The Lee Captured at Last. Sandy Keith alias Thomassen. Recruiting in the British Provinces for the United States Army. Failure of the Expedition. Return to Bermuda.

On our voyage to Halifax, we passed many vessels, and exciting no suspicion, for at that period many of the captured blockade-runners were afloat in the United States service. We showed American colors to those which passed near us and once, in thick weather off New York, we passed within hailing distance of a man of war bound South. We arrived at Halifax the 16th of October. The cargo of cotton was consigned to the firm of B. Wier & Co. with instructions to purchase shoes, etc., with a part of the proceeds, and to hold the balance to my credit. There was then no agent of the Confederate Government in Halifax, but I had taken letters of introduction from a mercantile house in London to this firm to be used in case of touching there on the way back from Glasgow the year before. When I received my instructions from the Secretary of the Navy before leaving Richmond, I wished to ascertain to whom the cargo was to be consigned on our arrival at Halifax; and then learned from the Secretary of State, to whom I was referred, that there was no accredited agent of the government there. In this dilemma I sought counsel of my good friend Mr. Seddon, Secretary of War, who advised me to act according to my own judgment. I therefore directed the bills of lading, invoices, etc., to be made out with B. Wier & Co. as consignees. In no case, I believe, did the Confederate Government appear as the shipper or consignor. Every cargo was supposed to be owned by private individuals; and the blockade-runners were regularly entered and cleared at the Confederate Custom House. Upon this occasion the Lee’s papers were closely scrutinized by the collector of the customs at Halifax, who did me the honor of personal attention; but he could find no flaw in them, and the vessel was regularly entered, with little more than the customary delay.

The Lee had made her last voyage under the Confederate flag. Sailing for Wilmington with a full cargo, she was captured off the coast of North Carolina. The land had been made the night before under quite favorable circumstances, but neither the captain, nor the pilot, being willing to assume the responsibility of taking charge of the vessel, the Lee was put to sea again, and by further culpable mismanagement, she fell an easy prey next morning to one of the United States cruisers. She had run the blockade twenty-one times while under my command, and had carried abroad between six thousand and seven thousand bales of cotton, worth at that time about two millions of dollars in gold, and had carried into the Confederacy equally valuable cargoes. My staunch old helmsman, who had been released in New York by claiming British protection, and who started at once in search of me, met me in Halifax on our return from the Johnson’s Island expedition. He actually shed tears as he narrated the train of circumstances which led to the capture. “She would have gone in by herself,” he said, “if they had only let her alone;” for indeed it was evident to all on board the morning of her capture, that she had been close in to the shore within a few miles of the New Inlet Bar. She had not reached the bar, however, so that the pilot’s course in refusing to take charge was justifiable; but the fatal error was committed by not making a good offing before daylight. At the time of her capture, she was not more than twenty miles from the land, and in the deep bay formed by the coast between Masonborough Inlet and the Cape Lookout Shoals.

The arrival of so large a party of Confederates in Halifax attracted attention, and it was essential to the successful execution of the project, that all suspicion should be allayed. The party, therefore, was divided into groups of three or four individuals, who were directed to report, in person, at Montreal, each one being strictly enjoined to secrecy and discretion; for although the precise object of the expedition was only known to three of its members, Lieutenants R. Minor, Ben. Loyall and myself, every one belonging to it was quite well aware that it was hostile to the United States Government. They were a set of gallant young fellows, with a single exception. Who he was and where he came from, none of us knew; but he had been ordered by the Secretary of the Navy to report to me for duty. We believed him to be a traitor and a spy; and succeeded in ridding ourselves of him the day after our arrival at Halifax, by advancing him a month’s wages. No member of the expedition ever saw him again.

