Washington, D.C.
October 3, 1863
By the President of
the United States of America.
A Proclamation.
The year that is
drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful
fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed
that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been
added, which are of so extraordinary a nature,that they cannot fail to
penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever
watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled
magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite
and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations,
order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony
has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that
theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the
Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful
industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or
the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines,
as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more
abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding
the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and
the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is
permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.
No human counsel hath
devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the
gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for
our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and
proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as
with one heart and one voice by the whole American People.
I do therefore invite
my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are
at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe
the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our
beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that
while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular
deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our
national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those
who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil
strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the
interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to
restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full
enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
In testimony whereof,
I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be
affixed.
Done at the City of
Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand
eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the
Eighty-eighth.
By the President:
Abraham Lincoln
