USA > Indiana > Henry County > Hazzard's history of Henry county, Indiana, 1822-1906, Volume I > Part 7
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One of the first matters investigated by the committee was the humiliating affair at Ball's Bluff. The investigation is a fair illustration of the difficulties
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under which the Federal generals labored in the early part of the war. The country was smarting under the disaster and, as is usual in such cases, a scapegoat was demanded and General Stone was the unfortunate victim selected. He was suspected of having held treasonable correspondence with the enemy and, by an order issued from the office of the Secretary of War, he was arrested and im- prisoned for six months in Fort Lafayette. No formal charges were filed, but a secret investigation was held by the Committee on the Conduct of the War. He was not permitted to confront the witnesses against him, nor was he informed what testimony they had given; in vain he demanded a hearing; in vain he demanded a copy of the charges against him. At last such a commotion was raised over the arbitrary proceedings by which he was deprived of his liberty that the authorities were compelled to release him. No one now doubts his loyalty and it has since been shown that the evidence upon which he was imprisoned was totally unworthy of credit. The case stands as a striking illustration of the neces- sity, even in time of war, of jealously guarding the individual liberty of the citizen.
Before the meeting of Congress in December, 1861, General McClellan had gathered together the greatest army ever known in America. It is true that it was not made up of veteran soldiers, but neither was the Confederate army under the command of General Joseph E. Johnston confronting Washington. Mc- Clellan's troops were as well disciplined and as well equipped as Johnston's and numbered twice as many. But Mcclellan's army had been in camp for five months and had made no advance nor any sign of an advance. The whole country was impatient at this delay and the demand in the North was loud and emphatic for a more vigorous prosecution of the war. One of the first changes made in response to this demand was the resignation of Simon Cameron as Secretary of War and the appointment of Edwin M. Stanton as his successor. All efforts to induce McClellan to move had so far proved unavailing. Even Lincoln's patience had been exhausted, and in an interview with Generals McDowell and Franklin, January 10, 1862, he said in his homely way that "if something was not soon done the bottom would be out of the whole affair; and if General Mc- Clellan did not want to use the army he would like to borrow it. provided he could see how it could be made to do something."
Under the constitution Lincoln, by virtue of his office, was commander-in-chief of the armies and navies of the United States. He was, however, totally destitute of military education. Appreciating his deficiencies in this respect he diligently studied books of strategy, poured over the reports of the department commanders, familiarized himself with maps, and in every way sought to understand the military situation. The generals with whom he consulted were surprised, or pretended to be surprised, at his familiarity with technical military learning and with the acuteness of his suggestions. He discussed with McClellan and other generals not only their own plans for the advance to Richmond, but some which he himself had conceived. At a later date he undertook to unfold a favorite plan to Grant. Grant tells us that he "listened respectfully." He did not tell Lincoln, but he tells the readers of his Memoirs, why Lincoln's scheme was impracticable, and adds this brief and characteristic sentence: "I did not communicate my plans to the President, nor did I to the Secretary of War or to General Halleck."
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The chief need now of the Union cause was a competent, responsible head with intelligence to direct, and power to enforce the conduct of military operations comformably to some general systematic plan. After the appointment of the Committee on the Conduct of the War and of Stanton as Secretary of War, McClellan was general-in-chief in name only. All his plans were subjected to the scrutiny not only of the President, but of the Committee on the Conduct of the War and of Stanton, whose influence in military operations was now more powerful than that of President, committee, and general-in-chief combined. The difficulties incident to such divided responsibility and conflicting counsels were intensified when, on March 12, 1862, McClellan was deprived of authority as general-in-chief and his command was limited to that of the Army of the Potomac. For four months after that date there was no general-in-chief of the Federal armies and each department commander was left to work out his own plans without reference to those of other commanders, modified only by such orders as came from Washington. It was not until July 11, 1862, when General Henry W. Halleck was appointed general-in-chief, that there was a responsible head of the Federal armies.
Three of the men already mentioned became very prominent in the Civil War -Stanton, Halleck, and McClellan. Stanton, the new Secretary of War, was a man of great intellectual strength, of sterling honesty, of boundless energy, and of vast executive ability. Though of Quaker descent he was a man of the type of Oliver Cromwell. Men of this type are necessary in great emergencies, but the very qualities that make them valuable are also apt to make them at times arbitrary and tyrannical. Stanton had been Attorney General under President Buchanan and, according to McClellan, was wont, before he became Secretary of War, to speak of Lincoln as the "original gorilla," shocking McClellan by the virulence with which he abused the President, his administration, and the Re- publican party. But, after becoming Secretary of War, he speedily developed into the most radical of the Radicals. He favored the policy of emancipation long before the proclamation was issued and was one of the earliest advocates of the arming of the negroes. He was a man who brooked no opposition and whose dislikes were relentless and enduring. He assumed toward Lincoln the attitude of a self-constituted guardian rather than that of a subordinate officer, and there is no doubt that he was often exasperated by Lincoln's seeming irresolution and disgusted with his jests.
