StsL,te.me.rvt§ of Gte-vi, W. 
 T. oner man coyvceryMnd: 
 
Cfte Mbmty 
 
 of m 
 
 Ontetsitp of BoWb Carolina 
 
 Collection of iRortl) CaroHniana 
 TO0 book toa0 ptegenteo 
 
The Statements of General W. T. Sherman Concerning Jefferson 
 Davis an<l Senator Yance filed in the War Department. 
 
 K E M A K K S 
 
 OF 
 
 HON. Z. B. VANCE, 
 
 OF NORTH CAROLINA, 
 
 In the Senate of the United States, 
 
 Tuesday, January 13, 1885. 
 
 The Senate having' under consideration the following resolution : 
 Resolved, That the President of the United States be, and he is hereby, re- 
 quested, if in his opinion it be not incompatible with the public interest, to 
 communicate to the Senate a historical statement concerning' the public policy 
 of the executive department of the Confederate States during the late war of 
 the rebellion, reported to have been lately filed in the War Department by Gen- 
 eral William T. Sherman. 
 
 The PRESIDING OFFICER. The resolution is before the Senate. 
 The question now is on agreeing to the resolution, on which question 
 the yeas and nays have been ordered. 
 
 Mr. VANCE said: 
 
 Mr. President : As the Senate will probably pass this resolution 
 and place upon its records an unofficial paper, filed in the War Depart- 
 ment by General W. T. Sberman, which contains statements affecting 
 certain persons, it is but right and proper that all persons so affected 
 should be heard in the same forum. As one thus interested, I desire to 
 notice some statements made in that communication to the War Depart- 
 ment. In order that I may not be misinterpreted I have placed in 
 writing the material portions of what I desire to say, which shall be 
 very brief. 
 
 It is understood and, I believe, not denied that in a speech made not 
 long since in Saint Louis, Mo. , General Sherman said he had seen a 
 letter written by Mr. Jefferson Davis to a governor of a Southern State 
 during the war, now a Senator, in which Mr. Davis threatened the co- 
 ercion of any Southern State that should attempt to secede from the 
 confederacy. As there are, I believe, three Senators at least on this floor 
 who were governors of Southern States during the war, myself being 
 one, I immediately on the appearance of that statement denied through 
 the Post of this city that any such letter had ever been received by me. 
 The newspapers soon afterward stated that General Sherman had been 
 interviewed as to my denial, and had stated that he had not alluded to me 
 
 oa3X\* 
 
as the person to whom the alleged letter had been addressed. I very 
 naturally thought that this denial at both ends of the line had con- 
 cluded the matter so far as I was concerned ; but it seems not. In the 
 statement filed in the War Department, as published in the papers of 
 the country, I find the following assertion: .. 
 
 At Raleigh, though the mass of the public records had been carried off, yet a 
 number were left behind at the state-house and at the governor's mansion, called 
 the " palace," which we occupied as headquarters during our stay there, name- 
 ly, from April 13 to April 29, 1865. 
 
 These records and papers were overhauled by provosts-marshal and clerks, 
 ■who delivered to Adjutant-General Sawyer such as contained material informa- 
 tion, and my personal attention was only drawn to such as were deemed of 
 sufficient importance. Among the books collected at the palace in Raleigh was 
 a clerk's or secretary's " copy-book," containing loose sheets- and letters, among 
 which was the particular letter of Mr. Davis to 'which I referred in my Saint 
 Louis " speech." I gave it little attention at the time, because Mr. Davis was 
 then himself a fugitive, and his opinions had little or no importance, but it ex- 
 plained to my mind why Governor Vance, after sending to me commissioners 
 to treat for his State separately, had not awaited my answer. It was the subject of 
 common talk about my headquarters at the time, or, as stated by Colonel Dayton 
 in a recent letter to me from Cincinnati, "I am quite sure that we generally talked 
 fthat] it was the desire of Governor Vance and the State officials to take North 
 Carolina out of the confederacy, as I have stated, but they were afraid of Jeffer- 
 son Davis and wanted protection." 
 
 Concerning this I have the following observations to make: 
 
 1. That no letters or documents of a public character were ever left 
 at my residence in the governor's mansion, while I was governor, at 
 any time. 
 
 2. No clerk or secretary of mine ever used as a repository for my cor- 
 respondence a "copy-book; " all official or public letters being first cop- 
 ied in the letter-book required by law to be kept in the executive office, 
 and then bound into bundles and placed in the files, where they remain 
 to this day. 
 
 3. General Sherman did not find in that copy-book ' ' the particular let- 
 ter of Mr. Davis to which he referred in his Saint Louis speech, ' ' for the 
 simple reason that there was no such letter there. 
 
 4. I aver most positively, on the honor of a gentleman and an Amer- 
 ican Senator, that no letter containing such a threat was ever received 
 by me from Mr. Jefferson Davis. All letters from him to me of any 
 nature are to be found copied in the letter-books of the executive de- 
 partment of North Carolina, now in the War Department in this city. 
 
 The reasons given by General Sherman bv way of corroborating his 
 statement are such as would scarcely be relied upon by a respectable 
 lawyer. He says he paid ' ' little attention to it at the time, ' ' and does 
 not say that he ever saw it afterward; andfurther, thatMr. Daviswasthen 
 himself a fugitive, and his opinions had little or no importance ! It 
 was, perhaps, the little attention given to the opinions of an unimpor- 
 tant man that enabled him to remember so well the contents of the letter 
 in which they were expressed after the lapse of nearly twenty years ! 
 The suggestion as to the probable fate of that mysterious letter, that it 
 was burned in the great fire in Chicago, is a mere apology for its non- 
 production, which at the same time contradicts the idea of its impor- 
 tance ; for had it been such as he says it was, it would certainly have 
 found its way to the public files. 
 
