February 1, 1861; The New York Herald
WASHINGTON, Jan. 31, 1861.
Colonel Hayne has been engaged today in preparing a letter to the President in regard to affairs at Charleston. This document will contain the ultimatum of South Carolina, which is understood to be the unconditional surrender of that fort to the authorities of South Carolina.
Colonel H. had been instructed to make this demand when he first arrived here, but was dissuaded by leading Southern men to withdraw it. The demand is now reiterated in the most positive terms, and will be laid before the President tomorrow in Colonel Hayne’s communication.
A rumor was very current this evening, that Fort Sumter had been assaulted and captured by the South Carolina troops. It could be traced to no reliable source. News of such an event, however, would not any moment create unusual surprise here. The plan of attack, as divulged, is to dismantle schooners and convert them into floats, load them with cotton bales, and, the vessels being towed under the walls of the fort, the cotton bags are to be piled one upon another until a sufficient height is reached to enable the scaling parties in multitudes to ascend the walls. It is believed that the fort can be taken by this process at less sacrifice of life than by any other means.
The friends of the Union are much discouraged by the news from Pensacola and Charleston. A collision is imminent, and the fear is it has already occurred. Once began, it is idle to talk of compromise. Whatever may have been the criminal folly that prompted the attack, the appalling consequences are to precipitate at once all the central slave States into the vortex of revolution. Whatsoever may have been the outrage perpetrated, they can never permit federal troops to avenge the fate of their comrades without themselves becoming partners in the melee.
The policy now talked of among leading Union men is to call on the President to evacuate Fort Sumter and Fort Pickens, and thus remove all the opportunity for the seceding States inaugurating civil war, and carrying off the central States with them. This course will save the Union, as it is now certain that none of these States can be voted out except by the application of some such unnatural stimulus as a fight at the South between State and federal troops.
The President is known to be opposed to the withdrawal of the troops, but the representations that will be made to him by many true men at the South, and to avoid civil war, it is thought by many he may be induced to do it.