Raphael Semmes, Memoirs of Service Afloat During the War Between the States

[827] Generals, and which was a substantial readoption of the military portion of the first convention. It was this latter convention which was formally approved, both by General Grant, the Commander-inChief, under whose orders General Sherman acted, and by the Executive at Washington.

Confiding in the good faith of the Government, pledged in a solemn treaty as above stated, I returned to my home in Alabama, and remained there for the space of seven months, engaging in civil pursuits as a means of livelihood for my dependent family, and yielding a ready obedience to the laws. I had, in fact, become an officer of the law, having established myself as an attorney. It would have been easy for me, at any time within these seven months, to pass out of the country, if I had had any doubt about the binding obligation of the Greensboroa convention, or of the good faith of the Government. But I had no doubt on either point; nor have I any doubt yet, as I feel quite sure that when you shall have informed yourself of all the facts of the case, you will come to the conclusion that my arrest was entirely without warrant, and order my discharge. While thus remaining quietly at my home, in the belief that I was ‘not to be disturbed by the United States authorities,’ I was, on the 15th of December, 1865, in the night-time, arrested by a lieutenant and two sergeants of the Marine Corps, under an order signed by the Secretary of the Navy, and placed under guard; a file of soldiers in the meantime surrounding my house. I was informed by the officer making the arrest that I was to proceed to Washington in his custody, there to answer to a charge, a copy of which he handed me. This charge, and the protest which I filed the next day with the Commanding General of the Department of Alabama, against my arrest, your Excellency has already seen. The question for you then to decide, Mr. President, is the legality of this arrest. Can I, in violation of the terms of the military convention already referred to, and under which I laid down my arms, be held to answer for any act of war committed anterior to the date of that convention? I respectfully submit that I cannot be so held, either during the continuance of the war, (and the political power has not yet proclaimed the war ended,) or after the war shall have been brought to a close by proclamation, and the restoration of the writ of habeas corpus, without a flagrant violation of faith on the part of the United States. If it be admitted that I might be tried for any act dehors the war, and having no connection with it—as, for instance, for a forgery—it is quite clear that I cannot be arrested or arraigned for any act manifestly of war, and acknowledged as such, (as the act, for instance, for which I was arrested,) whether such act be in consonance with the laws of war or in violation thereof; and this for the simple reason that the military convention was a condonation and an oblivion of all precedent acts of war, of what nature soever those acts might be. I am ‘not to be disturbed,’ says the military convention. Disturbed for what? Why, manifestly, for any act of war theretofore committed against the United States. This is the only commonsense