ESS A,Y S ; 
 
 IN 
 
 MILITARY BIOGRAPHY 
 
 BY 
 
 CHARLES CORNWALLIS CHESNEY 
 
 COLONEL IN THE BRITISH ARMY AND 
 
 LIEUTENANT COLONEL IN THE 
 
 ROYAL ENGINEERS 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 
 NEW YORK 
 HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 
 
 1874 
 

PREFACE. 
 
 OF THE ESSAYS here republished, the first four 
 relate to the great war in America, the military excel 
 lence displayed in which has been unduly depreciated 
 by comparison with late events on the Continent. 
 There is a disposition to regard the American generals, 
 and the troops they led, as altogether inferior to regu 
 lar soldiers. This prejudice was born out of the blun 
 ders and want of coherence exhibited by undisciplined 
 volunteers at the outset, faults amply atoned for by 
 the stubborn courage displayed on both sides through 
 out the rest of the struggle : while, if a man s claims to 
 be regarded as a veteran are to be measured by the 
 amount of actual fighting he has gone through, the 
 most seasoned soldiers of Europe are but as conscripts 
 compared with the survivors of that conflict. The 
 conditions of war on a grand scale were illustrated to 
 the full as much in the contest in America, as in those 
 more recently waged on the Continent. In all that 
 relates to the art of feeding and supplying an army 
 in the field, the Americans displayed quite as much 
 ability as any continental power ; while if the organiza- 
 
v PREFACE. 
 
 tion and discipline of their improvised troops were 
 inferior, the actual fighting was in fact more stubborn 
 for no European forces have experienced the amount 
 of resistance in combat which North and South opposed 
 to each other. Neither was the frequently indecisive 
 result of the great battles fought in America any proof 
 that they formed exceptions to the ordinary rules of 
 military science. These actions were so inconclusive, 
 first, from deficiency in cavalry, and next because the 
 beaten side would not break up. The American sol 
 diery, in thus refusing to yield to panic when losing 
 the day, retiring in good order, and keeping a good 
 front to the victorious enemy, displayed, let us venture 
 to believe, an inherited quality. In order to pursue, 
 there must be some one to run away, and, to the credit 
 of the Americans, the ordinary conditions of European 
 warfare in this respect were usually absent from the 
 great battles fought across the Atlantic. Hence partly 
 the frequent repetition of the struggle, almost on the 
 same ground, of which the last campaign of Grant and 
 Lee is the crowning example. Nor have those who 
 study the deeds wrought by Farragut and Forter, with 
 improvised means, any reason to hold American sail 
 ors cheaper than our own, or to think lightly of the 
 energy that raised the fleets they led. 
 
 The essays on DE FEZENSAC and VON BRANDT bring 
 to notice memoirs which not only deal with a most 
 interesting period of history, but may be studied with 
 
PREFACE. v 
 
 special advantage at this time. They will prove that 
 the present fashion of depreciating the French military 
 character and ascribing German successes to an innate 
 superiority, though carried to extravagance, is more 
 reasonable than the belief in French invincibility which 
 was as commonly entertained in the earlier days of the 
 first Empire. These memoirs show clearly that the 
 French victories of that era were not due to any intrin 
 sic superiority of a military organization in which might 
 be discerned broad-sown the germs of the faults that 
 have lately been manifested but to the extraordinary 
 imbecility of the powers that controlled the opposing 
 forces. The military qualities of the two races appear 
 to have been then very much what they are now. 
 
 The essay on Lord CORNWALLIS is an attempt to 
 illustrate the life of a man who, without conspicuous 
 ability, effected by common-sense, high-mindedness, and 
 force of character a complete revolution in the Indian 
 Public Service, overcoming in doing this the dearest 
 prejudices of his employers, as well as the self-interest 
 of his subordinates. In his early days Lord Cornwallis 
 had taken an honorable, if not glorious part in the war 
 of American independence, perhaps the most ill-con 
 ducted of the many ill-conducted wars in which England 
 has ever been engaged ; and the memior which follows 
 that on his Indian career gives a curious picture, by 
 one of the loyalist militia he raised, of that almost 
 forgotten struggle, when the Southern states especially 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 were divided almost man against man, as personal 
 feeling declared itself on the side of Congress or King. 
 
 The remaining essays in this volume are designed 
 to record high work done by two brother officers, name 
 sakes, though not related to each other : one, a man 
 who lately ended a life of which heart-whole devotion 
 to duty had been throughout to a degree hard to paral 
 lel, the unswerving guide ; the other, a soldier still 
 young, whose brilliant military genius has already 
 saved an empire from ruin, and is still happily available 
 for the service of his country. 
 
COHSTTE^TS. 
 
 
 "he Military Life of General Grant. 
 Memoir of General Lev. . . .Si 
 
 Admirals Farragut and Porter and the 
 
 Navy of the Union. . . . .136 
 
 4 Northern Raider in the Civil War. . 185 
 
 FezensaJs Recollections of the Grand 
 Army. . . . / I94 
 
 -lenry Von Brandt, # German Soldier 
 
 of the First Empire. . . . .241 
 
 ^ornwallis and the Indian Services. .293 
 
 4 Carolina Loyalist in the Revolutionary 
 
 War. . . 323 
 
 William Gordon of Gordon s Bat- 
 
 . . 34I 
 
 Chinese Gordon and the Taiping Re 
 
 bellion. . . . . . 350 
 
ESSAYS 
 
 IN 
 
 MILITARY BIOGRAPHY. 
 
 THE MILITARY LIFE OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 IT is not very many years since, that a needy man 
 was lounging in the streets of St. Louis, with scarce a 
 friend or a hope in the world. He had left an honor 
 able service under a cloud ; and after trying his hand 
 at the national pursuit of farming, which had brought 
 him much toil and little gain, had turned in vain to 
 other pursuits. As a dealer in wool, as agent for col 
 lecting debts, as auctioneer, as house-agent, he had 
 failed to compete successfully with the sharper or bet 
 ter trained minds around him ; and now what he had 
 regarded as his last chance, his application for a petty 
 local appointment, had been rejected curtly, with the 
 intimation that fit testimonials were lacking in his case. 
 To this ex-captain, bankrupt in fortune, name, and 
 hope, some demon may be imagined whispering, " Why 
 struggle any more against your fate? The world has 
 no place for you and such as you. Your chances have 
 slipped from you. Your day of hope is past. Your 
 friends are growing tired of your existence. Your ac- 
 
2 THE MI LI TAR Y LIFE 
 
 quaintances slink away, lest they should hear of your 
 need. Give up the useless effort to recover yourself, 
 and cast yourself away." On the other hand, his bet 
 ter angel intervening, may have urged him to good 
 courage, reminding him that he had been known on 
 the distant plains of Mexico for distinguished gallantry 
 and conduct ; that the name then gained was not yet 
 wholly lost ; and that in the seemingly peaceful money- 
 seeking country in which his fortune lay, there were 
 hid the elements of a deadly strife, soon possibly to 
 break out, when the soldierly qualities within him 
 would shine forth, and place him as high above more 
 common-place men in fame and fortune, as now he 
 seemed hopelessly beneath them. 
 
 Whether thoughts corresponding to these crossed 
 his mind, and the better in the end predominated, 
 who can truly tell ? Certain it is that the ex-captain 
 Hiram Ulysses Grant,* leaving St. Louis and its 
 temptations behind him, turned towards Galena in 
 Illinois, where his father lived, and was received into 
 his employment. Thus it came about that the future 
 General-in-Chief and President passed the next two 
 years of his life in the humble capacity of assistant to 
 a leather-dealer, taking his turn of rougher and harder 
 occupations in the winter. So passed his time peace 
 fully, but with no recovery of his lost position, until 
 the great events of April 1861 brought Southern pol 
 icy to a decisive issue at Fort Sumter, and electrified 
 the North with Lincoln s sudden call, the first hint 
 
 * Sucli is the President s Christian name. He .was entered how 
 ever as a cadet (by some unexplained mistake) as Ulysses Sidney, and 
 has retained the initials thus received ever since, calling himself 
 Ulysses Simpson. Simpson was his mother s maiden name. 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 the outer world gained of the dimensions of the con 
 test, for 75,000 volunteers. 
 
 In common with all educated men in the United 
 States, Grant had watched the approach of the rup 
 ture with intense interest. A Western man by birth, 
 and now a denizen of the great free state which 
 boasted the new President among her sons, instinct 
 and patriotism made him eager to strike for the Union : 
 nor self-interest less, since here appeared the long- 
 desired opening by which to raise himself at once to 
 the level from which he had fallen. Like many 
 another ex-officer of the army who held to the North, 
 he wrote at once to Washington to beg for a commis 
 sion. The War Office was not, however, to be his 
 door to fame. General Scott, the aged soldier who 
 commanded for the first few months of the war, was 
 stern against the offence of which Grant had been once 
 accused. With Hooker, and some other less known 
 officers who had left the service under similar circum 
 stances, the ex-captain found his application totally 
 neglected. He had not, however, happily, trusted to 
 it alone. Before making it, he had begun to form and 
 drill a company at the town of Galena, and in eight 
 days after Lincoln s first proclamation had his little 
 charge in sufficient order to present it to Governor 
 Yates at Springfield, the state capital. Military men 
 of any real training were exceedingly scarce in the 
 vVest, while military and patriotic enthusiasm 
 abounded. The governor, less prejudiced than Gen 
 eral Scott, after some conversation with Grant, gladly 
 took him into his own office to assist in organizing the 
 volunteers of the state. His professional knowledge 
 (for he had served as a quartermaster), his energy, his 
 
4 THE MILI TAR Y LIFE 
 
 strict attention to details, here made him a most service 
 able assistant; and when, five weeks later, the Twenty- 
 first Illinois Regiment begged the governor to give 
 them a colonel (since no one in the battalion could pro 
 fess the least military knowledge), Mr. Yates pointed 
 to the humbly dressed individual who sat writing in a 
 corner of his room, and said to the deputation, " Gen 
 tlemen, I cannot do better than give you Captain 
 Grant." The appointment was soon made out. Not 
 instantly, however; for Grant, before accepting it, 
 twice visited Cincinnati, where M Clellan was then 
 collecting the troops which soon after raised him to 
 distinction in Western Virginia. Grant had known 
 M Clellan well in former days, and hoped to find a 
 place upon his staff; but missing the general on each 
 occasion, returned finally to Illinois to receive charge 
 of his regiment of volunteers. This was, of course, 
 like all such commands, only mustered for three 
 months; and hence, no doubt, Grant s anxiety to find 
 some more permanent, though nominally lower ap 
 pointment. It is a curious study for the military 
 biographer, to conjecture what would have been the 
 fortunes of Grant had he become attached to those of 
 M Clellan. It is not to be doubted that his opportu 
 nities of separate personal distinction would have been 
 greatly missed, at least for a time, and that his disap 
 pointment in not meeting his old comrade was in 
 truth a remarkable piece of good fortune. 
 
 Taking command of the Twenty-first Illinois Vol 
 unteers early in June, 1861, Grant was ordered forth 
 with across the border to Missouri, each district of 
 which was at that time rent by contests for the pos 
 session of the state, waged by the slaveholding inter- 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 5 
 
 est on the one hand, and the Free-soilers, aided by a 
 powerful contingent of German immigrants, on the 
 other. The first regular officer he served under was 
 General Pope, who ordered him to the town of Mexico. 
 Here, meeting some other volunteer regiments, the 
 colonels begged him, as the only trained officer present, 
 to act as brigadier until some general arrived ; but a 
 week later the " Gazette" contained his commission, 
 with those of thirty-three other officers, as brigadier- 
 general of volunteers. Mr. Washburne, a well-known 
 member of the House of Representatives, and a resi 
 dent of Galena, though he had never noticed his hum 
 ble neighbor during the peaceful days before Fort 
 Sumter fell, had marked the strenuous exertions which 
 Grant had made to give military cohesion to the vol 
 unteers of first the town and then the state. Sup 
 ported by the other representatives of Illinois, he had 
 pressed the new colonel s name on Lincoln as one like 
 ly to do well in a higher command ; and Grant thus 
 came to form one of the first large creation of generals 
 which the growing dimensions of the war made need 
 ful. The promotion was altogether unexpected, and 
 reached the acting-brigadier at Mexico, at first solely 
 through the papers, without his even knowing who had 
 thus befriended him. 
 
 Major-General Fremont at this time commanded 
 the so-called Western Department, lately formed of 
 Illinois and the states west of the Mississippi. His 
 headquarters were naturally at St. Louis (saved to the 
 Union by the happy vigor of the deceased General 
 Lyon), where he had already assumed those extrava 
 gant airs of dictatorship which very soon after caused 
 his removal. He had serious fears for the southern 
 
6 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 portion of Missouri, which, though now freed from the 
 imminent danger of secession, was still penetrated by 
 partisans from Arkansas, and threatened by the large 
 forces known to be assembling for the Confederates 
 in Tennessee. The key to its defence was naturally 
 the town of Cairo, the junction point of the Ohio with 
 the Mississippi ; and hither General Grant (selected 
 by Fremont for his name for care and order rather 
 than for supposed higher qualities) was sent at the 
 opening of September with two brigades, to command 
 " the district of South-east Missouri," which included 
 large portions of the adjacent states. Fremont s in 
 tention at this time appears to have been chiefly to 
 remain on the defensive ; but his lieutenant was other 
 wise minded, and at once looked around for the oppor 
 tunity of action. 
 
 This was afforded ready to his hand by the acts of 
 the Confederates in the vicinity. They had hitherto 
 been separated on the east side of the Mississippi from 
 the Federal forces near Cairo by a strip of Kentucky, 
 which state had declared its neutrality in the contest, 
 Disregarding this, Polk, the well-known Southern 
 bishop-general, had just entered the state to seize and 
 fortify Columbus, an important point on the great 
 river. An officer or his staff had reached Paducah, a 
 small town standing at the point where the river Ten 
 nessee, ending with a northward course, drains the 
 state of that name and the western end of Kentucky 
 into the Ohio. It was probable that the Confederates 
 would, once lodged there, close the Ohio as effectually 
 as they had already closed the Mississippi, while their 
 batteries would also guard the approach up the Ten 
 nessee into the heart of the central members of the new 
 

 OF GENERAL GRANT. j 
 
 Confederation. Grant resolved at once to prevent this. 
 The pretended neutrality of Kentucky he had now no 
 reason to respect, and could therefore strike boldly for 
 the threatened point. Arriving on September second, 
 at Cairo, he heard on the fifth, of Folk s advance, and 
 telegraphing forthwith to Fremont that he should pro 
 ceed on his design, " if not forbidden," he started up 
 the Ohio, and was before Paducah soon after daylight 
 the next morning. The Confederate recruits who were 
 being raised fled hastily from the place, which Grant 
 occupied with a strong garrison ; and he had got back 
 to Cairo before he received Fremont s permission to 
 move " if he felt strong enough." He incurred his 
 chiefs rebuke soon after for having entered directly 
 into correspondence with the Legislature of Kentucky; 
 but the latter, hitherto led away from the Northern 
 cause by their governor, now passed resolutions on the 
 Union side, and the state neutrality which they at first 
 had affected to maintain, was heard of no more. Small 
 as are the details of these events, the energy which 
 they display in Grant ; the readiness with which he used 
 the raw land and water forces newly entrusted to him ; 
 the decision with which he moved into ground hither 
 to neutral, forestalling a too tardy permission ; finally, 
 the clear strategical view which led him to Paducah, a 
 place which was to prove presently of the highest im 
 portance : all testify to his possession at that time of 
 the very qualities of generalship for which all the world 
 has later given him credit. The moderation, tact, and 
 good sense of the politician appeared as plainly in the 
 address he issued on entering the town ; and as this 
 was the first important public document of his life, it 
 is well to read it in the original words : 
 
3 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 "PADUCAH, Kentucky, Sept 6, 1861. 
 " To the Citizens of Paducah, I am coming among you 
 not as an enemy, but as your fellow-citizen ; not to mal 
 treat you nor annoy you, but to respect and enforce the 
 rights of all loyal citizens. An enemy, in rebellion against 
 our common government, has taken possession of, and 
 planted his guns on the soil of Kentucky, and fired upon 
 you. Columbus and Hickman are in his hands. He is 
 moving upon your city. I am here to defend you against 
 this enemy, to assist the authority and sovereignty of your 
 government. I have nothing to do with opinions, and shall 
 deal only with armed rebellion and its aiders and abettors. 
 You can pursue your usual avocations without fear. The 
 strong arm of the government is here to protect its friends 
 and punish its enemies. Whenever it is manifest that you 
 are able to defend yourselves and maintain the authority of 
 the government, and protect the rights of loyal citizens, I 
 shall withdraw the forces under my command. 
 
 " U. S. GRANT, 
 " Brigadier- General Commanding" 
 
 Having thus secured the Ohio to its mouth, with 
 Paducah as the key to future operations up the Ten 
 nessee, Grant next turned his attention down the 
 Mississippi, where Polk was converting Columbus into 
 an important post commanding the stream. " If it 
 was discretionary with me," he wrote Fremont, on Sep 
 tember tenth, "with a little addition to my present 
 force, I would take Columbus." But his chief, who 
 looked on the garrison at Cairo as entirely subsidiary 
 to his own action in the interior of Missouri, made no 
 reply. Not until November was Grant permitted to 
 do more than organize his volunteer battalions and 
 strengthen his position : but on the third of that 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. g 
 
 month came orders to detach a force westward to co 
 operate with Fremont s movements on the frontier of 
 Arkansas. This was sent under Colonel Oglesby ; and 
 on the fifth, Fremont telegraphed to Cairo that Grant 
 should " make a demonstration " towards Columbus to 
 prevent Polk from sending detachments over the Mis 
 sissippi to aid the Arkansas Confederates. Next day, 
 therefore, he moved down the stream with the trans 
 ports previously provided for his command, taking all 
 his available troops, 3,000 men, of whom a large part 
 had only received their arms five days before. So 
 rough was the material in the action which followed. 
 
 At two A. M. on November seventh, Grant learned 
 from friends on the Kentucky side that Polk had 
 crossed a large detachment the day before to Bel- 
 mont, a low point lying opposite to and under the 
 guns of Columbus, with the design of cutting off Ogles 
 by from Cairo. He at once resolved to turn the 
 "demonstration" ordered into a real attack, and by 
 the sudden capture of the Confederate camp to check 
 the proposed operation. His purpose was at first 
 fairly carried out. Landing his men on the western 
 bank just out of sight of Columbus, he left one battal 
 ion in reserve to cover his boats, and with the rest 
 moved on the camp, three miles off, spreading out his 
 men in skirmishing order as he approached. The Con 
 federates were soon met, and there was much noise 
 and little advance for a long time, as might be expected 
 with such untrained soldiers : but the gallantry of 
 Grant and General M Clernand, a brigadier of volun 
 teers commanding under him (both of whom had their 
 horses shot in the attack), carried their raw-troops on 
 until the camp was taken, and the enemy, 2,500 men 
 
j o THE MI LIT A K Y LIFE 
 
 under General Pillow, pushed to the river bank. Here 
 pursuit and success ended ; for, to use the words of 
 one northern account, the men losing all attempt at 
 order " behaved like so many school-boys, while their 
 colonels took to making stump speeches for the 
 Union." Nor was it until Grant s own staff had set the 
 camp in flames, and brought on it the fire of the guns 
 at Columbus, that any order was restored. There 
 was no possibility of holding what was gained, since 
 the site of the camp was completely commanded by 
 the enemy s works. An orderly retreat to the trans 
 ports was all that the best troops could now have ac 
 complished, and to this task under the circumstances, 
 the Federals were not equal. Polk had not been idle 
 in the interval, and had dispatched five regiments 
 across the stream in boats to take the assailants in 
 flank. Three of these had already landed, and their 
 skirmishers were spreading in the woods between the 
 Federals and their transports. " We are surrounded," 
 said one of the staff riding up to Grant, with the 
 warmth of a man in action for the first time. " Well," 
 was the calm reply, " if that is so, we must cut our 
 way out as we cut it in." Some of the troops, at the 
 first thought of their being entrapped, had been for 
 laying down their arms at once : but taking heart at 
 their leader s coolness, they pushed on and cleared 
 their way without difficulty. Grant had in truth 
 already discovered the secret which he so often after 
 wards used with success ; that when both sides are 
 equally undisciplined and confused, success belongs to 
 that which makes the boldest front and moves the 
 most promptly to attack. The re-embarkation was 
 no easy matter : for he was anxious to carry off as 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. I r 
 
 many of his wounded as possible ; his men were too 
 confused to attend to orders ; not one of his staff had 
 the smallest experience: and the reserve battalion 
 which was to have covered the rear, had gone off to 
 the transports on its own account. Grant was the 
 last man on the bank when the boats were moving 
 away; and the Confederate skirmishers got so close to 
 him that he would certainly have fallen, but that they 
 were bent on trying to disable the crews, and not 
 distinguishing his rank under his private s overcoat, 
 suffered him to slip almost from under their hands. 
 
 The Battle of Belmont, as this combat, the first 
 of any serious nature in the valley of the Mississippi, 
 was magniloquently termed, has formed a subject of 
 controversy beyond its natural importance. Polk, who 
 had driven off the assailants finally, having seen them 
 embark in much disorder, and captured many of their 
 wounded, claimed it loudly as a victory. Grant, who 
 had attained his immediate object, gained the confi 
 dence of his men, and inflicted on the enemy a loss 
 (including nearly 200 prisoners whom he brought off) 
 greater than his own, regarded it as a valuable success 
 for his side ; and the improved tone of his troops fully 
 justified the boast. But the North was looking al 
 ready for advance at all cost into the enemy s country; 
 and seeing only the fact of the troops retiring from 
 the point which they had occupied, long spoke of it as a 
 disaster which was atoned for by the leader s later suc 
 cesses. No doubt it was for this reason that Grant, 
 years afterwards, when he had climbed to the highest 
 military honors, withdrew the summary report of the 
 affair which he had originally sent in, to substitute for 
 it an elaborate narrative showing fully what were the 
 
12 
 
 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 objects of the expedition, and how far they had been 
 accomplished. It is worth while to note that this 
 later report coincides fully, except as to the exact 
 numbers lost, with a graphic account written the very 
 morning after the battle to his father, by the general, 
 a dutiful son as well as a good correspondent through 
 out the war. This account concludes with the follow 
 ing sketch of the retreat : 
 
 " We found the Confederates well armed and brave. On 
 our return, stragglers, that had been left in our rear (now 
 front), fired into us, and some recrossed the river and gave 
 us battle for a full mile, and afterwards at the boats when 
 we were embarking. 
 
 " There was no hasty retreating or running away. Tak 
 ing into account the object of the expedition, the victory 
 was complete. It has given us confidence in the officers 
 and men of this command, that will enable us to lead them 
 in any future engagement without fear of the result. General 
 M Clernand (who, by the way, acted with great coolness and 
 courage throughout and proved that he is a soldier as well 
 as a statesman) and myself, each had our horses shot under 
 us. Most of the field officers met with the same loss, 
 besides nearly one third of them being themselves killed or 
 wounded. As near as I can ascertain, our loss was about 
 two hundred and fifty killed, wounded, and missing." 
 
 The mistaken view of the Belmont affair taken by 
 an excited press was not that of the trained soldiers 
 now rising to control of the war. One of these, Gen 
 eral Halleck, a man deserving more credit for his 
 organizing faculties than he ever obtained in Europe, 
 arrived at St. Louis to supersede Fremont not many 
 days later. He not only retained Grant in his com- 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. ! 3 
 
 mand, but in December largely augmented it, allotting 
 nearly the whole of Kentucky to his district, and thus 
 making him the chief instrument in the strategy of 
 the coming campaign. For it was of this Kentucky, 
 the state most central to the operations of the war 
 viewed as a whole, that Sherman, to the great indig 
 nation of sanguine politicians, and to his own tem 
 porary damage, had already prophesied that " it would 
 need 200,000 men to keep her to the Union." 
 
 The year 1862 opened on a new phase of the war. 
 It had now passed entirely beyond the stage of local 
 divisions, constitutional measures, and separate action 
 of states, and had become a grave struggle of the 
 vastest dimensions between two great sections of a 
 divided nation ; a civil war, in fact, such as the world 
 had never witnessed before, on the issues of which 
 depended not merely the unity of a country, but the 
 shaping the whole destinies of a continent. The sword 
 of the North, slow to move but terrible in its force, 
 was now fully drawn ; though the time had not yet 
 come for Lincoln, by his proclamation against slavery, 
 to fling away the scabbard, and pledge the Union of 
 the future to enforce emancipation, so winning the 
 world s opinion to his side. 
 
 To understand the strategy of the spring campaign 
 which followed, it is necessary to take a general survey 
 of the Confederate line to be attacked. This began 
 far to the east in Kentucky, where Sydney Johnston, 
 at that time the best known of the Southern officers, 
 lay with 25,000 men, by rumor magnified to 100,000, 
 and it ran across Kentucky to the Mississippi at 
 Columbus, and thence into Arkansas, where forces of 
 vague but very considerable strength were collecting, 
 
I4 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 to repel any advance from Missouri. The centre of 
 the line may be regarded as the strip of Kentucky 
 stretching from the Mississippi for sixty miles east 
 ward across the Tennessee to the Cumberland, a large 
 stream running near the latter river and parallel to it 
 in the northern portion of its course, into the Ohio. 
 The weakness of this part of their line was not 
 unknown to the Confederates; since the Tennessee 
 and Cumberland are open to steamers high up during 
 the spring, and the Federals, holding the mouths of 
 both ever since Grant s seizure of Paducah, were known 
 to be augmenting their transport constantly at that 
 place and at Cairo, with a view either to forcing the 
 Mississippi, or penetrating through Kentucky into the 
 state of Tennessee by the two minor streams. It was 
 supposed, however, these might be easily closed by 
 works, as the former was already ; and at one of the 
 narrowest points between the two, where they are 
 but fifteen miles from each other, Fort Henry on the 
 ri^ht or eastern bank of the Tennessee, and Fort 
 
 o 
 
 Donelson on the left or west of the Cumberland, were 
 thrown up for that purpose. The operations that fol 
 lowed have been often described, and their credit, as a 
 whole, assigned to Halleck: but it is but fair to state 
 that both Grant, and the naval commander with him, 
 the gallant Foote, had early in the year sought per 
 mission to capture Fort Henry, as their letters of Jan 
 uary prove ; so as at least to keep the Tennessee open 
 and paralyse the Confederates on the Cumberland, as 
 well as those on the Mississippi at Columbus, by break 
 ing the line between them and threatening each in 
 reverse. On the other hand, Halleck s instructions, 
 which were issued in detail on January thirtieth, and 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 1 5 
 
 the care with which he had accumulated his means 
 under Grant s hand, prove sufficiently that he had 
 resolved, before hearing from them, on the very course 
 his lieutenant had agreed to adopt ; and as he alone 
 could control the operations on the whole western 
 theatre, it is just that the praise of the original con 
 ception should remain his. Grant and Foote started, 
 accordingly, with 17,000 men and seven gun-boats, on 
 February second, and the spring campaign of 1862 was 
 opened, a campaign which Grant s energy was destined 
 to carry to infinitely greater results than the designer 
 dreamed of. 
 
 The plan of the joint commanders was to first 
 attack Fort Henry by water and land simultaneously, 
 so as to invest the garrison and take it with the works. 
 The combination party failed however, for Tilghman, 
 who commanded, sent his infantry off to avoid such 
 a contingency ; but finding his gunners unable to 
 maintain their posts in face of the fire of the gun-boats, 
 surrendered presently to Foote at discretion. Hal- 
 leek s next instructions pointed rather to a strong 
 occupation of the point in the enemy s line thus taken 
 than to any similar operations on the Cumberland ; 
 but his bolder lieutenant, rising with success to the 
 height of his position, at once telegraphed his inten 
 tion to march across the neck of land between the 
 streams against Fort Donelson, and issued orders to 
 his troops accordingly. His design was stayed for the 
 time by the sudden rising of the Tennessee, which 
 flooded the roads eastward, and, as he reported at the 
 moment, " perfectly blocked in " the army. Hearing 
 of this, Halleck still spoke in his orders solely of 
 defensive measures. Grant s resolution, however, had 
 
i6 
 
 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 been taken, and with that determination of character 
 which marks his whole military Career, he wrote to 
 Cairo during the delay for all possible reinforcements, 
 and to Foote (whose gun-boats were exploring the 
 Tennessee), to move round to the Cumberland and 
 help him. " I feel that there should be no delay in 
 this matter," were his words on the tenth ; and finding 
 himself able to move on the twelfth, he marched 
 across at once on Fort Donelson. The distance was 
 about twelve miles; and as the enemy remained 
 entirely on the defensive, though at this time not 
 inferior in numbers (as careful inquiry has since proved) 
 to their bold assailants, Grant got in sight of the works 
 in the afternoon, drove in the pickets, and prepared 
 to invest the place as coolly as though he outnumbered 
 the defenders threefold. The few days that followed 
 were probably the most anxious in his life. His gun 
 ammunition fell short. His men, having marched 
 without tents, were benumbed by the cold showers of 
 sleet. The iron-clad gun-boats were fairly beaten off 
 in their attempt to subdue the river defences on the 
 fourteenth, and Foote himself hurt. It was not until 
 the same night that Grant s numbers were raised by 
 reinforcements to a strength superior to that of the 
 force he held enclosed ; and when the enemy issued 
 forth next day in an attempt to force his lines, he was 
 absent on a visit to the wounded commodore, and 
 returned in haste to find his troops demoralized and 
 shaken by their losses, although they saw the foe 
 retiring. His own tenacity and military quickness of 
 perception here changed a doubtful struggle into a 
 brilliant success. "Are their haversacks filled ?" he 
 asked, as he saw some prisoners led in, carrying each 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. l j 
 
 a heavy load. Three days rations were reported to 
 be found in each. " Then they meant to cut their 
 way out, and not to fight," he said ; and, looking at 
 his own disordered men, added, " whichever party first 
 attacks now, will whip;" then riding sharply to his 
 left, which had not been attacked in the sally, he 
 ordered an immediate assault upon the works. 
 General C. Smith commanded this wing, an excellent 
 officer of regulars, though now somewhat advanced in 
 years. When last they were thrown together, he had 
 been the College Commandant of West Point, and his 
 present chief one of the cadets who held him in awe. 
 " I am now a subordinate, and know a soldier s duty," 
 he had said shortly before to Grant, observing the natu 
 ral hesitation with which the latter issued him some 
 orders. " I hope you will feel no awkwardness about 
 our new relations; and as he had already shown his 
 thorough subordination in the preceding movements, 
 so now he led on his men with all the ardor of a 
 youthful soldier. For once, an event seldom repeated 
 during the war, the intrenchmentswere fairly assaulted 
 and carried with the bayonet. False attacks, directed 
 by Grant with his right and centre at other parts of 
 the work, distracted the attention of the Confederates, 
 and prevented their concentrating to drive Smith out ; 
 and at dark his division still held the key of Fort 
 Donelson. The rest of the story is too well known 
 for us to do more than refer to its strange details ; the 
 disgraceful personal fears which caused Floyd and 
 Pillow successively to abandon the troops under their 
 command ; the fine escape of Colonel Forrest (after 
 wards a Confederate general of mark) with the cavalry ; 
 the vain attempt of Buckner, the third commander of 
 
T g THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 the garrison, to procure terms; the decisive demand 
 of Grant (who saw into the condition of affairs) for 
 unconditional surrender, with the famous threat, " I 
 propose to move immediately upon your works ; " and 
 the triumph that followed ; all these are fully set forth 
 in the official narratives of either side. While dis 
 grace justly overtook the two fugitive leaders of the 
 South, a cry of exultation went through the North at 
 this unhoped-for success. The 14,000 prisoners borne 
 off to Cairo formed a solid presage of future successes 
 in the West, which was sufficient to balance the dis 
 credit of Bull s Run, and to leave the advantage 
 already on the stronger side. Grant was at once 
 recommended by Stanton for a major-generalcy of 
 volunteers, and his name passed from the Secretary to 
 the President, and the President to the Senate the 
 same day. Halleck alone appears to have dissented 
 from this arrangement. Old prejudices probably more 
 than mere jealousy of his lieutenant s vast success, 
 caused him to recommend Smith to be promoted over 
 Grant s head, as the true author of the victory. But 
 this recommendation, which came late, received no 
 attention at Washington, where it was plainly seen 
 that it was Grant who had achieved success by taking 
 large- responsibility upon himself. Stanton declared 
 that his historic message to General Buckner should 
 be the true motto for the conduct of the war, and gave 
 the victor an unfailing support from that time until it 
 came to an end. As to the good old man himself 
 whom Halleck would have elevated over his comman 
 der, when speaking of the assault to Buckner (an old 
 West Point acquaintance) on the day of the surrender, 
 Smith said, " It was well done, considering our force ; 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. IC} 
 
 but no congratulations are due to me ; I simply obeyed 
 orders." 
 
 The gratitude and reward which Grant at once 
 met with were fairly his due for the tactical success 
 of his exploits. He had marched boldly up to a forti 
 fied camp held by numbers equal to his own ; enclos 
 ed them in their works until he received reinforce 
 ments; defeated them on open ground when, too 
 late, they moved out to battle ; finally, assaulted and 
 carried the most commanding point of their intrench- 
 ments, and forced them to lay down their arms on the 
 spot. All this was done with a loss of 2,500 Federals 
 killed and wounded a number not quite equal to 
 one-tenth of those engaged ! It is hardly surprising 
 that the effect of this victory told much upon the 
 character of Grant. We shall see it avowedly influ 
 encing his tactics in the battles that soon followed, and 
 that to the advantage of his army and -his fame : but, 
 on the other hand, it is no less plain to the discerning 
 student of the war that it taught the chief Federal 
 general to overrate the effect of dogged resolution and 
 brute strength, and caused him to suffer some fearful 
 lessons in consequence, when he carried out his favor 
 ite idea beyond the bounds of prudence against a vet 
 eran and determined enemy. 
 
 Great as was the immediate effect of the victory 
 on the confidence of his soldiers and of the North, the 
 results were in truth much larger than the most san 
 guine of those unobservant of its strategic bearing 
 could possibly have expected. The Confederate line 
 of defence thus pierced at its centre, the ends were 
 cut off, fell back, and the whole gave way to a general 
 advance of the Federals. Bowling Green on the east, 
 
20 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 and Columbus on the west, were hurriedly abandoned. 
 Kentucky and the greater part of Tennessee passed at 
 a blow into the hands of the North. Halleck s de 
 signs rose with these successes far beyond the origi 
 nal views of that general ; and though he had writ 
 ten on the morning of the surrender to Grant u not to 
 be too rash," and two days later to " limit the oper 
 ations of the gun-boats " on the rivers thus opened, 
 he had in two days more attained a clearer perception 
 of the state of affairs, and telegraphed to M Clellan 
 to ask for himself the command of the whole armies 
 of the West, for " hesitation and delay," he added, 
 " are losing us the golden opportunity." It would 
 have been better for his fame had the credit gained 
 by his lieutenant served to rouse no other feeling than 
 emulation of his energy. 
 
 One of these armies of the West was that of Gen 
 eral Buell in Kentucky, which had been opposed to 
 that under Sydney Johnston, and was now following 
 the Confederates on their retreat from Bowling Green. 
 The line lay through Nashville, the capital of Tennes 
 see: but as this city lies upon the Cumberland, it was 
 as directly open to Grant to enter it as to Buell. 
 Grant, however, knew that any further decisive opera 
 tions must be dependent on the line of strategy chosen 
 by Halleck. He therefore sent only his advanced 
 guard fifty miles towards Nashville, and wrote to sug 
 gest a movement onwards to the city. This, however, 
 the leading division from Kentucky had reached and 
 occupied unopposed before Halleck s answer came ; 
 and Grant having heard of the event, went on to 
 meet Buell and arrange as to the disposition of the 
 troops, the two armies being wholly independent of 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 21 
 
 each other. It is painful to record what followed, for 
 it would seem that Grant s chief had either conceived 
 a genuine distrust of his lieutenant, or had some 
 meaner motive for seeking a quarrel with him. On 
 February twenty-eighth, Grant had returned to his 
 army, and received instructions to make more regular 
 returns of the forces under his orders. Next day, 
 March first, Halleck wrote him to move back from the 
 Cumberland to the Tennessee, with a view of using 
 the line of that river for operations towards Corinth, 
 a great railroad junction in the state of Mississippi. 
 On the third, with no previous intimation to Grant, 
 Halleck telegraphed to Washington two complaints 
 against him, in a severe dispatch : " . . . He left his 
 command without my authority, and went to Nash 
 ville. ... I can get no returns, no reports, no informa 
 tion of any kind from him. Satisfied with his vic 
 tory, he sits down and enjoys it. ... C. Smith is 
 almost the only officer equal to the emergency." 
 Next day, after receiving a reply which has not been 
 recorded, he directed Grant to place Smith in com 
 mand of the troops about to go forward, and to re 
 main himself at Fort Henry, adding, " Why do you 
 not obey my orders to report strength and position ? " 
 On Grant s replying next day, " I have reported 
 almost daily the condition of my command, and re 
 ported every position occupied," he received a stern 
 reply, beginning, " General M Clellan directs that you 
 report to me daily" and ending with the complaint 
 now first mentioned to himself, of his going " to Nash 
 ville without authority " Grant was naturally much 
 hurt : 
 
22 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 " I have averaged writing (was his reply on the sixth) more 
 than once a day, to keep you informed of my position, and 
 it is no fault of mine if you have not received my letters. 
 My going to Nashville was strictly intended for the good of 
 the service and not to gratify any desire of my own. Be 
 lieving sincerely that I must have enemies between you and 
 myself, who are trying to impair my usefulness, I respectfully 
 ask to be relieved from further duty in the department." 
 
 And after another rebuke of precisely the same 
 tenor, Grant renewed his request on the ninth and 
 eleventh in stronger terms. Halleck probably had 
 changed his mind as to the wisdom of the course he 
 was pursuing, or was satisfied to have shown his own 
 authority supreme ; for on the thirteenth he replied in 
 a friendly and almost apologetic strain, concluding, 
 " Instead of relieving you, I wish you, as soon as your 
 new wing is in the field, to assume the immediate 
 command, and lead it on to new victories ; a wish 
 which Grant at once received with good will, and forth 
 with withdrew his resignation. Halleck now wrote to 
 Washington (in reply to inquiries his own complaints 
 had produced), that Grant had " made the proper ex 
 planations, and been directed to resume his command 
 in the field." Thus ended this strange episode of the 
 first Federal victory, the most pleasant comment on 
 which is, that it in no wise interfered with the cordial 
 working of Grant with Halleck, when their positions 
 were reversed two years later by the rise of the former 
 to the chief command of the whole armies of the 
 Union. 
 
 Joining the forces which had gone in advance up 
 the Tennessee under Smith, who died soon after from 
 the effects of his exposure before Fort Donelson, 
 
OF GENERAL GRAN7\ 2 $ 
 
 Grant, by Halleck s orders, collected his divisions, 
 amounting to 38,000 men, and remained on the defen 
 sive, awaiting the arrival of Buell from Nashville with 
 as many more ; for that general was now also put un 
 der Halleck. General Smith had already placed the 
 army on the west, or hostile bank of the Tennessee, 
 regarding his position as a base for future operations 
 into Mississippi ; and Grant made no change in the 
 disposition but by drawing his troops more together. 
 Yet there was some obvious danger in this arrange 
 ment, because the enemy was known to be rapidly 
 concentrating a large force at Corinth, twenty miles 
 off, by means of his railroads ; and Grant s camp lay 
 open to their attack, inasmuch as the Federal soldiers 
 had not yet begun to educe, from sharp experience, 
 the knowledge (which afterwards proved of such 
 countless value to them) of the use of rough intrench- 
 ments. The Confederates were estimated, vaguely 
 enough, at 100,000 men, their real number being just 
 equal to that under Grant ; and the Federal general 
 (as letters since published show plainly) grew more and 
 more anxious as time went on, and his colleague, a 
 deliberate man much given to cautious movement and 
 elaborate bridge-building, failed to arrive. From Co 
 lumbia, ninety miles off, which Buell reached on March 
 nineteenth, it took him seventeen days to attain the 
 Tennessee at Savanna, a point on the other side of the 
 river, and seven miles lower down than Grant s camp 
 at Pittsburg Landing. This was April fifth. Grant 
 directed the leading division (Nelson s), which only re 
 ported itself that day, to rffove up the river and hold 
 itself ready to reinforce his army, for there was skir 
 mishing along the front of the camp in the woods, and 
 
24 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 the enemy s cavalry had been seen in force. Next 
 morning Johnston s forces issued from the cover they 
 had secretly occupied close to the camp, and fell upon 
 the Federals, resolved to overwhelm them and drive 
 them into the stream. 
 
 It is a great mistake to say, with the vulgar ver 
 sion, that Grant was completely surprised at Pittsburg. 
 At the first firing he sent to Buell, words which prove 
 the contrary. " I have been looking for this, but did 
 not believe the attack would be made before Monday 
 or Tuesday." Moreover, General Prentiss, who held 
 the part of the camp towards Corinth, had been 
 warned of the danger, and had doubled his guards and 
 pushed his pickets some way in advance the day 
 before, though not far enough for security. Ere he 
 could collect his startled men from their untasted 
 breakfasts and form them, they were driven in upon 
 the other divisions, and the battle became general and 
 severe. Grant received no aid until late in the day 
 from Nelson, nor from L. Wallace, who, with one of 
 his own divisions, lay farthest down the river. Indeed, 
 the latter officer, one of the Federal commanders who 
 was unfortunate throughout the war, did not move 
 until he had had his orders five hours, and then took 
 the wrong route, arriving at seven P.M.; whereas, ac 
 cording to Grant s report to the War Department, the 
 division might, but for its commander s personal con 
 duct, have been on the ground at one o clock. The 
 Federals in his absence \vere outnumbered ; and 
 though little of tactical skill was displayed on either 
 side, they gave ground gradually, leaving General 
 Prentiss, with part of his division, who had stood their 
 ground too long, in the enemy s hands. The fight 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 2 $ 
 
 was carried on in the simple form of two long parallel 
 lines firing hotly at one another at no great distance, 
 until at four P.M. the Federals were driven close to 
 the landing-place, where those that were steady held 
 their ground till dark. 
 
