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Getting the News: 1862 Edition
Life in Time of War: 1862, New York City:
The people of New York City who viewed the Brady Gallery exhibit in October 1862, were living in a turbulent and frightening time.
Rebel invasions in the border states of Maryland and Kentucky had been turned back -- but at a horrible cost. The Battle of Antietam is, even to this day, the single worst day in American military history. Over 23,000 soldiers were killed or wounded or missing out of a United States population of about 30 million, which was only one-tenth of today's population.
Using reported successes of Union forces at Antietam as a justification, President Lincoln on September 22nd (less than a week after the battle of Antietam on September 17th) issued the Emancipation Proclamation. Citing his Constitutional power as Commander-in-Chief, Lincoln declared:
"That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State, or any designated part of State, the People whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States shall be then, thenceforward, and forever, free."
Not everyone in New York supported Lincoln or the War. Many financiers had made their money in the Cotton Trade Market and a contemporary observer cited by historian Harold Holzer, called New York City "a prolongation of the South."
Reflecting these split alliances, fierce campaigns for Governor of New York by Lincoln's Republicans, who were running James Wadsworth, and Horatio Seymour's Democrats, who represented the financial community, were being waged prior to the November election.
America may not have had television or the Internet in 1862, but they did have newspapers, weekly magazines, and the telegraphs. A skilled telegraph operator could send messages through the wires as fast a fast texter. Stories from New York appeared in early Chicago editions the next day.
Americans also may not have had partisan television networks like Fox News and MSNBC either, but they did have thousands of partisan newspapers to choose from. There weer approximately 2,900 newspapers, North and South. At least 370 were published daily. New York City had 17 daily papers, some that reported subscriptions over 100,000. Most of them had specific political positions. The 1860 Census report called 80% of them "political in nature."
However, the 1st Amendment rights of these papers were not being entirely respected by the Lincoln Administration.
Starting in February 1862, the Lincoln Administration had taken over the nation's telegraph system and placed it under the control of Secretary Stanton of the War Department. This resulted in the systematic censoring of correspondents' dispatches from the frontlines.
The writ of habeas corpus had been periodically suspended by local commanders and was officially suspended by Lincoln on September 24th, 1862 two days after the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation. The President states that conditions of Section 9 of the Constitution were in effect.
"The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it."
Upwards of 30 editors, mostly of Midwestern Peace or Pro-Southern newspapers, were detained and their publications stopped by Union army provost marshalls during the War.
Even so, news on censorship, the Emancipation Proclamation, the 1862 elections, and the Antietam photos made it to the papers and magazines. |