of fighting at or near Manassas, was only shifting and not surmounting
a difficulty; that we would find the same enemy and the same or equal
entrenchments at either place. The country will not fail to note--is
noting now--that the present hesitation to move upon an entrenched enemy
is but the story of Manassas repeated.

I beg to assure you that I have never written you or spoken to you in
greater kindness of feeling than now, nor with a fuller purpose to sustain
you, so far as in my most anxious judgment I consistently can; but you
must act.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.

TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, April 9, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Saint Louis, Mo.: If the rigor of the confinement
of Magoffin (Governor of Kentucky) at Alton is endangering his life, or
materially impairing his health, I wish it mitigated as far as it can be
consistently with his safe detention.

A. LINCOLN.

Please send above, by order of the President. JOHN HAY.

PROCLAMATION RECOMMENDING THANKSGIVING FOR VICTORIES,

APRIL 10, 1862.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:

A Proclamation

It has pleased Almighty God to vouchsafe signal victories to the land and
naval forces engaged in suppressing, an internal rebellion, and at the
same time to avert from our country the dangers of foreign intervention
and invasion.

It is therefore recommended to the people of the United States that at
their next weekly assemblages in their accustomed places of public worship
which shall occur after notice of this proclamation shall have been
received, they especially acknowledge and render thanks to our Heavenly
Father for these inestimable blessings, that they then and there implore
spiritual consolation in behalf of all who have been brought into
affliction by the casualties and calamities of sedition and civil war, and
that they reverently invoke the divine guidance for our national counsels,
to the end that they may speedily result in the restoration of peace,
harmony, and unity throughout our borders and hasten the establishment of
fraternal relations among all the countries of the earth.

In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the
United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this tenth day of April, A.D. 1862, and of
the independence of the United States the eighty-sixth.

A. LINCOLN.

By the President: WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Se