Memoranda of John M. Forbes: Minor Reforms Needed, September, 1862.

Minor Reforms Needed. September, 1862.

1st. Drunken officers. The public, rightly or wrongly, attribute part of the mischief at Bull Run to one, Colonel M., commanding the reserve. . . . If there be no time for courts-martial, why not quietly shelve every drunkard?

2d. Skulkers. The President found at Harrison's Bar half his army unaccounted for. The papers tell of crowds of stragglers helping to make panics in each battle. The enemy shoot their stragglers. We might at least drop, if not from a tree by a rope, at least from the army list, every skulking officer. . . . The inclosed cutting gives a hint of where the record can be found (the Marshall House and City Hotel, Alexandria) of the doings of 135 officers on Sunday, August 31, when our army was in its greatest peril. Why not call on each to account satisfactorily for his being there on that day? In short, why not have an efficient police system to correct this crying evil?

3d. Spies. The spies have thus far slain more than any other arm of the enemy. We hear of one, a famous guerilla, being condemned to die in Missouri; but it looks like a mere excuse for punishing other crimes. Several have been imprisoned, some compelled to take the oath!! but not one choked to death, — they probably being practised in swallowing hard oaths! We see accounts from Norfolk of three rebel mail carriers caught passing our lines “with private letters only, nothing of public interest,” and these will doubtless be leniently dealt with! Who can say what dangerous cipher those private letters carried? or whether the real object of their mission — a short military dispatch — was not swallowed or destroyed? . . . Shall we encourage spies and informers by continued leniency toward mail carriers from our lines to the enemy's? Washington thought it necessary to hang the noble André. Can it be doubted that the enemy destroy without any compunction any of our spies or “mail carriers”? We hang a man for the doubtful military crime of hauling down a flag, and we let pass free, or punish lightly, men who, by all military usages, and by the dictates of common sense, deserve the heaviest punishment. Half a dozen spies hanged would have saved as many thousand lives, and have given confidence to our own people and soldiers in the earnestness of their leaders, civil and military. It is not too late to begin.

4th. Robbers, in the shape of contractors, and of army officers receiving commissions [on purchases or sales for the government]; in short, the army worms of our military wheat. Of course, eternal vigilance is the only remedy for this disease. How would it do, as a sort of scarecrow at least, to insert a clause in each contract, that the contractor becomes by signing it subject to martial law, both as to his person and property? Without legislation it would not be binding, but many, nay, most of the new contracts will run beyond the meeting of the next Congress, when we may have a law for it, and by signing such a contract, agreeing to be amenable, the party could not complain that the law was ex post facto.

We who are paying taxes feel that the army contractors and the commission-receiving officers are eating us up. The soldier feels it in his bare feet and back, and sometimes in his empty stomach, and a hint from the Department would surely give us such a law during the first week of the session. The enemy does not tolerate drunken generals, stragglers, spies, or thieving contractors. Let us remember the old proverb, “Fas est et ab hoste doceri.”

SOURCE: Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, Volume 1, p. 328-31

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: March 4, 1862

We shall have stirring times here. Our troops are to be marched through Richmond immediately, for the defense of Yorktown — the same town surrendered by Lord Cornwallis to Washington. But its fall or its successful defense now will signify nothing.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 113

James Buchanan to John Tyler, February 22, 1861

washington, February 22, 1861.

My Dear Sir: I found it impossible to prevent two or three companies of the Federal troops from joining in the procession to-day with the volunteers of the District, without giving serious offence to the tens of thousands of people who have assembled to witness the parade.

The day is the anniversary of Washington's birth, a festive occasion throughout the land, and it has been particularly marked by the House of Representatives.

The troops everywhere else join such processions in honor of the birthday of the Father of our Country, and it would be hard to assign a good reason why they should be excluded from the privilege in the Capital founded by himself. They are here simply as a posse comitatus, to aid the civil authorities in case of need. Besides, the programme was published in the National Intelligencer of this morning without my personal knowledge, the War Department having considered the celebration of the national anniversary by the military arm of the Government as a matter of course.

From your friend, very respectfully,

james Buchanan.

President Tyler.

SOURCE: Samuel Wylie Crawford, The Genesis of the Civil War: The Story of Sumter, 1860-1861, p. 274-5

