November 13, 1861. On this date, Lincoln's secretary John Hay recorded in his diary what he considered "a portent of evil to come."

He wrote that Lincoln, Secretary of State William Seward, and he had gone that night to General George B. McClellan's house. When they learned that the General was out but would soon return, they went in to wait for him.

 

"[A]fter we had waited about an hour," Hay wrote, "McC. came in and without paying any particular attention to the porter [doorman], who told him the President was waiting to see him, went up stairs, passing the door of the room where the President and the Secretary of State were seated. They waited about half-an-hour, and sent once more a servant to tell the General they were there, and the answer coolly came that the General had gone to bed.

"I merely record this unparalleled insolence of epaulettes [officer in uniform] without comment. It is the first indication I have yet seen of the threatened supremacy of the military authorities.

"Coming home I spoke to the President about the matter but he seemed not to have noticed it, specially, saying it was better at this time not to be making points of etiquette & personal dignity."

 

John Milton Hay, Secretary of State William H. Seward, General George B. McClellan, President Abraham Lincoln

SOURCE

 

Lincoln, An Illustrated Biography, Philip B. Kunhardt, Jr., ed., p. 163. 

The Civil War Book of Days is a weekly newsletter marking the sesquicentennial of the Civil War. Published by the Vermont Humanities Council, it commemorates what happened each week 150 years ago.

VHC invites people to submit texts linked to specific dates -- an excerpt from a poignant or inspiring letter, an excerpt from a secondary source, or 100-500 words of original descriptive prose.

Please forward the e-mail to friends so they can subscribe -- using the forward link at the bottom of the e-mail.   

 

Read previous editions at the Civil War Book of Days Archive, including the most recent  

• War with England Averted: The Trent Affair  
• "Some of the greatest geese I have ever seen."  
• Lincoln and the Radical Abolitionists  
• The Benefits and Bloody Cost of State-based Brigades 
• "Grant stood by me when I was crazy . . ."  
• Perhaps One Southerner Could Whip Ten Yankees 
• "Cast off the Millstone" Frederick Douglass 
• Walt Whitman: Battle of Bull Run 
• Vermont's Sleeping Sentinel 
• Northerners Incensed by Lincoln's Caution  
• "Fighting Rebels with One Hand" 
• Vermont Women Go to War as Nurses  
• Naval Officers Jump Ship  
• "Only a Question of Time"--The First Confiscation Act 
• Balloons for Reconnaissance During Civil War 

Sign up for the Civil War Book of Days.