Civil War History - Secession and PoliticsWas it Slavery, or was it States Rights? Perhaps it was the election of Lincoln? What were the real reasons for Southern Secession and what were the political issues in this time of war? Find your answers here in the Secession and Politics Disussion.
Thank you for an interesting romp through a part of history I had not seen before.
A triple AMEN to that, Blue. As silly as it seems to be on the surface, I can now add another semester of study in the rarely seen outbacks of Mid-19th Century US History. This all has been fabulous information. Many thanks to Battalion.
ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
Thank you for an interesting romp through a part of history I had not seen before.
There I have to agree with you. I knew relatively little about this incident when this thread started. Now I know more.
IMHO, anything Cardinal Antonelli is doing here is probably more related to the situation in Europe than to what is going on in America.
Antonelli was not a priest. He was the last of the "Lay Cardinals", men who served the Church without ever having taken religious orders and were given ecclesiastical rank appropriate to their position. He had a reputation as a wily and cunning diplomat, called by at least one author the "Italian Richelieu". It was generally thought that the only reason the Papal States were still in existence after the revolutions of 1848 was his deft diplomacy, playing one side off against the other, back and forth. Pope Pius IX, regarded as a liberal when he came to office, was regarded as a hard-core conservative after his escape from that revolution in 1850.
In 1860-61, the Piedmontese growing out of the north had occupied most of the Papal States in order to confront and face down Garibaldi (who had just successfully conquered the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. The area around Rome survived only because the Piedmontese warned off Garibaldi and because of the French garrison Napoleon III maintained in the city.
Garibaldi handed over his gains in the South to the Piedmontese. This was apparently because he favored the reunion of Italy. He liked the King, but he had a strong dislike for the Prime Minister, di Cavour, who had traded Garibaldi's home city of Nice to Napoleon III for French support in the 1859 war against Austria. Garibaldi was forming his International Legion with the motto "Free from the Alps to the Adriatic", aiming at the incorporation of Rome (the Papal States) and Venice into the new Kingdom of Italy. Garibaldi was associated with Mazzini, who wanted a republic instead of a kingdom, since 1833.
King Victor Emannuel discouraged the aggitation for the conquest of Rome, but somehow Garibaldi felt he had his support. In the Summer of 1862, Garibaldi raised a small army and marched on Rome from the south. Victor Emannuel's forces met him in the Aspromonte. A confused skirmish followed after an accidental shot, in which Garibaldi told his men not to fire and was in turn shot in the foot by someone. Garibaldi was then held a prisoner on parole for a while as he recovered.
This leads into 1863. In that year all of Europe almost erupted into war over Poland (this is when the Russian fleet suddenly shows up in New York and San Francisco); the following year would see the Austrians and Prussians at war with Denmark over Schleswig-Holstein in the Third Danish War (or the "Potato War" as it was called by some). Meanwhile Napoleon III was proceeding with his invasion of Mexico and his attempt to make Maxmillian of Austria the Emperor of a new Empire there. In general, Europeans could see the coming "great war" (which turned out to be the 1866 Austro-Prussian War and 1870 Franco-Prussian War). Everyone is waiting for the explosion, the spark that will set it off.
So when the the Pope writes that letter in December of 1863 to Jefferson Davis, probably the most important thing in the diplomacy of the Papal States is the relationship with Napoleon III. If the French garrison withdraws (or simply refuses to sustain the Pope), then the Kingdom of Italy will occupy Rome. This is, in fact, what actually happens in 1870 when the French garrison is withdrawn for the Franco-Prussian War. Italy declares war September 9; crosses the border September 10; takes the city against token resistance September 19.
At that point, Napoleon III has an obvious stake in what goes on in America. This letter using the title of Jefferson Davis as President of the Confederate States of America commits the Papal States to absolutely nothing -- but it positions the Papal States very carefully for future changes in the diplomatic situation. They can easily deny -- as they did -- that it has any political purpose (although no diplomat would believe them). If 1864 unfolds so that support for the Confederacy suits the Papal States, they already have a toe in the water. If Napoleon III ends up more involved in the American situation (either over Mexico or because of an attempt to intervene or mediate in the Civil War), the Papacy will be well-positioned to play a small part (they'll have connections to the Confederacy, sympathy, etc.) If the Confederacy manages to survive and become independent, the Papcy has a solid position as the first one to be at all friendly to them. And if it all collapses, the Papal States can blandly deny they did anything at all.
