The Edinburg, which left Cork on the evening of February 4th, brings the only comment onf the transatlantic press on Zollicoffer’s defeat which has yet reached us:
The Cork Advertiser of the 4th has some remarks on the conduct of the rebels not complimentary to them.
“There has been a battle in Kentucky, and such a battle! Seventy-five killed on the side of the Federals, and two hundred and something on the side of the Confederates. Yet the latter fled, leaving their cannon in the hands of the former! They might as well, for they didn’t know how to use them. How often have we said that they had better give up, for that of fighting they had no more notion than if a musket had never been in their hands. This is thoroughly disgraceful, and we presume it occurred under one of their best generals, Sydney Johnston. Nothing is said on the subject, but it seems not improbable, as he was in Kentucky, Gen. Buell surrounded him with a superior force.
“If it be, and if McClellan can route the other Johnston (Joseph) and Beauregard in the same fashion on the Potomac, set them flying in the same ‘confusion,’ we don’t see what business the South will have prolonging the struggle. Her soldiers will be disheartened, in her Generals there will be no confidence, and in her citizens, deprived of their agriculture and commerce, there will be no ability to supply the ‘sinews’ which have been so shamefully misused. Months ago we said that a score of French or English officers would have been invaluable on either side, and every additional instance of native incompetence proves it.”
– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, March 1, 1862, p. 2
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