Gazaway B. Lamar to Howell Cobb.
Bank of the Republic,
New York, Apl. 13, 1861.
Dr. Sir: We have just learned by telegram of the bombardment and surrender of Fort Sumter.
Strange as it may seem to you, it is true that the people of this city who have professed to sympathise with the South have recently changed their expressions to hostility, some for one cause and some for another, and more so since the fleet left a week ago for Charleston. Even many influential Democrats have changed and there are very few reliable. The masses may feel differently, but they are led by a few corrupt, spoils-seeking rascals, and will go with them for or against the South as they may be led.
You may calculate that you may have to fight out and fight long too. And Prest. Davis should enlist and accept all the Volunteers he can from Kentucky and the other border States—which will incline all of each State that way. . . .
The Constitution ought on many considerations to be submitted to the vote of the people
1st. In order to clinch the people to its support through evil as well as good report.
2nd. To convince the world how unanimously it would be sustained.
3rd. To stop the mouths of the Republicans, who insist you dare not do it because the people are against you.
4th. It will give your friends ground to act upon to show that the people are with you and that so immense a majority of the people ought to rule, as these very Republicans are contending for in regard to Italy, Hungary, etc. etc.
5th. To convince the people of the North of the magnitude of the difficulty they will have to contend with when they make war upon you.
I am afraid you will find an elephant in Texas. She will cost more than she is worth, unless old Houston is hanged. And the Indians are so troublesome it will bankrupt the Confederacy to keep them off. And I still incline to the opinion that the Fedl. Govt, are sending most of its forces to Texas under an invitation from old Houston and under the pretext of defending her, but mainly to make war on the Confederacy; and in that they show more wisdom than in sending to Charleston, your strongest point of defence and most easily defended.
I hope Fort Pickens is reduced ere this also—there is no use in waiting; after you are once ready go ahead. Forbearance for 3 months is not appreciated here now because you did not allow 10 men to remain in Fort Sumter, as though there was such a difference in principle between 10 and 70. They even said you ought to have allowed provisions to be thrown into it and have waited ! ! ! Then they would have put 500 men into it unless you resisted ; and if you did the answers were ready. The state of Virginia will not vote to go out by the present convention,—it was elected as Union and it will remain so. Maryland will cost more than it will be worth, and Delaware is not worth having. The contest for the Capital would involve the whole North in the contest on a sentiment of honor, falsely so called., and would cause a war of years. Let Maryland, Delaware and Missouri go. Get Virginia if she will bring her forts in her own possession but don’t let her expect you to take them for her. With N. Carolina, Tennessee, Arkansas and Kentucky you can spare all the rest. There will be an advantage in many ways in having some slave border States between you and the North. It will keep your negroes safer and the way the North will deal with them will show your people what they have escaped.
The South cannot prepare too largely and efficiently for war. It will be the best means of insuring peace, or if needs must come, in defending your homes. I do not sympathise with any movement, or even a threat, against the capital or the North. Let your policy be exclusively and strictly on the defensive. Let every orator and every newspaper proclaim defence and by no means provoke aggression. When the North see that you will fight on your own soil and are ready to do it, and mean to confine yourselves to it, the}^ will reasonably conclude it is better to let you alone.
The rumors here are that the Harriet Lane has been sunk at Charleston; I am sure it is entitled to credit.
This failure of Lincoln on Charleston, made contrary to Genl. Scott’s advice and military science, will damage the Administration, and if Pickens falls too he will forfeit the confidence of all sensible men.
From Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1911.
Gazaway Bugg Lamar (1798-1874) was an American merchant in cotton and shipping in Savannah, Georgia, and a steamboat pioneer. He was the first to use a prefabricated iron steamboat on local rivers, which was a commercial success. In 1846 he moved to New York City for business, where in 1850 he founded the Bank of the Republic on Wall Street and served as its president. He served both Southern businesses and state governments. After the start of the American Civil War, Lamar returned to Savannah, where he became active in banking and supporting the war effort in several ways. With associates, he founded the Importing and Exporting Company of Georgia, which operated blockade runners.
Lamar and Cobb were cousins by marriage.
Howell Cobb was an American political figure. A southern Democrat, Cobb was a five-term member of the United States House of Representatives and Speaker of the House from 1849 to 1851. He also served as the 40th Governor of Georgia and as a Secretary of the Treasury under President James Buchanan. Cobb is, however, probably best known as one of the founders of the Confederacy, having served as the President of the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States.