CAMP NEAR FALMOUTH, VA.,
May 25, 1863.
I have addressed a circular letter to each of the officers
present at the much-talked-of council of war, asking them to give me their
recollections of what I said, and unless I am terribly mistaken, their answers
will afford me ample means of refuting Hooker's assertion that my opinion
sustained him in withdrawing the army.
We have to-day the glorious news from Grant.1 It
is in sad contrast with our miserable fiasco here, the more sad when you
reflect that ours was entirely unnecessary, and that we have never had such an
opportunity of gaining a great victory before.
Did I tell you that Curtin promptly answered my letter,
saying that General Cadwalader had entirely misapprehended what he said to him;
that he (Curtin) had never so understood me, or repeated to Cadwalader that I
had lost all confidence in Hooker?
_______________
1 Vicksburg, Miss., invested by the Federal
troops under Major-General Ulysses S. Grant. Confederate troops under General
John C. Pcmberton.
SOURCE: George Meade, The Life and Letters of George
Gordon Meade, Vol. 1, p. 381
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