1861 January 29th

January 29 1861 Tuesday

Kansas admitted to the Union

Go to January 30 1861

Florida. The US Marines and troops aboard USS Brooklyn (Captain Walker) en route to Pensacola and Fort Pickens were ordered not to land to reinforce Fort Pickens unless the fort was clearly under attack by secessionist forces.

Kansas. Kansas was admitted to the Union as the thirty-fourth state. Under the Wyandotte Constitution, the state would be a “Free State” and would not permit the ownership of slaves. This addition to Congress of new members antipathetical to slavery increased the concern of the Southern states that the balance of political power was shifting away from slave-holding states towards the slavery-free states. The state of Kansas remained under the control of the US Army’s Department of the West after its admission to the Union.

Louisiana. US Secretary of the Treasury John Adams Dix wired Agent William H Jones at New Orleans ordering him not to surrender the US Revenue Cutter Robert McClelland and to defend it with force if necessary, with the phrase: “If anyone attempts to haul down the American flag, shoot him on the spot”. Nevertheless, the USRC Robert McClelland was surrendered by Captain John G Breshwood USRM to the Louisiana authorities against Jones’ orders.

Texas. The Texas state legislature passed a resolution declaring that the US Government had no power to coerce a sovereign state after it had pronounced its separation from the Union.

Union Organisation

Commander in Chief: President James Buchanan
Vice-President: John Cabell Breckinridge
Secretary of War: Joseph Holt
Secretary of the Navy: Isaac Toucey

African Squadron: William Inman
Brazil Squadron: Joshua Ratoon Sands
East Indian (Asiatic) Squadron: Cornelius Kinchiloe Stribling
European Squadron: vacant
Home Squadron: Garrett J Prendergast
Mediterranean Squadron: Charles H Bell
Pacific Squadron: John Berrien Montgomery

General–in-Chief: Winfield Scott

Department of the East: John Ellis Wool

Department of New Mexico: Thomas Turner Fauntleroy interim, William Wing Loring awaited

Department of the Pacific: Albert Sidney Johnston

• District of Oregon: George Wright

Department of Texas: David Emanuel Twiggs

Department of Utah: Philip St George Cooke

Department of the West: William Selby Harney

Union Generals

Major-General USA

Winfield Scott

Brigadier-General USA

John Ellis Wool
David Emanuel Twiggs
William Selby Harney

Brigadier-General USA (Staff)

Joseph Eggleston Johnston