Cedar Creek, Oct. 17, 1864.
In spite of Will's anxiety to be back with us, and of our
desire to have him back, I cannot but hope for your sake that he may somehow be
delayed till we are safely in winter-quarters. Mails are very irregular up and
down the Valley, and during active operations I am sure you and Mrs. Forbes
would be constantly anxious about him, — more even than you can be now. Let him
come back in time to open the Spring with us; that will be early enough to “retrieve
all disasters” that you speak of. It was very kind of you to write me as you
did about Billy; I know how you feel about him. I will tell you, what I believe
I did not tell Alice, that I got off and walked some time before finally
deciding to take him into the charge where he was hit, and that I had three
orderlies' horses killed or disabled under me that day. I tried to use him as I
knew you and Will would wish him used. He was a dear little horse, — did not
always have a sore back, had got over that weakness bravely, — you see he
was improving to the last day of his life.
I get the Chaplain's “Army and Navy Journal” for the
present, — shall subscribe myself when he returns, — I have generally liked its
articles about operations before Richmond, as they told me all I ever learned
about that campaign. Its notices about this Shenandoah campaign have not been
very good: it has been wrong in some most important facts and in some of its
criticisms. It has been entirely wrong too in praising ——— so constantly; ——— from
the beginning has been the laughing-stock here, — his absurd newspaper reporter
may have caused this, — but worse than that, his false despatches to the
General and his constant habit of having “infantry” in front of him, and of
falling back “pressed,” have on two occasions come very near causing great
disasters.
I am very glad, my dear Mr. Forbes, that we have not a handy
writer among us. The reputation of regiments is made and is known in the Army, —
the comparative merits are well known there. Such a notice as I saw of
the —th ——— Cavalry makes a regiment ridiculous, besides giving the public
false history, — yet I have no doubt the writer meant to be honest.
SOURCE: Edward Waldo Emerson, Life and Letters of
Charles Russell Lowell, p. 362-4
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