harbor. Major Anderson,
suitably qualified by meritorious service, age, and rank, was deemed
especially acceptable for the position because he was a Kentuckian by
birth, and related by marriage to a prominent family of Georgia. Such
sympathies as might influence him were supposed to be with the South,
and his appointment would not, therefore, grate harshly on the
susceptibilities of the Charlestonians.

The statement, many times repeated, that he owned a plantation in the
South is incorrect. He never owned a plantation in Georgia or anywhere
else. On the death of his father he came into possession of a small
number of slaves. These he liberated as soon as the proper papers
could be executed and sent to him at his distant post; and he always
afterwards helped them when they were in need and applied to him.[5]

[Sidenote] F.J. Porter to Dawson. "Historical Magazine," January,
1872, pp. 37, 38.

The army headquarters being then in New York, Major Anderson on the
same day called on General Scott, and in conversation with the veteran
General-in-Chief learned that army affairs were being carried on at
Washington by Secretary Floyd, without consulting him. Under these
circumstances Scott did not deem himself authorized to interfere even
by suggestion. Nevertheless, the whole Charleston question seems to
have been fully discussed, and the relative strength of the forts, and
the possible necessity of occupying Sumter commented upon in such
manner as no doubt produced its effect in the subsequent action of
Anderson. Major Anderson next went to Washington, and received the
personal instructions of Secretary Floyd, and returning thereafter to
New York, General Scott in that city gave him on November 15th formal
written orders to proceed to Fort Moultrie and take command of the
post.

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[1] His policy, frankly written in a friendly letter to a prominent
nullifier, could scarcely provoke the most captious criticism:

"You have probably heard of the arrival of two or three companies at
Charleston in the last six weeks, and you may hear that as many more
have followed. There is nothing inconsistent with the President's
message in these movements. The intention simply is that the forts in
the harbor shall not be wrested from the United States.... The
President, I presume, will stand on the defensive, thinking it better
to discourage than to invite an attack--better to prevent than to
repel one."--Lieut.-Gen. Winfield