CHAPTER III

THE THIRD AND CLOSING ACT OF THE MCCLELLAN DRAMA

As it seems probable that Mr. Lincoln did not conclusively determine against the plan of McClellan for renewing the advance upon Richmond by way of Petersburg, until after General Halleck had thus decided, so it is certain that afterward he allowed to Halleck a control almost wholly free from interference on his own part. Did he, perchance, feel that a lesson had been taught him, and did he think that those critics had not been wholly wrong who had said that he had intermeddled ignorantly and hurtfully in military matters? Be this as it might, it was in accordance with the national character to turn the back sharply upon failure and disappointment, and to make a wholly fresh start; and it was in accordance with Lincoln's character to fall in with the popular feeling. Yet if a fresh start was intrinsically advisable, or if it was made necessary by circumstances, it was made in unfortunate company. One does not think without chagrin that Grant, Sherman, Sheridan lurked undiscovered among the officers at the West, while Halleck and Pope were pulled forth to the light and set in the high places. Halleck was hopelessly incompetent, and Pope was fit only for subordinate command; and by any valuation which could reasonably be put upon McClellan, it was absurd to turn him out in order to bring either of these men in. But it was the experimental period. No man's qualities could be known except by testing them; and these two men came before Lincoln with records sufficiently good to entitle them to trial. The successes at the West had naturally produced good opinions of the officers who had achieved them, and among these officers John Pope had been as conspicuous as any other. For this reason he was now, towards the close of June, 1862, selected to command the "Army of Virginia," formed by uniting the corps of Fremont, McDowell, and Banks.[28] Fremont resigned, in a pet at having an officer who was his junior in the service placed over his head; but he was no loss, since his impetuous temperament did not fit him for the duties of a corps commander. He was succeeded by General Sigel. The fusing of these independent commands, whose separate existence had been a wasteful and jeopardizing error, was an excellent measure.

General Pope remained in Washington a few weeks, in constant consultation with the administration. How he impressed Lincoln one would gladly know, but cannot. He had unlimited self-confidence, and he gave it to be understood at once that he was a fighting man; but it showed an astounding lack of tact upon his part that, in notifying the troops of this, his distinguishing characteristic, he also intimated that it would behoove them to turn over a new leaf now that he had come all the way from the West in order to teach Eastern men how to win victories! The manifesto which he issued has become famous by its folly; it was arrogant, bombastic, little short of insulting to the soldiers of his command, and laid down principles contrary to the established rules of war. Yet it had good qualities, too; for it was designed to be stimulating; it certainly meant fighting; and fortunately, though Pope was not a great general, he was by no means devoid of military knowledge and instincts, and he would not really have committed quite such blunders as he marked out for himself in his rhetorical enthusiasm. On the whole, however, the manifesto did harm; neither officers nor soldiers were inclined to receive kindly a man who came presumably on trial with the purpose of replacing McClellan, whom they loved with deep loyalty; therefore they ridiculed part of his address and took offense at the rest of it. Mr. Lincoln could hardly have been encouraged; but he gave no sign.

On July 29 Pope left Washington and joined his army, near Culpepper. He had not quite 45,000 men, and was watched by Jackson, who lay near Gordonsville with a scant half of that number. On August 9 Banks was pushed forward to Cedar Mountain, where he encountered Jackson and attacked him. In "a hard-fought battle, fierce, obstinate, sanguinary," the Federals were worsted; and such consolation as the people got from the gallantry of the troops was more than offset by the fact, which became obvious so soon as the whole story was known, that our generals ought to have avoided the engagement and were outgeneraled both in the bringing it on and in the conducting it.

