party which declared "the war a failure," and a majority of which opposed its vigorous prosecution. He himself was the most conspicuous failure of the war. He wrote more despatches, and General Grant fewer, than any other general of the war. The burden of those written by McClellan was a constant call for reënforcements, exaggerated and extravagant statements of the force of the enemy, and declarations of what he was going to do. Grant rarely called for reënforcements, never expressed apprehensions of the enemy, and when he spoke of himself, it was never to profess what he intended to do, but to state in the most simple and modest language, and in the fewest possible words, what had been done.

McClellan commanded the grand army of the Potomac for over fifteen months; he rarely attacked, and the successes won by his gallant and able subordinates, he never followed up, to secure decided results, although opportunities of the most favorable character attended him from Yorktown to Malvern Hill. He often withheld his army from attack; and after all his disasters, fortune, through the kindness of the President, offered him still an opportunity at Antietam, to redeem his failure. I have dwelt upon his campaigns, and lingered over the correspondence between him and the President, because in 1864 he was the opposing candidate for the presidency to Mr. Lincoln, and because I wished to exhibit truthfully, clearly and fully, the patience, the faithfulness and generosity with which he was supported by Mr. Lincoln. Mr. Lincoln never failed to do full justice to his political opponents. He sustained McClellan until it was demonstrated by repeated trials and failures, by repeated neglect on the part of the General to obey orders, that to retain him longer at the head of the army, was to endanger the cause of the Union. I venture the prediction that when the prejudices and partialities of the day shall have passed away, history will censure Mr. Lincoln for adhering to McClellan too long, rather than for a failure to support and stand by him. What were the motives which controlled McClellan-what considerations withheld him from obeying the President's urgent, repeated, ever continuing entreaties and orders to attack the enemy, it is difficult to define. His enemies have suggested every motive,

even secret treason, complicity with the rebels and personal cowardice. These in my judgment do him great injustice; still he was ever to a greater or less extent in political sympathy with those who declared it wrong to coerce the South, and who always reiterated that the seceded States could never be subjugated, and that the Union could not be restored by the means which Mr. Lincoln used. It is more charitable, probably more true, to say that he failed from a constitutional inability to meet the responsibility of a great crisis by prompt and decided action. He was always looking to the rear, and there was ever some insurmountable obstacle, or overwhelming numbers in his front. “With all his failings," said Mr. Lincoln, "McClellan was a pleasant and scholarly gentleman. He added: "He was an admirable engineer, but he had a special talent for a stationary engine."

On the 8th of November, General A. E. Burnside, by order of the President, assumed command of the army. He was a frank and manly soldier, of fine personal appearance, and everywhere respected as a Christian gentleman, and a patriot. He accepted the position with diffidence. On the 9th, he forwarded to Washington his plan of proposed operations. On the 12th, General Halleck and General Meigs visited his camp at Warrenton, and held a conference with him upon the movements to be made. General Burnside stated that his plan was to concentrate the army in the neighborhood of Warrenton, to make a movement across the Rappahannock as a feint, thus to lead the enemy to believe his object was Gordonsville, and then to make a rapid movement of the whole army to Fredericksburg. He desired to have provisions, forage, and pontoons sent to Falmouth, opposite Fredericksburgh to enable his army to cross the Rappahannock. An order was immediately sent by Halleck to General Woodbury at Washington, to call on the Quartermaster General for trans portation for pontoons to Aquia Creek. This order was received by Woodbury on the 13th of November. On General Halleck's return on the 14th, he had an interview with the President, in which Mr. Lincoln consented to Burnside's plans, and Halleck telegraphed to him to go ahead. There seems to have been some misunderstanding between Halleck

and Burnside, in regard to who was to see that the pontoons should reach Falmouth, opposite Fredericksburg in time.

Burnside started for Fredericksburg on the 16th, and reaching the river opposite that city on the 19th, found the pontoons were not there, and they did not arrive for sometime, so that he was not ready to cross before the 10th of December. By this delay, all the advantage of a surprise was lost, and the enemy had time to concentrate their forces upon the heights overlooking Fredericksburg, and to entrench. There was much discussion at the time, in regard to the question as to who was in fault for the failure of the pontoons to reach there in time. Upon this point, after full examination, these facts are proved: Generals Halleck and Meigs, as well as Burnside, knew of the movement, and of the importance of the pontoons being at Fredericksburg in time. Each of them it would seem ought to have known personally, that they were there. Neither should have depended upon the other. Each did depend, to some extent, upon the other, or on subordinates, and there was neglect.

