to bring him
such letters as this from the Assistant Secretary of War in October: "I
notice with much regret that [in the latest consignment] there were no
guns sent, as it was confidently expected that 20,000 would arrive by
the [steamship] Fulton, and accordingly arrangements had been made to
distribute them through the different States. Prompt and early shipments
of guns are desirable. We hope to hear by next steamer that you have
shipped from 80,000 to 100,000 stand."

The last word on the problem of munitions, which was so significant
a factor in the larger problem, is the report of the United States
Ordnance Office for the first year of the war. It shows that between
April, 1861, and June, 1862, the Government purchased from American
manufacturers somewhat over 30,000 rifles, and that from European makers
it purchased 726,000.

From these illustrations it is therefore obvious that the true measure
of the immediate strength of the American contestants in 1861 was the
extent of their ability to supply themselves from Europe; and this,
stated more concretely, became the question as to which was the better
able to keep its ports open and receive the absolutely essential
European aid. Lincoln showed his clear realization of the situation
when he issued, immediately after the first call for volunteers, a
proclamation blockading the Southern coasts. Whether the Northern people
at the time appreciated the significance of this order is a question.
Amid the wild and vain clamor of the multitude in 1861, with its
conventional and old-fashioned notion of war as a thing of trumpets and
glittering armies, the North seems wholly to have ignored its fleet; and
yet in the beginning this resource was its only strength.

The fleet was small, to be sure, but its task was at first also small.
There were few Southern ports which were doing a regular business with
Europe, and to close these was not difficult. As other ports opened and
the task of blockade grew, the Northern navy also increased. Within a
few months, to the few observers who did not lose their heads, it was
plain that the North had won the first great contest of the war. It had
so hampered Southern trade that Lincoln's advantage in arming the North
from Europe was ten to one. At the very time when detractors of Lincoln
were hysterical over the removal of Fremont, when Grimes wrote to
Fessenden that the country was going to the dogs as fast as imbecility
could carry it,