 But there is another matter averred by General Sherman that more 
 nearly concerns me, and to which I shall very briefly ask the attention 
 of the Senate. ■ 
 
 It may be that Northern gentlemen who were on the victorious side 
 during the civil war can not properly appreciate the feelings and senti- 
 
raents of those who were on the side of misfortune and defeat. They 
 seem to regard it as qtdte a sin that we do not readily join in the de- 
 nunciations of him who was our leader in the war, and hasten to con- 
 demn him on all occasions as the surest way of excusing our conduct 
 and commending ourselves to the good opinion of our late opponents. 
 Surely no man of even the slightest sense of honor could respect a South- 
 ern man who would thus debase himself. Surely the most flagrant 
 and rampant trafficker in the issues of sectional hatred would prefer 
 an adversary who walked upright on his feet to the one who crawled 
 upon his belly. If not, what must be thought of his own manhood ? 
 
 Now, sirs, be it known to you, that those of us who pledged our faith 
 to each other for the establishment of the confederacy gave up all for 
 which we contended when it failed, retainiug to ourselves only one sol- 
 itary satisfying reflection, and that was that we had at least served our 
 country faithfully, honestly, and devotedly, as we understood it. 
 
 This satisfaction General Sherman's statement would to some extent 
 take from me, and this it is, sir, which I resent. It is well known that I 
 was drawn into secession unwillingly ; it is also well known that in re- 
 gard to many of the details of administration I was at variance with the 
 authorities of the confederate government; but it is equally well known r 
 I hope, that, after my own honor was engaged and the honor of my 
 native State, there never was an hour during all that unhappy time 
 in which I did not give every energy of my body, mind, and soul to 
 the success of the cause to which I had pledged my allegiance. Gen- 
 eral Sherman, professing high respect for me, for which I thank him, 
 thinks, perhaps, that he does me a kindness and commends me to the 
 people of the country by holding out the idea that I was disaffected 
 while Governor toward the cause for which I was ostensibly fighting, and 
 that I was anxious to separate myself and State from the confederacy, 
 but was restrained by fear. Sir, I want no man's respect or good-will 
 based on the supposed virtues of treason to my country and the deser- 
 tion of my associates. The good-will of a man who would respect these 
 traits in another is not worth picking up from the dust of the common 
 highways. General Sherman says that the commissioners whom I 
 sent to meet him as he approached Ealeigh, to wit, ex-Governor Swain 
 and ex-Governor Graham and Surgeon-General Warren, told him that 
 I wanted to make separate terms for the State, but was afraid of ' 'Jeff 
 Davis." I do not believe it. It can not be true. The two gentlemen 
 first named are dead; they were eminent North Carolinians, of most 
 exalted character in all respects, and most especially for truth. They 
 knew I was faithful to the confederacy; they knew that I was not 
 afraid of opposing Mr. Davis when I differed from him, because they 
 had seen me constantly doing it, and they never told General Sherman 
 or any other living man the contrary of what they knew to be true as 
 perfectly as any men in North Carolina. 
 
 The other commissioner, Dr. Edward Warren, was surgeon-general 
 of the State of North Carolina, is now living, and is an eminent phy- 
 sician in Paris. His statement would surely carry as much proof of 
 what was said there as that of the witness cited to prove that there 
 was talk about camp of " the desire of Governor Vance and other State 
 officials to take North Carolina, out of the confederacy, but they were 
 afraid of Jeff. Davis and wanted protection." True it is that I sent a 
 commission to him under a flag of truce to ask protection, not separate 
 terms for the people of my State, but at that moment the war was vir- 
 tually ended. Lee had surrendered, Eichmond had fallen, President 
 
Davis and his official household were fugitives, and General Johnston, 
 commanding the last remnant of an army devoted to the South, was 
 about to march westward, no one knew whither, and uncover the cap- 
 ital of the State. With his consent .and approbation that embassy was 
 sent, and through his lines under his permit it went. Before its return 
 Kaleigh was uncovered and I had left to join" Mr. Davis, at Charlotte, 
 where the surrender of General Johnston was authorized and the final- 
 ity of things brought about. Then and there I took my leave of Mr. 
 Davis and of the confederacy, and went back with his full approbation 
 to share the fate of my people. 
 
 General Sherman finds an explanation of my failure to await the re- 
 turn of my embassy in the contents of the mysterious letter — that I 
 was afraid of Davis, then a fugitive without an army. Bold enough 
 he says I was to send an embassy to the enemy, but I was afraid to 
 await its return ! Was ever conclusion more absurd ? The reason why 
 I did not wait was that I had been told my embassy after passing 
 through the confederate lines had been captured by Kilpatrick's cav- 
 alry, promptly robbed of their personal effects, and taken before Gen- 
 eral Sherman as prisoners. Not returning up to midnight of the day 
 on which they were sent, I concluded this to be true, and left with the 
 retreating troops. 
 
 How well and how faithfully I served the lost cause the country 
 knows. My own people, sir, about whose opinion I am most concerned, 
 will wonder that anybody can be found to question it. 
 
UNIVERSITY OF N.C. AT CHAPEL HILL 
 
 00032725285 
 
 FOR USE ONLY IN 
 THE NORTH CAROLINA COLLECTION