Alfred Roman, The military operations of General Beauregard in the war between the states, 1861 to 1865

[418] a graduate of West Point, distinguished as a colonel in the Mexican war, and afterwards Secretary of War, and familiar with the personnel of the United States army—a man who expressed his conviction that the North would certainly make war upon the South, and urged military preparations for defence—picked out Major Caleb Huse and sent him to England, as agent, to purchase arms. Major Huse was also a graduate of West Point, of the class of 1847, from Newburyport, Mass., and, since the war, has been, and still is, principal of a preparatory school at West Point, N. Y. He did not go abroad until after war was declared, and ran the blockade from the harbor of Charleston, with instructions to buy ten thousand (!) rifles.¹ On the 30th of December, 1861, he wrote: ‘Not able to send anything.’ It seems, however, to have been held by the Confederate administration that Major House displayed prodigious energy when he sent the information that he ‘had in a warehouse at St. Andrew's Wharf, Liverpool, 25,000 rifles, 2000 barrels of powder, 500,000 cartridges, 13,000 accoutrements, 226 saddles, with blankets, socks, etc.;’ these ‘guarded by government watchmen, and the wharfingers ordered not to ship or deliver without acquainting the Board of Customs.’ So much for the commercial caution and skill of this select agent, whose repute is assuredly that of an estimable citizen, but not that of an active, enterprising, and practical man. If there were other agents sent to Europe by the Confederate government to purchase and ship arms the fact has not been published. The competent agency of John Frazer & Co., of Liverpool, might have been obtained by the government, and that of Confederate officers, one or more, who furnished the Russian government with arms during the Crimean war of 1855, and had information of the available arms in Europe. But their knowledge and experience were not utilized. Most of the wholly insufficient supply of arms that was obtained came through the private enterprise of merchants shipping at their own risk, and were sold to the government after landing. A large number were also acquired by capture on the fields of battle.

While the timely importation of what we sorely needed from abroad received comparatively insignificant and inefficient attention, the energies and agents of the administration seemed chiefly occupied in the preparation, within the Confederate States, of