Judah P. Benjamin - Confederate Statesman

Confederate Statesman

Davis appointed Benjamin to be the first Attorney General of the Confederacy on February 25, 1861, remarking later that he chose him because he "had a very high reputation as a lawyer, and my acquaintance with him in the Senate had impressed me with the lucidity of his intellect, his systematic habits, and capacity for labor". Benjamin has been referred to as "the brains of the Confederacy".

In September 1861, he became the acting Secretary of War, and was confirmed in the post in November. He became a lightning rod for popular discontent with the Confederacy's military situation, and quarreled with the Confederate Generals P.G.T. Beauregard and Stonewall Jackson. He had strong disagreements with Davis about how to conduct the war.

Worried about Confederate defenses in the West, Benjamin had urged foreign consuls in New Orleans to defend the city when attacked. He had no power to order them into Confederate military service. He ordered the seizure of fourteen privately owned steamers at New Orleans. The impressed vessels were strengthened with iron casings at the bow to be used as rams. The ships kept civilian crews. Each vessel had a single heavy gun to be used in the event it was attacked by the Union. The Confederacy allocated $300,000 to outfit these vessels.

The military issues were highlighted by the Confederate's loss of Roanoke Island to the Union "without a fight" in February 1862. Roanoke's commander, Brig. Gen. Henry A. Wise, was in desperate need of reinforcements when he was informed of the imminent Federal attack. He begged for some of the 13,000 men he knew were idle under the control of Maj. Gen. Benjamin Huger in nearby Norfolk, Virginia, but his pleas to Huger and Benjamin went unheeded. The heavily outnumbered Confederate force of some 2,500 surrendered and were taken prisoner after losing nearly a hundred of their number in the Battle of Roanoke Island. Benjamin was held responsible for the loss (although he was carrying out Davis' priorities), and the public was outraged. Rather than reveal the pressing shortage of military manpower that had led to the decision to concede Roanoke, Benjamin accepted Congressional censure for the action without protest and resigned.

As a reward for Benjamin's loyalty, Davis appointed him as Secretary of State in March 1862. Benjamin arranged the Erlanger loan from a Paris bank to the Confederacy in 1863, which was the only significant European loan of the war. In a round of "secondary diplomacy", he sent commercial agents to the Caribbean to negotiate opening ports in Bermuda, the West Indies, and Cuba to Confederate blockade runners to maintain supplies, which the Union was trying to prevent. After mid-1863, the system was expanded and "brought rich rewards to investors, shipowners, and the Confederate Army".

Benjamin wanted to draw the United Kingdom into the war on the side of the Confederacy, but it had abolished slavery years before and public opinion was strongly divided on the war. In 1864, as the South's military position became increasingly desperate, he publicly advocated a plan to emancipate and induct into the military any slave willing to bear arms for the Confederacy. Such a policy would have the dual results of removing slavery as the greatest obstacle in British public opinion to an alliance with the Confederacy, and easing the shortage of soldiers that was crippling the South's military efforts. With Davis' approval, Benjamin proclaimed, "Let us say to every Negro who wishes to go into the ranks, 'Go and fight—you are free." Robert E. Lee supported the scheme as well, but it faced stiff opposition from conservatives. The Confederate Congress did not pass the measure until March 1865, by which time it was too late to salvage the Southern cause.

Benjamin is pictured on the CSA $2.00 bill.