When such vast results are dependent upon things being done promptly, no person connected with the transaction should trust to another. At the bar, no good lawyer, when about to enter upon a trial, involving the life of a human being, ever leaves the main witness to be examined by his clerk or assistant; he sees and knows personally what the important evidence is. So, a great Commander, a great General in the position of Burnside, Halleck and Meigs, and with their knowledge of the possible fate of a great expedition depending on the arrival of pontoons at a particular date, should not have depended upon any other, but each should have known personally, that the thing was done.

On the 11th and 12th of December, General Burnside's army crossed, and on the 13th, attacked the enemy; Hooker under Sumner, commanding the centre, and General Franklin the left. General Burnside's plan was, that Franklin should turn the enemy's right, while the heights of Fredericksburg should be carried by assault. General Meade, under Frankin, carried a portion of the enemy's works on the right, but not being supported, was compelled to fall back. Franklin was

blamed by Burnside; but he alleged ambiguous orders, and that he did not understand them. The main assault upon the heights of Fredericksburg, although most gallantly made, was repulsed with terrible slaughter. The works, and position of the enemy were too strong. It was a sad, and bloody day for the brave men, who had driven the enemy from the field at Antietam. It is difficult now to understand why the army should be led across a stream like the Rappahannock, and up to the assault of works, which the delay in the arrival of the pontoons had given Lee full time to construct. Why should not flank movement have been made; such as was made again and again by Sherman and Grant, and thus force the enemy to deliver battle upon more equal ground? The position of Lee was very strong; he occupied a fortified ridge, the approach to which was swept by artillery. After holding the position in the town until the 15th, in the evening the army was withdrawn to Falmouth; and the morning of the 16th, saw General Burnside's army on the North bank, with a loss in killed, wounded, and missing, of about 12,321!

The armies of Burnside and Lee, now confronted each other on the banks of the Rappahannock. In reviewing the campaign of 1862, in the East, the result was upon the whole, favorable to the rebels. With a smaller force than the Union army, they had kept the army of the Potomac, all the Autumn and Winter of 1861-2, in the defences of Washington. They had blockaded the Potomac. They had, by the blunders and want of vigor in McClellan, repulsed him from Richmond. They had sent Jackson, swooping like an eagle, through the Valley of the Shenandoah, driving Banks across the Potomac, and then escaping from Fremont and McDowell. They had frightened McClellan away from Richmond, without ever once defeating his combined army; but on the contrary, his troops often defeated the rebels; yet the fruits of victory McClellan would never seize, but always, after knocking down the enemy, would call for reënforcements, or run away from him.

Then came the spirited and hard fought campaign of Pope, when, had McClellan obeyed orders, the armies of Burnside, Pope, and McClellan, would have been consolidated on the

field of Manassas, and crushed the smaller force of Lee; but McClellan's disobedience, and Fitz John Porter's treachery, led to the retreat on Washington.* Then came the rebel march into Maryland, and the battle of Antietam, which ought to have been a crushing defeat of the rebels, but which was upon the whole, an undecisive victory. Lee's 12,000 prisoners captured by Jackson at Harper's Ferry, was an offset or equivalent for his losses at South Mountain and Antietam. Then followed the long delays of McClellan-his removalBurnside's campaign-closed by the slaughter of Fredericksburg. Such is the sad and gloomy picture of the war on the Atlantic in 1862.

Let us return to the West, where, as Pope said boastingly but truthfully, "the Union armies had been accustomed to see the backs of their enemy." This narrative is designed to exhibit the spirit of contending principles, and to follow the movements of armies, so far only as is incidental and necessary to exhibit the final triumph of freedom, and therefore, does not go fully into the details of the vast and varied movements west of the mountains.

The evacuation of Corinth by Beauregard, led to the separation of the armies of Grant and Buell. Grant advanced towards the South, to take and hold the military positions along the banks of the Mississippi, preparatory to the great work which he was destined to accomplish of reclaiming and opening the Mississippi. He was to lead the sons of the Northwest, who were "to hew their way to the sea."

Buell was to move towards Chattanooga, and attempt the too long delayed work of relieving the loyal people of East Tennessee. These people occupying the mountains, had few slaves, and were passionately devoted to the Union. Never were a people more cruelly persecuted, than the devoted Unionists of this mountain region. Conscripted into rebel armies, driven from their homes, their houses burned, their property destroyed, families outraged, they fled to the caves. of the mountains, and organizing small bands, maintained a brave but unequal conflict for the flag they loved.

"Had the army of the Potomac arrived a few days earlier, the rebel army would have been easily defeated." Halleck's Report, November, 1862.