Military Reminiscences of the Civil War Volume I Part 15

A proclamation of such grave moment to the nation, officially communicated to the army, affords to the general commanding an opportunity of defining specifically to the officers and soldiers under his command the relation borne by all persons in the military service of the United States toward the civil authorities of the Government. The Const.i.tution confides to the civil authorities--legislative, judicial, and executive--the power and duty of making, expounding, and executing the Federal laws. Armed forces are raised and supported simply to sustain the civil authorities, and are to be held in strict subordination thereto in all respects. This fundamental rule of our political system is essential to the security of our republican inst.i.tutions, and should be thoroughly understood and observed by every soldier. The principle upon which and the object for which armies shall be employed in suppressing rebellion, must be determined and declared by the civil authorities, and the Chief Executive, who is charged with the administration of the national affairs, is the proper and only source through which the needs and orders of the Government can be made known to the armies of the nation.

Discussions by officers and soldiers concerning public measures determined upon and declared by the Government, when carried at all beyond temperate and respectful expressions of opinion, tend greatly to impair and destroy the discipline and efficiency of troops, by subst.i.tuting the spirit of political faction for that firm, steady, and earnest support of the authorities of the Government, which is the highest duty of the American soldier. The remedy for political errors, if any are committed, is to be found only in the action of the people at the polls.

In thus calling the attention of this army to the true relation between the soldier and the government, the general commanding merely adverts to an evil against which it has been thought advisable during our whole history to guard the armies of the Republic, and in so doing he will not be considered by any right-minded person as casting any reflection upon that loyalty and good conduct which has been so fully ill.u.s.trated upon so many battle-fields.

In carrying out all measures of public policy, this army will of course be guided by the same rules of mercy and Christianity that have ever controlled its conduct toward the defenceless.

By Command of Major-General McClellan, JAS. A. HARDIE, Lieutenant-Colonel, Aide-de-camp, and Act'g a.s.s't Adj't Gen'l."]

I have always understood that the order was drafted by Colonel Key, who afterward expressed in very strong terms his confidence in the high motives and progressive tendencies of McClellan at the time he issued it.

General Cochrane, some time after the close of the war, in a pamphlet outlining his own military history, made reference to the visit to McClellan which I have narrated, and states that he was so greatly impressed by the anti-slavery sentiments avowed by the general, that he made use of them in a subsequent effort to bring him and Secretary Chase into more cordial relations. [Footnote: The War for the Union, Memoir by General John Cochrane, pp. 29-31.] It is possible that, in a friendly comparison of views in which we were trying to find how nearly we could come together, the general may have put his opinions with a liberality which outran his ordinary statements of belief; but I am very sure that he gave every evidence of sincerity, and that none of us entertained a doubt of his being entirely transparent with us. He has since, in his "Own Story,"

referred to his taking counsel of Mr. Aspinwall of New York at about the same time, and there is evidence that General W. F. Smith also threw his influence against any opposition by McClellan to the Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation. [Footnote: Nicolay and Hay's Lincoln, vol. vi. p. 180.] McClellan's letters show that his first impulse was to antagonism; but there is no fair reason to doubt that his action at last was prompted by the reasons which he avowed in our conversation, and by the honorable motives he professed. He immediately sent a copy of his order to Mr. Lincoln personally, and this indicates that he believed the President would be pleased with it.

The reference which he made to suggestions that the army would follow him in a _coup d'e'tat_ is supported by what he formally declared in his memoirs. He there tells us that in 1861 he was often approached in regard to a "dictators.h.i.+p," and that when he was finally removed many in the army were in favor of his marching upon Was.h.i.+ngton to take possession of the government. [Footnote: Own Story, pp. 85, 652.] It would seem that treasonable notions were rife about him to an extent that was never suspected, unless he was made the dupe of pretenders who saw some profit in what might be regarded as a gross form of adulation. He must be condemned for the weakness which made such approaches to him possible; but we are obliged to take the fact as he gives it, and to accept as one of the strange elements of the situation a constant stream of treasonable suggestions from professed friends in the army and out of it. An anecdote which came to me in a way to make it more than ordinarily trustworthy was that in the summer of 1861 McClellan was riding with an older officer of the regular army, [Footnote: General McCall.]

and said to him, "I understand there is a good deal of talk of making a dictators.h.i.+p." "Ah!" said the other, "Mr. Lincoln, I suppose." "Oh, no," replied McClellan, "it's me they're talking of."