 " All around the landing" (says a Federal historian, 
 writing of the moment when Buell came up) " lay the cravens 
 who had swarmed in from the front, as many do in nearly 
 every battle ; these, however, were not stragglers nor lag 
 gards, but the panic-stricken mob, who had fled from that 
 danger which so many of their fellows seemed to court. As 
 the two generals were conversing at the landing, Grant ex 
 plained the situation of affairs, then apparently at the worst; 
 and Buell inquired: What preparations have you made for 
 retreating, General ? His remark was hardly concluded, 
 when Grant interrupted him at once, exclaiming : I haven t 
 despaired of whipping them yet. " 
 
 He had seen that the efforts of the assailants were 
 slackening. Exhausted with their long day s work, 
 thousands of Johnston s men had left the ranks to 
 plunder the abandoned camp of the Federals. Their 
 chief himself had fallen in pressing them on to the vic 
 tory he saw so near, and their loss had not been much 
 less than that of Grant s forces, which amounted to full 
 10,000 put hors de combat, including Generals W. Wal 
 lace killed, Prentiss taken, and Sherman wounded. 
 The Confederates were unable to push forward for the 
 final effort, which would have driven the Federals on 
 their boats ; and seeing this, Grant resolved to resume 
 the offensive next day, unsupported or not, it being on 
 his side impossible to urge his jaded men into an of 
 fensive that evening. As the turn in the battle has 
 
2 6 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 been naturally enough, both in America and elsewhere, 
 ascribed to the arrival of Buell, it is as well to make 
 the matter clear by the narrative of General Sherman, 
 written in 1865. This exactly confirms the assertion 
 made by those who knew him best that Grant from 
 the time of Fort Donelson, believed in there being al 
 ways a time in every hard-fought battle when both 
 armies being nearly exhausted, and it seeming impos 
 sible for either to do more, the one that first renews 
 the fight will win it. Sherman writes in so admirable 
 a spirit of candor and fairness, that his words should 
 be read in full : 
 
 "I never was disposed, nor am I now, to question any 
 thing done by General Buell and his army, and know that 
 approaching our field of battle from the rear, he encountered 
 that sickening crowd of laggards and fugitives that excited 
 his contempt, and that of his army, who never gave full credit 
 to those in the front line who did fight hard, and who had, at 
 four P.M. checked the enemy, and were preparing the next 
 day to assume the offensive. I remember the fact the better 
 from General Grant s anecdote of his Donelson battle, which 
 he told me then for the first time that at a certain period 
 of the battle he saw that either side was ready to give way, 
 if the other showed a bold front, and he determined to do 
 that very thing, to advance on the enemy, when, as he 
 prognosticated, the enemy surrendered. At four P.M. of 
 April sixth, he thought the appearances the same, and he 
 judged, with Lewis Wallace s fresh division and such of our 
 startled troops as had recovered their equilibrium, he would 
 be justified in dropping the defensive and assuming the of 
 fensive in the morning. And, I repeat, I received such 
 orders before I knew General Buell s troops were at the river. 
 I admit that I was glad Buell was there, because I knew 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 his troops were older than ours, and better systematized and 
 drilled, and his arrival made that certain which before was 
 
 Grant s army passed the night under arms amid 
 storms of rain ; but the transports were busy through 
 the darkness, and in the morning 20,000 of Buell s 
 force were ready for the action, with the remains of 
 the divisions which had fought the day before. This 
 great accession of strength told at once, when, in ac 
 cordance with Grant s resolve, the Federals advanced 
 to make their counter-attack at early morning. The 
 ground was very heavy from the rain, and the move 
 ments in consequence even more slow than the ordi 
 narily heavy mauceuvres of the early days of the war. 
 Beauregard, who had succeeded Johnston, found him 
 self from the first obliged to give ground, and falling 
 back slowly, left the scene of contest altogether about 
 noon, retreating upon Corinth unpursued ; for Buell s 
 men were declared by their officers exhausted by their 
 efforts to get up, as Grant s own were by the long bat 
 tle just ended. 
 
 This had been not merely the severest contest of 
 the war thus far, but its fierceness was hardly after 
 wards repeated. General Sherman has expressly said 
 that he never saw fighting so terrible ; possibly be 
 cause the panic among some of the raw troops of his 
 division, rendered necessary the exposure of his own 
 person in a wholly exceptional manner, and made the 
 conduct of the rest seem heroic. Grant has compared 
 the battle to that of the Wilderness ; but with little 
 justice, as it seems to us, inasmuch as at Pittsburg 
 the losses on either side (excluding those of Buell, all 
 suffered on the second day) were as nearly equal as 
 
2 8 THE MILITARY LIPE 
 
 possible,* like the strength of the original armies; 
 whereas at the Wilderness, as will be seen hereafter, 
 the disproportion was extraordinary. The victory 
 was claimed by either side; by the Confederates, 
 because they had captured their enemy s camp with 
 many prisoners, and had at one time all but destroyed 
 his army ; by the Federals, because they had at last 
 successfully repulsed the assault. In all such cases 
 the only safe method is to consider what was the real 
 object of a battle, and how far it was attained : and as 
 that of Johnston and Beauregard was undoubtedly to 
 crush Grant before succour arrived, and of Grant to 
 hold his own until Buell joined him, the true success 
 should belong beyond dispute to the Federal general. 
 Its moral effect was, however, impaired by the over 
 cautious conduct of Halleck, who coming up at this 
 time to assume charge of the united armies, kept 
 them from directly following up the enemy, and ap 
 proached Corinth by the slower process of advancing 
 solely under breastworks, thus giving to his soldiers 
 as well as to their country the impression that he was 
 afraid, after late events, to trust them in the open 
 ground. 
 
 In another respect the battle greatly disappointed 
 Grant. He had supposed, with most other North 
 erners, and in opposition to the views which made 
 Sherman unpopular, that one or two sharp blows, like 
 that of Fort Donelson, would end the war. The vigor 
 and determination with which General Johnston had 
 taken the offensive so soon after that great loss, 
 showed plainly that any such expectation was a fal- 
 
 * Grant s loss was, excluding Buell s 10,040; Beauregard s 10,699, 
 by their own official reports. 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 2 9 
 
 lacy. Then Grant arrived at the conviction, on which 
 as a whole he thereafter ever acted, that the war 
 would never end until the Southern armies were 
 crushed and worn down, and that they, not forts or 
 cities or territory, should be the chief objects of the 
 strategy which controlled the greater resources of the 
 North. From this time also he, and those that fol 
 lowed him, gave up the notion of sparing the property 
 of the South. The Confederacy had succeeded, they 
 admitted, in making this a war of the people. The 
 people, therefore, must suffer, until the people yielded. 
 Hitherto he, with most of the Federal generals, would 
 have protected slavery as an institution. Hencefor 
 ward that too must perish, with state rights, inde 
 pendent Constitutions, and whatever else stood in the 
 way of one grand object, the unity of the nation. 
 These sentiments of her chief generals, conservative 
 men by nature, but clear-eyed as to the nature and 
 issue of the struggle, were soon to become the policy 
 of the North. The peninsular campaign of M Clellan 
 had now begun, with its tedious advance, weary stop 
 pages, and final discomfiture. Then followed the tri 
 umphant counterblow struck on his army by Lee, the 
 new Confederate chief in Virginia, Jackson s magnifi 
 cent flank marches, the second battle of Bull s Run, 
 the confused retreat of Pope on Washington, the 
 summons of M Clellan to his old command by the 
 terrified Cabinet, the first invasion of Maryland (that 
 of September 1862,) and its sudden check at Antie- 
 tam. Lincoln saw clearly that a drawn battle under 
 such circumstances was the defender s victory, and 
 launched the Emancipation Proclamation until now 
 kept back, making reconciliation no longer possible 
 
30 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 but by the submission of the South to a social revo 
 lution. Pledged to set free the slaves of the revolted 
 states, the North could no longer grant them accept 
 able terms. Henceforth it became clear that the 
 contest must go on to the bitter end, the ruin of the 
 weaker section of the Union. 
 
 This seems to be a fit opportunity for noticing a 
 subject which, though not as yet surveyed by any his 
 torian, is intimately connected with the history of the 
 war. It is usually thought because Jefferson Davis 
 pressed, and General Lee consented to the design of 
 carrying the war into the Northern states, that its 
 wisdom was unquestioned. It is time that this delu 
 sion -for it is no less should be removed. There 
 were opinions expressed which should have been of 
 the highest value, opinions of soldiers which might 
 have weighed in council even against that of Lee, 
 which opposed most strongly these attempted inva 
 sions. In their view, it was throwing away a great 
 political advantage to reduce a defensive struggle for 
 rights to the mere level of a civil war for mastery. 
 Hundreds of thousands in the North, who had looked 
 coldly on a war of conquest against the alleged rights 
 of the sister states, would be ready to rush to arms 
 the moment that their own soil was violated by rebels 
 in arms. The military advantage was most doubtful, 
 seeing that neither men nor warlike material (in both 
 of which the South was inferior) could be recruited 
 to any great extent by conquest ; whilst the political 
 evil was so great as in all probability to be ruinous. 
 To the naturally weaker party, the defensive was, 
 according to all rule, the appropriate course. In this 
 case it was the only safe one as regarded the ultimate 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 3! 
 
 issue, the assertion or surrender of independence. 
 Such were the arguments urged against the invasion : 
 but bolder or rasher counsels prevailed at Richmond, 
 and Lee was urged on into Maryland, and Bragg 
 thrown into Kentucky, to be arrested each in turn by 
 the gathering of superior forces, and to retire from 
 the invaded territory, leaving those Northerners who 
 had hitherto been neutral or friendly, banded, by this 
 threatening of their own hearths, with the bitterest 
 enemies of the Confederacy. 
 
 To return to the fortunes of Grant. We left him 
 in April 1862, before Corinth, superceded by the ar 
 rival of Halleck, who carried on the campaign until 
 Beauregard retreated from the contested point at the 
 end of May. Then followed a complete breaking up 
 of the great army gathered on the Tennessee. Buell s 
 force was once more separated from that of Grant, and 
 sent eastward. Four divisions were soon after stripped 
 from the latter, and Grant was reduced to a defensive 
 in the heart of the hostile state of Mississippi, having 
 under him at one time less than 20,000 men, while an 
 army about equal in numbers covered the country to 
 the south, including Vicksburg, the key of the great 
 river, and Price and Van Dorn hung with light forces 
 on his eastern flank, and threatened his communica 
 tions. Thinking him to be perilously advanced, they 
 twice came down upon his rear; but being seriously 
 checked at luka (September nineteenth), and utterly 
 defeated (October second), in an attack on Corinth 
 which place Grant had well intrenched, they fell 
 back once more into Alabama. Rosecrans, who had 
 been left by Grant at Corinth, received the chief credit 
 of the action, which gained him the command of 
 
32 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 Buell s army, on the supercession of that general, and 
 Grant was relieved of a lieutenant who had more than 
 once thwarted his superior, and plainly thought less 
 of his judgment than those who had shared his vic 
 tories in the spring. The general course of the whole 
 summer operations of 1862, in the Western states is 
 well described in the words of General Badeau, the 
 best of Grant s biographers, whose account throws 
 special light on this portion of the war : 
 
 " The truth is, that Grant s extreme simplicity of behav 
 iour and directness of expression imposed on various officers, 
 both above and below him. They thought him a good plain 
 man, who had blundered into one or two successes, and who, 
 therefore, could not be immediately removed ; but they 
 deemed it unnecessary to regard his judgment, or to count 
 upon his ability. His superiors made their plans invariably 
 without consulting him, and his subordinates chose some 
 times to carry out their own campaigns in opposition or 
 indifference to his orders, not doubting, that, with their su 
 perior intelligence, they could conceive and execute triumphs 
 which would excuse or even vindicate their course. It is 
 impossible to understand the early history of the war, with 
 out taking it into account, that neither the government nor 
 its important commanders gave Grant credit for intellectual 
 ability or military genius." 
 
 The time was now about to come when this esti 
 mate was to be greatly changed ; when those who 
 would give him credit for nought else, would learn to 
 admire his undaunted tenacity and hopeful persever 
 ance in the face of discouragement ; and when, pursu 
 ing one great object steadfastly, he was to win it at last 
 by a display of resource such as the most brilliant or 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. ^ 
 
 scientific of modern generals could not surpass. The 
 town of Vicksburg, little known before the war, had 
 taken the place on the Mississippi first held by Colum 
 bus, before that port was turned by the fall of Fort 
 Donelson, and then by Memphis, which the retreat of 
 the Confederates from Corinth rendered similarly 
 untenable. It barred the passage of the stream to 
 Federal use ; its batteries, high-raised in air, defied the 
 skill and valor of Farragut s and Porter s fleets ; it 
 separated Banks force at New Orleans from the rest 
 of those of the North ; it formed a point tV appui, 
 whereby the Confederates on the \vest side of the 
 Mississippi could connect their operations freely with 
 the main armies on its east. They might still indeed 
 by bringing in the great left wing, which they had 
 kept uselessly scattered through Arkansas into Texas, 
 have added over 50,000 men to the centre of their line 
 of defence, and possibly turned the scale of the war. 
 As there has been indicated one grand error in their 
 conduct of the war, the making invasions beyond their 
 means on the eastern side, so it was possibly no less 
 fatal to them that they wasted a large part of their 
 fighting strength in a defensive occupation of their 
 semi-barbarous western states. At the time of Beaure- 
 gard s retreat from Corinth there were, according to 
 the official report of Cooper, the Adjutant-General, 
 55,000 fighting men enrolled under General Holmes 
 and ready for service in the trans-Mississippi part of 
 the Confederacy. It was proposed to Mr. Davis to 
 bring these across as secretly as might be, and so over 
 whelm Grant s army near Corinth, and that in Ten 
 nessee, in turn, if possible ; but the advice was rejected. 
 And finally a great part of Holmes s army, tired of 
 3 
 
34 
 
 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 inaction, dispersed gradually, and were never employed 
 at all. Never was the necessity of the concentration 
 of force on the decisive point more forcibly illustrated 
 than in this false strategy. 
 
 To return to the operations about Vicksburg, which 
 were to make of Grant the acknowledged hero of the 
 war on the side of the Union. We left him more than 
 loo miles to the north of the city, with a country in 
 tervening which was but little known, and crossed by 
 three great streams, each ending near the Mississippi 
 in a labyrinth of swamps and creeks. Yet he had his 
 eye already steadily on the important point ; for when 
 his command, after his unsuccessful defence of Corinth, 
 was suddenly enlarged in October, and a further in 
 crease of force promised, he wrote at once to propose 
 to Halleck a new and bold plan of operations, ending: 
 " I think I would be able to move down the Missis 
 sippi central railroad, and cause the evacuation of Vicks- 
 burgh." This was his first official mention of the his 
 toric name. From that time forward, until he entered 
 the works as victor on the fourth of July following, his 
 life, and that of his friend Sherman, were bound up 
 with the operations against the great stronghold of 
 the West. 
 
 It is not within our scope to recount these in de 
 tail, interesting as they are as a military study. Their 
 general features are so well known that we need only 
 remind the reader of them. The first attempt was by 
 direct march overland, which failed, owing to the bril 
 liant surprise by Van Dorn of Holly Springs, the most 
 important post in the long line of communication 
 Grant had formed with his base near Corinth. The 
 Federal General had not yet discovered the secret, 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 35 
 
 afterwards so freely used by Sherman, of working 
 an army in these rich but depopulated states of the 
 South, without a base at all, by living on the ene 
 my. He fell back, therefore, checked for the time. 
 Then, while he still acted inland, threatening another 
 advance, Sherman, with a separate force, descended 
 the river, and strove (about the Christmas of 1862) to 
 carry the works by a coup de main, a plan which failed 
 with heavy loss. But the North had now tasted 
 enough of success elsewhere to nerve her to put forth 
 her strength. 130,000 soldiers obeyed Grant s orders 
 in January 1863, and of these fully 50,000 were em 
 ployed in the swamps opposite Vicksburg, in his next 
 scheme of endeavoring to divert the course of the 
 Mississippi. English writers have been accused of ex 
 aggerating the sufferings that ensued ; let an American 
 one, therefore, who served with distinction in the 
 Western campaign, give his own account : 
 
 " The troops were put in camps along the west bank of 
 the river, on the low swamp land, overflowed this year to 
 an unusual extent. This protracted freshlet, together with 
 the extraordinary fall of rain, greatly increased Grant s diffi 
 culties, as well as the hardships of his army. 
 
 "The camps were frequently submerged, and the dis 
 eases consequent to this exposure prevailed among the 
 troops ; dysenteries and fevers made sad havoc, and the 
 small-pox even was introduced, but speedily controlled. 
 The levees furnished the only dry land deep enough for 
 graves, and for miles along the river bank this narrow strip 
 was all that appeared above the water, furrowed in its whole 
 length with graves. The troops were thus hemmed in by 
 the burial-places of their comrades." 
 
 No wonder that, as is added by the writer : 
 
36 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 "Exaggerated rumors of disease and even pestilence 
 were circulated by the enemy, and at the North ; these 
 added to the anxieties of the country, as well as to the diffi 
 culties of the commander." 
 
 This bold effort to deprive the place of its com 
 mand of the stream having failed, in March 1863 a 
 new attempt was made. It was now sought to turn 
 the works of Vicksburg on the north side by carry 
 ing some of the gun-boats and troops into the Yazoo 
 (which flows into the Mississippi above the place) 
 through the net-work of swamps which lies between it 
 and the course of the great river ; but this also miscar 
 ried from the inherent difficulties. Grant had now 
 tried three sides of the place in vain, and had brought 
 so much odium on himself as to make his removal on 
 the next failure certain ; yet in May he was found 
 landing on the west bank, thirty miles south of the 
 city, on a new enterprise against it, which involved his 
 throwing himself into a hostile country, between forces 
 of unknown strength, arriving in the rear of the place, 
 and dropping the base he had marched from and held 
 at first with his left, to seize a new one with his ex 
 tended right; that new one being itself dependent on 
 the success of his march turning the hitherto impreg 
 nable works on the Yazoo, and so admitting Porter s 
 fleet to form for him a new line of supply to it from 
 the great depots further north. The boldness of the 
 design, and the unity and vigor with which it was car 
 ried out to a perfect result, show a strategy as remark 
 able, if it was somewhat slowly conceived, as that 
 tactical use of pressure in the crisis of battle which 
 seemed instinctive in the Federal general, and had 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 37 
 
 given him his previous successes. The mistakes of 
 Pemberton, the too late arrival of General Joseph 
 Johnston (only now recovered from Virginian wounds) 
 did the rest; and July fourth, 1863, saw Grant, in 
 spite of Meade s hard-won victory of Gettysburg the 
 day before, the foremost man in the armies of the 
 Union. No longer a mere volunteer-general, commis 
 sioned but for three years, he received his well-earned 
 brevet into the regular army, and was numbered with 
 the most honored members of the profession from 
 which he had not many years before parted in de 
 spair. 
 
 The fame of this happy general, whose merits were 
 made more conspicuous by the faults of others, was 
 not to rest long upon the conquest of Vicksburg 
 and the triumphant opening of the Mississippi. The 
 shattering defeat of Rosecrans at Chickamauga by 
 Bragg and Longstreet, as he sought to force his way 
 from the Tennessee into Georgia, brought Grant upon 
 the scene in the autumn, summoned by telegraph to 
 retrieve his former subaltern s disaster. Thomas, who 
 had succeeded the disgraced general at Chattanooga, 
 was apparently shut in by the victorious army ; but his 
 line of supply was never wholly broken. Grant (now 
 commanding all the armies west of the Alleghanies) 
 hurried up a powerful reinforcement under Sherman ; 
 Halleck dispatched Hooker round with two corps from 
 Virginia ; and every day lost by Bragg after his victory 
 diminished the Confederate chances. There was no 
 greater mistake (it has been said by very high authority) 
 in the history of the war, than this so-called invest 
 ment of Chattanooga, in truth no investment at all, by 
 a numerically weak army distributed over a position 
 
38 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 which necessarily cut it in two. Too confident to re 
 tire and too weak to attack, Bragg lay idle on his hills 
 before the camp, until the enemy within it had gath 
 ered in irresistible strength. Then Grant, attacking 
 him at last in his own lines, drove him back with 
 heavy loss on Georgia, and opened the centre of the 
 Confederacy to be pierced next spring, as its western 
 portion had already been severed from it by his suc 
 cess on the Mississippi. The month of March 1864 
 saw him, with the new rank of Lieutenant-Generai 
 created expressly to do him honor, assuming, by a 
 sort of national appointment, the chief command of 
 the Union armies, with unlimited control over a mil 
 lion of men ; whilst Halleck, superceded by his former 
 lieutenant, was henceforth confined to those adminis 
 trative functions at Washington, which it is but bare 
 justice to say that he performed with constant energy 
 and success. The good discipline of the Federal ar 
 mies in the coming campaign owed much to the strong 
 measures he used during this spring, and especially 
 towards the lower ranks of regimental officers. On 
 the other hand, that of the Confederates, always lax 
 and neglected, fell off under the influence of discour 
 agement, until it resembled rather that of a band of 
 undisciplined volunteers than such as becomes the 
 tried soldiers of a national army. So loose, indeed 
 was their order that, however great the courage of the 
 men, no officer could count upon the number of men 
 he should bring in at the end of the day. 
 
 His new rank attained, Grant parted from the 
 comrades by whose help it had been won, prepared to 
 try his fortune elsewhere. Before the spring campaign 
 of 1864 was to open, it was necessary that he should 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 29 
 
 choose his own field of action, and assign those of his 
 subordinates. The Mississippi being now unquestion 
 ably secured to the North, there were but two great 
 lines on which the General-in-Chief could fitly conduct 
 the operations of 1864; that which his late success 
 against Bragg had laid open, or that which led direct 
 to the Confederate capital. Many reasons might have 
 tempted him towards the former. Here he would 
 command tried troops, who had in him the implicit 
 confidence gained by great achievements already done 
 under his leadership. Here he would be seconded by 
 lieutenants of the rarest powers ; for it was hard to say 
 whether he leant most on the calm courage and un 
 failing resource of Sherman (long recognized by him 
 before the world perceived them), or the subtle genius 
 and daring spirit of the lamented M Pherson, a soldier 
 of the very highest promise who fell before Atlanta, 
 having attained, at the early age of thirty-three, the 
 honor of commanding an independent army. Here 
 too, Grant had thoroughly examined the scene of op 
 erations, and understood that a moderate series of suc 
 cesses would plant his army across the main lines of 
 communication yet left to the enemy, dividing abso 
 lutely the Atlantic states of the South from those near 
 the Mississippi, and restricting the government of the 
 Confederacy within such limits as must necessarily 
 cause its extinction. Against these and all such con 
 siderations was set that weightier than any, the will 
 of his country ; for the North expected the general of 
 her choice to show his powers on the field where her 
 military honor had been so sadly tarnished. While 
 victory after victory and progress after progress had 
 accompanied her arms in the West, in Virginia the 
 
4Q THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 Army of the Potomac was now nearly as far from Rich 
 mond as when it was first raised ; and though holding 
 its own when on the defensive, and with especial suc 
 cess since Meade had the command, it had never ad 
 vanced without recoiling shattered, or at the least 
 wholly checked, before the unconquerable strategist 
 who held it at bay with his inferior force. Honor, 
 therefore, called Grant to Virginia, and policy also 
 plainly pointed out that to defeat Lee and to occupy 
 Richmond would, if not destroying the inner resources 
 of the Confederacy, at least damage her external pros 
 pects beyond all hope. In April, therefore, it was an 
 nounced that Grant was to command in person in the 
 next Virginian campaign. 
 
 He had left Chattanooga suddenly on March 
 third, on a private intimation of his coming promo 
 tion : but his own wish had been, as was natural, to 
 return and conduct the Georgian campaign in person, 
 a wish which he cheerfully relinquished when under 
 standing fully what the nation expected at his hands. 
 There is nothing a military biographer could offer 
 more honorable to the character of Grant than the 
 terms in which he now took leave of his great lieu 
 tenants. Flaws may be found in his tactics, or defi 
 ciencies in his strategical power ; yet, if not absolutely 
 perfect as general or soldier, as a commander full of 
 generous sentiment to the deserving, who could de 
 sire to serve under a better chief? Not that Grant s 
 praise was of that cheap sort which is easily earned 
 and little valued. On the contrary, few commanders 
 have spoken more severely of their subordinates 
 errors when censure was called for ; and Hooker, 
 Burnside, and Butler are notable examples that the 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 4! 
 
 scathing rebukes which he administered in his reports 
 spared neither rank nor standing. Unqualified praise 
 from such a chief is doubtless the more valued ; but it is 
 rather in justice to himself than his lieutenants that 
 we insert the letter he wrote, on the decision already 
 mentioned, to the general who, next to himself, had 
 earned most largely the gratitude of the Union their 
 swords aided to preserve : 
 
 "DEAR SHKRMAN, 
 
 "The bill reviving the grade of lieutenant- 
 general in the army has become law, and my name 
 has been sent to the Senate for the place. I now receive 
 orders to report to Washington immediately, in person, which 
 indicates a confirmation, or a likelihood of confirmation. I 
 Start in the morning to comply with the order. 
 
 " While I have been eminently successful in this war 
 in at least gaining the confidence of the public, no one feels 
 more than I, how much of this success is due to the energy, 
 skill, and the harmonious putting forth of that energy and 
 skill, of those whom it has been my good fortune to have 
 occupying subordinate positions under me. 
 
 "There are many officers to whom these remarks are 
 applicable to a greater or less degree, porportionate to 
 their ability as soldiers ; but what I want is, to express 
 my thanks to you and M Pherson, as the men to whom, 
 above all others, I feel indebted for whatever I have had of 
 success. 
 
 " How far your advice and assistance have been of help 
 to me you know. How far your execution of whatever has 
 been given to you to do, entitles you to the reward I am 
 receiving, you cannot know as well as I. 
 
 " I feel all the gratitude this letter would express, giving 
 it the most flattering construction. 
 
4 2 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 " The word you I use in the plural, intending it for 
 MTherson also. I should write to him, and will some day, 
 but starting in the morning, I do not know that I will find 
 time just now. Your friend, 
 
 "U.S. GRANT, Major- General."" 
 
 Less than a fortnight after this letter reached him 
 Sherman found himself promoted to the chief com 
 mand of the Southwestern states, which Grant had 
 left on his advancement to that of the whole land 
 forces of the Union ; and a few days earlier (March 
 ninth) the latter had publicly received at Washington 
 his commission of Lieutenant-General, bestowed by 
 Lincoln under the authority of the special Act of 
 Congress. The new Commander-in-Chief had already 
 decided to take the personal direction of the Virgin 
 ian operations, and the protracted campaign v*is to 
 begin which never actually can be said to have ceased 
 until Richmond fell, and with it the Confederacy that 
 Lee defended. 
 
 The main purpose of the new campaign was a con 
 centration of the scattered Federal invasion on two 
 points of the long line hitherto assailed. The front 
 of the Union armies had thus far practically extended 
 along a vast irregular curve from New Orleans to the 
 Lower Potomac. Three years of bitter welfare had 
 not sufficed to make any change in the strategic sit 
 uation at the eastern end of this line ; although the su 
 perior Federal resources, wielded with ability and te 
 nacity by Grant and his lieutenants, had greatly con 
 tracted the limits of the Confederacy along its south 
 western border, forcing it back from the Ohio to the 
 Tennessee, and wresting point after point on the Mis- 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 43 
 
 sissippi from its grasp. It was now resolved at Wash 
 ington to give up the system of embracing with sepa 
 rate attacks, the whole front of the enemy, who had 
 by it been permitted to avail himself of his shorter 
 lines of communication, and to bring unexpected num 
 bers to bear on the points most threatened. The 
 whole weight of the Northern pressure was now to be 
 thrown by the Commander-in-Chief upon the enemy s 
 capital ; by Sherman upon that vital point of the Con 
 federacy which the endurance of Rosecrans army and 
 the brilliant victory of Grant had laid bare to the next 
 advance from Chattanooga. The first-named object 
 of this double invasion was of course political. Not 
 withstanding the boast of the Confederate President 
 that the war did not in any manner depend upon 
 Richmond, it was manifest that the fall of that city 
 would be felt as a terrible blow to the Southern Gov 
 ernment both at home and abroad, and would greatly 
 justify the expectation of the mass of the Northern 
 people that the Union was to be reconquered by the 
 sword. Against the devoted capital Grant was to bring 
 forces more vast and powers more uncontrolled than 
 any general since the days of Napoleon. And should 
 these, aided by his prestige and his proved vigor and 
 activity, cause Lee in the defence to exhaust the re 
 sources of the South, Sherman, furnished with a mighty 
 army, would be able to penetrate into and hold the 
 whole centre of Georgia, threaten or seize such war 
 like magazines as the forethought of Davis s adminis 
 tration might have placed in that remote and hith 
 erto untouched state, and sever the Carolinas and 
 Virginia from the rest of the Confederacy. That the 
 complete success of either invasion would give the 
 
44 
 
 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 latter its death-blow was the not unnatural expecta 
 tion of even those more far-seeing Federals who 
 were not blinded to the difficulties each must en 
 counter. 
 
 The key to the whole campaign of 1864 in Virginia 
 is to be found in Grant s design (formed long before 
 on the spur of his success at Vicksburg) of assailing 
 Richmond by a double method, combining direct at 
 tack and wide-spread investment. He was himself to 
 move straight on that capital, or rather on the army 
 that defended it, with a host as large as it was possible 
 to manoeuvre in the country through which he must 
 pass ; while two minor but considerable armies, advanc 
 ing to the right and the left of the main one, were to 
 sweep through the territory beyond the city and aim 
 at the railroads which supplied it from the west and 
 south. His calculation, made on very reasonable 
 grounds, was that in opposing his own march Lee 
 would require to bring into line every available man 
 in the Virginian armies, and would thus be compelled 
 to strip the districts entered by his subordinate forces. 
 It was perfectly ascertained at Washington that the 
 very considerable population of the rival capital, as 
 well as the large army under Lee that covered it, were 
 maintained chiefly by food brought from great dis 
 tances. Indeed, the district to the north of the James 
 had been so harried by the Federal expeditions, and 
 so stripped of its negro laborers, as barely to produce 
 enough food for its own scattered rural population. 
 To sever completely the railroads which led to the city 
 would therefore quickly bring both its inhabitants and 
 Lee s army to a state of starvation, and inevitably 
 force the latter to retreat, not less than a series of 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 45 
 
 defeats in the open field. Grant believed himself 
 thus to have two distinct chances in his favor, and dili 
 gently applied himself to work out the details of his 
 scheme. 
 
 The first part of this which naturally came under 
 consideration was the line of operations to be chosen 
 for his own advance. The Army of the Potomac, with 
 which he had fixed his own headquarters on assuming 
 his new office, at this time lay around Culpepper, 
 north of the Rapidan, and its supplies came straight 
 from Washington by the Alexandria railroad. The 
 problem to be solved as to the best means of ap 
 proaching Richmond was precisely that which had 
 first produced open difference between M Clellan and 
 the President two years before. The preference of 
 the latter for a direct movement across Eastern Vir 
 ginia, which should at the same time keep his own 
 capital covered, is well known. The objections to it 
 we prefer to give in M Clellan s own words, which 
 are here quoted from his letter of February third, 
 1862, addressed to the President in reply to that of 
 the latter, challenging him to show the superiority of 
 his design : 
 
 " Bearing in mind what has been said, and the present 
 unprecedented and impassable condition of the roads, it will 
 be evident that no precise period can be fixed upon for the 
 movement on this line. Nor can its duration be closely 
 calculated ; it seems certain that many weeks may elapse 
 before it is possible to commence the march. Assuming the 
 success of this operation, and the defeat of the enemy as 
 certain, the question at once arises as to the importance of 
 the results gained. I think these results would be confined 
 to the possession of the field of battle, the evacuation of 
 
4 6 
 
 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 the line of the Upper Potomac by the enemy, and the moral 
 effect of the victory ; important results it is true, but not deci 
 sive of the war, nor securing the destruction of the enemy s 
 main army, for he could fall back upon other positions, and 
 fight us again and again, should the condition of his troops 
 permit." 
 
 With the exception of the Confederate army of 
 Virginia being intrenched behind the Rapidan instead 
 of near the Potomac, there was but little change in 
 the main conditions of the question which M Clellan 
 had treated. But Grant did not rely like his prede 
 cessor on the single hope of success from his own 
 direct attack. On the contrary, he intended (as we 
 have already pointed out) to use the latter partly to 
 cover a separate system of acting on his enemy by de 
 stroying the latter s communications. Further it 
 would have appeared a servile copying of a plan which 
 had already failed in the execution, and a reflection 
 on the President s judgment, if he had proposed to 
 move his main army by water to the peninsula, or 
 to the mouth of the Rappahannock (according to 
 M Clellan s original idea), and worked his detached 
 left, as it was open for him to do, from Norfolk far 
 beyond the south of the James. He had already 
 decided, therefore to move across the difficult country 
 which his predecessor had dreaded to attempt. His 
 force for this purpose would be, as we shall presently 
 see, fully as numerous as that which M Clellan had 
 commanded before his rupture with Lincoln. Al 
 though the staff, the organization, and the spirit of 
 the soldiery had most wonderfully improved under 
 the stern discipline of actual service, he yet felt the 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 47 
 
 necessity of keeping near to some better line of sup 
 ply for his numerous wants than cartage, however 
 liberally added, could furnish. The railroad he now 
 had at his back continued onward to Richmond ; but 
 even if he could drive Lee from the part his army 
 now covered, the line thence runs due east for forty 
 miles, and could only be followed by exposing a flank. 
 For this cause he resolved, if failing to surprise Lee s 
 position, to move the army of the Potomac round it 
 to his own left, so as to seize that short railroad from 
 Acquia Creek to Richmond, attempts to master the 
 Rappahannock passage of which near Fredericksburg 
 had successively proved so ruinous to Burnside and 
 Hooker. From the fords of the Rapidan, which his 
 left nearly touched, to Bowling Green, a station on that 
 line, is but twenty-seven miles. A rapid march south 
 eastward on the latter place, through Spojtsylvania 
 Court-house, would plant him with his back to Fred 
 ericksburg and his face to Richmond ; and if Lee were 
 not crushed in the coming collision, nor even forced 
 back into a strictly defensive attitude, the Federal 
 army could (as Grant believed) so use the difficult and 
 wooded country as to cover the movement effectually 
 by the peculiar tactics now become familiar to all its 
 branches. 
 
 For this part of his campaign Grant made earnest 
 personal preparations during the six weeks that ol- 
 lowed his appointment. The five whole corps of the 
 Army of the Potomac were not only recruited, but 
 also broken up and redistributed into three, under 
 Sedgwick, Hancock, and Warren, all men of proved 
 ability and courage. The chief cavalry generals were 
 superseded ; the most active of them, Kilpatrick, 
 
48 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 being sent to act in the army of Sherman, from which 
 Grant drew a still younger officer, General Sheridan, 
 whom he had previously marked out as the most 
 fitting leader for his 12,000 horse. The whole of 
 these arrangements were made under the supervision 
 of Meade, who retained the nominal command of the 
 Army of the Potomac, and carried out his new 
 superior s instructions with a whole-hearted earnest 
 ness worthy of Wellesley himself under the like 
 trial. 
 
 The three infantry corps numbered about 30,000 
 each, distributed in four divisions. They were to be 
 joined, at the last moment, by another, that of Burn- 
 side, which, on Longstreet s retreat from East Ten 
 nessee, had been brought round from Knoxville to a 
 depot in Maryland. Its regiments being filled up 
 with conscripts, and a large division of colored troops 
 just raised being added, it mustered 35,000 strong at 
 the end of April. This corps was purposely held back 
 in order to cause the Confederates to believe it to be 
 intended for some separate expedition, and so to keep 
 their government from reinforcing the Army of Vir 
 ginia. When the roads at length were reported fit 
 for use, and all Grant s preparations on the Rapidan 
 complete (and these had included separate reviews 
 and movements of each corps to test the efficiency of 
 the staff), Burnside s divisions advanced through 
 Washington, and having defiled before the President, 
 joined their new chief at his headquarters in the last 
 days of April. With Sheridan s cavalry, the Lieuten- 
 ant-General had now assembled, for his immediate 
 command, a fully equipped force of 135,000 men, 
 being in number only slightly larger than that which 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 49 
 
 M Clellan had prepared for his first campaign, but for 
 the major part composed of veteran troops. 
 
 Beyond the Blue Ridge, on his right, a separate 
 army of 25,000 fighting men had been assembled 
 under Sigel, to act in the Shenandoah. The super 
 session of that general (who had been in retirement 
 since the days of Fredericksburg) had given much 
 umbrage to the German Republicans. This, Lincoln 
 had lately striven to disarm by offering him a new and 
 detached command in the great valley. Augmented 
 now into a formidable army, his force was to be led, 
 in co-operation with Grant, straight upon Lynchburg, 
 the important point which commands both the railroad 
 and canal leading from the Upper James to Rich 
 mond. Grant believed there would be but little oppo 
 sition on this side ; and as the advance would neces 
 sarily cut the line from the Shenandoah into Rich 
 mond, the Confederate capital would be by it thrown 
 entirely for supplies on the railroads passing to the 
 South. 
 
 These are in number two only, regarded as main 
 lines. The one runs from Richmond due south 
 through Petersburg to Weldon, and so along the At 
 lantic side of North Carolina. The other nearly south 
 west through a richer country to the border of that 
 state at Danville. To completely sever these we have 
 shown to be a vital part in Grant s original design ; 
 and the operations for the purpose were to be conduct 
 ed by an army assembling at M Clellan s old base be 
 tween the York and James Rivers. A mere threaten 
 ing of Richmond, to be followed by a hasty change 
 of manoeuvre to the south side of the James, from 
 whence the expedition should rapidly penetrate far 
 4 
 
THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 into the interior and destroy, or if possible, hold the 
 railways, was the general plan. Thirty-five thousand 
 men were allotted to it. 
 
 Next to the fitness of Grant s main army for its 
 own share of the drama was evidently needful to him 
 the proper conduct of these subordinates ; and here 
 we come to the weak part of his strategy. Sigel s 
 appointment had taken place before his own, and 
 could not well be revoked (no present fault being 
 alleged against him) without great odium to the gov 
 ernment on the part of the German soldiers and voters. 
 Grant therefore did not attempt to change the staff in 
 the valley. But for the still more important change 
 on the James he had designed his protege, W. F. Smith, 
 whose promotion to Major-Gen eral he had just with 
 difficulty succeeded in forcing from the Senate, inclined 
 at first to reject it from jealousy of his dictation. Here, 
 however, he found an absolutely insurmountable ob 
 stacle in the obstinacy of Lincoln, who had resolved 
 not to allow the supersession of Butler, already selected 
 for this service : so that after some discussion, Grant 
 was forced to content himself with a half measure of 
 putting Smith at the head of one of Butler s two corps 
 (the other being formed of troops from Charleston 
 under Gilmore), in the vain hope that the civilian 
 would be guided by the soldier in the actual opera 
 tions ; a hope which Butler s character for self-asser 
 tion rendered vain from the first. 
 
 The forces available for the defence of Richmond 
 against this triple invasion, though far inferior in num 
 bers, were yet of formidable strength. Longstreet had 
 lately returned from East Tennessee with his corps, 
 which, with those of Ewell and Hill, mustered 70,000 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. * I 
 
 infantry nominally, and could put 52,000 bayonets into 
 the line of battle. Lee had but few cavalry near the 
 Rapidan, great part of Steuart s command lying nearer 
 to Richmond to watch against such raids as that of 
 Dahlgren, which had alarmed that city not long before. 
 There had been but little change in the staff of Lee s 
 force since the days of Gettysburg. 
 
 In addition to this, the so-called Army of Virginia, 
 Richmond was defended to the south by Beauregard 
 and his troops, released from their duties at Charles 
 ton. These were disposed along the Weldon railroad, 
 ready for concentration on any point threatened be 
 tween Richmond and Wilmington, at the further 
 extremity of North Carolina. They numbered about 
 20,000, exclusive of a well-trained militia which guarded 
 the capital itself. Twelve thousand troops, in great 
 part newly raised, were all that could be allotted to 
 the defence of the valley against Sigel, where Early 
 was now succeeded by Breckenridge. With this 
 marked inferiority in every quarter, the Confederate 
 strategy was necessarily of the defensive order, and 
 made dependent upon that of their opponents. Nor 
 was this hardly less the case in Georgia. There 
 Sherman had collected an army of 98,000 men at 
 Chattanooga, exclusive of the vast trains for rail and 
 common roads which were to force and maintain an 
 unequalled system of transport ; while Johnston con 
 fronted him with but 76,000, and this disproportion 
 of numbers was enhanced by doubts whether his con 
 tingent from Tennessee would hold to the Confederacy 
 from which their state was now wrested. 
 
 All things being now prepared for his great adven 
 ture, and orders given for a simultaneous advance to 
 
52 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 Sherman as well as to Sigel and Butler, Grant 
 launched his army by its left across the Rapidan. 
 The well-known passages at Ely and Germaniatown 
 Fords, used by Hooker in his disastrous attempt of 
 the year before, which led to his defeat at Chancel- 
 lorsville, were unguarded by the Confederates, and 
 crossed without difficulty on the night of May third. 
 The cavalry divisions of Gregg and Wilson moved 
 first before dark to lay the pontoon bridges at these 
 two points, three and seven miles respectively west 
 of the fork of the Rappahannock. Hancock s (second) 
 corps followed Gregg at the former place, and War 
 ren s (fifth) and Sedgwick s (sixth,) forming a right col 
 umn, passed after Wilson at the latter. A train of 
 8,000 wagons, carrying supplies for the whole army, 
 passed in rear of Hancock, thus interposing the bulk 
 of the force between itself and the enemy. From the 
 moment of beginning the march all connection with 
 the Alexandria railroad was thrown aside, and the 
 troops made dependent for all supplies on their mov 
 ing commissariat until a new base should be gained. 
 Burnside s (ninth) corps alone remained on the ground 
 where the army had lately stood, to deceive the 
 enemy as long as possible. But this for twenty-four 
 hours only ; after which he too moved across the 
 river, following the right column by Germania, and 
 rejoining the other corps on the fifth. That day saw 
 the first fighting of a long and bloody series of engage 
 ments. 
 