It is probable that Halleck while general-in-chief was little more than Stan- ton's scribe. The latter soon became hostile to McClellan and to Rosecrans. His injustice to Thomas before the battle of Nashville has never been satisfactorily explained, nor has it ever been forgotten by the friends of that illustrious com- mander. In Grant, Stanton at last found a general whose iron will and stubborn tenacity of purpose were superior to his own. Grant's opinion of Stanton is ex- pressed without any circumlocution. He says :
"Owing to his natural disposition to assume all power and control in all matters that he had anything whatever to do with, he boldly took command of the armies, and, while issuing no orders on the subject, prohibited any order from nie going out of the adjutant-general's office until he had approved it. This was done by directing the adjutant-general to hold any orders that came from me to be
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issued from the adjutant-general's office until he had examined them and given lıis approval. He never disturbed himself, either, in examining my orders until it was entirely convenient for him; so that orders which I had prepared would often lie there three or four days before he would sanction them. I remonstrated against this in writing, and the Secretary apologetically restored me to my rightful position of general-in-chief of the army. But he soon lapsed again and took control much as before."
And again, comparing Stanton with Lincoln, Grant says of the former :
"Mr. Stanton never questioned his own authority to command, unless resisted. He cared nothing for the feeling of others. In fact it seemed to be pleasanter to him to disappoint than to gratify. He felt no hesitation in assuming the functions of the executive, or in acting without advising with him. If his act was not sustained, he would change it-if he saw the matter would be followed up until he did so."
Throughout Grant's Memoirs it is easy to perceive the trouble he experienced with both Stanton and Halleck. Probably no enemy in front ever caused him so much annoyance as did these two Federal officials in the rear. During the four months, from March 12 to July 11, 1862, when the Union armies were without a general-in-chief, Stanton was virtually military dictator, for his im- perious will was too strong to be curbed by Lincoln. Whatever his abilities in other directions, he did not have the military education qualifying him to direct the operations of the armies in the field, and McClellan maintains, and with some reason, that the disasters following the Peninsular campaign were in no small part due to Stanton's ignorant and arbitrary interference.
Consistently with the policy of inconsistency, which seemed at the time to govern the military plans of the Federal authorities at Washington, Halleck, who had demonstrated his utter incompetence to accomplish anything with an army of 100,000 men in his own department, had been appointed general-in-chief of all the Federal armies. Only two excuses have ever been offered for his appointment : That General Scott favored him as his successor, and that it was desired to give General Grant full command of Halleck's department where it was thought the latter's jealousy of Grant's rising fame was keeping him in the background. Whatever were the motives for Halleck's appointment as general-in-chief, there is now almost entire unanimity respecting his unfitness for the place. McClellan, in "McClellan's Own Story," p. 137, says of him :
"Of all men whom I have encountered in high position, Halleck was the most hopelessly stupid. It was more difficult to get an idea through his head than can be conceived by any who never made the attempt. I do not think he ever had a correct military idea from beginning to end."
Swinton, in his "Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac," p. 170, a less prejudiced witness than McClellan, speaks of Halleck as "the incalculable ob- struction of the conduct of the war, and the intolerable annoyance of every general commanding the Army of the Potomac." Halleck's jealousy of Grant became apparent at an early period. Soon after the surrender of Fort Donelson, Grant went to Nashville to consult with General Buell, whereupon Halleck sent to McClellan, then general-in-chief, a dispatch containing this outrageous charge:
"I have had no communication with General Grant for more than a week.
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He left his command without my authority and went to Nashville. His army seems to be as much demoralized by the victory of Fort Donelson as was that of the Potomac by the defeat of Bull Run. It is hard to censure a successful general immediately after a victory, but I think he richly deserves it. I can get no returns, no reports, no information of any kind from him. Satisfied with his victory, he sits down and enjoys it without any regard to the future. I am worn out and tired with this neglect and inefficiency. Charles F. Smith is almost the only officer equal to the emergency."
Afterward, Halleck wrote Grant that his conduct had occasioned "very serious complaint at Washington," and tried to make him believe that it was his own interference in his behalf that saved him from the disgrace of an arrest. Halleck's downright duplicity in this affair is very clearly exposed by both Grant and McClellan.
Sherman was even more incensed than Grant against both Stanton and Halleck. His preliminary negotiations with General Joseph E. Johnston just at the end of the war have since been fully explained, but at the time, largely through the distorted construction of them by Stanton, they excited great in- dignation in the North against Sherman, causing that great soldier much mortifica- tion. Shortly before that time Halleck had been appointed to the command of the Department of Virginia with headquarters at Richmond, and he took it on himself to send a dispatch to Stanton containing this extraordinary suggestion :
"The bankers here have information today that Jeff Davis' specie is moving South from Goldsborough in wagons as fast as possible. I suggest that orders be telegraphed through General Thomas that Wilson obey no orders from Sher- man." etc.
