January 4, 1861

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Report of Capt. Jesse L. Reno, U. S. Ordnance Department, Of the seizure of Mount Vernon Arsenal

MOUNT VERNON ARSENAL, January 4, 1861

SIR: I have the honor to inform you that this arsenal was taken possession of by four companies of volunteers from Mobile at daylight this morning. I did not make, nor could I have made, any resistance, as they had scaled the walls and taken possession before I knew anything about the movement.

The governor has demanded all the public property, and his men now have entire possession of the arsenal ...

The men have not been paid, and I fear that now there, is no prospect of it at present.

I shall probably leave here by the 11th instant, unless I should receive other orders. As it was impossible for me to hold this place with my seventeen men, I trust that the Department will not hold me responsible for this unexpected catastrophe.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

J. L. RENO,
Captain, Ordnance.

Capt. Wm. MAYNADIER, Ordnance Office

http://www.simmonsgames.com/research/authors/USWarDept/ORA/OR-S1-V01-C003.html#r2

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1. The President's reply to South Carolina (Richmond Daily Dispatch | January 4, 1861)

On Monday, after three o'clock, the reply was addressed to the Hons. Barnwell, Orr and Adams, and delivered by the President's Secretary.

The President approved the conduct of Maj. Anderson, on the ground that be had tangible evidence of the intention, on the part of the South Carolinians, to seize and occupy Fort Sumter. Subsequently disclosures have satisfied those well informed, that such was the intention. Once in occupancy of SumterMajor Anderson would have been powerless and at the mercy of the Carolinians. No reinforcement of Fort Moultrie could have been made effectual for the recovery of Fort Sumter.

Major Anderson, being in command, took a military view, and anticipated the South Carolinians by proceeding to the stronghold they coveted under the cover of the night. Upon these considerations, the President also refused to interfere for the withdrawal of the United States forces, saying, "This I cannot do, and I will not do."

He also announced his firm determination to collect the revenues, and that the property now in the occupancy of the troops of South Carolina must be restored. The seizure of the United States Arsenal he deems a high-handed outrage.

http://imls.richmond.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=ddr;cc=ddr;view=text;idno=ddr0055.0019.004;rgn=div4;node=ddr0055.0019.004:3.1.1.4

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2. THE PRESIDENT'S FAST ... PREACHED IN THE BROADWAY TABERNACLE CHURCH ...

.. The morality of this Fast-Day recommendation is more elevated than that of the first Message of the same high functionary, in 1851, declaring that the right of property in slaves then in Kansas, was guaranteed under the Constitution of the United States ; and defending the notorious attempt to force upon that territory a Pro-slavery Constitution, devised by fraud and maintained by armed invasion, with the whole force of the Federal Government upon the side of perjury and violence. And, lastly, the tone of this recommendation is quite above the morality of the recent Message of the President, imputing- the prevalent discontent, and the threatened destruction of the Union, " to the long-continued and intemperate interference of the northern people with the question of Slavery in the Southern States." The Presidential lesson for to-day is pitched on quite another key. Instead of a plea for stealing Cuba ; for legitimating human chattelism in the territories ; for imposing Slavery upon Kansas by armed ruffians and perjured voters ; for the vigorous enforcement of negro-catching, as the only means of preserving the Union from revolutionary resistance — instead of such topics which have formed the staple of our Presidential literature for the past four years, we have now a document which distinctly traces the "present distracted and dangerous condition of the country" to the " crimes and follies" of the nation, not excluding its Executive head ; and which seeks a remedy for this calamity and peril, not in the old specific of stealing negroes, whether in Cuba, Kansas, or New York, not by interpolating Fugitive Slave Laws and Dred Scott decisions into the Constitution, but by confessing individual and national sins, by abandoning any " false pride or opinion which would impel us to persevere in wrong," by acknowledging the evils we suffer to be "a just punishment" from our Heavenly Father ; and of course, if we are not hypocrites — though the President forgets to say this — by openly renouncing and forsaking the crimes and follies that have brought us to this hour of danger.