 It was far from being Grant s desire to force his 
 foe to an immediate action. His wish was to pass 
 beyond the Confederates to Spottsylvania Court 
 house, the central point of all the tangled mass of 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 53 
 
 woods which covers the country to the south of 
 Chancellorsville, before Lee could discover his real 
 object. He had, indeed, fair ground to hope that the 
 latter would form his army behind the strong line of 
 Mine Run, a brook running north into the Rapidan 
 between Grant s new position and the Confederate 
 right, under the idea that the Federal army had 
 crossed the river (as under Meade it had attempted 
 in the November preceding) to threaten that flank 
 and turn his entrenchments. If Lee had been thus 
 deceived, the hostile army would soon have gained 
 ground sufficiently in its intended line to threaten his 
 direct communication with Richmond, and force him 
 to seek to dislodge it at any cost. But this was not 
 to be ; and Hancock was recalled from his advance 
 on the coveted point ; and wheeled rapidly into posi 
 tion, to meet the attack which Lee (much stronger 
 now than when opposed to Meade on the same ground 
 in the autumn) moved instantly to make. Of this 
 attack Grant received warning from his cavalry in 
 good time to form his line facing to the west, and 
 covering the road along which he would have pressed. 
 Hancock naturally formed his left. Sedgwick pro 
 tected the road near the ford, with Warren more to 
 the centre. Burnside arrived in time to fill the inter 
 val between the latter and Hancock; and as soon as 
 this disposition was complete, the shock fell on the 
 Federals. The column reported on the turnpike 
 road from Orange proved to be Swell s ; that more to 
 the south on the new or plank road was Hill s. So 
 desirous was Lee (who evidently hoped to take his 
 adversary by surprise) to commence the battle that 
 day, that he entered on it without the aid of Long- 
 
54 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 street, whose cantonments were so distant that he 
 could not reach the scene of action before the sixth. 
 Night closed upon it without decisive advantage to 
 either party. 
 
 At dawn on the sixth the battle was renewed ; but 
 by this time the Federals had intrenched the more 
 prominent parts of their position, and the contest 
 assumed the normal character of the great majority 
 of the battles of this war. The beginning of this sys 
 tem is to be found in M Clellan s operations before 
 Richmond; but it had now been fully developed. We 
 purpose to explain its details, which done, there will 
 be but little need to follow particular incidents ; for all 
 such contests bear of necessity a striking family resem 
 blance. 
 
 The tactics used in Europe, where the commander 
 of an army can sweep the battle-field with his glass, 
 and direct the march and instantly know the actual 
 danger or success of each division, are evidently not to 
 be applied to warfare conducted in the midst of forests, 
 broken only by clearings too small in many cases for 
 the free movement of a brigade. Combined move 
 ments can here be done by guesswork only ; and the 
 front of the army, instead of being at least at double 
 its artillery range from the enemy at the close of the 
 day, is often within earshot. Hence sprang the prac 
 tice early in the war, of each corps entrenching slightly 
 the ground on which it was to sleep. The facility with 
 which that could be done (in a manner presently to be 
 described) caused the same system of breastworks to 
 be applied extensively in the midst of battle, so as to 
 avoid the constant danger of being taken in flank by 
 sudden movements of the enemy through the wood. 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 55 
 
 Flank attacks are alarming to the best of troops, and 
 are especially applicable to the case of a forest engage 
 ment, where the enemy s line, broken into skirmishers, 
 each covered by a tree, could be forced back from the 
 front only by slow degrees, and with considerable sac 
 rifice of men ; and yet may be approached without ob 
 servation at either extremity. At the period of the 
 war of which we are writing, it had become a fixed 
 habit of the armies to cover every hundred yards 
 gained by a breastwork wherever the materials could 
 be found. It followed that the so-called battles degen 
 erated into a series of long and bloody skirmishes, car 
 ried on chiefly from under rude shelter, and occupying 
 sometimes many days without any decisive result. 
 The fighting, in fact, had grown to resemble rather the 
 last part of a siege on a great scale, with its constant 
 intrenching, sorties, counter-attacks, and vast expen 
 diture of powder, than such conflicts as Europe has 
 seen on her great fields. Indeed the latter have often 
 been fought (as Leipsic, Waterloo, Wagram, Borodino 
 testify) upon ground of remarkably open character, 
 naturally fitted for the parade movements of mighty 
 hosts. Yet the length of the American conflicts, the 
 often-repeated attempts of their generals to search the 
 enemy s lines, and the deadly fire of the arms employed, 
 have made their character scarcely less bloody than 
 that of the actions with which we contrast them. 
 
 We must now describe more particularly the breast 
 works which are so identified with our subject, and in 
 the forming of which the Federals especially were so 
 skilful and laborious as greatly to counteract the indi 
 vidual inferiority of their soldiery ; for many of these, 
 town-bred or recent immigrants, were no match in 
 
5 6 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 regular skirmishing for the active Southerners, trained 
 from their youth to free use of the rifle, who formed the 
 mass of the hostile army. 
 
 Given a piece of ground to be occupied, and thickly 
 covered with trees, there would be found in every 
 brigade some hundreds of stout arms ready to wield 
 the formidable bushman s axe, used throughout the 
 North American continent, and carried in profusion 
 with the regiments. A line being roughly marked, a 
 few minutes sufficed to fell the trees along its length, 
 letting each fall towards the front; and some further 
 chopping completed a rough " abattis," (or " entangle 
 ment" as it is technically called) forming a very awk 
 ward obstacle to an advancing enemy. Behind this, 
 and against its rear, two or three hours of spade labor 
 were enough to throw up a line of parapet with ditch, 
 or row of rifle-pits, sufficient to shelter the defenders 
 of this woodland barricade. But to enclose the 
 whole of the army s front in this fashion would be to 
 renounce all attempt to advance. Openings had 
 therefore to be left at frequent intervals, and these 
 again were covered by separate intrenchments, with 
 guns disposed to flank each other, and the approach 
 to the general line. If a retreat were thought of, other 
 lines formed to the rear might be so arranged as to 
 make it secure. If the enemy were forced from his 
 opposing works, a little ingenuity converted them to 
 the captor s use. Allow but a little time in advance, 
 and it is hard to say how resolute men could be forced 
 from a succession of such works as these. They were 
 indeed but the revival on a larger scale of those 
 against which British valor and discipline were shat 
 tered at Saratoga, to the ruin of our war against the 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. ^ 
 
 revolted colonies. But it is time to return to our nar 
 rative. 
 
 The battle of the Wilderness, begun late on the 
 fifth, was renewed next day, and continued even after 
 darkness closed over the scene. Longstreet had come 
 upon the ground at dawn, to the great relief of Hill, 
 whose corps showed symptoms of giving ground before 
 the pressure of Hancock. The newly-arrived general 
 restored the day, and sought soon after to decide it 
 by turning the extreme left of the Federals with one 
 of those wide sweeping movements so successful un 
 der Jackson. To do this it was needful to march his 
 troops to their right ; and in guiding his advanced 
 brigades that way, he was shot at through the cover 
 by some of his own men while passing along the front 
 of his second line, and desperately wounded, General 
 Jenkins being killed by the same volley. Less happy 
 in this respect than his great comrade had been at 
 Chancellorsville, the fall of Longstreet ruined the suc 
 cess of the manoeuvre he had undertaken, and the 
 Confederates made no real progress during the rest of 
 the day. As it closed, however, General Gordon, 
 whose troops formed their extreme left, stole up to 
 the breastworks which covered Sedgwick s right near 
 the Rapidan, and carried them by a swift surprise 
 made before the pickets were posted for the night. 
 Great part of two Federal brigades were captured, and 
 the rest of the division fled. But the pursuers were 
 checked by another line of intrenchments raised by 
 some reserve artillery close at hand ; and Sedgwick, 
 by gallant exertions, rallied his men behind this, 
 which, though somewhat at an angle with the general 
 
5 8 THE MI LIT A R Y LIFE 
 
 front, served to protect the right of the army suffi 
 ciently for Grant s purpose. 
 
 Lee in these encounters had already incurred a loss 
 of 7,000 men, including two of his best generals ; and 
 although the Federals estimated theirs at double that 
 number, yet the spirit of their soldiery was good, and 
 their position unshaken. Another day would see it 
 so strengthened that the Southern marksmen would 
 lose the advantage of that greater activity and quick 
 ness of aim which had told hitherto in their favor, and 
 Grant would be enabled to guard his front sufficiently 
 and yet to continue his original movement by a grad 
 ual extension of his left. Lee s offensive battle, in 
 short, had failed in its object ; and, with the versatility 
 of true genius, he shifted it at once for the opposite 
 course. For the rest of the campaign we shall find 
 him steadily pursuing that defensive warfare which 
 the great German writer, Clausewitz, points out for the 
 natural course of the weaker party, and which here be 
 came especially necessary to him, as he discovered 
 that his new antagonist was unsparing to a marked 
 degree of the lives of his men. Grant has in fact 
 much to answer for in this year s history as regards 
 the charge of wasting his army by pressing it on 
 against unfair odds of position. To justify him in any 
 measure, it must be borne in mind that he came to his 
 new work in Virginia after a train of striking successes 
 won greatly by the judicious employment of superior 
 numbers ; that he had sound reason to believe that 
 the enemy had no such supplies of recruits to draw 
 from as were available to himself; and that the gov 
 ernment he served was of necessity compelled to in 
 sist on constant advance, and on seeming advantage 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 59 
 
 at any present sacrifice. Add to these conditions that 
 the general was of disposition as obstinate as brave ; 
 and his troops resolute and patient rather than daring 
 in their character ; and we may account for much of 
 the waste of life now so notorious. A little more of 
 success in the results, and we should have heard noth 
 ing but praise. Doubtless Grant is deficient in that 
 sublime quality of genius which instinctively knows 
 the impossible, and recoils from it alone. His war 
 fare shows marvellous resemblance to that of Massena, 
 whose obstinate clinging to his purpose and patient 
 waiting for opportunity saved France and covered 
 himself with glory in 1799, as they proved the ruin of 
 his fame and of Napoleon s Peninsular designs when 
 met by Wellington and Torres Vedras. 
 
 The morning of the seventh saw Lee resting on the 
 defensive, and expecting Grant to advance. But the 
 latter, finding himself no longer pressed, began in the 
 afternoon to detach to his left in the direction of 
 Spottsylvania, the coveted point where, as before no 
 ticed, the chief roads of the district intersect. His 
 movement was complicated by the attempt to conceal 
 it, and the march of the Federals filled so much time, 
 that daybreak arrived on the ninth, and found the 
 cross-roads occupied by a mere advanced guard ; 
 while Lee, being warned of the operation by his cav 
 alry, and at once divining the full purpose of the Fed 
 erals, had resolved to throw himself across their path, 
 and compel them to become the assailants. His right 
 (now under Anderson, who had taken Longstreet s 
 place) marched rapidly for this purpose ; and arriving 
 at the double-quick, drove the Federals sharply from 
 the neighborhood of the Court-house. This corps was 
 
 o 
 
6 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 speedily supported by Hill and Ewell ; and the Con 
 federates intrenched themselves at once in their new 
 position, which covered the cross-roads, and ran in 
 semicircular form through a piece of ground peculiarly 
 adapted for their purpose of defence. 
 
 The tremendous losses which Grant endured on 
 the fifth and sixth of May (amounting to no less than 
 20,000 men, not including those of Burnside s corps) 
 must have shown him plainly that troops so hastily 
 made up as his own (the brigades in some cases being 
 composed four-fifths of recruits lately armed) were 
 helpless as skirmishers among these dense woods be 
 fore the veterans of Lee, each man of whom was hard 
 ened to the work. In the words of Swinton, at once 
 the ablest and the fullest of American writers on this 
 campaign : 
 
 " The result was a grievous disappointment to General 
 Grant, for he shared an opinion commonly entertained in 
 the West the opinion that the Army of the Potomac had 
 never been properly fought. This belief was perhaps nat 
 ural under the circumstances ; nevertheless it was fallacious. 
 Sharing it, he had hoped at one blow to finish the trouble 
 some, and seemingly invulnerable adversary. And to 
 achieve this end, he made little account of those arts that 
 accomplish results by the direction and combination of 
 forces : for at this period he avowedly despised manoeuvring. 
 His reliance was exclusively on the application of brute 
 masses, in rapid and remorseless blows, or as he himself 
 phrased it, in hammering continually. " 
 
 This statement is not made at random. It is founded 
 on the highest testimony; for as the same work 
 states : 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 6 1 
 
 " Shortly before the opening of the Rapidan campaign, 
 General Meade, in conversation with the lieutenant-general, 
 was telling him that he proposed to manoeuvre, thus and 
 thus ; whereupon General Grant stopped him at the word 
 manoeuvre, and said, Oh ! I never manoeuvre. This 
 characteristic utterance, which the suavity of biographers 
 might readily pass over in silence, cannot be omitted here ; 
 for it is the proof of a frame of mind that essentially influ 
 enced the complexion of the campaign. The battle of the 
 Wilderness can hardly be understood, save as the act of a 
 commander who never manoeuvred. " 
 
 In quoting this, it is but justice to General Grant to 
 add that if he used such expressions and acted here 
 with such apparent rashness, it was plainly owing to a 
 mistaken view of the particular army he had under 
 him; for in the previous campaigns of Vicksburg and 
 Chattanooga he had shown the very highest powers 
 of manoeuvring, those larger qualities of strategy in 
 fact, which will more and more be demanded in 
 modern war, as the means for great combinations 
 multiply. 
 
 Then followed for twelve long days the bloody con 
 test around Spottsylvania. Once only (May twelfth) did 
 Grant s troops break fairly in upon the breastworks, 
 on which they were moved again and again, searching 
 out the weak points in Lee s long enciente ; and then, 
 although the capture of a single projecting angle with 
 many guns and prisoners rewarded Hancock s bold 
 assault, the enemy s position was but slightly con 
 tracted, not really changed. This day, too, the Army 
 of the Potomac lost 8,000 men in retaining the ground 
 thus won, for the scene of the contest (says Swinton, 
 speaking here as an eye-witness) was literally, and by 
 
6 2 THE MI LI TAR Y LIFE 
 
 no figure of speech, " covered with piles of dead." But 
 two days before, in a less fortunate attack, " the loss 
 was between five and six thousand, while it is doubtful 
 whether the enemy lost as many hundreds ;" and 
 finally, " after General Grant had carried out with 
 much fidelity, but very indifferent success, his own 
 principle of hammering continuously, .... the carry 
 ing of the position was seen to be hopeless, and he, 
 abandoning the effort after twelve days, resolved by a 
 turning operation to disengage Lee from it." Grant 
 had paid the penalty of his want of discernment with 
 another 20,000 men put hors de combat, whilst the Con 
 federates, even including nearly a whole division cap 
 tured by Hancock s surprise, were again diminished 
 by only one-third of the number. " Grant s exhausted 
 army," says the same writer before quoted, " began to 
 lose its spirit. It was with joy that it turned its back 
 upon the lines of Spottsylvania." 
 
 Largely reinforced from the reserves about Wash 
 ington, Grant moved on May twentieth to the west, 
 passing beyond the right of the enemy, and then 
 making southward ; but only to find the Confederates 
 again established across his front on the North Anna 
 river, in a position so admirably chosen that even his 
 audacity admitted it unassailable. Another flank 
 march, the fourth within the month, carried him over 
 the Pamunkey, and finally brought his army, at the 
 end of May, in sight of the very ground occupied by 
 M Clellan two years before. Close to the army s front 
 was the Chickahominy, with the very passages which 
 had connected the wings of that general s forces when 
 pushing along that stream in 1862 ; but between it 
 and these passages, in a line of hasty intrenchments 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 63 
 
 covered by swamps and thickets, lay the ever-watchful 
 Lee, in that strictly defensive attitude which he held 
 throughout this campaign after the failure of his first 
 attack in the Wilderness. 
 
 Leaving the two great hosts once more facing each 
 other after a month of constant fighting, marching, 
 and intrenching, we turn to follow the courses of those 
 minor operations on which Grant had counted for the 
 success of his double scheme. In addition to the 
 movements of Sigel and Butler on their respective 
 lines, he had detached Sheridan with the cavalry of 
 the Potomac army as soon as the course of the first 
 two days battle had shown this arm to be unavailable 
 about Spottsylvania, with orders to pass through the 
 country to the north of Richmond, and operate 
 between it and Lee. In this there was nothing 
 original; for Stoneman had received the same charge 
 from Hooker the year before. Nor did Sheridan per 
 form any more striking feat upon his raid, which 
 would be little noteworthy, but for its having led to 
 the death of General Steuart, who was shot down in a 
 charge upon a party of the Federal horse which had 
 appeared close to Richmond on May eleventh. 
 Though this once famous leader had never, though 
 for two years in constant command, made any reform 
 in the wasteful over-work which wore Lee s cavalry 
 away ; yet was he unrivalled in the outpost duties of 
 that difficult country, and doubtless was sorely missed 
 by his old commander, and the army for which he had 
 so long kept watch. 
 
 Sigel s expedition up the Shenandoah was chiefly 
 remarkable for its fully revealing to the Federals the 
 intense hostility to their cause which the severities of 
 
6 4 
 
 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 former generals in that district had created. This, 
 and a natural hesitancy, caused him to strip his column 
 so much in order to guard his communications, that 
 when met suddenly by Breckenridge far up the valley, 
 he was very decisively beaten on May fifteenth, with 
 heavy loss in guns and men, and driven again far 
 north. Lincoln instantly superseded, this time with 
 out a murmur against the act, the unsuccessful com 
 mander, and sent General Hunter in his stead. The 
 latter, in the absence of Breckenridge (called at this 
 time to the aid of Lee on the Chickahominy), began 
 another of those advances up the great valley which 
 the high land on either side throughout the war kept 
 so distinct from other operations. 
 
 Butler at this time aided his chief but little more 
 than did Sigel. His first movement was a feint upon 
 York River to draw the attention of the enemy from 
 the south of Richmond, and it so far succeeded, that 
 when he debarked his force high up the James, he 
 struck without difficulty the railroad mentioned as 
 running through Petersburg, and sent his cavalry far 
 across country to that of Danville, promising in his 
 first dispatches to wrest them from the enemy. But 
 neither of these important lines was retained by the 
 Federals. Alarmed by a report that Lee was falling 
 back on Richmond, Butler drew in his posts, and con 
 fined his operations to a feeble demonstration against 
 Fort Darling, the chief work upon the river; and 
 being sharply attacked in flank by Beauregard on May 
 sixteenth (when the Federals lost, by surprise a whole 
 brigade captured), he abandoned the offensive entirely, 
 and intrenched himself upon a deep loop of the 
 James. His campaign had failed decisively as a 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 65 
 
 separate operation, and half his force was now called 
 suddenly from him to join the main army on the 
 Chickahominy. 
 
 Then came the darkest spot in the career of Grant 
 as a commander. It had seemed as though, when he 
 recoiled a few days before from Lee s position on the 
 North Anna, without attempting it, he had learnt by 
 bitter experience that the " continuous hammering " in 
 which he not long since had trusted might break 
 the instrument while its work was yet unfinished. 
 Not even the vast resources on which he had power 
 to draw could long spare 20,000 men a week for the 
 continuance of the experiment. It requires, therefore, 
 more excuse than has any where been offered for the 
 sacrifice which followed. It may be that Grant s usu 
 ally imperturbable temper was ruffled by the continued 
 readiness with which his adversary met him ; or that 
 he believed the Confederates already so worn down 
 by their unsupplied losses as to be unable to man their 
 works ; or that he judged that his new command had 
 not yet been sufficiently put to the proof by the stern 
 doings of the month just past ; or that all these causes 
 acted together. Possibly he was influenced more than 
 all by the uneasy consciousness that he had brought 
 the criticism of the whole world upon his strategy by 
 his famous dispatch, " I propose to fight it out on 
 this line, if it takes all the summer : " for had not this 
 chosen line been already abandoned and no result 
 won ? At any rate his conclusion was to try once 
 more to force Lee out of his path by direct attack. 
 So having called up 16,000 of Butler s forces from the 
 James to aid him, he ordered a general assault of the 
 kind so often made in the course of this campaign 
 5 
 
66 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 along the whole front, to be made at half-past four on 
 the morning of June third. 
 
 The most eulogistic biographer of the great Fed 
 eral general, speaks, as it were, under his breath when 
 he tells the story of the battle of Cold Harbor. 
 " There was a rush " (says such an one), " a bitter strug 
 gle, a rapid interchange of deadly fire, and the army be 
 came conscious that the task was more than it could 
 do." The testimony of Swinton, himself an eyewitness 
 is more emphatic and complete : " It took hardly 
 more than ten minutes to decide the battle. There 
 was along the whole line a rush the spectacle of im 
 pregnable works a bloody loss a sullen falling back, 
 and the action was decided." Then after some 
 details, he concludes : 
 
 " The action was decided, as I have said, in an incredi 
 bly brief time in the morning s assault. Rapidly as the re 
 sult was reached, it was decisive ; for the consciousness of 
 every man pronounced further assault hopeless. The troops 
 went forward as far as the example of their officers could 
 carry them : nor was it possible to urge them beyond ; for 
 there they knew lay only death, without even the chance of 
 victory. The completeness with which this judgment had 
 been reached by the whole army was strikingly illustrated 
 by an incident that occurred during the forenoon. Some 
 hours after the failure of the first assault, General Meade 
 sent instructions to each corps-commander to renew the at 
 tack without reference to the troops on his right or left. 
 The order was issued through these officers to their subor 
 dinate commanders, and from them descended through the 
 wonted channels ; but no one stirred, and the immobile lines 
 pronounced a verdict, silent yet emphatic, against further 
 slaughter. The loss on the Union side in this sanguinary 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 6/ 
 
 .ction was over thirteen thousand, while on the part of the 
 Confederates, it is doubtful whether it reached that many 
 lundreds." 
 
 t was in fact not half as many, if the most authentic 
 Confederate reports may be believed. 
 
 It is vain to enter into elaborate criticisms of such 
 in action. Grant s mode of assault, made u along the 
 ivhole line," and without any reserve, was contrary to 
 jill the tactical rules of theory or practice. There is, 
 ndeed, an exception in one important case, where 
 :he enemy is decidedly worn out and shaken by pre- 
 nous events. So Wellington ordered his general charge 
 it Waterloo when the Prussian shock had shattered 
 ind laid bare the French right flank, and made Napo- 
 eon s battle a hopeless struggle. So Radetsky, act- 
 ng on the same instinct of genius, threw all his front 
 ine suddenly on the exhausted Italians at Novara, ere 
 -less, his more methodical chief of staff, could array 
 he reserves for a final assault. Grant had no such 
 notive for his battle. The troops that he attacked 
 vere not the ill-led swaggerers whose indecision at 
 ort Donelson had been patent to his observant glance, 
 lor the wearied stragglers whose officers stayed to 
 Blunder with them at Pittsburg. They were veterans, 
 ,var-hardened to suffering and danger, confident in 
 their general, feeling themselves invincible on the 
 defensive, and making up by their priceless value as 
 ndividual soldiers for their want of discipline and 
 numbers. It is better for those who would think well 
 pf Grant, to pass onward from the subject, with a 
 word of pity for Burnside, so often condemned for the 
 like fault committed earlier in the war at Frederics- 
 
68 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 burg ; and to add only that the error of the Federal 
 generals was older than their day : since Napoleon 
 (whose mode of righting battles it is the fashion to im 
 agine faultless) threw away nearly the same number 
 of men in 1807, in a vain assault on the Russian in 
 trenched camp upon the Aller ; an assault ordered ap 
 parently without reason, for the works were afterwards 
 turned strategically without difficulty by a simple flank 
 movement. The holocaust thus offered by impatience 
 at Heilsberg was even more inexcusable than those of 
 Fredericsburg and Cold Harbor ; for no excited nation 
 was crying out to the French emperor for action at 
 all cost. 
 
 Unconscious, it may be, of his imitation of Napo 
 leon, whose tactics in his later period were not unlike 
 those of the great Federal general, Grant now once 
 turned aside from the works he could not carry, and 
 with a wide sweep to his left, the fifth and last of the 
 year, passed away from the blood-stained meadows of 1 
 the Chickahominy, crossed the James thirty miles 
 below Richmond, and establishing himself south of 
 Petersburg (which place should have been captured 
 but for a miscarriage in the movement), spent the rest 1 
 of the year intrenched before that place. 
 
 To do this was no strange conception, forced upon 
 him by his previous failures. On the contrary, in let 
 ters to Washington written before his late promotion, 
 he had strongly urged that the future campaign: 
 against Richmond should be conducted not by any 
 direct advance, but rather by just such an operational 
 conducted south of the James and based upon the! 
 coast ; the tendency of which would be ultimately to 
 sever Richmond (viewed thus as a sort of advanced! 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 6 9 
 
 )rtress thrust northward) from the rest of the Confed. 
 racy, and by straightening its defenders, to enclose them 
 s Pemberton was shut in Vicksburg, or at the least corn 
 el its evacuation. Strong indeed must have been the 
 olitical and personal motives which had induced him, 
 rhen nominally uncontrolled, to lay aside this plan, 
 nd adopt, in deference to the well-known anxiety of 
 ^incoln for the national capital, the line of advance 
 n which M Dowell and Pope, Burnside and Hooker, 
 .ad met their successive disasters, and had led him 
 fhen forced to abandon this, to try that on which 
 /TClellan had failed. The result had proved the 
 Sagacity of his original choice ; for now he found him- 
 elf at last in the position which he might have assumed 
 t the first, and he had only reached it after suffering 
 loss of nearly 70,000 men, while Lee s rolls were 
 iminished by about 25,000. The moral energy of 
 he North sustained its commander-in-chief still ; but 
 German s successful advance into Georgia had, it may 
 eil be believed, much effect at this time. Had that 
 eneral been as rash as his chief, and his campaign as 
 .nfruitful in aught but losses, " it would," in the opin- 
 on of the Federal historian already cited, " have been 
 lifficult to have raised new forces to recruit the Army 
 )f the Potomac, which, shaken in its structure, its 
 : ?alor quenched in blood, and thousands of its ablest 
 )fficers killed and wounded, was the Army of the 
 Potomac no more." 
 
 From that time forward, Grant, not too proud to 
 earn by adversity, abandoned the costly tactics which 
 lad served him so ill. His campaign took the shape 
 3f a siege, or rather a blockade, and the cumbrous 
 form of warfare which the world had not witnessed 
 
^O THE MI LI TAR Y LIFE 
 
 since Turenne and Montecuculi checked one anothe 
 in the Palatinate, was revived on a grander scale 
 Lines of circumvallation round the enemy in fron 1 
 arose, and lines of contravallation against the enerm 
 in rear. Works mounted with the heaviest gun, 
 guarded the camp of the Federals, and a railroac 
 brought the rations along its lines. Bit by bit Gran 
 strove to extend his left inland to seize the three lines 
 of railroad which connected Richmond with the Con 
 federacy. Bombardment and mining of unknowi 
 dimensions failed to shake Lee s defences in front 
 and the struggle gradually narrowed to the continuou 
 effort to reach beyond him by successive operation 
 on the western flank. August saw Grant in possessioi 
 of the coast railroad that led to Weldon ; but th< 
 year waned, and the spring of 1865, found th< 
 " Southside " branch line leading from Danvill* 
 through Petersburg to Richmond still intact, whilt 
 the more important one direct to the city was yet fa 
 from the Federal grasp. Grant not the less for man; 
 failures held tenaciously his threatening positior 
 being well supplied from those vast and ever-develop 
 ing resources of the Union cause which Sherman 
 brilliant successes had quickened into vigorous action 
 and being warned minutely by deserters and spies o 
 the waning strength of that heroic army which had s 
 long bidden defiance to the efforts of the North. 
 
 We have not space here to point out fully hov 
 fatal was that political determination which cause 
 General Lee, against his own opinion and all true mil] 
 tary rule, to maintain himself in Richmond at the cos 
 of ruin to its defenders. Two causes operated wit 
 terrible effect upon his army; the want of men, an 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. yi 
 
 he want of supplies. The Confederacy was not as 
 :ompletely stripped of its manhood as Grant believed 
 yhen he publicly declared that winter of his enemies, 
 ; they have robbed the cradle and the grave : " but 
 he conscription, badly managed at the first, failed 
 altogether in its object as the powers of the Confeder 
 ate government were lessened ; and this failure, coupled 
 with the proposed refusal of the exchange of prisoners, 
 )revented all recruiting for the forces at the capital. 
 As remarkable, and probably even more decisive of 
 he result, was the utter break-down of the commis- 
 iariat system in force. This department, it is now 
 veil known, was confided to a man as incompetent by 
 nature as ignorant of his duties ; and the mode he 
 adopted of pressing supplies at a nominal price caused 
 evasion wherever force was actually wanting. So 
 much is now generally admitted, and has been written 
 plainly in American works ; but, in addition to these 
 errors of the government, it is plain that there was a 
 certain weakness on the part of Lee himself, which 
 contributed largely to the result. If kept at Rich 
 mond against his will, there was all the more need of 
 lis being fully rationed ; and, strong as he was by his 
 position and prestige, had he insisted on taking the 
 :ommissariat of his force into his own hands, and seen 
 to its working, the failure of the supplies need not have 
 occurred. We have been informed by irrefragable 
 uthority that, when Richmond was abandoned, there 
 were stored up not far off, on the North Carolina rail 
 ways, four months provisions for such an army as his, 
 which had only required exertion to have been for 
 warded long before. The food was there, and the rail 
 roads still serviceable ; but there was a lack of that 
 
72 THE MILITAR Y LIFE 
 
 personal energetic supervision which in such cases 
 smooths difficulties away, and brings provisions and 
 army together. In excuse it may be said that a retreat 
 into North Carolina was constantly kept in view ; but 
 this should not have prevented the measures necessary 
 to meet immediate wants. For lack of such the 
 strength and spirits and number of those glorious sol 
 diers fell ruinously away. 
 
 Lee discovered this too late. Desertion had thinned 
 his ranks in the winter, and increased so rapidly in the 
 spring of 1865, that the month of March found himj 
 guarding forty miles of intrenchments with but forty 
 thousand men. The strength of the enemy was mean-] 
 while constantly increasing, and it became absolutely 
 necessary to make an effort to extricate the army from 
 a situation no longer tenable. To retreat from Rich 
 mond was, however, no longer easy nor safe. The 
 necessary movement would involve the march of long 
 columns past the left flank of Grant, who was constantly 
 on the watch ; and Lee resolved therefore to force his 
 enemy to draw this in by threatening the eastern or 
 right end of his lines before Petersburg by a sudden 
 assault. The sortie took place accordingly on the 
 morning of the twenty-fifth of March. It was confided 
 to Gordon, the youngest and most daring of Lee s 
 corps commanders, whose courage and conduct had 
 raised him from the rank of simple brigadier to his 
 present charge during the autumn campaign. His 
 attack at first promised to be successful, one of the 
 strong redoubts which guarded the Federal camp being 
 carried at a rush, and three of the neighboring batte 
 ries abandoned by their guards. But the advantage 
 could not be followed up ; for the supports which \vere 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 73 
 
 to have aided Gordon to establish himself beyond the 
 works by a further advance, failed to answer the call 
 upon them : and then the Federals, recovering from 
 their surprise, drove back the assailants by a counter 
 charge, taking many of them prisoners, and inflicting 
 further heavy loss in killed and wounded, the retreat 
 taking place under a severe artillery fire. The task had 
 not seemed impossible, nor the odds hopeless ; but 
 the Army of Virginia had failed because the energy 
 and spirit which had made it the world s wonder for 
 the past three years, were decaying for lack of nour 
 ishment and hope. 
 
 Grant detected his enemy s increasing weakness 
 under this show of offence, and made haste to give 
 the counterblow that was to conclude the long cam 
 paign. With his wish arrived the ready instrument 
 in the person of Sheridan, the most impetuous and 
 active of that new class of generals, young in years, 
 but veterans in war, whom the long series of contin 
 uous campaigns had raised to high charge upon the 
 Federal side. Grant had marked him out first in 1863, 
 at Chattanooga, where he led on his division of infantry 
 to break the lines of Bragg, with all the fire of youth 
 and the skill of a practiced soldier. Struck by his 
 spirit and tactical ability, he restored him to the cav 
 alry service (in which Sheridan had first distinguished 
 himself in the West), choosing him out, first to com 
 mand the whole horse of his army, and then to take 
 charge of the independent operations in the Shenan- 
 doah valley, where he had been opposed during the 
 autumn to General Early. Having first checked, he 
 finally routed and ruined that general s army ; and 
 then, his separate task accomplished, returned to his 
 
74 
 
 THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 chief to take part in the final struggle, arriving at 
 the Federal headquarters on March twenty-seventh, 
 two days after Gordon s repulse. His arrival was 
 the signal of the opening of the spring campaign of 
 1865. 
 
 Grant s first plan as laid down in his own orders, 
 was simple enough, and indeed may be regarded as a 
 continuation of the efforts made on his left in the 
 previous autumn. Sheridan, with the cavalry, was to 
 strike boldly inland, and destroy the Southside and 
 direct Danville Railroads. The other corps, taking 
 for lightness sake part only of their guns, were to 
 move by their left, for the double purpose of " turning 
 the enemy s positions, and insuring Sheridan s suc 
 cess." The Ninth Corps alone was to remain and 
 guard the lines before Petersburg. These, there 
 fore, would be watched by 20,000 men, while 10,000 
 horse and 80,000 foot moved beyond them, and cut 
 Richmond off from the rest of the South. The troops, 
 well fed, well armed, and confident of success, took 
 every man his four days rations ; and light wagon- 
 trains bore supplies for eight days more. This was 
 enough, it was thought (nor was the reckoning false) 
 to finish well the work in hand. The greatest Civil 
 War, as some prefer to call it, the greatest Rebellion 
 ever known, had drawn to its close. The energy and 
 resolution with which General Grant had carried out 
 his purpose, unwearied by delay, undaunted by failure, 
 were at last to bring their full reward. 
 
 The movement began early on the twenty-ninth 
 of March. That evening the fifth and second Infantry 
 Corps, under Warren and Humphreys, got well out 
 side the lines, and found slight intrenchments ex- 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. ^ 
 
 tended by the Confederates into the woods beyond. 
 Along the front of these they skirmished, feeling their 
 way cautiously. Sheridan lay that night at Diri- 
 widdie, six miles further to the west (or left), prepar 
 ing to start on his distant expedition next day. Sud 
 denly there fell upon Grant that sort of inspiration 
 which, in such great events, precedes and presages 
 success ; and changing his first plan, he resolved to 
 turn his left inwards, and crush the enemy where 
 they stood. " / now feel" he wrote that evening to 
 Sheridan, " like ending the matter, if it is possible to 
 do so, before going back. I do not want you, there 
 fore, to cut loose and go after the enemy s roads at 
 present. In the morning, push round the enemy, and 
 get on to his right rear. We will act altogether as 
 one army here until it is seen what can be done with 
 the enemy." 
 
 Lee was neither surprised nor idle. With his usual 
 insight, he had discovered the Federal manoeuvre, 
 and drawing 15,000 men from the weak garrison of 
 Petersburg, he moved to his right, to try his old 
 method of war once more and strike at the exposed 
 flank of the enemy while they were yet extending it. 
 The thirtieth of March found his troops gathering, 
 despite storms of rain which that day stayed the Fed 
 eral march at Five Forks, important cross-roads close 
 to the Southside Railroad and ten miles beyond the 
 Petersburg lines. Intrenching themselves here, they 
 stood almost between Sheridan and the nearest corps 
 of Federal Infantry, that of Warren : the next morn 
 ing the blow fell on each. Warren was at first sur 
 prised ; but, improving on the ordinary Federal prac 
 tice, he had disposed his forces deeply in echelon, 
 
76 THE MI LI TAR Y LIFE 
 
 so as to meet a flank attack by mutual support ; and 
 being reinforced by part of the corps of Humphreys, 
 he finally regained his ground. The Confederates, 
 retiring before him, now turned against Sheridan (who 
 had reached Five Forks with his advance), and drove 
 him roughly back upon Dinwiddie. On the whole, 
 therefore, this battle of the thirty-first of March was 
 indecisive ; though Grant s orders that night, show 
 that he was inspired with grave anxiety about Sheri 
 dan, and Warren was ordered to march directly to his 
 quarters, and support him. 
 
 The morning of the first of April decided the cam 
 paign. It showed Sheridan that the enemy had 
 retired on Five Forks ; and he followed them with his 
 horse, keeping Warren s corps back, concealed from 
 observation. When arrived before the enemy s 
 intrenchments, a simple line of breastwork, without 
 flank protection, held by Pickett s and Bushrod John 
 son s divisions, he engaged their attention with some 
 of his dismounted troopers, and made as though about 
 to turn the right of their works with another division, 
 while Warren s whole corps was secretly formed to 
 march in upon their left. These tactics (for no gen 
 eral had mastered, like this young American com 
 mander, the new art of using, amid infantry manoeuvres, 
 his mounted riflemen), succeeded perfectly. Warren 
 swept on in irresistible strength upon the astonished 
 Confederates, when occupied with the attacks of Sher 
 idan on their front and right. A panic seized them ; 
 they broke; and 5,000 of the defenders of Five Forks 
 fell captives into the victors hands. 
 
 Next day, Grant followed up vigorously the success 
 which his lieutenant s energy had won, and attacked 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. >jj 
 
 the whole front of the Petersburg lines. The outer 
 defences, too weakly manned for serious resistance, 
 fell at the first assault ; and although Longstreet 
 (delayed until now at his posts on the other side of the 
 River James by a feint) arrived in time to restore the 
 fight, and save the inner line of works, it became neces 
 sary for Lee to order the retreat at all risks that night. 
 But the Federals were as near as their enemies to the 
 Danville Railroad, by which alone could Lee hope to 
 feed his army in that wasted region while on his way 
 to North Carolina : and Grant s forethought *had 
 already furnished the provisions necessary for a length 
 ened pursuit, while the Confederate general had no 
 nearer supplies than at Danville, and was uncertain if 
 these would reach him in time to meet his wants on 
 the retreat. His uncertainty began to change into 
 despair when, early on the fourth, after a severe march, 
 he reached the railroad at the designated point, Ame 
 lia Court-house, to find his trains missent to Richmond ! 
 Meanwhile his adversary, the general who had long 
 since " felt like ending the matter," had now taken up 
 the pursuit with relentless vigor, and was not slow to 
 profit by the disparity of supplies. While the starv 
 ing Confederate columns were waiting for the foragers 
 sent out to gather up a meal, Grant himself directed 
 his infantry on a line parallel to that of Lee ; and 
 Sheridan, pushing impetuously past them, struck the 
 railroad just south of Amelia, where he was soon joined 
 by the Fifth Corps, the same which had turned the 
 scale at Five Forks, and disposed his force so as effect 
 ually to block the way. 
 
 Not even then did the great Confederate com 
 mander yield to his fate. Twice he struck westward 
 
^g THE MILITARY LIFE 
 
 with a wide sweep ; attempting to first pass around the 
 enemy and gain the Danville line beyond ; and when 
 that hope failed, to win the branch railroad which ran 
 to Lynchburg and the mountains. All was in vain 
 against the prescience of Grant, the fire of Sheridan, 
 the fatal odds they wielded. His famished troops 
 could bear the pressure of their misery no more. 
 " Hundreds," says an eye-witness, " dropped from 
 exhaustion, and thousands let fall their muskets from 
 inability to carry them any farther." On the ninth, 
 the gaunt relics of the Army of Virginia were finally 
 brought to bay near Appomattox Court-house, and 
 were surrendered shortly afterwards by their beloved 
 chief on terms so liberal, and enforced in so delicate a 
 manner, that one knows not whether the transaction 
 reflects most credit on the victor or the vanquished. 
 When President Johnson, not long after, in the first 
 vindictive impulse of triumph, would have singled out 
 the Confederate hero and his favored officers for trial 
 and vengeance, General Grant showed no less resolu 
 tion in maintaining the capitulation inviolate than he 
 had displayed in the campaign by which he won the 
 right to offer it. All honor to the noble instinct which 
 saved the restored Union from the crime her Chief 
 Magistrate meditated in the newness of his power ! 
 
 It is not within our present purpose to show how 
 far Sherman s masterly strategy had contributed to 
 the successful issue of the struggle. The war was rec 
 ognized as practically finished from the day when Lee 
 laid down his sword, and the cause of the Union 
 needed that of Grant no more. And soon the nation, 
 grateful for his services and expectant of more, resolved 
 to raise her favorite general to a yet greater charge 
 
OF GENERAL GRANT. fg 
 
 than that of army or bureau. As in the crisis of the 
 war the voice of the North called Grant to supreme 
 command, so after peace was won, it named him as 
 the man who best could solve the difficulties the war 
 had bequeathed. It is not for us to prophesy the final 
 result. Great, though not faultless, as a general, act 
 ive and successful in administrative office, the charac 
 ter of Grant as a statesman and the effect of his 
 personal character as President are enigmas which time 
 must solve. We know that he has steered so clear of 
 shoals of party that the Republicans have charged him 
 with being at heart a Democrat, and the Democrats 
 abused him for his gross Republicanism. We have seen 
 that fulsome and inappropriate praise, virulent and per 
 sonal abuse, have failed to shake his reticence, or cause 
 him to commit himself unreservedly to the arms of fac 
 tion. Yet the task before him needs more than mere 
 prudence and reserve. It demands high wisdom as well 
 as enduring resolution, and statesmanship no less than 
 self-restraint. To bind up the wounds left by the war, 
 to restore concord between the victorious and van 
 quished sections of the Union, to insure real freedom 
 to the Southern negro, and full justice to the South 
 ern white ; these are indeed tasks which might tax 
 the powers of Washington himself, or a greater than 
 Washington, if such an one could be found. It would 
 seem as though his friend and adviser, Sherman, had 
 foreseen coming events to the letter when he wrote, 
 five years ago, on Grant s elevation to be Lieutenant- 
 General, the warning prophecy which we may quote 
 as peculiarly appropriate now : " You are now Wash 
 ington s legitimate successor, and occupy a position of 
 almost dangerous elevation; but, if you can continue, 
 
go THE MILITARY LIFE OF GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 as heretofore, to be yourself, simple, honest, and un 
 pretending, you will enjoy through life the respect 
 and love of friends and the homage of millions of 
 human beings, that will award you a large share in secu 
 ring to them and their descendants a government of 
 law and stability." 
 
