CHAPTER XII

HIS PART IN THE CIVIL WAR: IN ENGLAND

Though Maury arrived in Charleston the latter part of September, it was not until October 12, 1862 that he departed with his twelve year old son “Brave” on board the steamer _Herald_ to run the Union blockade. An attempt had been made some three days before and had been unsuccessful, as the vessel had run into an enemy sloop of war and was forced to put back within the protection of the forts. The second trial was successful, but it almost ended in disaster. “We crossed the bar once”, Maury wrote, “and when we got in about two miles of the enemy the pilots plumped the ship ashore, where she lay all night. In the morning they opened on her but she got off without damage”. Maury certainly could not have looked upon capture with any feelings of pleasure, but to reassure his wife he wrote, before leaving Charleston, “If we get caught, I expect soon to be exchanged. The Brave and I will have a bully time in prison”.

Nothing further of an unusual nature happened on the six hundred miles voyage to the Bermudas except that Captain Louis M. Coxetter, who had never before been very far from land, after groping about for the island had to admit on the sixth day that he was lost.

James Morris Morgan, who as a midshipman accompanied Maury to England, thus relates how the great scientist extricated the captain from his difficulty: “He (Coxetter) told Commodore Maury that something terrible must have happened, as he had sailed his ship directly over the spot where the Bermuda Islands ought to be! Commodore Maury told him that he could do nothing for him before ten o’clock that night and advised him to slow down. At ten o’clock the great scientist and geographer went on deck and took observations, at times lying flat on his back, sextant in hand, as he made measurements of the stars. When he had finished his calculations, he gave the captain a course and told him that by steering it at a certain speed he would sight the light at Port Hamilton by two o’clock in the morning. No one turned into his bunk that night except the Commodore and his little son; the rest of us were too anxious. Four bells struck and no light was in sight. Five minutes more passed and still not a sign of it; then grumbling commenced, and the passengers generally agreed with the man who expressed the opinion that there was too much d...d science on board and that we should all be on our way to Fort Lafayette in New York Harbor as soon as day broke. At ten minutes past two the masthead lookout sang out, ‘Light ho!’—and the learned old Commodore’s reputation as a navigator was saved”.[16]

Fortunately Commodore Wilkes’s squadron, which had been hovering about the islands and overhauling all the ships that passed, had just departed and the _Herald_ made her way unmolested into the harbor. Here Maury remained for more than two weeks, waiting for the Royal Mail Steamer _Delta_ from St. Thomas. During this time he was received as a private citizen and world-renowned scientist by the governor of the islands, and was called upon by the commandant of Fort St. George and honored with a dinner on board H. M. S. _Immortality_ then stationed at Port Hamilton.

When the English ship sailed, she was followed to sea by the U. S. Sloops of War _San Jacinto_ and _Mohican_ in a threatening manner as though about to repeat the “Trent Affair” and take Maury from the vessel; but nothing of the sort materialized. At Halifax, where Maury arrived November 9, he received the most distinguished consideration from the general commanding the troops, the admiral of the fleet, and the governor of Nova Scotia. The Confederate flag was flown from the top of the hotel in his honor, and the hand-organs ground “Dixie” under his window all day.

Here Maury’s party took passage, on November 13, on the Cunard Steamer _Arabia_, a paddlewheel full-rigged ship plying between Liverpool and Boston. The ship tumbled about considerably during a great part of the voyage, and Maury was “as seasick and amiable as usual”. The voyage was uneventful, and Liverpool was reached in safety.

On arrival, Maury conferred with Captain James T. Bulloch, C. S. Navy, who had an office with Fraser, Trenholm, and Company, the financial agents of the Confederate government, at No. 10 Rumford Place. After a short stay in Liverpool, he went on to London to a house in Sackville Street which had already been engaged for him, where, according to Morgan, “All day long there would be in front of the house a string of carriages with coronets on their doors, while their owners were paying their respects to the great ‘Lieutenant Maury’”. Early in 1863, Maury established himself at Bowdon, a village about nine miles from Manchester, so that he could be near his son whom he had placed there in the Rose Hill School.