Greatly as Jackson was outnumbered by Pope, he could hope for no reinforcements from Lee so long as McClellan, at Harrison's Landing, threatened Richmond. But when gratifying indications showed the purpose to withdraw the Northern army from the Peninsula the Southern general ventured, August 13, to dispatch General Longstreet northward with a strong force. Soon afterward he himself followed and took command. Then for two or three days ensued a sharp matching of wits betwixt the two generals. By one of those audacious plans which Lee could dare to make when he had such a lieutenant as Jackson to carry it out, Jackson was sent upon a rapid march by the northward, around the army of Pope, to cut its communications. He did it brilliantly; but in doing it he necessarily offered to Pope such an opportunity for fighting the Southern forces in detail as is rarely given by a good general to an adversary whom he fears. Pope would fain have availed himself of the chance, and in the effort to do so he hurried his troops hither and thither, mingled wise moves with foolish ones, confused his subordinates, fatigued his men, and finally accomplished nothing. Jackson retired safely from his dangerous position, rejoined the rest of the Southern army, and then the united force had as its immediate purpose to fight Pope before he could receive reinforcements from McClellan's army, now rapidly coming forward by way of Washington. _E converso_, Pope's course should have been to retire a day's march across Bull Run and await the additional troops who could at once join him there. Unfortunately, however, he still felt the sting of the ridicule which his ill-starred manifesto had called forth, and was further irritated by the unsatisfactory record of the past few days, and therefore was in no temper to fall back. So he did not, but stayed and fought what is known as the second battle of Bull Run. In the conflict his worn-out men showed such constancy that the slaughter on both sides was great. Again, however, the bravery of the rank and file was the only feature which the country could contemplate without indignation. The army was beaten; and retired during the evening of August 30 to a safe position at Centreville, whither it should have been taken without loss two days earlier.[29] Thus was fulfilled, with only a trifling inaccuracy in point of time, the prediction made by McClellan on August 10, that "Pope will be badly thrashed within ten days."[30]

In all this manoeuvring and fighting the commanding general had shown some capacity, but very much less than was indispensable in a commander who had to meet the generals of the South. Forthwith, also, there broke out a series of demoralizing quarrels among the principal officers as to what orders had been given and received, and whether or not they had been understood or misunderstood, obeyed or disobeyed. Also the enemies of General McClellan tried to lay upon him the whole responsibility for the disaster, on the ground that he had been dilatory, first, in moving his army from Harrison's Landing, and afterward, in sending his troops forward to join Pope; whereas, they said, if he had acted promptly, the Northern army would have been too strong to have been defeated, regardless of any incompetence in the handling of it. Concerning the former charge, it may be said that dispatches had flown to and fro between Halleck and McClellan like bullets between implacable duelists; Halleck ordered the army to be transported, and McClellan retorted that he was given no transports; it is a dispute which cannot be discussed here. Concerning the other charge, it was also true that the same two generals had been for some days exchanging telegrams, but had been entirely unable to understand each other. Whose fault it was cannot easily be determined. The English language was giving our generals almost as much trouble as were the Southerners at this time; so that in a few short weeks material for endless discussion was furnished by the orders, telegrams, and replies which were bandied between Pope and Porter, McClellan and Halleck. A large part of the history of the period consists of the critical analysis and construing of these documents. What did each in fact mean? What did the writer intend it to mean? What did the recipient understand it to 'mean? Did the writer make his meaning sufficiently clear? Was the recipient justified in his interpretation? Historians have discussed these problems as theologians have discussed puzzling texts of the New Testament, with not less acerbity and with no more conclusive results. Unquestionably the capacity to write two or three dozen consecutive words so as to constitute a plain, straightforward sentence would have been for the moment a valuable adjunct to military learning.

The news of the defeat brought dismay, but not quite a panic, to the authorities in Washington. In fact, there was no immediate danger for the capital. The army from the Peninsula was by this time distributed at various points in the immediate neighborhood; and a force could be promptly brought together which would so outnumber the Confederate army as to be invincible. Yet the situation demanded immediate and vigorous

## action. Some hand must seize the helm at once, and Pope's hand would not

do; so much at least was entirely certain. He had been given his own way, without interference on the part of President or secretary, and he had been beaten; he was discredited before the country and the army; nothing useful could now be done with him. Halleck was utterly demoralized, and was actually reduced to telegraphing to McClellan: "I beg of you to assist me, in this crisis, with your ability and experience." It was the moment for a master to take control, and the President met the occasion. There was only one thing to be done, and circumstances were such that not only must that thing be done by him, but also it must be done by him in direct opposition to the strenuous insistence of all his official and most of his self-constituted advisers. It was necessary to reinstate McClellan.

