o made the entire typescript for the Press,
and whose criticisms were invaluable.
It is no purpose of a Preface to indicate results, but it is my hope
that with, I trust, a "calm comparison of the evidence," now for the
first time available to the historian, a fairly true estimate may be
made of what the American Civil War meant to Great Britain; how she
regarded it and how she reacted to it. In brief, my work is primarily a
study in British history in the belief that the American drama had a
world significance, and peculiarly a British one.
EPHRAIM DOUGLASS ADAMS.
_November 25, 1924_
CONTENTS OF VOLUME ONE
CHAPTER PAGE
I. BACKGROUNDS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
II. FIRST KNOWLEDGE OF IMPENDING CONFLICT, 1860-61 . . . 35
III. THE DEVELOPMENT OF A POLICY, MAY, 1861 . . . . . . 76
IV. BRITISH SUSPICION OF SEWARD . . . . . . . . . . 113
V. THE DECLARATION OF PARIS NEGOTIATION . . . . . . . 137
VI. BULL RUN; CONSUL BUNCH; COTTON, AND MERCIER . . . . 172
VII. THE "TRENT" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
VIII. THE BLOCKADE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
IX. ENTER MR. LINDSAY . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PART ONE
LORD JOHN RUSSELL . . . . . . . . . _Frontispiece_
_From Trevelyan's "Garibaldi and the Making of
Italy_"
LORD LYONS (1860) . . . . . . . . . _facing p_. 42
_From Lord Newton's "Life of Lord Lyons" (Edward
Arnold & Co_.)
SIR WILLIAM GREGORY, K.C.M.G. . . . . . " 90
_From Lady Gregory's "Sir William Gregory,
K.C.M.G.: An Autobiography"_ (_John Murray_)
WILLIAM HENRY SEWARD . . . . . . . . " 114
_From Lord Newton's "Life of Lord Lyons"_ (_Edward
Arnold & Co._)
C.F. ADAMS . . . . . . . . . . . " 138
_From a photograph in the United States Embassy,
London_
JAMES M. MASON . . . . . . . . . . " 206
_From a photograph by L.C. Handy, Washington_
"KING COTTON BOUND" . . . . . . . . " 262
_Reproduced by permission of the Proprietors of
"Punch"_
GREAT BRITAIN AND THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR
CHAPTER I
BACKGROUNDS
In 1862, less than a year after he had assumed his post in London, the
American Minister, Charles Francis Adams, at a time of depression and
bitterness wrote to Secre
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