The Most Unpopular Man In The North” (February 1964 | Volume: 15, Issue: 2)

The Most Unpopular Man In The North”

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Authors: Louis W. Koenig

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February 1964 | Volume 15, Issue 2

As dawn approached on the morning of May 25, 1863, General William S. Rosecrans, the Union commander in Tennessee, found himself in charge of a prisoner he would soon and gladly be rid of. The man was Clement L. Vallandigham—the most reviled member of that controversial political sect of the American Civil War, the Copperheads. A former United States congressman from Ohio recently defeated for re-election, Vallandigham had achieved notoriety by denouncing Abraham Lincoln as a dictator and by demanding an immediate armistice to end the war, with full restoration of the South’s constitutional rights and privileges. His real game, many believed, was to accomplish the permanent separation of the South and the acceptance of its independence by the North.

Vallandigham’s views, which he had given unbridled expression in an unending round of orations in the East and West, had roiled countless loyal Unionists. During his membership in the House of Representatives, petitions had poured out of Ohio electoral districts calling for his expulsion from the House as a “traitor and a disgrace to the State.” Five months after the outbreak of war, one of Vallandigham’s staunchest supporters was writing, “There is no denying the fact now that he is the most unpopular man in the north, and that here in his own district he has but a minority of the people with him.”

Just three weeks had passed since the long-gathering storm of condemnation had finally crashed down upon Vallandigham. On May 7, 1863, a military commission had tried him and found him guilty of publicly expressing sentiments calculated to hinder the suppression of the rebellion; he had been sentenced to prison. But President Lincoln had come up with a better idea: he simply ordered the troublesome Vallandigham exiled to the South, behind Confederate battle lines, for the rest of the war.

Now, as he prepared to hand his prisoner over to the Rebels, General Rosecrans provided him the benefit of a polite lecture on loyalty which concluded with the emphatic observation that were Vallandigham not under heavy guard, Rosecrans’ soldiers would tear him to pieces. “That, sir,” Vallandigham answered evenly, “is because they are just as prejudiced and ignorant of my character and career as yourself …”

“I have a proposition to make,” Vallandigham continued. “Draw your soldiers up in a hollow square tomorrow morning, and announce to them that Vallandigham desires to vindicate himself, and I will guarantee that when they have heard me through they will be more willing to (ear Lincoln and yourself to pieces than they will Vallandigham.” Rosecrans, of course, refused, but the rest of their conversation was amiable enough; when it was time to depart for the Confederate lines, the General laid his hand on Vallandigham’s shoulder and said to an aide, “He don’t look a bit like a traitor, now does he, Joe?”

History, in whose approving judgment Vallandigham had indestructible faith, has not smiled upon him. The prevailing view