As
@jgoodguy has pointed out, Mr. Current did not call Mr. Hurlbert "one of Lincoln's spies". Instead, Current simply calls him "an old
Illinois friend" who had been "born and educated in Charleston" and "still had friends and relatives there". As such, his opinion of the situation 'on the ground' was highly anticipated and invaluable to Lincoln.
The mission was not some 'cloak and dagger' episode. After all, Hurlbert would be openly staying with family, meeting neighbors and old friends. His task was simply to confirm or refute Lincoln's belief that once passions subsided a peaceful resolution could be achieved.
If anything, it shows Lincoln was still of a mind to settle the crisis peacefully.
Hurlbert was accompanied on the trip by Ward Lamon, who separately visited Fort Sumter and Governor Pickens. According to Current, Lamon "was acting more like Seward's agent than Lincoln's." Lamon led both Major Anderson and Governor Pickens to believe that Fort Sumter would soon be abandoned.
Hurlbert's March 27, 1861 report is worthy of its own thread.
Among other things, he dashed Lincoln's hopes that secessionists would reconsider their action. He found "no attachment to the Union" among South Carolinians and "Unionism appears to be almost as dead elsewhere in the South".
He further reported that "I have no doubt that a ship known to contain
only provisions for Sumter would be stopped and refused admittance. Even the moderate men who desire not to open fire, [who] believe in the safer policy of time and starvation" would approve of firing on any provisioning ship.
Adding to Lincoln's concerns, Hurlbert reported that his interviews convinced him that abandonment of Fort Sumter would lead to a demand for the remaining U. S. installations in the South.
<Richard N. Current,
Lincoln and the First Shot. (New York: Harper & Row, 1963), pp. 72-74.>
Lincoln's best hopes for a peaceful solution were dashed; all that remained was the slim possibility that local authorities might relent and allow reprovisioning of Fort Sumter, buying more time for some as yet undetermined peaceful solution.