most sanguine hopes, may be looked for. But if unwise counsels prevail if we become divided if schisms arise if dissentions spring up if factions are engendered if party spirit, nourished by unholy personal ambition shall rear its hydra head, I have no good to prophesy for you. Without intelligence, virtue, integrity, and patriotism on the part of the people, no republic or representative government can be durable or stable.

We have intelligence, and virtue, and patriotism. All that is required is to cultivate and perpetuate these. Intelligence will not do without virtue. France was a nation of philosophers. These philosophers become Jacobins. They lacked that virtue, that devotion to moral principle, and that patriotism which is essential to good government Organized upon principles of perfect justice and right-seeking amity and friendship with all other powers-I see no obstacle in the way of our upward and onward progress. Our growth, by accessions from other States, will depend greatly upon whether we present to the world, as I trust we shall, a better government than that to which neighboring States belong. If we do this, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas cannot hesitate long; neither can Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri. They will necessarily gravitate to us by an imperious law. We made ample provision in our constitution for the admission of other States; it is more guarded, and wisely so, I think, than the old constitution on the same subject, but not too guarded to receive them as fast as it may be proper. Looking to the distant future, and, perhaps, not very far distant either, it is not beyond the range of possibility, and even probability, that all the great States of the north-west will gravitate this way, as well as Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, Arkansas, etc. Should they do so, our doors are wide enough to receive them, but not until they are ready to assimilate with us in principle.

The process of disintegration in the old Union may be expected to go on with almost absolute certainty if we pursue the right course. We are now the nucleus of a growing power which, if we are true to ourselves, our destiny, and high mission, will become the controlling power on this continent. To what extent accessions will go on in the process of time, or where it will end, the future will determine. So far as it concerns States of the old Union, this process will be upon no such principles of reconstruction as now spoken of, but upon reorganization and new assimilation. Such are some of the glimpses of the future as I catch them.

But at first we must necessarily meet with the inconveniences and difficulties and embarrassments incident to all changes of government. These will be felt in our postal affairs and changes in the channel of trade. These inconveniences, it is to be hoped, will be but temporary, and must be borne with patience and forbearance.

As to whether we shall have war with our late confederates, or whether all matters of differences between us shall be amicably settled, I can only say that the prospect for a peaceful adjustment is better, so far as I am informed, than it has been. The prospect of war is, at least, not so threatening as it has been. The idea of coercion, shadowed forth in President Lincoln's inaugural, seems not to be followed up thus far so vigorously as was expected. Fort Sumter, it is believed, will soon be evacuated. What course will be pursued toward Fort Pickens, and the other forts on the gulf, is not so well understood. It is to be greatly desired that all of them should be surrendered. Our object is peace, not only with the North, but with the world. All matters relating to the public property, public liabilities of the Union when we were members of it, we are ready and willing to adjust and settle upon the principles of right, equity, and good faith. War can be of no more benefit to the North than to us. Whether the intention of evacuating Fort Sumter is to be received as an evidence of a desire for a peaceful solution of our difficulties with the United States, or the result of necessity, I will not undertake to say. I would feign hope the former. Rumors are afloat, however, that it is the result of necessity. All I can say to you, therefore, on that point is, keep your armor bright and your powder dry.

The original Confederate Cabinet. L-R: Judah P. Benjamin, Stephen Mallory, Christopher Memminger, Alexander Stephens, LeRoy Pope Walker, Jefferson Davis, John H. Reagan and Robert Toombs.

The surest way to secure peace, is to show your ability to maintain your rights. The principles and position of the present administration of the United States the republican party present some puzzling questions. While it is a fixed principle with them never to allow the increase of a foot of slave territory, they seem to be equally determined not to part with an inch "of the accursed soil." Notwithstanding their clamor against the institution, they seemed to be equally opposed to getting more, or letting go what they have got. They were ready to fight on the accession of Texas, and are equally ready to fight now on her secession. Why is this? How can this strange paradox be accounted for? There seems to be but one rational solution and that is, notwithstanding their professions of humanity, they are disinclined to give up the benefits they derive from slave labor. Their philanthropy yields to their interest. The idea of enforcing the laws, has but one object, and that is a collection of the taxes, raised by slave labor to swell the fund necessary to meet their heavy appropriations. The spoils is what they are after though they come from the labor of the slave

That as the admission of States by Congress under the constitution was an act of legislation, and in the nature of a contract or compact between the States admitted and the others admitting, why should not this contract or compact be regarded as of like character with all other civil contracts liable to be rescinded by mutual agreement of both parties? The seceding States have rescinded it on their part, they have resumed their sovereignty. Why cannot the whole question be settled, if the north desire peace, simply by the Congress, in both branches, with the concurrence of the President, giving their consent to the separation, and a recognition of our independence?Source: Henry Cleveland, Alexander H. Stephens, in Public and Private: With Letters and Speeches, Before, During, and Since the War (Philadelphia, 1886), pp. 717-729.