Bits of evidence from many sources prove that there had been from the first too much such talk about Was.h.i.+ngton, and whilst McClellan cannot be held responsible for it, there is no proof that he rebuked it as he should have done. It was part of the fermenting political and military intrigue which is found at the seat of government in such a time, if anywhere, and I take satisfaction in testifying that away from that neighborhood I never even heard the thing mentioned or referred to, that I can recollect. Was.h.i.+ngton would be spoken of in a general way as a place of intrigues, but I never knew this to have a wider meaning given to it than the ordinary one of political schemes within lawful limits and personal ambitions of no criminal character.

Mr. Lincoln visited our camp on the 1st of October, and remained two or three days. I was with the party of officers invited by McClellan to accompany the President in a ride over the route which Sumner had followed in the battle. We crossed the Antietam in front of Keedysville, followed the hollows and byways to the East Wood, and pa.s.sed through this and the cornfields which had been the scene of Hooker's and Mansfield's fierce fighting. We visited the Dunker Church and then returned to camp by b.l.o.o.d.y Lane and the central stone bridge. The President was observant and keenly interested in the field of battle, but made no display of sentiment. On another day he reviewed the troops which were most accessible from headquarters. As my own corps was among the first on the list, I did not join the escort of the President at the general's quarters, but was with the troops attending to the details of the parade. We were ordered to be under arms at eight o'clock, but it was more than two hours after that when the reviewing cortege came on the ground. The officers were very hilarious over some grotesque story with which Mr. Lincoln had seasoned the conversation, and which seemed to have caused some forgetfulness of the appointment with the troops. We were reviewed by divisions, and I met the party with my staff, riding down the lines with them, and answering the inquiries of the President and the general as to the history and the experience of the different organizations as we pa.s.sed them. The usual march in review was omitted for lack of time, the President contenting himself with riding along the lines formed in parade. I had missed seeing the President in Was.h.i.+ngton when I paid my respects at the White House, and this was my first meeting with him after his inauguration. His unpretending cordiality was what first impressed one, but you soon saw with what sharp intelligence and keen humor he dealt with every subject which came up. He referred very pleasantly to his knowledge of me through Secretary Chase, showing the kindly instinct to find some compliment or evidence of recognition for all who approached him.

This geniality in Mr. Lincoln made him avoid personal criticism of the campaign, and gave an air of earnest satisfaction to what he said of the work done by McClellan. There was enough to praise, and he praised it heartily. He was also thankful that the threatened invasion of the North had been defeated, and showed his sense of great relief. He had adopted the rule for himself to limit his direct influence upon his generals to the presentation of his ideas of what was desirable, often taking pains even in his written communications to say that he made no order, and left the definite direction to General Halleck. McClellan gave the most favorable interpretation to all that the President said, but could not ignore the anxiety Mr. Lincoln showed that an energetic campaign should be continued. He wrote home: "I incline to think that the real purpose of his visit is to push me into a premature advance into Virginia."

[Footnote: O. S., p. 654.]

