saw that there was little more that he could do in California to promote that cause. Later life Gwin returned east to New York on the same ship as Edwin Vose Sumner, commander of the Union Army's Department of the Pacific. Sumner organized Gwin's arrest along with two other secessionists, John Slidell (soon after involved in the Trent Affair) and J.L. Brent. However, President Abraham Lincoln intervened for their release, wishing to avoid an international incident, as Gwin had friends in Panama. Gwin sent his wife and one of his daughters to Europe, while he returned to his plantation in Mississippi. The plantation was destroyed in the war and Gwin, a daughter, and son fled to Paris. In 1864, he attempted to interest Napoleon III in a project to settle American slave owners in Sonora, Mexico. Despite a positive response from Napoleon, the idea was rejected by his protégé, Maximilian I, who feared that Gwin and his southerners would take Sonora for themselves. After the war, he returned to the United States and gave himself up to Major General Philip Sheridan in New Orleans. Sheridan granted his original request for release to rejoin his family, which had also returned, but was countermanded by President Andrew Johnson. Gwin retired to California and engaged in agricultural pursuits until his death in New York City in 1885. He was interred at Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland, California. References External links Retrieved on 2009-5-11 Guide to the William McKendree Gwin Papers at The Bancroft Library Senator William Gwin and the Politics of Prejudice by Howard A. DeWitt. |- |- |- |- |- 1805 births 1885 deaths 19th-century American physicians 19th-century American politicians Activists from California American proslavery activists American white supremacists Burials at Mountain View Cemetery (Oakland, California) California Democrats Democratic Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Mississippi Democratic Party United States senators from California People from Gallatin, Tennessee People of California in the American Civil War Transylvania University alumni United States Marshals