 We would hope that this worthy counsel of his 
 friend to the commander may find its full fruition in 
 the actions of the President. We trust that there was 
 a deep inner meaning, as well as fine political tact and 
 generous sentiment in the words with which General 
 Grant closed his brief acceptance of his first nomina 
 tion for the Presidency, and that generations of Amer 
 ican citizens yet unborn may identify his name with 
 the most noble aspiration a successful soldier could 
 utter, " LET us HAVE PEACE." 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE* 
 
 YEAR after year had passed by since General 
 Grant first publicly sought the presidency of the great 
 republic which owed so much to his services in war ; 
 but the peace which he then made his motto has not, 
 yet smiled on the reconquered South. The world from 
 outside the narrow sphere of American politics has 
 looked on with surprise at the petty warfare against 
 individuals which succeeded the gigantic contest 
 between Union and Secession. Amnesty upon am 
 nesty, ever repeated, never complete, tells the tale of 
 mistrust still nourished on the victor s side, or of party 
 intrigue defeating national generosity in its purposes. 
 Traveller after traveller through the limits of the over 
 thrown Confederacy brings back the sad story of 
 ceaseless dissension and widespread ruin. Rival legis 
 latures, born of mean fraud or open violence, contest 
 the political supremacy here. There negro revolt, 
 unchecked by law, threatens summary vengeance for 
 the long-endured wrongs of the slave. In other dis 
 tricts secret and bloody societies strive by illegal com 
 bination to prolong the rule which has passed away 
 from the white. Everywhere rises the same story of 
 corrupt administration and finances involved to enrich 
 the mean adventurers who have swarmed in upon the 
 prostrate states for booty, as foul birds seek their prey 
 
 * A Life of General Robert E. Lee. By John Esten Cooke. 
 
 6 
 
g 2 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 when the carnage is over. The successful general, 
 raised to rule the Union saved by the sword, who 
 had called upon the nation that elected him to join in 
 the noble wish, "Let us have peace," found his task 
 of political pacification more arduous, more thankless, 
 and withal far more prolonged, than the command of 
 the Union armies for the overthrow of Secession. 
 
 If to us afar off this defeat of the first hopes that 
 came with the victory of the Union seems sad and 
 surprising, how must those feel it who dwell near the 
 contending parties that prolong the strife, without 
 sharing their political passions ? Even among those 
 that lend themselves to prolong the intolerable state 
 of things in the reconquered states, must be many 
 who regret the results bitterly, while they excuse the 
 means used by the false reasoning of expediency. 
 And doubtless in the Northern States there are thou 
 sands of good men to whom each phase of the political 
 conflict that makes its market in the strife of the South 
 seems an unmixed evil, which mars, in their view, the 
 full freedom and growing greatness of the Union. But 
 all these can look on with comparative serenity. For 
 how much happier are such than those whose lot has 
 been cast among the storms that sweep over the face 
 of what they once dreamed of as an independent, 
 well-governed republic : who have watched sorrow 
 fully the growth of the evils they could not ward off 
 from the states which gave them birth : who had 
 offered their lives freely in battle to save these from 
 what they deemed oppression, and yet, when the 
 cause for which they had fought fell, bowed their 
 heads meekly before the victors yoke, in hopes that 
 their submission, possibly their sacrifice, might save 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 83 
 
 their humbler fellow-citizens from ruin : who, when 
 called upon to set the example of prudence, thought 
 it no shame to ask pardon at the hands of that gov 
 ernment which once their victories had shaken : who 
 urged the writers that would extol the brief-lived 
 glories of the Confederacy to " avoid all topics that 
 would excite angry discussion or hostile feeling :"* 
 who turned their faces steadfastly away from the 
 ambitions and hopes of the dead past to seek com 
 pensation for defeat and loss in the steady perform 
 ance of humble daily duties: whose blameless lives 
 and peaceful bearing in adversity have testified to 
 their love of country more gloriously than deaths upon 
 the battle-field : whose conduct, in short, when con 
 quered, has won involuntary admiration from the 
 adversaries who once heaped curses upon their rebel 
 lious names. Many such there must have been, vic 
 tims of fate, sacrifices to political necessity, innocent 
 expiators, if the truth be told, of wrongs done in ages 
 past to helpless Africans, among the leaders of the 
 late Secession. One such, at least, all recognize in 
 Robert Edward Lee, General-in-Chief of the ex-Con 
 federate forces, better known as the Commander of 
 the Army of Virginia, who passed away, after five 
 years endurance of his altered position, without the 
 sign of ailment outwardly, without a word of pain, 
 that great heart which repined not for his own loss of 
 dignity or of ancestral fortune, giving way at last 
 under the continued pressure of the ruin and degra 
 dation of the beloved state to the freedom of which 
 the prospects of his whole life had been sacrificed. 
 
 * General Lee s words to an author undertaking to write the life of 
 " Stonewall " Jackson. 
 
34 ^ MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 While he lived, General Lee never ceased to con 
 template (as we know from his private correspondence 
 with ourselves) giving a record of his own career to 
 the world. But the time never came when in his 
 judgment this could be honestly and fully done with 
 out stirring up the bitter feelings he would have 
 sacrificed all he could give to allay. Now that he has 
 passed away, others cannot be so reticent. And Mr. 
 Cooke has produced a life of the dead hero, which, if 
 wanting in many particulars, is more so perhaps from 
 the greatness of the subject than from the imperfec 
 tions and partiality of the writer. A large part of his 
 volume is, of course, directed to those campaigns 
 which have placed the name of Lee in the very fore 
 most rank of the world s great commanders. These, 
 however, have long been treated of and studied in 
 England in their general outlines. They were known 
 and admired here before the American public could 
 bear a critical recital of the defeats of the Union 
 generals. Be it our present task rather to speak of 
 those portions of Lee s eventful life which are less 
 known on this side of the Atlantic : what sacrifices he 
 made when he cast in his lot with the South : how, 
 brought into command by an accident, his first stroke 
 raised him to the eminence he never lost : how he fell, 
 carrying in his fall the tottering Confederacy which 
 had ceased to hope in any other name : how he bore 
 himself in his retirement, when vanquished by fate, 
 yet crowned with undying fame, he rivalled in patience 
 the patriarch of Uz, and waited in sad watch over 
 surrounding ruin through his appointed time for the 
 change which he longed for but would not anticipate. 
 Some eulogist, worthy of the grandeur of the theme, 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 8$ 
 
 will, we hope, arise hereafter. But it is time that at 
 least an attempt should be made to do justice to the 
 virtue and patriotism of the man, known hitherto to 
 Englishmen chiefly as one of the greatest of modern 
 generals. 
 
 When the American colonies, finding remonstrance 
 vain, rose in arms against the overbearing policy of 
 the mother country, the descendants of the Cavalier 
 families which had transplanted to Virginia the loyal 
 traditions and sentiments of the King s party in the 
 Civil War, were to a man found foremost among the 
 defenders of local independence. How this apparent 
 contradiction came about it is not here pretended to 
 explain. But it is certain that the so-called Royalists 
 of 1776 were for the most part very recent immigrants. 
 Those of their fellow-citizens whose interests were 
 fairly bound up by long association and descent with 
 the fortunes of the rising colonies, espoused almost 
 without exception the cause of the latter, no matter 
 how earnest their loyalty had been in theory before. 
 And it is of itself enough to condemn the measures 
 of King George and his Ministers that they should 
 have alienated from the very outset of the struggle 
 the class whose natural sentiments would have been 
 on the side of loyalty, had there been fair room left 
 for them to doubt. One member of this aristocracy 
 of Virginia, then a youth of twenty, was Henry Lee, 
 a direct descendant of Richard Lee of Stratford 
 Laughton in Essex, who had been an ardent Cavalier 
 in the Revolution, and one of many supporters of the 
 falling cause of the Monarchy whom fear of political 
 persecution after the overthrow of the Royalists, or 
 
86 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 disgust at the then triumphant Puritan Government, 
 had driven to hasty emigration. Settling in Virginia 
 with considerable means, Richard Lee had built what 
 was an exact reproduction of the old manor-house of 
 a country gentleman in the east of England, acquired 
 gradually a large estate, and maintained, so far as 
 possible, the dignity of a rich esquire of the old coun 
 try. For those were days when the abolition of 
 primogeniture had not been introduced into America ; 
 and settlers of Richard Lee s rank and fortune seem 
 to have looked confidently forward to a continuance 
 in the new country of all the privileges and enjoy 
 ments possessed by their class in Great Britain. A 
 great English writer, who has made the " Virginians" 
 of the last century the subject of one of his most 
 skilful and touching fictions, had in view precisely 
 such a family, by race and tradition, as that from 
 which General Lee was descended : and if his hero 
 had left descendants to our own times, they would 
 have played the same part as the illustrious represen 
 tative of this other Virginian race. 
 
 In the manor-house of the Lees once burnt, but 
 soon rebuilt on the same spacious lines, the family 
 were still living more than a century later, when young 
 Henry Lee, just graduated at Princeton College, came 
 forward to offer his services in the Revolutionary army, 
 and received a commission from the Congress as cap 
 tain of horse. From the very first he displayed mili 
 tary talent of a high order, and became before long 
 the most noted leader of his army for dashing enter 
 prise in separate command. A special gold medal was 
 awarded him by Congress for his capture of the fort 
 at Paulus s Hook, and in 1781 he was sent to command 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. g/ 
 
 the cavalry of the Republican forces in the Carolinas 
 under General Greene, there matched against Corn- 
 wallis. That Greene failed on the whole in his en 
 counter is well known. He was in fact in a position 
 of inferiority, until Cornwallis left the South for Pe 
 tersburg and the Richmond peninsula, in the vain 
 hope of effecting the decisive junction with the forces 
 of Clinton, which the timidity or insufficient resources 
 of his Commander-in-Chief never allowed to be ac 
 complished. Greene, however, though defeated, 
 never ceased to hold his own stoutly against Corn 
 wallis for the time, and afterwards recovered the Car 
 olinas fully for Congress : and his successes were due 
 in great part to the talents and energy of his young 
 cavalry commander. General Henry Lee had a 
 worthy opponent in Colonel Tarleton, a cavalry offi 
 cer of no mean merit in light warfare. But the repub 
 lican cavalier established his superiority very fully in 
 the series of skirmishes that ensued. And although, 
 in his own Memoir of the War, he has the modesty to 
 attribute his own successes over Tarleton to his su 
 periority in horse-flesh, readers of his interesting 
 work may discern for themselves that his own skill 
 and judgment were the prime causes of the advantage, 
 and will be disposed to agree to the full with General 
 Greene, who wrote in his personal thanks, " No man, 
 in the progress of the campaign, had equal merit with 
 yourself;" an expression of strong meaning coming 
 from a plain, blunt soldier of honest character. And 
 this praise was fully confirmed by Washington s own 
 words of " love and thanks," in a letter of later date, 
 written long after enough to show how strong in that 
 great man s mind was the memory of the services of 
 
88 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 " Light-horse Harry," as his contemporaries familiarly 
 called General Henry Lee. 
 
 Retiring from command, when the close of the 
 war turned the swords of revolutionary generals into 
 ploughshares, Henry Lee married his second cousin, 
 Matilda Lee, heiress of the old family estate of Strat 
 ford, and thus coming, as it were, into the place of the 
 head of the family, gave himself up to local political 
 life. Alternately governor of his native state of Vir 
 ginia, and her representative in Congress, he yet found 
 leisure to write the really thoughtful and accurate ac 
 count of his Southern campaigns already referred to, 
 as well as to indulge largely in the open-handed hos 
 pitality which was the tradition of the family, and 
 which in his case was carried so far as to impoverish 
 his estate. His cousin did not long survive their 
 union ; but a subsequent marriage gave him three 
 sons, the second of whom, Robert Edward, became 
 the renowned general, whose fame has almost caused 
 that of his father s reputation for warlike prowess to 
 be forgotten. He was born on January nineteenth, 
 1807, in the same room where Richard Henry Lee, 
 his father s cousin, first saw the light, the orator to 
 whose charge was intrusted the moving of the Declar 
 ation of Independence, and one of the leading mem 
 bers of the original Congress which voted it. 
 
 " Robert was always good," wrote his father some 
 ten years later to a relative, in a description of his 
 young family. The boy was then growing up in a 
 healthy out-of-door life, taught to ride almost from his 
 infancy, and enjoying the constant good health which 
 a serene conscience and temp era teJ^fl|H^M^d to 
 him until the close of a long life. 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 8 9 
 
 of his later boyhood the family lived in the town of 
 Alexandria, where there were facilities for education 
 not attainable in the country, and here, after General 
 Henry Lee s death, his widow remained for the same 
 reason. Before arriving at manhood, Robert Lee had 
 avowed his earnest desire to follow the military pro 
 fession in which his father had been so distinguished. 
 The services of the latter were too conspicuous to 
 make it difficult to procure an appointment to West 
 Point for his son; and in 1825 he entered the Military 
 Academy for that long and complete course of study 
 by which it is aimed in the United States to fit the 
 future officer, not as with us for one, but for every 
 branch of the service. Young Lee was as remarkable 
 here as through the rest of his career for the blameless 
 simplicity of his life and his devotion to the duties of 
 the hour. No entry was recorded against him in the 
 defaulters book during his four years residence, and 
 when his class graduated in 1829, he took the second 
 place, and was appointed to the Engineers, a small 
 corps regarded as the elite of a highly trained service. 
 His manly form, great personal beauty, and sweetness 
 of manner were noted then ; and in the young lieuten 
 ant s carriage and appearance were the pledge of the 
 noble presence and calm bearing which won the instant 
 confidence of the high-spirited but wilful troops of the 
 Confederacy, almost from the first sight of their new 
 commander thirty years later. Three years after being 
 commissioned, he became the fortunate suitor of Mary 
 Custis, the daughter and heiress of George Custis, 
 Washington s adopted son. By his marriage with her 
 he came into possession of the hereditary estates of 
 the founder of American liberty, and was the nearest 
 
go A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 representative before the world of that great man s 
 family. This fact, as well as the traditions of his own 
 family, should be distinctly borne in mind by those 
 who would understand fully his painful position at the 
 outbreak of the Civil War. 
 
 Seventeen years of peace service passed by, and 
 Captain Lee had hitherto found no special opportu 
 nity of distinction. In 1846, however, the Mexican 
 War began, and his character and attainments were so 
 well known as to cause him to be selected as Chief 
 Engineer to the army under General Scott, in which 
 capacity he served through the first campaign that any 
 American officer of his standing shared in. It is not 
 our purpose here to enter into the details of General 
 Scott s difficulties and successes. Suffice it to say that 
 from first to last Lee fully justified the choice which 
 had been made of him for his post, and was mentioned 
 in almost every important report. " Indefatigable in 
 the siege operations, in reconnoissances as daring as 
 laborious, and of the utmost value everywhere," was 
 the character he earned in his commander s dispatches. 
 Three times specially breveted for his services, he 
 returned to his own country after the close of hos 
 tilities, acknowledged as one of the most promising of 
 her officers, and possessing the confidence of his chief be 
 yond any other of the many distinguished men who had 
 served with him. From duty on the defences, or as 
 Superintendent of West Point, Lee soon passed again 
 to a service which had more promise of adventure. In 
 a fit of sudden liberality the Congress in 1855 voted 
 two regiments of cavalry to be added to the permanent 
 establishment of the army. Energetic officers of all 
 branches naturally sought commissions in the new 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. gi 
 
 corps, which were specially designed for active frontier 
 duty ; and Lee, being among the number applying for 
 transfer, became Lieutenant-Colonel of the Second 
 Cavalry, in which he found among his comrades Albert 
 Johnston, whose death lost the Confederates their 
 advantage at Shiloh, and, it has been declared, saved 
 Grant s army from ruin ; Thomas and Stoneman, in 
 after days leading generals on the Northern side ; with 
 Hardee, Van Dorn, and Hood, who were equally \vell 
 known on that of the South. The regiment was 
 ordered to Texas, where Lee spent the four years fol 
 lowing in guarding the new frontier of the Republic. 
 
 The next event of Lee s life brought him promi 
 nently into collision with the stormy elements already 
 brewing to burst later in civil war. He chanced to be 
 on leave at Washington in the autumn of 1859, being 
 then on a visit to his family at Arlington, his seat close 
 by, when he was sent for very suddenly by President 
 Buchanan. A gang of desperadoes, he learnt, under 
 one John Brown, had attacked and taken the military 
 depot at Harper s Ferry, and declared their intention 
 of raising a servile war against the slaveowners of Vir 
 ginia. To proceed there with the party of marines 
 placed at his disposal, attack the rioters in the build 
 ing they had fortified, and give them over, when pres 
 ently captured, to the civil authorities of Virginia, was 
 a duty executed with such completeness and prompti 
 tude as the service called for. But far-seeing and 
 sagacious as Lee was, he probably, as little as any man 
 in the states, could foretell that the small cloud thus 
 easily dispersed was but the forerunner of a tempest 
 of civil war of more terrible extent and fury than the 
 world had ever witnessed. He was again in Texas, 
 
^2 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 commanding his department, when the storm was 
 gathering rapidly after the election of Lincoln in 1860 ; 
 and early in the following spring he was recalled to 
 headquarters by General Scott, under whose com 
 mand were the modest forces which formed the whole 
 army of the now threatened Union. 
 
 Men s minds were on all sides growing fevered as 
 the coming struggle revealed its inevitable shape more 
 certainly. To none was it more vital and terrible 
 than to the sons of Virginia, a state in which the sen 
 timent of pride in the growing greatness of the Union 
 balanced her natural inclination to side with her more 
 forward and passionate sisters of the South. Border 
 ing too on the capital of the country and the North 
 ern states behind it, interest, as well as a loyal repug 
 nance to break up the republic, united to arrest her 
 tendency to follow the example of South Carolina, 
 which had seceded in December. But when Lincoln 
 issued his decisive proclamation, pronouncing secession 
 to be open rebellion, and calling on each state which 
 had not departed from the Union to send its contin 
 gent to repress the contemplated crime, an absolute 
 choice could no longer be deferred. Virginia must 
 fight either with or against the South. She chose the 
 former alternative, as that which, if the more immedi 
 ately dangerous, was the more certain to carry the 
 sympathies of her people. On the seventeenth of 
 April her Ordinance of Secession was passed, and her 
 lot for the future cast .by this measure with the new 
 Confederacy. 
 
 To none of her children was the crisis a severer 
 trial than it was to Colonel Lee. On the one hand 
 were the traditions of his family, whose whole career 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 93 
 
 from the time of its establishment in Virginia had 
 been identified with the honor and progress of the 
 state. She was his country proper in his eyes, having 
 been originally an independent colony, and only by 
 her own act long afterwards leagued with other inde 
 pendent colonies into a Federation for the mainte 
 nance of common rights and liberties. Brought up in 
 this faith, he could not view any other claim as more 
 than subordinate to that of his native state. 
 
 On the other hand, his professional interests we 
 
 lay stress on this fact, because it has been hitherto 
 
 unrecognized in England were absolutely on the 
 
 Union, since termed the Northern side. Distinguish- 
 
 i ed by position and pedigree above all those of his 
 
 i standing in the service he had chosen, beloved and 
 
 o 
 
 blameless in his private life, he had been recognized 
 by all as one of the ablest of the country s officers du- 
 ring the Mexican War; and what was more impor- 
 j tant than all, he had impressed his genius for war so 
 j strongly on General Scott, that the Commander-in- 
 Chief, conscious of his own growing infirmities, did 
 not hesitate to announce his intention to propose Lee 
 as his successor in his now weighty charge. A warm 
 personal regard for his junior made the aged general 
 all the more anxious not to lose his services. He 
 recommended him, therefore, on his arrival at Wash 
 ington for the first vacancy as brigadier-general in the 
 regular army. And although there is no record of the 
 personal conversation which ensued when the con 
 queror of Mexico and his trusted staff-officer were 
 closeted together in that eventful April, we may be 
 sure that no argument or appeal was left unused which 
 could avail to save the Union the loss of Lee s servi- 
 
94 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 ces. Up to the last hour before the die was cast by 
 the state Legislature at Richmond, Lee probably 
 hoped that its decision might be stayed, and his own 
 rendered unnecessary. But when certain news came 
 that Secession was accomplished, and he must choose 
 between the flag he honored and the state he loved, 
 he decided that the latter claimed his first allegiance, 
 and he could no longer delay what he believed to be 
 his painful duty. His last sad interview with his old 
 chief took place the following day, and found his res 
 olution fixed unalterably. On the twentieth he sent 
 in his official resignation of his commission, and apolo 
 gised for the two days delay by saying : 
 
 " It would have been presented at once but for the strug 
 gle it has cost me to separate myself from a service to which 
 I have devoted all the best years of my life and all the 
 ability I possessed. During the whole of that time more 
 than a quarter of a century I have experienced nothing 
 but kindness from my superiors and the most cordial friend 
 ship from my comrades. To no one, General, have I been 
 as much indebted as yourself. . . . Save in defence of my 
 native state, I never again desire to draw my sword." 
 
 Writing to his sister the same day, he lays bare 
 his feelings with a candor which even those who least 
 approve his decision must honor. No doubt his words 
 express generally the feelings of many others less 
 gifted with the power of expression ; and in these 
 days, when State independence has been swept away 
 by the keen arbitrament of the sword, it is well to 
 recall what was thought on the subject at that time 
 by one of the most pure-minded and unselfish of those 
 who were forced to choose : 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 95 
 
 " The whole South" [he writes] " is in a state of revolution, 
 into which Virginia, after a long struggle, has been drawn ; 
 and though I recognize no necessity for this state of things, 
 and would have forborne and pleaded to the end for the re 
 dress of grievances, real or supposed, yet in my own person 
 I had to meet the question whether I should take part 
 against my native state. With all my devotion to the Union 
 and the feeling of loyalty and duty of an American citizen, I 
 have not been able to make up my mind to raise my hand 
 against my relatives, my children, my home. I have there 
 fore resigned my commission in the army." 
 
 He adds here the same expression of his hope, 
 before quoted, that he may not be called upon to 
 serve save in defence of his own state : but Virginia s 
 
 o 
 
 fortunes were now to be -bound up for weal or woe 
 with those of the Confederacy that she was about to 
 join. 
 
 The very mansion of Arlington from which he 
 
 j wrote these letters was his first sacrifice to his decision. 
 Situated as it was in sight of the capital, it must needs 
 be abandoned, with the fine estate on which it stood. 
 Perhaps in quitting it and leaving its contents intact, 
 
 i he may have vainly hoped that the venerated relics 
 of Washington with which it was crowded might save 
 it from spoliation. But personal losses could weigh 
 nothing with such a soul as his ; and leaving to its 
 fate of almost certain occupation by the first advance 
 guard of the Union army that house in which he had 
 spent the happiest hours of his life, he set out for 
 Richmond. Ere, however, he had reached the capi 
 tal of this state, soon to become that of the Confed 
 eracy, he had been appointed Major-General of all 
 the Virginian forces by the spontaneous choice of the 
 
g6 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 governor and legislature, and on the twenty-third 
 he was publicly received in his new capacity at Rich 
 mond. He accepted the trust conferred on him 
 in a few simple and dignified words, again expressing 
 it to be his sole desire to defend his native state. 
 There was general joy, the American biographer 
 states ; for it had been feared that he would adhere 
 to the Federal Government, and Virginia would have 
 looked upon his loss as a public calamity. 
 
 He was now, though fifty-three years of age, still 
 remarkable for the manly beauty of his face and form, 
 as well as for his singular temperance and the calm 
 ness of his manner: 
 
 " Grave, silent, with a military composure of bearing that 
 amounted at times to stiffness," says Mr. Cooke. And he 
 adds that although then " looked upon by those who held in 
 tercourse with him as a personage of marked reserve, the 
 truth and frankness of the man, under all circumstances, and 
 his great, warm heart, full of honesty and unassuming sim 
 plicity, became known only in the course of the war." 
 
 No doubt General Lee felt at that time the 
 weight of his responsibilities and the serious character 
 of his decision, and possibly he discouraged the frivo 
 lous conversation in which the excitement of lesser 
 men would naturally vent itself at such a crisis. Be 
 this as it may, it is clear that the innocent gayety of 
 heart for which in earlier years he had been noted had 
 disappeared under the weight of official duties, or was 
 banished by the gravity of his new charge ; for this in 
 cluded the whole supply and training of the state forces, 
 which were collecting in large numbers, and gave him 
 incessant employment. But the defence of Virginia 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 97 
 
 soon became merged in that of the Confederacy which 
 she joined formally in May. Her capital was declared 
 the capital of the South. The Southern Congress 
 , soon met there. New men pressed in to take the lead 
 I in the affairs of what claimed to be a nation, and for a 
 time, General Lee was relegated to duties of a second 
 ary order, the late period at which his state had 
 ! declared for the Confederacy, having put others already 
 into the chief military posts. His immediate charge 
 i for the present became that of fortifying Richmond. 
 It is natural enough that the works he raised should 
 i have extorted admiration from the Northern generals 
 I whom they so long defied ; but their best eulogy is 
 I contained in the simple fact that though often threat 
 ened they were never seriously attacked. From the 
 time that he thus girdled Richmond with the full re 
 sources of the engineer s art, aided by the use of that 
 " eye for positions " for which he had been admired in 
 Mexico, the capital was destined to fall only with the 
 Confederacy itself. To other commanders, however, 
 Davis had been compelled by the political situation to 
 assign the first honors of the defence of the South. 
 
 While the fortifying of Richmond went on, the 
 battle of Bull s Run, the first great encounter of the 
 war, was fought and won by Beauregard, aided by 
 Johnston, who had marched to join him from the Shen- 
 andoah Valley. Though this event concerns us little 
 here, it is right to say that the surprise of the Confed 
 erates on their flank was a real one, and their defeat 
 at one time very near, being only averted by the su 
 periority in steadiness of Jackson s troops to their com 
 rades. And as we laughed so loud and long at the 
 behavior of the raw militia of M Dowell when once in 
 7 
 
9 8 
 
 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 retreat, it is well to add that there is not the least 
 reason to believe, judging from the testimony of 
 Southern officers, that their men would have behaved 
 one whit better had the reverse been on their side. 
 More than this. Those among ourselves who know 
 most of war are agreed that, however highly one may 
 think of the spirit of the levies we call our Auxiliary 
 forces, there is no ground whatever, beyond a vulgar 
 national vanity, for the common belief that a mass of 
 these, once beaten and panic-stricken, would show 
 conduct very different from that of M Dowell s volun 
 teers in 1861, or of the Mobiles of the Army of the 
 Loire ten years later. " Nations deceive themselves 
 very much in this matter of their untrained troops," 
 was the remark made to the present writer by the 
 chief of the Swiss army ; one composed wholly of mi 
 litiamen. And what is true of Frenchmen, of Swiss, 
 and of our own kith and kin in America, would hardly 
 be greatly falsified if misfortune fell upon ourselves. 
 Whatever may be thought of this deduction, certainly 
 nothing could be more mistaken than the judgment 
 hastily passed by our press on the conduct of 
 M Dowell s raw troops, sent as they were into the 
 field untrained, and through the ignorance of Congress 
 left unfurnished even with the semblance of a staff. 
 Nor was the general result of the battle at all as fa- 
 vorable to the Confederacy as was then supposed. For, 
 in fact, the Northern army had been hitherto com 
 posed only of three-months volunteers ; and though 
 not in proper fighting order, it was absolutely neces- 
 sary to employ them, before they dispersed to their 
 homes, in checking the hostile forces which had gath 
 ered to threaten Washington. And although com- 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE 
 
 99 
 
 pletely defeated in his attack, M Dowell yet left his 
 enemy so shattered as to be not only quite incapable 
 of an advance upon the capital of the Union, but ac 
 cording to the confession of the best Southern officers, 
 unfit for some time later for any serious operations. 
 Brave as the Confederates individually were, there was 
 not at this time any real power of discipline in their 
 commanders hands which could enable the latter to 
 reap the fruits of victory. And what is more surpris 
 ing, the best generals never wholly established this 
 moral forceover them. But discipline on the other side, 
 though far from being ever brought up to the stricter 
 European standard, was certainly improved during the 
 war ; and to this difference, hardly less than to the grea 
 ter resources of the Northher final triumph was due. 
 Poor as the military results of the battle of Bull s 
 Run were, and serious as its political effects proved in 
 rousing the North and her leaders to real earnestness, 
 it naturally caused great rejoicing for the hour at 
 Richmond. Johnston, who from the time of his arri 
 val was the senior officer on the ground, was confirmed 
 in his command of the whole army of Northern Vir 
 ginia, and Lee still remained at the capital completing 
 its defences. But attention was soon directed to 
 Western Virginia, the part of the state beyond the 
 Alleghanies, which had from the first showed its Union 
 sympathies. Into this M Clellan, a hitherto unknown 
 Federal officer, had been pushed from Pennsylvania. 
 By July his forces were augmented to 20,000 men, 
 giving him a large numerical superiority over the Con 
 federate troops of Garnett, who attempted to hold it 
 against him. In a series of skirmishes which followed, 
 M Clellan and his active lieutenant Rosecrans routed 
 
I00 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 the Confederates, killing their general. The officers 
 who succeeded to the latter, meeting with further 
 disasters, began to quarrel among themselves. On 
 this the Southern President dispatched General Lee 
 to the scene of action with reinforcements, and in 
 structions to bring into one common plan the move 
 ments along the scattered lines held by the Confed 
 erates, but with no orders to take the command,which 
 he never did officially, though for a short time direct 
 ing the operations. The only active part of these, an 
 attempt to carry a strong position held at Cheat 
 Mountain by General Reynolds, failed entirely, owing, 
 (as we have gathered from direct personal information,) 
 even more to the misconduct of a subordinate com 
 mander than to the ill discipline of the disheartened 
 troops. Lee himself left on record a full explanation 
 of the circumstances, but with the express understand 
 ing that it should not be made public during the war; 
 and as this confidential report perished in the fire at 
 Richmond, all that can now be known is from the 
 remark he made to a would-be critic soon after. 
 " When you read the story by-and-bye, you will be as 
 much surprised as any one." After this affair, Lee, 
 deciding that he had no forces that would justify 
 offensive operations against a superior enemy to whom 
 the feeling of the country had proved favorable, re 
 mained strictly on the defensive, and confined his 
 efforts to restricting, as far as possible, the movements 
 of Rosecrans, who had succeeded M Clellan. Winter 
 now came on, and in that high region fairly stopped 
 all serious operations. But the failure before Cheat 
 Mountain, where Lee s plans had apparently proved 
 too elaborate for such raw materials, and his subse- 
 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENEtlAL"LE. 
 
 ior 
 
 quent apparent inaction, were little calculated to raise 
 the general s reputation. When he left in the winter, 
 by Jefferson Davis s orders, to put the defences of 
 the Carolinas in order, he was spoken of in his new 
 command as " a Virginia failure/ his name being as 
 unduly depreciated as that of M Clellan was exalted. 
 For that officer s early success in Western Virginia 
 had shed a gleam of light over the North in its humil 
 iation. It caused his instant selection as Commander- 
 in-Chief when Scott resigned the post he had hitherto 
 retained. And while Washington politicians spoke 
 of M Clellan as the young Napoleon of the Union, 
 the critics of Richmond and Charleston poured forth 
 their strictures on General Lee as an over-refining 
 strategist, too subtle for practical warfare, and de 
 clared him the only mistaken choice among their 
 commanders ; judgments which were destined to be 
 singularly reversed a few months later. And even 
 while they were being made, the presence of the 
 latter in Carolina sufficed to bring back confidence to 
 the forces stationed there, who in the first moment 
 of panic at the success of Burnside s expedition against 
 Roanoke were for abandoning the coast defences 
 altogether. An officer at that time serving on the 
 North Carolina staff has assured us that Lee s arrival 
 on the coast worked an effect little less than magical 
 on the conduct of matters there, and on the temper 
 of the garrisons along the coast. 
 
 During the winter of 1861-2 M Clellan, wielding 
 large resources at Washington, showed to the full his 
 real genius for organization. At length, at the head 
 of a well-organized army numbering over 100,000 men, 
 with a large fleet in support, and the strategy not 
 
OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 without a sharp struggle with the strong will of Presi 
 dent Lincoln left to his own judgment, he disem 
 barked in May on that historic peninsula below Rich 
 mond which had witnessed in former days the triumph 
 of Washington over Cornwallis, forced his way along 
 it despite obstinate resistance near Yorktown, and 
 crossing his right over the river Chickahominy, which 
 describes a steady curve at a few miles distance round 
 the north and east sides of the city, planted himself 
 firmly within sight of the spires of the enemy s capital. 
 The North, under the influence of her first defeat, had 
 made far more exertions than the Confederacy since 
 the previous summer. M Clellan s army was soon 
 raised to 156,000 men, while Johnston could only col 
 lect rather less than half that number to protect the 
 city, which was really covered mainly by the works 
 that Lee had thrown up. Co-operating with M Clel- 
 lan were further independent armies under separate 
 leadership. Of these Fremont and Banks, with 30,- 
 ooo men, were opposed by Jackson with half that 
 number in the Shenandoah Valley ; and a more im 
 portant force of 40,000, under M Dowell at Fredericks- 
 burg, was designed to come in on M Clellan s right, 
 and would complete the investment of the city on its 
 northern side, and bring an immense superiority ofj 
 numbers to overbear its defenders. 
 
 Such was the programme on the side of the North. 
 But Jackson s detached command against great odds 
 proved just such an opportunity as that general needed 
 to make his rare talent for war conspicuous. Being 
 ordered by Johnston to take the offensive in the 
 Valley, and draw some of the pressure off Richmond, 
 he performed his task so admirably as not only to 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 103 
 
 neutralize the large forces of Fremont and Banks, but 
 to cause President Lincoln, in alarm, to direct 
 M Dowell to send half the Fredericksburg corps west 
 ward to take part in the operations against this re 
 doubtable adversary. This detachment from his 
 expected support held M Clellan motionl-ess ; for he 
 had from the first considered his own force insufficient 
 for direct attack upon the enemy in his works, and, 
 indeed, overrated the number before him under 
 Johnston : and while he thus stood indecisive, the 
 latter suddenly issued from his line of redoubts on the 
 south side of the Chickahominy, and became the 
 assailant. The action that ensued on May thirty-first, 
 known as the Battle of Seven Pines, was the most 
 obstinate of those fought at this early period of the 
 war. M Clellan s front was partly intrenched and well 
 guarded by artillery, and though the left of his line 
 was forced, the Confederates gained no decisive advan 
 tage over him, while they themselves suffered the loss 
 of their general, who was severely wounded in the 
 commencement of the engagement by a shell. It was 
 of course necessary to give the Southern army a new 
 chief at once, and the choice fell naturally on Lee. 
 He had just returned to Richmond from his duty in 
 the Carolinas. He was more intimately acquainted 
 with the defences of the capital than any other officer. 
 And, what was still more to the purpose, his former 
 rivals in reputation and superiors in the favor of the 
 South, Albert Johnston and Beauregard, were far away, 
 the one slain in the hour of his promised victory over 
 Grant on the Tennessee, the other still in command of 
 the large forces near that river. President Davis had 
 therefore full opportunity of exercising his own judg- 
 
104 
 
 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 ment, and giving effect to the high opinion he had 
 from the first entertained of the Virginian general. 
 On June third Lee took charge of the army in which, 
 save to battalions of his own state, he was unknown or 
 thought little of, but which was destined under him to 
 achieve a history, hardly less glorious or less chequered 
 than that of the African veterans of Hannibal. Acci 
 dent, rather than the choice of the Confederacy, had 
 given him his high office. It remained for him to use 
 his opportunity so as to win at once the confidence of 
 his soldiers and of the government he served. The 
 opinion of him at that time was that he was disposed 
 to be cautious, slow, and somewhat timorous. He was 
 about to show himself on the instant a master of the 
 art of strategy, at once as daring as sagacious, and as 
 brilliant in combination as decided in action. 
 
 M Clellan s force, as we have said, was almost 
 double of that now placed under his new opponent. 
 His front was so strong that Johnston s bold assault 
 had failed to shake it. His left was covered by the 
 vast morass known as White Oak Swamp, which ex 
 tended southward from the Chickahominy nearly to the 
 James. The only part left open to Lee s attack was 
 the Federal right, which, as before mentioned, was 
 thrown northward across the Chickahominy, and plant 
 ed there to await the reinforcements through Peters 
 burg which the Federal general was still demanding 
 from Washington. Well supplied by the railroad 
 from the York River behind, he had at first little fear 
 for his present position ; and it was only when he 
 found as June passed by, that the President was thor 
 oughly alarmed by the ill success of the Northern 
 troops against Jackson, and had resolved to detain 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 105 
 
 the promised succor, that M Clellan determined to 
 withdraw his exposed right, and move through the 
 White Oak Swamp to the James River, where his 
 communications with the fleet would be absolutely se 
 cure. In not venturing an attack there can be little 
 doubt that he still overrated the force before Rich 
 mond ; but w r hile his change of plan had been hardly 
 more than decided on, his enemy was upon him. Lee 
 had assumed the offensive with every man whom he 
 could throw upon his foe. 
 
 To explain whence this apparent boldness came is 
 not difficult. From the hour of his first command he 
 resolved on raising the threatened siege by such a de 
 cisive stroke as should at once give heart to the army 
 and to the government which watched him anxiously. 
 But to do this with full effect he resolved to bring Jack 
 son secretly to his aid, and hence time for action was 
 practically chosen by that general, whose special task 
 it was to arrive before Richmond without being miss 
 ed from the Valley : for it was absolutely necessary 
 for the success prepared on the Chickahominy that the 
 alarm of the Federal Government for the safety of 
 Washington should be kept up, and all succor denied 
 M Clellan. The plan was carried out with a complete 
 ness worthy of the conception. The matchless activity 
 with which Jackson marched and countermarched in the 
 Shenandoah Valley up to the very hour of his sudden 
 ly quitting it, deceived the Federals effectually there : 
 while M Clellan was tricked for the time into the same 
 belief that Washington was threatened, by the ruse 
 of sending detachments northward from Richmond for 
 a few miles of course only when exchanged prisoners 
 were about to quit the city. So completely was the 
 5* 
 
IO 6 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 Federal commander deceived on this occasion, that he 
 wrote, certainly not with any pleasure, and in contra 
 diction of his former views, to the president on June 
 twentieth, " I have no doubt Jackson has been rein 
 forced from here." The reinforcements imagined had 
 at the time long safely returned into Lee s lines, and 
 Jackson was then making his forced march from the 
 Valley to Richmond with such rapidity and secresy 
 that even. the bulk of his own men knew nothing of 
 their destination. To all questions they were directed 
 to reply, "I don t know;" and so when the general 
 himself demanded of a straggler his name and regi 
 ment, the soldier, using the license which never left the 
 Confederate army throughout the war, put his interro 
 gator off with the answer the order had enjoined on 
 him, and of course escaped punishment. Jackson s 
 distance from Richmond, being a straight line, was 
 short comparatively to that which any of the forces 
 with which he had hitherto been engaged must have 
 covered in order to move round to M Clellan, even had 
 they discovered their enemy in the act of vanishing. 
 Never was the advantage of what are technically called 
 " interior lines " more finely used than in this first de 
 sign of Lee. Never was the execution of such a design 
 more ably accomplished than by Jackson on this mem 
 orable occasion. On the night of June twenty-fifth ; 
 before one of the Federal officers in the sphere of his 
 late operations had missed him from their outposts ; 
 before M Clellan, now abandoning present hope of 
 support, had issued the orders he was preparing for his 
 change of base from the York River to the James ; be 
 fore Lee himself could hope to greet him ; Jackson had 
 left his divisions within a few miles of Richmond, and 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. IO/ 
 
 entered the city in person after dark to meet his new 
 chief. The colloquy that followed was but brief. 
 Both were essentially, in their several ways, men more 
 of action than words. General Steuart, the hencefor 
 ward famous cavalry general of Lee, had just distin 
 guished himself for the first time by his raid, or recon- 
 noissance in force, round M Clellan s position, which 
 had revealed fully the exposure of the Federal right 
 and rear. The orders for the attack had been prepar 
 ed by Lee s own hand the night before. It was only 
 necessary, therefore, to assign the new comer his part 
 in the action of the next day, and all would be ready. 
 Lee s plan in effect was this: Leaving but 25,000 
 men under Magruder, to guard the front of Richmond 
 on the south side of the Chickahominy, he resolved to 
 march the remaining 50,000, under Longstreet and the 
 two Hills, to the north of that stream, so as to turn 
 and attack M Clellan s right, which was under General 
 Porter. Jackson, keeping still more to the northward, 
 was to pass behind this mass of Confederate troops, 
 and carry his divisions beyond it in a decisive turning 
 movement directed against Porter s extreme right and 
 rear. Of course this scheme of operation, which threw 
 some 70,000 men on the 40,000 of M Clellan s right, 
 could only be executed at a certain risk to Richmond. 
 M Clellan, if fully acquainted with his opponent s 
 strength and design, would almost certainly have or 
 dered Porter to do no more than defend the Chicka 
 hominy bridges, while he himself pressed forward the 
 bulk of his army to crush the two divisions left alone 
 under Magruder in his own front ; and if it proved not 
 possible to attempt the works behind them, he at least 
 might have got between these and Lee, and so cut the 
 
IO8 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 latter off from the capital he had to defend. But some 
 risk must needs be run by a general, who, with so great 
 an infeiiority as Lee s, attempts vast combinations. 
 And he trusted rightly as the event shows, to his ad 
 versary s ignorance of his real strength, and to the 
 alarm this pressure on Porter s wing would certainly 
 occasion, as sufficient to keep the Federal attention 
 from discovering the weakness of the force that was 
 left in their front. 
 