British Tourist Visits The Low Country of Savannah and Charleston

From the UK Telegraph Travel section, by Nigel Richardson, on 27 August 2008: "American south: A black and white story: Behind the elegant facades of Savannah and Charleston lies the ugliness of slavery. Nigel Richardson hears a neglected view of history."

It was raining so hard in Savannah, Georgia, that the patrolmen of the Chatham County Sheriff’s Department wore plastic covers on their wide-brimmed hats. Noisy cones of white water geysered from sawn-off drainpipes, turning trousers into litmus paper, and the horse-drawn carriages remained stabled all day.

With its 18th-century squares and disconcerting air of England — an England twice filtered, through time and climate, into a tropical Georgiana — Savannah is one of the finest American cities to walk round. Finest cities anywhere to see on foot, come to that. But not today. Today was for indoors.

Off Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard, we stumbled into the Ralph Mark Gilbert Civil Rights Museum, shook down our raincoats and requested the restrooms (all that rain). But the WCs weren’t marked “Men” and “Women”. The signs on the doors said “White only” and “Coloured only”, which left us, two white-faced Europeans, red-faced and dumbfounded. This was the intended effect.

The history of black America — for white people at least — has always run on parallel, all-but-invisible tracks to the history promulgated in guidebooks and mainstream museums. Sure, we've heard of Dr King. But when white people come to beautiful Savannah and its Grace Kelly-like sister, Charleston, across the state line in South Carolina, they look for, and are fed, the history of white people.

These are embodied in the architecture, older and better preserved than that of most British cities. Savannah and Charleston are two of the oldest settlements in the United States, founded in 1733 and 1670 respectively. The adventurers who made fortunes here — in many cases on the back of slavery — built big and bold, borrowing from Europe and sticking knobs on: sweeping steps, deep porches, wrought-iron scrollwork and pillars like the Parthenon. There are knot gardens — the one at the Davenport House in Savannah was designed by Penelope Hobhouse — and magnolias, and climate completes the heady effect by draping swooning arms of Spanish moss from branch and balcony.

We loved walking in Savannah and Charleston, spotting, through tropical tangle, the ghostly cousins of a Chelsea mews or a Brighton seafront terrace, reading heritage plaques on reconditioned façades and visitors’ books in hallways that smelled of floor polish. (In the Eighties, at the Green-Meldrin House in Savannah, Mrs Thatcher had signed herself, with uncharacteristic wit, “A representative of the former colonial power”.)

It’s just that in a part of America with a significant black population, and in a year when the American people may just elect their first African-American as president, it felt timely to discover some neglected narratives and points of view. In the institutionally racist days of the Deep South, for example, when every aspect of life was segregated, from shops to drinking fountains, Savannah had “one of the most significant and effective civil rights movements in the US,” according to the curator in the civil rights museum, Heru Iman.

“It was the youth here in the Sixties who integrated Savannah — sitting in at the lunch counters, demonstrating, kneeling outside white churches praying to be let in,” he told us. Activists fanned out from the basement of the First African Baptist Church in Montgomery Street carrying out “wade-ins” at whites-only beaches and boycotting racist stores. The civil rights museum features a re-creation of the lunch counter at Levy’s department store — a particular target for protesters — in which a white waitress advises a black customer, “We don’t serve your kind here”.

The nerve centre of these protests, the First African Baptist Church, claims to have the oldest black congregation in North America, dating from 1775. The present church was completed in 1859 (having been built at night because during the day the men had to work in the cotton plantations).

Our “conductor” on a tour was a shy and proud young man called Johnnie McDonald. “Martin Luther King, Jesse Jackson and Coretta Scott King [Dr King’s widow] have all preached in that pulpit,” he said. In the balcony he pointed out scratch marks on the ends of some pews that were built by slaves in the late 1700s. For many years these marks were a puzzle, but it is now thought they may be cursive Hebrew. “The slaves who came from [West] Africa knew that language,” said Johnnie.

In the basement of the church he indicated a series of holes in the wooden floor and explained that they were part of the “underground railroad”, the network of routes by which runaway slaves were spirited to freedom. “These are air holes, so they could breathe,” he said. “There’s only four feet of crawling space. You’d crawl from here and exit by the Savannah River [a quarter of a mile away].”

There are 36 sets of these holes and they are configured in the same pattern, a combination of cross and diamond which Johnnie described as a “Congo cosmogram” — another link with the West African ancestry of Savannah’s slaves.

That ancestry has survived to a surprising extent in the marshy maze of islands and causeways known as the Lowcountry, which separates Savannah from Charleston, 100 miles up the coast. Here many descendants of West African slaves and plantation labourers continue to speak Gullah, which is a mixture of English and West African words (the word Gullah is also used to mean the culture of the people who speak it).

