The enemy's movements had already thrown the capital into alarm. At 12 p. m. August 10, General Halleck again telegraphed: a The enemy is crossing the Rapidan in large force. They are fighting General Pope to-day; there must be no further delay in your movements; that which has already occurred was entirely unexpected, and must be satisfactorily explained. Let not a moment's time be lost, and telegraph me daily what progress you have made in executing the order to transfer your troops. At 11.30 p. m., General McClellan replied: Your despatch of to-day is received. I assure you again that there has not been any unnecessary delay in carrying out your orders. You are probably laboring under some great mistake as to the amount of transportation available here. I have pushed matters to the utmost in getting off our sick and the troops you ordered to Burnside. Colonel Ingalls has more than once informed the Quartermaster-General of the condition of our water transportation. From the fact that you directed me to keep the order secret, I took it for granted that you would take the steps necessary to provide the requisite transportation. A large number of transports for all arms of service, and for wagons, should at once be sent to Yorktown and Fort Monroe. I shall be ready to move the whole army by land the moment the sick are disposed of. You may be sure that not an hour's delay will occur that can be avoided. I fear you do not realize the difficulty of the operation proposed. The regiment of cavalry for Burnside has been in course of embarkation to-day and to-night; 10 steamers were required for the purpose; 1,258 sick loaded to-day and to-night. Our means exhausted except one vessel returning to Fort Monroe in the morning, which will take some 500 cases of slight sickness. The present moment is probably not the proper one for me to refer to the unnecessary, harsh, and unjust tone of your telegrams of late. It will, however, make no difference in my official action.c August 12, nearly two weeks after the order was issued to send off the sick, General Halleck telegraphed to General McClellan: * * * * * The Quartermaster-General informs me that nearly every available steam vessel in the country is now under your control. All yessels in the James River and the Chesapeake Bay were placed at your disposal, and it was supposed that 8,000 or 10,000 of your men could be transported daily. * The bulk of your matériel on shore it was thought could be sent to Fort Monroe, covered by that part of the Army which could not get water transportation. Such were the views of the Government here. Perhaps we were misinformed as to the facts; if so, the delay could be explained. Nothing in my telegram was intentionally harsh or unjust, but the delay was so unexpected that an explanation was required. There has been, and is, the most urgent necessity for despatch, and not a single moment must be lost in getting additional troops in front of Washington.d The same night General McClellan replied: * * * * * Your despatch of noon to-day received. It is positively the fact that no more men could have been embarked hence than have gone, and that no unnecessary delay has occurred. Before your orders were received Colonel Ingalls directed all available vessels to come from Monroe. Officers have been sent to take personal direction. Have heard nothing here of Burnside's fleet. * I am sure that you have been misinformed as to the availability of vessels on hand. We can not use heavily loaded supply vessels for troops or animals, and such constitute the mass of those here, which have been represented to you as capable of transporting this army. I learn that wharf accommodations at Aquia are altogether inadequate for landing troops and supplies to any large extent. Not an hour should be lost in remedying this. With all the facilities at Alexandria and Washington six weeks, about, were occupied in embarking the army and its matériel. Burnside's troops are not a fair criterion for rate of embarkation. All his means were in hand, his outfit specially prepared for the purpose, and his men habituated to the movement. There shall be no unnecessary delay, but I cannot manufacture vessels. I state these difficulties from experience, and because it appears to me that we have been * * @ This despatch was doubtless dated 12 m., as otherwise General McClellan could not have replied to it the same day. McClellan's Report, p. 159. e Ibid., p. 160. d Ibid., pp. 161, 162. lately working at cross purposes, because you have not been properly informed by those around you, who ought to know the inherent difficulties of such an undertaking. It is not possible for anyone to place the army where you wish it, ready to move, in less than a month. If Washington is in danger now, this army can scarcely arrive in time to save it; it is in much better position to do so from here than from Aquia. a * * * Had General McClellan been directed to abandon his sick and such stores as could not be transported in the regular supply trains of the army, he could have begun the march to Fort Monroe the day the order was received, but the order directed him first to remove the sick and matériel. This was accomplished in eleven days, and on the 14th, the Fifth Corps, under Fitz John Porter began the retrograde movement. General McClellan, remaining with the rear guard, followed on the 16th. Whether there was any lack of zeal in the movement of the troops will best appear