 The battle of the Chickahominy, which lasted 
 through the twenty-sixth and twenty-seventh of June 
 took exactly that course which Lee had designed be 
 forehand. The brunt of the first attack came from A. 
 Hill s division, which followed nearly the line of the 
 river downwards, and soon got into serious collision 
 with the enemy. Checked until dark that day on the 
 line of Beaver Dam Creek, a small stream running from 
 the north into the Chickahominy, which afforded the 
 Federals a strong line to hold, Hill found them retreat 
 ing next morning as Jackson with a wide circling move 
 ment turned their position. They fell back on Cold 
 Harbor, where they occupied a new line with their 
 backs towards the Chickahominy, holding in part the 
 same ground on which General Grant, two years later, 
 threw away many thousands of lives in a vain attempt 
 the last of many such in his Virginian campaign, to 
 force a roughly intrenched position by direct attack. 
 Reinforced from the south side of the river, Porter 
 held his own stoutly for some hours. In vain did 
 Longstreet, already famous for his fierce courage in ac 
 tion, press his men on to support those of Hill. In 
 vain did General D. Hill bring his division up to his 
 namesake s aid. The Confederates were fairly beaten 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 109 
 
 off: yet their chief did not dare to slacken their attack, 
 for every hour he feared to hear far up the stream the 
 din of battle suddenly rise, which would tell him that 
 M Clellan had discovered how he was deceived, and 
 was making the counterstroke on Magruder which was 
 the chief danger the Confederate cause had to fear. 
 But at length to his left, as the afternoon advanced, 
 was heard the roar of fresh guns coming into action. 
 Jackson, it was plain, had completed his flank march, 
 and was closing with the Federal right rear. A few 
 minutes more and the gallant soldier himself appeared 
 on the scene, and rode up to greet Lee, cheered loudly 
 by Longstreet s men, already veterans enough in war 
 to understand what his coming meant. Nothing, it 
 has been said, of this first meeting of these great 
 soldiers on the battle-field could be in more striking 
 contrast than the appearance and manner of the two. 
 Handsome in face and figure, finely mounted, a grace 
 ful rider, calm-visaged, and carefully dressed, Lee pre 
 sented the beau ideal of the commander whose outward 
 bearing captivates the soldier s eye. His famous lieu 
 tenant rode, apparently by choice, an ill-groomed, raw- 
 boned horse, and sat so short-stirruped as to give his 
 figure the most awkward appearance. An old cadet s 
 cap, evidently a relic of the college professorship he 
 had not long since left, was drawn down over his eyes. 
 His coat was not only threadbare but ill-brushed ; and 
 his words were jerked out in short, abrupt sentences, 
 between which he sucked the lemon which was as usual 
 his sole refreshment during his day s work. Yet each 
 already understood the other, and valued him at his 
 true worth. " That is a heavy fire down yonder," said 
 Lee, as the Federal guns opened in reply to Jackson s. 
 
HO .A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 "Can your men stand it?" " They can stand almost 
 any thing. They can stand that," was the emphatic 
 reply ; and after a few words of order and explanation 
 he left his chief to lead on the attack. This was deci 
 sive, aided as it was by a fresh advance of the troops 
 before engaged. The Federals were turned, over 
 matched, and driven from their position, and before 
 dark the shattered remains of Porter s force were cross 
 ing the Chickahominy in hasty retreat. Lee s first 
 battle, in fact, was as striking a success, and as well 
 earned, as any of the more famous victories won by 
 him in after days which have been so widely studied 
 and so often extolled. No word henceforward from 
 his government of any want of confidence in his pow 
 ers, or fear of his over-caution. From that hour he 
 became the most trusted, as well as the most noted, 
 general of the Confederacy. As to his soldiery, his 
 fyardy bearing, free self-exposure, and constant presence 
 near their ranks, completed the influence gained by 
 that power of combining their force to advantage which 
 they instinctively felt without fully understanding. 
 From man to man flew the story of the hour. The 
 subtle influence of sympathy, which wins many hearts 
 for one, was never more rapidly exercised. Like Na 
 poleon, his troops soon learnt to believe him equal to 
 every emergency that war could bring. Like Hanni 
 bal, he could speak lightly and calmly at the gravest 
 moments, being then himself least grave. Like Rag 
 lan, he preserved a sweetness of temper that no person 
 or circumstance could ruffle. Like Caesar, he mixed 
 with the crowd of soldiery freely, and never feared 
 that his position would be forgotten. Like Bliicher, 
 his one recognized fault was that which the soldier 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 1 1 1 
 
 readily forgives; a readiness to expose his life beyond 
 the proper limits permitted by modern war to the 
 commander-in-chief. What wonder, then, if he thence 
 forward commanded an army in which each man 
 would have died for him : an army from which his 
 parting wrung tears more bitter than any the fall of 
 their cause could extort : an army which followed him, 
 after three years of glorious vicissitudes, into private 
 life, without one thought of further resistance against 
 the fate to which their adored chief yielded without a 
 
 murmur 
 
 Is it therefore asserted that Lee as a commander 
 was faultless ? Far from it. We say it with all hu 
 mility, but without any doubt, that from first to last 
 he committed most grave errors ; errors which only his 
 other high qualities prevented from being fatal to his 
 reputation. Chief of these was his permitting the con 
 tinuance of the laxity of discipline which throughout 
 the war clogged the movements of the Confederates, 
 and robbed their most brilliant victories of their reward. 
 The fatal habit of straggling from the ranks on the least 
 pretext ; the hardly less fatal habit of allowing each 
 man to load himself with any superfluous arms or 
 clothes he chose to carry , the general want of subordi 
 nation to trifling orders, which was the inheritance of 
 their volunteer origin : these evils Lee found in full 
 existence when he took command before Richmond, 
 and he never strove to check them. Nor did he ever 
 use his great authority, as he might have done, to purge 
 his command of the many inefficient officers whose 
 example of itself was ruinous to all discipline. Add 
 to this, that though never careless of the good of his 
 soldiers, he failed altogether to enforce on the Con- 
 
H2 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 federate Government the vital necessity of bringing 
 the supply of their wants more directly under the con 
 trol of those who commanded them ; so that at the 
 last they were absolutely starving in Richmond, while 
 the War Department there, uninspired by the proper 
 energy for its task, had left large supplies scattered on 
 the line of railroad leading to the Carolinas. And 
 lastly, there must rest on him the grave responsibility, 
 shared certainly by, but not wholly falling on his fa 
 vorite cavalry commander, of misusing the limited sup 
 plies of horseflesh at his disposal in repeating brilliant 
 but unserviceable marches; so that in their last cam 
 paign the Confederates were left almost destitute of 
 that most necessary arm. " Divisions of cavalry," an 
 eminent Southern officer and devoted admirer of Lee 
 has said to us, " were sent in those early days on work 
 which squadrons might have done as well." These are 
 grave charges. But the errors cited all plainly sprang 
 from one flaw in Lee s character ; the too yielding 
 generosity of his nature, which made him reluctant to 
 enforce upon others that self-denial he never forgot in 
 his own person. Trifling matters they seemed at the 
 first. The very modesty of temperament which pre 
 vented his correcting them, might in another situation 
 have won him fresh admiration. But as the war went 
 on, the rifts caused by indiscipline and carelessness in 
 the Confederate armor widened more and more; and 
 in the end, these faults were hardly less fatal to the for 
 tunes of the South than the greater material resources 
 of her adversary. Her fall was to offer a new proof to 
 the world that neither personal courage nor heroic 
 leadership can any more supply the place of discipline 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 to a national force than can untrained patriotism or 
 vaunts of past glories. 
 
 Before leaving the subject of the first relief of Rich-, 
 mond, so brilliantly accomplished by the victory on 
 the Chickahominy, it is necessary to follow M Clellan s 
 retreat, not only for the story s sake, but in order to 
 do justice to a commander whose ill success before 
 Richmond has diminished in the world s eyes the great 
 services he performed for the cause of the Union, both 
 before and after that fatal check. It has been said 
 that the Federal general had decided before the battle 
 to transfer his operations from the Chickahominy to 
 the James. Of this there can be no manner of doubt. 
 Nor is there any that the deciding causes ; the failure 
 of the hope of support to his exposed right wing from 
 M Dowell at Fredericksburg, and the alarm caused by 
 the havoc which Steuart, in his raid a few days before, 
 produced on the Federal communication-s with York 
 River ; were very sufficient reasons for the proposed 
 change of base. Unhappily for M Clellan s reputation, 
 he had not, as before noticed, issued his orders for the 
 movement when Lee s stroke fell on his right. It was 
 natural enough that the success of this served to quicken 
 the Federal commander in his intended operation ; but 
 it is hardly less natural that when the world learnt 
 from his dispatches that the severe defeat on the Chick 
 ahominy was followed at once by the retreat to the 
 James, the one was directly and wholly ascribed to the 
 other : so that M Clellan s declaration that the move 
 ment through White Oak Swamp was but " a strategic 
 change of base," only caused his expression to be 
 caught up and used as a taunt against himself, and 
 became a proverb in all cases where a beaten general 
 8 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 excuses the necessity of retreat under a cloud of 
 words. 
 
 If M Clellan deserves sharp criticism for not having 
 sooner made up his mind, and still more for his failure 
 to discover and use the absence of the Confederates in 
 his front, where his advance in mass, according to 
 General Magruder s officially expressed opinion, " would 
 have insured his success, and the occupation of the 
 works about Richmond, and consequently the city;" 
 his character as a commander never shone so brightly 
 as in the hour of disaster and danger, when Porter s 
 wing was driven in upon his centre. The ill-success 
 of his campaign as a whole has caused his conduct at 
 this crisis to be done scant justice to. But there is no 
 military reputation in the world which would not be 
 increased by the manner in which that retreat to the 
 James was conducted from the moment it began. His 
 troops were so demoralized by the shock of the two 
 days unsuccessful fighting as to begin their retreat, 
 according to the testimony of Hooker, one of the 
 oldest officers present, " like a parcel of sheep ; for a 
 few shots from the rebels would have panic-stricken 
 the whole : " expressions strong enough at once to 
 show the importance of this first victory of Lee s which 
 some writers have spoken lightly of, and to give the 
 more credit to M Clellan for what followed. On the 
 very evening of his defeat he assembled his chiefs of 
 corps, explained his plan for retreating to the shelter 
 of the fleet, and made his arrangements for covering 
 the movement. The roads leading through White 
 Oak Swamp direct to the James were bad, and crossed 
 by many others which the Confederates might advance 
 on. Their outposts on the Chickahominy were close 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 to his own : their confidence as high as that of his own 
 troops was depressed ; and the first movement of 
 retreat discovered, would bring them on in ardent pur 
 suit, Lee s only doubt now being as to which way his 
 adversary would attempt to draw off. Nevertheless 
 M Clellan succeeded in concealing his design during 
 the whole of the twenty-eighth while his trains were 
 moving off; and when the pursuit was taken up on the 
 morning of the twenty-ninth, his worst danger was 
 already over. Moreover, the coolness and self-posses 
 sion of the Federal commander not merely stood him 
 self in good stead, but had its natural effect on his 
 subordinates, and through these began to reach his 
 discouraged men. Step by step he fell back, using his 
 heavy artillery with great skill to guard the dangerous 
 approaches to his flanks by the cross-roads through the 
 swamp. On their side the Confederate staff showed a 
 not very creditable ignorance of the scene of contest. 
 No sketch or survey had been made of it, though lying 
 but a few miles from their own lines ; and their pursu 
 ing columns were greatly delayed for want of this 
 simple precaution. Fighting soon ensued ; but as 
 neither side could form any front, it was never serious, 
 and the advantage naturally on the side of the defend 
 ers. So the retreat went on day after day. In vain 
 did Longstreet, relieved in his turn by Jackson, press 
 on the Federal rear. In vain Magruder threw his 
 troops, eager to share in the newly-won glories of their 
 comrades, along each approach towards their western 
 flank by the cross-roads leading from the city. Each 
 attempt was met skilfully and repulsed ; and when, on 
 July seventh, M Clellan found himself clear of the 
 swamp, and occupied the strong ridge of Malvern Hill 
 
Il6 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 beyond it, his men had so far recovered heart as to 
 inflict a very sharp repulse on the advance guard of the 
 pursuers, which Magruder has been charged with en 
 gaging with useless rashness. Thus closing his retreat 
 with an unquestioned success, M Clellan drew off his 
 army, no longer followed, to its proposed encampment 
 by the James, where the support of the gun-boats 
 gave him a position well-nigh impregnable. He had 
 recovered the confidence of his troops. If they 
 shouted for joy when he again accepted their command 
 two months later at Washington ; if they followed him 
 confidently when he moved to check Lee s first inva 
 sion of the North, it must be ascribed not to his mere 
 genius for organization, but to the moral effect of his 
 masterly retreat. The battle of Antietam, the first 
 check in Lee s steady career of victory, was in truth 
 saved for the Federal side at Malvern Hill. Lee s 
 dispatch on the subject of the White Oak Swamp 
 affair puts the general facts in a clear light. " Under 
 ordinary circumstances," were his words, " the Federal 
 army should have been destroyed. Prominent among 
 the causes of its escape is the want of timely and cor 
 rect information. This fact, attributed chiefly to the 
 character of the country, enabled General M Clellan 
 skilfully to conceal his retreat, and to add much to the 
 obstruction with which Nature had beset the way of 
 our pursuing columns." Nevertheless, though thus 
 saved from ruin, M Clellan s force was for the time 
 powerless for harm. Richmond was relieved from all 
 pressure, and without strong reinforcements there was 
 no hope of a fresh advance from the James. The 
 political differences between President Lincoln and his 
 unsuccessful general aggravated the former s distrust 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 of M Clellan s powers. He turned to new projects and 
 new commanders for his hopes of attack on Richmond, 
 and the first phase of the war in Virginia came fairly 
 to an end. 
 
 To follow it farther would be to tell a twice-told tale. 
 Lee crowded into the next two years as much per 
 sonal glory as has ever fallen to the lot of a commander 
 within the same time. Overthrowing one opponent 
 after another by brilliant strategy wielding an inferior 
 force ; applying with unsurpassed skill to each new pur 
 pose the special resources of the country he defended, 
 and the personal weakness of his adversaries ; he failed 
 only when attempting for political reasons an offensive 
 beyond the means of his force. While elsewhere, ill 
 success on the side of the Confederacy became disaster, 
 and disaster grew into ruinous defeat, the defence of 
 Northern Virginia was never shaken. Only when a 
 general advanced upon it whose resources in men and 
 material were practically unlimited, and who used them 
 deliberately in what Union historians, such as Dr. 
 Draper, have exultingly called " the process of attrition," 
 wearing down his adversary s numbers gradually by the 
 free sacrifice of his own, was Richmond once more 
 seriously threatened. But the June of 1864 found 
 Grant almost in sight of the city, upon the very ground 
 which M Clellan had held on the banks of the Chicka- 
 hominy two years before. Four times he had changed 
 the line of operations, chosen in obedience to Lincoln s 
 strong desire, on which he had declared his intention to 
 " fight it out all the summer." Four times he had 
 recoiled from the attempt to force his way direct to the 
 rebel capital ; for his indomitable and watchful adver 
 sary ever barred the way. Once more, on the morning 
 
Il8 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 of June third, he flung his masses fiercely against the 
 line held by Lee, which ran across the very field of 
 battle where that general had won his first triumph 
 over M Clellan. The result was so fearful and useless 
 a slaughter that, according to the chief Union histo 
 rian,* when " later in the day orders were issued to 
 renew the assault, the whole army, correctly appre 
 ciating what the inevitable result must be, silently 
 disobeyed." 
 
 Foiled and exasperated, yet never disheartened, for 
 the fifth time Grant changed his strategy. Following 
 M Clellan s movement of two years before, he pressed ; 
 on to the James ; but without halting at that stream in 
 indecision, crossed it at once to invest Petersburg, and 
 gain the approaches to Richmond from the south ; fol 
 lowing, in fact, the plan by which he had triumphed at 
 Vicksburg, and which he had himself long before 
 pointed out, when asked to advise freely, as the most 
 decisive mode of attacking the capital of the Confed 
 eracy. Gaining the southern part of Petersburg before 
 his advance was fully discovered, he assaulted the 
 works fiercely, and it was not till he had lost 9,000 men 
 more that he desisted, and sat down deliberately to 
 prepare the investing lines which were thenceforward 
 continually to be strengthened and extended until 
 Richmond should be won. But he had still 150,000 
 men at his command, having been largely reinforced 
 by General Butler s army ; and he had the prospect 
 of continual supplies of men and means. Lee had less 
 than 70,000 men all told. The armies of the South 
 elsewhere were overmatched, and could promise him 
 no help. Want of energy and ability in the adminis- 
 
 * Draper, vol. iii. p. 387. 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 tration of the Confederacy, hardly less than its inferior 
 resources, left him destitute not only of recruits, but 
 straitened for the most necessary supplies. And if his 
 enemy had weakened himself by fully 60,000 men in his 
 fruitless attempts to gain Richmond, it had cost Lee 
 more than one-third that number to defend it. He 
 well knew that this loss could never be replaced. 
 Firm as his soul was, the sure effect of that " process 
 of attrition," of which the chroniclers of the triumph 
 ant Union now speak with admiration of its success, 
 was already discovered by the general of the Army of 
 Virginia, which was melting away under it. The 
 hopes that had brightened his earlier years of command, 
 were plainly disappearing as the increasing energy of 
 the North brought her superior strength into full 
 play. From the hour that Grant sat down before the 
 lines of Richmond, already too weakly guarded, and it 
 became plain that ill success had not shattered the con 
 fidence of the Washington Administration in his sagac 
 ity, and that his reserves were increasing from week to 
 week, the result could never be doubtful. Lee, above 
 all others, could well forecast the event, which might 
 be delayed but could not be averted. Two years 
 before, when M Clellan, after his first retreat, had pro 
 posed to cross the James and move on Petersburg, and 
 the plan which brought Grant triumph in after days 
 had been summarily rejected by Halleck as " imprac 
 ticable," a fact his official memorandum of his visit to 
 the Army of the Potomac records ; Lee had in his 
 private conversations expressed his own conviction that 
 Richmond, now freed from immediate pressure, could 
 be held safely so long as such a movement on its com 
 munications with the Carolinas was left untried. Yet 
 
I20 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 it needed two years of continued victory in the West 
 to gain for Grant that prestige which could enable him 
 to patiently carry out, after plain proof of the imprac-j 
 ticability of the President s favorite plan of a direct^ 
 advance, the strategy which he, as well as his great- 
 adversary and his predecessor, all saw clearly to be thatj 
 to which the defence of Richmond must succumb. 
 
 Not in the first flush of triumph when his army^ 
 cheered his victory over M Clellan ; not when hurling 
 back Federal masses three times the weight of hisl 
 own on the banks of the Rappahannock: nor even 
 when advancing, the commander of victorious legions,, 
 to carry the war away from his loved Virginia into the 
 North ; had Lee seemed so great, or won the love of 
 his soldiers so closely, as through the dark winter that, 
 followed. Overworked his men were sadly, with forty 
 miles of intrenchments for that weakened army to 
 guard. Their prospects were increasingly gloomy as 
 month passed by after month, bringing them no rein 
 forcements, while their enemy became visibly stronger. 
 Their rations grew scantier and poorer, while the 
 jocund merriment of the investing lines told of abun 
 dance, often raised to luxury, by voluntary tribute 
 from the wealth of the North. The indiscipline, too* 
 long allowed, told on them ; and, with the pangs of ; 
 hunger added, led to desertion, a thing formerly almost 
 unknown in the Army of Virginia. But the confidence 
 of the men in their beloved chief never faltered. 
 Their sufferings were never laid on " Uncle Robert." 
 The simple piety which all knew to be the rule of his 
 life, acted upon thousands of those under him with a 
 power which those can hardly understand who know 
 not how community of hope, suffering, and danger 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. I2 i 
 
 fairly shared amid the vicissitudes of war, quickens the 
 sympathies of the roughest and lowest as well as of 
 those above them. He who was known to every sol 
 dier under him to have forbidden his staff to disturb 
 the impromptu prayer-meeting that stopped their way 
 when hurrying to the fierce battle in the Wilderness ; 
 he whose exposure was seen by all to grow only greater 
 as the hour grew darker; he who was as constant in 
 the lines during the monotonous watch against the 
 foe that never attacked, as he had been when Grant 
 hurled fresh legions on him day after day in the blood 
 stained thickets of Spottsylvania ; he who, in short, 
 had long lived up to the motto he is said to have com 
 mended to his own children on entering life, as the 
 only sure guide, " Duty is the sublimest word in our 
 language;" now illustrated in his own person that 
 other motto which he bequeathed to the army when it 
 dissolved, " Human virtue should be equal to human 
 calamity." The vision of becoming the new Washing 
 ton of a new Republic, had he ever entertained it, had 
 faded away, with all its natural ambition. The very 
 hope of saving from humiliation the state for whose 
 safety and honor he had sacrificed his high prospects 
 in the army of the Union, must now be despaired of. 
 Yet the firmness of his bearing, and his unfaltering 
 attention to the hourly business of his office, never 
 declined for a moment, and impressed alike the falling 
 government of the Confederacy, the dejected citizens 
 of its capital, and the humblest soldiers of its army. 
 Once during the sad spring of 1865 he recommended 
 earnestly the prompt abandonment of the attempt to 
 defend Richmond, and the retreat of his force, while 
 it was still capable of movement, far into the South to 
 
122 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 concert further resistance with Johnston. This was 
 in February, when he had received the commission of 
 General-in-Chief of all the Confederate Armies ; an 
 empty title now, when those armies were melting into 
 nothingness. But though he gave orders to prepare 
 for the march, and looked on it as the only hope of 
 using the few men at his disposal with effect, President 
 Davis, ever buoyed up with false hopes of foreign 
 succour and loth to admit the decadence of his brief 
 rule, forbade the design being carried out. The only 
 effect of this contemplated change of strategy was 
 probably to delay the forwarding of supplies to the 
 troops at Richmond, already too ill-cared for. And 
 when March came, and Sheridan, hot from his suc 
 cesses in the Shenandoah, had joined General Grant 
 with 10,000 mounted infantry, raising the Federals 
 with all deductions to a strength 130,000 men, well 
 fed and efficiently provided for in all respects, Lee s 
 "effectives," a bare 40,000 men according to the best 
 records, were subsisting solely on the daily issue of a 
 quarter of a pound of rancid bacon, with a ration of ill- 
 baked maize bread. Not that they ever murmured at 
 their general. Their cheers for him when he visited their 
 lines were as ready as of old ; but their hungry eyes 
 gazed more wistfully and sadly on his retreating form 
 each time that he passed from them. And the suppli 
 cating look of the citizens when he entered Richmond, 
 fixed with inquiring entreaty on the man in whom they 
 still believed, there lay the power to save them, must 
 have added a pang hardly less sharp to that felt each time 
 that he saw the increasing gauntness of his unconquer 
 able troops. No wonder that his hair grew gray in 
 these days of darkness. No one so well as he knew 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. I2 i 
 
 the hopelessness of the situation of all. He was fully 
 aware that Johnston, too late restored to the com 
 mand of which Davis, in alarm at his Fabian strategy, 
 had deprived him in the crisis at Atlanta, was quite 
 unprovided with means to check Sherman s march 
 through the Carolinas ; and that that general, moving 
 steadily northwards, was bringing up 100,000 victori 
 ous troops to complete the conquest of Richmond and 
 its defenders. 
 
 But while Sherman yet approached the ruin fell, 
 under the vehement impulse communicated to Grant s 
 own troops by the ardor of Sheridan. The line of de 
 fence, " stretched so long as to break," in Lee s own 
 phrase, and ever more weakly guarded, at last gave 
 way. Sheridan s attack on Pickett s troops, which 
 formed the extreme right or west of Lee s positions, 
 proved completely successful in the decisive action of 
 Five Forks, fought on April second ; and Grant fol 
 lowed up the victory by assaults made all along the Con 
 federate lines. The position, so long and so painfully 
 held, was untenable when turned ; and was yielded re 
 luctantly, but without hesitation. Those around Lee 
 could judge of the serious nature of his feelings only, 
 by the care with which that day he carried with him the 
 sword he usually dispensed with in action. As dark 
 ness closed on that eventful night, he was seen amid 
 the glare of explosions from the abandoned works, 
 standing at the angle of the road chosen for retreat up 
 the north bank of the Appomattox, guiding and cheer 
 ing his troops in person as they reached the point, and 
 following them only when the last man of his ragged 
 and weary columns had passed by. 
 
 Space would fail us did we attempt to follow out 
 
124 
 
 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 that retreat in its memorable details. Well-rationed, 
 followed by light trains of provisions, and its advanced 
 guard led by one who never faltered nor admitted hesi 
 tation in others, the Federal army started in pursuit 
 next morning, following parallel roads. Great praise 
 has been justly bestowed on Sheridan for his nervous 
 and energetic conduct of the pursuit by which Lee was 
 finally completely cut off. Nor less does Grant deserve 
 it, for the free and ungrudging manner in which he 
 supported his ardent lieutenant. But he who, above 
 all, should have earned honor for the conduct of that 
 march now sleeps in the grave ; and it is due here to 
 the reputation of General Halleck to say, that the 
 errors which had marked his earlier conduct of the war 
 are amply redeemed in the eyes of those who recognize 
 that to his stern and unflinching insistance on the 
 necessity of bringing proper discipline to bear on the 
 Federal volunteers, was due much of the success with 
 which the arms of the Union were crowned at the close 
 of the war. The disorders which had hindered the 
 efficiency of the Federal levies in earlier years had been 
 purged sharply from their ranks by the stern applica 
 tion of the military code to the embodied volunteers 
 and conscripts on whom the Union relied to save it. 
 While Meade and Grant pressed the enemy home in 
 Virginia, courts-martial at Washington cleared from 
 the service the scum which accident, or bribes, or 
 the favor of state governors, had mixed with the solid 
 materials of the Northern troops. Week after week 
 appeared lists of officers cashiered for crimes, to look 
 back on which is to peruse the strangest records of in 
 competence and worthlessness that the annals of war 
 ever disclosed. None proved guilty met with mercy. 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 12$ 
 
 The general that sold his safe-conduct to the trembling 
 people of the district plundered by his troops ; the 
 field officer who disappeared from his battalion before 
 the action ; the captain who stole and drank his men s 
 rations of whisky; these, and others such as these, 
 typical cases from the official records of the period, 
 found themselves treated with no more leniency than 
 the private sentinel who slept before the enemy. And 
 as gazette upon gazette published the names of culprits 
 stripped of the epaulettes they had dishonored, insen 
 sibly but steadily a higher tone of bearing was instilled 
 into the officers of the army thus watched over. Sol 
 diers are ever dependent largely for their feeling of 
 subordination on the conduct of those above them ; 
 and the improvement effected by Halleck s stern meas 
 ures extended constantly downwards. The Army of 
 the Potomac, which was at once the nearest and the 
 most important of those which, as Chief of the Staff, he 
 supervised, rose that year in its standard of discipline, 
 if not to the level to which Europe, with the aid of 
 caste traditions and reverence for rank, brings her 
 standing forces, at least to a measure of efficiency 
 which troops recruited as were these, the mixed volun 
 teers and conscripts of a young republic, can seldom 
 attain. And if Grant and Sheridan were able to press 
 the success of Five Forks on to a complete triumph 
 over the retreating Confederates ; if the conduct of 
 their troops after the victory of the second of April 
 was in marked contrast to the lassitude and indiffer 
 ence which had hitherto followed advantages won on 
 either side ; the difference is to be found not so much 
 in the circumstances of the time, or the individual char 
 acter of the generals, as in the moral power of disci- 
 
126 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 pline, which had been left unused by both parties alike, 
 until Halleck brought it into play to add to the advan 
 tages of the North. 
 
 So the pursuit of the flying Confederates went on 
 unintermitted from day to day. It is needless here to 
 follow it in its details. Enough for us to say that the 
 Federal troops were well supplied by their trains, while 
 the depot on which Lee had counted for his men had, 
 through the blunder of the same official who had re 
 duced them to quarter rations while in their lines, 
 been removed to the capital, just in time to fall into 
 the enemy s hands. Starving, except for what could 
 be collected by their disposal to forage, and moving 
 round an arc of which their adversaries followed the 
 chord, the long experience in marching of the Army 
 of Virginia could no longer avail. By the fifth day 
 their enemy had passed them, and was across their 
 path ; and on the morning of the ninth of April the 
 way of escape was completely barred. Up to this time 
 Lee had resisted the proposals for capitulation which 
 had reached him from his adversary ; but when this 
 fatal news came from his most trusted officer, the gal 
 lant Gordon who led his advance, he resigned himself 
 to his fate. For a moment those who looked on him 
 saw him almost overcome ; and the first words of com 
 plaint ever heard from his lips during the war broke 
 sharply forth ; " I had rather die a thousand deaths ! " 
 Musing sadly for a few seconds,* as his men s favorite 
 cry broke on his ear, " There s Uncle Robert ! " in deep, 
 sad tones he said to those near him, " How soon could 
 I end all this, and be at rest. Tis but to ride down 
 the line, and give the word, and all would be over." 
 Then presently, recovering his natural voice, he an- 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 127 
 
 swered one who urged that the surrender might be 
 misunderstood, " That is not the question. The ques 
 tion is, whether it is right. And if it is right, I take 
 the responsibility." Then, after a brief silence, he 
 added, with a sigh, " It is your duty to live. What 
 will become of the wives and children of the South if 
 we are not here to protect them ? " So saying, he sent 
 in his flag of truce without further hesitation to Grant. 
 The coming action was stayed on the instant, and the 
 struggle of the Confederacy was virtually over. 
 
 Of the interview between the great commanders 
 which followed, enough has been already written. 
 Those who would understand how highly Lee was held 
 in honor by the very men who fought hardest against 
 him, should study the story of that eventful meeting, 
 not in the loving records of Mr. Cooke, or of other 
 writers whose sympathies were with his efforts, but in 
 the pages of the warmest partisans of the cause of the 
 Union ; in such works, for instance, as the well-known 
 memoir called " With Sheridan in Lee s last Campaign," 
 where the ardent Northern writer, almost against his 
 will, makes the chief of the captive army the hero of 
 the scene. Or they may read it in the cold lines of 
 the anti-slavery historian of the war, where no word of 
 bitterness is ever missing for the politicians whose 
 cause Lee s arm had upheld : 
 
 " From the Rapidan to the Appomattox Court-house " [says 
 Dr. Draper, vol. iii. p. 392] " he had indeed made a grand 
 defence. He had shed over Virginia a mournful glory. In 
 the Wilderness, at Spottsylvania, on the Anna, at Cold Har 
 bor, during the siege, and in the final retreat, he had strug 
 gled against preponderating power. For a whole year he 
 had tried to stay the hand of Fate. No one can read his 
 
I2 8 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 gallant acts without lamenting that they had not been in the 
 cause of human freedom and national unity." 
 
 His parting words to his troops are historical. 
 " Men, we have fought through the war together. I 
 have done the best I could for you. My heart is too 
 full to say more." But it is not so well known that 
 while he uttered them with voice slightly trembling, 
 tears from the rough soldiers he was parting from, an 
 swered those in his eyes, as they pressed around him to 
 wring his hand lovingly, and offer their response in the 
 rude prayer, " May God help you, general ! " In his 
 last army-order, issued the next morning, he replied to 
 their sympathy : " You will take with you to your 
 homes the satisfaction that proceeds from the con 
 sciousness of duty faithfully performed, and I earnestly 
 pray that a merciful God will extend to you His bless 
 ing and protection." His last official act was to inter 
 cede with Grant that the mounted soldiers might be 
 granted the use of their horses, so as to set at once to 
 work on their neglected farms ; a favor the Federal 
 commander at once accorded with a readiness as cour 
 teous in the giver as it was politic in the disturbed 
 state of the country. Indeed, the whole conduct of 
 General Grant on this memorable occasion reflects on 
 him a credit which the severest critic of his chequered 
 life can never lessen. That the two armies so fiercely 
 opposed for four long years, could have parted as they 
 did without one word but those of sympathy and re 
 spect, seemed to presage with certainty the day when 
 the last wounds of the recovered Union shall be fully 
 healed, and the great constitutional victory of the rights 
 of the Federation over those of the states shall be 
 
A MEMOIR CF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 129 
 
 spoken of with as little bitterness in South and North 
 as its petty prototype, the War of the Sonderbund, is 
 to-day in all parts of Switzerland. 
 
 Leaving his army dispersing on parole, Lee passed 
 into Richmond, declining the public honors which, 
 even in their hour of humiliation, its people sought to 
 offer him. Living here in the strictest retirement, he 
 began his new duty of conciliation, from which he 
 never ceased while life remained. When he received 
 from a Federal general a private and friendly warning 
 that it was resolved to arraign him for treason, despite 
 the military protection of his capitulation, checking his 
 informant s violent indignation, he replied with a smile, 
 " Sir, we must forgive our enemies. Since the war 
 began, not a day has passed that I did not pray for 
 them." But the danger that the Union would be dis 
 credited by dishonorable vengeance soon passed away. 
 The firmness of General Grant upon this point im 
 pressed itself on the hasty and violent man whom the 
 murder of Lincoln had made President ; and when An 
 drew Johnson ceased to encourage the thought, lesser 
 partisans gave it up, and Lee continued unmolested in 
 his privacy. In vain his fellow-citizens besought his 
 attendance at their public meetings, when these were 
 once more resumed. The one duty he had made his 
 own was to set an example of personal submission to 
 the people who looked on him as the chief representa 
 tive of the South ; and for this reason he steadfastly 
 discouraged all premature and useless remonstrance at 
 the arbitrary measures by which it was long governed. 
 But despite his reticence and humility, he made no at 
 tempt to hide his own personal responsibility for the 
 actions done under the Confederacy ; and when sum- 
 9 
 
1 3 o 
 
 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 moned before the Reconstruction Committee of Con 
 gress he was questioned as to the oath of allegiance to 
 the fallen Goverment, he answered plainly, " I do not 
 recollect having taken it, or whether it was required. 
 If it was required, I took it : or if it had been required 
 I would have taken it." 
 
 Virginia, in her ruin and suffering, could do little 
 for her hero, especially when it became known that 
 under no circumstances, however favorable, would the 
 fallen general meddle with politics. What she could 
 do, however, was soon done, and six months after the 
 surrender at Appomattox Court-house Lee had accept 
 ed the presidency of the State College at Lexington, 
 originally designed as a cadet school for the militia 
 officers of Virginia, but now changed into a place of 
 general training for the sons of such Southerners as 
 were still left the means to educate their children. 
 His fortune had perished, like his former professional 
 prospects, with the war. For his wife s sake, therefore j 
 the offer was doubly welcome, when it came to him as 
 the token of the undiminished affection of his beloved 
 state. And employment was not the less grateful to 
 one who had never known idleness during a long life 
 time, except in the enjoyment of a hard-earned holi 
 day. He took up his post at Lexington therefore 
 on October first, and devoted himself to his new duties 
 with not the less assiduity that their sedentary nature 
 made them somewhat a physical trial to a man of his 
 active habits. The appointment was a fitting one in 
 all respects, as well as creditable to those who made it. 
 From far over the Southern States parents sent their 
 sons to be trained under the once renowned command 
 er, whose unblemished character was as well known as 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 131 
 
 his military greatness. And the College, which had 
 sunk into nothingness during the war, and reopened 
 in 1865 with but a few of its old inmates, boasted five 
 hundred students before his death five years later. 
 Some of these, too, came from far Northern States, 
 where very early in the days of reconquered peace 
 there were not wanting men desirous to do all that in 
 them lay to bury the remembrance of civil strife in 
 oblivion. 
 
 Here then, engrossed chiefly by the steady perform 
 ance of his daily duties, and in no society but that of 
 his pupils and his neighbors in the country town, the 
 rest of that great life was spent ; varied sometimes by 
 visits to Washington, where he was several times sum 
 moned to give evidence on the state and feeling of the 
 South, over the hard fate of which he never outwardly 
 complained, though its sorrows were wearing his heart 
 away. Public cares never prevented his attention to 
 his College labors, nor to the local municipal affairs in 
 which every American citizen of mark is expected to 
 take an interest. He became scarcely less popular 
 henceforward with the students than with his soldiers 
 in his days of fame; while the residents around rever 
 enced his name no less for his patient bearing in his 
 state s adversity than for his heroic defence of her in 
 dependence. The very children learnt to recognize as 
 a friend the general who had led their fathers to victo 
 ry, and went outof their way to seek the grave kindly 
 smile which had won their simple hearts. 
 
 Two objects only Lee seemed to have left during 
 these years of retirement : the one, to lead his country 
 men back to the Union, against which he had fought 
 with such terrible effect ; the other, to make of those 
 
132 A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 under his charge men who would grow up to do honor 
 to it. Of the many anecdotes offered us by Mr. Cooke 
 and other Virginian writers, one or two will suffice to 
 illustrate the spirit of his life. 
 
 " This is one of our old soldiers who is in neces 
 sity," were his words to a friend who discovered him in 
 the act of relieving a broken-down wayfaring man, and 
 adding kindly words to his gift. " He fought on the 
 other side," he added in a whisper ; " but we must not 
 think of that." To a lady, one of the many widowed 
 in the war, who on bringing her sons to the College 
 burst out into a strain of bitterness against the North, 
 he said, with a gentleness which gave the more force to 
 his rebuke: " Madam, do not train up your children in 
 hostility to the government of the United Sates. Re 
 member we are one country now. Pray dismiss from 
 your mind allj, sectional feeling^ and bring them up to 
 be^above all Americans." And all this was while his 
 feelings as to the original act by which he broke with 
 the Union remained unaltered. For when asked di 
 rectly by the Reconstruction Committee, " What are 
 your own personal views on the question [of the origi 
 nal Act of Secession] ? " he replied unhesitatingly : " It 
 was my view that the act of Virginia in withdrawing 
 herself from the United States carried me along with 
 it as a citizen of Virginia, and that her laws and acts 
 were binding on me." The past tense being plainly 
 employed to signify, what he constantly expressed in 
 private, that the arbitrament of the sword to which the 
 seceding states had appealed had quenched the suppos 
 ed rights claimed by them before the war, without 
 affecting their original legitimacy. 
 
 Pages of anecdotes might here be gathered toillus- 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. ^3 
 
 trate his care for his other main object, the welfare of 
 his students. That this took a deeply religious form 
 will surprise no one who knows that during the war he 
 had never ceased the regular use of the well-worn 
 pocket Bible which had been his constant companion 
 before it, and which still bore the inscription " R. E. 
 Lee, Lt.-Colonel, U. S. Army." . In his comparative 
 retirement, and meditating constantly over the sorrows 
 of his country, which he had little power to heal, it was 
 most natural that this spiritual side of his character 
 should become more plainly developed. He held to 
 the Episcopal Church in which he had been brought 
 up, but never showed any trace of that sectarian feel 
 ing which is almost as much a reproach to American 
 Christianity as to that of our own country : and when 
 once pressed by a forward inquirer for his opinion 
 upon Apostolical Succession, he expressed his simple 
 faith in the words : " I have not cared to think deeply 
 of these things ; I have aimed to be a Christian." Of 
 his limited income a large part was regularly devoted 
 privately to charity. And his feelings for his students 
 were expressed to one who congratulated him on the 
 high state the College had attained under him, in words 
 expressed with all the earnestness of the heart s near 
 est wish: " I shall be disappointed, sir; I shall fail in 
 the leading object that brought me here, unless the 
 young men I have charge of become real Christians." 
 In saying this, it is recorded, tears sprang to his eyes ; 
 for his feelings were ever warm and sympathetic, and 
 his heart, as his chief biographer has well said, " was 
 so open to every touch of gentle and quick emotion, 
 as to show that beneath his heroic character was a vein 
 of almost feminine softness." "A noble action," are 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 
 
 Mr. Cooke s words, " flushed his cheek with emotion ; 
 a tale of suffering brought a sudden moisture to his 
 eyes ; and a loving message from one of his old soldiers 
 has been seen to melt him to tears." 
 
 Thus living and thus minded, he was ready when 
 the end -came suddenly. No failing strength of body 
 or faculty gave token of the approaching close of that 
 great life. The unruffled health, which in long years 
 of war as of peace he had enjoyed unfailingly, never 
 seemed to leave him till the last. But his heart, long 
 bowed down by the weight of his country s sorrows, at 
 last gave way. His death may have been profession 
 ally ascribed to cerebral congestion ; but the medical 
 attendants unanimously declared this to be but the 
 effect of long-suppressed sorrows : and that this was 
 the exciting cause no one could doubt who knew how 
 his hope of complete peace and restored tranquillity 
 was deferred from year to year, and how the mental 
 depression he struggled in vain to cast off increased as 
 post after post brought him piteous appeals for assist 
 ance from those who had served under him, many of 
 whose families were starving. 
 
 On September twenty-eighth, 1870, he had spent the 
 evening at a vestry meeting of the church he attended, 
 and had headed a liberal subscription for the object 
 which brought it together. On his return to the sit 
 ting-room where the evening meal awaited him, his 
 wife remarked that he looked very cold. " Thank 
 you, I am well wrapped up," was his answer ; but the 
 words were the last he ever spoke articulately. He sat 
 down and opened his lips to say grace a habit, it is 
 remarked, he had never failed to preserve amid all the 
 haste of war but no sound came from them, and he 
 
A MEMOIR OF GENERAL LEE. 135 
 
 presently sank back in his chair in a half-insensible 
 state, from which he never rallied, expiring tranquilly 
 on October twelfth, with his family around him. 
 
