n the varying motives which in times of stress determined men
into a common path. The first, Percival Drayton, a South-Carolinian,
had a strength of conviction on the question of slavery, in itself,
and the wrong-headed course of the slave power, as well as a strong
devotion to the Union, all which were needed to keep a son of that
extreme state firm in his allegiance. I question, however, whether any
other one of the seceding communities furnished as large a proportion
of officers who stuck to the national flag, chiefly among the older
men; a result scarcely surprising, for the intensity of affection for
the Union necessary to withstand nearest relatives and the headlong
sweep of separatist impulse, where fiercest, naturally throve upon the
opposition which it met, eliciting a corresponding tenacity of
adherence to the cause it had embraced. No more than that other
Southerner, Farragut, did Drayton feel doubt as to where he belonged
in the coming struggle. "I cannot exactly see the difference between
my relations fighting against me and I against them, except that their
cause is as unholy a one as the world has ever seen, and mine just the
reverse." "Were the sword in the one hand powerful enough, the
secessionists would carry slavery with the other to the uttermost
parts of the Union, and I do not think the North has been at all too
quick in stopping the movement." "I do not think there will ever be
peace between the two sections until slavery is so completely
scotched as to make extension a hopeless matter."[6]

Drayton stayed with us but a brief time. His successor, George B.
Balch, who still survives, now the senior rear-admiral on the retired
list of the navy, a man beloved by all who have known him for his
gallantry, benevolence, and piety, was equally pronounced and equally
firm; but his position illustrated and carried on my experiences at
the Academy, and afterwards in the service, and for the time confirmed
my old prepossessions. He was fighting for the Union, assailed without
just cause; not against slavery, nor for its abolition. Were the
latter the motive of the war, he would not be in arms. This, of
course, was then the attitude of the government and of the people at
large. Abolition, which came not long after, was a war measure simply;
received with doubt by many, but which a few months of hostilities had
prepared us all to accept. My own conversion was early and sudden. The
ship had made an expedition o