On December 28th he wrote a note to the Secretary expressing the hope:  1.  That orders may not be given for the evacuation of Fort Sumter [this was after Major Anderson had withdrawn his forces from Fort Moultrie and concentrated at Sumter]. 2.  That one hundred and fifty recruits may be instantly sent from Governor’s Island to re-enforce that garrison, with ample supplies of ammunition and subsistence, including fresh vegetables, as potatoes, onions, turnips, etc. 3.  That one or two armed vessels be sent to support the said fort.  In the same communication he calls the Secretary’s attention to Forts Jefferson (Tortugas) and Taylor (Key West).  On December 30th he addressed the President and asked permission, “without reference to the War Department, and otherwise as secretly as possible, to send two hundred and fifty recruits from New York Harbor to re-enforce Fort Sumter, together with some extra muskets or rifles, ammunition, and subsistence,” and asked that a sloop of war and cutter might be ordered for the same purpose as early as the next day.  The documents show that from General Scott’s first note, referred to and quoted herein, down to the inauguration of Mr. Lincoln, he was persistent in his efforts to have the Southern forts, or as many of them as the means at hand would permit, re-enforced and garrisoned against surprise and capture; but little heed was paid to his importunities.

On the day before the inauguration of Mr. Lincoln General Scott addressed William H. Seward, who, it was known, would become Secretary of State in Lincoln’s Cabinet, what is called the “Wayward sisters” letter, and which is quoted in full: 

“WASHINGTON, March 3, 1861.

“DEAR SIR:  Hoping that in a day or two the new President will have happily passed through all personal dangers and find himself installed an honored successor of the great Washington, with you as the chief of his Cabinet, I beg leave to repeat in writing what I have before said to you orally, this supplement to my printed ‘Views’ (dated in October last) on the highly disordered condition of our (so late) happy and glorious Union.

“To meet the extraordinary exigencies of the times, it seems to me
that I am guilty of no arrogance in limiting the President’s field
of selection to one of the four plans of procedure subjoined: 

“I.  Throw off the old and assume the new designation, the Union party; adopt the conciliatory measures proposed by Mr. Crittenden or the Peace Convention, and my life upon it, we shall have no new case of secession; but, on the contrary, an early return of many, if not of all, the States which have already broken off from the Union.  Without some equally benign measure the remaining slaveholding States will probably join the Montgomery Confederacy in less than sixty days, when this city, being included in a foreign country, would require a permanent garrison of at least thirty-five thousand troops to protect the Government within it.

  “II.  Collect the duties on foreign goods outside the ports of which
  the Government has lost the command, or close such ports by act of
  Congress and blockade them.