President Abraham Lincoln Summons Secretary of State Seward After the Confederate Secret Service Raid on St. Albans

During the Civil War, although the British were mainly opposed to the institution of slavery, the ruling class sympathized with the South and King Cotton, and the government's policies reflected it. In Britain’s brand of neutrality, Confederate agents were allowed to operate from its territory with impunity, buying ships and munitions and plotting actions in furtherance of its war aims. Feelings ran high between the British and U.S. governments, and animosities during the contentious Trent incident in 1861 almost resulted in war. However, President Lincoln thought that one war at a time was more than sufficient, and Secretary of State William Seward was adamantly against getting involved in hostilities with European nations while the rebellion continued jn the United States. He developed a policy of maintaining American honor while avoiding a conflict with Britain, despite provocations. Seward was thus engaged in a delicate juggling act, and was much castigated for this in the press at the time.     

Before the British North America Act of 1867, Canada did not exist as a federated, independent nation, but consisted of British colonies ultimately under British governance. British foreign policy was Canadian foreign policy, but in addition there was a great deal of real sympathy for the Confederacy in Canada.

In secret sessions during February 1864, the Confederate Congress passed a bill that authorized a campaign of sabotage against “the enemy’s property, by land or sea.” The bill established a Secret Service fund—$5 million in U.S. dollars—to finance the sabotage. One million dollars of that fund was specifically earmarked for use by agents in Canada, as many believed that large-scale across-the-border covert actions could win the war.

Confederate President Jefferson Davis named Jacob Thompson, who had been Secretary of the Interior under President James Buchanan, to head the Confederate Secret Service in Canada, and he arrived there in May 1864. A Confederate operations station was established in Toronto under the command of Thomas Henry Hines, who had ridden with Morgan’s Raiders in guerrilla sorties into Kentucky and Tennessee. George N. Sanders, who had taken part in Confederate operations in Europe, was also sent to Canada. Their goals were twofold: to undermine the Lincoln administration by arranging peace initiatives through contacts with influential pro-Southern businessmen and politicians in the North. Moreover, their orders were to try to subvert the Union war effort using various means, including arranging the escape of Confederate POWs from the Johnson's Island prisoner-of-war camp on Lake Erie, launching raids across the border, and creating as much disorder and panic in the North as possible. They intended to show the people of the North that the war was far from over, that the U.S. Government was incapable of defending them, and with the 1864 presidential election upcoming, that voters in the North should not reelect President Lincoln. Such raids would also avenge Union Army destruction in the South, and might even obtain money needed by the Confederacy.

In mid-October 1864, 21 cavalrymen, organized by George Sanders and led by Lieut. Bennett Young, infiltrated from Canada into St. Albans, Vermont, fifteen miles South of the Canadian border. They came by twos and threes over a period of nine days to engage in what would prove to be the northernmost engagement of the Civil War. They hoped to burn down the town to give the Yankees a taste of what the South was receiving (Sherman was on his march to the sea at that very moment), and to rob banks to fund operations. On October 19 the agents met up, changed into their Confederate uniforms, and commenced the action. With his gun drawn, Lieut. Young mounted the steps of a hotel and shouted: "This city is now in the possession of the Confederate States of America!" Shock and confusion followed as gun-toting horsemen galloped down Main Street, herding terror-stricken townsfolk onto the Village Green. The raiders then turned their attention to robbing the three local banks. Even though the Confederates dropped much of their loot in the confusion of escape, they still managed to make off with over $200,000. Their plan to burn down the town was less successful, as they managed to destroy only a woodshed. By that time residents organized an armed opposition, so the marauders promptly returned to Canada. One townsman was killed, another wounded, and the story was front page news all over the North.

In Canada, the police captured 13 of the raiders and $88,000 of the stolen money, in a shoot-out in which a policeman was killed. The U.S. Government sought their extradition from Canada on the grounds that they were criminals. In November 1864 Lord Monck, the British-appointed Governor General of Canada, ordered the Confederates transferred to Montreal, where it was generally understood they would find friends and sympathizers, and handed over the robbed monies to the Montreal chief of police, over the strenuous opposition of the attorneys for the American banks that had suffered the losses. A hearing on the extradition was set for mid-November, but it was continued for one month at the defendants' request. That month was spent in finding grounds to secure their release.

On December 13, before the contingent of attorneys for the U.S. Government and the banks had even finished arriving, no less filed their motions and briefs, the defendants' counsel moved to release them on the grounds that some paperwork required to hold them in custody was inappropriately prepared. An attorney for the U.S. side later claimed that the magistrate hearing the case had himself been delegated to prepare that very paperwork and had made it defective on purpose. In any event, the magistrate then precipitously dismissed the case, discharged the prisoners, and to add insult to injury, returned the robbed money to the robbers instead of the banks. In his lengthy , delivered opinion, the magistrate found that, to Canada, the men had been determined to be military belligerents rather than mere criminals, and that with Britain neutral, the Canadian court could not convict them of a crime. A Canadian minister acting as counsel for the United States protested against such conduct, warning that it would unnecessarily alienate the United States, but to no avail.            

Lincoln and Seward received the disquieting news by telegraph the next day, and the President immediately wrote his Secretary of State to meet with him immediately at the White House to craft a response. Autograph Note Signed, Washington, December 14, 1864, to Seward. "Will the Sec. of State please call at once." At that meeting it was decided to demand a broad policy statement from the British rather than focus simply on this one incident.

Right after his meeting with the President, an angry Seward wrote the American ambassador to Great Britain, Charles Francis Adams, saying he had just received information from Canada on the outrage, and instructing Adams to query the British government as follows: "This grave circumstance renders it my duty, under the direction of the President, to ask whether Her Majesty's Government has taken or proposes to take any measures to prevent a renewal of the invasions of the territory and sovereignty of the United States from the border provinces. If such measures have been taken, or are to be taken, this government desires to know their character…" That same day Seward sent a copy of this letter to Adams to J. Hume Burnley, British ambassador in Washington, who responded immediately acknowledging receiving it.

The affair resulted in a flurry of exchanges between the U.S. and British governments, and the authorities in Canada. The British responded the next day, December 15, agreeing that the release was improper and promising to issue new arrest warrants and seize the raiders. The Canadians expressed surprise at the magistrate's decision in Montreal, and Lord Monck stated his "vexation." With the North clearly winning the war, the British were not looking for a confrontation. In the end, five raiders were in fact taken and held in custody; the rest escaped. The high profile trial began December 27. In January 1865, couriers were ordered to make a wartime trip to Richmond, Va. to bring back the defendants’ military service papers. Secretary of War Edwin Stanton refused a request that President Lincoln authorize a pass to make their journey a less dangerous one.

On March 9, 1865, the Canadian court determined that it had no jurisdiction, finding in essence that the defendants had acted as combatants of war. They were never extradited. It wasn’t until April 1865 that Canada reimbursed banks in St. Albans for the funds returned to the raiders. The settlement, paid in gold and bank notes returned to the St. Albans Bank, was a controversial one. The exchange rate was no longer as favorable to the U.S. as it once had been, and Canada needed just $42,000 from its treasury to pay the $88,000 American dollars.