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Published: Sunday, Jul. 05, 2009

Dan Krieger: A California community struck by Civil War divisions

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“A Union and secession war on a small scale occurred on Monday (July 4, 1864) afternoon on (H) Street, near Fourteenth.”

The flames of America’s Civil War burned as intensely in California as they did in the border states.

Many of the Argonauts who flooded into California during the 1850s were from Southern states.

Sacramento wasn’t just California’s capital, it was also the heart of the Mother Lode.

The summer of 1864 was the last hope of the Confederacy.

Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia had inflicted severe casualties on Gen. Ulysses H. Grant’s much larger army in the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, May 8 to 21, 1864.

Many Republicans were already convinced that Lincoln could not be re-elected.

General George B. McClellan ran against Lincoln as a “pro-War Democrat,” but his party’s platform was written by the “Copperhead,” Clement Laird Vallandigham, who advocated peace with the Confederacy.

The national tensions nearly became deadly in a quiet Sacramento residential district according to the Daily Union, on July 6, 1864:

“A double house at that locality is occupied by two families — those of John Drummond (pro-Union), and John Clary (a secessionist).

Heretofore these families have lived together in peace and quietness. On Monday morning, Mrs. Drummond heard Mrs. Clary order her child, who had gone into the room with a small American flag, to leave, as she would not have the rag about the place.

“Mrs. Drummond at once called her child home. In the afternoon Mrs. Drummond put up the flag over the door. Mrs. Clary tore it down, stating that was the only door which she could pass through, and she would not be compelled to walk under the Union flag.

“Mrs. Drummond put it up again, and procuring a small piece of board, which made a formidable weapon, threatened to strike Mrs. Clary with it if she attempted to tear it down again.

“Mrs. Clary then repaired to her room and improvised a Confederate flag, although it was not made according to regulation. This she pinned to the Union flag, when Mrs. Drummond again appeared and tore it down, leaving the stars and stripes afloat, of course.

“Before placing the Confederate flag up, Mrs. Clary was joined by her husband, who justified his wife in her course. Mrs. Drummond informed him that she would as soon strike him as his wife if he acted as she had done.

“When Mrs. Clary pinned up the flag Mrs. Drummond dealt a heavy blow at her, but Mrs. Clary dodged and escaped its consequences.

“Soon afterward Mrs. Drummond was joined by her husband, who, after learning what had occurred, went into Clary’s room, Clary and two other men being present, took off his coat, said he could whip any Secessionist in the room, and gave them his views on the subject under discussion explicitly and without reserve.

“Clary defended his wife’s course, and looked occasionally at a double-barreled shotgun in the room, but no blows were struck. Clary said his wife should put up a flag if she chose and he would defend it.

“Drummond responded that she could not put up a traitor flag on that house or any other in this city, and that he for one would shoot down him or any other man who would make the attempt. The Union flag was kept afloat until evening, when Mrs. Drummond took it down.”

Two days later, the Union wrapped the story up, noting:

“Soon after ... several soldiers from Camp Union stopped at the house and were anxious to see the man who was going to tear down the flag.

Clary, on seeing them, disclaimed being that individual, and declared that he was as good a friend to the Union as any other man.”

The soldiers changed the weather in our state’s steamy capital. Nationally, that change manifested itself in Lincoln’s winning reelection and ultimately the Civil War.

Dan Krieger is a professor emeritus of history at Cal Poly and president of the California Mission Studies Association.