Diary of Judith Brockenbrough McGuire: March 15, 1863

Weather dark and cloudy. We had a good congregation in our little church. Mr. ––– read the service. The Bishop preached on “Repentance.” Richmond was greatly shocked on Friday, by the blowing up of the Laboratory, in which women, girls, and boys were employed making cartridges; ten women and girls were killed on the spot, and many more will probably die from their wounds. May God have mercy upon them! Our dear friend Mrs. S. has just heard of the burning of her house, at beautiful Chantilly. The Yankee officers had occupied it as head-quarters, and on leaving it, set fire to every house on the land, except the overseer's house and one of the servants' quarters. Such ruthless Vandalism do they commit wherever they go! I expressed my surprise to Mrs. S. that she was enabled to bear it so well. She calmly replied, “God has spared my sons through so many battles, that I should be ungrateful indeed to complain of any thing else.” This lovely spot has been her home from her marriage, and the native place of her many children, and when I remember it as I saw it two years ago, I feel that it is too hard for her to be thus deprived of it. An officer (Federal) quartered there last winter, describing it in a letter to the New York Herald, says the furniture had been “removed,” except a large old-fashioned sideboard; he had been indulging his curiosity by reading the many private letters which he found scattered about the house; some of which, he says, were written by General Washington, “with whom the family seems to have been connected.” In this last surmise he was right, and he must have read letters from which he derived the idea, or he may have gotten it from the servants, who are always proud of the aristocracy of their owners; but not a letter written by General Washington did he see, for Mrs. S. was always careful of them, and brought them away with her; they are now in this house. The officer took occasion to sneer at the pride and aristocracy of Virginia, and winds up by asserting that “this establishment belongs to the mother of General J. E. B. Stuart,” to whom she is not at all related.

SOURCE: Judith W. McGuire, Diary of a Southern Refugee, During the War, p. 198-9

Diary of Judith Brockenbrough McGuire: February 22, 1863

Ashland.—A very deep snow this morning. The cars are moving slowly on the road, with two engines attached to each train. Our gentlemen could not go to Richmond to-day. Washington's birthday is forgotten, or only remembered with a sigh by his own Virginia. Had he been gifted with prophetic vision, in addition to his great powers, we would still remain a British colony; or, at least, he would never have fought and suffered for seven long years to have placed his native South in a situation far more humiliating than the colonies ever were towards the mother-country; or to have embroiled her in a war compared to which the old Revolution was but child's play.

SOURCE: Judith W. McGuire, Diary of a Southern Refugee, During the War, p. 194

Diary of William Howard Russell: Monday, April 2, 1861

The following day I started early, and performed my pilgrimage to “the shrine of St. Washington,” at Mount Vernon, as a foreigner on board called the place. Mr. Bancroft has in his possession a letter of the General's mother, in which she expresses her gratification at his leaving the British army in a manner which implies that he had been either extravagant in his expenses or wild in his manner of living. But if he had any human frailties in after life, they neither offended the morality of his age, nor shocked the susceptibility of his countrymen; and from the time that the much maligned and unfortunate Braddock gave scope to his ability, down to his retirement into private life, after a career of singular trials and extraordinary successes, his character acquired each day greater altitude, strength, and lustre. Had his work failed, had the Republic broken up into small anarchical states, we should hear now little of Washington. But the principles of liberty founded in the original Constitution of the colonies themselves, and in no degree derived from or dependent on the Revolution, combined with the sufferings of the Old and the bounty of nature in the New World to carry to an unprecedented degree the material prosperity, which Americans have mistaken for good government, and the physical comforts which have made some States in the Union the nearest approach to Utopia. The Federal Government hitherto “let the people alone” and they went on their way singing and praising their Washington as the author of so much greatness and happiness. To doubt his superiority to any man of woman born, is to insult the American people. They are not content with his being great — or even greater than the great: he must be greatest of all; — “first in peace, and first in war.” The rest of the world cannot find fault with the assertion, that he is “first in the hearts of his countrymen.” But he was not possessed of the highest military qualities, if we are to judge from most of the regular actions, in which the British had the best of it; and the final blow, when Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown, was struck by the arm of France, by Rochambeau and the French fleet, rather than by Washington and his Americans. He had all the qualities for the work for which he was designed, and is fairly entitled to the position his countrymen have given him as the immortal czar of the United States. His pictures are visible everywhere — in the humblest inn, in the Minister's bureau, in the millionnaire's gallery. There are far more engravings of Washington in America than there are of Napoleon in France, and that is saying a good deal.

