Also, one obvious reason the UK did not recognize the South as a country at the time of the "Trent" affair, besides the fact that the Southern diplomats were in fact freed, is the other fact that the Palmerston government recognized the fact that the South was based on a slave economy, anathema to the British.

But that recognition did not stop the Palmerston administration from favoring the South through sins of omission, not commission--at least until Gettysburg.