Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1872-05-25
Graphic DeserIptiSn Of the scene By
an Eyewitness. u
From the Chicago Tribune.

From the Chicago Tribune.
WASHINGTON, May I3.-Nearly at this
day of the year, five years ago-a Friday il
May received liberal offer from news
paper published in Philadelphia 10 90 Il
Richmond, Va, and see Jefferson Davii
plead to an indictment for treason in The
United Ststes Court there.
l had been home from Europe, where
had gone to describe Napoleon's great Elk
position, only one week; and the PROPOSE
ton to again review the battleields in the
environs Of the late Confederate capital,
and to conclude my adventures in the civil
war, with the last pageant it might present,
affected me more tayorably than the point
to be gained at commerce. At that mo-
ment little presumed that, for five years
yet to come, the appearance Of hostlities
would continue, and the flame of the ex-
piring brands Of battle be nursed to light
the career of party camp-followers.
FIRST GLIMPSE OF JEFF.
took the regular steamboat at Balti-
more, and slept down the bay. Atdaylight
Fortress Monroe was disclosed above the
sand-pits of Hampton Roads, with the flag
of the recovered country lazily waving above
the paTapet. We swung to at the pier,
waited halt an hour, and then saw walk
down the plank roadway from the fort, with
military officer on one side of him and a
lady on the other, thin, bent, gray-haired,
Unimposing, village-looking man, in suit
of homemade gray or drab--JefersOn
Davis. A couple of soldiers, think, Jagged
behind, and, altogether, there were not
above a dozen people on the wharf in sight
beside these.
Mr.. Davis did not come directly out to
the boat, but loitered there awhile in the
warm sunshine of that quiet Saturday, talk
ing to Gen. Duncan and Mrs. Davis, with
a smile ola sick man eonvalescent playing
on his face. l was disappointed with his
appearance, for l was familiar with his per-
son and face only from portraits on Confed-
crate money and from engrayings. Those
pictures heroized him, and gave him CLASH
cal profile and an eye Of ruling decision,
which now he did not show. Still, in this
setting Of Hampton Roads, the man could
not be else than the central figure. The
great law of association made him the per-
sonage to which everything in view was
subservient-the old Fort, which was the
entering wedge into the late Confederacy;
the yellow barrack peeping over the para
pet where he had been imprisoned; the
wrecks Of frigates sunk in the roadstead by
:
wood, where lurked that morning, terrible
as ever, the superstition of the iron monster
which had emerged thence for the deliber-
ate work of destruction at the command of
his will. And now be was the riddle and
perplexity of his conqueror; this thin old
man, just permitted to feel the breath of
liberty, whose name, for fear or wonder,
had gone round the world, and earned from
a cool head like Gladstone, the opinion that
Jefferson Davis had made a nationw
What should the United States do with JEFF
ferson Davis At law he might be hanged.
Who would hang him? The pulse of the
country fluttered, and everybody wanted
somebody else to take the responsibility.
DAVIS THE ELEPHANT.
l shall not attempt to wreck expression
upon the feelings that entertained as l
leaned over the deck-rails of the steamer,
and looked down upon this man whose &C
tive history was done. | have never got
over the fresh country boys surprise at see
ing the world, and real news affects me IS
phenomena. There was neither resentment
nor judgment in my estimate of this man,
whom 1 did not hold either wholly or in
chief responsibility fol the great insurrec-
ton and its calamities. There is nobody
responsible for general revolution like that
which he led, any more than deluge is the
fault of the channels il chooses or the &C
cessOries it receives. In the broad spread
evaporation of slavery rose the energies of
the storm and the flood. This dam was
treacherous, and yonder reservoir bursts.
Here and there a staunch and 10y
al wall or column kept erect to
be revered when the waters subside;
but he who had seen the war for
slavery from newsman's eyrie was not fit
for bis vocation who should point out JEFF
ferson Davis, and say: "This was the re-
bellion!n And, with an underlined half
conscious sense Of the injustice of such an
Interpretation, the popular mind looked
uneasily upon its prisoner, and wished he
had escaped to Mexico, or Canada, or
Europe, and not remained the elephant
that he was upon our hands. Should wa
hang him, and afterward feel mean about
ityasnd sanctify his gibbet to a dead cause +?
Should we keep kim in jail as Elizabeth
kept Queen Mary, and, at the end, come TO
the same unwilling conclusion? Should
we set him free, and make rebellion cheap?
Was it not a party necessity? Was it hui
man and patriotic necessity? What would
he have done TO us under like circumstan-
ces? Should we apply our low estimate of
his magnanimity TO our own in the per-
iod of power?
GREELEY TRANSFORMS THE ELEPHANT.
At the moment of awkward irreselution,
a man in New York, out of his own notions
Ofthe needs and fitness of things, obebed
aan impulse which solved the problem.
Horace Greeley took the public mind off
Jefferson Davis, and became, in turn, the
best-abused man in America He Obeyed
the old law of cards: "When in doubt,
play trumps!" lie played mercy and mag
nanimity, and closed up the war without
shedding a life to stain the victory of free
dom. Whas ever the motives ofhis decision,
whether ga neddlesome impertinence, as
Mr.. Dan VOORHEES, says, or high and con-
sistent principle, he made mercy a success.
Not under the apple-tree at Appomattox did
the Confederacy yield up its life, but under
the gallows-tree at Richmond. The most
prominent man in the North wrote his name
to the chief traitors bond of security, and
while we cayil about it to this day, the
South, srlent and anxious 3 gain for restora-
ton TO fraternal citizenship, and absorbed
with more necessities than we, cry, "We
accept Horace Greeley as he accepted usl''
UP THE JAMES WITH JEFF.
BY reference TO my diary, find that we
assembled the James river, ON the steamer
John Sylvester, and were all day on the pas
sage. Gen. Duncan, Adjutant McElrath
"a son Of Thos. McElrath, once partner and
publisher of Horace Greeley, and other
regular army officers, were on board, and
wished to introduce me TO the Davis fam
ily, for was the only newspaper man on
the vessel. l declined. interviewing had
not then become the fashion. And | had
too much respect for my profession and for
Jefferson Davis misfortunes, to snatch |
from him momentary expressions, and print |
them to mankind as bis revealed and criti |
cal opinions.
Ma, Davis was given the absolute free