To Reverdy Johnson1
Confidential.
Hon. Reverdy Johnson
Executive Mansion, April 24th 1861.
My dear Sir: Your note of this morning is just received. I forebore to answer yours of the 22d because of my aversion (which I thought you understood,) to getting on paper, and furnishing new grounds for misunderstanding.
I do say the sole purpose of bringing troops here is to defend this capital.
I do say I have no purpose to invade Virginia, with them or any other troops, as I understand the word invasion. But suppose Virginia sends her troops, or admits others through her borders, to assail this capital, am I not to repel them, even to the crossing of the Potomac if I can?
Suppose Virginia erects, or permits to be erected, batteries on the opposite shore, to bombard the city, are we to stand still and see it done? In a word, if Virginia strikes us, are we not to strike back, and as effectively as we can?
Again, are we not to hold Fort Monroe (for instance) if we can? I have no objection to declare a thousand times that I have no purpose to invade Virginia or any other State, but I do not mean to let them invade us without striking back. Yours truly
I do say the sole purpose of bringing troops here is to defend this capital.
I do say I have no purpose to invade Virginia, with them or any other troops, as I understand the word invasion. But suppose Virginia sends her troops, or admits others through her borders, to assail this capital, am I not to repel them, even to the crossing of the Potomac if I can?
Suppose Virginia erects, or permits to be erected, batteries on the opposite shore, to bombard the city, are we to stand still and see it done? In a word, if Virginia strikes us, are we not to strike back, and as effectively as we can?
Again, are we not to hold Fort Monroe (for instance) if we can? I have no objection to declare a thousand times that I have no purpose to invade Virginia or any other State, but I do not mean to let them invade us without striking back. Yours truly
A. Lincoln
- Maryland’s ex-senator (1845-1849) and recent delegate to the Peace Conference wrote on April 24 that he desired an answer to his letter of April 22 before he left Washington. A contemporary copy of the earlier letter made by Joseph Holt, in the Lincoln Papers, reads in part as follows: “. . . The existing excitement and alarm . . . of my own State and of Virginia are owing . . . to an apprehension that it is your purpose to use the military force you are assembling in this District for the invasion of . . . these States . . .”