The Sun.
London, England, 1863-07-28 00:00:00

THE RIOTS IN NEW YORK.

(From the Times' Correspondent.)
NEW YORK, July 13.
The enforcement of the conscription has fallen
with the suddenness of a surprise upon the people of
New York. So lately as a fortnight ago no one

believed that the Government would dare to resort

to it ; but, emboldened by fhe check which General
Meade was enabled to offer to the advancing armies

of General Lee, and still more by the surrender of
Vicksburg, Mr. Lincoln and his advisers have
plucked up heart, and taken a step that may yet prove
to ba the most momentous of the war. They calculated
upon the good temper of the people consequent upon
the first promise of success that has rewarded them
for "pegging away." A few days will show whether
or not their confidence has been misplaced. The
draught commenced on Saturday, and will be con-
tinued during the present week in all the congres-
sional districts of the city. Fearful, apparently, of
the resistance of the working classes, especially of
those of foreign birth, the Government has adopted
the precaution of taking each district separately,
and of sending a military guard of 400 men to pre-
side over the turning of the wheel, to see fair play
and to preserve order. The Republican papers and
all the supporters of the Administration take especial
pains to spreadabroad the impression that the draught
is a mere formality, that the rebellion is all but sup-
pressed,that the existing armies are more than ample
to give it the coup de grace, and that none of the
enforced levies will ever be required to do other
than militia duty in the towns and cities where
they will be drawn, and that they will under no
circumstances be incorporated with the armies now
in the field. It is much too early to ascertain to
what extent these representations are believed by
the people most interested. There is no question
that the conscription is in itself intensely un-
popular, and that among the Irish and Germans,
and to a smaller extent among the native-born
Americans, Trades' Unions, and other societies have
been organised in opposition to enforced military
service, and that many valiant resolutions have
been adopted, on paper, in assertion of the determi-
nation of the Americans, like Britons, " never to be
slaves." The doubt is whether the opposition will
take the shape of armed resistance—a doubt which
among the native-born Americans is justified by the
ell.llnovvn civic cowardice—or, if that epithet be
considered too strong, the respect for law, or what
appears to be law—that characterises the Americans
as a people. They will fight obstinately against a
foreign or a domestic foe, as their past and present
history proves ; but they are reluctant to take
un arms in the street against their own Govern-
ment, however great the provocation, ea French-
men, Italians, Poles, or Germans would do, and
have often done. It would not, therefore, be sur-
prising if the only resistance to the draught should
come from the turbulent foreign element that
ablunds in this city, or if the Government should,
in case of its e:esureir g aey large proportions, re-
solve to overpower it by force of arms. It does no:,
seem, however, as. if any army or portion of an
army to be raised by this means could be of much
service to the Government. The conscription an-
swers its purpose in the South, and is cheerfully
submitted to 13,cause the conscripts are inspired with
a burning hatred against the Northern people,
whom they coneider tyrants, oppressors, Yankees,"
and " worse than hyenas" who desire to overrun
their country, exterminate the people, and confis-
cate the property of all classes. But no such danger
affronts the North, and no such passions, either of
hatred or patriotism, exist. In the minority of cases,
where such passions find play they are to be dis-
covered among the non-fighting classes, the pugna-
cious disputants of the pulpit and the lecture-rooms,
and the strong-minded women, whose type is Anna
Dickinson, and whose model gentleman is General
Butler. Whatever these people and the war con-
tractors may think or say, there is a growing feel-
ing throughout the North that the Southerners are
as right in their assertion of the principle of inde-
pendence as they are gallant in defending it, and a
growing disinclination to fight for the emancipa-
tion of negroes and the destruction of the Constitu-
tion, under the protection of which both North and
south had attained so high a pitch of greatness
and prosperity. The feeling is too strong and too
widely diffused to be mistaken. It has not been
weakened by the temporary success of General
Meade, nor would the defeat of the Army of the
Potomac, which the present disposition and strength
of the contending forces do not render at all impro-
bable. have any perceptible effect in diminishing
it. These persons say that if the Union cannot be
preserved by the willing arms of volunteer soldiers,
the Union is dead, and would not be worth the
trouble of resuscitation, if resuscitation were pot
sible.

JULY 14

I had written thus far yesterday, when the repor
reached me that the most serious riot that had ever
occurred in America had broken out in the upper
congressional district of the city, where the draught
had first commenced, and that a mob of men and
women variously estimated at from 20,000 t 040,000,
had suddenly appeared, acting without concert or
known leaders, and were committing havoc that,
unless speedily checked, might lead to awful loss of
life and immense destruc,ion of property. The
report, though possibly' exaggerated as to the
numbers of the rioters, was in other respects true.
The pent-up passions of the multitude had broken
loose, and there was imminent peril of a catas-
trophe that might have delivered the city to
the unrestrained possession of a populace that
Chad tasted blood and grown furious on the diet.
The readers of this correspondence have been
from time to time informed that the working classes
were not only disgusted with the war and all re-
-lilting to it ; that they did not sympathise with or
take any interest in the abolition of slavery, except
to condemn it ; that they looked upon the negroes
with mistrust and dislike ; that they felt the bur-
den of the war in the enhancement of the price of
food and clothing, and of every article of comfort
and meeessity ; and that, above all, they were op-
posed to theprinciple of a conscription and had
banded
themselves into secret societies to resist it.
All these
day,
and
were
of action came into play yester-
eintensified by the sympathy and sup•
port of the
women, who turned out into the streets
in immense t
ambers to incite their sons, brothers,
fathers, husbands, or lovers to the work of de-
struction. The lists of those who were draughted in
the Ninth er);
aitriat were published in the evening
papers on Saturday, repeated iu the Sunday
journals.
imcattion was the only notice of
their doom that the
theor t ni ai
lists
te
SundayEs3 hadwer
were
studied received; andby
all . day on
excited groups of
working men, gathered at
street corners, at church oTa el doors, and at the
hap
less tranquil resorts of
shops, and hotel bars, Thegveerr-bbeer saloons, grog-
draught was loud and universal, opposition to the
to be illegal, unfair in its mode It was declared
exempting from personal service the operations, BB
rich enough to pay 300 dollars, and e man
who was
tion of power on the part of the Feadsean aBsumP-
ment which could not be submitted to in al G
eovern-
that still claimed to be free. It was alleged aeountry
of the Sunday journals that no less a person one
Mr. Horatio Seymour, Governor of the startiethhan
declared his opinion that the act of Congress wasaci
unconstitutional and could not be enforced •
, and that
its legality would be tested before the recognised tri- 1
banals of New York. This statement, which ought to
have allayed the agitation of the people, produced a
contrary effect. Early in the day gangs of workmen
wend from workshop io workshop to call upon t
he
heir
!alloys, s to leave their labour and proceed to t
buildie gin the Third-avenue wkere the formalities
of the draught were to be resu ned. i
, B^ 11 o'clock
some tlieeneancls of persons ILA collected.
ws. They
They
com-
menced ',by throwing stones at the windo
next rusined into the office, s. ized the wh.eel by which
the lute wtere drewri and broke it into fragments, got
held of thee: nrolment lists and tore them .nto shreds;
thus render.'.ng the prosecution of the draught im-
possible unti2 a new enrolment had been completed
—assaulted an tl severely ill-treated the functionaries
employed, and were debating what was next to be
done, when a man suddenly appeared on the plat-
form with a pail ..,,f turpentine, which he deliberately
poured upon the ;floor. A lucifer match was imme-
diately applied, the turpentine blazed up furiously,