UK Policy - American Civil War
Bernhardi wrote in 1901, "Since England committed the unpardonable blunder ... of not supporting the Southern States in the American war of secession, a rival to England's worldwide empire has appeared ... in the form of the United States of America." He later marveled that the Union did not take advantage of England's distress to take possession of Canada.
The American Civil War had a profound effect on Britain's political culture. The traditional historiographical assessments of British partisanship along class and economic lines must be reevaluated in light of the nature and changing contours of transatlantic abolitionist connections, the ways in which nationalism framed the debate, and the effect that race -- among other issues -- exerted over the British public's perception of conditions in America.
Douglas Gardner noted that the more conservative - and Conservative - elements of British society, mostly the aristocracy and the upper reaches of the middle classes, tended to support the Confederacy, and were scornful of the possibilities of liberalism or democracy at home. Many of the spokespeople for this group accepted and publicized the Southern apology for slavery as the basis of a properly hierarchical society. Palmerston, Russell, and Gladstone were ready to recognize the Confederacy; the Emperor Napoleon would offer them every inducement to do it.
Those in the middle - Liberals whose spokespeople often were Dissenting ministers or members of the growing professional groups - tended to support the Union, but held and displayed a variety of views on race, slavery, and democracy. Working class spokespeople tended to abhor slavery as another system of human exploitation, and for the most part stood firm in these beliefs even during the Cotton Famine and other war-related economic dislocations. Less certain in the views of some revisionists, notably Mary Ellison, was the loyalty of workers (as opposed to their spokespeople) to the antislavery cause, particularly and not surprisingly among those in the textile industry in Lancashire and Cheshire.
Gardner observed that by the 1860s, many of those British traditionally friendly to blacks and black aspirations on either side of the Atlantic were increasingly pessimistic about black capabilities, including in the United States. Antislavery Britons at mid-century, perhaps disillusioned with some of the perceived results of British and other emancipations and coming under the influence of the increasingly racialist social thought of the nineteenth century, seen to have suffered a decline in energy.
Blackett believes that "while British abolitionist sentiment had lost some of its bite with the passage of time and the death of many of those who had promoted the cause of West Indian slaves, there existed a residue, a tradition, that could be called upon in times of need. Abolition still had currency".
The Confederates adopted or accepted as their champion an eccentric of eccentrics; a type of 1820; notorious for poor judgment and worse temper. John Roebuck had been a tribune of the people, and, like tribunes of most other peoples, in growing old, had grown fatuous. He was regarded by the friends of the Union as rather a comical personage— a favorite subject for Punch to laugh at — with a bitter tongue and a mind enfeebled even more than common by the political epidemic of egotism. In all England they could have found no opponent better fitted to give away his own case. No American man of business would have paid him attention; yet the Lairds, who certainly knew their own affairs best, let Roebuck represent them and take charge of their interests.
In the Commons debate on the recognitions of the Southern Confederacy on 30 June 1863, John Roebuck, member from Sheffield, stated: "America, while she was one, ran a race of prosperity unparalleled in the world. Eighty years made the Republic such a Power, that if she had continued as she was a few years longer, she would have been the great bully of the world. Why, Sir, she —bestrode the narrow world, Like a Colossus; and we petty men Walked under her huge legs, and peeped about To find ourselves dishonourable graves. As far as my influence goes, I am determined to do all I can to prevent the re-construction of the Union, and I hope that the balance of Power on the American continent will, in future, prevent any one State from tyrannizing over the world as the Republic did. Could anything be more insulting than her conduct towards us? Yet we who turned upon Greece—we who bullied Brazil—we crawled upon our bellies to the United States. They could not treat us contemptuously enough to raise our ire....
"The Emperor of the French said, and he gave me authority to repeat it here, ".... my feeling was not, indeed, exactly the same as it was, because it was stronger than ever in favour of recognising the South. I told him also to lay before the British Government my understanding and my wishes on this question, and to ask them again whether they would be willing to join me in that recognition.... I have determined in all things to act with England; and more particularly I have determined to act with her as regards America.""