It was a little humiliating to be driven to this step. McClellan had lately been kept at Alexandria with no duty save daily to disintegrate his own army by sending off to Washington and to the camp of his own probable successor division after division of the troops whom he had so long commanded. Greatly mortified, he had begged at least to be "permitted to go to the scene of battle." But he was ignored, as if he were no longer of any consequence whatsoever. In plain truth it was made perfectly obvious to him and to all the world that if General Pope could win a victory the administration had done with General McClellan. Mr. Lincoln described the process as a "snubbing." Naturally those who were known to be the chief promoters of this "snubbing," and to have been highly gratified by it, now looked ruefully on the evident necessity of suddenly cutting it short, and requesting the snubbed individual to assume the role of their rescuer. McClellan's more prominent enemies could not and would not agree to this. Three members of the cabinet even went so far as formally to put in writing their protest against restoring him to the command of any army at all; while Stanton actually tried to frighten the President by a petty threat of personal consequences. But this was foolish. The crisis was of the kind which induced Mr. Lincoln to exercise power, decisively. On this occasion his impersonal, unimpassioned temperament left his judgment free to work with evenness and clearness amid the whirl of momentous events and the clash of angry tongues. No one could say that he had been a partisan either for or against McClellan, and his wise reticence in the past gave him in the present the privilege of untrammeled action. So he settled the matter at once by ordering that McClellan should have command within the defenses of Washington.

By this act the President gave extreme offense to the numerous and strenuous band with whom hatred of the Democratic general had become a sort of religion; and upon this occasion even Messrs. Nicolay and Hay seem more inclined to apologize for their idol than to defend him. In point of fact, nothing can be more misplaced than either apology or defense, except criticism. Mr. Lincoln could have done no wiser thing. He was simply setting in charge of the immediate business the man who could do that especial business best. It was not a question of a battle or a campaign, neither of which was for the moment imminent; but it was a question of reorganizing masses of disorganized troops and getting them into shape for battles and campaigns in the future. Only the intensity of hatred could make any man blind to McClellan's capacity for such work; and what he might be for other work was a matter of no consequence just now. Lincoln simply applied to the instant need the most effective help, without looking far afield to study remote consequences. Two remarks, said to have been made by him at this time, indicate his accurate appreciation of the occasion and the man: "There is no one in the army who can man these fortifications and lick these troops of ours into shape half so well as he can." "We must use the tools we have; if he cannot fight himself, he excels in making others ready to fight."

On September 1 Halleck verbally instructed McClellan to take command of the defenses of Washington, defining this to mean strictly "the works and their garrisons." McClellan says that later on the same day he had an interview with the President, in which the President said that he had "always been a friend" of the general, and asked as a favor that the general would request his personal friends among the principal officers of the army to give to General Pope a more sincere and hearty support than they were supposed to be actually rendering.[31] On the morning of September 2, McClellan says, "The President informed me that Colonel Keelton had returned from the front; that our affairs were in a bad condition; that the army was in full retreat upon the defenses of Washington, the roads filled with stragglers, etc. He instructed me to take steps at once to stop and collect the stragglers; place the works in a proper state of defense, and go out to meet and take command of the army, when it approached the vicinity of the works, then to place the troops in the best position,--committing everything to my hands." By this evidence, Mr. Lincoln intrusted the fate of the country and with it his own reputation absolutely to the keeping of McClellan.

McClellan was in his element in fusing into unity the disjointed fragments of armies which lay about in Virginia like scattered ruins. His bitterest tractors have never denied him the gift of organization, and admit that he did excellent service just now for a few days. But circumstances soon extended his field of action, and gave detraction fresh opportunities. General Lee, in a bold and enterprising mood, perhaps attributable to the encouraging inefficiency of his Northern opponents, moved up the banks of the Potomac and threatened an irruption into Maryland and even Pennsylvania. It was absolutely necessary to watch and, at the right moment, to fight him. For this purpose McClellan was ordered to move along the north bank of the river, but under strict injunctions at first to go slowly and cautiously and not to uncover Washington. For General Halleck had not fully recovered his nerve, and was still much disquieted, especially concerning the capital. Thus the armies drew slowly near each other, McClellan creeping forward, as he had been bidden, while Lee, with his usual energy, seemed able to do with a thousand men more than any Northern general could do with thrice as many, and ran with exasperating impunity those audacious risks which, where they cannot be attributed to ignorance on the part of a commander, indicate contempt for his opponent. This feeling, if he had it, must have received agreeable corroboration from the clumsy way in which the Federals just at this time lost Harper's Ferry, with General Miles's garrison. The Southern troops, who had been detailed against it, rapidly rejoined General Lee's army; and again the people saw that the South had outmarched and outgeneraled the North.

