 The Trent Affair had taken place before Benjamin took office as Secretary of State : a U.S. warship had in October 1861 removed Confederate diplomats James Mason and James Slidell ( Benjamin 's former Louisiana colleague in the U.S. Senate ) and their private secretaries from a British @-@ flagged vessel . The crisis brought the U.S. and Britain near war , and was resolved by their release . By the time of Benjamin 's appointment , Mason and Slidell were at their posts in London and Paris as putative ministers from the Confederacy , seeking recognition by the governments of Britain and France . With difficult communications between the South and Europe ( dispatches were often lost or intercepted ) , Benjamin was initially reluctant to change the instructions given the agents by Secretary Hunter . Communications improved by 1863 , with Benjamin ordering that dispatches be sent to Bermuda or the Bahamas , from where they reached the Confederacy by blockade runner . 