What have we here? The steamer which has been paddling down the gentle current of the Potomac, here a mile and more in breadth, banked in by forest, through which can be seen homesteads and white farm-houses, in the midst of large clearings and corn-fields — has moved in towards a high bluff, covered with trees, on the summit of which is visible the trace of some sort of building — a ruined summer-house, rustic temple — whatever it may be; and the bell on deck begins to toll solemnly, and some of the pilgrims uncover their heads for a moment. The boat stops at a rotten, tumbledown little pier, which leads to a waste of mud, and a path rudely cut through the wilderness of briers on the hill-side. The pilgrims, of whom there are some thirty or forty, of both sexes, mostly belonging to the lower classes of citizens, and comprising a few foreigners like myself, proceed to climb this steep, which seemed in a state of nature covered with primeval forest, and tangled weeds and briers, till the plateau, on which stands the house of Washington and the domestic offices around it, is reached. It is an oblong wooden house, of two stories in height, with a colonnade towards the river face, and a small balcony on the top and on the level of the roof, over which rises a little paltry gazebo. There are two windows, a glass door at one end of the oblong, and a wooden alcove extending towards the slave quarters, which are very small sentry-box huts, that have been recently painted, and stand at right angles to the end of the house, with dog-houses and poultry-hutches attached to them. There is no attempt at neatness or order about the place; though the exterior of the house is undergoing repair, the grass is unkempt, the shrubs untrimmed, — neglect, squalor, and chicken feathers have marked the lawn for their own. The house is in keeping, and threatens to fall to ruin. I entered the door, and found myself in a small hall, stained with tobacco juice. An iron railing ran across the entrance to the stairs. Here stood a man at a gate, who presented a book to the visitors, and pointed out the notice therein, that “no person is permitted to inscribe his name in this book who does not contribute to the Washington Fund, and that any name put down without money would be erased.” Notwithstanding the warning, some patriots succeeded in recording their names without any pecuniary mulct, and others did so at a most reasonable rate. When I had contributed in a manner which must have represented an immense amount of Washingtoniolatry, estimated by the standard of the day, I was informed I could not go up-stairs as the rooms above were closed to the public, and thus the most interesting portion of the house was shut from the strangers. The lower rooms presented nothing worthy of notice —some lumbering, dusty, decayed furniture; a broken harpsichord, dust, cobwebs — no remnant of the man himself. But over the door of one room hung the key of the Bastille.*  The gardens, too, were tabooed; but through the gate I could see a wilderness of neglected trees and shrubs, not unmingled with a suspicion of a present kitchen-ground. Let us pass to the Tomb, which is some distance from the house, beneath the shade of some fine trees. It is a plain brick mausoleum, with a pointed arch, barred by an iron grating, through which the light penetrates a chamber or small room containing two sarcophagi of stone. Over the arch, on a slab let into the brick, are the words: “Within this enclosure rest the remains of Gen. George Washington.” The fallen leaves which had drifted into the chamber rested thickly on the floor, and were piled up on the sarcophagi, and it was difficult to determine which was the hero's grave without the aid of an expert, but there was neither guide nor guardian on the spot. Some four or five gravestones, of various members of the family, stand in the ground outside the little mausoleum. The place was most depressing. One felt angry with a people whose lip service was accompanied by so little of actual respect. The owner of this property, inherited from the “Pater Patriӕ,” has been abused in good set terms because he asked its value from the country which has been so very mindful of the services of his ancestor, and which is now erecting by slow stages the overgrown Cleopatra's needle that is to be a Washington Monument when it is finished. Mr. Everett has been lecturing, the Ladies' Mount Vernon Association has been working, and every one has been adjuring everybody else to give liberally; but the result so lately achieved is by no means worthy of the object. Perhaps the Americans think it is enough to say — “Si monumentum quӕris, circumspice" But, at all events, there is a St. Paul's round those words.

On the return of the steamer I visited Fort Washington, which is situated on the left bank of the Potomac. I found everything in a state of neglect — gun-carriages rotten, shot piles rusty, furnaces tumbling to pieces. The place might be made strong enough on the river front, but the rear is weak, though there is low marshy land at the back. A company of regulars were on duty. The sentries took no precautions against surprise. Twenty determined men, armed with revolvers, could have taken the whole work; and, for all the authorities knew, we might have had that number of Virginians and the famous Ben McCullough himself on board. Afterwards, when I ventured to make a remark to General Scott as to the carelessness of the garrison, he said: “A few weeks ago it might have been taken by a bottle of whiskey. The whole garrison consisted of an old Irish pensioner.” Now at this very moment Washington is full of rumors of desperate descents on the capital, and an attack on the President and his Cabinet. The long bridge across the Potomac into Virginia is guarded, and the militia and volunteers of the District of Columbia are to be called out to resist McCullough and his Richmond desperadoes.

_______________

* Since borrowed, it is supposed, by Mr. Seward, and handed over by him to Mr. Stanton. Lafayette gave it to Washington; he also gave his name to the Fort which has played so conspicuous a part in the war for liberty — “La liberté des deux mondes,” might well sigh if he could see his work, and what it has led to.

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, p. 55-9

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: July 8, 1861

There is a stout gray-haired old man here from Maryland applying to be made a general. It is Major J. H. Winder, a graduate of West Point, I believe; and I think he will be successful. He is the son, I believe, of the Gen. Winder whose command in the last war with England-unfortunately permitted the City of Washington to fall into the hands of the enemy. I have almost a superstitious faith in lucky generals, and a corresponding prejudice against unlucky ones, and their progeny. But I cannot suppose the President will order this general into the field. He may take the prisoners into his custody — and do other jobs as a sort of head of military police; and this is what I learn he proposes. And the French Prince, Polignac, has been made a colonel; and a great nephew of Koscinsko has been commissioned a lieutenant in the regular army. Well, Washington had his Lafayette — and I like the nativity of these officers better than that of the Northern men, still applying for commissions.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 59-60

Diary of Judith W. McGuire: February 23, 1862

Notwithstanding the violence of the rain yesterday, the Capitol Square, the streets around it, and the adjacent houses, were crowded. The President stood at the base of that noble equestrian statue of Washington, and took the oath which was taken by the “Father of his Country” more than seventy years ago — just after the “great rebellion,” in the success of which we all, from Massachusetts to Georgia, so heartily gloried. No wonder that he spoke as if he were inspired. Was it not enough to inspire him to have the drawn sword of Washington, unsheathed in defence of his invaded country, immediately over his head, while the other hand of his great prototype points encouragingly to the South? Had he not the life-like representations of Jefferson, George Mason, and, above all, of Patrick Henry, by his side? The latter with his scroll in his outstretched hand, his countenance beaming, his lips almost parted, and seeming on the point of bursting into one blaze of eloquence in defence of his native South. How could Southern tongues remain quiet, or Southern hearts but burn within us, when we beheld our heroes, living and dead, surrounding and holding up the hands of our great chief? By him stood his cabinet, composed of the talent and the patriotism of the land; then was heard the voice of our beloved Assistant Bishop, in tones of fervid eloquence, beseeching the blessings of Heaven on our great undertaking. I would that every young man, from the Potomac to the Rio Grande, could have witnessed the scene.

