Dear Brother: I have purposely refrained
from writing to you my opinions and feelings on the terrible fate that so
suddenly has befallen General Belknap, because I want to say truthfully that I
have never asked you to advocate my cause or to be compromised by my mistakes.
I am proud of your position in the Senate, and would not have you to risk it by
even the faintest partiality to your brother. But people will ask you what was
the real reason why I left Washington; did I have knowledge of frauds and
peculations? and was I not bound to reveal them? You may answer positively that
I had no knowledge except what Congress and the President had. It was not my
office to probe after vague rumors and whispers that had no official basis. The
President and Belknap both gradually withdrew from me all the powers which
Grant had exercised in the same office, and Congress capped the climax by
repealing that law which required all orders to the army to go through the
General, and the only other one, a joint resolution that empowered the General
to appoint "traders."
The
consequence was that orders to individuals of the army went over my head to
them, and reports went back without coming through me, as required in every
military service on earth. . . .
I
have now from Moulton two letters, and from Dayton one. In all which is stated
that the new Secretary, Judge Taft, has spoken kindly of me, and expressed a
desire to meet me in Washington. I will not go to Washington unless ordered,
and it would be an outrage if Congress, under a temporary excitement, should
compel my removal back. I came out at my own expense, and never charged a cent
for transportation, which I could have done. I can better command the army from
here than from there. The causes that made a Belknap remain and will remain. .
. .
If
you see Judge Taft, say to him that my opinion is that I can fulfil any general
policy he may prescribe, and enforce any orders he may give better from St.
Louis than Washington.
There
are two ways to govern the army, its generals, and the other through the staff.
If orders and instructions are made to individuals composing the army direct by
the Adjutant-General, and not through the commanding General, the latter is not
only useless but an incumbrance, and had better be away. But if Secretary Taft
is willing to trust me to execute and carry into effect his orders and
instructions, all he has to do is to order, and he will find me ready.
SOURCE:
Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence
Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 348-9
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