*

war, and did not once offer to interrupt your narrative or correct your statements, but, on the contrary, repeatedly signified his assent by an inclination of his head.

"You then went on to say: We all know how the campaign opened, the splendid and complete preparation in all respects, the immense force, the long delays in embarking troops, the slow progress, the final disasters, defeat, and retreat to Harrison's Landing.' General Naglee then remarked: Had we received the coöperation of General McDowell's corps, as promised, we could undoubtedly have been entirely successful.' To which you replied: 'But, sir, the campaign, on that route and in that manner and with an army less in force than that to which it was subsequently increased by the addition of Franklin's and McCall's divisions of McDowell's corps, was undertaken by General McClellan with the most positive, distinct, and expressed determination on the part of the President that McDowell should remain with his corps for the protection of Washington; and I can tell you, General Naglee, a fact which you do not probably know, I saw in the hands. of the Secretary of War, and was present when it was received, a dispatch from General McClellan, in these words: "I acknowledge the arrival of General McCall's division, and am fully prepared for the enemy in any force he can bring against me." General Naglee expressed much surprise at this statement, and remarked: 'We were always told that General McDowell was to come down from Fredericksburg and coöperate with us in the capture of Richmond. The failure to do this was the chief cause of our want of success. Another cause that interfered seriously with our progress up the Peninsula was the unprecedented rains of the season-the oldest inhabitant of the region frequently remarked that such a

wet season had never been known there. As a consequence we found a country that in ordinary times was quite favorable for military movements converted into swamps and rendered impassable.' I then put to General Naglee the following question: Do you, with your experience of this summer, consider General McClellan equal to the task of properly handling so large an army and conducting so vast a campaign?' To which General Naglee replied: "While he may not be, I do not know his superior-I do not know that we have a general that can properly handle a hundred thousand men in the field.' To which I replied: 'But, sir, we have a government to protect a country to save, and because one general or another fails we cannot settle down into submission, under the theory that the work cannot be done, we must go on and try another until we find one that can succeed,' and then added: 'So much for the past, now what is to be Jone next?' To which General Naglee responded: We have to do what is always mortifying to a military man, admit that we have made a mistake in our line of approach to Richmond, get the army away from there as rapidly as possible and try another route, or add large reinforcements to it, if we move again in the same direction.' This terminated the interview, and General Naglee took leave of us. He spoke but little, and then only in reply to questions, but was a respectful and apparently attentive listener to your long and interesting narrative. This was certainly the substance, and almost, if not quite, the exact language of the interview between you and General Naglee. HENRY C. TOWNSEND."

For a time General Naglee delighted in repeating the facts recited in this memorandum, and in my interview of March 30th with Mr. Stanton, and in boasting of the tact

with which he and his associates had constrained the President to surrender his judgment on so vital a matter as the conduct of the Army of the Potomac in an active campaign, or to assume a responsibility so overwhelming as to cause him and his heroic Secretary of War to shrink from its assumption. But by Sept., 1864, the comments of the living or the shades of the tens of thousands of victims of his cabal who had perished in the swamps and hospitals of the malarious Peninsula had impressed him with the wisdom of silence; and in apparent forgetfulness of the interview we had had in Mr. Price's office, on the 27th of September he addressed me an open letter in which he assumed that I had obtained my information from Mr. Stanton, and said: "Now, my dear sir, this statement is simply false, and on the part of your friend, Mr. Edwin M. Stanton, maliciously false." I immediately responded in an open letter in which, after informing him that he was mistaken in supposing I had derived my information from Mr. Stanton, I named himself as my author, and endeavored to recall to his memory the buoyancy with which, in his conversation with Messrs. Moore and Hacker, both of whom were then living, he had stated every fact to which I had referred.' The conclusion of my reply was as follows:

"But, sir, you have also boasted to others of the success Messrs. Latham, Rice, and yourself had in constraining the President to retain General McClellan in command. You know General Gilman Marston, and, doubtless, remember the fact that you and he travelled together some time later from Fortress Monroe to Washington, he being at the time in command of a regiment of New Hampshire volunteers. Do you not remember how fully 1 Mr. Hacker is dead, but Mr. Moore is an active citizen of Philadelphia.

you detailed to him all the facts I have recited? I do not doubt that you then spoke the truth; the collateral facts prove that you did. But if error there be, it is you who are responsible. General Marston is a brave and truthful man. I know him well, and cheerfully refer any of our military friends to him for proof that you are yourself the author of the story you wantonly ascribe to the Secretary of War, and denounce as maliciously false."'

Immediately after Mr. Stanton entered upon the duties of Secretary of War he requested me to call at his room in the Department every morning before going to the House if I could without neglect of committee business or other duty. I regarded the request as a commandand presented myself daily. Observation soon convinced him that access to the Department was too easy and indis

1 Gen. Marston is still an active and a justly distinguished citizen of New Hampshire.

criminate for the times, and he issued an order restricting the hours in which calls might be made and regulating the manner of admission. On the morning on which this order was promulgated he handed me a card, the original of which I still have, and of which the cut on the preceding page is a facsimile.

Our relations were as confidential as our intercourse was unrestrained. On the morning of Sunday, the 30th of March, I went to the War Department, presented my card, and was admitted. In the ante-room I wrote on my card: "Will probably detain you but a few minutes, but it is important that I should see you." The messenger quickly returned, saying: “The Secretary will see you in a few minutes," and, leaning over my shoulder, whispered: "General McClellan is with him." The General soon took his departure, and I entered, saying: "Mr. Stanton, I may have brought you a 'mare's nest'; if so, as you are involved in the story, you can soon terminate our interview by letting me know that I have been deceived." He replied: "Well, put me to the test"; and I proceeded to make the following statement:

General Henry M. Naglee, who commands a brigade in Hooker's Division, is reported by gentlemen well known to me and in whose veracity I have perfect confidence as having left the depot at Broad and Prime streets, Philadelphia, on the sleeping car for Washington at eleven o'clock last evening. My informants say he entered the car some time before that fixed for the departure of the train, and recognizing old friends in Messrs. George H. Moore and George W. Hacker, seemed anxious to impress them with a sense of his military and political importance and proceeded, without suggestion that the communication was of a confidential character, to tell