In short, this is about as good as it gets in diplomacy for a small and weak nation. They curry favor with France, they get both sides of the Americans paying attention to them, they get favorable attention and publicity for their concern for peace in the world. All of this in return for a few polite words that cost them nothing at all, with no commitment of any kind for the Papal States.
Confederate Secretary of State Benjamin obviously understood a large part of that, which is why he attached so little weight to the letter. This is an indicator of why they called him the "Brains of the Confederacy".
In the letter itself, the content is neutral. The form of the address is really all that *might* possibly be used to infer that Pope considered the Confederacy a nation -- while the body of the letter implies firmly that they are engaged in a civil war and so are not an independent nation. The Pope and his minister, Antonelli, undoubtedly considered carefully what they would say -- but the Pope told Mann he would give him something suitable for publication. This is the nineteenth century equivalent of a "sound bite", carefully released to create a short spurt of publicity, but with no substance and no follow-up to give it meaning. Think of it the same way you think of photo-ops and press-releases today, carefully staged to be available just before the six-o'clock news.
All this makes it pretty clear why Cardinal Antonelli had the repuation for diplomatic wile and guile that he did -- as well as showing us how he managed to keep the decrepit Papal States alive from 1850-1870. But the Papal States never recognized the Confederacy, because there was no benefit to them to do it at that time.
Regards,
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
You are in the wrong business. You ought to be writing history books. In one post you've managed to convey an inconceivable grasp of Italian history and related it quite nicely with concurrent US history.
I'm overwhelmed.
ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
You are in the wrong business. You ought to be writing history books. In one post you've managed to convey an inconceivable grasp of Italian history and related it quite nicely with concurrent US history.
Thanks.
Hard to make money writing. A few, a very lucky few, make very big money at it. Most people who write books do so as a sideline (i.e., they have a day-job to pay the bills). I haven't written anything for publication myself since the 1980s, and that was technical work on computers, not history. Even then, I had a day job as a programmer that paid the bills; the money from the books and articles was nice (very nice), but not essential.
However, if I'd made the right choice of topic then and done a good job, I might have been out of the workaday world a long, long time ago. Our books (my wife and I) sold down around 10,000 copies each. Some people who broke in with the same publisher at the same time chose better (topics like Microsoft Word, Excel, Access when it came out, dBase II/III/III+/IV, etc.) and did a very good job. I used to walk into bookstores and see their work, with banners emblazoned on the cover: "5th Edition! 1.2 Million Copies Sold!" and so on. Some of them are still around, still selling on various topics, still lecturing.
Regards,
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
3) if you are really interested, try finding a copy of Reports of Bishop Lynch of Charleston, South Carolina, commissioner of the Confederate states to the Holy See
by Patrick Neeson Lynch published in 1905.
Found it (though not easy to find).
Ordered it (not expensive).
Will be interesting to see what it says.
__________________ POWER & MONEY
"Your New-York bankers and merchants are shrewd people, but I never gave them credit for so much sagacity as when they took the Government Loan. It was not merely patriotism, it was a high stroke of policy. It has saved the Government, and what they will regard as equally important, saved them from a great financial disaster."
Sometimes the magic works. Sometimes it doesn't. cest' la vie. Just hope that you are doing as well as you would like. But still think you'd have been one helluva historical writer.
ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
Found it (though not easy to find). Ordered it (not expensive). Will be interesting to see what it says.
It will be even more interesting to learn of what you think of it. I don't suppose we can expect your review soon, but do post on it when you can.
ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
It will be even more interesting to learn of what you think of it. I don't suppose we can expect your review soon, but do post on it when you can.
BTW, the reason Bishop Lynch's papers were not readily available to the War Department when they were doing the Navy Official Records seems to be that a priest who was the archivist for the archdiocese of Charleston was working on them and took them with him when he was transferred to Georgetown University. Somehow they ended up in the records up there for 80+ years before someone noticed what they were and returned them to Charleston in 2001.
Regards,
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
I remember reading in American Heritage magazine many years ago that Lincoln offered Girabaldi a commission in the Union Army, which the Italian patriot declined. Am I remembering correctly?
I remember reading in American Heritage magazine many years ago that Lincoln offered Girabaldi a commission in the Union Army, which the Italian patriot declined. Am I remembering correctly?
Well, that's fairly close. The actual tale is so twisty and turny that the best I can do is to refer you to this excellent 1975 article in American Heritage to try to show it: http://www.americanheritage.com/arti...975_6_34.shtml
Is that the one?
Regards,
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
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