 So passed away the greatest victim of the Civil 
 War. Even in the farthest North, where he had once 
 been execrated as the worst enemy of the Union, the 
 tidings caused a thrill of regret. But though America 
 has learnt to pardon, she has yet to attain the full 
 reconciliation for which the dead hero would have 
 sacrificed a hundred lives. Time only can bring this 
 to a land which in her agony bled at every pore. 
 Time, the healer of all wounds, will bring it yet. The 
 day will come when the evil passions of the great civil 
 strife will sleep in oblivion, and North and South do 
 justice to each other s motives, and forget each other s 
 wrongs. Then history will speak with clear voice of 
 the deeds done on either side, and the citizens of the 
 whole Union do justice to the memories of the dead, 
 and place above all others the name of the great chief 
 of whom we have written. In strategy mighty, in 
 battle terrible, in adversity as in prosperity a hero 
 indeed, with the simple devotion to duty and the rare 
 purity of the ideal Christian knight, he joined all the 
 kingly qualities of a leader of men. 
 
 It is a wondrous future indeed that lies before 
 America ; but in her annals of years to come as in 
 those of the past there will be found few names that 
 can rival in unsullied lustre that of the heroic defender 
 of his native Virginia, Robert Edward Lee. 
 
ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 THE NA VY OF THE UNION* 
 
 "To overcome the dangers springing from so for 
 midable an insurrection three results must be obtained. 
 The shores of the Seceding States must be effectively 
 blockaded ; the course of the Mississippi and the 
 whole water-system of the West must be mastered ; 
 finally, the rebellious government must be driven from 
 Richmond, its chosen capital." Such were the broad 
 outlines (as traced by the Prince de Joinville s clear 
 pen) of the great task which lay before the forces of 
 the Union at the outbreak of the Civil War. The 
 important part borne by the American navy in the 
 contest ; its absolute performance of the first portion 
 of the task indicated in our opening lines ; the power 
 ful share taken by it in the river campaigns which cut 
 the Seceded States in twain ; the vast weight due to 
 
 o 
 
 its exertions in the final successes of the Federal 
 generals, have been but little noticed as compared to 
 the din and shock of the great battles with which the 
 New World rang. Yet nothing is more surprising in 
 this great contest ; no military, political, or financial 
 success more completely defied expectation, prophecy, 
 and precedent ; than the work wrought by this arm of 
 
 * Reports of the Secretary for the American A T azy for 1861-65, with 
 Appendices. 
 
ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER, ETC. 
 
 the Union forces, and wrought by it in the very pro 
 cess of creation out of actual nonenity. 
 
 European journals have not failed to make occa 
 sional comments on the Reports of the Secretary of 
 the American Navy. Yet out of the United States 
 few persons are aware of the extreme penury of 
 resources with which that officer and his chief, the new 
 President, had to contend, when the terrible fact of the 
 unavoidable contest burst upon them. Even in 
 America the full truth of the difficulties which, in this 
 one department alone, beset the Cabinet of Lincoln, 
 has only been made known by the publication of docu 
 ments which, for personal motives, it had been designed 
 to withhold. An attack upon the political reputation 
 of Mr. Seward, made some months after the actual 
 jclose of the contest, first brought to light incidentally 
 the full particulars of the failure to relieve Fort Sumter 
 in April 1861, the papers concerning which had been 
 once laid before the Senate, but suppressed by that 
 body. The report of Captain Fox (afterwards Assist 
 ant Secretary of the Navy), the principal actor in the 
 iaffair, reveals in vivid colors the destitute condition of 
 ^the department at the breaking out of the war, and 
 the shifting nature of the counsels which prevailed at 
 Washington in the first dread of provoking actual con 
 flict. This officer, who had left the navy for private 
 employment before the era of Secession, was one of 
 many bold and active spirits who flocked back to the 
 public service of the Union when its existence was 
 endangered. Events so vast as to afford a field for the 
 most daring and energetic of the sons of the North 
 were at hand, and were partly foreseen by the more 
 clear-sighted of her politicians, though none fathomed 
 
138 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 fully their mighty scope and the great results to 
 follow. 
 
 On January ninth, 1861, the "Star of the West," a 
 vessel chartered to carry supplies to Fort Sumter, was 
 turned back by shots from Morris Island, the first 
 hostile missiles of the civil war proclaimed by this out 
 rage on the Federal flag. Captain Fox, being then in 
 New York, and well acquainted with the approaches 
 to Charleston, lost no time in laying before certain 
 eminent merchants of strong Union principles his 
 " views as to the possibility of relieving the garrison, 
 and the dishonor which would be justly merited by the 
 government, unless immediate measures were taken to 
 fulfil this sacred duty." Into the details of his pro 
 posal it is not necessary to enter here. So much effect 
 did his vehemence and energy exercise on the hearers, 
 that one of them, Mr. Marshall, undertook to furnish 
 and provision the necessary vessels forthwith. While 
 these preparations were made, the authorities at Wash 
 ington were communicated with; and on February 
 sixth Captain Fox was present at the capital, sum 
 moned by a telegram from General Scott. Next day 
 his plan was fully discussed in the presence of Mr. 
 Buchanan ; but the simple vacillation of the latter was 
 (as his own confessions indicate) changed into down 
 right weakness when news arrived on the following 
 morning, that the Seceding States had actually pro 
 ceeded to the election of a President of their own. 
 " I called upon General Scott," says Captain Fox, " and 
 he intimated to me that probably no effort would be 
 made to relieve Fort Sumter. He seemed much dis 
 appointed and astonished ; I therefore returned to 
 New York on February ninth." Nor can we wonder 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. 
 
 it the retiring President s hopeless view of the case, 
 vhen we learn from Mr. Welles s first report that the 
 lumber of seamen officially under the control of the 
 >Javy Department in the first week of March amounted 
 :o less than 300 on home service, with a proportionately 
 ow supply of stores! This weakness was, however, 
 n the main ostensible only ; for but a brief time was 
 leeded to show what a fund of energy private will 
 :ould supply, and what wealth of means private 
 -esources could create when the spirit of the Northern 
 States should be fairly aroused to grapple with the 
 :risis of their fate. 
 
 That crisis was rapidly approaching. The day of 
 :ompromises and expedients ceased with Buchanan ; 
 and his successor, Mr. Lincoln, was no sooner installed 
 in the seat of peril, when the naval enterprise which 
 had been at first rejected was again entertained. 
 
 Dismissed by the new President with verbal instruc 
 tions, Captain Fox is again found at New York in con 
 sultation with his merchant friends, " and making pre 
 liminary arrangements for the voyage." At these inter- 
 jviews, no doubt, was laid the foundation of that new 
 naval system to be created through private agency for 
 the public service, which may be considered one of the 
 most remarkable products of the great Civil War. 
 
 Undaunted by the withdrawal from the project of 
 his first ally, Mr. Marshall, who thought "that the peo 
 ple had made up their minds to abandon Sumter," 
 Captain Fox pressed his project forward. " Delays 
 which belong to the secret history of the time;" in 
 plainer words, the irresolution of the majority of Lin 
 coln s advisers and its effect upon their chief, 
 
140 
 
 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 " prevented a decision until the afternoon of April fourth, when 
 the President sent for me, and said that he had decided to let 
 the expedition go, and that ... I should best fulfil my duty 
 to my country to make the attempt. The Secretary of the 
 Navy had in commission, in the Atlantic waters of the United 
 States, only the Powhatan, Pocahontas, and Pawnee, all 
 these he placed at my disposal, as well as the revenue steamer 
 Harriet Lane, and directed me to give all the necessary 
 orders." 
 
 On April twelfth, Captain Fox in a borrowed steamer 
 made the rendezvous of Charleston, just three hours* 
 before the fire on Fort Sumter was opened. The 
 expedition proved unable to succor it. The weather 
 was rough and the means for landing in the night (the 
 pith of the design) totally inadequate. Moreover, the 
 squadron was left unexpectedly incomplete. A heavy 
 gale along the coast fully accounted for the non-appear 
 ance of certain hired tug-boats ; but the Powhatan was 
 looked for all day, and through the night, signals in 
 vain thrown up. It was not until the next morning, 
 that of the surrender of the fort, that Captain Fox first 
 learnt that the missing frigate had been carried off to 
 another service by still higher orders than those of the 
 Secretary of the Navy. The instructions of the latter 
 to her captain, Mercer (who was to act as senior naval 
 officer), had been issued in elaborate detail on April 
 5th, the morning after the President s promise to Fox 
 that the expedition should sail. That in this promise 
 the Powhatan was specifically included does not appear ; 
 but that both Mr. Welles and Captain Fox so under 
 stood it is perfectly clear, although this all-important 
 ship (as they considered it) was in reality already 
 
THE NA VY OF THE UNION. 14 i 
 
 ecretly engaged for another service, destined to be the 
 .rst step on his way to honor of the afterwards famous 
 Admiral, then Lieutenant, Porter, a naval officer whose 
 alents had already brought him into the private coun- 
 ils of President Lincoln. 
 
 For while Fox had been pressing forward his pro- 
 ect for the relief of Sumter, Captain Meigs of the 
 Engineers (distinguished later for his services as Quar- 
 ermaster-General) had been not less urgent with the 
 Resident to attempt the reinforcement of the troops 
 .t Fort Pickens, the key of Pensacola Harbor. This 
 >ort was so weakly garrisoned as to be subject to sur- 
 >rise from Bragg s Confederate force on the main land ; 
 ind yet of itself it was known to be far more susceptible 
 !>f defence than Fort Sumter; while Porter was confi- 
 lent that its relief by a dash from the sea-side was an 
 idventure that only needed secresy and speed to insure 
 )erfect success. Whether the merely military view of 
 he question ; or the advice of Mr. Seward, who fa- 
 ored this project ; or the secret belief of the President 
 :hat the fall of Fort Sumter was of more political value 
 i:han the holding it to the Federal cause, prevailed in 
 Lincoln s decision over the arguments of Fox, is not 
 :lear. A consolatory letter addressed soon afterwards 
 :o the latter by the President concludes with a remark- 
 ible expression, which seems to justify the belief that 
 ;he failure to relieve and consequent surrender of Sum- 
 :er were events foreseen without much reluctance. 
 The paragraph ran thus : 
 
 " For a daring and dangerous enterprise of a similar char 
 acter, you would to-day be the man, of all my acquaintances, 
 vvhom I would select. You and I both anticipated that the 
 
142 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 cause of the country would be advanced by making the attempt 
 to provision Fort Sumter, even if it should fail" 
 
 Whatever was the motive, the President chose 
 rather to sacrifice his failing hold on Charleston har 
 bor than give up the other fort at Pensacola. And 
 so small was the degree of confidence at that times 
 reposed in his own officials, that Mr. Welles, the Naval- 
 Secretary, remained in complete ignorance of the new- 
 design, and was actually suffered (as we have seen) to 
 issue instructions which secret and imperious orders 
 from his chief, set aside. For when the Powhatan was 
 ready for sea and about to quit New York for Charles 
 ton, Porter and Meigs suddenly stepped on board ; and 
 the former producing the President s sign-manual 
 authorizing the proceeding, assumed command of the 
 frigate and diverted her course from the Carolina coast 
 to the Gulf of Mexico. 
 
 " It was not [says General Meigs, in a recently published 
 account] without some hesitation that Captain Mercer gave 
 up the ship. But the positive order of the President, detach 
 ing him and placing Lieutenant Porter in command, over 
 ruled the order of the Navy Department. The conflict was 
 the result of the secresy with which the whole business was 
 conducted, and to that secresy, in a great measure, was due 
 the relief of Fort Pickens, and the retention of this finest har 
 bor in the South by the United States." 
 
 Besides preserving the control of the harbor of 
 Pensacola (which the Union forces never from that time 
 found difficulty in holding), Porter and his coadjutors 
 were enabled on their way to save the islands of Key 
 West and the Tortugas from yielding to the state au- 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. ^3 
 
 i;horities of Florida. So rapid and complete was their 
 success, that the first news of it was brought back by 
 .Captain Meigs himself, up to the time of whose arrival 
 :he true destination of the Powhatan, and of the steam 
 -.ransport Atlantic, which had accompanied her, was 
 unknown to any save the President and the officers 
 who executed the design ! 
 
 It is not surprising that in his first report, that of 
 July 1861, the Secretary of the Navy makes no allusion 
 to an achievement the conception of which had been 
 kept secret from him ; nor that Captain Fox appears 
 to have long harbored a very bitter feeling against Mr. 
 Seward, to whose personal advice he attributed the 
 President s decision. We are not here concerned with 
 the personal or party aspect of the question, but have 
 rbrought this, the first episode of the naval warfare in 
 ^America, prominently forward ; partly for the light it 
 ithrows on the political chaos out of which so much en- 
 ergy, valor, and statesmanship was to be born ; partly 
 for the picture it affords of the extraordinary want of 
 any ready means by which the Government of the 
 iUnion could assert its authority. The Congress ad- 
 jjourning without providing any men or material to meet 
 the threatened danger : the fleet so reduced that but 
 one steam frigate could be found to execute all the de 
 signs the President might have for the control of the 
 seceding ports : a Secretary of the Navy so new to his 
 trust that it was thought necessary to keep from him 
 the knowledge of the orders sent to his own depart 
 ment : a lieutenant sent with secret orders to supersede 
 the post-captain on the deck of his own ship, and at 
 the hour of his departure on an important service : ex 
 peditions involving civil war urged on the government 
 
144 
 
 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 by private citizens, who yet made their aid dependent 
 on the undeclared will of the people; such were some 
 of the strange circumstances which surrounded the 
 Executive of the Great Republic in the day w r hen its 
 power by land and sea seemed rent in twain. Never 
 if war must come, had a commercial state more need 
 of a navy. Never were the apparent difficulties of cre 
 ating one greater ; for many of the merchant princes 
 of the North were inclined to take a more lukewarm 
 view of the Union cause when its defence seemed to 
 threaten danger to their foreign trade, than in the first 
 moments of excitement, before the cost was fully 
 counted. 
 
 Lincoln however was more fortunate in his Cabinet. 
 Neither he nor any of his advisers shrank from the 
 mere magnitude of the duties thronging on them, nor 
 lacked that faith in their cause which should hereafter 
 carry the whole North with it to a triumphant end. 
 Mr. Welles swallowed manfully enough the mortifica 
 tion he had felt, and applied himself with diligence to 
 the vast task before him ; while Captain Fox was soon 
 to find that the President s expressions of satisfaction 
 with his conduct in the Sumter affair were no mere 
 perfunctory commendations. An Assistant Secretary 
 of the Navy was one of the first additional offices rec 
 ommended for the sanction of the new Congress ; and 
 on the approval of that body being obtained to this ad 
 dition to the now important bureau, the appointment 
 was at once conferred on Captain Fox, who held it un 
 til the war was brought to a successful end. No better 
 selection could have been made. The happy combina 
 tion he possessed of cultivated professional knowledge 
 with close experience of the details of the Northern 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. i^ 
 
 shipping trade, enabled him, in a degree to which per 
 haps no other man could have attained, to utilize the 
 resources of the latter for the supply of the vast de 
 ficiencies existing in the department of which through 
 out the struggle he held practical charge. 
 
 How great these deficiencies were appears sufficient 
 ly in the first report of Mr. Welles, made before the 
 appointment of his energetic and able coadjutor. 
 There is a brevity and a frankness about the bare 
 statements in this paper, which contrast not unfavora 
 bly with the more labored narratives of the work 
 achieved by the department in those which came later. 
 Forty-two ships in commission, with a complement of 
 7,600 men, formed the active fleet of the United States 
 at the accession of Lincoln ; and while thirty of these 
 were absent on foreign stations, four only of the re 
 mainder, manned by 280 sailors, constituted the exact 
 force left in the harbors of the states adhering to the 
 Union. 
 
 But more serious still was the disaffection among 
 the naval officers, a far larger proportion of whom than 
 in the army sympathized to the full with the objects 
 of Secession. It was found possible at a later time to 
 fill the posts of the 260 who resigned their commissions 
 with volunteers, who, like Captain Fox, had been 
 brought up to the service. But before this could be 
 done, one of the principal naval depots, the yard at 
 Norfolk, had fallen into hostile hands. In it was a 
 large steam frigate, the Merrimack, now nearly com 
 plete, which the Confederates, on the hasty evacuation 
 of the place, succeeded in saving from the flames when 
 some lesser vessels perished. Possessing thus at least 
 one formidable vessel of war, they forthwith proceeded, 
 
 10 
 
I 4 6 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 with an ingenuity which made up for the limited means 
 at their command, to convert her into such an invinci 
 ble iron-clad as might hope to defy all the fleets of the 
 North. To the foresight and activity of Captain Fox 
 it was due that this design was foiled in the end, by 
 the counter-measures adopted at his instance. 
 
 Before his official appointment as assistant to Mr. 
 Welles, that statesman had in this report brought the 
 subject of iron-clad vessels before the House of Con 
 gress ; and a vote of a million and a half of dollars be 
 ing granted for the purpose of obtaining experimental 
 models, three of those submitted were speedily selected 
 for practical trial. The first of the ships thus ordered 
 was the " Ironsides ; " a steam sloop armored through 
 out with 4J--inch plates, and designed to carry eight of 
 the Dahlgren ii-inch hollow-shot guns, up to that 
 time the heaviest piece known in the navy. The next 
 was the famous invention of Captain Ericsson, the 
 " Monitor," the first ship built with a revolving turret, 
 The principles of her construction were (as is univer 
 sally known) altogether new in the history of naval 
 architecture, and on their general scope it is not need 
 ful here to dwell. Plated very imperfectly, slow, and 
 dangerously unseaworthy, inferior even in armament to 
 her successors (her two guns being i i-inch, one of 
 theirs always 1 5-inch), she yet, by her prompt prepara 
 tion and opportune dispatch to the Chesapeake, arrived 
 to do such service in her single harbor action as few ves 
 sels of the longest sea-going history can claim ; for her 
 success secured its naval base to the army of M Clellan. 
 
 Undeterred by the sneers of the numerous critics, 
 \yho prophesied that the Monitor would never float, or 
 if floating could never venture beyond Sandy Hook, 
 
THE NA VY OF THE UNION. 
 
 147 
 
 the inventor and his employer with equal eagerness 
 pressed her to completion. Such confidence did Fox 
 and Ericsson inspire in Mr. Welles as the " Floating 
 Iron Battery " (her first official name) drew near com 
 pletion, that the Secretary, before the time of actual 
 test arrived, applied for and obtained, with a little gen 
 tle pressure, a special vote from Congress for twenty 
 more iron-clad gun-boats, the greater part of which 
 were ordered to be constructed at once on the Moni 
 tor principle. The additions already made to the 
 
 i strength of the navy in the first four months of Mr. 
 Welles s charge, comprised, besides eight steam-sloops 
 sanctioned by the previous Congress, twelve large 
 steamers bought, and nine more hired from the mer 
 chant service, to be fitted for war purposes with from 
 
 two to nine guns each. Much of the report of July 
 1861 is devoted to an apology for the responsibility 
 assumed by the Secretary in making this provision, 
 and in ordering from private yards twenty-three gun 
 boats of about five hundred tons each ; measures which 
 are especially justified by a reference to the violence 
 
 | committed at Norfolk on the naval property of the 
 Union, and to the insurrection against the Washington 
 authorities of the people of Baltimore. It is evident 
 that Mr. Welles was yet in some uncertainty as to the 
 support the Cabinet might receive in their vigorous 
 action ; an uncertainty at once removed by the prompt 
 approval of the Congress specially summoned to decide 
 whether the Union was to be saved by war. 
 
 In the next report (that of December 1861) it is 
 vain to look for any great progress beyond that shown 
 by returns of expenditure, purchase, and blockade cap 
 tures. With the exception of the disastrous campaign 
 
148 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 ending at Bull s Run, the autumn of this year was 
 chiefly spent by the North in gathering up her strength 
 by land and sea for that great war which she now saw 
 plainly must be passed through if the Union was to be 
 saved. Critics there were in abundance, at home and 
 abroad, ready to denounce the expenditure as profli 
 gate, and the hope of reconquest as visionary. Yet 
 every month added to the majority who supported 
 Congress in their resolution to place the national forces 
 on a thoroughly serviceable footing ; and Captain Fox 
 and his superior availed themselves to the full of the 
 grants made for their department. Supplemental esti 
 mates for five millions of our money had been submit 
 ted in the summer session, and sanctioned without 
 delay ; so that now, in addition to the engaging by 
 special bounties, a respectable number of seamen, one 
 hundred and twenty-one more vessels had been pur 
 chased from merchants and converted into transports 
 or vessels of war, in addition to fifty-two begun or 
 actually completed in the yards, or under special con 
 tracts the greater part by the latter means. Of the 
 old navy the number of vessels brought into service 
 was seventy six ; but one-half of those were sailing- 
 vessels, unsuited to the new exigencies of the service. 
 It had already become evident that the proclamation 
 of blockade, without an abundant use of steam-power, 
 would have proved a nullity ; while the capture now 
 reported of one hundred and fifty-three vessels attempt 
 ing to break it, proved the wisdom of (we quote from 
 Mr. Welles s fuller description in a later report) " the 
 steps which were promptly taken to recall the foreign 
 squadrons, and to augment the navy by repairing and 
 fitting, as expeditiously as possible, every available ves- 
 
 
THE NA VY OF THE UNION. 149 
 
 sel, by rapidly constructing as many steamers as could 
 be built at the navy-yards, and by employing, to the 
 extent that we could procure materials, engines and 
 machinery, the resources of the country in adding 
 others from private ship-yards." 
 
 On the whole, however, the year 1861 had given 
 but little opportunity to show whether the American 
 navy, under the new conditions would prove equal to 
 its former reputation. The validity of its blockade, the 
 one work really accomplished, was questioned daily in 
 the foreign press, whose critics, swayed often by na 
 tional or party prejudice, measured it by the notorious 
 number of escapes rather than by its practical effects 
 upon the South. Yet as we now look coolly back, it is 
 evident that the marine department of the Union forces 
 had done more during this period of general girding 
 for the strife than the administration of the sister ser 
 vice. It is true that masses of volunteers were accept 
 ed for the army and placed in camp : but until Bull s 
 Run had been lost, not the smallest attempt was made 
 to give them consistency and value by a working staff. 
 
 Passing forward another year in our review, we find 
 more conspicuous successes obtained by the energy of 
 Mr. Welles s able assistant than perhaps even he had 
 dreamed of, when the mantle of office fell on him in a 
 fortunate hour for the Union. The general result of 
 his exertions, and of the support and confidence he re 
 ceived from the President and Mr. Welles, is best giv 
 en in the words of the latter s report of December 
 1862: 
 
 " We have at this time afloat or progressing to rapid com 
 pletion a naval force consisting of 427 vessels, there having 
 
ISO 
 
 ADMIRALS FARRAGTT AND PORTER AND 
 
 been added to those of the old navy enumerated in my report 
 of July 1861, exclusive of those that were lost, 363 vessels, 
 armed in the aggregate with 1,577 guns, and of the capacity 
 of 240,028 tons. 
 
 " The annals of the world do not show so great an increase 
 in so brief a period to the naval power of any country. It 
 affords me satisfaction to state that the acquisitions made to 
 the navy from the commercial marine have proved to be of 
 an excellent character, and though these vessels were not 
 built for war purposes, and consequently have not the strength 
 of war vessels, they have performed all the service that was 
 expected of them." 
 
 Some exceptions may of course be made to this 
 broad statement ; but the history of the navy had now 
 become largely the history of the war, and it is ne 
 cessary to survey its achievements a little more in de 
 tail, in order to see how great a share it had already 
 taken in determining the course of events. 
 
 The greatest success, as a purely naval operation, 
 of the whole war the greatest in naval history since 
 Exmouth s victory at Algiers was that achieved in 
 the course of the spring of 1862, at the mouth of the 
 Mississippi. Captain Farragut, whom Welles had 
 specially selected as fitted by his resolute character to 
 take charge of the active operations in that quarter, 
 arrived at the scene of action in February with the 
 new rank of Flag Officer, soon afterwards raised to that 
 of Rear-Admiral, which a special Act allowed the Pres 
 ident to confer on any captain or commander chosen to 
 lead a naval force. The Western Gulf Squadron had 
 been gradually increased from a few blockading vessels 
 to a powerful fleet of 6 steam frigates and 12 large gun- 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. \^\ 
 
 boats. To these a flotilla of 20 bomb-vessels under 
 Porter (raised to commander s rank for his earlier ser 
 vices) was added by the eighteenth of March. But the 
 obstacles to be overcome were of the most formidable 
 character. Two strong forts Jackson on the west 
 bank, St. Philip on the east were connected by a huge 
 boom of rafts and hulks, the approach to which, to be 
 made against a powerful current, was swept with their 
 fire of 80 guns, and seemed thus to bar wholly the way 
 up the stream. Above this obstruction a flotilla of 
 gun-boats was ready to support the fire of the works ; 
 and iron-clad rams were known to have been some time 
 in preparation in order to employ in the coming war 
 fare that use of the blow of the prow disused for so 
 many centuries, but now revived by the power of 
 steam. 
 
 The first attempt of this kind in modern history 
 had been already made off one of the mouths of the 
 river by Commodore Hollins of the Confederate service 
 in the previous October, when he had attacked and all 
 but driven off a blockading squadron with the ram 
 Manasses, a small river-steamer plated rudely with 
 railroad iron. Thus early in the war, however, the 
 means of the Confederates proved unequal to the car 
 rying out their bold designs. The shock of the ram 
 fell partly as it happened, on a coaling schooner along 
 side the steamer Richmond, the vessel attacked ; and 
 although the latter was considerably damaged, she was 
 not reduced to a sinking condition, while the ram suf 
 fered so much in her machinery as to be disabled from 
 continuing the contest. A further attempt on the 
 same occasion to destroy the alarmed blockaders with 
 fire-barges failed also, the former succeeding in drifting 
 
152 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 out of the way of the danger. Hollins then drew off 
 without any practical advantage gained beyond the 
 prestige established in favor of the dashing mode of 
 warfare which he had the credit of being the first to 
 revive, and which the fleet of Farragut had to prepare 
 for, as one of the most dangerous obstacles to their 
 enterprise. 
 
 The navy was from the first designed to bear the 
 labor and reap the honor of the capture of New 
 Orleans unsupported ; although General Butler, with 
 18,000 men, was dispatched to the scene of action. It 
 may be that the fatal example of Pakenham s defeat in 
 his attempt to reach the city by land influenced the 
 arrangements of Welles and Fox. Certain it is that 
 their instructions to Farragut set aside all thought of 
 active use of the troops in the attack. Their simple 
 wording ran (after some preliminary details) thus : 
 
 " When you are completely ready . . . you will proceed 
 up the Mississippi river, and reduce the defences which 
 guard the approaches to New Orleans, when you will appear 
 off that city and take possession of it under the guns of your 
 squadron, and hoist the American flag therein, keeping 
 possession until troops can be sent to you. ... As you have 
 expressed yourself perfectly satisfied with the force given to 
 you, and as many more powerful vessels will be added before 
 you can commence operations, the department and the coun 
 try will require of you success." 
 
 Such success might have been all but impossible 
 had the Confederate resistance been as perfectly organ 
 ized as at the time was believed. A full knowledge 
 of the truth as it may be gained from the official re 
 ports laid before the Richmond Congress, shows not 
 
THE NA VY OF THE UNION. i$<$ 
 
 only that much was left undone in the way of material 
 preparation on the side of the Confederates, but that 
 their commanders were wanting in the unity, vigor, 
 and activity opposed to them by their formidable 
 assailants. 
 
 Farragut s earliest reports refer chiefly to the trans 
 port of the needful supplies, and to the steps taken 
 for carrying the larger steamers over the bar. The 
 difficulties here encountered were greater than had 
 been anticipated, and it was only on April eighth 
 that the frigates were completely brought over the 
 obstacle, with the exception of the heaviest, the Colo 
 rado, which it was found impossible to tow through 
 the mud-banks, however she was lightened. The rest 
 had then to be fully armed and coaled ; and in the 
 meanwhile the whole squadron was fitted for the com 
 ing conflict, under orders previously prepared by the 
 flag-officer with elaborate care to meet the various 
 contingencies of a battle fought in the contracted 
 space of a river s width. The mere issuing of instruc 
 tions was by no means the limit of Farragut s care for 
 his command. Imitating, perhaps unconsciously, the 
 scrupulous anxiety of Nelson before the victory of the 
 Nile, he visited every vessel under his flag, and saw 
 that the commander personally comprehended his own 
 share in the work. Thus, too, he was enabled (as his 
 detailed report discovers) to utilize such suggestions as 
 the ingenuity of individuals offered. The first of these 
 was by the engineer of the Richmond, who proposed 
 that the sheet-cables should be stopped up and down 
 the sides in the line of the engines a plan which was 
 immediately adopted by all the vessels. Then each 
 commander made his own arrangements for prevent- 
 
154 
 
 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 ing the shot from penetrating the boilers or machinery, 
 by hammocks, coal, bags of ashes, bags of sand, clothes- 
 bags, and in fact every device imaginable. The bul 
 warks were lined with hammocks by some, by splinter- 
 nettings made with ropes, by others. Some rubbed 
 their vessels outside with mud, to make their ships less 
 visible, and some whitewashed their decks, to make 
 things more visible during the fight, for the actual con 
 flict was to take place in the night. 
 
 While thus consulting in person with his captains, 
 all of whose opinions Farragut heard, that of Com 
 mander Porter, was listened to with a deference cor 
 responding to his important charge and the reputation 
 he had already gained, rather than to his relative 
 rank. In his general order of April twentieth the flag- 
 officer freely avowed this, and declared himself to be 
 about to essay an attack which was a combination of 
 two modes suggested by that able and daring officer. 
 The forts were at all risks to be run past in the dark, 
 and the troops to be left behind until a sufficient naval 
 force to protect them was in the river above at a point 
 (called the Quarantine) near to which they might be 
 conveyed by a shallow creek which turned the Con 
 federate main works. The latter could then be effect 
 ually besieged, while the bulk of the joint forces moved 
 up along the stream, prepared to operate further by 
 land or water according to the means of resistance, as 
 yet hardly guessed at, which the enemy possessed. 
 This project was in the end not executed in its integ 
 rity only because, the forts once passed, opposition 
 practically ceased. The assault was preluded by a 
 bombardment from Porter s heavy mortars. After 
 careful reconnoissance that officer had towed his flotilla 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. 
 
 155 
 
 within range of the works by the morning of April 
 eighteenth and the work of destruction began by their 
 throwing that day nearly 3,000 large shells about the 
 heads of the garrison. 
 
 Those who have wondered at the success obtained 
 at New Orleans need do so no more when they con 
 trast the completeness of the Federal preparations, 
 and the vigor and decision with which Farragut at the 
 proper moment went to work, with the divided coun 
 sels and inefficient armaments opposed to them by the 
 Confederates. On March twenty-seventh, General 
 Duncan, a well-known artillerist, who personally com 
 manded the defences, became aware that the enemy s 
 fleet was crossing the bar. Both he and his superior, 
 General Lovell, had previously anticipated this, and 
 had made urgent and repeated applications for a 
 change of armament at the forts, the guns in which 
 were but old 32 and 42-pounders, justly held to be 
 unfit for repelling the steam fleet which threatened the 
 place ; while a second line of works nearer to the city 
 mounted but twelve of the former pieces, having been 
 stripped even of the latter "at the urgent request of 
 the naval authorities," who wished to use this part of 
 the armament on some gun-boats fitting for defence 
 of the creeks. That this most serious mistake of not 
 supplying proper ordnance arose from underrating the 
 imminence of the danger on the river side appears 
 plainly from General Lovell s reports. These also 
 show how early in the war the Confederate naval 
 authorities had turned their attention to the use of 
 iron-clad vessels, of which two large specimens, in 
 tended both for ramming and carrying guns in shot- 
 proof batteries, were being prepared at New Orleans. 
 
156 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND FOR TER AND 
 
 Happily for the success of the Union fleet, the mechan 
 ical means which their foes controlled were by no 
 means equal to their powers of conception. This de 
 ficiency produced continual delay ; while the readiness 
 of Fox and Farragut was so far beyond that anticipa 
 ted by their professional opponents, that the iron-clads 
 (originally designed for February first) w r ere found 
 unprepared for use when the Federal fleet, three 
 months later, burst its way through to the fated city. 
 
 " Immediately" [says General Lovell] " after I assumed 
 command of the department, finding there were no guns of 
 the heaviest calibre, I applied to Richmond, Pensacola, and 
 other points for some lo-inch columbiads and sea-coast 
 mortars, which I considered necessary to the defence of the 
 lower river ; but none could be spared, the general impression 
 being that New Orleans would not be attacked by the river; 
 and I was therefore compelled to make the best possible 
 defence with the guns at my disposal. Twelve 42-pounders 
 were sent to Forts Jackson and St. Philip, together with a 
 large additional quantity of powder ; and being convinced 
 that with the guns of inferior calibre mounted there we could 
 not hinder steamers from passing, unless they could be 
 detained for some time under the fire of the works, I pushed 
 forward rapidly the construction of a raft which offered a 
 complete obstruction to the passage of vessels." 
 
 The personal exertions of an ordnance officer, a 
 relation of the general, did at length procure three ten- 
 inch and three eight-inch columbiad hollow-shot guns 
 and five large mortars, which were mounted just before 
 the bombardment commenced. This was, as before 
 noticed, on April eighteenth : but a week previous to 
 Porter s attack the raft was seriously damaged by a 
 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. 157 
 
 storm accompanied by a flood, which, according to 
 General Duncan s statement, " parted the chains, scat 
 tered the schooners, and materially affected the charac 
 ter and effectiveness of the raft as an obstruction." 
 
 For six long days did the garrisons of the forts en 
 dure the pitiless fire which Porter rained on them. 
 Carefully as the casemates had been constructed, the 
 thirteen-inch shells inflicted serious damage, and dis 
 abled a number of the defenders guns. The unpro 
 tected barracks in the fort were destroyed with all 
 their contents within the first twelve hours of this tre 
 mendous bombardment. The garrison could make 
 feeble response, owing to the inferiority of range of 
 most of their pieces ; yet the gunners never flinched, 
 and the enormous expenditure of Federal ammunition 
 determined Farragut to hurry on the endeavor to 
 pass the batteries by main force in the hours of dark 
 ness on the third night, under cover of a furious fire, 
 an expedition of two gun-boats, under Captain Bell, 
 approached the barricade to attempt its destruction by 
 means of petards or, as they are now called, torpedoes. 
 "This duty," says Admiral Farragut, " was not thor 
 oughly performed, in consequence of the failure to ig 
 nite the petards with the galvanic battery." In fact, 
 no officer of the American services had at that time 
 been trained to the use upon or under water of these 
 powerful engines of destruction. " Still," he continues, 
 " it was a success, and, under the circumstances, a 
 highly meritorious one." In fact, the Itasca, under 
 Lieutenent Caldwell, grappled one of the schooners, 
 which that officer boarded at once, and detached from 
 the chains which had secured her to the barricade, 
 which was thus laid open. His gun-boat was the only 
 
I 5 8 ADMIRAL S FARRA GUT AND POR TER AND 
 
 one seen by the look-outs of Duncan, who writes : 
 " A heavy fire was opened upon her, which caused her 
 to retire, but not until she had partially accomplished 
 her purpose. The raft after this could not be regarded 
 as an obstruction." 
 
 The following night the garrison was cheered by 
 the descent from New Orleans of one of the two iron 
 clad rafts, the Louisiana, mounting sixteen heavy guns. 
 By this time the injuries in their defences were very 
 considerable; but. under her almost impregnable cover 
 they had hoped to make the necessary repairs. On 
 conferring however with Captain Mitchell, a naval 
 officer who now arrived and assumed charge of all the 
 steamers gathered for the defence, Duncan learnt that 
 her motive power was incomplete, and that so far from 
 taking the offensive against the enemy, his coadjutor 
 was bent on keeping her above the forts until the me 
 chanics had finished their labors. In vain did the gen 
 eral appeal to his chief at New Orleans, and the latter 
 to Commodore Whittle, the successor of Hollins and 
 superior of Captain Mitchell. The commodore s orders 
 were sent indeed to the latter, but with the proviso to 
 execute them only " if in his judgment it w r as advis 
 able ; " and in consequence, Mitchell held to his deter 
 mination of keeping the iron-clad for the present out 
 of fire. It is fair to say that his view was supported 
 by those of the naval officers under him. On the 
 other hand, the naval volunteers who chiefly manned 
 the steamers (eight in number, besides the small rarn 
 Manasses and a fire-raft flotilla), which had been pre 
 pared for co-operation with the forts, were jealous alike 
 of the interference they had at first met with from the 
 generals, and of that to which they now were subjected 
 
THE NA VY OF THE UNION. ! 59 
 
 when transferred to the rule of their professional breth 
 ren. 
 
 It is not for us, who inherit the memories of Wal- 
 cheren, to lean too hardly on the errors which divided 
 the command of the Confederates at this critical time, 
 and kept the real chiefs at New Orleans, twenty miles 
 above the vital point of action. It is enough to say 
 that the fifth day of bombardment and endurance went 
 by in vain correspondence and appeals. Not only did 
 Mitchell refuse to place the Louisiana where her bat 
 tery might be of use, but the only immediate service 
 remaining to be performed, the sending down of fire- 
 ships in the night against Porter s fleet, was left undone, 
 the tug-boats allotted for that duty being under repair. 
 " This does not excuse the neglect," says Duncan, " as 
 there were six boats of the river fleet available for this 
 service, independent of those alluded to, and fire-barges 
 were plentiful." More plainly still does General Lov- 
 ell s report speak of what occurred that night and dur 
 ing the eventful one which followed. " The river-defence 
 fleet," he writes, " proved a failure, for the very reasons set 
 forth in my letter to the department of April fifteenth. 
 Unable to govern themselves, and unwilling to be gov 
 erned by others, their almost total want of system, vig 
 ilance, and discipline rendered them useless and help 
 less, when the enemy finally dashed upon them sud 
 denly in a dark night. I regret very much that the 
 department did not think it advisable to grant my 
 request to place some competent head in charge of 
 these steamers." 
 
 The twenty-third of April broke warm and clear. The 
 garrisons had now given up hope of immediate aid from 
 the steamers, and attempted to repair their pressing 
 
l6o ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 damages as they best could under Porter s fire. Before 
 night the latter slackened perceptibly ; and Duncan, 
 struck by this fact (which he correctly enough, as his 
 letter of that evening proves, ascribed to the enemy s 
 growing short of ammunition), and observing move 
 ments in the fleet below, once more wrote to Mitchell 
 to urge the Louisiana s being brought into a position 
 to aid at least by her battery in the defence. His 
 request was refused, and when, somewhat later, he 
 communicated the additional news that his suspicions 
 were confirmed by the enemy s boats fixing white flags 
 in the line of their expected advance, he learnt only 
 from Mitchell s reply that the Louisiana would be ready 
 by the next evening. Before that evening had arrived 
 the luckless iron-clad was prepared to be blown up by 
 her captain s own orders. Kept so carefully out of 
 harm s way as she had been, the only damage inflicted 
 by her was that caused by the explosion, to the garri 
 son she had been built to aid. 
 
 The anxiety suffered by Duncan and his troops 
 during the early part of the night was enhanced by an 
 increase in the fire of the bomb-vessels which took 
 place when darkness closed, and by their ignorance of 
 what the enemy was doing under cover of Porter s 
 shells ; for, as on the previous night, the promised fire- 
 rafts were not floated down by the flotilla. Who it was 
 that should be charged specially with this omission it 
 is hard to say. It is clear that Captain Mitchell, though 
 invested nominally with the whole control of the river 
 defence, was unable to make his authority felt by the 
 naval volunteers, whose senior officer, Captain Steven 
 son, had declared officially three days before, in the 
 name of his force, "it would not be governed by the 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. j6i 
 
 regulations of the navy or commanded by naval offi 
 cers." 
 
 At two o clock on the morning of the twenty-fourth 
 Farragut gave his pre-arranged signal, two ordinary red 
 lights, so as not to excite special notice ; and the ad 
 vance began in two columns. That on the right, under 
 Captain Bailey (Farragut s second in command), was 
 led by the gun-boat Cayuga, which bore the flag. She 
 was followed by the steam frigates Pensacola and Mis 
 sissippi, and five other gun-boats in succession. The 
 left column, the Admiral s own, was similar in forma 
 tion, but stronger by a frigate, being led by his fleet- 
 captain in the gun-boat Scioto, which was followed by 
 the Hartford (the flag-ship), two other frigates, and five 
 more gun-boats. The divided counsels of their oppo 
 nents, the exhaustion of some, the insubordination of 
 others, the incompleteness of their defences, were all 
 unknown to the Federals : and how great was their 
 commander s anxiety as to the issue of his bold ad 
 vance, and the prospect of passing the forts with a re 
 spectable force left, is best shown by his own general 
 order, sent round a short time before : 
 
 " When, in the opinion of the flag-officer, the propitious 
 time has arrived, the signal will be made to weigh and ad 
 vance to the conflict. If in his opinion, at the time of arriv 
 ing at the respective positions of the different divisions of the 
 fleet, we have the advantage, he will make the signal for close 
 action, No. 8, and abide the result conquer or to be conquer 
 ed drop anchor or keep under weigh, as in his opinion is 
 best." 
 
 At half-past three the fleet approached the barrier, 
 the bomb-vessels having also placed themselves so as 
 ii 
 
!62 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 to fire freely on the forts, and being strengthened for 
 the night by the addition of the sailing corvette Ports 
 mouth, which was towed up within range of Fort Jack 
 son. Severely damaged already, the boom gave way 
 to the rush of the leading gunboats, while at the same 
 moment the forts opened fire, and one of the most fear 
 ful scenes began which naval annals record. 
 