On St Helena Island, in the heart of the Lowcountry, is the Penn Centre Historic District, a campus of former school buildings where freed slaves once studied and which Martin Luther King used as a retreat in the Sixties. Nearby we ate lunch in a plain shack called Gullah Grub, which serves authentic Lowcountry food — catfish, crab, shrimp — using old African-influenced recipes.

Shrimp gumbo — knocked back with ”swampwater”, homemade lemonade served in jam jars — hit the spot and we were soon back on Highway 17 and barrelling into the antique Manhattan that is the Charleston historic district, squeezed between the Cooper and Ashley Rivers. The rain had passed, leaving bright sunshine on stucco facades and weatherboard porches. The suits of wedding revellers — there were many — left mothball whiffs on the humid air.

It is beautiful and affluent even now, but in the 1700s Charleston was the richest city in the United States. It was also the country’s biggest slave port and the city’s wealthy white merchants used their slaves to ape the imagined lifestyles of English aristocrats.

One of the architectural highlights of Charleston is the Aiken-Rhett House, a vast antebellum confection of pillared porches that was once the home of William Aiken, a rice planter. The house has scarcely changed since 1858, which means that the slave quarters, a handful of cubicle rooms situated above kitchen and stables, are intact.

The family owned 800 slaves, of whom between 10 and 20 worked and lived in the house (these included one Dorcas Richardson, her husband and five children). In the vast living rooms of the house, there were ciphers of bygone ways of thinking and behaving: a set of Sir Walter Scott’s Waverley novels in the library; a harp standing in the middle of the old ballroom, whose red fabric wallpaper had faded to the colour of dried blood.

These southern ways were not to last. “Blacks knew that once the [civil] war started, they were on their way to freedom,” said Al Miller into the microphone of his minibus. Al, smartly turned out in checked linen trousers and white shirt, runs Sites and Insights Tours around the Charleston area, acquainting black visitors with the often invisible history of their people. As the only whites on his minibus tour, we were swept up in this different perspective.

First, he drove us south-west, off the peninsula, to James Island. “During slavery there were over 20 plantations here,” he said. We passed the Macleod Plantation where the wooden, white-painted slave quarters, standing on brick stilts, have been preserved. Here slaves grew sea-island cotton, indigo, okra and sweet potatoes and lived on grits, shrimp and gravy.

“It was the black people’s dish, the poor people’s dish,” said Al. “You ever paid an arm and a leg for it?” The rest of the bus shook their heads and laughed in agreement.

In the early 1930s George Gershwin spent time on James Island, absorbing a history and atmosphere that inspired him to write Porgy and Bess. His folk opera, including Summertime and It Ain’t Necessarily So, was based on the novel Porgy by the Charleston writer, DuBose Heyward. Driving past the old plantations — avenues of live oak trees mark where the driveways were — Al got the bus rocking and clapping by enacting the Porgy and Bess story in a kind of baritone rap: “Here comes Bess/ a slut in a red dress/ She was selling holy dust which was like cocaine/ She kept it in her girdle, she kept her money in her bosom/ She was not well liked...”

We got off the bus at James Island Presbyterian Church, where there are two cemeteries — one for black folk, one for white — separated by shrubbery. “It’s like day and night,” said Al. In the black section is the grave of Samuel Smalls, “the goat man”, upon whom DuBose Heyward based the character of Porgy. In honour of Gershwin’s Jewishness, visitors had placed stones on the top of Smalls’s headstone.

“A lot of Gullah cheechee [people] are superstitious when it comes to cemeteries,” said Al. “If you point your finger at a tombstone, it will rot off. Don’t bring cemetery dirt into your car on your shoes. Where did these things come from? Africa.”

James Island Presbyterian Church

Back on the historic peninsula, we cruised the golden streets. But Al screened out the antebellum and Greek revival mansions, the city’s architectural setpieces, pointing out instead the alleys, lanes and courts once lived in by poor blacks. We passed 78 Church St, where Heyward was living when he wrote Porgy, and Catfish Row, which features in the novel and opera and would now fit seamlessly into a discreet corner of Knightsbridge. “Once this was a rundown slum area,” said Al. “Catfish Row was a black tenement. Especially when Porgy was written. Not any more.”

As he drove, Al told us things that white people would rather not think about. “The average black man sold for between 800 and 1,200 dollars, which was a lot of money,” he said. “Women were made to have 10 or 15 children. They were made to have sex blindfold by the slave owners and had multiple partners.”

Jenkins Orphan Band

One of our last ports of call was in Franklin Street where we paused outside the site of the Jenkins Orphanage. Here, in the 1920s, the resident band drew on Gullah rhythms and dance steps to invent the tune and dance craze that became known as The Charleston. A plaque marks the site of the orphanage but doesn’t mention The Charleston, let alone make Al Miller’s point that “they started it here. The white folk just stole it from us.” (source: UK Telegraph)