At the time of Maury’s arrival in England, there were, it appears, eight officers of the Confederate Navy in Europe, who were engaged in the task of securing by whatever means possible the much needed ships for the Confederacy. Captain Samuel Barron, who had been sent over to command the ironclad rams at that time being built by Lairds at Liverpool, was the flag-officer and in actual command, though the duties and responsibilities of the various officers were not very clearly defined and often overlapped.

Maury’s first accomplishment was the purchase, in March, 1863, of a new iron screw-steamer of about 560 tons, which had just been completed at Dumbarton on the Clyde. She was fitted out as a merchant steamer under the name of the _Japan_, and on April 1, set sail, pretending to be bound for the East Indies. At about the same time a small steamer, the _Alar_, cleared from New Haven for St. Malo with Commander William Lewis Maury and a staff of officers together with guns, ammunition, and other supplies. The two ships met off Ushant, where the war material was placed on board the larger vessel. Commander Maury, a cousin to M. F. Maury, then commissioned her a Confederate man-of-war with the name _Georgia_.

The ship at once began a cruise which lasted seven months and resulted in the capture of eight or nine vessels, amounting to a loss of $406,000. After cruising over the South Atlantic and calling at Bahia, Brazil, where she fell in with the _Alabama_, and at Capetown, she made her way in safety to Cherbourg, France, where she arrived during the night of October 28–29. Here Commander Maury was detached because of ill health, and the ship was refitted. But she was fated not to go out on another cruise. The vessel was not adapted to the service for which she was required; her coal capacity was limited and the consumption of fuel on her was made very large because she lacked great sail-power and always had to chase under steam. She did, however, slip out past the Union ships on guard, and made her way to the Mediterranean to a rendezvous with the C. S. S. _Rappahannock_ on the coast of Morocco. Here her battery, ammunition, and a part of her crew were to be transferred to the other vessel, and she was then to be sold. But the French kept such a close watch on the _Rappahannock_ that she was not able to leave the harbor of Calais, and the _Georgia_ was at last forced to turn about and make her way to Bordeaux. She was then ordered to Liverpool, where on the 10th of May, 1864, she was put out of commission and sold to an Englishman by the name of Edward Bates for about 15,000 pounds. She was then captured in August of that year by Captain T. T. Craven of the U. S. S. _Niagara_, and sent to Boston, where she was condemned; and afterwards the owner’s claim for damages was disallowed by the Mixed Commission at Washington.

Maury was instructed by the Secretary of the Navy, on June 8, 1863, to purchase another ship. This order, however, did not reach him until two months afterwards, and he was not able to carry it out until the month of November, when he secured a condemned dispatch boat belonging to the Royal Navy. This was the _Victor_, a screw-steamer of about 500 tons which had been offered for sale at Sheerness. For fear of being stopped, Maury hurried her to sea on the wintry night of November 24, with workmen still on board and with only a few of her intended crew. Her officers joined her in the Channel, where she was commissioned the _Rappahannock_. Two days later she entered the harbor of Calais under the guise of a Confederate ship in distress. Here the French threw such restrictions about her as to prevent her from even making an attempt to leave port. Some endeavors were made to sell the vessel, but the war came to an end before this could be accomplished and the ship was eventually turned over to the United States. Her commanding officer had considered her a poor ship for commerce destroying, because her machinery took up too much space and her magazine was so large as to leave but little room for crew and provisions. The ship was often referred to as “The Confederate White Elephant”, but she did serve the very useful purpose of keeping two United States war vessels constantly off Calais to prevent her from going to sea.

