The great battle which is to arrest rebellion, or to make it
a power in the land, is no longer distant or doubtful. McDowell has completed
his reconnoissance of the country in front of the enemy, and General Scott
anticipates that he will be in possession of Manassas to-morrow night. All the
statements of officers concur in describing the Confederates as strongly
intrenched along the line of Bull Run covering the railroad. The New York
papers, indeed, audaciously declare that the enemy have fallen back in disorder.
In the main thoroughfares of the city there is still a scattered army of idle
soldiers moving through the civil crowd, though how they come here no one
knows. The officers clustering round the hotels, and running in and out of the
bar-rooms and eating-houses, are still more numerous. When I inquired at the
head-quarters who these were, the answer was that the majority were skulkers,
but that there was no power at such a moment to send them back to their
regiments or punish them. In fact, deducting the reserves, the rear-guards, and
the scanty garrisons at the earth-works, McDowell will not have 25,000 men to
undertake his seven days' march through a hostile country to the Confederate
capital; and yet, strange to say, in the pride and passion of the politicians,
no doubt is permitted to rise for a moment respecting his complete success.
I was desirous of seeing what impression was produced upon
the Congress of the United States by the crisis which was approaching, and
drove down to the Senate at noon. There was no appearance of popular
enthusiasm, excitement, or emotion among the people in the passages. They drank
their iced water, ate cakes or lozenges, chewed and chatted, or dashed at their
acquaintances amongst the members, as though nothing more important than a
railway bill or a postal concession was being debated inside. I entered the
Senate, and found the House engaged in not listening to Mr. Latham, the Senator
for California, who was delivering an elaborate lecture on the aspect of
political affairs from a Republican point of view. The senators were, as usual,
engaged in reading newspapers, writing letters, or in whispered conversation,
whilst the Senator received his applause from the people in the galleries, who
were scarcely restrained from stamping their feet at the most highly-flown
passages. Whilst I was listening to what is by courtesy called the debate, a
messenger from Centreville, sent in a letter to me, stating that General
McDowell would advance early in the morning, and expected to engage the enemy
before noon. At the same moment a Senator who had received a despatch left his
seat and read it to a brother legislator, and the news it contained was
speedily diffused from one seat to another, and groups formed on the edge of
the floor eagerly discussing the welcome intelligence.
The President's hammer again and again called them to order;
and from out of this knot, Senator Sumner, his face lighted with pleasure, came
to tell me the good news. “McDowell has carried Bull Run without firing a shot.
Seven regiments attacked it at the point of the bayonet, and the enemy
immediately fled. General Scott only gives McDowell till mid-day to-morrow to
be in possession of Manassas.” Soon afterwards, Mr. Hay, the President's
Secretary, appeared on the floor to communicate a message to the Senate. I asked
him if the news was true. “All I can tell you,” said he, “is that the President
has heard nothing at all about it, and that General Scott, from whom we have
just received a communication, is equally ignorant of the reported success.”
Some senators and many congressmen have already gone to join
McDowell's army, or to follow in its wake, in the hope of seeing the Lord
deliver the Philistines into his hands. As I was leaving the Chamber with Mr.
Sumner, a dust-stained, toil-worn man, caught the Senator by the arm, and said,
“Senator, I am one of your constituents. I come from ——town, in Massachusetts,
and here are letters from people you know, to certify who I am. My poor brother
was killed yesterday, and I want to go out and get his body to send back to the
old people; but they won't let me pass without an order.” And so Mr. Sumner
wrote a note to General Scott, and an other to General Mansfield, recommending
that poor Gordon Frazer should be permitted to go through the Federal lines on
his labor of love; and the honest Scotchman seemed as grateful as if he had
already found his brother's body.
Every carriage, gig, wagon, and hack has been engaged by
people going out to see the fight. The price is enhanced by mysterious
communications respecting the horrible slaughter in the skirmishes at Bull's
Run. The French cooks and hotelkeepers, by some occult process of reasoning,
have arrived at the conclusion that they must treble the prices of their wines
and of the hampers of provisions which the Washington people are ordering to
comfort themselves at their bloody Derby, “There was not less than 18,000 men,
sir, killed and destroyed. I don't care what General Scott says to the
contrary, he was not there. I saw a reliable gentleman, ten minutes ago, as cum
[sic] straight from the place, and he
swore there was a string of wagons three miles long with the wounded. While
these Yankees lie so, I should not be surprised to hear they said they did not
lose 1000 men in that big fight the day before yesterday.”
When the newspapers came in from New York, I read flaming
accounts of the ill-conducted reconnoissance against orders, which was
terminated by a most dastardly and ignominious retreat, “due,” say the New York
papers, “to the inefficiency and cowardice of some of the officers.” Far
different was the behavior of the modest chroniclers of these scenes, who, as
they tell us, “stood their ground as well as any of them, in spite of the shot,
shell, and rifle-balls that whizzed past them for many hours.: General Tyler
alone, perhaps, did more, for “he was exposed to the enemy's fire for nearly
four hours;” and when we consider that this fire came from masked batteries,
and that the wind of round shot is unusually destructive (in America), we can
better appreciate the danger to which he was so gallantly indifferent. It is
obvious that in this first encounter the Federal troops gained no advantage;
and as they were the assailants, their repulse, which cannot be kept secret
from the rest of the army, will have a very damaging effect on their morale.