Last night was the first levee. The rooms were crowded. The President looked weary and grave, but was all suavity and cordiality, and Mrs. Davis won all hearts by her usual unpretending kindness. I feel proud to have those dear old rooms, arousing as they do so many associations of my childhood and youth, filled with the great, the noble, the fair of our land, every heart beating in unison, with one great object in view, and no wish beyond its accomplishment, as far as this world is concerned. But to-day is Saturday, and I must go to the hospital to take care of our sick — particularly to nurse our little soldier-boy. Poor child, he is very ill!

SOURCE: Judith W. McGuire, Diary of a Southern Refugee, During the War, p. 95-6

Diary of Mary Boykin Chesnut: July 4, 1861

Russell abuses us in his letters. People here care a great deal for what Russell says, because he represents the London Times, and the Times reflects the sentiment of the English people. How we do cling to the idea of an alliance with England or France! Without France even Washington could not have done it.

We drove to the camp to see the President present a flag to a Maryland regiment. Having lived on the battlefield (Kirkwood), near Camden,¹ we have an immense respect for the Maryland line. When our militia in that fight ran away, Colonel Howard and the Marylanders held their own against Rawdon, Cornwallis, and the rest, and everywhere around are places named for a doughty captain killed in our defense — Kirkwood, De Kalb, etc. The last, however, was a Prussian count. A letter from my husband, written June 22d, has just reached me. He says:

"We are very strongly posted, entrenched, and have now at our command about 15,000 of the best troops in the world. We have besides, two batteries of artillery, a regiment of cavalry, and daily expect a battalion of flying artillery from Richmond. We have sent forward seven regiments of infantry and rifles toward Alexandria. Our outposts have felt the enemy several times, and in every instance the enemy recoils. General Johnston has had several encounters — the advancing columns of the two armies — and with him, too, the enemy, although always superior in numbers, are invariably driven back.

"There is great deficiency in the matter of ammunition. General Johnston's command, in the very face of overwhelming numbers, have only thirty rounds each. If they had been well provided in this respect, they could and would have defeated Cadwallader and Paterson with great ease. I find the opinion prevails throughout the army that there is great imbecility and shameful neglect in the War Department.

"Unless the Republicans fall back, we must soon come together on both lines, and have a decided engagement. But the opinion prevails here that Lincoln's army will not meet us if they can avoid it. They have already fallen back before a slight check from 400 of Johnston's men. They had 700 and were badly beaten. You have no idea how dirty and irksome the camp life is. You would hardly know your best friend in camp guise.''

Noise of drums, tramp of marching regiments all day long; rattling of artillery wagons, bands of music, friends from every quarter coming in. We ought to be miserable and anxious, and yet these are pleasant days. Perhaps we are unnaturally exhilarated and excited.

Heard some people in the drawing-room say: “Mrs. Davis's ladies are not young, are not pretty,” and I am one of them. The truthfulness of the remark did not tend to alleviate its bitterness. We must put Maggie Howell and Mary Hammy in the foreground, as youth and beauty are in request. At least they are young things — bright spots in a somber-tinted picture. The President does not forbid our going, but he is very much averse to it. We are consequently frightened by our own audacity, but we are wilful women, and so we go.

_______________

¹ At Camden in August, 1780, was fought a battle between General Gates and Lord Cornwallis. in which Gates was defeated. In April of the following year near Camden, Lord Rawdon defeated General Greene.

SOURCE: Mary Boykin Chesnut, Edited by Isabella D. Martin and Myrta Lockett Avary, A Diary From Dixie, p. 74-6

Diary of Private Charles H. Lynch: June 12, 1864

Sunday. Came off picket. General Hunter is applying the torch to many buildings. I watched them burn. Among them were the Washington Military Institute, and the home of Governor Letcher. It was a grand and awful sight to see so many buildings burning at the same time. A bronze statue of George Washington was removed from the front entrance and saved. It was put in one of the wagons, and in time was to be sent to Washington, D. C. After the fires were out I visited the ruins. The cavalry brought in to our lines many slaves, the owners trying to hide them in the surrounding mountains. They were a husky lot, and could run as fast as a horse. I saw them keep up with cavalry. Visited many points of interest in and around this fine looking town.