With all his troops together, Lee was now ready to fight at the convenience or the pleasure of McClellan, who seemed chivalrously to have deferred his attack until his opponent should be prepared for it! The armies were in presence of each other near where the Antietam empties into the Potomac, and here, September 17, the bloody conflict took place.

The battle of Antietam has usually been called a Northern victory. Both the right and the left wings of the Northern army succeeded in seizing advanced positions and in holding them at the end of the fight; and Lee retreated to the southward, though it is true that before doing so he lingered a day and gave to his enemy a chance, which was not used, to renew the battle. His position was obviously untenable in the face of an outnumbering host. But though upon the strength of these facts a victory could be claimed with logical propriety, yet the President and the country were, and had a right to be, indignant at the very unsatisfactory proportion of the result to the means. Shortly before the battle McClellan's troops, upon the return to them of the commander whom they idolized, had given him a soul-stirring reception, proving the spirit and confidence with which they would fight under his orders; and they went into the fight in the best possible temper and condition. On the day of the battle the Northern troops outnumbered the Southerners by nearly two to one; in fact, the Southern generals, in their reports, insisted that they had been simply overwhelmed by enormous odds against which it was a marvel of gallantry for their men to stand at all. The plain truth was that in the first place, by backwardness in bringing on the battle, McClellan had left Lee to effect a concentration of forces which ought never to have been permitted. Next, the battle itself had not been especially well handled, though perhaps this was due rather to the lack of his personal attention during its progress than to errors in his plan. Finally, his failure, with so large an army, of which a part at least was entirely fresh, to pursue and perhaps even to destroy the reduced and worn-out Confederate force seemed inexplicable and was inexcusable.

The South could never be conquered in this way. It had happened, on September 12, that President Lincoln heard news apparently indicating the withdrawal of Lee across the Potomac. He had at once sent it forward to McClellan, adding: "Do not let him get off without being hurt." Three days later, he telegraphed: "Destroy the rebel army if possible." But McClellan had been too self-restrained in his obedience. He had, indeed, hurt Lee, but he had been very careful not to hurt him too much; and as for destroying the rebel army, he seemed unwilling to enter so lightly on so stupendous an enterprise. The administration and the country expected, and perfectly fairly expected, to see a hot pursuit of General Lee. They were disappointed; they saw no such thing, but only saw McClellan holding his army as quiescent as if there was nothing more to be done, and declaring that it was in no condition to move!

It was intolerably provoking, unintelligible, and ridiculous that a ragged, ill-shod, overworked, under-fed, and beaten body of Southerners should be able to retreat faster than a great, fresh, well-fed, well-equipped, and victorious body of Northerners could follow. Jackson said that the Northern armies were, kept in too good condition; and declared that he could whip any army which marched with herds of cattle behind it. But the North preferred, and justly, to attribute the inefficiency of their troops to the unfortunate temperament of the commander. Mr. Lincoln looked at the unsatisfactory spectacle and held his hand as long as he could, dreading perhaps again to seem too forward in assuming control of military affairs. Patience, however, could not endure forever, nor common sense be always subservient to technical science. Accordingly, on October 6, he ordered McClellan to cross the Potomac, and either to "give battle to the enemy, or to drive him south." McClellan paid no attention to the order. Four days later the Confederate general, Stuart, with 2000 cavalry and a battery, crossed into Maryland and made a tour around the Northern army, with the same insolent success which had attended his like enterprise on the Peninsula. On October 13 the President wrote to McClellan a letter, so admirable both in temper and in the soundness of its suggestions that it should be given entire:--

"MY DEAR SIR,--You remember my speaking to you of what I called your over-cautiousness. Are you not over-cautious when you assume that you cannot do what the enemy is constantly doing? Should you not claim to be at least his equal in prowess, and act upon the claim?

