The resignation of Gen. Gustavus W. Smith has been accepted
by the President. It was well done — the acceptance, I mean. Who will Gen.
Winder report to now? Gen. Winder has learned that I am keeping a diary, and
that some space in it may be devoted to the history of martial law. He said to
Capt. Warner, his commissary of prisons, that he would patronize it. The
captain asked me if Gen. Winder's rule was not dwelt upon in it. I said
doubtless it was; but that I had not yet revised it, and was never in the habit
of perusing my own works until they were completed. Then I carefully corrected
them for the press.
Major-Gen. Pickett's division marched through the city
to-day for Drewry's Bluff. Gen. Lee writes that this division can beat the army
corps of Hooker, supposed to be sent to the Peninsula. It has 12,000 men — an
army corps 40,000. Brig.-Gen. Hood's division is near the city, on the
Chickahominy. Gen. Lee warns the government to see that Gens. French and Pryor
be vigilant, and to have their scouts closely watching the enemy at Suffolk. He
thinks, however, the main object of the enemy is to take Charleston; and he
suggests that every available man be sent thither. The rest of his army he will
keep on the Rappahannock, to watch the enemy still remaining north of that
river.
I sent a communication to the President to-day, proposing to
reopen my register of “patriotic contributions” to the army, for they are
suffering for meat. I doubt whether he will agree to it. If the war be
prolonged, the appeal must be to the people to feed the army, or else it will
dissolve.
SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's
Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 261-2
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