General Johnston, who has been for some days with a
considerable force in an entrenched position at Winchester, in the valley of
the Shenandoah, had occupied General Scott's attention, in consequence of the
facility which he possessed to move into Maryland by Harper's Ferry, or to fall
on the Federals by the Manassas Gap Railway, which was available by a long
march from the town he occupied. General Patterson, with a Federal corps of
equal strength, had accordingly been despatched to attack him, or, at all
events, to prevent his leaving Winchester without an action; but the news
to-night is that Patterson, who was an officer of some reputation, has allowed
Johnston to evacuate Winchester, and has not pursued him; so that it is
impossible to predict where the latter will appear.
Having failed utterly in my attempts to get a horse, I was
obliged to negotiate with a livery stable-keeper, who had a hooded gig, or
tilbury, left on his hands, to which he proposed to add a splinter-bar and
pole, so as to make it available for two horses, on condition that I paid him
the assessed value of the vehicle and horses, in case they were destroyed by
the enemy. Of what particular value my executors might have regarded the
guarantee in question, the worthy man did not inquire, nor did he stipulate for
any value to be put upon the driver; but it struck me that, if these were in
any way seriously damaged, the occupants of the vehicle were not likely to
escape. The driver, indeed, seemed by no means willing to undertake the job;
and again and again it was proposed to me that I should drive, but I
persistently refused.
On completing my bargain with the stable-keeper, in which it
was arranged with Mr. Wroe that I was to start on the following morning early,
and return at night before twelve o'clock, or pay a double day, I went over to
the Legation, and found Lord Lyons in the garden. I went to request that he
would permit Mr. Warre, one of the attachés, to accompany me, as he had expressed a desire
to that effect. His Lordship hesitated at first, thinking perhaps that the
American papers would turn the circumstance to some base uses, if they were
made aware of it; but finally he consented, on the distinct assurance that I
was to be back the following night, and would not, under any event, proceed
onwards with General McDowell's army till after I had returned to Washington.
On talking the matter over with Mr. Warre, I resolved, that the best plan would
be to start that night if possible, and proceed over the Long Bridge, so as to
overtake the army before it advanced in the early morning.
It was a lovely moonlight night. As we walked through the
street to General Scott's quarters, for the purpose of procuring a pass, there
was scarcely a soul abroad; and the silence which reigned contrasted strongly
with the tumult prevailing in the daytime. A light glimmered in the General’s
parlor; his aides were seated in the veranda outside smoking in silence, and
one of them handed us the passes which he had promised to procure; but when I
told them that we intended to cross the Long Bridge that night, an unforeseen
obstacle arose. The guards had been specially ordered to permit no person to
cross between tattoo and daybreak who was not provided with the countersign;
and without the express order of the General, no subordinate officer can
communicate that countersign to a stranger. “Can you not ask the General?” “He is lying down asleep, and I dare
not venture to disturb him.”
As I had all along intended to start before daybreak, this contretemps
promised to be very embarrassing, and I ventured to suggest that General
Scott would authorize the countersign to be given when he awoke. But the
aide-de-camp shook his head, and I began to suspect from his manner and from
that of his comrades that my visit to the army was not regarded with much favor
— a view which was confirmed by one of them, who, by the way, was a civilian,
for in a few minutes he said, “In fact, I would not advise Warre and you to go
out there at all; they are a lot of volunteers and recruits, and we can't say
how they will behave. They may probably have to retreat. If I were you I would
not be near them.” Of the five or six officers who sat in the veranda, not one
spoke confidently or with the briskness which is usual when there is a chance
of a brush with an enemy.
As it was impossible to force the point, we had to retire,
and I went once more to the horse dealer's where I inspected the vehicle and
the quadrupeds destined to draw it. I had spied in a stalk a likely-looking
Kentuckian nag, nearly black, light, but strong, and full of fire, with an
undertaker's tail and something of a mane to match, which the groom assured me
I could not even look at, as it was bespoke by an officer; but after a little
strategy I prevailed on the proprietor to hire it to me for the day, as well as
a boy, who was to ride it after the gig till we came to Centreville. My little
experience in such scenes decided me to secure a saddle horse. I knew it would
be impossible to see anything of the action from a gig; that the roads would be
blocked up by commissariat wagons, ammunition reserves, and that in case of
anything serious taking place, I should be deprived of the chance of
participating after the manner of my vocation in the engagement and of
witnessing its incidents. As it was not incumbent on my companion to approach
so closely to the scene of action, he could proceed in the vehicle to the most
convenient point, and then walk as far as he liked, and return when he pleased;
but from the injuries I had sustained in the Indian campaign, I could not walk
very far. It was finally settled that the gig, with two horses and the saddle
horse ridden by a negro boy, should be at my door as soon after daybreak as We
could pass the Long Bridge.
I returned to my lodgings, laid out an old pair of Indian
boots, cords, a Himalayan suit, an old felt hat, a flask, revolver, and belt.
It was very late when I got in, and I relied on my German landlady to procure
some commissariat stores; but she declared the whole extent of her means would
only furnish some slices of bread, with intercostal layers of stale ham and
mouldy Bologna sausage. I was forced to be content, and got to bed after
midnight, and slept, having first arranged that in case of my being very late
next night a trustworthy Englishman should be sent for, who would carry my
letters from Washington to Boston in time for the mail which leaves on
Wednesday. My mind had been so much occupied with the coming event that I slept
uneasily, and once or twice I started up, fancying I was called. The moon shone
full through the mosquito curtains of my bed, and just ere daybreak I was
aroused by some noise in the adjoining room, and looking out, in a half dreamy
state, imagined I saw General McDowell standing at the table, on which a candle
was burning low, so distinctly that I woke up with the words, "General, is
that you?" Nor did I convince myself it was a dream till I had walked into
the room.
SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and
South, Vol. 1, p. 434-9
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