Today’s New York Times offers glimpses into post-war realities, including news about colored troops, Baptists and a possible attempt on the life of United States President Andrew Johnson.
“We print this morning an important order by the Lieutenant-General, which will very speedily muster out of service nearly all the volunteer army. He has assigned the artillery for the most part to the forts of the Northern States; the forts of the Southern seaboard, with two or three exceptions, are to be in charge of colored troops. All the volunteer cavalry east of the Mississippi goes out of service forthwith. Other reductions are in progress, and it will not be many weeks, if nothing goes awry, before we shall be reduced almost entirely down to the regular army.
The Philadelphia Ledger has the following dispatch dated New-Orleans, Oct. 3: The ship Emma from this port, reported abandoned at sea, had on board a cargo of cotton valued at nearly a quarter of a million dollars, the greater part of which is understood to have been covered by insurance in foreign offices. Most of the cotton burned at Mobile is said to have been insured at the North. The China’s advices produced considerable sensation in the cotton market here, and a general withdrawal of supplies until the full nature of the news could be developed.
Rochester University has received and additional endowment of one hundred thousand dollars. Of this amount twenty-five thousand were contributed by Mr. TRACY H. HARRIS, of the Madison-avenue Church (Baptist) of this city. The next largest subscriber is Hon. WILLIAM KELLY, the Chairman of the Board of Trustees, for ten thousand dollars, and five hundred dollars is the smallest amount given by any one individual, except one of three hundred dollars and another of one hundred dollars.
Gen. FISK, agent of the Freedmen’s Bureau in Kentucky and Tennessee, makes most favorable report of affairs under his supervision. The matter of subsistence at government expense is so far improved that where, on the 2d of September, nearly a thousand persons were subsisted, at the present day “not one ration is issued by the Freedman’s Bureau in Tennessee.”
A drunken man from Alexandria visited the Executive mansion yesterday, seeking an interview with the President, but becoming disorderly, was ejected by the officer on duty. The latter had just turned to reenter the house, when the sentry noticed the man daawing a pistol and seized it. The man was taken before a Justice of the Peace and fined for carrying a concealed weapon….”
Source: “News of the Day; General News,” New York Times, October 13, 1865 (link)
