738 



PUBLIC DOCUMENTS. 



like degrading punishment for selling medicine to the 

 sick soldiers ol the Confederacy. The soldiers have 

 been incited and encouraged by general orders to in- 

 sult and outrage the wives, the mothers, and the sis- 

 ters of our citizens, and helpless women have been 

 torn from their homes and subjected to solitary con- 

 finement, some in fortresses and prisons, especially one, 

 on an island of barren sand, under a tropical sun, have 

 been fed with loathsome rations, and have been ex- 

 posed to the vilest insults. Prisoners of war who sur- 

 rendered to the naval forces of the United States on 

 the agreement that they should be released on parole 

 have been seized and kept in close confinement ; and 

 repeated pretexts have been sought or invented for 

 plundering the inhabitants of the captured city by fines 

 levied and collected under threat of imprisonment at 

 hard labor with bali and chain. The entire population 

 of New Orleans have been forced to elect between 

 starvation by the confiscation of all their property, and 

 taking an oath against their conscience to bear al- 

 legiance to the invader of their country. Egress from 

 the city has been refused to those whose fortitude 

 withstood the test, and even to lone and aged women, 

 and to helpless children, and after being ejected from 

 their houses and robbed of their property, they have 

 been left to starve in the streets or subsist on charity. 

 The slaves have been driven from the plantations in 

 the neighborhood of New Orleans, until their owners 

 consent to share their crops with the Commanding 

 General, his brother Andrew J. Butler, and other 

 officers, and when such consent had been extorted the 

 slaves have been restored to the plantations, and then 

 compelled to work under the bayonets of the guard of 

 United States soldiers. Where that partnership was 

 refused armed expeditions have been sent to the plan- 

 tations to rob them of everything that was susceptible 

 of removal, and even slaves too aged and infirm for 

 work have, in spite of their entreaties, been forced 

 from the homes provided by their owners and driven 

 to wander helpless on the highway. By a recent or- 

 der, No. 91, the entire property in that part of Louisi- 

 ana, west dF the Mississippi river, has been seques- 

 trated for confiscation, and officers have been assigned 

 to the duty, with orders to gather up, collect the per- 

 sonal property, and turn over to the proper officers, 

 upon their receipts, such of said property as may be 

 required for the use of the United States army ; to col- 

 lect together all the personal property and bring the 

 same to New Orleans, and cause it to be sold at public 

 auction to the highest bidders. An order, which, if ex- 

 ecuted, condemns to punishment by starvation, at least 

 a quarter of a million of all ages, sexes, and conditions, 

 and of which the execution, although forbidden to mil- 

 itary officers by orders of President Lincoln, is in ac- 

 cordance with, the confiscation law of our enemy, which 

 he has enforced through the agency of cruel officials ; 

 and finally the African slaves nave not only been in- 

 cited to insurrection by every license and encourage- 

 ment, but numbers of them have actually been armed 

 for a servile war a war in its nature far exceeding 

 the horrors and most merciles atrocities of savages. 

 And whereas the officers under the command of the 

 said Butler have been in many instances active and 

 zealous agents in the commission of these crimes, and 

 no instance is known of the refusal of any one of them 

 to participate in the outrages above narrated. And 

 whereas the President of 'the United States has by 

 public and official declaration signified, not only his 

 approval of the effort to excite servile war within the 

 Confederacy, but his intention to give aid and encour- 

 agement thereto if these independent States shall con- 

 tinue to refuse submission to a foreign power after the 

 1st day of January next, and he has thus made known 

 that ail the appeals to the law of nations, the dictates 

 of reason and instincts of humanity would be addressed 

 in vain to our enemy, and that they can be deterred 

 from the commission of these crimes only by the hor- 

 rors of just retaliation. Now, therefore, I, Jefferson 

 Davis, President of the Confederate States, and acting 

 by their authority, appeal to divine justice in altering 

 my conduct that I am not guided by the passion of 



revenge, but reluctantly yield to the solemn duty of 

 redressing by necessary severity the crimes of which 

 their citizens are the victims, and thus issue my pro- 

 clamation, and by virtue of my authority as Com- 

 mander-in-Chief of the army of the Confederate States, 

 do order : 



1st. That all commissioned officers in the command 

 of the said Benjamin F. Butler be declared not entitled 

 to be considered as soldiers engaged in honorable war- 

 fare, but as robbers and criminals deserving death, and 

 that they and each of them be, whenever captured, re- 

 served for execution. 



2d. That the private soldiers and non-commissioned 

 officers of the army of said Butler be considered as 

 only the instruments for the commission of crimes per- 

 petrated by his orders, and not as free agents, and that 

 they, therefore, be treated, when captured, as prisoners 

 of war, with kindness and humanity, and be sent 

 home on the usual parol that they will in no manner 

 aid or serve the United States in any capacity during 

 the continuance of this war, unless duly exchanged. 



3d. That all negro slaves captured in arms be at 

 once delivered over to the executive authorities of the 

 respective States to which they belong, to be dealt 

 with according to the laws of said States. 



4th. That the like orders be executed in all cases 

 with respect to all commissioned officers of the United 

 States, when found serving in compan}' with said 

 slaves in insurrection against the authorities of the 

 different States of this Confederacy. 



In testimony whereof, I have signed these presents 

 and cause the seal of the Confederate States of America 

 to be affixed thereto, at the city of Richmond, on the 

 23d day of December, in the year of our Lord one 

 thousand eight hundred and sixty-two. 



(Signed) JEFFERSON DAVIS. 



By the President, 

 J. H. BENJAMIN, Sec. of State. 



The overtures of France and the replies of Great 

 Britain and Russia on mediation in the 

 affairs of the United States : 



The following is the despatch of the French 

 Minister of Foreign Affairs addressed to the 

 Ambassadors of France at London and St. 

 Petersburg : 



PAKIS, Oct. 30, 1S62. 



Europe watches with painful interest the struggle 

 which has been raging more than a year upon the 

 American continent. The hostilities have provoked 

 sacrifices and efforts certainly of a nature to inspire 

 the highest idea of the perseverance and energy of the 

 two populations. But this spectacle, which does so 

 much honor to their courage, is only given at the price 

 of numberless calamities and a prodigious effusion of 

 blood. To these results of civil war, which from the 

 very first .assumed vast proportions, there is still to be 

 added the apprehension of servile war, which would 

 be the culminating point of so many irreparable dis- 

 asters. 



The suffering of a nation toward which we have al- 

 ways professed a sincere friendship would have sufficed 

 to excite the sincere solicitude of the Emperor, even 

 had we ourselves not suffered by the counterblow of 

 these events. Under the influence of intimate relations 

 which extensive intercourse has multiplied between the 

 various regions of the globe, Europe itself has suffered 

 from the consequences of the crisis which has dried up 

 one of the most fruitful sources of public wealth, and 

 which has become, for the great centres of labor, a 

 cause of the most sad trials. 



As you are aware, when the conflict commenced, we 

 held it our duty to observe the most strict neutrality in 

 concert with other maritime Powers, and the Wash- 

 ington Cabinet has repeatedly acknowledged the hon- 

 orable manner with which we adhered to that line of 

 conduct. The sentiments dictated to us have under- 

 gone no change, but of a benevolent character. That 