Thereupon Stanton sent a dispatch to Thomas, April 27. 1865. reciting Hal- leck's dispatch and adding this :
"You were some days ago notified that the President disapproved Sherman's proceedings and were directed to disregard them. If you have not already done so, you will issue immediate orders to all officers in your command, directing them to pay no attention to any orders but your own or from General Grant," etc.
The insulting character of this order conveying, as it did, a scandalous insinuation against Sherman's loyalty, will be better understood when it is remembered that Generals Thomas and Wilson were at that time subordinate officers under General Sherman, and that he and his victorious army, after the conspicuous services they had rendered the Union cause, were then on their way to Washington. Grant, in his "Memoirs," tells how Sherman resented Halleck's insult :
"It was during this trip that the last outrage was committed upon him. Halleck had been sent to Richmond to command Virginia, and had issued orders prohibit- ing even Sherman's own troops from obeying his, Sherman's, orders. Sherman met the papers on his return, containing this order of Halleck, and very justly felt indignant at the outrage. On his arrival at Fortress Monroe returning from Savannah, Sherman received an invitation from Halleck to come to Richmond and be his guest. This he indignantly refused, and informed Halleck, further- more, that he had seen his order. He also stated that he was coming up to take command of his troops, and as he marched through it would probably be as well
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for Halleck not to show himself, because he (Sherman) would not be responsible for what some rash person might do through indignation for the treatment he had received."
Grant also says, in his "Memoirs," that at the grand review in Washington after the close of the war, Sherman "showed his resentment for the cruel and harsh treatment that had unnecessarily been inflicted upon him by the Secretary of War, by refusing to take his extended hand." At that time Halleck, at least, who had just emerged from a year's obscurity at Washington, had become a very insignificant figure in comparison with the illustrious soldier who had completed a triumphant march through the heart of the Confederacy, and Stanton was no longer the military dictator that he had been for over three years.
As general-in-chief Halleck conducted military operations at long range from Washington-never appearing on a field of battle, but sending telegraphic dis- patches and voluminous letters, planning on paper vast campaigns utterly impos- sible of execution in the field, and so hampering all the generals in front as to make it impossible for them to execute any plans of their own.
Of McClellan it is safe to say that there are few at this day that question his loyalty, of which there was, during the war, a widespread suspicion. Of his military abilities and operations it is perhaps not possible, even at this day, to form a just and impartial estimate. There is no doubt, however, that he was constantly embarrassed and thwarted by the orders that he received from Wash- ington and by the relentless hostility of Stanton. This is clear from the evidence that he himself has furnished. In view of the constant interference with his plans, the wonder now is that he accomplished as much as he did. That he himself felt stung to desperation by what he believed to be the persecution of Stanton is indicated by his remarkable dispatch to the latter June 28, 1862, in which he said :
"If I save this army now, I tell you plainly that I owe no thanks to you or to any other persons in Washington. You have done your best to sacrifice this army."
When McClellan took command of the troops at Washington immediately after the first battle of Bull Run, he found the city full of stragglers and round about in regiments camped indiscriminately here and there without even a brigade organization, or general organization of any kind; without any systematic fortifications or defenses, and even without pickets on some of the roads leading to the capital. McClellan took these unorganized troops, together with the raw recruits that were afterward added, organized, trained, and disciplined them, and out of them fashioned the magnificent Army of the Potomac. He took that army again and with it won a great victory at Antietam; he had never shown so much vigor and generalship as he exhibited immediately before and during this battle, and at the time when he was finally removed from the command of the Army of the Potomac he had the unbounded confidence of all the officers and men under his command.
But McClellan's great faults as a general were that he never ceased preparing for a forward movement, and that he was perpetually exaggerating the strength of the enemy in his front. The chief drawback, however, to his success as a general was a delusion of which he was possessed that he had been predestined from all eternity to be a Moses and Washington combined and to go down to posterity as the savior of his country, his memory surrounded with a halo of
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glory and his fame forever growing more resplendent. Therefore he undertook not only to conduct the military operations entrusted to him, but to advise Lincoln how to discharge his duties as President. In a long letter to the latter, dated July 7, 1862, and since published in "McClellan's Own Story," p. 497, he said :
"Neither confiscation of property, political execution of persons, territorial organization of states, or forcible abolition of slavery should be contemplated for a moment. Military arrests should not be tolerated except in places where active hostilities exist, and oaths not required by enactments constitutionally made should be neither demanded nor received. . . .. Military power should not be allowed to interfere with the relations of servitude, either by supporting or impair- ing the authority of the master, except for the repressing disorder, as in other cases."
