Camp Brightwood, June [14th?], 1863.
I don't believe we are going to have marching orders, after
all. For twenty-four hours we have been all ready to move at a moment's notice.
I want marching orders very much, but am afraid I shall be kept here. I wish
you could see how my Battalion will turn out tomorrow morning; not an extra
gew-gaw, nothing for ornament. If they want ornamental troops around
Washington, they’ll let me go, — indeed, I have dropped some things which have
generally been counted necessaries; two of my companies go without any blankets
but those under their saddles. That is pretty well for recruits.
If we use it rightfully, I think the Pennsylvania movement
an excellent thing for the cause, — but that is if. What effect will it
have on the opposition? For the moment, of course, all differences will be
dropped, — but afterwards will not the Administration be the weaker for it,
unless the if be avoided? You would not suppose I had thought much about
it, from the loose and simple way in which I write, but I have: only, so much
depends now on the skill of Hooker and Halleck (Eheu!) and on the nerve
of Lincoln and Stanton, — depends, that is, on individuals, — that it is
impossible to foresee events even for a day.1
_______________
1 The invasion of the North was beginning, by way
of the Shenandoah Valley, and Hooker, intent on guarding Washington, had not
yet started in pursuit. Mosby, with his guerrilla band, had crossed the Potomac
into Maryland on the night of the 10th and 11th, and Lowell was telegraphed: “Go
where you please in pursuit of Mosby!” and promptly set out; but unfortunately
before the message came Mosby had made his raid, re-crossed to Virginia and
scattered his band.
SOURCE: Edward Waldo Emerson, Life and Letters of
Charles Russell Lowell, p. 257-8, 424
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