SOURCE: Charles H. Lynch, The Civil War Diary, 1862-1865, of Charles H. Lynch 18th Conn. Vol's, p. 75

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: April 18, 1861

In spite of every precaution, it is currently whispered in the streets to-day that Virginia has seceded from the Union; and that the act is to be submitted to the people for ratification a month hence. This is perhaps a blunder. If the Southern States are to adhere to the old distinct sovereignty doctrine, God help them one and all to achieve their independence of the United States. Many are inclined to think the safest plan would be to obliterate State lines, and merge them all into an indivisible nation or empire, else there may be incessant conflicts between the different sovereignties themselves, and between them and the General Government. I doubt our ability to maintain the old cumbrous, complicated, and expensive form of government. A national executive and Congress will be sufficiently burdensome to the people without the additional expense of governors, lieutenant-governors, a dozen secretaries of State, as many legislatures, etc. etc. It is true, State rights gave the States the right to secede. But what is in a name? Secession by any other name would smell as sweet. For my part, I like the name of Revolution, or even Rebellion, better, for they are sanctified by the example of Washington and his compeers. And separations of communities are like the separations of bees when they cannot live in peace in the same hive. The time had come apparently for us to set up for ourselves, and we should have done it if there had been no such thing as State sovereignty. It is true, the Constitution adopted at Montgomery virtually acknowledges the right of any State to secede from the Confederacy; but that was necessary in vindication of the action of its fathers. That Constitution, and the permanent one to succeed it, will, perhaps, never do. They too much resemble the governmental organization of the Yankees, to whom we have bid adieu forever in disgust.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 24

George William Curtis to Charles Eliot Norton, April 20, 1861

20th April, 1861.

Anna and the baby are perfectly well. Her brother Bob and my brother Sam marched yesterday with their regiment, the 7th, both the Winthrops, Philip Schuyler, and the flower of the youth of the city.

This day in New York has been beyond description, and remember, if we lose Washington to-night or to-morrow, as we probably shall, we have taken New York. The grand hope of this rebellion has been the armed and moneyed support of New York, and New York is wild for the flag and the country, and our bitterest foes of yesterday are in good faith our nearest friends. The meeting to-day was a city in council. The statue of Washington held in its right hand the flagstaff and flag of Sumter. The only cry is, “Give us arms!” and this before a drop of New York blood has been shed. What will it be after?

I think of the Massachusetts boys dead. “Send them home tenderly,” says your governor. Yes, “tenderly, tenderly; but for every hair of their bright young heads brought low, God, by our right arms, shall enter into judgment with traitors!”

SOURCE: Edward Cary, George William Curtis, p. 145

Diary of Private Charles H. Lynch: February 22, 1864

Washington's Birthday. Orders to prepare for parade and review. All the troops around town ordered to take part. The march will be through the principal streets. Quite a celebration in honor of the first president, George Washington. Wrote several letters to friends at home.

SOURCE: Charles H. Lynch, The Civil War Diary, 1862-1865, of Charles H. Lynch 18th Conn. Vol's, p. 42

Robert E. Lee to P. G. T. Beauregard, October 3, 1865

LEXINGTON, VIRGINIA, 3d October, 1865.

GEN. G. T. BEAUREGARD, New Orleans, La.

MY DEAR GENERAL: I have received your letter of the 1st ult., and am very sorry to learn that the papers of yourself and Johnston are lost, or at least beyond your reach; but I hope they may be recovered. Mine never can be, though some may be replaced. Please supply all you can. It may be safer to send them by private hand, if practicable, to Mr. Caskie at Richmond, or to me at this place. I hope both you and Johnston will write the history of your campaigns. Every one should do all in his power to collect and disseminate the truth, in the hope that it may find a place in history, and descend to posterity. I am glad to see no indication in your letter of an intention to leave the country. I think the South requires the aid of her sons now more than at any period of her history. As you ask for my purpose, I will state that I have no thought of abandoning her unless compelled to do so.

After the surrender of the Southern armies in April, the revolution in the opinions and feelings of the people seemed so complete, and the return of the Southern States into the union of all the States so inevitable, that it became in my opinion the duty of every citizen, the contest being virtually ended, to cease opposition, and place himself in a position to serve the country. I, therefore, upon the promulgation of the proclamation of President Johnson of 29th of May, which indicated his policy in the restoration of peace, determined to comply with its requirements, and applied on the 13th of June to be embraced within its provisions. I have not heard the result of my application. Since then I have been elected to the Presidency of Washington College, and have entered upon the duties of the office in the hope of being of some service to the noble youth of our country. I need not tell you that true patriotism sometimes requires of men to act exactly contrary, at one period, to that which it does at another, and the motive which impels them — the desire to do right — is precisely the same. The circumstances which govern their actions change; and their conduct must conform to the new order of things. History is full of illustrations of this. Washington himself is an example. At one time he fought against the French under Braddock, in the service of the King of Great Britain; at another, he fought with the French at Yorktown, under the orders of the Continental Congress of America, against him. He has not been branded by the world with reproach for this; but his course has been applauded. With sentiments of great esteem,

I am, most truly yours,

R. E. LEE.

SOURCE: John William Jones, Life and Letters of Robert Edward Lee: Soldier and Man, p. 390

Senator Davis' Opinion Of The President

Senator Davis, of Ky., in the course of a speech, a few days since, in the U. S. Senate paid this tribute to the President:

“I voted against Mr. Lincoln and opposed him honestly and sincerely; but Mr. Lincoln has won me to his side.  There is a niche in the temple of fame, a niche near to Washington, which should be occupied but the statue of him who shall save this country.  Mr. Lincoln has a mighty destiny.  It is for him, if he will, to step into that niche.  It is for him to be a President of the people of the United States, and there will his statue be.  It is in his power to occupy a place next to Washington – the founder and preserver side by side.”

