An Affair is an Ugly Thing
By November of 1861 the war in America had been going on for seven months. Most in Richmond knew that the only real way that the Confederacy could defeat the US & gain its independence was through diplomatic or military intervention by Britain, France, or both. To try & obtain diplomatic recognition & support for their cause the Confederate diplomats James Mason & John Slidell were to be sent to Europe to try & achieve just that.
The Union steam frigate the USS San Jacinto, commanded by Captain Charles Wilkes, arrived in St. Thomas on October 13. San Jacinto had cruised off the African coast for nearly a month before setting course westward with orders to join a U.S. Navy force preparing to attack Port Royal, South Carolina. However in St. Thomas, Wilkes learned that the Confederate raider CSS Sumter had captured three U.S. merchant ships nea Cienfuegos in July. Wilkes headed there, despite the unlikelihood that Sumter would have remained in the area. In Cienfuegos he learned from a newspaper that Mason and Slidell were scheduled to leave Havana on November 7 in the British mail packet RMS Trent, bound first for St. Thomas and then England. He realized that the ship would need to use the narrow Bahama Channel, the only deep water route between Cuba and the shallow Grand Bahama Bank.
Trent left on November 7 as scheduled, with Mason, Slidell, their secretaries, and Slidell's wife and children aboard. Just as Wilkes had predicted, Trent passed through Bahama Channel, where San Jacinto was waiting. Around noon on November 8, lookouts aboard the San Jacinto spotted Trent, which unfurled the Union Jack as it neared. San Jacinto then fired a shot across the bow of Trent, which Captain James Moir of Trent ignored. San Jacinto fired a second shot from her forward pivot gun which landed right in front of Trent. The Trent continued to ignore & tried to evade the San Jacinto. A third shot was then fired that disabled the Trent.
With armed guards in tow Wilkes second in command Lieutenant DM. Fairfax then boarded the Trent from a cutter. Fairfax, certain that Wilkes was creating an international incident and not wanting to enlarge its scope, ordered his armed escort to remain in the cutter. Upon boarding, Fairfax was escorted to an outraged Captain Moir, and announced that he had orders "to arrest Mr. Mason and Mr. Slidell and their secretaries, and send them prisoners on board the United States war vessel nearby." The crew and passengers then threatened Lieutenant Fairfax, and the armed party in the two cutters beside Trent responded to the threats by climbing aboard to protect him. Captain Moir refused Fairfax's request for a passenger list, but Slidell and Mason came forward and identified themselves. With armed guards now on board fairfax was able to search of the vessel for contraband of which none could be found.
International law required that when "contraband" was discovered on a ship, the ship should be taken to the nearest prize court for adjudication. While Fairfax argued against this since transferring crew from San Jacinto to the Trent would leave San Jacinto dangerously undermanned, this was Wilkes' determination & the Trent was taken in tow.
The news of the actual capture of the Trent did not arrive in London until November 27. Much of the public and many of the newspapers immediately perceived it as an outrageous insult to British honor, a flagrant violation of maritime law, & an act of war. The London Standard saw the capture as "but one of a series of premeditated blows aimed at this country … to involve it in a war with the Northern States." A letter from an American visitor written to Seward declared, "The people are frantic with rage, and were the country polled I fear 999 men out of 1,000 would declare for immediate war." A member of Parliament stated that unless America set matters right the British flag should "be torn into shreds and sent to Washington for use of the Presidential water-closets."
Dispatches from Lyons were given to all in attendance. These dispatches described the excitement in America in support of the capture, referred to previous dispatches in which Lyons had warned that Seward might provoke such an incident, and described the difficulty that the United States might have in acknowledging that Wilkes had erred. Lyons also recommended a show of force including sending reinforcements to Canada. Palmerston indicated to Lord Russell that it was very possible that the entire incident had been a "deliberate and premeditated insult" designed by Seward to "provoke" a confrontation with Britain. After several days of discussion, on November 30 Russell sent to Queen Victoria the drafts of the dispatches intended for Lord Lyons to deliver to Seward. Though the Queen's husband Prince Albert would have normally been asked to review the matter, the typhoid that he had been battling had unfortunately taken his life on November 16. The dispatches covered that the actions of the San Jacinto were a breach in international law by the firing on & capture of the Trent, a neutral powers vessel, & its passengers, as a direct hostile action against Her Majesty's Government. The dispatches were shipped on December 1 via the Europa, reaching Washington on December 18.
While military preparations were accelerated, diplomacy would be on hold for the rest of the month while Britain waited for the American response. There had been unrest in the British financial markets since the news of the Trent was first received. Consols, which had initially declined in value in the early part of the month, fell by another 2 percent, reaching the level during the first year of the Crimean War. Other securities fell another 4 to 5 percent. Railway stocks and colonial and foreign securities declined. The Times noted that the financial markets were reacting as if war were a certainty.
In the early deliberations over the appropriate British response to the capture of the diplomats, there was concern that Napoleon III would take advantage of a Union-British war to act against British interests in "Europe or elsewhere". France quickly alleviated many of Britain's concerns. On November 28, with no knowledge of the British response or any input from Mercier in the U.S., Napoleon met with his cabinet. They had no doubts about the illegality of the U.S. actions and agreed to support whatever demands Britain made. Thouvenel wrote to Count Charles de Flahault in London to inform Britain of their decision. After learning of the actual content of the British note, Thouvenel advised the British ambassador Lord Cowley, that the demand had his complete approval, and on December 4 instructions were sent to Mercier to support Lyons.