by quoting the words of Horace Greeley: General Porter was under orders to halt the advance at Williamsburg until the crossing was complete, but, intercepting there a letter which apprised him that the enemy were concentrating rapidly on Pope with intent to crush him before he could be reenforced, he took the responsibility of pressing on to Newport News, which he reached on the 18th, having marched 60 miles in three days; and on the 20th his corps had embarked and was on its way to Aquia Creek. On that day the last of the army had reached its prescribed points of embarkation at Yorktown, Newport News, and Fortress Monroe. * * b * The order to General Porter was received at 5 p. m. of the 14th. At 7 p. m. his corps was in motion and continued to march all night. The distance from Williamsburg to Newport News-45 miles-was made between daylight of the 17th and 8 a. m. of the 18th. If it be considered that the Burnside fleet was not available for several days after the order to withdraw was issued, and that nearly every transport in service was used to supply the current wants of the eastern departments, besides transporting new troops from Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, it will be admitted that under orders to abandon neither sick, wounded, nor stores, the movement of the Army of the Potomac from Harrison's Landing to Fort Monroe was one of the quickest on record. Nevertheless, nearly a year later, March 11, 1863, General Halleck was asked by the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War: Had the Army of the Peninsula been brought to cooperate with the Army of Virginia with the utmost energy that circumstances would have permitted, in your judgment, as a military man, would it not have resulted in our victory instead of our defeat? To which he replied: I thought so at the time, and still think so.c Upon this opinion chiefly have contemporary historians based the conclusion that the battle of the Second Bull Run was lost through the tardy movements of the Army of the Potomac. April 6, 1863, three weeks after General Halleck made the above reply, the Committee on the Conduct of the War, ignoring the influence of its members in forcing the retreat from the Peninsula, reported to Congress as follows: * * * In the history of that army is to be found all that is necessary to enable your committee to report upon "the conduct of the war." Had that Army fulfilled a McClellan's Report, pp. 162, 163. Greeley's American Conflict, vol. 2, p. 171. c Report of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, vol. 1, p. 454. al that a generous and confiding people were justified in expecting from it, this rebellion had long since been crushed and the blessings of peace restored to this nation. The failure of that Army to fulfill those expectations has prolonged the contest to the present time with all its expenditure of life and treasure, for it has to a great extent neutralized, if not entirely destroyed, the legitimate fruits which would otherwise have been reaped from our glorious victories in the West.a That the reader may form his own conclusions, let us now consider the feasibility of uniting the two armies on the line of the Rappahannock. In effecting the concentration of troops it is a principle of strategy that the point of concentration must be nearer to your own corps than to those of the enemy. Whether General Halleck be regarded as a free agent, or as the victim of a system which required implicit obedience to the Secretary of War, his neglect of this strategical axiom cannot be excused, particularly as the danger of its violation had just been illustrated in his own department in the West. When assigned to the command of the Department of the Mississippi in March, 1862, the Army of the Ohio, under General Buell, was at Nashville and the Army of the Tennessee, under General Grant, was moving up the Tennessee River. The point of concentration first selected was Savannah, on the east bank, but the expedition against the Memphis and Charleston Railroad having fallen back and disembarked at Pittsburg Landing, on the west bank 9 miles above, the remainder of the Army of the Tennessee was sent forward to the same place, on which the Army of the Ohio was also directed. From Pittsburg Landing to Nashville the distance was more than 100 miles; from the same point to Corinth, where the Confederate Army lay, it was scarcely 25 miles. Aware of the impending junction, the Confederates, as already stated, assailed the Army of the Tennessee on the 6th of April and steadily pressed it back, their last attack being only resisted by a heroic effort just as the leading division of the Army of the Ohio reached the field. The chances of a successful concentration in Virginia were much less promising than at Pittsburg Landing. The Army of Virginia was on the Rapidan, 60 miles from Richmond; the Army of the Potomac was on the James River, 25 miles below. Directly between the two, under a single commander, lay the Confederate army, reenforced by all the troops that could be collected east of the Alleghenies. To join the Army of Virginia, the Army of the Potomac had to march from Harrison's Landing to Fort Monroe, a distance of from 60 to 70 miles, proceed 125 miles by water from Fort Monroe to Aquia Creek, involving the delay of embarking and disembarking, and thence march to the Orange and Alexandria Railroad, 30 miles farther-in all a distance of 215 miles. By contrast with the