States--The militia--Unpreparedness--McClellan at Columbus--Meets
Governor Dennison--Put in command--Our stock of munitions--Making
estimates--McClellan's plan--Camp Jackson--Camp Dennison--Gathering
of the volunteers--Garibaldi uniforms--Officering the troops--Off
for Washington--Scenes in the State Capitol--Governor Dennison's
labors--Young regulars--Scott's policy--Alex. McCook--Orlando
Poe--Not allowed to take state commissions.


On Friday the twelfth day of April, 1861, the Senate of Ohio was in
session, trying to go on in the ordinary routine of business, but
with a sense of anxiety and strain which was caused by the troubled
condition of national affairs. The passage of Ordinances of
Secession by one after another of the Southern States, and even the
assembling of a provisional Confederate government at Montgomery,
had not wholly destroyed the hope that some peaceful way out of our
troubles would be found; yet the gathering of an army on the sands
opposite Fort Sumter was really war, and if a hostile gun were
fired, we knew it would mean the end of all effort at arrangement.
Hoping almost against hope that blood would not be shed, and that
the pageant of military array and of a rebel government would pass
by and soon be reckoned among the disused scenes and properties of a
political drama that never pretended to be more than acting, we
tried to give our thoughts to business; but there was no heart in
it, and the morning hour lagged, for we could not work in earnest
and we were unwilling to adjourn.

Suddenly a senator came in from the lobby in an excited way, and
catching the chairman's eye, exclaimed, "Mr. President, the
telegraph announces that the secessionists are bombarding Fort