By November of 1861 the war in America had been going on for seven months. Most in Richmond knew that the only real way that the Confederacy could defeat the US & gain its independence was through diplomatic or military intervention by Britain, France, or both. To try & obtain diplomatic recognition & support for their cause the Confederate diplomats James Mason & John Slidell were to be sent to Europe to try & achieve just that.
The Union steam frigate the USS San Jacinto, commanded by Captain Charles Wilkes, arrived in St. Thomas on October 13. San Jacinto had cruised off the African coast for nearly a month before setting course westward with orders to join a U.S. Navy force preparing to attack Port Royal, South Carolina. However in St. Thomas, Wilkes learned that the Confederate raider CSS Sumter had captured three U.S. merchant ships nea Cienfuegos in July. Wilkes headed there, despite the unlikelihood that Sumter would have remained in the area. In Cienfuegos he learned from a newspaper that Mason and Slidell were scheduled to leave Havana on November 7 in the British mail packet RMS Trent, bound first for St. Thomas and then England. He realized that the ship would need to use the narrow Bahama Channel, the only deep water route between Cuba and the shallow Grand Bahama Bank.
Trent left on November 7 as scheduled, with Mason, Slidell, their secretaries, and Slidell's wife and children aboard. Just as Wilkes had predicted, Trent passed through Bahama Channel, where San Jacinto was waiting. Around noon on November 8, lookouts aboard the San Jacinto spotted Trent, which unfurled the Union Jack as it neared. San Jacinto then fired a shot across the bow of Trent, which Captain James Moir of Trent ignored. San Jacinto fired a second shot from her forward pivot gun which landed right in front of Trent. The Trent continued to ignore & tried to evade the San Jacinto. A third shot was then fired that disabled the Trent.
With armed guards in tow Wilkes second in command Lieutenant DM. Fairfax then boarded the Trent from a cutter. Fairfax, certain that Wilkes was creating an international incident and not wanting to enlarge its scope, ordered his armed escort to remain in the cutter. Upon boarding, Fairfax was escorted to an outraged Captain Moir, and announced that he had orders "to arrest Mr. Mason and Mr. Slidell and their secretaries, and send them prisoners on board the United States war vessel nearby." The crew and passengers then threatened Lieutenant Fairfax, and the armed party in the two cutters beside Trent responded to the threats by climbing aboard to protect him. Captain Moir refused Fairfax's request for a passenger list, but Slidell and Mason came forward and identified themselves. With armed guards now on board fairfax was able to search of the vessel for contraband of which none could be found.
International law required that when "contraband" was discovered on a ship, the ship should be taken to the nearest prize court for adjudication. While Fairfax argued against this since transferring crew from San Jacinto to the Trent would leave San Jacinto dangerously undermanned, this was Wilkes' determination & the Trent was taken in tow.
The news of the actual capture of the Trent did not arrive in London until November 27. Much of the public and many of the newspapers immediately perceived it as an outrageous insult to British honor, a flagrant violation of maritime law, & an act of war. The London Standard saw the capture as "but one of a series of premeditated blows aimed at this country … to involve it in a war with the Northern States." A letter from an American visitor written to Seward declared, "The people are frantic with rage, and were the country polled I fear 999 men out of 1,000 would declare for immediate war." A member of Parliament stated that unless America set matters right the British flag should "be torn into shreds and sent to Washington for use of the Presidential water-closets."
Dispatches from Lyons were given to all in attendance. These dispatches described the excitement in America in support of the capture, referred to previous dispatches in which Lyons had warned that Seward might provoke such an incident, and described the difficulty that the United States might have in acknowledging that Wilkes had erred. Lyons also recommended a show of force including sending reinforcements to Canada. Palmerston indicated to Lord Russell that it was very possible that the entire incident had been a "deliberate and premeditated insult" designed by Seward to "provoke" a confrontation with Britain. After several days of discussion, on November 30 Russell sent to Queen Victoria the drafts of the dispatches intended for Lord Lyons to deliver to Seward. Though the Queen's husband Prince Albert would have normally been asked to review the matter, the typhoid that he had been battling had unfortunately taken his life on November 16. The dispatches covered that the actions of the San Jacinto were a breach in international law by the firing on & capture of the Trent, a neutral powers vessel, & its passengers, as a direct hostile action against Her Majesty's Government. The dispatches were shipped on December 1 via the Europa, reaching Washington on December 18.
While military preparations were accelerated, diplomacy would be on hold for the rest of the month while Britain waited for the American response. There had been unrest in the British financial markets since the news of the Trent was first received. Consols, which had initially declined in value in the early part of the month, fell by another 2 percent, reaching the level during the first year of the Crimean War. Other securities fell another 4 to 5 percent. Railway stocks and colonial and foreign securities declined. The Times noted that the financial markets were reacting as if war were a certainty.
In the early deliberations over the appropriate British response to the capture of the diplomats, there was concern that Napoleon III would take advantage of a Union-British war to act against British interests in "Europe or elsewhere". France quickly alleviated many of Britain's concerns. On November 28, with no knowledge of the British response or any input from Mercier in the U.S., Napoleon met with his cabinet. They had no doubts about the illegality of the U.S. actions and agreed to support whatever demands Britain made. Thouvenel wrote to Count Charles de Flahault in London to inform Britain of their decision. After learning of the actual content of the British note, Thouvenel advised the British ambassador Lord Cowley, that the demand had his complete approval, and on December 4 instructions were sent to Mercier to support Lyons.