University of Virginia Library

II. After Election of Lincoln

On the day of election, the students convened in the
Rotunda and cast the majority of their votes, not for
Douglas or Breckinridge, but for Bell and Everett, whose
campaign cry was the "Constitution and the Union."
The triumph of Lincoln in November, and the secession
of South Carolina in December, had the effect of
crystalizing among them what had previously been a more
or less fluctuating sentiment in support of the general
theory of secession; but several weeks after the last of
these events occurred, the editors of the magazine deplored
the exasperated divisions in the country at large.
"Is it too late," they asked, "to speak of adjustment,
and a return to our former allegiance? Is there no
deliverance from all these troubles, no escape from the
fate that threatens us? Can no remedy be found for
the evils now upon us? We cannot endure, without
inexpressible horror and the profoundest regret, to see
the purest and best government the world has ever yet
known, sink dismembered and dishonored beneath the
waves of civil discord. God grant that the measure of
our calamities may not exceed the rumor of war." A
writer who contributed to the same number, dwells upon
the lofty place among the nations of the globe which
the United States then occupied. "In science, in wealth,
in prosperity, in religious freedom, in power, what country
was there," he exclaims, "which could justly claim
to surpass it? And now hatred was engaged in tearing
down the fabric upon which so many hopes were so
ardently set!"

The very month in which this conservative article was
published, the Washington Society debated the question:
Are the Crittenden Resolutions a sufficient remedy for
the existing posture of affairs? and reached a negative

decision by a vote of seventeen to three. The upshot of
this ballot would seem to demonstrate that the students,
like Mr. Lincoln himself, on the other side, were of the
opinion that the hour for compromise had vanished.
A more significant proof of the same conviction was the
organization of two military companies within the precincts.
This had occurred not long after South Carolina
had adopted the first ordinance of secession. The Faculty
had, as we have already stated, previously discouraged
the formation of such bodies among the young men,
but when they saw the extraordinary agitation of the
public mind both before and after the Presidential election,
they concluded that the hour had arrived for lifting
the ban. Indeed, permission had been granted as early
as December 5. The ranks of both companies were
quickly filled. The officers chosen were as a rule, students
who had been trained in the military art at the
Virginia Military Institute. Professor Holcombe, with
characteristic ardour, suggested that one of these companies
should be christened "Sons of Liberty," in recollection
of the heroes of the Revolution. The uniform
of this company consisted of a red shirt, conspicuously
trimmed with black velvet and bespangled with brass
buttons; trousers, manufactured of black doeskin; a
cape of dark blue color; and a white cross belt, adorned
with a large brass buckle. The other company assumed
the name of the Southern Guard. Its uniform consisted
of a blue shirt and blue pantaloons, with a cap of the
same distinctive color. The weapons of both companies
were the same: a flintlock musket, cartridge box, bayonet,
and scabbard. No banner was used at first; and as wind
instruments were unprocurable, the students, in the course
of the drill, marched to the sound of the hip hip of the
officers.

William Tabb was elected to the captaincy of the
Sons of Liberty, and Edward S. Hutter to that of the
Southern Guard. Tabb, whose health seems to have
been frail, was succeeded in April by James Tosh. The
officers under Tabb were R. J. Washington, first lieutenant;
A. G. Hill, second, and W. Page McCarty, third.
The orderly was F. S. Robertson. There were five
sergeants and four corporals. The officers of the Southern
Guard, subordinate to Captain Hutter, were George
Ross, Frank Carter, James M. Payne, P. L. Burwell,
John M. Poague, L. D. Roane, William Pegram, R. E.
Lee, Jr., J. Compton French, and R. Corbin Wellford.
The names of these officers,—as well as the names of
the officers of the Sons of Liberty,—were conspicuous
in the social history of Virginia. Families of equal distinction
were represented in the rank and file, as the following
partial list for the Southern Guard will demonstrate:
Baldwin, Boyd, and Barton, of Winchester;
Barbour, of Orange; Baskerville, of Mecklenburg; Moncure,
of Stafford; Chapman, of West Virginia; Davidson
and Pendleton, of Lexington; Fairfax, of Alexandria;
Field, of Culpeper; Fleming, of Hanover; Garnett, Latane,
Hunter, and Micou, of Essex; Goggin, of Bedford;
Green, of Fauquier; Hinton and Pegram, of Petersburg;
Maury, of Fredericksburg; McCabe, of Hampton;
Michie, Page, Minor, and Harris, of Albemarle; Bolton
and Munford, of Richmond; Neblett, of Lunenburg;
Elliott, of Georgia; and Howard, McKim, Murdoch,
Mackall, and Munnikhuysen, of Baltimore. Among the
members of the Sons of Liberty who belonged to the
station of privates were Bedinger, of Jefferson county;
Berkeley, of Hanover; Brockenbrough, of Rappahannock;
Bronaugh, of Loudoun; Buford, of Brunswick;
Dew, of King and Queen; Drewry, of Southampton;