The President had coupled his earliest telegraphic congratulations with the question, "Can't you beat them some more before they get off?" and McClellan's private correspondence shows that he, on his part, chafed at every suggestion of haste. As early as the 22d of September, the general had written that he looked upon the campaign as substantially ended, and intended to give some time to the reorganization of the army before beginning a new one. The vicinity of Harper's Ferry or Frederick seemed to him the proper place for the camp meanwhile, and he wished for a rise in the Potomac River which should make it impracticable for Lee to ford it again. He delayed in the neighborhood of Sharpsburg, waiting for this. To those of us with whom he talked freely, he spoke of the necessity of incorporating into the Army of the Potomac at least a hundred thousand of the new levies to make it really fit for an aggressive campaign, and argued that it would save time in the end to use some of it now in the work of reorganizing.

Mr. Lincoln was plainly troubled with the apprehension that the delays of 1861 were to be repeated, and that the fine October weather of that region would be again wasted and nothing done till the next spring. There were men enough about him at Was.h.i.+ngton to remind him of this in irritating ways, and to make him realize that as he had personally restored McClellan to the command he would be personally responsible for keeping him moving. McClellan rightly understood Mr. Lincoln's visit as meaning this. He did not refuse to move; on the other hand, he professed to be anxious to do so at the earliest moment when it should be really practicable. His obstinacy was of a feminine sort. He avoided open antagonism which would have been a challenge of strength, but found constantly fresh obstacles in the way of doing what he was determined from the first not to do.

The need of clothing for the men and of horses for the cavalry was a fruitful subject for debate, and the debate, if sufficiently prolonged, would itself accomplish the delay that was desired.

The official correspondence shows that the President went back to Was.h.i.+ngton determined to cut the knot in a peremptory way, if he was forced to do so. McClellan could not have been blind to this. His private letters show that he thought it not improbable that he would be relieved from command. His desire for military success was a ruling one with him on both public and private grounds. We are forced, therefore, to conclude that he actually lacked faith in success, and regarded the crossing of the Potomac as too perilous until he should reorganize the army with the additional hundred thousand recruits. In this we see the ever-recurring effect of his exaggeration of the enemy's force. We now know that this over-estimate was inexcusable, but we cannot deny that he made it, nor, altogether, that he believed in it. It const.i.tuted a disqualification for such a command, and led to what must be regarded as the inevitable result,--his removal. The political questions connected with the matter cut no important figure in it.

If he had had faith in his ability to conquer Lee's army, we should never have heard of them.

Whilst I mean what I say in speaking of McClellan's exaggeration of his enemy as const.i.tuting incompetence for such a command, it has reference to the necessity in which we were that our army should be aggressively handled. Few men could excel him in strictly defensive operations. He did not lack personal courage, nor did his intellectual powers become obscured in the excitement of actual war.

He showed the ordinary evidences of presence of mind and coolness of judgment under fire. His tendency to see his enemy doubled in force was, however, a const.i.tutional one, and no amount of experience seemed to cure it. Had it not been so he would have devised checks upon the reports of his secret-service agents, and corrected their estimates by those more reliable methods which I have already spoken of. McClellan was, even in those days, often compared to Marshal Daun, whose fair ability but studiously defensive policy was so in contrast with the daring strategy of the great Frederick. The comparison was a fair one. The trouble was that we had need of a Frederick.

It may seem strange that his subordinates so generally accepted his view and supported him in his conduct; but it was a natural result of forces always at work in an army. The old maxim that "Councils of war never fight" is only another way of saying that an army is never bolder than its leader. It is the same as the old Greek proverb, "Better an army of deer with a lion for leader, than an army of lions with a deer for leader." The body of men thus organized relies upon its chief for the knowledge of the enemy and for the plan by which the enemy is to be taken at a disadvantage. It will courageously carry out his plans so long as he has faith in them himself and has good fortune in their execution. Let doubt arise as to either of these things and his troops raise the cry "We are sacrificed," "We are slaughtered uselessly." McClellan's arts of military popularity were such that his army accepted his estimate of the enemy, and believed (in the main) that he had shown great ability in saving them from destruction in a contest at such odds.

