"My Dear Sir: I have only time to say that the movement of my command to this place was made on my own responsibility and not in obediance to orders from Washington. I did it because in my opinion it was the best way of preventing the shedding of blood. God grant that the existing condition of affairs may be adjusted without any resort to force."
Truly your friend, Robert Anderson.
The Hon. Robert N. Gourdin."
In another letter he states....
"No one will regret more deeply than I shall, should it prove true that the movement I have made has complicated rather than disembarrassed affairs."
Reading almost all of Anderson's communications that I can find during this period, he switches from patriotic belief in his act, to extreme doubt, to trying to prove to others it was the right thing to do after seeing the reaction from the people of Charleston. He never proved he was going to be attacked. I believe Anderson was not a sound minded man. He only lasted another year or so
after losing Fort Sumter and seeing the war it brought about, he eventually had to go on medical leave.
_______________________
David Upton