"As I understand, you telegraphed General Halleck that you cannot subsist your army at Winchester, unless the railroad from Harper's Ferry to that point be put in working order. But the enemy does now subsist his army at Winchester at a distance nearly twice as great from railroad transportation as you would have to do without the railroad last named. He now wagons from Culpepper Court House, which is just about twice as far as you would have to do from Harper's Ferry. He is certainly not more than half as well provided with wagons as you are. I certainly should be pleased for you to have the advantage of the railroad from Harper's Ferry to Winchester; but it wastes all the remainder of autumn to give it to you, and, in fact, ignores the question of _time_, which cannot and must not be ignored.

"Again, one of the standard maxims of war, as you know, is 'to operate upon the enemy's communications as much as possible without exposing your own.' You seem to act as if this applies _against_ you, but cannot apply in your _favor_. Change positions with the enemy, and think you not he would break your communication with Richmond within the next twenty-four hours? You dread his going into Pennsylvania. But if he does so in full force, he gives up his communication to you absolutely, and you have nothing to do but to follow and ruin him; if he does so with less than full force, fall upon and beat what is left behind, all the easier.

"Exclusive of the water line, you are now nearer Richmond than the enemy is, by the route that you _can_, and he _must_ take. Why can you not reach there before him, unless you admit that he is more than your equal on a march? His route is the arc of a circle, while yours is the chord. The roads are as good on yours as on his.

"You know I desired, but did not order you, to cross the Potomac below, instead of above, the Shenandoah and Blue Ridge. The idea was that this would at once menace the enemy's communications, which I would seize, if he would permit. If he should move northward, I would follow him closely, holding his communications. If he should prevent our seizing his communications, and move towards Richmond, I would press closely to him, fight him if a favorable opportunity should present, and at least try to beat him to Richmond on the inside track. I say, try; if we never try, we shall never succeed. If he makes a stand at Winchester, moving neither north nor south, I would fight him there, on the idea that if we cannot beat him when he bears the wastage of coming to us, we never can when we bear the wastage of going to him. This proposition is a simple truth, and is too important to be lost sight of for a moment. In coming to us, he tenders us an advantage which we should not waive. We should not so operate as to merely drive him away. As we must beat him somewhere, or fail finally, we can do it, if at all, easier near to us than far away. If we cannot beat the enemy where he now is, we never can, he again being within the intrenchments of Richmond.

"Recurring to the idea of going to Richmond on the inside track, the facility for supplying from the side away from the enemy is remarkable, as it were by the different spokes of a wheel extending from the hub towards the rim; and this, whether you moved directly by the chord or on the inside arc, hugging the Blue Ridge more closely. 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 Washington. The same, only the lines lengthened a little, if you press closer to the Blue Ridge part of the way. The Gaps through the Blue Ridge, I understand to be about the following distances from Harper's Ferry, to wit: Vestala, five miles; Gregory's, thirteen; Snicker's, eighteen; Ashby's, twenty-eight; Manassas, thirty-eight; Chester, forty-five; and Thornton's, fifty-three. I should think it preferable to take the route nearest the enemy, disabling him to make an important move without your knowledge, and compelling him to keep his forces together for dread of you. The Gaps would enable you to attack if you should wish. For a great part of the way you would be practically between the enemy and both Washington and Richmond, enabling us to spare you the greatest number of troops from here. When, at length, running for Richmond ahead of him enables him to move this way, if he does so, turn and attack him in rear. But I think he should be engaged long before such point is reached. It is all easy if our troops march as well as the enemy, and it is unmanly to say they cannot do it. This letter is in no sense an order."

