Crawfordville [Ga.], Nov. 8th, 1860.
Dear Smith, I got home Sunday night last—was here at the election. Taliaferro County did well; but the State I fear has gone for Breckinridge by the popular vote. The old Eighth is all right, I feel confident. I have just heard that Judge Andrews[i] has been elected to fill Irwin’s place in the House of Rep. in our State Legislature. This shows that Wilkes county does not endorse the course of the seceders at Charleston and Baltimore. I see by the papers received this morning that Lincoln is elected President. It does not surprise me in the least. I have been expecting it ever since the burst up at Baltimore, as you know very well. What is to be the result I cannot tell. We shall I apprehend have trouble. The people here are taken greatly by surprise at the result. They did not anticipate it and thought I was only indulging in unnecessary apprehensions when I told them months ago how it would most probably be. I have never been disappointed in a Presidential election since 1840. I do not feel so much oppressed in spirits at the result now actually upon us as I did months ago in looking forward to it. But enough of this. I got your letter enclosing the States and Union with extract of my letter to you. I should have preferred that you had only given the first part and omitted that which spoke of my reasons for the course I was taking. The first part would have answered the misrepresentation of my position. But the whole makes no difference. The truth seldom does any harm; and in this case I have been actuated from the beginning by disinterested patriotism looking to the safety, peace, security and best interest of the whole country. I can say no more. Let me hear from you often.
[i] Judge Garnett Andrews, of Washington, Ga., was one of the most thoroughgoing unionists in the State.
From Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1911.
Alexander Hamilton Stephens was an American politician who served as the vice president of the Confederate States from 1861 to 1865. After serving in both houses of the Georgia General Assembly, he won election to Congress, taking his seat in 1843. After the Civil War, he returned to Congress in 1873, serving to 1882 when he was elected as the 50th Governor of Georgia, serving there from late 1882 until his death in 1883.
J. Henley Smith was a Georgia journalist.