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“These raids under these peculiar circumstances are in violation of every dictate of humanity. Having no result and apparently no object but annoyance & a useless sacrifice of life, they are also in violation of every principle of honorable warfare … I have directed Maj. Genl Keyes to re-occupy the town…”
Summary: An indignant letter to General Henry A. Wise, who commanded a Confederate brigade on the Virginia Peninsula in 1863. Dix demands that he cease attacking Union troops supporting an insane asylum in Williamsburg. He warns that if attacks continue, he would send all of the patients to Richmond to relieve the United States of the expense, and further, that any local resident found perpetrating or assisting such attacks will be “will be put to death as a violator of the laws of civilized warfare.” Dix’s letter sheds light on the fate of Southern civilians in Union-occupied areas, five months after Robert E. Lee famously complained about Ambrose Burnside’s treatment of the citizens of Fredericksburg.
John Adams Dix. Letter Signed, “John A. Dix Maj. Genl,” to General Henry A. Wise. Fort Monroe [Va.], April 28, 1863. 3 pp. 252 x 202 mm. On “Headquarters Department of Virginia Seventh Army Corps” stationery.
Inventory # 21786 $2,800
Complete Transcript:
Fort Monroe, Va. Apl. 28th” 1863
[struck: Thu]
To General Henry A. Wise,
Or the Commanding Officer,
Of the troops on the Chickahominy,
Sir:
The town of Williamsburgh has been occupied, as you are aware, by the troops under my command as a picket Station or outpost of Yorktown. A large portion of the inhabitants are known not to be well disposed to the Government of the United States. They have nevertheless, while quietly pursuing their domestic avocations, been unmolested, and have been permitted to supply themselves with the necessaries and comforts of life at Yorktown and Fort Monroe. The Insane Asylum at Williamsburgh has been put under the Superintendence of an Army Surgeon and its three hundred helpless inmates supplied, at the expense of the United States, with everything necessary to their comfort and with the remedial treatment they require. While exercising these [2] offices of humanity, the troops at Williamsburgh have been several times attacked by your forces, not with a view to gain and hold possession of the place and to assume the guardianship which has been extended to the inhabitants and the tenants of the Asylum by us, but for the purpose of harassing those who were performing this generous service. – on the 31st ult your forces entered and endeavored to take possession of the town, occupying several houses & firing upon the troops: and in this, as I am informed, they were aided by some of the inhabitants, who have been living for nearly a year, under our protection. More recently your forces entered the town and took possession of it, placing our employés in the Insane Asylum under parole, carrying off some of the Servants and depriving its inmates of the care to which they have been accustomed and which their helpless condition renders indispensable. You have by withdrawing your forces, left the Asylum again to our charity and compelled Major General Keyes the Commanding Officer of the troops at Yorktown and Fort Magruder to supply it with food to save the patients [3] from Starvation. –
These raids under these peculiar circumstances are in violation of every dictate of humanity. Having no result and apparently no object but annoyance & a useless sacrifice of life, they are also in violation of every principle of honorable warfare. I have directed Maj. Genl Keyes to re-occupy the town; and that [inserted: the aggrissions referred to may cease, I give you notice] in case of any repetition of them.
1st. That the inmates of the Asylum will be sent to Richmond, and the United States relieved of the burden of their support.-
2nd. That any house which may be taken possession of for the purpose of firing upon the troops stationed there will be razed to the ground; and
3rd. That any citizen of Williamsburgh not belonging to a regularly organized corps, who shall be found co-operating in these attacks and rising in arms against the occupying troops, will be put to death as a violator of the laws of civilized warfare. –
I am, very respectfully / Your obdt servt, / John A. Dix / Maj. Genl
Historical Background:
The "Public Hospital for Persons of Insane and Disordered Minds," which opened in 1773 at the behest of colonial governor Francis Fauquier, was the first building in North America devoted solely to the treatment of the mentally ill. The hospital was at the cutting edge of the asylum movement in America, predicated on the Enlightenment belief that reason and science could be employed to cure people who had long been left to the care of families or parish vestries. By the 19th century, it was known as the Eastern Lunatic Asylum.
General Dix commanded the Department of Virginia, based out of Fort Monroe. His subordinate, corps commander Erastus Keyes, conveyed the message by way of Yorktown on April 29. Keyes reported on April 30 that: “our picket line now embraces [Williamsburg] …. The case of the insane asylum is a difficult matter in our hands or with the Confederates. If they have it, it would afford a standing pretext for visits from their emissaries, which evil must be balanced by our troubles with the institution. I would like to have you decide the question.”
The Official Records show that Wise was not unaware of the needs of the asylum. On April 16, informed his superior, Major General Arnold Elzey, of his minor offensive around Williamsburg, which included some of the foraging and skirmishing mentioned in Dix’s letter. Wise said he received a letter from “Surgeon Wager, the enemy’s surgeon at the lunatic asylum,” addressed to Wager by Union General West at Fort Magruder, to surrender the asylum. “I ordered Major Garrett to make no reply … I had anticipated some such ruse, and yesterday had arranged with Talbot Sweeny, esq., the only State of Virginia officer left with the asylum, to attend to and provide for its wants. I will also send to it Dr. Martin, a resident practicing physician of this county …. The enemy have drawn in their lines, and the report is that they have informed the inhabitants that they consider the town itself surrendered.” Four days later, on April 20, Wise wrote again to Elzey, “The Yankee rascals tried to throw the hospital on my hands to embarrass and pum me as to my purpose of permanent occupation. I declined to have anything to do with it, and they retired their superintendent, nurses, &c. I then gave it up to the State civil authorities, who … obtained from them ten days’ provisions without compromising our dignity …. You may assure the Governor that the patients will not suffer, as I know they will take charge of the asylum again now that I have retired.”
Williamsburg was a sort of no-man’s land in the spring of 1863, and there was a great deal of skirmishing throughout southeastern Virginia. Two divisions of James Longstreet’s corps, led by Longstreet himself, operated opposite Suffolk through much of the spring despite the fact that Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia faced a threatening offensive by Joseph Hooker and the Army of the Potomac. Hooker’s offensive failed miserably at the Battle of Chancellorsville (May 1-6). Soon after, Longstreet was called to rejoin Lee for the invasion of Pennsylvania, allowing for Dix’s brigadiers to occupy more of southeastern Virginia.
John Adams Dix (1798-1879) fought in the War of 1812 at the age of fourteen, obtaining an ensign’s commission through the aid of his father, a prominent New Hampshire merchant. Dix remained in the Army until 1828, settled in Cooperstown, New York, and became a leading Democratic politician, dispensing spoils through the Albany Regency. He served in the U.S. Senate (1845-1849) and was named Treasury Secretary in the waning days of the Buchanan administration. His telegram to a New Orleans Treasury official, “If anyone attempts to haul down the American flag, shoot him on the spot,” earned him fame as the Civil War opened. Dix was commissioned major general of volunteers in May 1861, and performed various district and garrison command duties, including the suppression of the New York City Draft Riots in 1863. After the war, he served as Minister to France and Governor of New York.
Henry A. Wise (1806-1876), a brother-in-law of Union General George G. Meade, was a Confederate brigadier general who served previously as U.S. Congressman and Governor of Virginia.
References:
War of the Rebellion: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series 1, Vol. 18, Chapter 30, pp. 673, 995, 1006.
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