Maury and the other Confederate agents had great obstacles to meet in securing ships, and probably did as well as possible under the circumstances. Federal agents were constantly on the watch to see that French and British neutrality was strictly observed, and besides Maury and his associates were greatly handicapped by the lack of money for the purchase of vessels and the insufficiency of both officers and their crews. “If I had had money and officers”, wrote Maury, “I could since I have been here have fitted out half a dozen just as good to prey upon the Yankee commerce as the _Alabama_”.

Maury also had a hand in the attempt to have two ironclad rams constructed in a French port for the Confederate government, one of which he hoped to have the privilege of commanding. The specifications for such vessels were these: ability to cross the Atlantic, hulls of wood and iron with two armored turrets, engines of 300 horsepower which would give great momentum and a speed of fifteen or sixteen knots, two twin screw propellers, and a draft of fifteen feet. His general plan and the cost of construction were approved by Secretary Mallory, and on July 16, 1863 the contract was signed between Bulloch and L. Arman, a naval constructor at Bordeaux, for the building of the two steam rams. But these ships of war were destined never to be finished for the Confederacy, for the turn of events in America and the attitude of Great Britain caused the Emperor Napoleon to shift his position diplomatically and maintain a strict neutrality, though at one time, according to Maury’s diary, the Emperor had written to Arman for a description of the guns with which the rams were to be armed in order that the French government might superintend their fabrication, and test them to see if they were properly constructed.

Maury was engaged in other activities in England and on the Continent which were altogether political in their nature. He had a European reputation for his literary and scientific attainments, and was peculiarly well qualified to bring the Southern version of the causes, progress, and probable outcome of the war before an influential class of people. Upon his arrival in England he began at once to exert this influence, both privately and publicly. As an example of the latter form of propaganda was a letter which he addressed to the editor of the London _Times_. This appeared in that newspaper on December 22, 1862, and set forth a sanguine account of conditions in the South as he had recently seen them, and sought to impress upon the British the hopefulness of the Southern cause.

On October 7 of that year, Gladstone, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, had said at a banquet at Newcastle, “There is no doubt that Jefferson Davis and other leaders of the South have made an army; they are making, it appears, a navy; and they have made, what is more than either—they have made a nation”. The speech caused a sensation, and was received with cheers. “We may anticipate”, he also declared, “with certainty the success of the Southern States so far as their separation from the North is concerned”.[17] Maury had reason, therefore, for being at first very hopeful of European recognition and intervention, and was not merely drawing on his imagination when he wrote, “The Emperor may, and I hope will, decide on recognition and there are hopes here that when Parliament meets, February 5, the British government may find itself compelled to do something”.

In a short time, however, his eyes began to be opened, and he saw that, though great admiration was expressed for the bravery of the soldiers and the heroism of the women of the South, such sympathy was more apparent than real and was confined mostly to the upper classes. He began to realize that, since 1850, a million and a half had gone from the English middle class and settled in the North, and that their relatives and friends at home naturally sympathized with that section in the war.

Toward the close of the year 1863, Maury drew up a “Recast of Resolutions, etc.” for a Southern sympathizer, the Reverend Dr. Tremlett, of London, and for his 2000 parishioners, the purpose of which was the organization of a society to encourage remonstrance against the war. This developed into the “Society for Obtaining the Cessation of Hostilities in America”, which was very active during the year 1864. It had its headquarters at 215 Regent Street, London, and numbered among its officers and members many very influential persons. Leaflets and pamphlets were drawn up and distributed, which called upon the participants to bring the strife and bloodshed, the misery and suffering to a close. Many of these petitions were read in the churches of both Ireland and England, and signatures representing several millions of British people were secured. By that time, however, the war had advanced to that stage in which no such petitions could affect the North and only the complete collapse of the Confederacy would bring the struggle to an end.

