Papers Relating to Foreign Affairs, Accompanying the Annual Message of the President to the Second Session Thirty-eighth Congress, Part IV, Appendix to diplomatic correspondence of 1865; the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, late president of the United States of America, and the attempted assassination of William H. Seward, Secretary of State, and Frederick W. Seward, Assistant Secretary, on the evening of the 14th of April, 1865; expressions of condolence and sympathy inspired by these events

Reform Union

Bristol, undated

Resolution passed at a meeting held by the Bristol Reform Union.

Sir: We, members of the Bristol Reform Union, in meeting assembled, believing it to be the duty of all public bodies to put on record an expression of the feelings of horror and indignation excited in every right-minded person by the atrocious murder of a wise, honest, and patriotic President of a great republic, and regarding with equal detestation the cowardly assault on the chief Secretary of State, desire to convey to the President and people of the United States, to the bereaved widow and family of Abraham Lincoln, and to the honorable Mr. Seward and his family, the assurance of our heartfelt sorrow and sincere sympathy in their profound affliction and abhorrence of the treacherous and cold blooded murder of their noble and illustrious President by a ruthless assassin the tool of a foul conspiracy.

Associated for the purpose of obtaining political rights for the unenfranchised millions of our own country, we feel the sudden removal of such a man as a loss not only to you, but to ourselves and the world at large. Sprung from the people, and raised by the force of his native genius and industry to be the Chief Magistrate of a great and free people, he has endeared himself to all lovers of liberty by his devotion to the great cause of negro emancipation, and by his earnest desire to confer the blessings of equal rights and privileges on all, without distinction of party, creed, or color.

While thus deeply sharing your grief and sorrow that just as the great work he had set himself to was approaching its consummation, his death has turned the hour of triumph into one of mourning, we fervently trust that his successor may adhere to the policy he inaugurated and tread in his footsteps, by tempering justice with mercy, and by advancing those glorious principles of freedom and progress to which he had devoted himself; and we sincerely hope that whatever differences of opinion, imaginary grievances, or animosities may exist on either side, they may not disturb the cordial amity and good feeling which ought to prevail between two nations so like in race, language, and religion, but that the common interests of humanity, the mutual dependence of the two countries, and the sympathy evoked by this sad catastrophe, from all classes of Englishmen, may knit more closely the bonds of Union and brotherhood between England and America.

Signed on behalf of the meeting.

CHARLES MORRIS,

Chairman.

His Excellency the Minister
of the United States.