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Saturday Morning, May 17, 1862, p. 2

Col. Jennison

The Democrat publishes an article from the Chicago Journal defamatory of Col. Jennison.  The secret of the Journal’s opposition to Jennison is not that it has anything in reality against that hero, but because the Tribune spoke praisingly of him.  Were Washington alive and the Tribune to write an article favorable to him the Journal would take opposition ground.  Those are its principles.  When we have the leisure we will tell you why Col. Jenison is the object of persecution by the Buchanan proslavery press.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Saturday Morning, May 10, 1862, p. 2

The Government of God

Society is of God, as well as nature and religion.  Man has received his life from the Creator, and no one has the right to take it from him, unless he is a violator of the most precious rights and privileges he has conferred upon him. – Even the Guilty and the wicked should not suffer the extremity of the law, but for crimes involving the life and peace of society.  No one has the right to shed the blood of his fellow, unless for reasons the highest and most sacred, derived from the word of God and the original constitution of our nature.  Government holds a sword, and that sword is the gift of God.  Without it, society would be exposed to the lawlessness of the unprincipled and base, and would be like a human body without arms.  God has the power to take away human life, as he does by sickness, famine, and death; and he has put the sword into the hands of human governments, to be used when the necessity of the case demands it.

He is called the Lord of hosts, or armies, and the reason is, that among the heathen the nation most successful in arms was supposed to have the most powerful God!  Jehovah entered the lists against the Lords many and Gods many of the idolatrous nations, and was always successful, when his chosen people, the Jews, cast themselves upon his arm, and thereby proved the eternal sovereignty.

The history of the struggles of the Revolution shows the special care of Providence over our great leader, Washington.  He rode in the thickest of the fight, and was never injured.  Four bullets made as many holes in his coat, and two horses fell dead under him in a single battle, yet he escaped without a wound.  He, himself, regarded it as a special interposition of the hand of God.

The following incident is reported of him:  In the battle of Monongahela – the defeat of Braddock – a distinguished warrior swore it was impossible to bring Washington down by a bullet.  His reason was, that he had taken steady aim at Washington seventeen times, but could not once hit him, and he gave up believing he was invulnerable.  Washington’s work was not then completed.  An unseen hand defended him; and every soldier is under the special care of Him, who recognizes His authority.  Let every one who goes out to defend the sacred rights of his country, look to God for aid and counsel.  He is a present help – a refuge in distress.  If he fall in battle, he falls in a good cause; and even the more wicked and desperate are cut off from the evil to come, and are saved from additional years of crime and guilt.  God does not permit war to be an undeserved and lasting injury to any one.

War should lead us to look to god as the Supreme Arbiter and Judge of nations, and make us feel our dependence upon Him, at home and in the field of battle.  Each father and mother, who has sent a son into battle, should pray as Moses did for Judah:  “Hear, Lord, the voice of Judah, and bring him unto his people.  Let his hand be sufficient for him; and be thou an help to him from his enemies.”  Let every warrior, like Judah, call upon the Lord; and let every parent and friend remember Judah on the field of battle.

God uses war as a purifier of the world.  It is often the scourge of a nation’s wickedness and impiety.  It makes the proudest heart to quail, and humble itself under his mighty hand.  It shows how vain is the help of man.  The neglect of a single officer may turn the tide of war against us, and after a successful campaign, bring us into unexpected disasters.  God is now reminding us of His authority, and teaching the nation that not in statesmen, nor in captains or great generals, but in Him alone there is ever-lasting strength.

The following incident is recorded in a private letter from Ft. Donelson by a soldier in the fifteenth Illinois regiment:

I visited the battle-field on the day of the surrender; here indeed can one truly see the “horrors of war.”  I would not sicken you by detailing the horrible sights I witnessed, but I cannot refrain from mentioning one incident.  In passing among the wounded and dead of the enemy, I came to the body of a young man, lying partly on his side; he belonged to the Second Kentucky Regiment, and was an exceedingly handsome man.  It was the expression of his face, so different from the rest, which first attracted my attention.  One of his hands rested upon his breast just beneath his coat; slightly removing this, I discovered the cause of that expression: tightly grasped in his hand was a Bible.  My curiosity was so great that I could not resist the temptation of learning his name, but it was with no little difficulty that I succeeded in obtaining it, so tightly had his fingers stiffened in their grasp.  I opened the book, and on the fly leaf was written: “Presented to Robert Reeves by his affectionate mother,” and then immediately beneath these words were “My dear son, when troubles and temptations assail you, here alone can you find comfort and consolation.”  What a consolation would it be to her poor heart if, when she hears of the death of her dear son, could she but know that ’midst the din and roar of battle, and with death slowly but surely creeping over him, he had sought and found that comfort and consolation in the teachings of a redeeming Savior.  * *