They were inclined, therefore, to hold the government at Was.h.i.+ngton responsible for sacrificing them by demanding the impossible. Under such circ.u.mstances nothing but a cautious defensive policy could be popular with officers or men. If McClellan's data were true, he and they were right. It would have been folly to cross the Potomac and, with their backs to the river, fight a greatly superior enemy.

Because the data were not true there was no solution for the problem but to give the army another commander, and painfully to undo the military education it had for a year been receiving. The process of disillusion was a slow one. The disasters to Burnside and Hooker strengthened the error. Meade's standstill after Gettysburg was very like McClellan's after Antietam, and Mr. Lincoln had to deal with it in a very similar way. When Grant took command the army expected him to have a similar fate, and his reputation was treated as of little worth because he had not yet "met Bobby Lee." His terrible method of "attrition" was a fearfully costly one, and the flower of that army was transferred from the active roster to the casualty lists before the prestige of its enemy was broken. But it was broken, and Appomattox came at last.

It will not do to say that the Confederate army in Virginia was in any sense superior to their army in the West. When the superior force of the National army was systematically applied, General Lee was reduced to as cautious a defensive in Virginia as was General Johnston in Georgia. Longstreet and Hood had no better success when transferred to the West than the men who had never belonged to the Army of Virginia. In fact, it was with Joseph E. Johnston as his opponent that McClellan's career was chiefly run. Yet the Confederate army in the West was broken at Donelson and at Vicksburg. It was driven from Stone's River to Chattanooga, and from Missionary Ridge to Atlanta. Its remnant was destroyed at Franklin and Nashville, and Sherman's March to the Sea nearly completed the traverse of the whole Confederacy. His victorious army was close in rear of Petersburg when Richmond was finally won. Now that we have got rid of the fiction that the Confederate government gave to Lee an enormously larger army than it gave to Bragg or to Joseph Johnston, we have to account for the fact that with much less odds in their favor our Western army accomplished so much more. As a military objective Richmond was in easier reach from the Potomac than Nashville from the Ohio. From Nashville to Chattanooga was fully as difficult a task. The vulnerable lines of communication multiplied in length as we went southward, and made the campaign of Atlanta more difficult still. Vicksburg was a harder nut to crack than Richmond. We must put away our _esprit de corps_, and squarely face the problem as one of military art with the Official Records and returns before us. Our Western army was of essentially the same material as the Eastern. Regiments from nearly all the States were mingled in both. Wisconsin men fought beside those from Maine in the Army of the Potomac, as men who had fought at Antietam and at Gettysburg followed Sherman through the Carolinas. The difference was not in the rank and file, it was not in the subordinates. It was the difference in leaders.h.i.+p and in the education of the armies under their leaders during their first campaigns. That mysterious thing, the morale of an army, grows out of its belief as to what it can do. If it is systematically taught that it is hopelessly inferior to its adversary, it will be held in check by a fraction of its own force. The general who indoctrinates his army with the belief that it is required by its government to do the impossible, may preserve his popularity with the troops and be received with cheers as he rides down the line, but he has put any great military success far beyond his reach. In this study of military morale, its causes and its effects, the history of the Army of the Potomac is one of the most important and one of the gravest lessons the world has ever seen.

I have to confess that at Antietam I shared, more or less fully, the opinions of those among whom I was. I accepted McClellan as the best authority in regard to the enemy's numbers, and, a.s.suming that he was approximately right in that, the reasonable prudence of waiting for reinforcements could not be denied. I saw that he had lost valuable time in the movements of the campaign, but the general result seemed successful enough to hide this for the time at least.

My own experience, therefore, supports the conclusion I have already stated, that an army's enterprise is measured by its commander's, and, by a necessary law, the army reflects his judgment as to what it can or cannot accomplish.

