Part 15 (1/2)

Boom! Boom! Boom! Never in history did the firing of a gun have such a powerful effect as that which sent the first shot at the flag of the Union, as it floated over Fort Sumter on that memorable Friday, April 12, 1861.

Fired at a time when most people were hoping for a peaceful outcome of the sectional troubles, it astonished the world and stirred the whole country to its depths.

Across the dry plains and rugged mountains of the West its echoes seemed to roll. The startled people of the Pacific coast looked at each other with anxious, uncertain eyes. No one felt quite sure of his neighbor, and they were so far from the scene of action that the government could not help them. They must settle the great question for themselves. Who was for the Union? Who was against it?

In Was.h.i.+ngton the President and his advisers waited with keen anxiety to learn what wealthy California would do. Senator Gwin had often spoken in Congress and elsewhere as though it would certainly be one of the states to secede. He and others had talked too, in a confident way, of the ”Grand Republic of the Pacific” that might be then formed out of the lands of the Western coast. To lose this rich territory would be a terrible blow to the Union.

From the time of California's admission there had been a constant endeavor on the part of Southern sympathizers to introduce slavery into its territory. A large number of politicians, especially those holding prominent positions, were Southerners, some of whom, like Dr. Gwin, had come to the Pacific coast for the express purpose of winning either the new state or some portion of it for the South and slavery.

They had succeeded in giving it a fugitive slave law that was particularly evil. Under it a colored man or woman could be seized, brought before a magistrate, claimed as a slave, and taken back South without being allowed to testify in his or her own behalf. Neither could a colored person give testimony in a criminal case against one who was white.

Opposed to this strong Southern party one man stood almost alone as the friend of free labor and free soil. This man was David C. Broderick. For years he fought the slavery interests inch by inch in San Francisco, in the state legislature, and finally in the United States Senate.

When he went to Was.h.i.+ngton he found the same state of affairs as in California--President Buchanan yielding to the Southern demands, Southern members ruling and often terrifying Congress. Broderick at once joined Stephen A. Douglas in the struggle he was then making for free soil in Kansas and the territories, and his speeches were clear and often fierce.

In reply to a speech from a Carolina senator in regard to the disgrace of belonging to the working cla.s.s, Mr. Broderick said (Congressional Globe, 1857-58), ”I represent a state where labor is honorable, where the judge has left his bench, the doctor and lawyer their offices, the clergyman his pulpit, for the purpose of delving in the earth, where no station is so high, no position so great, that its occupant is not proud to boast that he has labored with his own hands. There is no state in the Union, no place on earth, where labor is so honored, so well rewarded, as in California.” Mr. Broderick died in the midst of his bright career, murdered in a duel by one of the leading members of the slavery party.

When he died, those of his fellow-citizens who believed much as he did, yet had let him fight secession and slavery lone-handed, recognized what he had done for them--their ”brave young senator,” as Seward called him, who had kept the evil of slavery from their soil. His work, stopped by the bullet of his enemy, was taken up by the people, and his name became a rallying cry for the lovers of the Union, of honest labor, and of free soil.

News that the war had really begun brought forth the strongest Union sentiments from many of those who had before been careless or indifferent. A ma.s.s meeting of the people of San Francisco was held--business was suspended, flags were flying everywhere, while eager-faced people listened to earnest Union speeches. A few days later the legislature, by an almost unanimous vote, declared in the strongest terms for the Union, offering to give any aid the government might require. No one could longer have any doubt of the loyalty of the state of California.

There were certainly many people from the South who were deeply in sympathy with secession; but these, if honorable men who were able to fight, hurried east to join the Confederate army, or if they chose to remain under the protection of the flag, were generally wise enough to keep their feelings to themselves.

Some there were, however, who, while they enjoyed the law and order of the peaceful state, still spoke, plotted, and schemed for secession. To keep such as these in order it was found necessary to retain most of the California troops in the state for home defense. Those who did reach Eastern battlefields fought well and n.o.bly.

One of San Francisco's ministers was unwise enough frequently to express disloyal views in the pulpit, until one Sunday morning he found the banner he would dishonor floating over his church, and hanging to a post in front of the door a figure intended to represent himself, with his name and the word ”traitor” pinned to it. The next day he left for Europe, where he stayed until the close of the war.

Another minister, Thomas Starr King, was one of the most earnest supporters of the government. He organized the California division of the Sanitary Commission for the a.s.sistance of sick and wounded soldiers.

Chiefly through his influence California gave over a million and a half to that cause, which was one third of the whole expenditure of the Commission.

In 1862 Leland Stanford became governor. He was devoted to the Union, always striving to influence his state to give liberally of its wealth to help the government; and its record in that line was second to none.

”A good leader, energetic and long-headed,” the governor was called; but no one dreamed that long before he was an old man, he would give for the cause of education in California the mightiest gift ever bestowed by any one man for the benefit of humanity.

During the war, California furnished 16,000 men, two regiments of which were among the best of the Union cavalry. One regiment of infantry was composed of trappers and mountaineers, from whom were taken many ”sharpshooters” so famous in a.s.sisting the advance of the Northern troops.

In the southern part of the state there was a body of volunteers known as the California Column, also the California Lancers, who, far off though they were, found enough to do. They drove the Southern forces out of Arizona and New Mexico, fought the Apache Indians in several battles, met and defeated the Texas Rangers, and took various military posts in Texas.

Great was the excitement in San Francisco when one morning the United States marshall captured, just as she was leaving the wharf, a schooner fully fitted out as a privateer. She was filled with armed men, and in her cabin was a commission signed by Jefferson Davis in the name of the Confederate States, also a plan for capturing the forts of the harbor, the Panama mail steamer, then en route north, and a treasure steamer soon to, sail for Panama.

In Los Angeles disloyalty was more outspoken and unrebuked by public opinion. Sometimes the surrounding ranchmen, many of whom were in sympathy with the South, on the news of a Southern victory would come into Los Angeles to celebrate with disloyal banners and transparencies.

Living on Main Street there was a Yankee, one of the leading citizens, who upon such an occasion would take his rifle and, promenading the flat roof of his wide-spreading adobe, hurl down defiance at the enemy, calling them ”rebels” and ”traitors” and defying them to come up and fight him man to man. But there must have been a feeling of good fellows.h.i.+p through it all, since no stray bullet was ever sent to put a stop to the taunts of the fiery old Unionist.

Some Spanish soldiers of the California Column, however, grew weary of such open disloyalty, and one night, when off duty, captured two of the Southern ranchmen and proposed to hang them to the oaks in the pasture near where the city of Pasadena now stands. The American officers of the troops, hearing of the affair, hurried out from Los Angeles and begged their men to give up so disorderly and unsoldier-like an idea. ”Yes, sirs, it is true, all that you say; but they are rebels, they talk too much; why suffer them to c.u.mber Union ground?” This seemed the only reply they could obtain; but finally the captives were liberated, though advised in the future to guard well their tongues and actions.

The desire for war news from the Eastern states led to the completion of a telegraph line between the Missouri River and San Francisco, and on all sides the need of an overland railroad was also being recognized.

Plans for such a road had been frequently presented to Congress, but straightway slavery entered into the question. The South wanted the road, but it must be through Southern territory, while the North favored the middle or northern route; and they could not agree.

On one such occasion Senator Benton spoke in favor of a line that had just been surveyed by Captain Fremont. He was told by those who had other plans that his route was not possible, that only scientific men could lay out a railroad and determine the most practicable ways and easiest pa.s.ses. But Senator Benton's answer is worth remembering.