Hunter, of Louisa; Lee, of Fairfax; Nicholas, of Richmond;
Preston, of Botetourt; Radford, of Montgomery;
Venable, of Prince Edward; Withers, of Campbell;
Harvie, of Amelia; and Wyatt, of Albemarle.

Each of the two companies counted on its roll about
seventy men. The ground on which the drill took place
was either the Lawn or Carr's Hill. The spectacle of
so many young men conspicuously uniformed and handling
muskets, and marching backwards and forwards, at
the spirited word of command, could not fail to kindle
a martial flame even among those who were simply looking
on. The first exhibition of this newborn fire was
certain to take the form of the display of the flag which
the States that had seceded had already adopted. In
February (1861), it was excitedly rumored about the
dormitories that the students who occupied the rooms
in Dawson's Row were having the flowing emblem of the
new Confederate States duplicated for the purpose of
hoisting it above some conspicuous site within the precincts.
R. C. M. Page and Randolph H. McKim, who
were domiciled in another part of the University, determined
to anticipate their triumph, and hurrying to Charlottesville,
they bought the requisite quantity of inexpensive
colored cambric, and took it to a seamstress on
Main street, the owner of a sewing machine, who soon
manufactured out of it the flag so eagerly desired. Before
leaving the town, they had the foresight to purchase
the gimlet and saw which would be needed for cutting
a hole into the back-door of the Rotunda for the purpose
of gaining admission to the dome. As they were
hastening back, they stopped for a moment and ordered
a flagstaff of a negro carpenter, and gave directions that
it should be delivered on Carr's Hill at eleven o'clock the
same night. The proposed adventure was decided to be

too complicated for two men only to carry it through
successfully, and George Bedinger, James M. Garnett,
John Latane, William Wirt Robinson, and P. Lewis
Burwell were taken into the secret of the project. The
negro arrived, by a backway, promptly at the hour named
beforehand, with the flagstaff, which was borne mysteriously
into McKim's dormitory; and there the virgin ensign
of the new republic was firmly attached to it.

Not until the clock struck the hour of midnight, however,
did the ardent young conspirators consider it safe
to issue forth with the flag. So soon as the Rotunda was
reached, the gimlet and saw were set to going on the panel
of the back-door; a hole large enough in size to admit the
human body was cut; and one by one, the members of
the band crept through it, in the darkness. But there
was still another door to be passed through after the
library was entered. This led out on the roof near the
bell. How was it to be forced? It was too solid and too
full of nails to be pierced by the saw. One means alone
of demolishing the barrier was left, and that was to butt
it down. A line was formed, and each unit in turn serving
as buffer, the repeated impact at last smashed in
the door. But the cupola was yet to be scaled. How
could they reach it? They accomplished this feat by
holding on to the lightning-rod as they climbed up in Indian
file—a course now doubly dangerous as the wind
was sharp and blowing fiercely. The cupola which, at
that time, was surmounted by an arrow, was protected
from a stroke of lightning by the erect end of the conductor.
To this upstanding rod, the staff, with the flag
wrapped about it, was firmly tied; and then the folds were
unwound and allowed to flow with the wind.

The descent to the library was more perilous than
the ascent, and the consciousness of this fact was increased

by signs of approaching dawn, for it was four
o'clock, and the negro servant was seen extinguishing the
gas-jets along the arcades. One of the flag raisers was
wounded in the cheek by the point of the saw as he
awkwardly held it in one hand in going down. The
stars were shining brightly, and lit up the folds as they
were whipped by the strong wind which was blowing, so
that they were plainly visible from below. According
to the historian of this episode, the lamplighter was so
much astonished by the sight of the flag, that he exclaimed,
"Hi, whar' dat thing come from? I aint nuvver
see dat befo'. Dese certan'y is cu'yous times." As
soon as he had shambled off in a state of bewilderment,
the flag-raisers crept back to their dormitories.

