“You know it is not a sin. and if it was. the Constitution forbids you to interfere with it.” That strange stutter of periods. It’s not a sin, but if it’s a sin, it’s not a sin, but if it is . . .

He is working his way towards his climax, which is, once again, the Gorsuch story. How the father of his dearest childhood friend, Thomas Gorsuch (whose name he seems to have forgotten since it appears in the speech as Thomas Gorruge), was killed retrieving his runaway slaves in Christiana.

He writes, “I begin to hate my Northern brothers.” He writes, “If abolitionists held the whip, slaves would be beaten double.”

These opinions put him at odds with the rest of the family. But, given his promise to Mother not to fight, no one is much perturbed. Let him say whatever he likes. What’s the harm? Mother, who once angrily told Aunty Rogers that in her house the natural dignity of every person God made was to be respected, makes no such objection when the sentiments come from her favorite son.

Besides, John tells his family, the war will be over soon enough. Recollect how Lincoln slunk into Washington. Lincoln doesn’t have the guts for a protracted campaign.

—

Edwin also believes the war will be short. Edwin’s faith is in the great general Winfield Scott, who will surely wipe out secession in a single battle. In fact, Scott is already retiring and George B. McClellan taking his place. McClellan, who will conduct the war so disastrously, some will suspect him of secretly working for the South.

Edwin and Mary are still in New York, but he’s been invited to star in the fall season at London’s Haymarket Theatre, so they’re making plans to sail for England. Meanwhile one friend after another goes to war. Richard Cary, to whom Edwin is particularly close, enlisted immediately and is already encamped outside the capital.

Another intimate is Julia Ward Howe, whose husband, although he escaped prosecution, is widely understood to have supplied John Brown with guns and money. Julia is unhappily married and a little in love with Edwin. A few years back she published an ode to his Hamlet, celebrating his beauty and genius.

And thou, young hero of this mimic scene,

In whose high breast

A genius greater than thy life hath been

Strangely comprest!

Now she is writing new lyrics to “John Brown’s Body,” lyrics that will become “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” She travels from Boston to Washington with her husband and other abolitionists in the hopes of persuading Lincoln into emancipation.