Arguing against recognition of the Confederacy, Lord Robert Montagu, member from Huntingdonshire, noted that "From the Northern States of America we received 5,500,000 quarters of corn, whereas from the north of Europe we received only 2,000,000. The total imported into England in 1861 was 16,094,914 quarters, of which more than one-third came from the North Western States—namely, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, and Wisconsin—whose yearly available produce was not nearly exhausted by their exports.....
"To intervene now, when the South was described as all but successful, in order to receive a share of the glory of the conquest, would be both unfair and ungenerous. To proclaim an armistice would give a breathing time to the North; and when recruited she would recommence the struggle with redoubled fury, and carry it on with increased energy. The only chance of peace was when every one shuddered at the name of war. .... "
W.E. Gladstone, member from Oxford University and then serving as Chancellor of the Exchequer, stated "I never have agreed with those who thought it was a matter of high British interest that the old American Union should be torn in pieces. Nor do I agree with the hon. and learned Member for Sheffield when he says that the American Union had become so vast and so menacing to the world, that we were in danger of dwindling beside it, or of experiencing a defect of power to maintain our rights. I do not think that territorial extension necessarily adds to the vigour of a State. I do not admit that either England or France, or any other country of Europe, had lost, or was relatively losing, strength in comparison with the United States of America...
"The cluster of Northern States, having lost all connection with the slavery interests that were formerly adverse to extension northwards, would have, of course, every motive—I do not say by violent or illegitimate measures—to endeavour to re-establish their territorial grandeur by uniting themselves with the British Colonies of North America. But, whether that be a sound opinion or not, I cannot help stating, with some confidence, that if we strongly put forward the consideration of British interests in this matter—if we found an argument for recognition of the South, on the plea that British interests require the separation, and that British greatness was threatened by the former condition of the American Union—by that very fact you stamp upon your argument for recognition, upon every expression even of a wish for peace, a certain character of hostility to our brethren in the Northern States....
"No man is justified in wishing for the continuance of a war unless that war has a just, an adequate, and an attainable object. For no object is adequate, no object is just, unless it also be attainable. We do not believe that the restoration of the American Union by force is attainable. I believe that the public opinion of this country is unanimous upon that subject....
"I believe the public opinion of this country bears very strongly on another matter upon which we have heard much — namely, whether the emancipation of the negro race is an object that can be legitimately pursued by means of coercion and bloodshed. I do not believe that a more fatal error was ever committed than when men — of high intelligence I grant, and of the sincerity of whose philanthropy I, for one, shall not venture to whisper the smallest doubt — came to the conclusion that the emancipation of the negro race was to be sought, although they could only travel to it by a sea of blood...."
As a Quaker, John Bright, Member for Birmingham, played a significant role, taking on Gladstone, Russell and Palmerston to ensure that Britain was not drawn into the conflict on the side of the Confederacy – particularly during the tense times of the Trent and Alabama affairs – but also as a key influence on Abraham Lincoln himself. In 1865, Bright’s speeches were published in New York as The American Question by the celebrated journalist, Frank Moore.
Great Britain plotted the invasion of the United States, considering bombarding and burning both Boston and New York. Predictably, Great Britain (joined then by France) wanted to take advantage of the American internal turmoil to regain control over its former colony. In order to ruin Franco-British plans, Russia sent its Navy to protect the Union from the foreign intervention. The most dramatic gestures of cooperation between the Russian Empire and the United States came in the autumn of 1863… On September 24, the Russian Baltic fleet began to arrive in New York harbor. On October 12, the Russian Far East fleet began to arrive in San Francisco.
The English Government in 1861-1865 tried in characteristic British ways to keep aloof from the American struggle. The result was that England incurred the fierce dislike of both South and North. In 1861 each party in the United States counted confidently on the support of the English Government and people, the North because of the universal condemnation of human slavery, the South because of the importance of cotton to English commerce. The diplomatic efforts of both were concentrated upon Great Britain. With her aid the South might win. Without her aid the Southern cause was almost hopeless, and the one European friend of the South, Louis Napoleon, would not dare to interfere directly.
The Southern leaders were disappointed and angry because the English Government would not recognize the Confederacy as independent, although the Premier, Palmerston, at one time in 1862 favored such action, and because the English Government would not interfere with the Federal blockade of the Southern ports, and because English sentiment against slavery was so strong.
