The members of our society sympathized with General McClellan when he was criticised by some and we wrote him the following letter:
CANANDAIGUA, Feb. 13, 1863.
MAJ.
GEN. GEO. MCCLELLAN:
Will
you pardon any seeming impropriety in our addressing you, and attribute it to
the impulsive love and admiration of hearts which see in you, the bravest and
noblest defender of our Union. We cannot resist the impulse to tell you, be our
words ever so feeble, how our love and trust have followed you from Rich
Mountain to Antietam, through all slanderous attacks of traitorous politicians
and fanatical defamers—how we have admired, not less than your calm courage on
the battlefield, your lofty scorn of those who remained at home in the base
endeavor to strip from your brow the hard earned laurels placed there by a
grateful country: to tell further, that in your forced retirement from
battlefields of the Republic's peril, “you have but changed your country's arms
for more,—your country's heart,”—and to assure you that so long as our country
remains to us a sacred name and our flag a holy emblem, so long shall we
cherish your memory as the defender and protector of both. We are an
association whose object it is to aid, in the only way in which woman, alas!
can aid our brothers in the field. Our sympathies are with them in the cause
for which they have periled all-our hearts are with them in the prayer, that
ere long their beloved commander may be restored to them, and that once more as
of old he may lead them to victory in the sacred name of the Union and
Constitution.
With
united prayers that the Father of all may have you and yours ever in His holy
keeping, we remain your devoted partisans.
Signed
by a large number.
The following in reply was addressed to the lady whose name was first signed to the above:
New YORK, Feb. 21, 1863.
MADAM—I
take great pleasure in acknowledging the receipt of the very kind letter of the
13th inst., from yourself and your friends. Will you do me the favor to say to
them how much I thank them for it, and that I am at a loss to express my
gratitude for the pleasant and cheering terms in which it is couched. Such
sentiments on the part of those whose brothers have served with me in the field
are more grateful to me than anything else can be. I feel far more than
rewarded by them for all I have tried to accomplish. — I am, Madam, with the
most sincere respect and friendship, yours very truly,
GEO. B. MCCLELLAN.
SOURCE: Caroline Cowles Richards, Village Life in America, 1852-1872, p. 149-51
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