BIBFRAME Work

Title

The plot to perpetuate slavery

Other Titles (e.g. Variant)

How George McClellan, Southern spies and a confidence man nearly derailed Emancipation

Type

  • Text
  • Monograph

Contribution

Subject

Language

Illustrative Content

Classification

  • DDC: 973.7/14 (Assigner: dlc)
  • LCC: E608 .R69 2024 (Assigner: dlc) (Status: uba)

Content

Supplementary content

Summary

"In the aftermath of the September 1862 Battle of Antietam, President Abraham Lincoln issued the most significant presidential decree in American history, the Emancipation Proclamation, which would forever free all slaves in territory not under Union control. Nevertheless, his chief military commander in the field, Major General George B. McClellan, was outraged. Within days, two former Union officers nefariously crossed the lines into rebeldom, an initiative resulting in an elaborate subterfuge to scam Lincoln into withdrawing the Proclamation in return for nebulous promises of peace. This book tells the story, obscured in a veil of secrecy for 150 years, of the cloak and dagger chess match between Union detectives and Southern operatives in the months before emancipation become effective. Despite an ominous warning by author Herman Melville five years before, the scheme to perpetuate slavery almost succeeded, for it was engineered by a man the National Police Gazette once declared the "King of the Confidence Men"-- Provided by publisher.

Table of Contents

A confidence man in Manhattan -- Another grand scheme -- The aristocracy of slaveholding interests -- Monument Street girls -- On Mansfield's secret service -- A recusant chaplain -- Loudoun County scouts -- Redeeming their tarnished honor -- A brighter and more permanent prosperity -- The curiosity tour -- Strange bedfellows -- A fraudulent peace -- Mission to Maryland -- The church militant -- Attack of the Copperheads -- A shallow attempt at humbuggery.

Authorized Access Point

Roycraft, Philip R. The plot to perpetuate slavery

Geographic Coverage

Admin Metadata

  • Date: 2026-09-30T17:45:28.806372+00:00
  • Agent: cbc
  • Status: c
  • Derived from: 23792546

Admin Metadata

  • Date: 2026-09-30
  • Cataloger id: Unknown
  • Description level: http://id.loc.gov/ontologies/bibframe-2-6-0/
  • Description language: eng
  • Description authentication: pcc

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