A general who failed to respond to such a spur as this was not the man for offensive warfare; and McClellan did not respond. Movement was as odious to him now as it ever had been, and by talking about shoes and overcoats, and by other dilatory pleas, he extended his delay until the close of the month. It was actually the second day of November before his army crossed the Potomac. Another winter of inaction seemed about to begin. It was simply unendurable. Though it was true that he had reorganized the army with splendid energy and skill, and had shown to the Northern soldiers in Virginia the strange and cheerful spectacle of the backs of General Lee's soldiers, yet it became a settled fact that he must give place to some new man. He and Pope were to be succeeded by a third experiment. Therefore, on November 5, 1862, the President ordered General McClellan to turn over the command of the army to General Burnside; and on November 7 this was done.

This action, taken just at this time, called forth a much more severe criticism than would have attended it if the removal had been made simultaneously with the withdrawal from the Peninsula. By what motive was Mr. Lincoln influenced? Not very often is the most eager search rewarded by the sure discovery of his opinions about persons. From what we know that he did, we try to infer why he did it, and we gropingly endeavor to apportion the several measures of influence between those motives which we choose to put by our conjecture into his mind; and after our toilful scrutiny is over we remain painfully conscious of the greatness of the chance that we have scarcely even approached the truth. Neither diary nor letters guide us; naught save reports of occasional pithy, pointed, pregnant remarks, evidence the most dubious, liable to be colored by the medium of the predilections of the hearer, and to be reshaped and misshaped by time, and by attrition in passing through many mouths. The President was often in a chatting mood, and then seemed not remote from his companion. Yet while this was the visible manifestation on the surface, he was the most reticent of men as to grave questions, and no confidant often heard his inmost thoughts. Especially it would be difficult to name an instance in which he told one man what he thought of another; a trifling criticism concerning some single trait was the utmost that he ever allowed to escape him; a full and careful estimate, never.

Such reflections come with peculiar force at this period in his career. What would not one give for his estimate of McClellan! It would be worth the whole great collection of characters sketched by innumerable friends and enemies for that much-discussed general. While others think that they know accurately the measure of McClellan's real value and usefulness, Lincoln really knew these things; but he never told his knowledge. We only see that he sustained McClellan for a long while in the face of vehement aspersions; yet that he never fully subjected his own convictions to the educational lectures of the general, and that he seemed at last willing to see him laid aside; then immediately in a crisis restored him to authority in spite of all opposition; and shortly afterward, as if utterly weary of him, definitively displaced him. Still, all these facts do not show what Lincoln thought of McClellan. Many motives besides his opinion of the man may have influenced him. The pressure of political opinion and of public feeling was very great, and might have turned him far aside from the course he would have pursued if it could have been neglected. Also other considerations have been suggested as likely to have weighed with him,--that McClellan could do with the army what no other man could do, because of the intense devotion of both officers and men to him; and that an indignity offered to McClellan might swell the dissatisfaction of the Northern Democracy to a point at which it would seriously embarrass the administration. These things may have counteracted, or may have corroborated, Mr. Lincoln's views concerning the man himself. He was an extraordinary judge of men in their relationship to affairs; moreover, of all the men of note of that time he alone was wholly dispassionate and non-partisan. Opinions tinctured with prejudices are countless; it is disappointing that the one opinion that was free from prejudice is unknown.[32]

FOOTNOTES:

[28] The consolidation, and the assignment of Pope to the command, bore date June 26, 1862.

[29] This campaign of General Pope has been the topic of very bitter controversy and crimination. In my brief account I have eschewed the view of Messrs. Nicolay and Hay, who seem to me if I may say it, to have written with the single-minded purpose of throwing everybody's blunders into the scale against McClellan, and I have adopted the view of Mr. John C. Ropes in his volume on _The Army under Pope_, in the Campaigns of the Civil War Series. In his writing it is impossible to detect personal prejudice, for or against any one; and his account is so clear and convincing that it must be accepted, whether one likes his conclusions or not.

[30] _Own Story_, 466.

[31] Pope retained for a few days command of the army in camp outside the defenses.

[32] McClure says: "I saw Lincoln many times during the campaign of 1864, when McClellan was his competitor for the presidency. I never heard him speak of McClellan in any other than terms of the highest personal respect and kindness." _Lincoln and Men of War-Times_, 207.

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