The Civil War in the United States was then at its height, and Halifax, as a neutral port, open to the vessels of both contestants for supremacy, occupied a peculiarly advantageous position. Never before in the history of the city had business been brisker or money more plentiful. Hardly a day passed without its quota of steamships or sailing-vessels pressing into the splendid harbour, and willing to pay almost any price in good gold for immediate attention.
Nor were these profitable customers of the harmless merchant class only. From time to time there appeared grim men-of-war, looking terribly business-like with their rows of black-muzzled guns; and now and then the whole city was thrown into excitement by the sudden advent of one of the far-famed Confederate cruisers, which did such fearful damage to Federal commerce--as, for instance, the renowned _Tallahassee_, whose trim black form came dashing through the white caps one fine summer morning, while far out in the offing a keen eye could discern the dark shapes of her disappointed pursuers.
But most interesting of all such visitors were the blockade-runners, the _Colonel Lamb_, the _Robert E. Lee_, and the like. Marvels of beauty and speed they were, their low, graceful hulls painted a soft gray tint, so as to make them invisible at sea when only a few miles distant; and in the eyes of the Halifax boys every man on board was a hero, and the object of profound admiration.
This feeling, moreover, was by no means confined to the boys. If at any time during the war a poll of the Haligonians had been taken, the majority in favour of the South would certainly have been very large. Self-interest, no doubt, had much to do with this state of affairs; and, besides that, there was current the belief that the South was fighting for freedom rather than for the maintenance of slavery.
The firm of Drummond and Brown having had extensive business connections with the Southern States for many years before the war, it was but natural that Long Wharf should be the favoured resort of the Confederate vessels. The blockade-runners, without exception, docked there; and, as a matter of course, from the heads of the firm down to the humblest toiler on the wharf, everybody belonging to the establishment was Confederate to the core.