Two Miserable Presidents by Steve Sheinkin

of more than 30,000 Union and Confederate soldiers were killed or wounded. And though Lee lost even more men than McClellan, Seven Days was a major Confederate victory. The Union army had been driven far from Richmond.
    When the fighting ended, survivors on both sides tried to put the weeklong bloodbath behind them. One Southern soldier remembered: “Our boys and the Yanks made a bargain not to fire at each other, and went out in the field … and gathered berries together and
talked over the fight, traded tobacco and coffee and exchanged newspapers as peacefully and kindly as if they had not been engaged for the last seven days in butchering each other.”
    What About Slavery?
    A braham Lincoln was in no mood to pick berries. The entire North was disappointed and angry, and Lincoln got most of the blame. He desperately wanted to fire McClellan, but he was afraid the soldiers would be angry. “McClellan has the army with him,” Lincoln said.
    Then there was the always explosive issue of slavery. Abolitionists such as Frederick Douglass were demanding that Lincoln attack Southern slavery as well as Southern armies.

    â€œTo fight against slaveholders, without fighting against slavery, is but a half-hearted business.”

    Frederick Douglass
    Douglass was making an interesting point about war strategy. Southern farms and businesses depended on the labor of enslaved African Americans. And the Southern army was using slaves to build forts and cook food. Slavery was actually helping the South fight the war. So freeing slaves could help the North win it.
    Lincoln agreed with Douglass’s logic. When asked about ending slavery, he said, “I can assure you that the subject is on my mind, by day and night, more than any other.”
    One of the questions on Lincoln’s worried mind was this: If the Confederacy’s 3.5 million slaves were freed, where would they live? Lincoln was considering an idea some politicians were suggesting—that freed slaves should move to another country, maybe in Central America. But black leaders came to the White House to urge Lincoln to put that stupid idea out of his mind. As Robert Purvis told the president: “In the matter of rights, there is but one race, and that is the human race … . Sir, this is our country as much as it is yours, and we will not leave it.”
    Lincoln was also nervous about the four “border states,” or slave states that were still in the Union: Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, and Delaware. If he tried to abolish slavery, would those states join the Confederacy?
    And here’s another question: Shouldn’t free African Americans be allowed to enlist in the Union army? As of the middle of 1862, this was still being debated in Congress.
    Some people weren’t waiting for Congress to make up its mind.
    Robert Smalls’s Dash to Freedom
    R obert Smalls was a twenty-three-year-old expert boat pilot in Charleston, South Carolina. He was also a slave. In 1862, Smalls was working on the Planter , an armed steamship used by the Confederate navy.
    On the night of May 12, the Planter was loaded with weapons and ammunition. The captain told Smalls to have the ship ready for an early departure the next morning.
    â€œAye, aye, sir,” Smalls said.
    The captain and white crew went on shore for the night, leaving on board Smalls and the other black crew members. The captain never would have guessed that Smalls and the black crew, all slaves, had spent the past few months preparing for this exact moment.
    At three a.m. on May 13, Smalls put on the captain’s hat and jacket. He powered up the steam engines and began cruising—very slowly, as if this were just another normal night. At a dark waterside spot he stopped to pick up his wife and children, as well as family members of the other crew members. Then he turned the ship and headed out to sea.
    Now came the most dangerous part of the escape: the Planter had to sail