Mr. Wright to Mr. Seward.
[Extract.]
Berlin, May 26, 1861.
Sir:
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Enclosed is a copy of a recent communication to the minister of foreign affairs. Prussia will take efficient steps to sustain the government of the [Page 40] United States in the protection of property and commerce, and will do all she can, consistently with her obligations to other governments, to sustain the vigorous action of our government in maintaining law and order.
The minister of foreign affairs, Baron Von Schleinitz, informed me on yesterday that it was the intention of the government to issue a proclamation touching these questions.
The government and people are, in spirit and feeling, with us. I am in the receipt of hundreds of letters and personal calls seeking positions in the American army, and asking for means of conveyance to our shores. So numerous, indeed, are the applications, that I have been compelled to place on the doors of the legation a notice to the purport that “This is the legation of the United States, and not a recruiting office.” The fidelity and firmness exhibited with such unanimity by our own people in sustaining the administration in their efforts to put down the outrages of the so-called “Confederate States,” whilst it astonishes the people of the old world, is at the same time rapidly creating a sentiment of confidence in our ability to maintain unimpaired the institutions of our fathers.
Let the cost be what it may, we must vindicate the memory of our fathers from the slanders announced by those in high places in the so-called “Confederate States,” wherein they have proclaimed ours is only a confederation of States, and not a national union.
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I have the honor to be, most respectfully, your obedient servant,
His Excellency Hon. William H.
Seward,
Secretary of State,
Washington, D. C.