Congress, in secret session, has authorized the declaration of
martial law in this city, and at some few other places. This might be well
under other circumstances; but it will not be well if the old general in
command should be clothed with powers which he has no qualifications to wield
advantageously. The facile old man will do anything the Secretary
advises.
Our army is to fall back from Manassas! The Rappahannock is
not to be our line of defense. Of course the enemy will soon strike at
Richmond from some direction. I have given great offense to some of our people
by saying the policy of permitting men to go North at will, will bring the
enemy to the gates of the city in ninety days. Several have told me that the
prediction has been marked in the Secretary's tablets, and that I am marked for
destruction if it be not verified. I reply that I would rather be destroyed
than that it should be fulfilled.
SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's
Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 111-2
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