Greenhow received a heroine’s welcome in the Confederate capital of Richmond, and President Jefferson Davis asked her to go to Europe to serve as an emissary to gain British and French recognition and intervention. In accepting Davis’ offer she became the first official female ambassador in American history. “Our President Jefferson Davis and our General thank you. The Confederacy owes you a debt,” appre-ciative authorities informed Greenhow at battle’s end. Greenhow’s espionage activities soon came under suspicion, however, and she was arrested by Allan Pinkerton only one month after the Confederate victory at Manassas. Initially placed under house arrest in Fort Greenhow, as Union authorities dubbed her home, she was even-tually moved with Little Rose to the Old Capitol Prison. Ironically, the military jail was the former boardinghouse where she was reared. For almost ten months, the indignant and defiant “Rebel Rose,” as she became known because of her allegiance to the rebel-lious Southern states, was held in captivity. Due in part to her personal relationship with the powerful Senator Wilson, Greenhow was released in late May 1862, but was exiled through battle lines to the South. She resided in Virginia and never returned to her beloved Washington. Greenhow received a heroine’s welcome in the Confederate capital of Richmond, and President Jefferson Davis asked her to go to Europe to serve as an emissary to gain British and French recognition and intervention. In accepting Davis’ offer, she became the first official female ambassador in American history. GR E E N H O W A N D L I T T L E R O S E 68 WBM september 2014 booked passage for England on board the blockade-runner Phantom out of Wilmington in early August 1863. Representing Confederate interests with abiding loyalty, Greenhow spent one year working tirelessly, if unsuccessfully, on her mis-sion. She even found time to publish a memoir, “My Imprisonment and the First Year of Abolition Rule at Washington.” In August 1864, she embarked on a trip back to the Confederacy. Bearing both diplomatic and personal dispatches for President Davis, Greenhow sailed from Greenock, Scotland, on the block-ade- runner Condor, making her maiden voyage. The Condor was a magnificent iron steamship — 270 feet long, 283 registered tons, and with three smokestacks — built exclusively for the blockade-running trade by Randolph, Elder and Company of Govan, Scotland. The ship was registered to Alexander Collie and Company, a successful London-based importing and exporting firm, and was captained by William Nathan Wrighte Hewett, a highly decorated British naval officer on leave. Considered “swift as a sea swallow” and painted a dull lead color to avoid detection, the Condor carried a large cargo of Jefferson Davis YZ IMAGES COURTESY OF LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
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