Photo from the Warren Mail A snippet of the Emancipation Proclamation that was published at least twice in the Warren Mail in both September and January.

When studying history, it’s very, very easy to look back with the benefit of hindsight and draw conclusions about the significance of people and events.

We armchair quarterback these kinds of things all the time – What did we know about the 9/11 plot before it happened? Why did it take so long to grant women the right to vote? And, for you conspiracy theory lovers, who killed Kennedy?

I don’t want to say there isn’t validity in asking those kinds of questions at times but it’s important to always keep an eye on what people knew at the time.

That’s why I’ve so enjoyed digging into old county newspapers. Sometimes what 19th century editors thought was important turned out to not be and vice-versa (example: burying the Gettysburg address on the inside of the paper).

So for the next week we’re going back to late 1862 and early 1863 when one of the most singularly substantial presidential actions ever taken became effective – the Emancipation Proclamation. When you read these reports, think of them as breaking news.

Library of Congress image An 1866 drawing from an 1864 painting purported to depict President Abraham Lincoln’s signing the Emancipation Proclamation to his Cabinet.

The story starts in the wake of the Battle of Antietam outside of Sharpsburg, Md. on Sept. 17, 1862 when over 22,000 men became casualties in the war’s bloodiest single day. The battle was a tactical draw but the Confederate army left the field first.

The Warren Mail in a report 10 days later seems to have recognized that it wasn’t a total victory.

“Gen. McClellan calls it ‘complete,'” the Mail reported on Sept. 27. “We don’t so understand it. It is a gratifying success, for we keep the advantage of position ; but it decides nothing. It does not determine any grand result. Like many other Union victories, it brings us no nearer the great object of the war, to wit, the subduing of the Rebels and the restoration of the Federal authority in all the States.”

Here’s the first instance where you need to remember what they knew. While we know that the issue of human slavery was the root cause of the Civil War, not everyone at the time saw it that way. How does a farm boy from Warren County have any conception for what slavery really is? Of course not. But they knew that their country was breaking apart and we all know what rebellion is. And until this point, those had been the stated war aims.

“Really, we can’t disguise the fact that we feel a little disappointed in this ‘victory,'” the Mail editors wrote.

But to President Lincoln, it was enough.

On the same edition of the Warren Mail, three columns over is the full text under a headline “President’s Emancipation Proclamation.”

“I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States of America and Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy thereof, do hereby proclaim and declare that hereafter, as heretofore, the war will be prosecuted for the object of practically restoring the constitutional relations between the United States and the people thereof, in which States that relation is or may be suspended or disturbed.”

He acknowledged at the outset why the war had been fought to that point – restoration of the Union.

The bombshell – which he called a “practical measure” came a bit later: “That on the 1st day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thence forward for ever free….”

“Then, thence forward for ever free….”

The proclamation went on to say that the government and military forces of the United States “will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they make for their actual freedom.”

The statement is clear that it only applied to slaves in states that were in rebellion effective Jan. 1.

Not having a Congressional delegation voted on by more than half of a state’s citizens would “in the absence of strong countervailing testimony” be “deemed conclusive” that a state was not in rebellion.

Lincoln then turned to Congress and said that “the following shall be promulgated as an additional article of war for the government of the army of the United States, and shall be obeyed as such.”

That article states that the military could not return escaped slaves to the South and anyone doing so would be court-martialed.

He also masterfully made suggested amendments to an act designed to “seize and confiscate property of revels” by deeming that any slaves that came under the control of the government be considered “captures of war, and shall be forever free of their servitude, and not again held as slaves.”

A narrow window was left open for loyal Americans to reclaim their slaves and the “Executive will in due time recommend that all citizens of the U. States who shall have remained loyal thereto throughout the rebellion shall, upon the restoration of the constitutional relation between the United States and their respective States and people, if the relation shall have been suspended or disturbed, be compensated for all losses by acts of the United States, including the loss of slaves.”

The only local commentary from the Warren Mail on this statement from Lincoln?

“Be sure and read the above.”

More to come….