Among the least sensible minor
incidents of the war were a number of fantastic attempts of
private persons to negotiate peace. With one exception they had
no historic importance. The exception is a negotiation carried
on by Greeley, which seems to have been the ultimate cause of his
alliance with the Vindictives.
In the middle of July, 1864, gold was selling in New York at 285.
There was distress and discontent throughout the country. The
horrible slaughter of the Wilderness, still fresh in everybody's
mind, had put the whole Union Party into mourning. The
impressionable Greeley became frantic for peace peace at any
price. At the psychological moment word was conveyed to him that
two persons in Canada held authority from the Confederacy to
enter into negotiations for peace. Greeley wrote to Lincoln
demanding negotiations because "our bleeding, bankrupt, almost
dying country longs for peace, shudders at the prospect of fresh
conscriptions, of further wholesale devastations, and of new
rivers of human blood."
Lincoln consented to a negotiation but stipulated that Greeley
himself should become responsible for its conduct. Though this
was not what Greeley wanted for his type always prefers to tell
others what to do--he sullenly accepted.
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