In the same letter he assured Lincoln: "A declaration of radical views, especially upon slavery, will rapidly disintegrate our present armies."
Such sentiments ill suited the radical element then in control of the Re- publican party, but greatly elated those in the North who were denouncing the prosecution of the war as an Abolition crusade and who were loudly complaining of arbitrary arrests. The radical leaders of the Republican party could not believe that a man with such sentiments as those advocated by McClellan was fit to lead the armies of the Union to victory, and their conviction of his unfitness was strengthened by his acceptance in 1864 of the nomination for President on a "Peace at any price" platform.
It is probable, however, that future generations, uninfluenced by the intense political prejudices that swayed McClellan's contemporaries, will judge him more leniently. The spirit of justice that, after many years, brought about the vindica- tion of General Fitz-John Porter may be depended upon to correct, as far as it is possible to correct the errors of the past, whatever injustice may have been done to McClellan. In Mcclellan's Own Story he has made a strong defense against many of the aspersions that at an early period were accepted by his political opponents as undoubted facts. His admirers, however, will probably never succeed in convincing the American people that if he had been given all the men and all the opportunities that Grant had, he would ever have accomplished what Grant accomplished.
The wonder is that under such conflicting and incompetent management the Union cause did not speedily fall to pieces. It did not, because military opera- tions in the South were conducted under still greater difficulties. The South, from the beginning, was inferior to the North in men, in munitions of war, and in material resources, but had the great advantage of being on the defensive in the inner circle or interior lines which made them in every way equal to the North. It excelled the North, however, in its abundant yield of political generals, but this proved to be a constant source of weakness. Moreover, if the generals of the North were perplexed with the interference of Stanton and the Committee on the Conduct of the War, the southern generals were still more harassed by the per- petual interference of Jefferson Davis, who affords a striking illustration of the truth of the saying that "a little learning is a dangerous thing." Priding himself on being a West Point graduate and puffed up with exaggerated notions of his military acquirements, he imagined himself profoundly versed in the art of war.
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Acting on this assumption, he constantly thwarted the plans of all the Confederate generals, addling the weaker and confusing the stronger, by suggestions and advice springing from his conceited superiority as a military strategist.
With the extraordinary vanity of Davis was combined an uncontrollable pro- pensity to boast of the anticipated results of his military schemes thus betraying to the enemy in advance plans which a careful general would have taken all pains to conceal. On several occasions the Federal generals gained the first and most reliable information of proposed movements of the Confederate armies from the boastful speeches of Davis as reported in the southern newspapers. It was in this way that Grant was advised of the purpose of Longstreet's advance against Burn- side, and Sherman of Hood's proposed invasion of Tennessee. Pollard, a southern historian, in "The Lost Cause," p. 456, speaking of the withdrawal of Longstreet's corps during the siege of Chattanooga, says :
"This extraordinary military movement was the work of President Davis, who seems, indeed, to have had a singular fondness for erratic campaigns. His visits to every battle-field of the Confederacy were ominous. He disturbed the plans of his generals ; his military conceit led him into the wildest schemes; and so much did he fear that the public would not ascribe to him the hoped-for results of the visionary project, that his vanity invariably divulged it, and successes were foretold in public speeches with such boastful plainness, as to put the enemy on his guard and inform him of the general nature of the enterprise."
The same author, in speaking of Davis's visit to Hood's army after the capture of Atlanta, says :
"The catastrophe moved President Davis in Richmond, and mortified the vanity that had so recently proclaimed the security of Atlanta under the command of Hood. He determined to visit Hood's new lines, to plan with him a new cam- paign, to compensate for the loss of Atlanta, and to take every possible occasion to raise the hopes and confidence of the people. It is remarkable that the visits of the Confederate President to the armies were always the occasions of some far-fetched and empirical plan .of operations, and were always accompanied with vapors and boasts that unduly exalted the public mind. Mr. Davis never spoke of military matters without a certain ludicrous boastfulness, which he maintained to the last event of the war. It was not swagger or affection ; it was the sincere vagary of a mind intoxicated with conceit when occupied with a subject where it imagined it found its forte, but where in fact it had least aptitude. Mr. Davis, as a military commander or adviser, was weak, fanciful to excess, and much too vain to keep his own counsels. As he traveled toward Hood's lines, he made ex- cited speeches in South Carolina and Georgia. At Macon he declared that Atlanta would be recovered; that Sherman would be brought to grief; and that this Federal commander 'would meet the fate that befell Napoleon in the retreat from Moscow.' These swollen assertions, so out of character, were open advertisements to the enemy of a new plan of operations."
If Davis had ever heard it, he evidently did not appreciate the pith of the witty saying attributed to John Adams who is reported to have added, after com- menting on a portrait of George Washington : "And that old wooden-head made his fortune by keeping his mouth shut."
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