The most officiously zealous friend and partisan whom we all encountered in Halifax was Mr. “Sandy” Keith, who was facetiously called the Confederate Consul. By dint of a brazen assurance, a most obliging manner, and the lavish expenditure of money, “profusus sui alieni appetens” he ingratiated himself with nearly every southerner who visited Halifax although he was a coarse, ill-bred vulgarian, of no social standing in the community. It is true that a worthy member of the same family had risen from obscurity to high honors, but Sandy was a black sheep of the flock. He was employed at first by many of our people to purchase for them on commission, and afterwards by the Confederate Government. He profited by so good an opportunity for swindling, eventually forging invoices of articles, and drawing bills of exchange upon the Confederate Government, which were duly honored. This villainy was perpetrated towards the end of the war, and at its close, Sandy Keith absconded with his ill-gotten gains, a considerable proportion consisting of money in his hands, belonging to private individuals. Among his victims was Colonel S. of Baltimore, who determined to make an effort to recover his money. His first step was a visit to Halifax. His endeavors there to find Keith’s whereabouts were for some time fruitless. But at last a clue was found. A girl, who had accompanied Keith in his flight, had written a letter to a relative in Halifax, and Colonel S. by some means obtained a sight of the envelope. The post-mark, plainly legible, indicated that the letter had been written at an obscure little village in Missouri. S. hastened back to Baltimore, and secured the cooperation of a detective, not for the purpose of arresting Keith, because he doubted whether he could recover possession of his property by the slippery and uncertain process of law, but for the sake of the detective’s strong arm and presence of mind in the event of resistance. The reward to the detective being made contingent upon the recovery of the money, the pair left Baltimore, and in due time reached the village in the backwoods, where they learned that two persons, as man and wife, were boarding at the house of a widow, a mile or two distant. They waited until night, and then, arming themselves with revolvers, started for the house of the widow. Knocking at the door, it was opened to them, and as they passed in, Keith’s voice was heard, inquiring who had entered. Guided by the sound, they rushed to the room occupied by him. He had retired for the night. His loaded pistol was lying on a table near his bedside; but he had neglected to lock the door of his chamber, and S. and the detective had secured his arms and held him a prisoner before he was fairly awake. There was little parleying between them, the detective merely assuring him that if he did not come to terms speedily, his trunk would be broken open and all of its contents seized. The whole affair was amicably settled in ten minutes, by a check upon the bank in which Keith had deposited some of his money, for the amount due to S., and the detective’s reward. Keith demurred a little to the latter demand, but finally yielded to moral suasion; and next day S. presented the check, which was paid. Sandy Keith was supposed by those who had known him, to have been lost among the common herd of low swindlers and rogues, for none of them would have given him credit for enterprise or sagacity. He emerged, however, from obscurity, to perpetrate the most horrible and devilishly ingenious crime of the century; for it was he who under the name of Thomassen blew up the “City of Bremen” with his infernal machine. Those who have read the account of that dreadful tragedy will remember that the explosion was precipitated by the fall of the box containing dynamite from a cart, or wheelbarrow, conveying it to the steamer. The hammer was set, by clockwork apparatus, to explode the dynamite after the departure of the steamer from England and when near mid-ocean, and Keith, confiding in the efficacy of the arrangement, was actually about to take passage in the steamer from Bremerhaven as far as England. Many persons believe that the “City of Boston” was destroyed some years ago by this incarnate fiend, and by the same means. That calamity carried mourning into many households in Keith’s native city, for a large number of its most respectable citizens were on board. It will be remembered that she was supposed at the time to have foundered at sea in a gale of wind.

I had been furnished, before leaving Richmond, with letters to parties in Canada, who, it was believed, could give valuable aid to the expedition. To expedite matters, a trustworthy agent, a canny Scotchman, who had long served under my command, was dispatched to Montreal, via Portland, to notify these parties that we were on our way there. Our emissary, taking passage in a steamer bound to Portland, passed safely through United States territory, while the rest of us commenced our long and devious route through the British Provinces. Wherever we travelled, even through the remotest settlements, recruiting agents for the United States army were at work, scarcely affecting to disguise their occupation; and the walls of the obscurest country taverns bristled with advertisements like the following: “Wanted for a tannery in Maine one thousand tanners to whom a large bonus will be paid, etc.” Many could not resist such allurements, but it was from this class and similar ones, no doubt, that the “bounty jumpers” sprang. It has been asserted, by those who were in a position to form a correct estimate, that the British Provinces, alone, contributed one hundred thousand men to the Federal army. It is scarcely an exaggeration to add, that the population of the civilized world was subsidized.

We were seven days in making the journey to Montreal, where my faithful agent met me by appointment, and carried me to the residence of Captain M., a zealous and self-sacrificing friend to the cause, and to whom I had been accredited. He looked steadily at me for a moment after our introduction, and then said “I have met you once before.” He recalled to my memory the fact, that while I commanded the battery at Acquia Creek in the early part of the war, he had brought a schooner loaded with arms, etc., up the Potomac, and succeeded in placing her under the protection of our batteries; having profited by a cold, dark, and inclement night, to evade the vigilance of the gunboats. Subsequently he and his family were compelled to leave Baltimore, and were now refugees in Canada. Colonel K., also a refugee and an inmate of Captain M.’s house, and to whom, likewise, I carried letters, enlisted enthusiastically in the expedition, and devoted his whole time and energies to its success. We might, indeed, have obtained a large number of recruits from among refugees and escaped prisoners in Canada, but it was not considered prudent to increase the size of the party to any extent, our number being quite sufficient, under the plan as devised. But we picked up two or three escaped prisoners from Johnson’s Island; among them an individual who was well known to Colonel Finney (a member of the expedition); having been in the Colonel’s employment on the plains previous to the war. The Colonel was the right hand of Major Ficklin in organizing and putting into operation the “pony express,” which used to traverse the continent from St. Louis to San Francisco, and our recruit, Thompson, was one of his trusted subordinates. This man had led a very adventurous life. He informed us that after making his escape from Johnson’s Island on the ice one dark winter night, he walked into Sandusky, and there laid in wait at the entrance of a dark alley for a victim with whom to exchange clothing. His patience being rewarded after a while, he laid violent hands upon his prize, and directed him to divest himself of his suit. The stranger replied, that he would not only supply him with clothing, but with money to make his way into Canada; adding that he had a son in the Confederate army. He gave Thompson the contents of his purse, and requesting him to wait till he could go home, soon returned with a full suit of clothes.