 "After we had fairly entered into the fight " [writes Farra- 
 gut], " the density of the smoke from guns and fire-rafts, the 
 scenes passing on board our own ship and around us (for it 
 was as if the artillery of heaven were playing upon earth), were 
 such that it was impossible for the flag-officer to see how 
 each vessel was conducting itself, and lie can only judge by 
 the final results and their special reports, which are herewith 
 enclosed. But I feel that I can say with truth that it has 
 rarely been the lot of a commander to be supported by offi 
 cers of" more indomitable courage or higher professional 
 merit." 
 
 In short, the darkness of the night, the closeness 
 of the action, and the tremendous calibre of the Fed 
 eral cannon made it hopeless for any officer to do more 
 than control the movements of a single vessel in the 
 confused uproar which arose. The flag-officer s own 
 was soon in danger so imminent as to task his utmost 
 energies, and we quote from his report only that further 
 portion which speaks of her share : 
 
 " I discovered a fire-raft coming down upon us, and in at 
 tempting to avoid it ran the ship on shore ; and the ram Ma- 
 nasses, which I had not seen, lay on the opposite of it, and 
 pushed it down upon us. Our ship was soon on fire halfway 
 up to her tops, but we backed off, and through the good or- 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. 163 
 
 ganization of our fire department, and the great exertions of 
 Captain Wainwright and his first lieutenant, officers, and crew, 
 the fire was extinguished. Tn the meantime our battery was 
 never silent, but poured in its missiles of death into forl St. 
 Philip, opposite to which we had got by this time, and it was 
 silenced, with the exception of a gun now and then." 
 
 Silenced perhaps for the minute ; for the gunners at 
 such times sought shelter in the casements close by, 
 which had preserved them during the preceding bom 
 bardment ; yet only to rush forth at every interval of 
 slackening in the fire of the frigates, and reply with 
 their feebler pieces to the storm of grape hurled at 
 them from Q-inch and ii-inch guns. Their gallantry is 
 not merely testified to by their own commanders. More 
 important witness to it is borne by the detailed reports 
 of the Federal captains, and especially by those of three 
 gunboats, the Itasca, Kennebec, and Winona, which 
 became entangled in portions of the barrier after the 
 frigates had gone by, and found the fire of the garrison 
 still so insupportable as to compel them to head down 
 stream, and thus, for safety, to separate themselves 
 from the rest of the fleet. 
 
 The forts and boom once passed, as well as the 
 
 fire-rafts (of which only one, that which struck the 
 
 Hartford, did any harm,) the " defence fleet " of 
 
 Mitchell" had yet to be encountered. This Farragut 
 
 estimated at thirteen gun-boats, and two iron-clads, but 
 
 the truth was considerably within this. The Louisiana 
 
 : was but a motionless raft, so moored that she could 
 
 hardly bring her bow-guns to bear, and fired (it was 
 
 said by the garrison) but twelve shots. The eight gun- 
 
 ; boats had been but poorly fitted, and some of them 
 
164 
 
 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 mounted but a single large gun, while in weight they 
 were no match even for the enemy s smallest vessels. 
 The action, therefore, was of very brief duration, al 
 though gallantly undertaken by the Confederates. Four 
 of their boats had been fitted with iron plates over their 
 bows with the intention of using them as rams, and two 
 of these, the Governor Moore and Quitman, came im 
 mediately into collision with the Varuna, which had in 
 the melee with the forts got ahead of the rest of the 
 Federal fleet. She was in chase of an unarmed steamer 
 on board of which was General Lovell himself (who 
 had arrived from New Orleans on a visit of inspection 
 just as the firing commenced), when the Governor 
 Moore attacked her boldly, firing a bow-gun which dis 
 abled thirteen of the Varuna s hands, and charging her 
 afterwards on the starboard side. The Federals, how 
 ever, succeeded in bringing an 8-inch gun to bear on 
 the assailant, and disabling her completely in a few 
 minutes ; but the Quitman, which had approached the 
 Varuna on the port side at the same time, now butted 
 at her twice, at the second collision driving in her side. 
 In doing this, however, she swung round, and the Fed 
 erals, before their vessel sank, sent five of their 8-inch 
 shells into their new enemy, and had the satisfaction of 
 seeing her in flames. Of the rest of the " defence fleet " 
 the Defiance was the only one saved under the guns of 
 the fort at daybreak, the others having either been 
 sunk, burnt, or driven ashore, disabled by the over 
 whelming batteries which the frigates had opened on 
 them. These last had been attacked indeed by the 
 Manasses with a boldness worthy of better success ; 
 but her feeble power and small tonnage were found 
 perfectly unavailing to injure the ships through the 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. 165 
 
 chain-armor so judiciously prepared. Her encounter 
 with the flag-ship Hartford has been already mention 
 ed. Passing on while the latter was on fire, she charg 
 ed the Brooklyn full on the starboard gangway, but 
 with little effect, beyond breaking some of the links of 
 the chain and driving in three planks above water line. 
 Wedged in between her huge antagonist and the 
 shore, the ram found herself unable to get up speed for 
 a fresh charge, and was glad to drop down stream. 
 She then crossed over to attack the Mississippi, and 
 struck her with a very partial effect, inflicting injuries 
 similar to those of the Brooklyn, and then passing 
 down to the forts, where she lay for a short while. 
 
 The gray of early daylight now succeeded to the 
 flashes of the hostile guns which had lighted up the 
 scene ; and Farragut discovering the completeness of 
 his victory, signalled to discontinue action. His fleet 
 had begun to form and steam slowly upwards when the 
 indomitable little ram was seen singly in pursuit, and 
 preparing to renew her assaults. The admiral at once 
 signalled the Mississippi to turn and attack her; and 
 Captain Smith, aided by the gun-boats Pinola and 
 Kineo, charged her at once. Captain Warly (who, from 
 her first construction, had commanded the ram), seeing 
 I the huge bows of the frigate coming straight towards 
 i him, steered to avoid the direct shock, and ran his 
 vessel aground, exposing her to the full broadsides of 
 the enemy. From this helpless position he escaped 
 with his crew to the shore, and the once famous 
 Manasses was fired by the boats of the Mississippi, 
 which had been ordered off to board her. This was 
 the last episode of the battle ; for Farragut, leaving 
 behind him the shattered forts and the relics of the 
 
1 66 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 enemy s flotilla, went upward on his path of conquest. 
 Captain Bailey, still leading in the Cayuga, soon came 
 in sight of a small camp of.sharp-shooters on the right 
 bank, who, finding their position and line of retreat 
 along the levee under command of the gun-boats, sur 
 rendered at once. Near this point known as the 
 Quarantine, the river is approached by the creek before 
 mentioned, as turning (for shallow boats) the forts and 
 barricade. The flag-officer now made use of it to com 
 municate with Porter and General Butler, and leaving 
 two gun-boats to protect the latter s advance from the 
 enemy still remaining at the forts, proceeded on with 
 the rest of the fleet. The farther progress of the 
 Federals occupied all that day and the early part of the 
 twenty-fifth, " owing to the slowness of some of the 
 vessels, and want of knowledge of the river ;" but 
 New Orleans was finally approached at ten A. M. on 
 the twenty-sixth. Then came a ten minutes contest i 
 with the inner works, armed, as we know, with but a 
 dozen 32-pounders. The rest of the story of the con 
 quest ; the public thanksgiving ordered by the Admiral 
 on board his victorious fleet; the fierce heart-burnings 
 of the proud city, which lay helpless under his guns ; 
 the unjust obloquy thrown on General Lovell by the 
 Confederates for not ensuring its destruction by a use 
 less resistance with his petty garrison of 3,000 men; 
 these things, and, above all, the humiliation which 
 followed on Butler s taking possession, are well known. 
 We pass them, therefore, by; citing merely the follow 
 ing paragraph of Farragut s letter, which tells the final 
 history of the forces of Duncan and Mitchell, and 
 observing that the surrender of the former was com 
 pelled by the violent insubordination of the same 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. 1 67 
 
 volunteer gunners who had obeyed him with cheerful 
 endurance until their retreat was cut off: 
 
 " On the evening of the twenty-ninth, Captain Bailey 
 arrived from below, with the gratifying intelligence that the 
 forts had surrendered to Commander Porter, and had 
 delivered up all public property, and were being paroled ; 
 and that the navy had been made to surrender uncondition 
 ally, as they had conducted themselves with bad faith, burn 
 ing and sinking their vessels while a flag of truce was flying 
 and the forts negotiating for their surrender, and the Louisiana, 
 their great iron-clad battery, being blown up alongside of 
 the vessel where they were negotiating ; hence their officers 
 were not paroled, but sent home to be treated according to 
 the judgment of the government." 
 
 With the Louisiana the Confederates had lost their 
 iron-clad frigate Mississippi, the most important naval 
 structure they had undertaken, which was lying 
 (unfinished at a wharf near the city, and was burnt on 
 the approach of Farragut, whose victory was thus as 
 complete as any officer commanding afloat could have 
 jdesired over a combined land and sea force. The 
 garrison of Lovell, and all its stores, should perhaps 
 have been added to the prize ; but the Federals were, 
 strangely enough, not aware that a single ship anchored 
 Iten miles above the city would, at the then height of 
 jthe river, have completely commanded the only exit, 
 jwhich through their ignorance was left open for several 
 jdays. At the least, however, the success was almost 
 ibeyond price to the Union Government from its moral 
 importance on both sides of the Atlantic. As to the 
 jmaterial advantage won, it may be best judged of by 
 the statement of the well-known Confederate writer 
 Mr. Pollard:; 
 
1 68 A DMIRA LS FARRAGUT A ND P OR 7 *ER A ND 
 
 " The extent of the disaster was not to be disguised. It 
 was a heavy blow to the Confederacy. It annihilated us in 
 Louisiana; separated us from Texas and Arkansas ; dimin 
 ished our resources and supplies by the loss of one of the 
 greatest grain and cattle countries within the limits of the 
 Confederacy; gave to the enemy the Mississippi river, with 
 all its means of navigation, for a base of operations ; and 
 finally led, by plain and irresistible conclusion, to our virtual 
 abandonment of its great and fruitful valley." 
 
 " Treachery," was the cry raised by the indignant 
 South at the loss of its commercial capital : and al 
 though such a charge against the Confederate com 
 manders bears no inquiry, the fall of New Orleans and 
 its consequences must, as has been shown, be held due 
 in part to the improvident delays and discordant coun 
 sels of the defenders, as well as to the want of appre 
 ciation in their chosen government of the greatness of 
 the danger which threatened the Confederacy at this 
 vital point. Allowing fully for all these, the highest 
 credit must yet be given to the judgment which planned 
 and the vigor which executed this successful stroke. 
 If the language of Mr. Welles seems a little exagge 
 rated when he says, " It was regarded everywhere, 
 both at home and abroad, as the grandest achievement 
 of the war," no less is it certain that, in calling the cap 
 ture of New Orleans " one of the most remarkable tri 
 umphs in the whole history of naval operations," he is 
 fully justified, both by the daring with which unknown 
 dangers were faced and the vast importance of the vic 
 tory gained. 
 
 The success of Farragut was marred, as has been 
 seen, by the loss of only a single gun-boat ; and com 
 ment on the battle won by so hastily formed a fleet 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. ify 
 
 would be incomplete indeed if it omitted special notice 
 of the fact that the Varuna was the only one of Farra- 
 gut s gun-boats " converted," from the merchant ser 
 vice, instead of being built expressly for the rougher 
 business of the navy. 
 
 " Here let me pause" [says Lieutenant Swasey. in a very 
 clear report of the disaster] " while we reflect upon the una- 
 daptedness of a merchant-built vessel for war purposes, par 
 ticularly such as the Varuna was called to take part in. Had 
 it been built with that strength which all the other vessels 
 possessed, and the need of which becomes more apparent to 
 the mind of the naval officer each day, we would yet be afloat 
 off the city of New Orleans. Such vessels may perhaps do 
 for the ordinary duties of a blockade, and I think it is yet a 
 . question whether they will or not ; but certainly they are not 
 fit to trust lives and property on to engage works of the 
 strongest magnitude." 
 
 New Orleans once secured and handed over to 
 . General Butler, Farragut pushed up the Mississippi, 
 j and in the course of the next two months the Union 
 | flag was hoisted at Baton Rouge, Natchez, and every 
 town of importance as high as Vicksburg. This city, 
 strong by its natural position on high bluffs sloping 
 gently landward, and already partly converted into a 
 fortress by intrenchments heavily armed, was now 
 (since the surrender of Memphis on the sixth of June) 
 the only point of importance held by the Confederates 
 on the banks of the great river. It at once, therefore, 
 assumed an importance well warranted by its later his 
 tory. Summoned on the eighteenth of May to evacu 
 ate the place, General M. L. Smith, who held it, gave 
 a decided refusal ; and Farragut found it necessary to 
 
170 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 await once more the arrival of Porter s flotilla, which 
 was not brought up and reported ready until the 
 twenty-seventh of June. On the twenty-eighth a general 
 attack took place, Farragut succeeding in taking two 
 of his three frigates and six gun-boats above the bat 
 teries, but producing no effect on the defences. " The 
 enemy leave their guns for the moment," says his hasty 
 report, " but return to them as soon as we have passed, 
 and rake us." About fifty men were killed and 
 wounded on board, and the Brooklyn frigate, with two 
 gun-boats, forced to retreat below the place. 
 
 The bombardment continued at intervals, pending 
 an application to General Halleck at Corinth for a 
 corps of his army to aid the fleet, and the result of an 
 experiment (the first of three) made to cut a ship canal 
 through the isthmus opposite Vicksburg, and leave 
 the Federal ships an independent passage. On the j 
 fifteenth of July their possession of the river was sud 
 denly challenged by a large ram, the Arkansas, which ; 
 the Confederates had been fitting on the Yazoo, a con- j 
 siderable stream entering the Mississippi just above j 
 Vicksburg. This new enemy was built, in imitation of j 
 those destroyed at New Orleans, with a screw-propel- j 
 ler, and iron-clad sides sloping inwards; and, besides j 
 the means of offence offered by her sharp prow, she 
 mounted nine guns. Her plating, however, proved to 
 be weak, and her machinery very defective. Uneasy 
 at the reports of her, Farragut had sent a small river- 
 steamer, the Tyler, to explore the Yazoo, and this 
 probably brought her down incomplete ; for she ap 
 peared suddenly, on the evening of the fifteenth, com 
 ing into the Mississippi, apparently in chase of the 
 Tyler, and forthwith ran down to take shelter under 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. 
 
 171 
 
 the guns of Vicksburg. In passing she received and 
 returned the broadsides of Farragut s whole squadron ; 
 and several of the heavier shot crashed through her 
 armor, tearing up her unplated deck, damaging her 
 fittings, and killing and wounding some of the crew. 
 But this was not fully known to the Federals, and her 
 escape for the time spread alarm as far as the garrison 
 of Butler at New Orleans. Her history, however, need 
 not be pursued at length. On her first leaving her 
 shelter to co-operate with a Confederate land force in 
 the attack (made August fifteenth) on Baton Rouge, 
 her engines broke hopelessly down when yet five miles 
 from the place, and, drifting to the shore end on, she 
 fell an easy prey to the shells of the Essex, a large 
 iron-plated river-boat, whose commander had taken 
 charge of the Lower Mississippi on the departure of 
 Farragut. The latter officer, in compliance with orders 
 from Mr. Welles, had abandoned his contest with the 
 Vicksburg works on the twentieth of July, and made 
 down stream for New Orleans, whence he proceeded 
 with his squadron to carry on operations along the 
 coast of Texas, where the chief posts were (for the 
 time) recovered to the Union by his detachments in 
 the course of a few weeks. " All we want," he wrote 
 on the fifteenth of October, " is a few soldiers to hold 
 the places, and we will soon have the whole coast. It 
 is a more effectual blockade to have the vessels inside 
 instead of outside." In this simple remark lies the 
 key to the constantly increasing success of the Union 
 ists in restricting their enemy s trade, a success which 
 was finally complete when Wilmington fell to Admiral 
 Porter s and General Terry s combined forces two years 
 later in the war. 
 
1^2 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 Second only in importance to the exploits of Farra- 
 gut s fleet during this remarkable year, were the ser 
 vices rendered on the rivers by the squadrons of the 
 Mississippi and Tennessee. Flag-officer Foote (raised 
 to rear-admiral s rank soon afterwards with Farragut) 
 directed their operations with extraordinary activity 
 until disabled by the effects of a wound in May. They 
 were continued for the next four months under Captain 
 Davis, who had succeeded to the temporary charge. 
 In October, however, a new flag-officer appeared in the 
 person of Porter, whose services as lieutenant and com 
 mander we have already noticed. The constant ap 
 proval of Farragut, Bailey, and all with whom he served, 
 had fully justified the early selection of this officer at 
 the opening of the war for high charge by the Presi 
 dent; and the latter, proud of so fortunate a choice, 
 took occasion now to advance him per saltuni to the 
 rank of acting rear-admiral, and to the command left 
 vacant by Foote. Much of the uniform though slow 
 success of the Federal armies in the central states 
 depended henceforth on the activity and energy by 
 which Porter showed himself worthy of his unexampled 
 promotion. But the story of his deeds in that quarter, 
 of Foote s, and of Farragut s, when he appeared a 
 second time in the Mississippi to co-operate in the fall 
 of Vicksburg, forms so essential a part of the cam 
 paigns of General Grant, that we prefer to leave it to 
 those writers who have made the progress of the Fed 
 eral armies in the West their special theme. 
 
 The year 1862 and its naval operations have an 
 interest which to many may seem even higher than that 
 which belongs to the subjects we have hitherto treated. 
 The world-famous battle of the Monitor and Merrimack 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNIOX. ^3 
 
 on April ninth first opened the way to that practical solu 
 tion of the proper form of iron-clad steamers for spe 
 cial service which no government has attained to as 
 rapidly as that of the United States. It is as well to 
 be fully understood on this matter ; and the report of 
 Mr. Welles sets forth in the clearest light the impor 
 tance of the Monitor s victory, the prescience shown 
 by his practical adviser. Captain Fox, at the outset of 
 the war, and the conditions aimed at in the construc 
 tion of the original vessels built on the turret princi 
 ple. The details of the battle; the sudden appearance 
 in Hampton Roads of the Merrimack, heavily plated 
 with layers of iron, fitted as a ram, and well armed ; 
 her attack and easy destruction of two large wooden 
 ships of war ; the dangerous situation of the blockad 
 ing steam-frigates, unfitted to cope with and unable to 
 escape from their antagonist, from whom they were 
 only saved the first day by her dread of the shallows; 
 the unlooked-for arrival (in the middle of that anxious 
 night) of the Monitor, hurried from New York by Cap 
 tain Fox s exertions to meet and foil the long-threat 
 ened design of the Confederates: all these particulars 
 have been so often and so fully given to the world, 
 that we forbear to repeat them. At noon next day, 
 the Merrimack abandoned her attack and retreated to 
 Norfolk, leaving the honors of her discomfiture to her 
 diminutive but invulnerable foe. 
 
 " Thus terminated " [writes Mr. Welles somewhat grand 
 iloquently] " the most remarkable naval combat of modern 
 times, perhaps of any age. The fiercest and most formidable 
 naval assault upon the power of the Union which has ever 
 been made by the insurgents was heroically repelled, and a 
 new era was opened in the history of maritime warfare." 
 
174 ADMIRALS FARRAG UT AND PORTER AND 
 
 The defeat and capture by two other Monitors of 
 the Confederate iron-clad Atlanta, prepared with great 
 toil at Savannah, and supposed impregnable until tested 
 on her first essay in June 1863 by the rude shock of 
 1 5-inch shells from the new Dahlgren guns, put an end 
 to the last Southern hopes of raising the blockade. 
 Yet the land defences of the other Atlantic ports still 
 defied the navy of the Union. It seemed as though it 
 needed the presence of Farragut or Porter to overcome 
 the prestige of shore batteries. Admiral Dupont, 
 beaten off from the capital of South Carolina, was 
 superseded for declaring that " to renew the attack 
 would be attended with disastrous results, involving the 
 loss of the coast." His views of the strength of 
 Charleston were fully justified by the conduct of his suc 
 cessor. Dahlgren did not repeat the attempt, and his 
 fleet played but a secondary part in the siege conducted 
 by General Gillmore ; nor was it until the latter had 
 captured Morris Island that the blockade was made 
 effective by vessels placed in the smooth water near it, 
 and the commerce of the city ceased. Yet so formi 
 dable did Fort Sumter, even in its ruins, appear, that 
 so late as the following summer a fresh attempt to force 
 the Monitors between it and Fort Moultrie was dis 
 cussed and deliberately rejected by the Admiral and 
 his captains assembled in council of war. 
 
 The services of Farragut during the year 1863, in 
 cluding his forcing a passage at tremendous risk and 
 loss past Fort Hudson, the new Confederate fortress on 
 the Mississippi, and his subsequent co-operation in the 
 all-important conquest of Vicksburg, though of them 
 selves gallant and memorable achievements, are yet, as 
 before mentioned, of a secondary nature, being bound 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. ^5 
 
 up with the history of Grant s armies, with which Por 
 ter also acted throughout the year. 
 
 The spring of 1864, however, found the former ad 
 miral returning from a brief sick leave, and preparing 
 for a new enterprise, more perilous in appearance than 
 the attack on New Orleans, where well-won success had 
 first raised him to fame. Mobile Bay was one of the 
 few refuges remaining to the blockade-runners at this 
 period of the war. The main entrance to it was guard 
 ed by Fort Morgan, a bastioned work of great strength 
 armed with lo-inch hollow shot and rifled 32-pounder 
 guns. The channel was narrow at this part, must be 
 entered by daylight, and was thickly beset by such 
 torpedoes as that which had recently, in spite of Dahl- 
 gren s precautions, proved fatal to the steam sloop 
 Housatonic at Charleston, and placed the Ironsides 
 herself in danger. Yet more to be dreaded than fort 
 or torpedo was the ram Tennessee, commanded by 
 Admiral Buchanan, whose courage and ability were 
 well-known to Farragut, and of strength and armament 
 beyond any of those which the Confederates had 
 launched. Her description, given with exactness by 
 deserters, spoke of her as built upon the same princi 
 ples as the Atlanta, but with the casemate large 
 enough to carry six guns, and plated all over with three 
 layers of two-inch iron, by which additional strength the 
 Confederates hoped to save her from the fate of her 
 model. Her speed was slow, and Farragut declared 
 on his arrival that he would not hesitate to encounter 
 her with his larger wooden ships, but for the fear of 
 her taking refuge in such shallow water as they could 
 not enter. " Wooden vessels," he added, " can do 
 nothing with these iron-clads unless by getting within 
 
176 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 one hundred or two hundred yards, so as to ram them 
 or pour in a broadside." 
 
 Four Monitors being at length supplied him in July, 
 he prepared to test the strength of his enemies without 
 delay, the latter being reported to be striving hard to 
 add other iron-clads to the Tennessee, which alone 
 proved ready for action. She was aided by three 
 wooden gun-boats only, when the Federal fleet entered 
 the channel on August fifth, in great strength, but with 
 much uncertainty as to the issue of the attack. The 
 seven frigates and steam sloops which carried the prin 
 cipal batteries were not only protected by chains 
 stopped up and down, but were lashed each to a gun 
 boat on the port side, in order that if crippled in the 
 narrow channel they might be towed out of range of 
 Fort Morgan, which was on the starboard hand. The 
 Monitors formed a single line between it and the ships, 
 engaging the work and absorbing its fire as far as pos 
 sible. Thus covered, the wooden vessels in tneir 
 double column forced their way up (the admiral most 
 gallantly taking the lead when the first ship, the Brook 
 lyn, hesitated at the sudden appearance of a line of 
 buoys), and found themselves in half an hour above 
 the forts, on which their starboard broadsides had 
 poured such a continuous fire of grape, the missile 
 specially chosen beforehand by Farragut, as the gun 
 ners could hardly endure. Not one ship was disabled, 
 and but a hundred of their crews killed and wounded 
 But the Tecumseh, which led the Monitors, was struck 
 in sight of all by a torpedo, and went down with her 
 crew. Her fate did not prevent her comrades from 
 gallantly carrying out the allotted task ; and when the 
 Tennessee sailed from a side channel higher up to as- 
 
THE A r A 7Y OF THE UNION. 
 
 sail the wooden squadron, the Monitors strove to take 
 share in the general assault Farragut directed to be 
 made on her. He had prepared for this bold move 
 ment of Buchanan s by providing false bows of iron to 
 the frigates to charge the ram more effectually as soon 
 as she drew near ; and having already cast loose from 
 their respective consorts, they steamed unhesitatingly 
 to meet her. Then began a contest of a completely 
 new order in naval tactics, and in which the ram never 
 as it proved, had a chance of success. Some of her 
 enemies crowded around her sufficiently to impede her 
 motion, while the larger steamers strove to run her 
 down in turn. Steering badly, slow in movement, and 
 close pressed on each side, the Tennessee received in 
 succession the charges of three of her assailants with 
 out perceptible damage, " the only effect being to give 
 her a heavy list," and continued to ply her guns for 
 near an hour. The flagship Hartford, after charging 
 under the personal direction of the Admiral (who stood 
 lashed in his main-top), poured a broadside of 9-inch 
 shot at her casemates at a distance of barely ten feet. 
 Two of the Monitors fired their 1 5-inch guns steadily 
 at her whenever an opening was made ; and though 
 one only of their shots damaged the plating of the 
 casemate, another destroyed her steering chains, and 
 her chimney was carried away. The decisive injuries, 
 however, were inflicted by successive damages to the 
 shutters of her gun-ports ; and three of these being 
 jammed or made useless by the concentrated fire of the 
 frigates, her reply slackened, and presently a shell en 
 tering through one wounded Buchanan dangerously, 
 and caused her immediate surrender. The fall of the 
 forts soon followed, and Mobile, though still itself pro- 
 
 12 
 
178 
 
 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 tected by a shallow bar above, became harmless against 
 the Union : while the victor, whose heroic conduct had 
 won him the personal adoration of his fleet, stood con 
 fessed the first seaman of the age. This last achieve 
 ment won from the grateful Congress the rank of Vice- 
 Admiral, created for Farragut under a special act ; a 
 just reward, which placed him on an equal footing 
 with Grant, now raised to be Lieutenant-General of the 
 Union army. 
 
 Small as has been the success of the Confederates 
 with their rams, the last brilliant feat of their arms in 
 the war, the capture by Hoke in the spring of 1864 of 
 the forts so long held by the Union forces on Albe- 
 marle Sound, was due in great part to the aid of a 
 small vessel of this description, which attacked and 
 drove off the covering gun-boats, sinking the boldest of 
 them with a blow of her prow. This first feat of the 
 Albemarle proved, however, to be her last. In the fol 
 lowing October she perished by what may beyond 
 question be called the most daring action of the war, 
 the attack on her at night by a steam-launch carrying 
 a torpedo at the bow. Of the gallant volunteers who 
 undertook this work, two only were saved death or 
 capture, the boat being sunk by the effect of their own 
 engine : but one of these was the young commander, 
 Lieutenant Cushing, already four times thanked for 
 conduct before the enemy, whose new exploit might 
 fairly rank with the boldest deeds of Nelson or Dun- 
 donald in their youth. His escape forms an episode 
 of the war, so romantic in itself and so well told by the 
 hero, that we prefer transcribing from his simple narra- 
 rative : 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. 
 
 179 
 
 "A dense mass of water rushed in from the torpedo, 
 filling the launch and completely disabling her. The enemy 
 then continued his fire at fifteen feet range, and demanded 
 our surrender, which I twice refused, ordering the men to 
 save themselves, and removing my own coat and shoes. 
 Springing into the river, I swam, with others, into the middle 
 of the stream, the rebels failing to hit us. The most of our 
 party were captured, some drowned, and only one escaped 
 besides myself, and he in a different direction. Acting Mas 
 ter s Mate Woodman, of the Commodore Hull, I met in the 
 water half a mile below the town, and assisted him as best I 
 could, but failed to get him ashore. 
 
 " Completely exhausted, I managed to reach the shore, 
 but was too weak to crawl out of the water until just at day 
 light, when I managed to creep into the swamp, close to the 
 fort. While hiding a few feet from the path, two of the Al- 
 bemarle s officers passed, and I judged from their conversa 
 tion that the ship was destroyed. Some hours travelling in 
 the swamp served to bring me out well below the town, when 
 I sent a negro in to gain information and found that the ram 
 was truly sunk. Proceeding through another swamp, I came 
 to a creek and captured a skiff belonging to a picket of the 
 enemy, and with this, by eleven o clock the next night, had 
 made my way out and on board the Valley City." 
 
 No wonder that this feat procured Cushing not 
 merely his step to commander in the volunteer service, 
 but the special thanks of Mr. Welles under his own 
 hand, with the offer from that statesman of a transfer 
 to the regular navy upon the completion of the requi 
 site course of study. 
 
 The naval operations of the war, which began by 
 Lieutenant Porter s relief of Pensacola with the single 
 frigate available for Union service, in defiance of Bragg s 
 
!8o ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 guns, were fitly closed by Admiral Porter s capture of 
 the defences of Wilmington, the last port of the Con 
 federacy, with a fleet of overwhelming strength, before 
 the very eyes of the same general. As nothing was 
 here proved of the iron-clads save their general fitness 
 to share in a steady bombardment of forts or inferior 
 armament, and as we know from undoubted authority 
 that the success of the Federals was assured as much 
 by the fatal indecision of the commander opposed to 
 them (who, though supplied with full means, made no 
 effort to relieve his exhausted garrisons) as by the vast 
 superiority of the fire of the fleet, we do not think it 
 needful to comment on the details. 
 
 Long before this affair the efforts of the South by 
 sea had been reduced to what appeared to all the 
 world rather a mere form of revenge than any useful 
 warfare. Failing utterly in the purpose of embroiling 
 the North with any neutral nation, these doings left a 
 seed of bitterness, such as needed much patience to 
 stay from growing into evil fruit in the future. From 
 the fall of Wilmington the advantages of blockade-run 
 ners and the mushroom growth of their trade became 
 things of the past. For the rest of the war the Con 
 federate flag only covered what was, after all (if we ex 
 cept the cruise of the iron-clad Stonewall), an ignoble 
 piracy, legalized in default of provision made against it 
 by jurists. The ex-Cabinet of Richmond, which sanc 
 tioned this system to the end of their rule, left as a 
 legacy one of the most difficult problems on interna 
 tional duties ever offered for statesmen to solve. But 
 we are more concerned here to point out the urgent 
 necessity which will arise, in case of England s enga 
 ging in a war, for our commerce being more efficiently 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. igl 
 
 guarded at sea than by iron-clads of 5,000 tons, or first- 
 rate wooden frigates. A class of swift corvettes, carry 
 ing two or three heavy guns, with engines so powerful 
 as to enable them to overhaul any ordinary merchant 
 steamers, will be absolutely indispensable, if our trade 
 is to escape ruin in any future naval war while privateer 
 ing is employed against it. At such a class, Mr. Welles 
 and Captain Fox aimed when they ordered the Kear- 
 sage and her consorts ; but in this particular service 
 alone did their efforts wholly disappoint expectation. 
 The Alabama, Sumter, and Florida (managed certainly 
 with extraordinary skill under very difficult conditions) 
 roamed unchecked over the ocean. At the close of 
 1864 the capture of 193 vessels, valued with their car 
 goes at 13-! millions of dollars, bore testimony to their 
 activity, and to the danger to which, under the new 
 conditions of naval warfare, an unprotected commer 
 cial marine is exposed. That these losses were not 
 from expenditure being too narrow, but from the pecu 
 liar direction which it had taken under Mr. Welles, is 
 abundantly shown by his report of that date. The 
 navy which four years before had counted but 76 ships, 
 in and out of commission, and of these about one-half 
 sailing vessels, \vas now increased to a total of 671. Of 
 this number no less than 71 were iron-clads of different 
 classes, 37 of them of formidable strength and carrying 
 heavy Dahlgren guns ; and only 1 12 of the whole were 
 without steam power, these being in fact used for trans 
 port purposes. 
 
 Whether the fleet thus enumerated was, as Ameri 
 cans openly declared, infinitely beyond any that Eu 
 rope could at that time show in fighting power, is a 
 question we do not here attempt to decide. Our 
 
I 82 ADMIRALS FARRAGUT AND PORTER AND 
 
 space does not allow us to do more than indicate some 
 of the more important questions connected with the 
 discussion, and raised by even a cursory view of the 
 performances of the Union navy during the war. 
 
 The first of these that naturally occurs is the sub 
 ject of the exact value and use of monitors. It is clear 
 from Mr. Welles s original report upon these vessels 
 that it was not in England or France alone that official 
 men mistrusted their ever being fitted for sea service. 
 That they were at first much disliked by American 
 naval officers, and were in fact easily disabled in action, 
 the records of Dupont s unsuccessful attack on Charles 
 ton abundantly prove. On the other hand, it is certain 
 that Mr. Welles and his adviser after this failure still 
 approved of the construction of Monitors (the Puritan, 
 Dictator, and Roanoke) built specially for sea service ; 
 that the navigation of another large one around to the 
 Pacific has been found by no means so dangerous as 
 was anticipated ; that the crews of these vessels have 
 not found them unhealthy; and that the experience 
 gained before Charleston has been wonderfully utilized 
 for the improvement of the mechanism of the turret 
 and ports, so that (as is alleged) the shots which then 
 produced so much disabling effect might now be easily 
 endured. The value of these assertions no one was 
 more desirous to see practically tested than Captain 
 Fox himself. Under the special sanction of Congress, 
 he undertook after the war to bring across the At 
 lantic a large double-turreted vessel, the Miantonomah, 
 for the conviction of the sceptical ship-designers of 
 Europe ; but her being afterwards handed over to 
 Russia for use in the Baltic, as though the return 
 passage were too dangerous to attempt, naturally 
 
THE NAVY OF THE UNION. ^3 
 
 weakened the then rising belief in the efficacy of the 
 Ericsson system. 
 
 Closely connected with this subject is that of the 
 American system of heavy smooth-bore guns ; for such 
 as those which won the fight with the Atlantic, and 
 far more, the new 2O-inch, are evidently too weighty 
 for any broadside vessel now in use. We know the 
 objection which lies to their moderate charges and the 
 consequent low velocity of their projectiles. On the 
 other hand, it is clear that this may yet be overcome 
 by even a slight improvement on the present Rodman 
 method of casting on a cooled bore, or by the use of 
 wrought iron ; while even as they exist, their 45O-pound 
 and 99Opound balls, fired with only -g-th or -g-th charges, 
 are missiles so powerful as none but the highest class 
 of iron-clads could endure. But this subject with the 
 comparison of the American model in power and in 
 their boasted endurance with the huge rifled guns pre 
 ferred in Europe, would carry us beyond our subject, 
 and we therefore pass it by. For the same reason we 
 do not enter on that part of the torpedo system of 
 defence and assault, to the practical solution of which 
 the American examples served, although dimly and 
 incompletely, to point the way. 
 
 There is one deduction which might be made from 
 a hasty survey of the naval annals of the war, against 
 which we desire to give an earnest warning. Some 
 will say as some have already said that the chief 
 thing shown is the possibility of creating, from private 
 resources during actual war, all that a great contest at 
 sea may require, without that elaborate preparation 
 and vast expenditure to which in this country we 
 dedicate millions yearly in time of peace. The exam- 
 
1 84 ADMIRALS FARRA GUT AND FOR TER, E TC. 
 
 pie of the Great Republic and the precepts of the 
 successful statesmen who carried her safely to a 
 triumphant reunion prove, when studied conscientious 
 ly, the very contrary. It cost them years of toil and 
 uncertainty and oceans of expenditure before the 
 naval predominance to which the North had full right 
 was completely asserted. No minister has ever more 
 loudly deprecated the relying too much on private 
 shipyards than Mr. Welles, to whose earnest and 
 repeated recommendation it is due that the Congress 
 was soon after the war engaged on the question of 
 determining the site of a grand depot for the future 
 construction of American iron-clads. We in England, 
 if entering into a struggle for that supremacy of the 
 seas which involves the very life of our independent 
 existence, no less than the protection of a vast and 
 wide-spread commerce, must look to meeting not a raw 
 seceding province, but Powers who may be swift to 
 attack, and allow us brief space to prepare. A suffi 
 cient fleet must in such event be ready, not waiting the 
 chances of a hurried creation. Be then the shock 
 what it may, we doubt not it would be met by hearts 
 as brave, by heads as cool, and arms as skilful, as those 
 of the seamen whose exploits we have here briefly 
 traced. The jealousies of a day, we trust, will die, 
 while common blood and language will create new 
 ties: and Englishmen who desire this will not be slo\v 
 to recognize as worthy successors of our own great 
 naval chieftains those names which now fill with pride 
 the hearts of our kinsfolk on the other side of the 
 Atlantic. 
 
A NORTHERN RAIDER IN THE CIVIL WAR. 
 
 [It needs some apology for introducing here this excerpt from a for 
 mer work ; and its being a detached episode, however striking, in the 
 course of the American Civil War would not of itself be a justification. 
 But the writer has observed that although the struggle has now passed 
 into history, the tendency of our countrymen still often is to exalt iso 
 lated feats of arms done by the defeated party, while ignoring what may 
 be called the romantic side of the war on the side of the North, where 
 the same daring spirit in truth existed. Against that tendency the story 
 of Dahlgren was long since written as a protest, and for the same rea 
 son it reappears here.] 
 
 THE fourth year of the Civil War opened with an 
 attempt by General Butler to surprise the capital 
 of the Confederacy, which was reported to be nearly 
 destitute of a garrison. But after a slight skirmish 
 along the banks of that river on February seventh, 
 Butler, finding his advance fully discovered and opposed, 
 retired without further pursuing his project, which had 
 been neither prepared with skill nor executed with 
 vigor. The alarm within the oft-threatened city had 
 been but slight, though there were indeed but few 
 regular troops in its vicinity ; nor did any one at this 
 time consider it possible that the Southern capital 
 should be seriously endangered by any expedition of 
 the character of a raid. Yet a month had hardly gone 
 by when its inhabitants were startled by an approach 
 to their walls so daring in design, and by them believed 
 so fell in purpose, that even in its failure it did more 
 
A NORTHERN RAIDER 
 
 to rouse fierce passions and embitter strife than any 
 incident the war had yet witnessed. 
 
 Colonel Dahlgren, the real author of the new pro 
 ject, was a man of character in itself so remarkable, and 
 so typical of the deeper passions which stirred the 
 North to its tremendous efforts for the reconquest of 
 the Union, that he well deserves the study of the his 
 torian. Born of a good family, and wedded by pre 
 scription to the service of his country, in whose navy 
 his father had long been distinguished ; he was far 
 from being of those who could view with indifference 
 the lessening of her external power by the proposed 
 separation of the Southern States. By many a thou 
 sand of her youth (and among them all there was none 
 of purpose more earnest, or soul more romantic, than 
 Ulric Dahlgren) the vision had been cherished of a 
 mighty democratic power growing up to so fill the 
 western hemisphere with its greatness as to overshadow 
 the \vhole earth, and shed freedom over its nations. 
 Such a feeling of belief in a country s destiny may be 
 called lust of empire abroad, but it stands for patriot 
 ism at home ; and those who boast of England s great 
 ness and " her dominion that the sun never sets on" 
 would do well to examine themselves before they con 
 demn the Young American. To one born and 
 brought up in these convictions of the just future of 
 the Union, its voluntary disruption by the South 
 seemed such a crime as sacrilege could not outdo, and 
 the perpetrators of the act the basest traitors that sword 
 was ever lifted to punish. The very force of the re 
 ligion which a pious mother had, through his earlier 
 years, instilled into his heart, made him long, like the 
 Puritans of our own revolution, to smite down those 
 
IN THE CIVIL WAR. 
 
 I8 7 
 
 who opposed the political faith which to him seemed 
 destined to spread justice and freedom and truth 
 throughout the world. Burning with such thoughts as 
 these, and having just attained to manhood at the out 
 break of the civil war, he threw himself with all the ar 
 dor of youth and passion into the struggle against 
 secession. Those writers who, content to judge from 
 a superficial view, or led by they own sentiments wholly, 
 have sought to trace the first cause of the uprising of 
 North against South in a national hatred and loathing 
 of slavery, have missed the real motive power which 
 first called twenty millions of free people under arms, 
 and gave to Abolition that growing strength which 
 stern fanaticism wins when it allies its cause with revo 
 lution. This power it was, this yearning for their 
 country s greatness, and no special love for the negro 
 race, which moved Dahlgren and a thousand others 
 less known than he to offer their lives freely for the 
 unity of their country. 
 