uncertainties of water transportation, the Confederates had two railroads from Richmond--one leading to Fredericksburg, on the Rappahannock, the other to Rapidan Station, on the Rapidan-two points but 30 miles apart. The first road was available for massing on our left, against the troops from the Army of the Potomac, arriving successively at Aquia Creek; the other was equally available for an attack on the Army of Virginia, while both could be used for a movement against the center, midway between Fredericksburg and Rappahannock station. a Report of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, vol. 1, p. 4. With all these advantages, the separation of our armies gave to the Confederates an opportunity not to be neglected. Stonewall Jackson, the moment the Seven Days' battles were over, urged an offensive movement against the Army of Virginia. Lee, however, more cautious if not more sagacious, recognizing, like McClellan, that the defense of Washington lay at Richmond, waited till the 13th of July, when, knowing that no reenforcements had been sent to the Army of the Potomac, he moved Jackson with his own and Ewell's division to Culpeper Court House. Near this place, on the 9th of August, Jackson fought the battle of Cedar Mountain, and then fell back across the Rapidan. This temporary retreat resorted to for safety, was but preparatory to a general movement. The reports of spies from Washington, where, after the injunction of secrecy was removed, army movements could be discussed in Congress, on the streets, and in the hotels; the advance of the Army of Virginia midway to the Confederate capital; the reembarkation of Burnside's corps at Fort Monroe, and its landing at Aquia Creek; the increase of the number of transports on the James River, together with the shipment of troops and stores, satisfied the mind of the Confederate commander that if Richmond was still our objective point, we had determined to reach it by the overland route." No longer uneasy as to the safety of his capital, he designated a division for its protection, and on the 13th of August, the day before the Fifth Corps began the retreat from the Peninsula, put the main body of his army in march for the Rapidan. Fortunately for the Union, the Confederates were slow in profiting by their advantage. With but 60 miles to march to the Rapidan, part of the troops proceeding by rail, and a further march of 20 miles to the Rappahannock, it was not till the 21st and 22d of August, that they were able to make demonstrations along the line of the latter river, which, owing to the judicious dispositions of General Pope, they were unable to cross until the 25th. In the meantime, General Pope had been reenforced by Reno's division of Burnside's corps, and by the Fifth Corps under General Porter, the head of which only arrived at Aquia Creek on the 21st. Thus, notwithstanding the tardiness of the Confederates, but one corps of the Army of the Potomac, by making forced marches and using every exertion to hasten its transportation by water, was able to join the Army of Virginia on the line designated by the General in Chief. a Pollard's Lost Cause, p. 303. CHAPTER XXIII. REVIEW OF THE CAMPAIGN OF THE SECOND BULL RUN. GENERAL POPE'S ORDERS AND DISPOSITION OF TROɔPS. Had General Pope been left to himself, it is probable that he would have conducted his army back to Bull Run or to the defenses where the concentration could have been effected in safety; but on the 21st, General Halleck telegraphed that in fully forty-eight hours he could be made strong enough, adding "Don't yield an inch if you can help it.' " a This order General Pope carried out to the letter. On the 23d, he intended to cross the Rappahannock and give battle, but was prevented by a rise of the river. The same day, Heintzelman's corps from the Army of the Potomac, without its artillery, arrived by rail at Warrenton Junction, having, by a change of orders, been disembarked at Alexandria, instead of Aquia Creek. On the 25th, General Pope became fully aware of a turning movement by his right. On the 26th, in the evening, Stonewall Jackson, with about 30,000 men, seized his communications at Kettle Run, 6 miles east of Warrenton Junction. For more than sixteen years, the mass of our loyal people of the country have been convinced that the second battle of Bull Run was lost on the 29th of August, and that the loss was due to the disobedience of orders, insubordination, and treachery of some of the high officers of the Army of the Potomac. This conviction was naturally produced by the official dispatches and subsequent report of the commander of the Army of Virginia. In settling so important a question, the only safe data are despatches and official reports. From these it appears that up to the night of August 27, the dispositions of the commander of the Army of Virginia were all that could have been expected from a skillful commander. General Halleck had asked him to hold the Rappahannock till the 23d; he held it till the 26th. His army at the time consisted as follows: Banks's corps Sigel's corps 5,000 McDowell's corps (including Reynold's division of the Fifth Corps, Army of the Potomac) 9,000 15, 500 7,000 Cavalry 18,000 4,000 Total..... 58,500 The cavalry was so completely broken down that there were not more than 500 fit for effective service. Although short of this class of a Report of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, pt. 2, p. 125, Supplement. |