It is recorded that the excitement caused by the discovery
of the flag on the Rotunda, when day fairly
broke, was so great that lectures and recitations were
suspended. What would the authorities do in their displeasure?
Virginia had not withdrawn from the Union,
and the sentiment in favor of secession at the University
was not aggressive enough to suffer the flag to continue
to float where it was. The chairman posted the request
that, if it was lowered by those who had raised it, no
further notice would be taken of the act. It was soon
pulled down by another band of students; but finally
found its way to Carr's Hill, where it seems to have
been again thrown to the wind, but now on a very modest
building. From this time, the Confederate flag began
to be descried here and there in town. W. B. Hutton,
a student, mentions in his diary that he had, towards the
end of March, seen several waving above the streets of
Charlottesville; and on the 23rd of March, he was present
at an assembly at William Wertenbaker's house at
which a Confederate flag was unfolded, toasts to the

new Republic drunk, and speeches of a warlike character
delivered.

In April, a few days before the convention sitting in
the capitol at Richmond adopted the ordinance of secession,
there was a parade on the Lawn in celebration of
Jefferson's birthday. The participants comprised the
Albemarle Rifles, commanded by Captain R. T. W.
Duke, afterwards Colonel of the Forty-Sixth Virginia
Regiment; the Monticello Guards of Charlottesville,
commanded by Captain Mallory; the Southern Guard,
by Captain Hutter, and the Sons of Liberty, by Captain
Tosh. These troops numbered about four hundred men,
who had been assiduously trained and were fully equipped.
The drill took place in the afternoon, and as a compliment
to the University companies, the officer in general
charge was Captain Hutter. As the troops stood
drawn up in line before him, a message from O. Jennings
Wise, despatched from Richmond, was handed to
him. "Fort Sumter," it ran, "has surrendered, and the
Palmetto flag now floats over its walls." It is recorded
that this sensational announcement was received with
many evidences of satisfaction by all who were present.
Whatever differences of opinion touching the legality or
the expediency of Secession may, before this event, have
existed among the students or the professors, were
merged by President Lincoln's call for volunteers into
a common determination to resist the invasion of the
South which it foreshadowed.

The revulsion in feeling was reflected in a scene recalled,
with a characteristic spice of humor, by W. Gordon
McCabe. "A knot of us," he relates, "were gathered
at the Blue Cottage[4] and were discussing with great
warmth the affairs of the nation. It is needless to say

our voice was all for war. A friend of mine, then one
of the best students at the University, now a grave professor
in a theological seminary, alone remonstrated
against our abandonment of our studies, and spoke so
sensibly and so temperately as to cast a very decided
damper on our martial aspirations. Later on, during
the same day, our young Sir Galahad, Percival Elliott,
of Georgia, who now fills a soldier's grave, and myself,
walking up to the Rotunda from the postoffice, descried
hurrying towards us a familiar figure clad in a uniform
known to no service in Christendom; a revolver as large
as a small howitzer was buckled about his waist; and a
cavalry sabre of huge dimensions clanked furiously as
he came towards us. We were literally spellbound with
amazement. 'Why, Nelson, what in the name of all that
is righteous is the meaning of this?' 'Have not got
time to talk to you boys. Lincoln has called for 75,000
troops. I enlisted five minutes ago in the Albemarle
troop.' So sped away our peaceful counsellor of the
morning!"

Two incidents that are recorded in the proceedings of
the Washington Society, about a fortnight after the adoption
of the ordinance of secession by Virginia, cast an
unmistakable light on the sentiment then prevailing among
the young men. First, it was resolved that the money
which had been received from Mr. Everett and invested
in a bond,—the income from which was now used for the
annual purchase of a medal for the best essay in American
biography published in the magazine,—should be
returned to him just as soon as hostilities should end;
and secondly, it was voted that the surplus funds of the
society, amounting to two hundred dollars, should be

remitted at once to the Governor of the Commonwealth
for expenditure in defense of the State. It was neither
hope nor expectation of preserving the institution of
slavery that had brought about this perfect unanimity of
opinion among the students at this crisis. The spirit that
now animated them was succinctly expressed in a stanza
which was printed in the April, 1861, number of the
University magazine: