The United States Navy in the first flood of its victories made another
false step which brought to the South an hour of brilliant hope. Captain
Wilkes overhauled a British steamer carrying the royal mail and took
from her decks by force the Commissioners Mason and Slidell whom Davis
had dispatched to Europe to plead for the recognition of the
Confederacy. The North had gone wild with joy over the act and Congress
voted Wilkes the thanks of the nation as its hero.
Great Britain demanded an apology and the restoration of the prisoners,
put her navy on a war footing and dispatched a division of her army to
Canada to strike the North by land as well as sea.
The hard common sense of Abraham Lincoln rescued the National Government
from a delicate and dangerous situation. Lincoln apologized to Great
Britain, restored the Confederate Commissioners and returned with
redoubled energy to the prosecution of the war. In answer to the shouts
of demagogues and the reproaches of both friend and foe, the homely
rail-splitter from the West had a simple answer.
"One war at a time."
Jefferson Davis watched this threat of British invasion with breathless
intensity. He saw the hope of thus breaking the power of the navy fade
with sickening disappointment.
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