In addition to this work as a propagandist which was carried on more or less in the open, Maury was also concerned in political intrigues with the Emperor Napoleon and Maximilian of Austria. These matters were veiled in secrecy, of course; and it is difficult to determine, at this late day, the exact extent of Maury’s operations. But there is evidence that it was very considerable. Napoleon had succeeded in conquering Mexico, and the crown had been offered to the Archduke Maximilian of Austria. Maury, who in the old days in Washington had had correspondence with this Austrian prince, thought the time opportune to write to him concerning a scheme which he thought might be greatly to the advantage of both Mexico and the Confederacy. The plan was the offer of assistance in the separation of California from the Union and its restoration to Mexico. Maury hoped that, in this way, foreign complications would arise, which would result in European intervention that would bring the war to a close.

At first, the scheme was received with great favor by Maximilian. Meanwhile, Napoleon changed his mind concerning any plan he may have once had for the recognition of the Confederacy and intervention in her behalf, probably because of England’s repeated refusals to join with him in any such action. As Bulloch says, “The invitation to build ships in France was given during the period of successful resistance at the South, and of apparent doubt and trepidation at the North. It was withdrawn when force of numbers and immeasurable superiority in war material began to prevail, and when aid and encouragement was most needed by the weaker side. It suited the Imperial policy, and appeared to be consistent with the designs upon Mexico, to extend a clandestine support to the South when the Confederate armies were still strong and exultant”.[18] Accordingly, when Maximilian visited the Emperor in Paris to consult in regard to his acceptance of the Mexican throne, he was persuaded by Napoleon to give up his plan of recognizing the Confederacy and entering into intimate relations with that government; and he did not receive Slidell, the Confederate representative, in Paris, as he had fully expected to do. Nothing further came of Maury’s plan. Maximilian was proclaimed Emperor of Mexico by a deputation from that country at the Archduke’s palace at Mirarmar on the Adriatic, on April 10, 1864; and on the 15th of that month he embarked for Vera Cruz, without making any further advances toward the Confederacy.

So much, then, for Maury’s endeavors to secure ships of war for the Confederacy, his work as a propagandist, and his political intrigues. But a fourth activity of his remains to be considered. This had to do with experiments with electric mines,—a continuation of that pioneer work in this field which he had commenced in Richmond early in the war. It has often been stated that this was the primary object of his mission to England; but certainly neither his correspondence nor his diary, which was begun at Bowdon on April 27, 1863, not very long after his arrival abroad, bear out this impression. The fact is, that not until after the comparative failure of his other plans and projects did Maury devote much time and attention to these experiments. Then from July, 1864 up to the time of his departure from England the following spring, everything indicates that his mind was absorbed with the electric mine.

It was not the fault of Maury, however, that this weapon was not more quickly developed, and used more effectively in the war. “I saw”, he bitterly complained in one of his letters, “that he did spring at least one mine on Farragut’s ships (in the Battle of Mobile Bay). It is so strange to me that sensible men will require to see ship after ship blown up before they will have faith in submarine mining. Don’t you remember some drawings that cousin John was making for me in the fall or winter of 1861? That was a plan for mining our channel ways, and our authorities have not yet faith in it to make of it a regular organized system of defense”. Even as late as November, 1864 he wrote in his diary: “The question may be asked why I do not hasten home with this information and knowledge? Who—for Davis and Mallory are bitter enemies—will believe my report? The importance of a navy and the value of submarine mining were urged upon them by me from the beginning. Moreover, I have written both the Secretary of War and the Secretary of the Navy urging these things, and here I am ordered to lie. Another thing, since the whole field is so new I can be of more service here in traversing and exhausting it with experiments where mechanical facilities and appliances are so abundant. I report results as fast as I obtain them and in a manner, as to circumstances and details, so minute that they may be brought into play as well as though I were there. Finally, I think it best since so it must be”.

