Rebellion Record: a Diary of American Events: Documents and Narratives, Volume 11.
Frank Moore, Ed.

[474]

letter from the editors of the suppressed journals.

To the Editor of the New Fork Times:

Will you oblige us by publishing in your columns the following statement of the proceedings of the Government, this evening, toward the World and the Journal of Commerce, regarding the publication, in our morning issues, of the forged proclamation, purporting to be signed by President Lincoln, appointing a day of fasting and prayer, and calling into the military service four hundred thousand men.

The document in question was written on the manifold paper, such as is used for all the despatches sent to the several newspapers of our Association, and had every external appearance and mark to identify it as a genuine despatch arriving in the regular course of business.

It was delivered at our office late at night, at the time of the receipt of our latest news, too late, of course, for editorial supervision, but, as it happened, not before our printing offices were closed.

It was delivered at all, or nearly all the newspaper offices, and was published in a part of the morning editions of the Journal of Commerce and World, and, as we are informed, in a part of the editions of one or more of our contemporaries.

Early this morning the fact that the despatch had not been sent by the agent of the Associated Press became known to us, and its fraudulent character was at once announced upon our bulletin boards, and a reward of five hundred dollars offered by us for the discovery of the forger. The Executive Committee of the Associated Press also offered a similar reward of one thousand dollars, as the fraud had attempted to be perpetrated upon all the journals composing our association.

We took pains, in the afternoon, to apprise General Dix of the facts of the case, and gave him such information in regard to the circumstance of the forgery, as might assist him in the discovery of its author. The Government was at once put in possession of the facts in the case.

Nevertheless, this evening, General Dix, acting under peremptory orders from the Government, placed our offices under a strong military guard, and issued warrants for the arrest of the editors and proprietors of the World and Journal of Commerce, and their imprisonment in Fort Lafayette. A vessel was lying under steam, at one of the wharves, to convey us thither.

Chancing to meet one of the officers of General Dix's staff, charged with the execution of this order, we proceeded in his company to the Headquarters of the Department of the East, and were informed, by General Dix, that the order for our arrest had been suspended, but that the order for the suppression of the publication of the World and Journal of Commerce had not been rescinded, and that we could not be permitted to enter our offices, which continue under the charge of the military guards.

We protest against this proceeding. We protest against the assumption of our complicity with this shameless forgery, implied in the order for our arrest. We protest against the suppression of our journals, for the misfortune of being deceived by a forgery, not less ingenious nor plausible than the forged report of the Confederate Secretary of War, which Secretary Seward made the basis of diplomatic action.

prime, Stone, Hale & Hallock, Journal of Commerce. Manton marble, World.
New York, May 18, 1864.

arrest of the Forgers.

Francis A. Mallison, a reporter for the Brooklyn Eagle, and a manifold copyist for several New York papers, was arrested on the morning of May twenty-first, at half-past 9 o'clock, while on his way to the Forty-fifth Precinct Station-house, Williamsburgh, where he was to attend to the draft, by detectives Young, Radford and McDougal, on suspicion of being implicated with J. Howard, Jr., in the preparation and publication of the forged proclamation. Howard was arrested the day previous. Mallison was immediately taken before Colonel Ludlow, at General Dix's headquarters, by whom he was subjected to a searching examination. Perceiving that he was hopelessly implicated, and that the evidences of his guilt already in the possession of Colonel Ludlow were clear and overwhelming, Mallison at length made a full confession of his complicity in the matter, corroborating in every point the previous confession of Mr. Howard.

The examination of Howard and Mallison showed that the proclamation fraud was for stock-jobbing operations, in which, it is at present believed, only two persons besides Mr. Howard were concerned; that no other persons connected with the newspaper forces of New York or Brooklyn had any connection with the transaction, or were privy to it. The sole purpose of the parties was to purchase gold on Tuesday and sell it early on Wednesday morning. Mallison confessed that he wrote in manifold, at Mr. Howard's residence, the copies of the pretended proclamation, which had been prepared by Mr. Howard, and brought them over to this city about half-past 11 o'clock Tuesday night He lingered about the streets until about three o'clock A. M., and then sent them round to the different newspaper offices by a lad, to whom he gave minute directions where and in what manner to deliver them without exciting suspicion.

At the conclusion of his examination, Mallison was sent to Fort Lafayette.

Howard was arrested at about three o'clock P. M., at his residence,corner of Middagh and Willow streets, Brooklyn. The officers, on entering the house and making the arrest, informed him