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Monday Morning, May 5, 1862, p. 2

Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Saturday, February 22, 1862

This is Washington's birthday. We packed our knapsacks early this morning and left Lookout for California, arriving at 2 p. m. The roads were quite muddy. In camp again at California, Missouri. We pitched our tents on the commons south of town.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 33

Common Scolds

Next to lying, the easiest thing in the world is scolding; and there are men who have acquired such skill by practice that they may be said to scold and lie with equal facility.  It affords one an opportunity to be very smart – to exhibit an unusual degree of wisdom and sagacity – to have a criticism for every act, a suspicion for every motive, and an offset of censure for every word of extorted praise.  It is a very pretty thing for some people to believe, or affect to believe, that public virtue is dead, that selfishness is the rule of live in every responsible station, that patriotism is scarcer than diamonds, and that the country generally is only fit to go to the devil and is well advanced in the journey.  This sort of thing gives the self-appointed censor prominence, as the office which he assumes to fill is one that pre-supposes eminent purity, patriotism, valor, prudence and all unselfishness and all excellence as its qualifications and credentials.

Since the commencement of the present war, there have been men, nominally supporters of the Government and the Administration – nay, men who are the recipients of the favors of the Administration – whose words and whose influence have not been such as to strengthen either the hands of the Government or the hearts of the people.  If men have gone to them for strength or comfort, they have not found it. – They have instead, received the impression that the Government either does not know what it is about, or is in the hands of sharpers; that military men care more for themselves, a thousand times, than they do for their country; that the Government has no policy and the army no plan; and that the rebels really monopolize all the military genius of the country.  The President, according to these wise ones, is “well enough,” but he is weak: every member of the Cabinet is “well enough,” but there is something radically wrong about him; and military men are “well enough,” perhaps, but military men are military men, and much in the way of the public virtue is not to be expected of them.  If a mistake is made, it is always “inexcusable.”  If any possible emergency proves to be unprovided for, somebody’s neck should be stretched for it.  Every success is only a lucky chance which involves no credit to anybody, and the common scolds even go so far, not unfrequently, as to say that the happening is contrary to the will of the superiors in military command, and that all successful subordinates would be punished if the operation were a safe one.

It was a remark of Mr. Beecher, we believe, that the strongest encouragement he ever obtained in his Christian life was derived from the weaknesses of the apostles.  If they, in intimate contact with the great Master, were so much like him, then there was no hope for him.  We feel very much like this on looking to revolutionary times.  Let a person take up and read through Irving’s Life of Washington, and get his glimpses of the revolution through that life, and it will certainly give him courage and strength.  He will find that no man connected with the government to-day is half as much maligned and abused as Washington was by the men of his time – that rancor and hatred, such as were leveled at him, are to-day unknown out of the precincts of treason.  He will find prevalent everywhere the same impatience, and same caviling spirit, the same cursing and scolding, there were men, then, as now, who could see nothing good in public men, and nothing laudable in public policy.  There were men, then, as now who assumed the censorship of all movements, and could find nothing good in any.  Yet Washington and his associates stand to-day the glorified objects of our reverent love; and we have no doubt that the men who are at the head of affairs to-day are to take their place among the canonized immortals whom grateful patriotism will never permit to die.  We say this none the less heartily because the common scolds will turn up their noses at the bare suggestion.

It is easy to sit home and scold.  It is easy to do nothing while others are crushed down by cares of state, or are sacrificing ease and comfort in the camp, and periling life and limb in deadly conflict.  We say it is easy to sit at home – nay, it may be easier still to sit in the editor’s chair – and scold; but it is meaner than any other thing mentionable.  If there ever lived a set of men who deserved the sympathy and the moral support of their fellow countrymen, then those who are engaged in putting down this great rebellion deserve them.  The largest charity should be extended to them, and the firmest trust reposed in them.  Our hope under god must be in them; and even if they should not all be what they ought to be, they are the best we have, and it is impossible to decide impartially upon their fitness for their posts to-day.  No man to-day is in possession of the facts that will enable him to decide fully as to the merits of those who are at the head of the civil and military affairs of this country.

In view of the late advances and successes of our army, it would seem as if the common scolds would perceive that their vocation is gone; but we presume they are in full blast yet.  In their opinion, the evacuation of Columbus and Manassas is not attributable to any strategic plan, devised in Washington; but it happened so. – Indeed, we presume that it will be represented to have occurred against the will of those in power, and to have subjected all who were active in procuring it to degradation from the service.  Such men deserve to be slapped across the mouth, and to receive an emphatic injunction to “dry up.”  If a man cannot be sharp and witty and impressive, at a time like this, without sowing the seeds of discontent and dissatisfaction and distrust in every mind with which he comes in contact, let us have his right hand in a swing.  A “friend of the government” who believes in the general rascality of all who are in it is nothing better than a pimp of treason. {Springfield Republican.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, March 22, 1862, p. 3

Jeff. Davis’ Inauguration – The Scene

When at the Restoration, Louis XVIII returned to Paris, as was received with demonstrations of welcome by the populace, the official Moniteur of the following day put in his mouth some pithy observations most apt for the occasion.  “But I never said anything of the kind,” said the King to one of his Court when he read it.  “Sire,” replied the official, “it is necessary that your Majesty should have said so.”

