Saturday, January 25, 2014

Brigadier General George G. Meade to Margaretta Sergeant Meade, September 27, 1862

CAMP NEAR SHARPSBURG, September 27,1862.

I have received your letters of the 20th and 23d. In the latter you had received my pencil note of the 18th, and were aware of my success and promotion, which I must say you take in the most humble manner and pretty much as if it were no more than you expected. In regard to my newspaper fame, I agree with you, that when wounded I was over-advertised; but this time not a single paper yet has announced that on the battle-field I was selected to command a corps d'armee, in place of Hooker, which fact, after all, is the greatest feather in my cap. Hooker has received his reward, having been appointed a brigadier general in the regular army, in place of Mansfield, killed in battle.

I don't think I ever told you about Master John1 at Bull Run, on the first day's fighting. He came on a part of the field, with my spare horse and some cigars for me. On arriving where the balls were flying, John's courage oozed out, and he declined proceeding any farther, but gave the cigars to an orderly to bring to me in the advance. On his return, the orderly could not find him, and I never saw anything of John or the horse till we got to Arlington Heights, when he presented himself and said that he heard I was cut off and a prisoner, and he had gone to Alexandria to save the horse for the family. I charged him with, and he frankly acknowledged his cowardice. I sent for a file of men, intending to have him drummed out of camp as a coward; but he begged so piteously I let him off, and since then he has behaved pretty well. Still, no reliance is to be placed on him at the very moment when his services are most needed, and I intend to let him go as soon as I can get some one to take his place.
__________

1 General Meade's body-servant.

SOURCE: George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Vol. 1, p. 314

No comments: