Civil War-dated ink signature, "Alexander H. Stephens, Con. States Comm'r, City Point, Va. 2 Feb. 1865,” on an off-white 3.25 x 1.75 slip. Affixed to a slightly larger card and in fine condition.
On January 31, 1865, three Confederate peace commissioners—Vice President Alexander H. Stephens, Senator Robert M. T. Hunter, and Assistant Secretary of War John A. Campbell—presented themselves under a flag of truce to the Union lines around Petersburg, having been appointed by Jefferson Davis to negotiate an end to the Civil War. Their instructions were to 'explore all options short of renouncing independence.' They were immediately conducted to General Grant's headquarters at City Point, Virginia. Gen. Grant corresponded with Secretary of War Edwin Stanton and President Abraham Lincoln via telegram, and was directed to retain them there until President Lincoln, or another representative of the United States government, could meet with them.
In his memoirs, Grant reports: 'After a few days, about the 2d of February, I received a dispatch from Washington, directing me to send the commissioners to Hampton Roads to meet the President and a member of the cabinet. Mr. Lincoln met them there and had an interview of short duration. It was not a great while after they met that the President visited me at City Point. He spoke of his having met the commissioners, and said he had told them that there would be no use in entering into any negotiations unless they would recognize, first: that the Union as a whole must be forever preserved, and second: that slavery must be abolished. If they were willing to concede these two points, then he was ready to enter into negotiations and was almost willing to hand them a blank sheet of paper with his signature attached for them to fill in the terms upon which they were willing to live with us in the Union and be one people.'
The 'Hampton Roads Conference' took place on February 3rd, aboard the steamboat River Queen in Hampton Roads, Virginia, between the three Confederate commissioners, President Abraham Lincoln, and Secretary of State William H. Seward. Ultimately, the Confederate negotiators were unwilling to compromise on the issues of sovereignty or slavery, and the war would persist until General Robert E. Lee's surrender on April 9th.
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