Per­fidy marked a piv­otal moment on April 9, when Gov­er­nor Pick­ens, Gen­er­al Beau­re­gard, and for­mer fed­er­al judge Andrew G. Magrath gath­ered in Pick­en­s’s office at the Charleston Hotel to dis­cuss a sen­si­tive mat­ter. The deliv­ery of mail addressed to Fort Sumter had been halt­ed by Beauregard’s order, spark­ing a tense con­ver­sa­tion among the three men. They were acute­ly aware of the grav­i­ty of the sit­u­a­tion, with the loom­ing con­flict with the Union putting them in a dif­fi­cult moral posi­tion. While the integri­ty of mail was typ­i­cal­ly sacro­sanct, Pick­ens rea­soned that, giv­en the extra­or­di­nary cir­cum­stances of war, they need­ed to gath­er any infor­ma­tion that might be per­ti­nent to their cause. The stakes were high, and as the ten­sion mount­ed, they were forced to weigh their actions care­ful­ly against the back­drop of an impend­ing war.

Ini­tial­ly, both Beau­re­gard and Magrath hes­i­tat­ed, reluc­tant to vio­late the pri­va­cy of the mail. How­ev­er, under the pres­sure of the moment, Pick­ens took charge and ner­vous­ly tore into the let­ters him­self. The group decid­ed to lim­it their inspec­tion to offi­cial com­mu­ni­ca­tions, intend­ing to send per­son­al let­ters for­ward with­out read­ing them. But in doing so, they inad­ver­tent­ly uncov­ered a let­ter from Major Ander­son to Colonel Loren­zo Thomas in Wash­ing­ton. This let­ter detailed a planned sup­ply expe­di­tion for Fort Sumter, impli­cat­ing Cap­tain Fox as the mas­ter­mind behind this oper­a­tion. The dis­cov­ery deep­ened their sus­pi­cions about the Lin­coln admin­is­tra­tion and raised ques­tions about its trust­wor­thi­ness, as it sug­gest­ed that the Union was prepar­ing to rein­force the fort, mak­ing a con­fronta­tion almost inevitable.

As the mail exam­i­na­tion con­tin­ued, more let­ters revealed the com­plex emo­tions of Major Ander­son, who had recent­ly become a hero to the Con­fed­er­a­cy. Despite his ele­vat­ed sta­tus, the let­ters exposed Anderson’s con­flict­ed loy­al­ties. In one of his let­ters, Ander­son open­ly admit­ted that his heart was not in the war, which pre­sent­ed a moral dilem­ma for the Con­fed­er­a­cy. On one hand, his reluc­tance to engage ful­ly in the con­flict could serve as a ral­ly­ing point for the South, offer­ing a chance to ques­tion his com­mit­ment. On the oth­er hand, this dis­cov­ery could also be used by those who admired Anderson’s brav­ery to crit­i­cize the Con­fed­er­ate war effort. His inter­nal con­flict mir­rored the larg­er strug­gle with­in the coun­try, with divid­ed loy­al­ties play­ing a sig­nif­i­cant role in the course of the Civ­il War.

In response to these rev­e­la­tions, Gov­er­nor Pick­ens wast­ed no time in com­mu­ni­cat­ing his con­cerns about the North­ern expe­di­tion to Con­fed­er­ate Pres­i­dent Jef­fer­son Davis. He assert­ed that prepa­ra­tions were already under­way in Charleston, where thou­sands of troops had been deployed to pre­pare for what was believed to be an immi­nent Union assault. Rein­force­ments were on their way, and Pick­ens expressed con­fi­dence that Charleston’s defens­es were ready to face what­ev­er might come. His assess­ment under­scored the ten­sion that was build­ing, as both sides braced for the inevitable clash. The chap­ter reflects the strate­gic maneu­ver­ing tak­ing place with­in Charleston, as its lead­ers nav­i­gat­ed the murky waters of war prepa­ra­tions. In the process, they found them­selves mak­ing dif­fi­cult deci­sions about what infor­ma­tion could be trust­ed, all while gear­ing up for a con­flict that was rapid­ly esca­lat­ing.

The episode also illus­trates the broad­er chal­lenges faced by both the Con­fed­er­a­cy and the Union in the lead-up to the Civ­il War. As infor­ma­tion flowed in from mul­ti­ple sources, the issue of trust became increas­ing­ly cen­tral. The Confederacy’s lead­er­ship had to bal­ance the need for intel­li­gence with the risk of mis­in­for­ma­tion, espe­cial­ly in the case of Major Anderson’s let­ters. They were not only fac­ing an exter­nal threat from the Union but also deal­ing with the com­plex­i­ties of inter­nal dis­sent and divid­ed loy­al­ties with­in their own ranks. These ten­sions, com­pound­ed by the uncer­tain­ty of what would come next, played a cru­cial role in shap­ing the Con­fed­er­ate response to the loom­ing war. The actions tak­en dur­ing this peri­od, from read­ing inter­cept­ed let­ters to orga­niz­ing mil­i­tary defens­es, were steps toward a con­flict that would soon engulf the nation.

Gov­er­nor Pick­en­s’s quick com­mu­ni­ca­tion with Pres­i­dent Davis fur­ther high­lights the rapid pace of deci­sion-mak­ing that defined this crit­i­cal peri­od. With Charleston’s defens­es on high alert, the city was brac­ing for the moment when it would be forced to respond to the Union’s actions. As rein­force­ments poured in, the Con­fed­er­ate lead­er­ship in Charleston solid­i­fied its posi­tion, ready to defend the city against any assault. The atmos­phere was thick with antic­i­pa­tion, as both sides pre­pared for what they knew could soon become a full-scale war. The chap­ter under­scores the com­plex­i­ty of the ear­ly days of the Civ­il War, where infor­ma­tion, mis­trust, and mil­i­tary strat­e­gy all played inter­twined roles in shap­ing the tra­jec­to­ry of the con­flict.