It seems a long way from the pirate's creed issued at Ostend, and the buccaneering manifestoes against Kansas, to the Calvinistic humility and dependence of our Fast-Day lesson. Yet there is a logical connection between these extremes ; the crime meditated against Cuba, the blood raid upon Kansas, an almost unbroken course of public injustice and wrong pursued in the interest of Slavery, have necessitated the marked judgments of Jehovah; and these have startled the mummified consciences of public functionaries into an energy all the more terrific, because so long restrained. The handwriting is seen upon the wall, and the knees smite together ...

http://www.archive.org/stream/presidentsfastdi5337thom/presidentsfastdi5337thom_djvu.txt

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3. Claiborne Fox Jackson’s inauguration as governor of Missouri

<Richmond Daily Dispatch>

St. Louis,Jan. 4–Governor Jackson’s inaugural address was almost exclusively devoted to the discussion of Federal relations.–He says the destiny of the slaveholding States are identical, and Missouri would best consult her own interests and the interests of the whole country by a timely declaration of her determination to stand by her sister slaveholding States, in whose wrongs she participates and with whose institutions her people sympathize.

Missouri will remain in the Union so long as there is a hope of maintaining the guarantees of the Constitution; but it the Northern States are determined to put the slaveholding States on the footing of inequality, by preventing the entrance of slaves into the Territories; admitting no more slave States; or persisting in nullifying or perverting the Constitution in reference to slave property, then they themselves practically abandon the Union, and cannot expect the South to submit to such a Government ...

http://gathkinsons.net/sesqui/?p=1765

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4. Staunton Vindicator

The Vindicator commences its seventeenth year in existence with this issue ... Where Virginia leads there will we follow to victory or to death. With her glorious motto, "sic semper tyrannis," streaming in the breeze, we will join in resisting an oppression more odious than that of George the Third, and crushing out a despotic fanaticism as repulsive as the Spanish Inquisition ...

The Legislature of Virginia meets in extra session on Monday next, the 7th inst. In no period of the history of the country has a deliberative body been called upon to consider graver, or more important and stirring events than those that will be presented to the General Assembly of Virginia during its present session. Among its first duties will be to call a State Convention, and take efficient steps towards thoroughly arming the State ...

http://valley.lib.virginia.edu/news/rv1861/va.au.rv.1861.01.04.xml#02

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5. Diary of Rutherford B. Hayes

January 4, 1861.—South Carolina has passed a secession ordinance, and Federal laws are set at naught in the State. Overt acts enough have been committed. Forts and arsenal taken, a revenue cutter seized, and Major Anderson besieged in Fort Sumter. Other cotton States are about to follow. Disunion and civil war are at hand; and yet I fear disunion and war less than compromise. We can recover from them. The free States alone, if we must go on alone, will make a glorious nation. Twenty millions in the temperate zone, stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, full of vigor, industry, inventive genius, educated, and moral; increasing by immigration rapidly, and, above all, free—all free—will form a confederacy of twenty States scarcely inferior in real power to the unfortunate Union of thirty-three States which we had on the first of November. I do not even feel gloomy when I look forward. The reality is less frightful than the apprehension which we have all had these many years. Let us be temperate, calm, and just, but firm and resolute ...

http://dotcw.com/rutherford-b-hayes/

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6. ADVERTISER (2/1) THE GOVERNOR’S ADDRESS

Mr. Washburn was inaugurated to-day, and delivered his address. His allusions to national questions were received with frequent applause: “….The history of the past shows, that no concessions will be accepted as satisfactory which do not secure to the slaves States the rights of expansion and protection to their peculiar property, under the Federal Constitution. This is what they believe they need, and this alone will satisfy them. I believe that I speak the voice of every true, brave, and conservative man in the North, when I say that such concessions cannot be made …

http://www.maine.gov/civilwar/calendar/january1861.html

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7. “Danger of the Capital,” Chicago (IL) Tribune

The telegraph brings further assurances of the existence of a secret military organization, whose purpose is the seizure of the national capitol before the fourth of March next ... http://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/34767