We had reliable information to the effect that the garrison at Johnson’s Island was small, and that the United States sloop of war Michigan was anchored off the island as an additional guard. If the sloop of war could be carried by boarding, and her guns turned upon the garrison, the rest would be easy of accomplishment; and there appeared to be no obstacle to the seizure of as many vessels in Sandusky harbor, as might be required for purposes of transportation. They were to be towed over to the Canada shore, about twenty-five miles distant. There were several difficulties to be overcome; the chief one being how to notify the prisoners of the attempt about to be made. This was accomplished after several visits to Baltimore and Washington, by the brave and devoted Mrs. M. and her daughter; and finally the wife of General obtained permission from the authorities at Washington, to visit her husband, then a prisoner on Johnson’s Island. Although the interview between them was brief, and in the presence of witnesses, she contrived to place in his hand a slip of paper, which informed him that our progress would appear in the New York Herald’s “Personals” over certain initials, and so disguised as to be intelligible only to those who were initiated. Next, it was important to know the exact condition of affairs in Sandusky, up to the time of our departure from Canada; and this was effected through the agency of a gallant gentleman, a retired British army officer, who went over to Sandusky upon the pretext of duck shooting, and who by a pre-arranged vocabulary, conveyed daily intelligence to us up to the time of our departure from Montreal. Everything progressed favorably, until we began to make final preparations for departure. Colonel K., who knew personally the manager of an English line of steamers upon the lakes, and confided in the integrity of the man, recommended him as most competent to give valuable information; and to him, under the seal of confidence, I applied. The only interview between us, (and in the presence of Colonel K.) was brief, and the object of the expedition was not divulged to him; nor was it intimated to him that any hostile act was contemplated; but he probably drew the inference. His replies to my questions were so unsatisfactory that I never saw him again, having recourse to other sources of information.

It was arranged that our party should take passage on board one of the American lake steamers at a little port on the Welland Canal. We were disguised as immigrants to the west; our arms being shipped as mining tools; and when clear of the canal, we were to rise upon the crew, and make our way to Sandusky. As the Michigan was anchored close to the main channel of the harbor, and we had provided ourselves with grapnels, it was believed that she could be carried by surprise. We had sent off our last “Personal” to the New York Herald, informing our friends at Johnson’s Island “that the carriage would be at the door on or about the tenth;” our party had collected at the little port on the canal waiting for the steamer then nearly due, when a proclamation was issued by the Governor General, which fell among us like a thunderbolt. It was announced in this proclamation, that it had come to the knowledge of the Government that a hostile expedition was about to embark from the Canada shores, and the infliction of divers pains and penalties was threatened against all concerned in the violation of the neutrality laws. What was even more fatal to our hopes, we learned that His Excellency had notified the United States Government of our contemplated expedition.

Our good friend sojourning at Sandusky abandoned his duck shooting in haste, (for the news sped across the frontier,) bringing intelligence that the garrison at Johnson’s Island had been increased, and such other measures adopted as to render our success impossible. I called a council of the senior officers, who unanimously recommended that the attempt be abandoned; and so ended all our hopes. We learned, from what was believed by some to be a reliable source, that the informant against us was the manager, alluded to above, who betrayed us at the last moment.

There was a possibility of a successful issue to this enterprise, but not a probability. The American Consul at Halifax possessed intelligence and zeal; and he could easily have traced our course, by means of a detective, up to the very point of our departure on the Welland Canal. It is quite probable, indeed, that we were closely watched through the whole route, for immediately after the proclamation was issued, two or three detectives, no longer affecting disguise, dogged my footsteps for several days, with the intention I suspected of carrying me “vi et armis” across the frontier. But they were, in turn, subjected to as close an espionage by several members of the expedition, who were prepared for any emergency. “The engineer would have been hoisted with his own petard” probably, if they had attempted the arrest. That dare-devil Thompson, in fact, proposed one night that I should take a walk alone along the canal, and see what would come of it, but I declined the invitation.

One plan of releasing the Johnson’s Island prisoners was to purchase a steamer in England, through the agency of Captain Bullock, load her with a cargo, and clear from the Custom House “for a market” on the lakes. The chief obstacle to this plan would have been the passage, unsuspected, through the Welland Canal, but it was believed that, by proper discretion and management, this might have been accomplished, and the rest would have been easy; for all that was expected of any expedition was to carry the Michigan by surprise; the prisoners upon the island cooperating by attacking and overpowering the garrison.

As there was no farther necessity for keeping our movements secret, the whole party started together on the return to Halifax. We followed the route from “Riviere du Loup” overland by stage, or rather in sleighs, for the ground was already covered with snow, and the steamers had stopped running for the season, upon the beautiful picturesque St. John’s River; and our way lay through a cheerless and sparsely populated country for nearly the whole distance. We were able too, without indiscretion, to accept the hospitalities of our friends in Halifax, during our brief stay there. But duty called us back to the Confederacy, and passage was engaged for the whole party by the first steamer (the Alpha,) to sail for Bermuda.