Details
DAVIS, JEFFERSON, President, C.S.A. Letter signed ("Jefferson Davis") as President of the Confederate States, TO VICTORIA, QUEEN OF ENGLAND, Richmond, Virginia, 23 September 1861. One page, large folio, 402 x 265 mm. (15 13/16 x 10 1/2 in.), integral blank, written in a bold formal hand on heavy bond paper, slight separation at one fold, otherwise very fine.
DIPLOMATIC CREDENTIALS FOR JAMES M. MASON OF "MASON AND SLIDELL" AND THE TRENT AFFAIR
Addressing Victoria as "great and Good Friend," and signing himself "Your good friend," Davis gives letters of credence to James M. Mason, the Confederate Minister to Great Britain. "Animated by a sincere desire to cultivate the friendly relations so happily subsisting between the Confederate States of America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, I have selected the Honorable James M. Mason, one of our most intelligent, discreet, esteemed and worthy citizens, to represent the Government of the Confederate States as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary near the Government of your Majesty. He is well acquainted with the wishes and interests of the Government of the Confederate States, and your Majesty will be pleased to receive with full faith and credence whatever representations he may make on its behalf. May God preserve your Majesty in His safe and holy keeping...."
The present is probably an official copy retained for diplomatic files, rather than the letter received by the Queen (Mason's own papers were destroyed by fire, according to DAB). Still, it is a very remarkable memento of the serious diplomatic breach between the United States and Great Britain known as the Trent Affair, which came close to provoking war between the two powers. On November 8, 1861, Mason (1798-1871) and John Slidell (Confederate minister to France) sailed together for Europe on board the British packet Trent. Captain Charles Wilkes of the U.S.S. San Jacinto, learning of the minister's plans, stopped the ship on the high seas off the Bahamas with a warning shot and seized the two commissioners, who were incarcerated at Boston. His act was a blatant violation of international maritime law and touched off a diplomatic uproar between Great Britain and the United States. When news of the affair reached Palmerston, he is reported to have exclaimed to his cabinet, "You may stand for this, but damned if I will!" President Lincoln "at first indicated that he was unwilling to hand over the envoys," so Seward "warned him that his choices were to surrender Mason and Slidell or face a real possibility of war with Britain" (John H. Taylor, William Henry Seward: Lincoln's Right Hand, 1991, p.183). War fever in England was only abated when Secretary of State Seward ordered the commissioners released on the flimsy excuse that Wilkes had not properly impounded the ship by having it condemned by due process in a U.S. court.
Provenance:
Elsie O. and Philip D. Sang Foundation (sale, Sotheby's, 4 December 1981, lot 1011).
DIPLOMATIC CREDENTIALS FOR JAMES M. MASON OF "MASON AND SLIDELL" AND THE TRENT AFFAIR
Addressing Victoria as "great and Good Friend," and signing himself "Your good friend," Davis gives letters of credence to James M. Mason, the Confederate Minister to Great Britain. "Animated by a sincere desire to cultivate the friendly relations so happily subsisting between the Confederate States of America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, I have selected the Honorable James M. Mason, one of our most intelligent, discreet, esteemed and worthy citizens, to represent the Government of the Confederate States as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary near the Government of your Majesty. He is well acquainted with the wishes and interests of the Government of the Confederate States, and your Majesty will be pleased to receive with full faith and credence whatever representations he may make on its behalf. May God preserve your Majesty in His safe and holy keeping...."
The present is probably an official copy retained for diplomatic files, rather than the letter received by the Queen (Mason's own papers were destroyed by fire, according to DAB). Still, it is a very remarkable memento of the serious diplomatic breach between the United States and Great Britain known as the Trent Affair, which came close to provoking war between the two powers. On November 8, 1861, Mason (1798-1871) and John Slidell (Confederate minister to France) sailed together for Europe on board the British packet Trent. Captain Charles Wilkes of the U.S.S. San Jacinto, learning of the minister's plans, stopped the ship on the high seas off the Bahamas with a warning shot and seized the two commissioners, who were incarcerated at Boston. His act was a blatant violation of international maritime law and touched off a diplomatic uproar between Great Britain and the United States. When news of the affair reached Palmerston, he is reported to have exclaimed to his cabinet, "You may stand for this, but damned if I will!" President Lincoln "at first indicated that he was unwilling to hand over the envoys," so Seward "warned him that his choices were to surrender Mason and Slidell or face a real possibility of war with Britain" (John H. Taylor, William Henry Seward: Lincoln's Right Hand, 1991, p.183). War fever in England was only abated when Secretary of State Seward ordered the commissioners released on the flimsy excuse that Wilkes had not properly impounded the ship by having it condemned by due process in a U.S. court.
Provenance:
Elsie O. and Philip D. Sang Foundation (sale, Sotheby's, 4 December 1981, lot 1011).