Mr. Lincoln had told McClellan during his visit to the army that his great fault was "overcautiousness." He had intimated plainly enough that he must insist upon the continuance of the campaign. He had discussed the plans of advance, and urged McClellan to operate upon Lee's communications by marching south on the east side of the Blue Ridge. He had disclaimed any purpose of forcing a movement before the army was ready, but saw no reason why it should take longer to get ready after Antietam than after Pope's last battle. Soon after his return to Was.h.i.+ngton, Halleck sent a peremptory order to McClellan to cross the Potomac. [Footnote: Official Records, vol.

xix. pt. i. p. 10.] It was dated October 6th, and said: "The President directs that you cross the Potomac and give battle to the enemy or drive him South. Your army must move now while the roads are good. If you cross the river between the enemy and Was.h.i.+ngton, and cover the latter by your line of operations, you can be reinforced with 30,000 men. If you move up the valley of the Shenandoah, not more than 12,000 or 15,000 can be sent to you. The President advises the interior line between Was.h.i.+ngton and the enemy, but does not order it." It also required him to report immediately which line he adopted. Halleck, as General-in-chief, ought to have given his own decision as to the line of operations, but his characteristic indecision was shown in failing to do so. He did not even express an opinion as to the relative merits of the two lines, and limited himself to his concurrence in the order to move in one way or the other.

McClellan replied on the 7th, [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix.

pt. i. p. 11.] saying that he had determined to adopt the Shenandoah line, though he wished to "state distinctly" that he should only use that line till the enemy should retire beyond Winchester, as he did not expect to be able to supply his army more than twenty or twenty-five miles beyond a railway or ca.n.a.l depot. If the enemy retreated, he would adopt some new and decisive line of operations.

He objected to the interior line because it did not cover Maryland and Pennsylvania from a return of Lee's army, and because (as he said) the army could not be supplied by it. He indicated three days as the time within which he could move. At the end of that time he complained of still lacking clothing. On the 12th he found it "absolutely necessary" that the cavalry should have more horses. The discussion over these things ran on till the 21st.

Mr. Lincoln made a strong effort to save McClellan from the effects of his mental deficiencies. He exhausted advice and exhortation. He even ventured upon mild raillery on the idleness of the army. On the 13th he had written a remarkable letter to McClellan, in which he reminded him of what had occurred between them at the Antietam and argued in favor of the interior line of movement. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. i. p. 13.] He showed that Lee at Winchester supplied his army twice as far from his railway depot as McClellan thought possible for the Army of the Potomac. He urged the recognized advantage of operating by a line which attacked the enemy's communications. He pointed out that if Lee should try to cross the Potomac, our army could be in his rear and should destroy him. He showed that McClellan at Harper's Ferry was nearer to Richmond than Lee: "His route is the arc of a circle of which yours is the chord." He a.n.a.lyzed the map and showed that the interior line was the easier for supplying the army: "The chord line, as you see, carries you by Aldie, Haymarket and Fredericksburg, and you see how turnpikes, railroads, and finally the Potomac by Acquia Creek, meet you at all points from Was.h.i.+ngton." He even gave the figures in miles from gap to gap in the mountains, which would enable McClellan to strike the enemy in flank or rear; and this was of course to be done if Lee made a stand. "It is all easy," his letter concluded, "if our troops march as well as the enemy; and it is unmanly to say they cannot do it." Yet he expressly disclaimed making his letter an order. [Footnote: Since writing this, I have had occasion to treat this subject more fully, as bearing upon Mr. Lincoln's military judgment and intelligence, in a review of Henderson's Stonewall Jackson, "The Nation," Nov. 24, Dec. 1, 1898.]

