Wichita eagle., 1889-05-12
A LETTER BY DAVIS.
Reply Made to General Wolseley's Attacks
on His Official Record

NASHVILLE, May 1.-The America to-
morrow will publish the following letter
from jefferson Davis. The letter was
written in reply to request made on Mr..
Davis by Z. Carmack, editor of the Amer
lean, for statement in reply to General
Wolseiey's article in the North American
Review for May, criticising Mr.. Davis
course as president of the confederacy.
The letter of Mr.. Davis is as follows:
BEAUvoIR. Miss, May s. 1889.
Mr.. E. W. Carmack
NV Dear Sir-Your kind letter and the
copy of the North American Review of
this month, forwarded by you, have both
been received. / comply with your request
for reply to an article by General Wolse-
ley which is contained in the Review.
Surprising that you have only desired
reply to the passage specially directed
against myself it will be so limited.
A year or so since that same writer pub
lished an article containing matter p T.
porting to have been gained by intercourse
with General r. l.. Lee while his guest
dnring the war between the states OF the
American union. To those persons ac-
uuainted with General Lee, who knew his
characteristic discretion, his strict regard
for official courtesy and the personal
friendship and cordial relations which had
long existed between him and President
Davis it was incredible that he should
have seized the opportunity offered by the
arrival of an itinerant foreigner to make
such statements as would afford material
for the cynical criticisms of the article re-
ferred to in the administration of the con-
federacy For manifested hostility TO me
] could imagine no cause, unless an eyre
gious vanity had been wounded by NY fail
ure, to notice his presence IN our country, a
presence which it is most probable was
to me unknown. My reply then made to
his article exposed his historical errors,
his baseless fictions and acknowledged that
had previously known nothingof him save
through his large promises and small per-
formances on a memorable occasion.
In the article to which you now call my
attention the agent general of the British
army, Viscount Wolseley, with increased
venom renews his attack on me and opens
it with the cover of a hypOcrltical preten-
sion of sympathy. His arrogance hereto
fore exhibited was SO extreme as TO be
harmless and merely provoke contempt
while it suggested the query put TO one of
old whether he thought knowledge would
die with him. Now having learned that
facts are needed to sustain allegations he
followshis depreciatory remarks concerning
me by 1ibellouS statements. Where, when
or how did / ever express the opinion
that $1,000 Enfield rifles" would suffice for
the conIederacy? Where, when or how
did | then refuse to receive SGT, 900 men
offered for the confederate service? Where
when or how was the East Indian feet"
ever offered to me? What means were re-
jected by me when proposed by others for
placing the finances OF the confedeTacy on
a solid basis?
These are the specifications of his ar
raignment. Where are the proofs? He
expresses regret that no answer was pub
lished IN thn Cen ury to go forth with the
indictments against me, but was he re
stricted to 4 rehash of the articles there
published and to those evolved from his
internal consciousness. WhS, If he wished
to know the truth and to tell it,
did he not consult more authentic
sources of information, such as Admiral
Semmes' Memoirs of Service Atioat," or
Secret Service of the Confederate States
in Europe" by Captain Bullock, the naval
representative of the confederate states in
Europe, or the History of the Confederate
States Navy" by J. I. Scharpe, c. 5. A..
or the report of Major Caleb Huse, charged
with the purchase and shipment of ord
nance stores of General Georges, chief of
the ordnance department, or reports of the
treasury, war and navy departments of
the confederacv, or the signed denial by
Secretaries Memminger and Trenholm of
the silly reflection, made after the war on
the confederate government Tor not having
sent ont the cotton crop OF lS6l-62 as a ba-
sis of public credit
In these and elsewhere, except in the
writings of sectional enemies or diSap-
pointed candidates for executive favor. is
TO be found concurrent evidence of the
prompt and energetic efforts TO secure
large importations of arms and the muui-
tons of war and at the same time by the
grossly manifested policy of enrolling
only men who could be armed, to draw
from the large amount of private arms in
the country the weapons to supplement
our deficiency when the confederacy was or
ganized. Respectfully and truly,
I E-EErrSAN- M