n the South, thus postulating the real danger of some "negro Garibaldi
calling his countrymen to arms[859]." Nor was this fear merely a
pretended one. It affected all classes and partisans of both sides. Even
official England shared in it; January 20, 1862, Lyons wrote, "The
question is rapidly tending towards the issue either of peace and a
recognition of the separation, or a Proclamation of Emancipation and the
raising of a servile insurrection[860]." At nearly the same time
Russell, returning to Gladstone a letter from Sumner to Cobden,
expressed his sorrow "that the President intends a war of emancipation,
meaning thereby, I fear, a war of greater desolation than has been since
the revival of letters[861]." John Stuart Mill, with that clear logic
which appealed to the more intelligent reader, in an able examination of
the underlying causes and probable results of the American conflict,
excused the Northern leaders for early denial of a purpose to attack
slavery, but expressed complete confidence that even these leaders by
now understood the "almost certain results of success in the present
conflict" (the extinction of slavery) and prophesied that "if the
writers who so severely criticize the present moderation of the
Free-soilers are desirous to see the war become an abolition war, it is
probable that if the war lasts long enough they will be gratified[862]."
John Bright, reaching a wider public, in speech after speech, expressed
faith that the people of the North were "marching on, as I believe, to
its [slavery's] entire abolition[863]."

Pro-Southern Englishmen pictured the horrors of an "abolition war," and
believed the picture true; strict neutrals, like Lyons, feared the same
development; friends of the North pushed aside the thought of a "negro
terror," yet even while hoping and declaring that the war would destroy
slavery, could not escape from apprehensions of an event that appeared
inevitable. Everywhere, to the British mind, it seemed that emancipation
was necessarily a provocative to servile insurrection, and this belief
largely affected the reception of the emancipation proclamation--a fact
almost wholly lost sight of in historical writing.

Nor did the steps taken in America leading up to emancipation weaken
this belief--rather they appeared to justify it. The great advocate of
abolition as a weapon in the war and for its own sake was Charles
Sumner, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations