double quick for the railway station. In one hour and three-quarters their train pulled out for Nashville, Tenn.

We now were positive that the entire transfer would be complete within the seven days promised by McCallum. Secretary Stanton, for the first time since the movement began, had gone to his home. General Eckert and myself talked the matter over and decided to give him our latest information and walked together to his house for that purpose. It was 4 o'clock when we rang the bell. Although he had been asleep but a short time, the news was so gratifying that he arose and returned with us to the Department, where report followed report of arriving trains.

The expedition having safely arrived, Stanton, accompanied by General Anson Stager, left on a special train for Louisville by way of Indianapolis to create the Department of the Mississippi and place Grant in command of it. Having done this, he telegraphed to Assistant-Secretary P. H. Watson from Louisville:

General Grant reached Nashville safely yesterday.

Generals Garfield and Steedman are here on their way home. Their representation of the incidents of the battle of Chickamauga more than confirms the worst that has reached us from other sources as to the conduct of the commanding general* [Rosecrans] and the great credit that is due to General Thomas.

I expect to leave for home to-morrow, having completed all arrangements in regard to railroad management and transportation. make as quick time† returning as I did coming here.

I will not

Thus the Army of the Cumberland was saved; the rout at Chickamauga turned to victory; the Confederate power of the West permanently broken and Sherman's destructive march to the sea made possible!

*It would be unjust to infer from Stanton's blunt telegram that Rosecrans was cowardly or recalcitrant, for he was not. He was a good fighter, "but," says Colonel Robert F. Hunter of Washington, D. C., a graduate of West Point and one of Rosecrans' close personal friends, "Rosey occasionally tippled and of course sometimes at an exceedingly inopportune moment. That, unfortunately, was the case at Chickamauga."

†The run from Washington to Indianapolis was made at the highest attainable rate of speed. In Ohio, when the train held up for water and fuel, Stanton alighted and asked the engineer how he was getting on. The reply was: "Great God! You'll get through alive if I do."

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

NEWSPAPER HOSTILITY-THE WAR DIARY.

Stanton was not popular with newspapers. He never sought their favor and, as secretary, held them strictly within what he believed to be the limits of national safety. In his order of February 26, 1862, he decreed:

All newspapers publishing military news, however obtained, not authorized by official authority, will be excluded thereafter from receiving information by telegraph and from transmitting their publications by railroad.

Although this was modified next day by an order "permitting newspapers to publish past facts, leaving out all details of military forces, and all statements from which the number, position, and strength of the military forces of the United States can be inferred," the press, as a whole, was greatly exasperated. However, the summary imprisonment in Fort Henry of Dr. Malcolm Ives of the New York Herald, held reporters, editors, and publishers considerably in check, though much against their will. Ives forced his way into the War Department on the evening of February 8, 1862, and threatened the administration with chastisement by the Herald (which threat that paper fully repudiated) if he should not be given free access to whatever information might be on file. The order of arrest was published as a general warning to correspondents and reporters and concluded thus:

Newspapers are valuable organs of public intelligence and instruction, and every proper facility will be afforded to all loyal persons to procure, on equal terms, information of such public facts as may be properly made known in times of rebellion. But no matter how useful or powerful the press may be, like everything else, it is subordinate to national safety. The fate of an army or the destiny of a nation may be imperiled by a spy in the garb of a newspaper agent. The nation is in conflict with treason and rebellion, and may be threatened by foreign foes. The lives and fortunes of 20,000,000 of people, and the peace and happiness of their posterity in the loyal States, the fate of public liberty and of republican government, are

staked on the instant issue. The duties of the President, his secretary, of every officer of the Government, and especially in the War Department and military service, are at this moment urgent and solemn duties-the most urgent and solemn that ever fell upon man.

No news-gatherer or any other person for sordid or treasonable purposes can be suffered to intrude upon them at such a time to procure news by threats or spy out official acts which the safety of the nation requires shall not be disclosed. For these reasons the aforesaid Ives has been arrested and imprisoned, and all other persons so offending will be dealt with in like manner.

Nevertheless he was unable to prevent the publication of false reports of victory or defeat, exaggerated statements of losses in battle, unfounded "rumors" of prominent commanders killed, and sensational plans of army movements. But the faults complained of did not lie wholly with the newspapers. General Herman Haupt says:

Public opinion, in and out of the army, was manufactured by the pen. Most commanders did not dare to be on terms of familiarity with the large and enterprising corps of newspaper correspondents, and General McDowell went so far as to station a guard about the telegraph instruments so the reporters could not intercept telegrams. But McClellan made a point of being friendly and condescending to them and frequently invited them to dine with him. Thus, while he was falsely puffed and written up as the "Little Napoleon," the "Savior of the Country" and all that, the other commanders, Secretary Stanton especially, were written down, maligned, and misrepresented on every possible occasion.

William H. Russell of the London Times, who was expelled by Stanton from McClellan's command for sending out army secrets and false news, was one of McClellan's particular friends, and received his "news" personally from the "Little Napoleon."

Other commanders were friendly with reporters. On April 30, 1863, Stanton wrote to General Hooker at Falmouth, Virginia:

You must protect yourself by rigid means against the newspaper reporters in your army, and the Department will support any measure you may take. Unless some one shall be punished you may suffer great injury. Exaggerated reports have been sent by mail to the Times and Herald, but nothing has been allowed to go by telegraph.

*

*

Again on May 2 he telegraphed to Hooker:

We cannot control intelligence in relation to army movements while your own generals are writing letters giving details. A letter from Gen

eral Van Alen to a person not connected with the War Department fully describes your position and entrenchments at Chancellorsville. Can't you give his sword something to do so he will have less time for the pen?

Stanton telegraphed to General Meade that reporters were securing news from his headquarters through his chief-of-staff, who should be suppressed or removed; and when Meade wrote a letter to Senator Reverdy Johnson concerning the battle of Gettysburg, he was called to account with severity, Stanton asking him for his authority for such a letter and reminding him of prior suggestions that all communications concerning the war must be sent through the War Department only.

In December, 1864, Grant wrote to him concerning cooperation of the navy in an attempt to reduce Wilmington, North Carolina, saying he himself would not correspond with that Department. Stanton answered: "You can count on no secrecy in the navy. Newspaper reporters have the run of that Department."

Grant cooperated effectively in preventing military secrets from reaching the newspapers, all telegraphic communication with army headquarters except on Government business being absolutely prohibited by Stanton's order. In November, 1864, Grant asked Stanton to exclude certain newspapers containing army secrets from Southern circulation, calling attention to a publication in the New York Times of Sherman's plans. On November 11, 1864, at 10 P. M., Stanton replied:

I have seen with indignation the newspaper articles referred to and others of like kind, but they come from Sherman's army and generally from his own officers, and there is reason to believe he has not been very guarded in his own talk. I saw to-day, in a paymaster's letter to another officer, his plans as stated by himself. Yesterday I received full details given by a member of his staff to a friend in Washington. Matters not spoken of aloud in the Department are bruited by officers from Sherman's army in every Western printing-office and street. If he cannot keep from revealing his plans to his paymaster, and his staff send them broadcast over the land, I cannot prevent their publication.

Papers like the Chicago Times, New York News, and many others of lesser calibre* were suppressed, sometimes for long

*John D. Kees of the Ohio Watchman, who was immured in the Old Capitol Prison on Stanton's order for publishing articles against enlistment, sued, on being released, for $30,000 damages for false imprisonment, but was defeated, as was every other editor of this class who resisted.