The resentment of the North had more complex elements. It became increasingly disappointed and angry for the following reasons. First, the English Government recognized in May, 1861, the belligerent rights of the Confederates. Although President Lincoln had practically done the same thing a month earlier by proclaiming the blockade, the North felt that the action had been hasty, and therefore unfriendly. Second, the sympathy of the upper and wealthier classes of English society was given not to the free North, but to the more aristocratic South. They bought Southern bonds.
The Times thundered for the South. A majority of English writers pointed out that it would be advantageous for England to deal with two republics here instead of one, and that America's crude democracy had found its inevitable end. The historian Freeman sat down to write in several volumes a "History of Federal Government, from the Foundation of the Achaian League to the Disruption of the United States." He published the first volume in 1863, and wrote no more. Mr. Gladstone almost disrupted Palmerston's cabinet in 1862 by announcing in a public address that Jefferson Davis and other leaders of the South had made an army, a navy and a nation.
Northerners noted that Gladstone's wish was the father of his thought, but could not know at the time that, by his premature and discreet eulogy he had thwarted the hope of official recognition of Southern independence, a hope that was forever extinguished by Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation.
In November 1862, the British cabinet under Prime Minister Lord Palmerston considered an interventionist proposal to recognize the Confederacy and thus force the Union to discuss peace. The cabinet overwhelmingly voted against this, not least because it did not wish Britain to be seen on the side of slaveholders against Lincoln and emancipation. Together with the Russians, Britain then rejected the proposal by French Emperor Napoleon III for an armistice demand backed by multilateral force should either American belligerent reject the demand (in reality this was a threat aimed at the North, since an armistice effectively would ratify southern independence).
British Prime Minister Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston, was the British Prime Minister during the American Civil War. Although he was anti-slavery, his sympathies were with the Confederacy, believing that once independent of the United States they would be a valuable trading partner in cotton, tobacco, tea, and whisky. Furthermore, before the war he was concerned the growing American nation could eventually become a threat to the British Empire, so felt that successful Southern secession was in Britain’s best interests.
Lord Palmerston was personally sympathetic to the Confederacy, and many other elite Britons felt similarly. Lord Palmerston served twice as British Prime Minister in the mid-nineteenth century. He was of the old aristocratic sect and secretly held animosity towards the United States and desired destruction. Palmerston, supported the South during this time, but he was careful not to show as much favor as his colleagues.
But Lord Palmerston, Lord Clarendon, and Lord Russell, were staunch abolitionists all. They clearly detested and despised the Southern slaveholding aristocracy for their ruthless, brutal, and inhumane treatment of their slaves and for the racist attitudes they espoused to justify holding human beings as chattel.
In the British colonies, abolition was paired with a period of apprenticeship, i.e. a progressive emancipation at the end of which the former slave would obtain real freedom. The length of the period of apprenticeship varied as between those slaves on the plantations, and those in domestic and urban service. In some British islands, this transition period towards a new individual status would only last one year (Antigua and Barbuda, St. Vincent). In practice, emancipation in the British islands was achieved in by 1838.
As Palmerston played the nineteenth century game of balancing power in Europe, he concluded that Russia posed a greater threat than the Ottoman Empire centered on Turkey. Thus Britain fought the Crimean War (1853 - 1856) on the side of Turkey against Russia. Public opinion in Europe respecting the American Civil War was, to a great extent, founded on the views of the English press. The middle classes in England were brought to coincide with the privileged classes in sentiments unfavorable to the American Union, partly by appeals to historical recollections, and partly by considerations connected with the revenue legislation of the American Congress.
Southerners began the war effort confident that the cotton their plantations provided European textile manufacturers would naturally ally their governments to the Confederacy, especially Great Britain. Britain imported three-fourths of its cotton from the American South [the Union obtained most of its saltpeter, the primary ingredient in gunpowder, from India, a British colony]. After declaring secession, the North would declare a blockade on Southern ports. Any interruption of cotton supply would disrupt the British economy and reduce the workers to starvation, they thought. Britain would have to break the blockade and provoke a war with the North that would allow Confederates to solidify independence and gain international recognition. There was nearly a complete cessation of cotton transports to Great Britain. Up until the end of May, 1862, only 11,500 bales of cotton had been received in Great Britain. This was less than one percent of shipments made in the same period.