The results of Maury’s experiments in the electric mine while in England are embodied in the following agreement, made April 11, 1865 with an English electrical engineer as agent: “My dear Sir,—My own experiments show that the electrical torpedo or mine has not hitherto been properly appreciated as a means of defense in war. It is as effective for the defense as ironclads and rifled guns are for the attack. Indeed, such is the progress made in what may be called the new department of military engineering that I feel justified in the opinion that hereafter in all plans for coast, harbor, and river defenses and in all works for the protection of cities and places whether against the attack by armies on land or ships afloat, the electrical torpedo is to play an important part. It will not only modify and strengthen existing plans but greatly reduce the expense of future systems. These experiments have resulted in some important improvements and contrivances, not to say inventions and discoveries, which have been fully made known to you verbally. The communication was confidential and for the purpose of making you a party interested in bringing the subject into proper notice. It was also verbally agreed that you should undertake to negotiate with certain powers for the adoption of this new system of defense as improved by me and grants made therefor should be shared between us, I receiving one half of the full amount so granted without charge or deduction of any sort.

“The only restrictions placed upon you in this matter are: 1. The enemies of my country are not for any consideration whatever to have the benefits of these improvements. On the contrary, on making them known to others, you are to make them known in confidence and with a clause in the agreement especially providing against publicity and stipulating that the plan shall not be made known to any Yankee or his government. 2. I had already offered to H. I. H. Grand Duke Constantine, as a token of acknowledgment for his great kindness and friendly consideration shown me and mine, when this war broke out, to place all these my discoveries and improvements at his feet and for the use of his government. I have referred him to you as my confidant and friend who is fully prepared to carry out my plans in all their details, or who will explain them in confidence to any person he may appoint. You are to make no charge, therefore, for imparting this information, at his request, and should he or his government think proper to offer me an honorarium, it is not to be shared by you. 3. My friend, Captain M. Jansen of the Dutch Navy who resides at Delft, has assisted me in a part of these experiments. We are as brothers. All that I have done is known to him and he has the authority to use the information acquired for his own government, provided he may be personally benefited thereby. The restriction here is, that should you deem it worth while to bring the subject before the Dutch government you will first confer with Captain Jansen and shape your course accordingly. Should you effect a negotiation there, please turn over to him my share of the Dutch grant. 4. I restrict you also as to Mexico. Leave that to me. Should, however, any negotiation be entered into with that government, I shall refer the authorities to you for the articles such as wire, etc. required.

“Such in substance is our verbal understanding. But as I am about to leave England, it becomes proper, for more reasons than one, that we should make a memorandum of agreement in writing, to the end of making it good in law and binding also upon our heirs and assigns. With this view, this writing is drawn and the following statement is added. The points upon which this system hangs and which give special value to the information imparted to you concerning it are mainly these: 1. A plan for determining by cross bearings when the enemy is in the torpedo field of destruction and for ‘making connections’ among the torpedo wires in a certain way and by which the concurrence of each of two operators becomes necessary for the explosion of any one or more torpedoes. This plan requires each operator to be so placed or stationed that a line drawn straight from them to the place of the torpedoes may intersect as nearly as practicable at right angles. And it requires the connection to be such that each operator may put his station in or out of circuit at will. When the torpedoes are laid, a range for each station is established for every torpedo or group of torpedoes. When either operator observes an enemy in range with any torpedo, he closes his circuit for that torpedo. If the enemy before getting out of this range should enter the range for any torpedo from the other station, the operator there closes his circuit and discharges the igniting spark. Consequently, if the ranges belong to the same torpedo, its explosion takes place. But if not, there will be no explosion. Hence, here is an artifice by which explosion becomes impossible when the enemy is not in the field of destruction and sure when she is. 2. The Electrical Gauge, a contrivance of my own which you perfectly understand and some of which you have already made; by means of it one of the tests which the igniting fuse has to undergo before it is accepted is applied. By means of it, the operators can telegraph through the fuse to each other without risk to the torpedoes and by which the torpedoes may without detriment to their explosibility be tested daily or as often as required. And thus the operators can at all times make sure that all is right. 3. A plan for planting torpedoes where the water is too deep for them to lie on the bottom and explode with effect, by which they will not interfere with the navigation of the channels and by which, when the enemy makes his appearance, they may by the touch of a key be brought instantly into the required position at the required depth. These contrivances are very simple. They are readily understood from verbal description. They require neither models nor drawings for illustration. You understand them all. They are of little or no value except to governments and, as against these letters of patent are of no use, I have not deemed letters patent desirable. I have every confidence in you and therefore intrust the whole secret to your keeping and discretion. Having thus placed myself in your hands, let us make this agreement binding also upon our heirs and assigns, and to this end I propose that the necessary steps be at once taken. Yours truly, M. F. Maury, Confederate Navy. To Nath. J. Holmes, Esq.”