As a mere matter of military comprehension and judgment of the strategic situation, the letter puts Mr. Lincoln head and shoulders above both his military subordinates. Halleck saw its force, but would not order it to be carried out. McClellan shrank from the decisive vigor of the plan, though he finally accepted it as the means of getting the larger reinforcements. On the 21st of October the discussion of cavalry horses was pretty well exhausted, and McClellan telegraphed Halleck [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix.

pt. i. p. 81.] that in other respects he was nearly ready to move, and inquires whether the President desired him to march on the enemy at once or to wait the arrival of the new horses. Halleck answered that the order of the 6th October remained unchanged. "If you have not been and are not now in condition to obey it, you will be able to show such want of ability. The President does not expect impossibilities, but he is very anxious that all this good weather should not be wasted in inactivity. Telegraph when you will move and on what lines you propose to march." This dispatch was plainly a notice to McClellan that he would be held responsible for the failure to obey the order of the 6th unless he could exonerate himself by showing that he could not obey it. In his final report, however, he says that he treated it as authority to decide for himself whether or not it was possible to move with safety to the army; [Footnote: _Ibid_.] "and this responsibility," he says, "I exercised with the more confidence in view of the strong a.s.surance of his trust in me, as commander of that army, with which the President had seen fit to honor me during his last visit." Argument is superfluous, in view of the correspondence, to show that orders and exhortations were alike wasted.

The movement began in the last days of October, the Sixth Corps, which was in the rear, crossing the Potomac on the 2d of November.

McClellan had accepted Mr. Lincoln's plan, but lack of vigor in its execution broke down the President's patience, and on the 5th of November, upon Lee's recrossing the Blue Ridge without a battle, he ordered the general to turn over the command to Burnside, as he had declared he would do if Lee's was allowed to regain the interior line. The order was presented and obeyed on the 7th, and McClellan left the army. The fallen general brooded morbidly over it all for twenty years, and then wrote his "Own Story," a most curious piece of self-exposure, in which he unconsciously showed that the illusions which had misguided him in his campaigns were still realities to him, and that he had made no use of the authentic facts which Confederate as well as National records had brought within his reach. He had forgotten much, but he had learned nothing.

CHAPTER XVIII

PERSONAL RELATIONS OF McCLELLAN, BURNSIDE, AND PORTER

Intimacy of McClellan and Burnside--Private letters in the official files--Burnside's mediation--His self-forgetful devotion--The movement to join Pope--Burnside forwards Porter's dispatches--His double refusal of the command--McClellan suspends the organization of wings--His relations to Porter--Lincoln's letter on the subject--Fault-finding with Burnside--Whose work?--Burnside's appearance and bearing in the field.

McClellan and Burnside had been cla.s.smates at West Point, and had been a.s.sociated in railway employment after they had left the army, in the years immediately before the war. The intimacy which began at the Academy had not only continued, but they had kept up the demonstrative boyish friends.h.i.+p which made their intercourse like that of brothers. They were "Mac" and "Burn" to each other when I knew them, and although Fitz-John Porter, Hanc.o.c.k, Parker, Reno, and Pleasonton had all been members of the same cla.s.s, the two seemed to be bosom friends in a way totally different from their intimacy with the others. Probably there was no one outside of his own family to whom McClellan spoke his secret thoughts in his letters, as he did to Burnside. The characteristic lack of system in business which was very noticeable in Burnside, made him negligent, apparently, in discriminating between official letters and private ones, and so it happens that there are a number in the official records which were never meant to reach the public. They show, however, as nothing else could, the relations which the two men sustained to each other, and reveal strong traits in the characters of both.

After Burnside had secured his first success in the Roanoke expedition, he had written to McClellan, then in the midst of his campaign of the peninsula, and this was McClellan's reply on the 21st of May, 1862:--[Footnote: Official Records, vol ix. p. 392.]

"MY DEAR BURN,--Your dispatch and kind letter received. I have instructed Seth [Williams] to reply to the official letter, and now acknowledge the kind private note. It always does me good, in the midst of my cares and perplexities, to see your wretched old scrawling. I have terrible troubles to contend with, but have met them with a good heart, like your good old self, and have thus far struggled through successfully.... I feel very proud of Yorktown: it and Mana.s.sas will be my brightest chaplets in history, for I know that I accomplished everything in both places by pure military skill. I am very proud, and very grateful to G.o.d that he allowed me to purchase such great success at so trifling a loss of life.... The crisis cannot long be deferred. I pray for G.o.d's blessing on our arms, and rely far more on his goodness than I do on my own poor intellect. I sometimes think, now, that I can almost realize that Mahomet was sincere. When I see the hand of G.o.d guarding one so weak as myself, I can almost think myself a chosen instrument to carry out his schemes. Would that a better man had been selected....