The intellectual power of England was engaged, as far as circumstances permitted, in promoting a partition of the republic. Considered merely as a matter of policy, the ministry of Lord Palmerston regarded it as not un-densirable to promote a partition of the American Union. With very great skill the journalism of England manufactured public opinion, and brought the middle classes into accord with the privileged.
It is impossible to express the pain felt by loyal and conservative men in America when it was announced that the ministry of Lord Palmerston had determined to concede belligerent rights to the South. Republican America did not solicit the moral support of Constitutional England as a boon. She expected it as a right. Not without the deepest regret did she find that she must fight the battle of Representative Institutions and human freedom alone.
Though no one imagined that the privileged classes of England would look with disfavor on the downfall of a democracy, no one in loyal America supposed that they could regard without horror a resort to conspiracy for the accomplishment of political ends, or contemplate without disdain great officers of state, who, with atrocious perfidy, had betrayed their trust. No one supposed that the religious middle classes of England, who had ever been foremost in support of human liberty, could forget their traditions, and lend their influence to those who were attempting, by armed force, to perpetuate and extend human slavery. Britain was faced with the decision of joining together with France in recognizing the Confederacy following the final export of Southern cotton in September 1861.
One illustrious man in England saw that the great interests of the Future and the Queen would better be served by a sincere friendship with America than by the transitory alliances of Europe. The Prince Consort recognized the bonds of heritage. His prudent counsels strengthened the determination of the sovereign that the Trent controversy should have an honorable and peaceful solution. Had the desires of these, the most exalted personages in the Realm, been more completely fulfilled, the administration of Lord Palmerston would not have cast a disastrous shadow on the future of the Anglo-Saxon people.
Palmerston's maverick approach to the niceties of diplomacy frequently brought him into conflict with Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Unhappy with the belligerent tone of the dispatch summarizing the Cabinet’s position, Prince Albert rose from his sick bed to redraft the dispatch, taming the language and offering the Americans a way to save face. Britain gave the Union an opening to foist all blame for the Trent incident on Wilkes. The dispatch, which left for Washington on 30 November 1861, is considered the Prince’s last great service for the Crown. He died two weeks later, after succumbing to typhoid.
When confronted with whether to go to war with Britain, Lincoln is famously said to have uttered, “One war at a time.” While there was plenty of reason for the Lincoln administration to be exacerbated by Britain’s decision to remain neutral and her handling of the Trent incident, the Union needed all of its resources to defeat the Confederacy. A two-front war would have spelled disaster for a Union war effort.
The English Government placed so lax an interpretation upon its neutrality laws that a half-dozen cruisers flying the Confederate flag, built in British shipyards, manned by British crews using an equipment bought in England, and permitted to use British ports as bases of supply, roamed the ocean and destroyed practically all of Federal merchant marine that was not sold to Englishmen. The Laird rams, the most powerful warships that were built in England for the Confederates, and that, if set free, might have shattered the Union blockade, were prevented from leaving the docks, not so much by the vigilance of the British Government as by the wise courage of Minister Charles Francis Adams at the Court of St. James who wrote to Earl Russell: " It would be superfluous in me to point out to your Lordship that this is war."
But, in spite of all these delinquencies and blunders, the fact remains that Confederate diplomacy utterly failed to obtain any help from England to break the strangle-hold of the Federal blockade. The Union's own unwise laws prevented recovery of merchant marine after the war was over, but public opinion was by that time too incensed against Great Britain to see or believe that, and believed that English neutrality had been purposely strained so that the only rival merchant marine might be wiped out.
The majority of the governing class in England were convinced that the South would win and wished it to. When it became evident that the triumph of the North would destroy slavery, English sympathy for the Union cause increased daily. The laborers of Lancashire, led by John Bright, though in distress through the paralysis of the cotton mills, stood firm for human freedom.
England avoided war with the United States because she knew how much her merchant marine would suffer from American cruisers. Palmerston went so far as to send additional troops to Canada in the chance that peace between the Union and the Confederacy was made and their attention turned towards invading the British-held territory. The risk to the British empire's security was too great to consider war with the militarily powerful Union short of compelling reasons. Throughout this period of strained relations with the USA, naval supremacy was Britain’s chief tool, and Britain remained the main potential enemy for the USA.
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