The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1902-02-23
English Sentiment During Our Civil
War.

English Sentiment During Our Civil
War.
The Rev. DR.. NEWMAN HALL, who
died at London on Tuesday In his eighty.
sixth year, was notable as a pulpit orator
generation ago. but he had a special dis.
tinction for Americans in being n OF
the few conspicuous Englishmen who
took the Union side during our Civil
War and defended it stoutly as a preacher
and a lecturer. The drift Of English
sentiment, however, was sc strongly
the other way, among the upper, the
middle and tho official classes more
especially, that it cannot be said that
DR.. HALLS eloquence had much infu-
ence. Even that far greater orator
and more powerful personality, JOHN
BRIGHT, gave expression to Union SYM
pathies, growing out Of hatred OF slavery,
which already existed among the work.
ing people to a very considerable ex-
tent, rather than produced lei English
conviction favorable to the Northern
cause.
The dominant English feeling at that
time Is described very strikingly in an
address on the Treaty Of Washington,
for the settlement Of the Alabama claims,
more specifically, by Mr.. CHARLES
FRANCIS ADAMS. This address was de-
livered before the New York Historical
Society last November, but it has only
just been published. It is a calm and
judicial history of the proceedings and
negotiations Leading up to the treaty,
and incidentally and necessarily the
tone Of English sentiment respecting
our Civil War is explained and analysed.
The prevailing conviction Of the hope
~lessness of the Union cause which he
demonstrates may bring surprise to
many Of the generation which has grown
up since the War; but it must be remem-
bered that expert European military
Judgment was almost unanimous in
holding that the attempt to restore the
American Union was a military impos-
sibility. Moreover, as Mr.. ADAMS ex-
plains, g during the Civil War the entire
s%ympathies and hearty good will Of the
great body Of those composing what are
known as the governing and influential
classes throughout Europe west OF the
vistula we're enlisted on the side OF the
Confederacy.' Dislike and distrust Of
democracy prevailed and the failure Of
the American experiment was desired.
In England, while the poor, the lowly
and the conscientious or those to whom
a Nonconfomist like DR.. NEWMAN
HALL appealed more specifically, . sym
pathized instinctively with the Union
and the North, Of the privileged and the
moneyed, the commercial and man
featuring classes, it may safely be as
serted that nine out OF ten were heart
and soul on the side Of the rebel and
With this sympathy went
the confident assumption of Southern
triumph; and it cannot be denied that
there seemed to be very much to justify
it. The suppression of a rebellion ex-
tending over a territory so vast. and so
bitterly pursued by millions of a race
peculiarly strenuous and of unequalled
aptitude for warlike resistance, was
not looked upon by the South as within
the range of human possibility; and even
at the North a like feeling prevailed
among a large minority of the people,
here in the city Of New York, more par
ticularly. REPRESENTATIONS that grass
would grow in the streets we're heard
in many bank parlors and counting
houses as the certainty Of a clash of
arms became more obvious. Even the
of some Of the stanchest Union
men we're almost ready to fail them.
In England sympathy with the Con-
federacy was unrestrained in its frank
ness of expression. When 80 late as
the close Of 1883 pressure by the Ameri-
can Minister had brought about the
trial in the Court of Exchequer Of the
test case Of the Alexandra, building in
for the Confederate service, |
a verdict by the jury for the defendants
brought forth a great outburst Of APP
in the court room. The Alabama
and its ravages were followed with
admiration and e~xultation.
a The company on the decks Of British
mail steamers cheered her TO the echo
as they passed" Ardent sympathy for
the South and contemptuous enmity
10 the Union were" well-nigh p~ervasive. "
/" Nineteen-twentieths of the ruling
class, said RICHARD CoBDEN in a public
were firmly convinced from the
first hat the Civil War in America could
end in separation One OF the
Confederate agents in England " never
met among army and navy men n OF
service who did not warmly SYM
with the South" Mr.. BENTINcK.
a member Of Parliament. declared in a
in 1862, that " wherever | have
throughout the length and
breadth OF the land | never yet have
met the man who has not at once said,
My wishes are with the Southerners.'
This IA because. as he explains,
The South Was " fighting against n OF
The most grinding, one of the most
n Of the most irritating at
to establish %tyrannical govern