Good-bye and G.o.d bless you, Burn. With the sincere hope that we may soon shake hands, I am, as ever,

Your sincere friend, MCCLELLAN."

When McClellan reached the James River after the seven days'

battles, the first suggestion as to reinforcing him was that Burnside should bring to his aid the bulk of his little army in North Carolina. This was determined upon, and the Ninth Corps was carried by sea to Fortress Monroe. As soon as the movement was started, Burnside hastened in advance to Was.h.i.+ngton, and on returning to the fortress wrote McClellan as follows:--[Footnote: O. S., p. 472.]

"OLD POINT, July 15, 1862.

MY DEAR MAC,--I have just arrived from Was.h.i.+ngton, and have not time to get ready to go up this morning, but will to-morrow. I've much to say to you and am very anxious to see you.... The President has ordered me to remain here for the present, and when I asked him how long, he said five or six days. I don't know what it means; but I do know, my dear Mac, that you have lots of enemies. But you must keep cool; don't allow them to provoke you into a quarrel. You must come out all right; I'll tell you all to-morrow.

Your old friend, BURN."

He went up the river to Harrison's Landing and stayed a couple of days, consulting with McClellan as to the situation. He returned to Old Point Comfort on the 18th, and immediately telegraphed to the War Department for leave to go to Was.h.i.+ngton and present the results of his conference with McClellan. [Footnote: Official Records, vol.

xi. pt. iii. p. 326.] This was granted, and he again presented himself before the President and Secretary Stanton as the friend of McClellan. He urged the increase of McClellan's army to an extent which would make the general resume the aggressive with confidence.

Halleck visited McClellan at once after a.s.suming command as general-in-chief, but satisfied himself that the government could not furnish the thirty thousand additional troops which McClellan then demanded. [Footnote: _Id._, p. 337.] This led to the decision to bring the Army of the Potomac back by water, and to unite it with Pope's army on the Rappahannock.

On this visit to Was.h.i.+ngton the President and Secretary of War had offered to Burnside himself the command of the Army of the Potomac.

He had refused it, earnestly a.s.serting his faith that McClellan was much fitter for the command than he, and trying hard to restore confidence and a mutual good understanding between his friend and the government. He was discouraged at the result, and after he returned to his command wrote a letter, every line of which shows his sadness and his disinterested friends.h.i.+p, for he does not mention, much less take credit to himself for, the refusal to supersede his friend. [Footnote: O. S., 472.]

"FORT MONROE, Aug. 2, 1862.

MY DEAR MAC,--I'm laid up with a lame leg, and besides am much worried at the decision they have chosen to make in regard to your army. From the moment I reached Was.h.i.+ngton I feared it would be so, and I am of the opinion that your engineers [Footnote: This hints at General Barnard's unfavorable criticisms of McClellan's management, which led to a request by the latter to have another officer a.s.signed as chief engineer. See Halleck to McClellan, Aug. 7, 1862.

Official Records, vol. xi. pt. iii. p. 359.] had much to do with bringing about the determination. When the conclusion was arrived at, I was the only one who advocated your forward movement. I speak now as if a positive decision had been arrived at, which I do not know, and you of course do; my present orders indicate it. But you know what they are and all about it, so I will accept it as something that is ordered for the best. Let us continue to give our undivided support to the cause and all will be well. It looks dark sometimes, but a just G.o.d will order everything for the best. We can't expect to have it all as we wish. I'm off for my destination, and will write you a long letter from there. The troops are nearly all embarked. Good-bye. G.o.d bless you!