Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward.
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the reception in due course, since the date of my last, of despatches from the department numbered 305 to 318, both inclusive, together with one marked confidential, and not numbered, dated the 2d of August.
The tenor of these papers, and especially of Nos. 308, 314, and of that marked “confidential,” is such as completely to answer the purposes of my inquiries. I am now in no doubt as to the course it will be my duty to pursue under any of the contingencies which are likely to occur.
In the meantime the state of things here is not materially changed. The ministers have, most of them, left town, and little is done excepting the formal business ordinarily transacted through the agency of the subordinates left in charge. For this reason I have been in some doubt how to proceed in executing the instructions contained in No. 306, of the 24th of July, and in No. 316, of the 4th of August, so far as they relate to objects to be gained by personal conference with the minister. On the whole, I have determined upon formal action in the first place, the nature of which will be more fully set forth in separate despatches devoted to the respective subjects.
The character of the news received from America is regarded as so unfavorable to us as materially to affect the views of policy proper to be adopted here. It is now hoped that the rebels will be able to sustain themselves without the necessity of any other than moral support. This sensibly relieves us from the immediate probability of movement in any form.
You will have seen before this the publication made by Lord Russell of your despatch No. 260, a copy of which I communicated to him so long ago as the 19th of June last, and also of his own note to Mr. Stuart, of the 28th of July, taking notice of it. The whole proceeding must be admitted to be not a little anomalous. His lordship received a copy of the paper from me, which was furnished only for his information and for that of his government. He holds it for more than a month without even acknowledging its existence, when all of a sudden, on intimation of the probability of a [Page 181] call for information in the House of Lords, he seizes the occasion not to write to me, but to address a species of reply to Mr. Stuart, at Washington, based upon the intelligence received of some reverses in America, which seem then, for the first time, to be caught at as a justification for continuing in the old line of policy, and then causes both to be published forthwith. This singular proceeding has subjected his lordship to some sharpness of criticism even here.
I have indeed been told, but not by authority such as to place the matter altogether beyond a doubt, that your despatch, in connexion with preceding ones likewise communicated, and other considerations, had had so much effect on the ministry as to incline them to leave open a way to the revisal of their former policy, depending on the issue of the movement upon Richmond. Had that been successful, the recognition of belligerent rights was to have been withdrawn. I do not vouch for this as true, but, at any rate, it would fully explain the cause, both of the earlier delay and of the later action.
I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, Washington, D. C.