Maury had at this time fully decided to return to the Confederate States in the spring, and was then arranging his affairs in England with that end in view. He hoped to arrive there early enough to make use of his electric mines in the land warfare of the spring campaign. He had recently undergone a surgical operation, and his friends in England were very much opposed to his going home, some of them being of the opinion that by the time he arrived Richmond would have been abandoned and he would have no home to go to. But he conceived it to be his duty to return, as he might be of greater service there than he was abroad.

Before the date he had set for sailing, May 2, Lee had surrendered at Appomattox and Lincoln had been assassinated; still Maury did not change his plans, but sailed on the Royal Mail Steamer _Atrato_ with a quantity of insulated wire, copper tanks, magnetic exploders, etc. for Havana with the hope of being able to keep open Galveston or some other port on the coast of Texas.

He had worried a great deal about the members of his family who were in the Confederate service. “My dreams”, he wrote in January, 1863, “are nightly of death and mutilation of children and friends”. Just four days after this date his son John, who was at Vicksburg on the staff of General Dabney H. Maury, disappeared while reconnoitering the enemy alone, and was never heard of again.[19] News of this unfortunate event did not reach the father until April 8, 1863, and soon afterwards he wrote as follows on the evils of war: “War is a great scourge, and this has touched you and me and many a good fellow with a heavy hand. As I look out upon the landscape that lies before my window, and see the men and women working in the fields, and the fields smiling to man’s husbandry, when I see no marks of the spoiler, and recognize that each one is safe in his person and secure in his possessions, then it is I see peace, and think of my poor country with a sigh, and, oh, with what reflections. ‘Thoughts on thoughts a countless throng’, bless your hearts—you and John—for comforting, with so much solicitude and affection, my poor dear wife in her affliction! Good brothers are you both. How lovely and beautiful are the memories of my Johnny! I wonder if all parents think of their dead as I do of mine. Bless that sleeping boy! Never did he, in his whole life, do one single act that either displeased or grieved me or his mother. ‘He never offended’. What an epitaph; and how proudly I write it! But where is the end of this war to find us—where you and yours, me and mine, and where so many that are dear and near to us? Our charming circle of relations is, I fear, broken up, never, never to be restored on this side of the grave”.

His family had been made refugees three different times, and Maury had been much concerned over their needs and probable sufferings. He wrote in the summer of 1864 to Dr. Tremlett from the Duke of Buckingham’s palace at Stow, “I had a letter to-day of May 7th from my daughter Nannie, and she says, ‘Flour has gone to $100 per barrel—too high for us—but meal is cheaper, thank God!’... ‘We had for dinner to-day soup made out of nothing, and afterwards a shin. ’Twas good, I tell you; we all dote on shins’. And again, from my little Lucy, ‘Ham and mashed potatoes to-day for dinner; and, as it was my birthday (9th May), Mamma said I might eat as much as I wanted’. Here, you see, there is no complaining, but only a gentle lifting of the curtain, which in their devotion and solicitude they have kept so closely drawn before me. With this pitiful picture in my mind’s eye, I felt as if I must choke with the sumptuous viands set before me on the Duke’s table. Alas, my little innocents!”

So it was with a heavy heart and the future all dark that he and his young son set sail, after an absence of more than two years, for home,—the home which Maury himself was not to see until several more years of exile had been spent in foreign lands.