Sold – President Lincoln: The Appointment of Henry A. Wise As Chief of Naval Ordnance

Henry Augustus Wise was born into a prominent Virginia family, but his father died young and he mainly grew up with his mother’s family in the north. He was appointed a midshipman in the Navy at the behest of his cousin and guardian, Henry Alexander Wise, then a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Virginia. Young Wise served as a naval lieutenant in the Mexican War, and speaking Spanish, was sent on a perilous mission to carry messages to Mexico City. When gold was discovered in California in 1848, Wise was sent to San Francisco, where he worked with William T. Sherman. Between the wars, he became a novelist and was well known in literary circles. He also contributed to scientific journals. Widely recognized as an expert on naval ordnance, he was sent to Europe to secretly investigate the Krupp steel discoveries being used in new German weapons. He was ultimately able to trace the steel to Sweden. Then he was sent on to Japan, a rare posting in the pre-Civil War era.

From 1856-1860, his cousin Henry was governor of Virginia. In that capacity, in 1859, he sent John Brown to the gallows. During the Civil War, Gov. Wise went on to become a Confederate general. His protege, however, was faced with a severe test of loyalties. With the war’s outbreak in 1861, Henry Augustus had to choose between his traditional feeling for Virginia and devotion to his cousin, versus his inclinations, life-long residency at the north, and his immediate family’s wishes (his wife was the daughter of Edward Everett, senator and governor of Massachusetts). He remained with the Union and was appointed Assistant Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance in the Navy Department, where working under Admiral John Dahlgren, the father of American naval ordnance, he played a key role in the development of the Dahlgren gun. Wise was consulted by President Lincoln in January 1862 regarding mortars under construction, and reported to Admiral Foote that the Commander in Chief “is an evidently practical man, understands precisely what he wants, and is not turned aside by anyone when he has his work before him. He knows and appreciates your past and present arduous services, and is firmly resolved to afford you every aid in the work in hand. The additional smooth howitzers you asked for were ordered two days ago." On March 9, 1862, Wise stood beside Gustavis V. Fox, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, and watched the encounter between the Monitor and Merrimack from a small tugboat at Hampton Roads.  Then Dahlgren, Navy Secretary Welles, and Wise ascended to the Cabinet Room where Wise gave the President a spirited account of the battle between the “iron-cased,” as he put it.

On June 24, 1863, Dahlgren was detached from duty at the Washington Navy Yard and as Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance and ordered to relieve Rear Admiral DuPont in command of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron. The next day, with this very document, Captain Wise was named by the President to replace Dahlgren as Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance. In this position he was responsible for the offensive and defensive arms of the Navy and shore stations where they are produced and tested. He would hold that position until June 1, 1868.

Document Signed, large folio, Washington, June 30, 1863, appointing Henry A. Wise “Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance, in the Department of the Navy, from the 25th of June, 1863.” The document is countersigned by Gideon Welles as Secretary of the Navy and retains its original seal.