Somewhat so with Jeff. Davis’ inaugural, tho’ it was, no doubt, pronounced by him as printed.  In reading it we must bear in mind that he was under a necessity of saying what befitted the occasion, with little reference to facts, or exactness of statement.  His position required him to present the most hopeful and encouraging aspects of the struggle into which he may be said  himself to have plunged the people of the Confederate States.

He would have played his role very badly indeed in the drama that was being enacted, if he had ventured upon a candid and sincere exposition of the real state of affairs.  Necessity as manager, had written down his part for him, and he could not deviate without spoiling the play, and being, as the theatrical phrase has it, “damned” by boxes, pit and gallery.  The select audience would not permit even a star performer to lay aside the lion and announce himself as “Nick Bottom, the Weaver.”  He must roar in character.

The august ceremonial of inauguration, in the accounts given of it in the Richmond papers, serious as they are, seems more like a burlesque than the solemn inauguration of a “permanent government” by men in their right wits.  Yet we doubt not the crowd of adventurers, F. F. coxcombs, swaggerers, lavish of “the last drop of blood” but careful of the first, behaved with all the solemnity befitting such an occasion.

The ceremonies, it appears by the programme, took place upon a platform erected for the purpose, against the east front of the Washington monument.  To this Jeff. refers to his exordium: “On this, the birthday of the man most identified with the establishment of American Independence, and beneath the monument erected to commemorate his heroic virtues and those of his compatriots, we have assembled, &c.  The stage is described as “extending from the pedestal in front of the statue of Mason to that in front of Jefferson.”

That Monument in Capitol Square, Richmond, is one of the noblest works of art in America. – Those who have seen and studied it, united in pronouncing it alike worthy of the great subject and of the distinguished artist Crawford, who designed and partially executed the work.  The main figure is a colossal equestrian statue of Washington.  Around it, upon subordinate pedestals, are statures of life size, of Jefferson, Henry, Mason and others – Virginia’s sons in the period when she produced heroes and statesmen of honest renown in all time.

These figures are in bronze, cast at the royal foundry, Munich.  The monument itself is designed to commemorate to posterity genuine heroism and patriotic devotion.  The very shadow – even the very steps of that noble monumental structure, are chosen as the place of inaugurating a government founded upon the overthrow of  that which those great men organized, and having as it’s “corner stone,” that slavery which they one and all abhorred.  The utterance to-day by either of the four Virginians named, of the sentiments they promulgated, in their lifetimes, would cause him or them to be driven from “the sacred soil” of Virginia, as “Abolitionists” and traitors to the Davis Confederacy.  It was the presence of these magnificent effigies of these founders of the National Government that the arch conspirators chose for displaying before the world their formal organization for its overthrow.  With impious lips, the Chief pretended to invoke such an example in justification of his crime.  How applicable the following words of Washington to this scene enacted near his statue:

“The Constitution which at any time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all.  The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish government, presupposes THE DUTY OF EVERY INDIVIDUAL TO OBEY THE ESTABLISHED GOVERNMENT.”

Again:

“However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which CUNNING, AMBITIOUS AND UNPRINCIPLED MEN will be enabled to subvert the power of the people, and TO USURP FOR THEMSELVES THE REINS OF GOVERNMENT.”

The assemblages there that day, we may well suppose, was made up in no small part, of an empty and pretentious class of Virginians, foplings proud of ancestry whose virtues are grown obsolete.  But Virginia surely is not without some men in whom “the ancient spirit is not dead.  Let us imagine such as one present on that occasion.  As he regards first that magnificent monument, and the silent figures of Virginia’s heroic men, and then turns and listens to the specious harangue of the living trickster, demagogue and traitor, must he not be reminded of the degenerates of another age and country, who “built the tombs of the prophets and garnished the sepulchers of the righteous,” but were ready to stone him who should follow such just example?

Was it not Washington who said “it is my most ardent wish to see some plan of emancipation adopted in Virginia?”

Did not Jefferson say in reference to slavery: “I tremble for my country when I remember that God is just, and that justice cannot sleep forever.  The almighty has no attribute that could take sides with us in such a contest.”

And Mason – quite another from him of that name who figures now – declared in the most forcible language, the dangerous and corrupting tendencies of slavery in its effects upon the white race.

Patrick Henry (whom the sculptor has represented in the attitude of high wrought passion, in which he might be imagined when he exclaimed “Give me liberty or give me death!”) bore his testimony no less emphatic against that system by which Virginia makes men and women one of her two staple crops for the market.

Regarding that the whole scene together, and thinking of the desecration of that presence by such a pageant of treason, one might almost have expected the spirits of the mighty dead to utter audible rebuke through the bronze lips of the statues erected to their memory. – St. Louis Democrat.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, March 8, 1862, p. 2