 Of daring courage and noted horsemanship, he had 
 soon become sensible of the deficiencies of the Union 
 cavalry, and attempted, as early as the days of M Clellan, 
 to lead them to a better fame. The breaking up of 
 Hooker s personal staff, of which he had formed one, 
 on the suppression of that general in 1863, gave him 
 his opportunity; and he applied for the command of a 
 detachment of horse, with which he volunteered to 
 harass the rear of the Confederates. Twenty dragoons 
 only were granted him at first ; but his almost imme 
 diate capture of an orderly, bringing dispatches to Lee 
 from Richmond, brought him into notice, and after the 
 battle of Gettysburg he moved, with 100 of the sixth 
 New York Cavalry placed under his orders, to attack 
 
1 8 8 A NOR THERN RA IDER 
 
 the retreating trains and their escorts. In this service, 
 and the series of skirmishes near Hagerstown, he effect 
 ed as much real havoc as Kilpatrick or Gregg with their 
 whole divisions of horse ; but on July sixth he was 
 badly wounded in the leg, in covering some of his 
 captures from a superior force. Amputation proved 
 necessary, and his career for some time was closed by 
 the illness that followed ; but his name as a dashing 
 leader (added possibly to the great services of his 
 father to the Union) caused the President to console 
 him with a flattering letter from the War Secretary, en 
 closing his brevet of colonel, bestowed without passing 
 through the usual grades. Recovering by slow degrees, 
 and musing much, no doubt, upon the high career 
 which seemed open to him who now held rank such 
 as Napoleon had not reached at the age of twenty-one 
 he returned to the Army of the Potomac in its winter 
 quarters, when hard weather and enforced idleness 
 made the sufferings of the Northern prisoners at Rich 
 mond seem doubly near to all. There were known 
 to be about 10,000 Federal soldiers there confined in 
 the Belle Isle prison on the James, while the garrison 
 of the city was but weak. The prisoners crowded in 
 this island complained much of their treatment ; and 
 although receiving the same rations as were issued to 
 the Confederate soldiers, these were so scanty that 
 those who could not eke them out by private means 
 fared but ill compared to their well-supplied comrades 
 in the field. It is not surprising that many plans were 
 canvassed for their release by surprise ; and that to 
 Dahlgren, whose feelings led him to believe the worst 
 of the Confederate Government, the enterprise how 
 ever carried out, seemed the holiest of duties, as well 
 
IN THE CIVIL WAR. 
 
 as a swift road to further honors. Forthwith an expe 
 dition was arranged, under the nominal conduct of 
 General Kilpatrick, who felt the urgent need, after the 
 autumn failures, of doing something to retrieve the 
 reputation which was slipping from him. The more 
 dangerous part of the design and no forlorn hope was 
 ever mustered for more perilous work was undertaken 
 by Dahlgren. This consisted in a proposed attempt to 
 cross with a detached force to the south side of the 
 James, and move on Richmond by that bank, where 
 an enemy would naturally be but little expected, and 
 near which the prison lay. Kilpatrick, with the main 
 column, was to make a simultaneous demonstration 
 against the works to the north of the city ; and it was 
 hoped that, under cover of this, Dahlgren s men might 
 break their way into the prisons and release the cap 
 tives. Once free, it was even supposed that the num 
 ber of these, and their desperation, might enable them 
 to master the surprised capital, and perhaps hold it 
 until Butler s forces, which were to advance at the same 
 time up the peninsula, should come to their aid. It is 
 significant of the determined character of the man, 
 that the chief who was thus to guide his dragoons into 
 the heart of a hostile city was still suffering from the 
 debility of fever, and unable to move on foot without 
 crutches. 
 
 On the night of February twenty-eighth, after a 
 part of the Army of the Potomac had made a feint on 
 Lee s flank, the expedition left Meade s lines for Ely s 
 Ford, far beyond the Confederate left. It was composed 
 originally of 3,800 cavalry, with three light guns, the 
 whole being formed of selected detachments of well- 
 mounted men of various regiments. Crossing the Rap- 
 
190 
 
 A NORTHERN RAIDER 
 
 idan unopposed, they pushed on through the wooded 
 district south of Chancellorsville, called the Wilderness 
 (soon to be the scene of a series of deadly struggles 
 enduring half the length of a European campaign), to 
 Spottsylvania Court-house, where Dahlgren, with 500 
 volunteers, left the main column on the twenty-ninth for 
 his separate march, which lay southward direct to the 
 James, which he hoped to gain in the vicinity of the 
 threatened city, and yet far enough from the works to 
 prevent his arrival being discovered. 
 
 Kilpatrick, continuing his south-eastward course, 
 struck the railroad to Richmond not far from the well- 
 known junction at Orange ; and pausing only to do as 
 much damage to the line as was consistent with a 
 somewhat rapid march, rested for the night some miles 
 farther on, near the southern branch of the Pamunkey. 
 A detachment of 400 men was sent eastward before 
 daylight, with intent to destroy the railroad bridge 
 over the stream, but retreated on finding it protected 
 by a party of infantry ; and the whole force was soon 
 on its way towards Richmond, now but twenty miles 
 distant, in the hope of finding its way into an unde 
 fended capital. Early in the afternoon an outer line 
 of redoubts was reached and passed through without 
 resistance ; but the advance had been made known by 
 the telegraph some hours before, and a heavy fire from 
 works within upon the cavalry of General Davies, 
 which supported the advanced guard, soon proved that 
 the movement was discovered and prepared for. Da- 
 vies at once dismounted his men and deployed them 
 as skirmishers, after the fashion adopted by the North 
 ern cavalry, and in days long past by the extinct dra 
 goon of the European armies. But Kilpatrick, seeing 
 
IN THE CIVIL WAR. igi 
 
 the redoubts before him to be strong and apparently 
 well manned (though there were in truth but a few 
 hundred troops, with some city militia within them), 
 and hearing nothing of Dahlgren s expected attack on 
 the other side, grew alarmed at his own position, and 
 drew his men off before dark, moving westward across 
 the Chickahominy to Mechanicsville. Here he en 
 camped for the night ; but General Wade Hampton, 
 who arrived that evening at Richmond after a rapid 
 march with 400 Southern horse, learning the enemy s 
 position, resolved to attempt a surprise, which was so 
 far successful that he captured a hundred of their num 
 ber, and broke up the encampment, forcing them to re 
 treat down the river. In the morning however Kilpat- 
 rick discovered how small was the number of the pur 
 suers, and his rear-guard under Davies drove them off 
 with ease. Passing thence, he was met at the close 
 of the day by the force from the peninsula under But 
 ler, which had been intended to co-operate with him ; 
 and which, by some unexplained misconception, had 
 moved just a day too late to be of any effectual assist 
 ance. Two days later the united column was joined 
 by the greater part of Dahlgren s command, coming 
 southward after circling round Richmond ; but their 
 enterprise had yet more completely miscarried, and 
 their leader had paid for his share in it with his life. 
 
 He had parted from Kilpatrick, as before stated, 
 at Spottsylvania, and had reached Frederickshall, his 
 next point, early in the day. Having here destroyed 
 the railroad station with some stores, but missed a 
 park of artillery which he had hoped to capture, he 
 proceeded onward to the James. A negro fugitive of 
 the district had undertaken to conduct the party to 
 
!Q2 A NORTHERN RAIDER 
 
 the desired ford not far from Richmond : but through 
 treachery or ignorance he missed his way, and at mid 
 night the Federals, after much wandering, found them 
 selves a day s march higher up the stream than the 
 point they sought. The wretched guide was sacrificed 
 on the spot to their fury, and the course of the river 
 followed down towards the city ; but the latter was 
 now only attained on its guarded side ; and that at 
 dark, twenty-four hours after Kilpatrick had retreated. 
 Driven off in a vain attempt to surprise the nearest 
 work, Dahlgren marched northward through the dark 
 ness, seeking for the present only to save his column, 
 which he strove to guide in person ; but at dawn he 
 found himself with but a hundred dragoons following 
 him, the rest having wandered from him on the way at 
 some turning of the by-roads he pursued. That day 
 he crossed the Pamunkey and Mattapony rivers in 
 succession, inclining eastward in hopes to find some 
 road open towards York River. But the country was 
 now beset by armed parties of excited citizens and 
 militia in chase of the invaders; and in attempting to 
 continue his march in the dark, he fell into an ambush 
 at midnight, and was shot down with some of his men, 
 the rest surrendering. That his body was stripped 
 and plundered, and a ring cut from his hand, was but 
 natural under the circumstances, and no uncommon 
 fate in war : but the order found upon his person, di 
 recting his men "to exhort the released prisoners to 
 destroy and burn the hateful city, and not allow the 
 rebel leader Davis and his traitorous crew to escape," 
 was made the pretext for such an act of savage retali 
 ation as the war had not yet witnessed ; the exposing 
 his corps to the common gaze as that of a murderer 
 
IN THE CIVIL WAR. 
 
 193 
 
 slain in the midst of his felon deed. His family denied 
 the authenticity of this document : but their charge 
 of forgery against the Richmond Government was 
 scarcely supported by evidence or probability, though 
 the local journals gave color to it, by their folly in 
 printing as if true whatever exaggeration added to the 
 original words in the excitement of the hour. How 
 ever the exact truth may be, certain it is that the 
 attempt on her capital envenomed to the utmost the 
 feelings of the South : as the insult to the remains of 
 the gallant dead, and the virulent assault on his mem 
 ory made subsequently in an official report of the 
 Confederate Secretary for War, served to enhance the 
 bitterness of the Unionists against the Seceded States. 
 Is it to be wondered at that a new generation is need 
 ed to reunite in heart the two sections, the hopes of 
 whose bravest youth led to such fierce purpose and 
 such bloody end as Ulric Dahlgren s ? What freedom, 
 what greatness, can close the wounds made among 
 the homes of the recovered Union by a thousand lives 
 and deaths like his ? 
 
DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF THE 
 GRAND ARMY.* 
 
 No subjects have created wider differences between 
 critics than the military genius and system of Napoleon. 
 To some few of those who have considered them, the 
 admiration usually lavished upon them appears fulsome 
 and indiscriminate. This section regards the French 
 Emperor as nothing more than a bold and unscrupu 
 lous adventurer, seizing the reins of power by political 
 intrigue, and then using his authority to collect and 
 throw into the field unheard-of masses of men, to 
 whose numbers and courage, opposed to feebler 
 adversaries, his long train of imperial conquest was 
 due. Such men balance Acre against Toulon, Aspern 
 against Austerlitz, Leipsic and Waterloo against 
 Friedland and Wagram ; and confident in the fact that 
 they find weaknesses and flaws in the object pressed 
 on them as perfect, refuse to recognize any strength or 
 brilliancy in it. A far larger class there is (we speak 
 with all respect of one that has Thiers for its represen 
 tative and Napier in its ranks) who err almost equally 
 in the opposite direction. To these Napoleon, regarded 
 simply as a general, appears faultless. His administra 
 tive arrangements only failed by Jack of care in others ; 
 
 * Souvenirs Militaires de 1804 d 1814. Par M. le Due de Fezensac 
 General de Division. 
 
 
RECOLLECTIONS OF THE GRAND ARMY. 195 
 
 his strategy never erred ; his tactics were to the last 
 superior to those of his foes. Climate, diplomacy, the 
 deficiencies of his lieutenants, the envy of his allies, 
 even his own want of political judgment and modera 
 tion, may have caused his disasters; but they are never 
 to be attributed to want of foresight in his arrange 
 ments for the field, or mistaken views of the military 
 events around him. Let any evidence be rejected, 
 and any supposition entertained, rather than believe 
 that he was ever wanting to his army, or his army to 
 its chief. 
 
 A third school of critics has of late arisen, who 
 pursue a simpler and more truthful method, the only 
 one worthy a sound writer of military history. This 
 is to lay aside, as far as may be, all prepossession for 
 or against the man, and look only at what the general 
 did. Take nothing for granted in what, after all, are 
 mere matters of evidence and fact. Accept no one 
 sided statement from any national historian who rejects 
 what is distasteful in his authorities, and uses only 
 what suits his own theory. Believe not that any man 
 ever lived who, in so dark and uncertain a science as 
 war, had the gift of infallibility. Gather carefully 
 from actual witnesses, high and low, such original 
 material as they offer for the construction of the narra 
 tive. This once being safely formed, judge critically 
 and calmly what was the conduct of the chief actor; 
 how far his insight, calmness, personal control over 
 others, and right use of his means were concerned in 
 the result. This plan is that which Clausewitz has 
 pursued with the campaign of 1812, Cathcart with 
 that of 1813, and Charras, with singular success, in 
 throwing light on the great struggle of Waterloo. 
 
196 
 
 DE FEZEN SAC S RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 The work of the latter has left but little that is new to 
 be added as regards his special subject, and his 
 untimely death alone prevented his repeating this 
 literary triumph by carrying his researches further 
 back. The fragment published posthumously of his 
 intended " Guerre de 1813" shows the same industry 
 and clearness which distinguished his former writings,! 
 Had he lived, we may believe he would have laid bare 
 the inner details of the gigantic struggle in Germany 
 with the same thoroughness which had placed him 
 already at the head of all French writers who have 
 treated of Napoleon s latest campaign. 
 
 For this high class of military history, which aims 
 at truth, and seeks first to know what was done, before 
 delivering judgment on the action, all genuine narra 
 tives of eyewitnesses have a peculiar value. Many 
 such have already served to illustrate the history of 
 Napoleon s wars ; but there has hitherto been wanting 
 an account by some writer who had held every rank in 
 the Grand Army from the private to the general, had 
 intelligence enough to reason from its details up to its 
 general action, and who could admire the genius of 
 Napoleon, without in any way being identified with 
 the system which he founded. The memoirs of no 
 marshal, chamberlain, or grand equerry meet these con 
 ditions. They could be found only in a man who had 
 rank independent of Imperialism, education outside the 
 Lycee, and patriotism superior to party. 
 
 Such a man was the Duke de Fezensac, whose 
 death, at a most venerable age, the third Napoleon 
 noticed in a public letter addressed to his family. His 
 " Military Recollections," will for ever occupy one of 
 the highest places among the literature that illustrates 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 
 
 I 9 7 
 
 the Napoleonic era. That portion which bears upon 
 the campaign in Russia was published long ago, and 
 seems to have won its way but slowly to the notice it 
 merited ; for an interval of more than ten years elapsed 
 before the author was emboldened to offer to the world 
 the complete work. There needed not the apology of 
 his modest preface to make this acceptable. The per 
 sonal details which abound in it do, as he truly says, 
 paint the very manners and spirit of the times. Let 
 us add that they paint the true features of the system 
 of war which the author observed from its midst with a 
 force and accuracy, which gives this unpretending vol 
 ume a genuine historical value far above that of the 
 brilliant pages of " The Consulate and Empire," which 
 M. de Fezensac, like many other loyal Frenchmen, rates 
 higher than their worth. To tell plainly and without 
 exaggeration or concealment the truth with regard to 
 Napoleon s method of war; to show how great it was 
 on some fit occasions, how full of shortcomings it 
 proved when overstrained ; to trace the effect of its 
 deficiencies in the vain efforts of the great conqueror 
 to stem the European tide when it once turned full 
 against him ; to do all this with the spirit of a keen- 
 eyed observer, yet of an honest soldier of France : this 
 is no trifling task to have accomplished. Moreover, M. 
 de Fezensac has taken pains to throw his personal 
 memoirs into an historical form by adding here and 
 there outlines of the general course of events connected 
 with the war ; yet has carefully distinguished between 
 what he saw and what he only gives from report. 
 Where he differs broadly from the usual authorities as 
 to the actual working of Napoleon s army, he does so 
 in the most modest way, and gives good reason for his 
 
198 
 
 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 own sounder opinion. In short, the reader who visits 
 under his guidance the camp of Boulogne, follows him 
 thence through the brilliant strategy of 1805, !8o6 and 
 
 1807, in Germany and Poland, passes on with him t 
 Napoleon s own brief personal command in Spain in 
 
 1808, and later, makes the disastrous campaigns of 181 
 and 1813 in his company, will know more of what th 
 warriors of the Grand Army really were and did, a 
 these successive periods, than could be learnt by a life 
 long study of popular French works on the subject 
 M. de Fezensac does not indeed pretend to tell us wha 
 went on in the German and Russian camps during 
 epochs so glorious and so fatal to the pride of France 
 In this he shows no special ignorance, but much supe 
 rior honesty to French historians of the vulgar clas 
 who take no trouble to search any records but thos 
 of their own nation, as well as to those who, like M. 
 Thiers, never use any records, save when they seem to 
 corroborate their own prepossessions. The campaigns 
 above mentioned do not include all the service which 
 the author saw, but special circumstances prevented his 
 keeping personal notes of the gigantic struggle between 
 Napoleon and the Archduke Charles in 1809; and 
 although he witnessed the great events of Eckmiihl, 
 Aspern, and Wagram, he modestly mentions his omis 
 sion to record them, and dismisses them in a page. 
 Through the other portions of his narrative we now 
 purpose to follow him, not with the intent to rewrite 
 the story of well-known marches and battles, but to 
 show how much the popular histories which delight 
 the worshippers of Napoleon lack a reality to be found 
 in the observations of one single-hearted individual of 
 his million soldiers. 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 
 
 I 99 
 
 The book opens with the camp at Boulogne, where 
 the author, then a youth of twenty, went to join his 
 regiment. He was already too old for a military col 
 lege ; for his parents had long withheld their consent 
 to his entering the army of one whom they, as mem 
 bers of the old French aristocracy, regarded as a low 
 born usurper. " Like all the young fellows," he first 
 thought of the cavalry ; but a friend of the family 
 who commanded the 59th regiment of the line, per 
 suaded him to enter under his tutelage into that arm 
 a step, he assures us, never afterwards repented of. 
 In the capacity of a private soldier therefore, he first 
 became acquainted with the vast machine by which 
 Napoleon s busy brain was preparing to intimidate 
 England in the first place, and, when this failed, to 
 strike Germany prostrate. " If I consulted only my 
 attachment to you and to your family," said his friend 
 Colonel Lacuee, " I would make you my secretary and 
 keep you personally about me. But for the sake of 
 your own career, you must learn to know those whom 
 you will one day command ; and the way to do that 
 is to live among them." "By doing this" he added, 
 "you will learn to know their virtues ; otherwise you will 
 only know tlieir vices." The author italicises these 
 words, as implying that he considers them the key to 
 the whole relation between officers and men. Such 
 was, at any rate, the creed of the republican soldiers 
 who furnished Napoleon with his materials, of whom 
 Colonel Lacuee was a fair specimen. A favorite at one 
 time with the First Consul, he had shown, in common 
 with a vast number of the higher officers, a sympathy 
 with Moreau which the new ruler of France could not 
 brook. One must look deeply into the history of the 
 
2OQ DE FEZENSAC S RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 time to understand how widely this feeling of sympa 
 thy extended through the ranks of the army, and how 
 bitterly Napoleon resented all manifestations of military 
 respect and of personal regard towards the great gen 
 eral who more than rivalled him (according to the can 
 did statement of his own favorite, Dumas) in its affec 
 tions. 
 
 Lecourbe in exile, Dessoles pining in neglect, 
 Richepanse sacrificed in an obscure expedition in the 
 tropics, testified to the animosity with which he pur 
 sued the more distinguished members of Moreau s staff. 
 Lesser men felt it only in a less degree ; and Colonel 
 Lacuee, being among those who had shown an interest 
 in the fallen general, was dismissed from snug employ 
 ment on the staff, and ordered to take the command of 
 a regiment which Napoleon told him as he left, was 
 one of the worst in the army, and which from its ill ap 
 pearance had gained the soubriquet of the Royal Tat 
 ters (Royal Decousii}. The 59th had had for their last 
 colonel an officer who did not scruple to embezzle 
 from the regimental chest ; a fact the author mentions 
 as though it were no extraordinary occurrence in that 
 ci-devant republican army, of whose severe purity so 
 much has been written. Lacuee was at least a gentle 
 man, though ignorant, it seems of the duties assigned 
 to him as the head of a regiment. He had contented 
 himself with acquiring the power of manoeuvring his 
 battalions and enforcing discipline, leaving in the hands 
 of the quartermaster the more vulgar care of improv 
 ing the ill condition of the clothing which had made 
 the regiment so notorious. This good colonel, with 
 his aristocratic habits and republican theories, was 
 of a disposition much superior to the troops he com- 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 2OI 
 
 manded, and his rough subordinates hardly understood 
 though they learnt to like him. M. de Fezensac has 
 traced the lineaments of his character with a loving 
 hand and leaves them as clearly drawn in these open 
 ing pages as though he sought to tempt some future 
 novelist with a ready-made hero. 
 
 Handed over by Lacuee after a few days holiday 
 to the captain of his company, the young aspirant 
 began his new life by laughing at the eccentricity of his 
 uniform, a compromise between the stiff republican 
 garb of the expiring age and the imperial extravagance 
 of the future. From a full description of this dress, 
 with its three-cornered hat, black gaiters, and long 
 powdered hair, we pass to an admirable account of the 
 life of the camp at Boulogne, as seen in the winter of 
 1804-5. Here he at once digresses, to show us how 
 different practice is from theory, even in the most elab 
 orately formed army. We hear of various regula 
 tions which, as in certain other services, exist only to be 
 broken. Of these infractions the most striking in an 
 army constituted as the French up to that time had 
 been, relates to the sergeants, those important links 
 between the officers and their men. The rule was that 
 they should live among the latter; the practice was 
 that they had a separate hut to themselves in each 
 company. " This arrangement," says the author, " had 
 its good and its bad side. The sergeants being sepa 
 rated from the soldiers, could not exercise so active a 
 watch over them. During my apprenticeship as private 
 and corporal, I saw many things escape them. But 
 they were the more respected for being the less often 
 seen, and I believe, to speak decidedly, that this is the 
 more important matter." Theorists who would con- 
 
202 
 
 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 struct an ideal British army, upon the model of some 
 French or Prussian Book of Regulations may here 
 learn how little mere written rules signify when they 
 conflict with the spirit and habits of the service. 
 Those who have judged the separation enforced in our 
 own army between non-commissioned officers and men 
 to be the mere product of aristocratic prejudice may 
 find their lesson and reproof in this disinterested 
 opinion. 
 
 Placed as M. de Fezensac was for the next few 
 weeks in the position of a private soldier, it is interest 
 ing to see how far a young man of fortune seeking 
 promotion through the ranks of Napoleon s army, had 
 to submit to real hardships, and in what his lot differed 
 from that of the ordinary recruit. In some matters, 
 it seems from the details afforded, the French gentle 
 man private was destitute of the special advantages of 
 a Prussian advantageur y or an Austrian regimental 
 cadet. He ate, sat, and slept with the other privates, 
 could occupy no separate lodging, employ no recog 
 nized servant from among his comrades, nor escape 
 being nominally detailed by his sergeant for the most 
 repulsive duties of the camp. On the other hand, 
 when closely looked at, his service as a private was 
 little different from that required of the young German 
 noble, except in the matter of his enforced companion 
 ship with those of a different class of life. His com 
 rades paid him to the full the respect due to one who, 
 in their soldier s phrase, " had a louis a day to eat of 
 his own," and could give a dinner to forty of them at 
 a time. For a few sous any of them would take his 
 turn at sweeping and cooking. The hairdresser of 
 the company connived at his avoiding the growth of 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 
 
 203 
 
 the obnoxious and antiquated cue. The corporal who 
 placed him on the only turn of sentinel duty that was 
 ever allotted him, connived at his quitting his post 
 before the proper time for relief. In fine, if brought 
 further from the level of. his personal rank for a few 
 weeks, he had the advantage over the volunteer pri 
 vate of other armies in the quick promotion which 
 rewarded his endurance. Having only left Paris in 
 the month of September, he gained his first step of cor 
 poral on the eighteenth of October. Of this he frankly 
 tells us he proved hardly worthy, receiving various 
 reprimands for his irregularity in his new duties, to 
 which it was possibly owing that he was allowed to 
 continue in this rank until midwinter, finding his life, 
 still spent among the men, at times intolerably irk 
 some. Ordered to go in January with a guard detach 
 ment on board one of the gun-boats which Nelson kept 
 imprisoned in Etaples harbour, he murmured openly 
 to his friend the colonel, and finding no comfort in the 
 cool reply, "You must learn to be put out," went off 
 in sad humor with his new duty, which was to last a 
 month. Lacuee was, however, merely testing his pa 
 tience by this service, and on the fifth day he was 
 summoned back to camp on promotion to the rank of 
 sergeant, a step which raised him out of immediate 
 contact with the rough privates with whom he had 
 now been for four months herded. None of these, it 
 would seem, showed any jealousy of the elevation of 
 their aristocratic messmate, for birth, wealth, and edu 
 cation had become as sure passports to promotion in 
 the army of the Consulate as in that of the most 
 ancient monarchies. Two months had not passed 
 over the new sergeant s head when he was brought 
 
2O4 
 
 DE FE ZEN SACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 before the colonel, charged with a dereliction of duty ; 
 but his supposed offence being shown to be but an 
 ordinary practice, though irregular enough, the color- 
 sergeant (or company sergeant-major, according to 
 French grade) was broken for not reporting it, and the 
 cause of his disgrace promoted in his stead. At six 
 months service young de Fezensac thus found himself 
 in a position which gave him practical charge of a 
 company, and which was, as it still is, the recognized 
 stepping-stone of the deserving soldier to a commission- 
 The sergeant-major of that day differed little from 
 the subaltern in social condition. The officers had all 
 passed through this rank, and all who then held it were 
 entitled, if qualified, to look for the epaulette of a sub 
 lieutenant in their turn. Many, however, were not thus 
 classed, for a certain degree of education and some 
 small means were in practice necessary for further pro 
 motion. As this last qualification sounds like an anom 
 aly in a service where merit has been commonly sup 
 posed the sole road to advancement, the autobiographer 
 has taken pains to explain his mention of it. It seems 
 that in those days the captain of the company left to 
 his sergeant-major the charge of the accounts, subject 
 only to a quarterly settlement ; and as the pay of the 
 latter was actually insufficient for his wants, it followed 
 that, if he could not eke it out by other means, he 
 usually had recourse to petty dishonesty. Where this 
 was exercised only against the government, it was 
 very lightly regarded. The captains only said they 
 should be glad to know of the little resources which 
 their accountants managed to get hold of. The sol 
 diers were well aware when their pay for days of ab 
 sence or sickness was charged to the public, and had 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 2 O$ 
 
 their professional jest ready; "The sergeant-major s 
 arithmetic put down nought and carry nine : " but 
 this indulgence by no means extended to the plunder 
 of individuals ; and a case of unfair stoppages from a 
 conscript would ruin the author of it, if detected. 
 Always ready, as M. de Fezensac more than once tells 
 us, to suspect every one of cheating them, from their 
 Minister of War down to the sergeant-major, they 
 watched narrowly to see that no advantage was taken 
 by him of themselves ; and moreover they expected 
 for their connivance at his other peculations a forbear 
 ance for their own petty impositions on the hucksters 
 who served the camp, and their forays on the neigh 
 boring forest for firewood. Napoleon, the author tells 
 us, issued in vain the most severe orders against this 
 last abuse. Such was his characteristic way of dealing 
 with the like difficulties, and it answered to some ex 
 tent, but only when the army was directly under his 
 own eye: an explanation which helps us to understand 
 how in after years the bonds of discipline snapped 
 "under the test of service in Russia. His successors 
 have taken the more rational mode of paying the sol 
 dier fairly, and, as M. de Fezansac remarks, have a 
 right to be more strict. 
 
 Very coarse and bare was the soldier s life here 
 depicted, with its mixed good-humor, grumbling, and 
 dishonesty; its wearisome evenings, spent in bed for 
 lack of candle ; its cold dark mornings, enlivened only 
 by the chance of a glass of brandy and a roll. Yet 
 the reader looks naturally to the camp of Boulogne 
 with respect, as the nursery of the Grand Army which 
 carried its eagles from Madrid to Moscow. Surely we 
 may assume that the professional aspect of the gather- 
 
20 6 DE FE ZEN SACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 ing was always kept in sight, and that the military 
 spirit was here developed at least as high as a time of 
 peace can allow. Those writers can hardly be wrong 
 who, in unvarying chorus, ascribe the success which 
 followed, to the vast pains with which Napoleon s staff 
 used the camp to improve the tactics bequeathed by 
 the revolutionary wars. Indeed that the weapon was 
 here actually forged before which no other army could 
 stand, has been asserted in plain terms by French 
 writers of authority, from Marshal Marmont down to 
 Baron Ambert. We ourselves were led formerly to 
 adopt the same language, being misled by authors of 
 such critical pretension as Trochu and the Due 
 d Aumale. But M. de Fezensac s personal experience 
 caused him to take a totally different view of the 
 Boulogne army; and as he dissents in the broadest 
 terms from the class of writers just cited, we quote his 
 evidence entire, that the reader may judge what the 
 general assertions are worth which have long deceived 
 the world : 
 
 "The camp of Boulogne, of which that of Montreuil 
 [held by Ney s corps, in which the author served] formed the 
 left, has left deep memories in our history of that age. The 
 advantage of gathering troops into camps of instruction is 
 known to all military men. To that of Boulogne is attribu 
 ted the honor of the successes which we gained in the follow 
 ing campaigns, and we are supposed to have been always 
 occupied with manoeuvres, military works, and exercises of 
 all kinds. I shall astonish my readers therefore, by telling 
 them how very little, at the camp of Montreuil, our chiefs 
 occupied themselves with instructing us, how ill they profited 
 by this precious time. Marshal Ney commanded two grand 
 field-days in the autumn of 1804, and as many in 1805 ; I 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 2O/ 
 
 was present at them as a private soldier first, and then as 
 officer. There was a general upsetting and excessive fatigue. 
 We started before daybreak after taking our soup, and did 
 not get back till night, having had nothing during the day 
 but a dram of brandy. General Malher, who succeeded 
 Partonneaux in command of the division, hardly brought it 
 together three times, and handled it then very badly. 
 Brigade drill there was none, for the brigadier did not even 
 come to the camp. Each colonel taught his regiment in his 
 own fashion. There was some slight theoretical instruction 
 and drilling of conscripts, and in the spring the non-commis 
 sioned officers had all to go through their drill afresh, begin 
 ning with the extension motions . . . . This instruction was 
 carried up to battalion-drill, but the regiment was rarely 
 manoeuvred in a line. There were a few marchings out for 
 a short single day s stage, and some target practice without 
 any method ; but no skirmishing, nor bayonet, nor fencing 
 exercise. No field-works were thrown up, nor was any 
 officer employed in any kind of instruction. Regimental 
 schools might easily have been established, but no one had 
 thought of them in those days. It was better to get drunk 
 when one had money, and to sleep when one had none. The 
 other regiments did no more. ... At the beginning of March 
 each company was allotted a small garden to cultivate ; but 
 at this the men grumbled, such charms had idleness. 
 Soldiers are like children ; it is necessary to do them good 
 against their own will. 
 
 What then were all these young men about at times when 
 not under exercise, nor cleaning their arms and persons ? 
 Nothing at all, I may safely say. To sleep a part of the day 
 after having slept all night, to sing songs, tell stories, quarrel 
 sometimes without knowing why, and read such few bad 
 books as were procurable. Such were the daily lives of 
 sergeants as well as men, of officers as well as sergeants. 
 
208 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 Yet, on the whole, their morals were not so bad as might be 
 supposed." 
 
 If any of the recruits of that day had been brought 
 up in those religious habits which the Revolution had, 
 for the most part, banished from France, they found 
 little encouragement for their devotions at the camp. 
 No mass was celebrated for Napoleon s troops, except 
 when they chanced to be quartered in towns. " I do 
 not want a bigoted army," M. de Fezensac quotes as a 
 saying of the Emperor, who had abundant cause to be 
 satisfied on this head. He adds his own opinion, that 
 the moral tone of the whole service was lowered by this 
 omission of customary religious observance. 
 
 In thus exposing the waste by Napoleon and his 
 lieutenants of their opportunities at Boulogne, the 
 critic is careful to point out how far this great assem 
 blage was practically useful. Two chief advantages 
 were obtained by it. In the first place, the rough life 
 of the camp, devoid alike of comfort or diversion, pre 
 pared all ranks for those inconveniences of the cam 
 paign which they were soon to taste to the full. They 
 often found the night bivouac of the next winter more 
 endurable than the huts of Boulogne. A more impor 
 tant use of their training lay in the gain to all ranks 
 from their knowledge of those with whom they were to 
 be associated in the rough trials of war. To the staff 
 and superior officers this was especially valuable. 
 Marshal Ney, the author instances, was thus enabled 
 throughout the coming operations to confine his atten 
 tion to the points that required it, knowing exactly 
 which of his subalterns might be trusted to take care of 
 themselves. Moreover, there was a high military spirit 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 2OQ 
 
 in certain regiments which had done great services in 
 the revolutionary campaigns, and this spread by emu 
 lation among those brigaded with them, who longed 
 for like opportunities of winning the respect of the 
 army. On the whole therefore, despite the grievous 
 shortcomings he lays bare, M. de Fezensac judges the 
 camp life to have contributed much to the success 
 which followed it. 
 
 If he is severe on the mistakes and omissions of his 
 seniors, he is not less plainspoken as to his own faults. 
 Although at first proud of his advancement to sergeant- 
 major, he was disgusted to find his new rank laden 
 with liabilities beyond his means, due to his predeces 
 sor s carelessness or dishonesty, and he soon got so out 
 of heart with his duties as to neglect them openly, and 
 incur a reprimand. At this juncture, happily for the 
 prospects of the young soldier, a vacancy occurred as 
 sub-lieutenant, It was one of the special steps still re 
 served for election, in accordance with the practice of 
 the old Republican army, soon afterwards abolished. 
 The choice lay, in the first place, with the sub-lieuten 
 ants of the corps, who presented three names to the 
 lieutenants, and the latter selected one of the three for 
 the step. The popular notions of the French service 
 of that era would picture such an election as the very 
 model of rude honor and martial integrity. In this 
 case the aristocratic candidate had the special disad 
 vantages of his recent known carelessness, and of con 
 siderable jealousy on the part of the subalterns at his 
 rapid progress from the ranks. Some of them also had 
 personal friends, men who had seen hard service, among 
 his competitors. Against this, however, was the sim 
 ple fact that young de Fezensac had not yet lost his 
 4 
 
2io DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 colonel s favor, and that it was known that Lacuee de 
 sired him to receive his step by election, as more hon 
 orable than to wait for a nomination vacancy. The 
 desire of pleasing the commanding officer outweighed 
 merit, service, and friendship, and the choice fell on 
 the young Parisian lounger of eight months before, 
 rather than on either of the veterans of Marengo, who 
 were the other competitors. Before the imperial con 
 firmation could be obtained, the sub-lieutenant elect 
 was startled by a decree aimed at such families as his 
 own, whose sons avoided the military schools of the 
 Empire requiring four years service in every non 
 commissioned officer promoted. Happily for de Fe- 
 zensac the imminence of a general war rescued him from 
 this new difficulty, and after a few weeks delay he re 
 ceived a provisional commission, which was never 
 revoked. 
 
 This was on July second, 1805, a day unfortunate 
 at its close in our hero s annals. One of the sham em 
 barkations, which were still practised, was to take place 
 next day, and brought some guests into the huts of 
 the 5Qth. This double fete was too much for the 
 newly-made officer, who signalized his promotion by 
 getting drunk, and by using insubordinate language to 
 the captain of police, thus drawing on himself the 
 colonel s displeasure and a close arrest for a fortnight. 
 A chief part of this childish punishment (for such in our 
 service it would be regarded) was the fee to the sentry 
 stationed at the door, who received a perquisite of 
 three francs a day for his extra duty. No friends were 
 nominally to be received by the culprit ; but as two 
 brother-subalterns shared his hut, he had the full ad 
 vantage of their guests, if his leisure proved wearisome. 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 211 
 
 No discipline in fact could be less effectual than this 
 sort of compromise between the severity of a court- 
 martial and the minor penalties inflicted on the rank 
 and file ; for one of the other subalterns is in the same 
 page described as under a succession of these arrests 
 half his time, behaving in fact very much as an ill-con 
 ditioned cadet of seventeen at Woolwich or St. Cyr. 
 M. de Fezensac felt the inconvenience little, but the 
 displeasure of his colonel much, until a frank avowal 
 of contrition to the latter, with a confession to his pa 
 rents of his sorrow at having offended so good a friend, 
 restored him to the favor which he thenceforward took 
 more care to deserve. 
 
 The ideas and customs of his brother-officers were 
 found by the new subaltern to be in no way superior 
 to those of the class he had now left. All had seen 
 service ; but very few had had a decent education, and 
 fewer still had used their leisure to improve it. " Their 
 manners were vulgar," he tells us, " their politeness 
 the politeness of the soldier." For this the reader may 
 very possibly have been prepared ; but it is more 
 startling to learn how rarely such men rose to any em 
 inence in their profession, notwithstanding the constant 
 succession of wars in which their master engaged. Of 
 all the long list of officers on the strength of the 59th 
 when de Fezensac entered it, but one became a gen 
 eral, and the most distinguished soldier of them all 
 never was more than colonel of a light-infantry regi 
 ment. Such must of necessity be the lot of ordinary 
 men in any service where promotion goes chiefly by 
 selection, and that selection depends wholly on a su 
 perior s will. Where one man is advanced by sole 
 discernment of his merits, a dozen others will owe the 
 
212 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 like advantage to some personal acquaintance with 
 those near the fountain of power. The interest which 
 as we shall see, pushed de Fezensac himself from his 
 first commission to the rank of general of brigade in 
 eight years, like that which in as many months had 
 passed him on from the recruit-squad to the officer s 
 epaulette, could only be exercised at the cost of men 
 less known, and probably enough too, less fitted for 
 high rank. 
 
 The summer of 1805 was passed by the soldiers of 
 Boulogne in wondering whether the evolutions prac 
 ticed by the troops and flotilla were but a feint or se 
 riously designed to lead to an embarkation. Some of 
 de Fezensac s brother-subalterns prophesied a speedy 
 conquest of the insolent islanders ; some declared the 
 whole a ruse of the Emperor s, preluding a sudden at 
 tack on Germany ; none feared any event so much as 
 another winter passed in the same dreary purposeless 
 existence as the last. Neither section of these military 
 prophets was wholly wrong or right. Napoleon s own 
 correspondence has fully revealed the real truth to be that 
 the invasion was his first and darling object, and was 
 abandoned only when he found his admirals fail utter 
 ly in their share of the task. On August twenty-sixth, 
 it was known in the camp that Villeneuve had gone 
 back to Cadiz, leaving the English fleet in undisturbed 
 possession of the Channel. " Happily," as our author 
 with a soldier s naivete says, " the new coalition per 
 mitted Napoleon to substitute for the expedition, so 
 often and so vainly announced, a general European 
 war." On September first, the three divisions of Mar 
 shal Ney were on their march for Strasburg, and with 
 them moved the new-made subaltern. His provisional 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 213 
 
 commission had never been confirmed by the Minister 
 of War ; but on this point he now felt easy, feeling 
 that rank was more likely to be won than withdrawn 
 on actual service. Burdened with nothing but his 
 sword, he no longer regretted his choice of the infan 
 try, and trudged gaily along at the side of his platoon. 
 Like his own, the spirit of his comrades ran high, and 
 made the constant onward move seem easy. He bears 
 special testimony to the exceptional order of this three 
 weeks march, on which the officers never quitted their 
 companies without a reprimand. He himself incurred 
 an arrest from his major the first day for a brief delay 
 in appearing on parade, a reproof from his captain 
 somewhat later for spending more time over his break 
 fast than the men, and a sharp remonstrance from his 
 colonel for over-politeness to a fatigued vivandiere 
 which threatened to cost him his promised trip to 
 Paris, where his parents expected to see him for a few 
 hours. Once more Lacuee proved kinder in action 
 than in word to his young protege, and the desired per 
 mission to quit the regiment for a brief space being 
 granted, the young soldier posted rapidly the necessary 
 hundred miles, embraced his family, took one brief 
 glance at those joys of Parisian existence on which he 
 had often looked back regretfully during the past 
 year and then turned his face once more to the Rhine. 
 Borne back to his regiment with all the speed the post 
 would allow, de Fezensac contrived to miss the outfit 
 which kind hands had dispatched beforehand by the 
 diligence, and with a borrowed sword and epaulette, 
 passed the great frontier stream on September twenty- 
 seventh, near Lauterburg, and plunged with his regi 
 ment into the defiles of the Black Forest beyond, a 
 
2I 4 
 
 DE FE ZEN SACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 unit in the legions which were to tear the crown of 
 the Western Empire from the house of Hapsburg. 
 
 We are not about to follow the author through his 
 narrative of the great events which led to the shameful 
 disaster of Mack at Ulm. They have been illustrated 
 with marvellous freshness in the well-known work of 
 Colonel Hamley, who has so clearly analyzed the 
 strategy of Napoleon s design as to make the stupen 
 dous events of that October as plain as they can ap 
 pear regarded from the victor s side alone. Those who 
 would understand them in their strictly German aspect, 
 and know the details of the miserable delusions and 
 vacillations which ruined the Austrian theorist, must 
 go to the exhaustive work of Riistow on this campaign, 
 which is as remarkable for its industry as for its gen 
 eral impartiality. We have another task here specially 
 before us, which is to show from unexceptionable tes 
 timony how little to be relied on was the so-called sys 
 tem by which Napoleon supplied his army in such 
 movements. In this the first week of its first campaign, 
 fresh from camp discipline, full of patriotic spirit and 
 confidence in its great head, scarce clear of the borders 
 of its own fair land, the Grand Army is found, upon 
 the first difficulty it had to encounter, resolving itself 
 into a host of armed and violent marauders. We give 
 M. de Fezensac s account of the affair in his own words, 
 the simple force of which it would be difficult to im 
 prove : 
 
 " On the evening of the fifth, before reaching Geislingen 
 our division turned to the left to follow the movement of the 
 other corps towards the Lower Danube. We marchec 
 through the whole of the night and the day following, with 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 
 
 21$ 
 
 only a few moments for rest, and without any food. The 
 ; Emperor had ordered that the soldiers should carry bread 
 for four days, and that the wagons should have four more 
 day s rations of biscuit. I do not know what happened in 
 the other corps. As for us, we had nothing, and as the 
 ,59th marched in the rear, according to its number, it was 
 nightfall when we got to our bivouac near Giengen, the town 
 where General Malher, our division commander, had his 
 quarters. The colonel reported to him the arrival of the re 
 giment after their six-and-thirty hours march, and asked per 
 mission to make a requisition for rations. The general re 
 fused, having promised to spare the town; but the result was 
 to authorize every sort of disorder, for the villages around 
 were sacked, and the first day of bivouac became the first 
 day of pillage. The colonel, almost famishing himself, found 
 some grenadiers roasting a pig. His appearance at first caused 
 some confusion, but a moment later one of the privates, more 
 bold than his fellows, offered him a share of the repast, which 
 Iwas heartily accepted, and pillage thus became officially 
 sanctioned." 
 
 . 
 
 Thus initiated into the the new system of " making 
 ar with the legs," Colonel Lacuee pressed his regi- 
 Iment on to the Danube, and fell at the passage of the 
 bridge of Gunzburg three days later, the first officer of 
 rank the French lost in the campaign. 
 
 M. de Fezensac, who came up with the reserve of 
 the 5Qth after the first part of the fight, takes the 
 opportunity of recounting this his first action, to point 
 out, by the simple process of telling the exact truth, 
 how wofully short of the language of bulletins and dis- 
 : patches was the conduct and discipline of his regi 
 ment. 
 
2i6 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 " This day did our regiment much honor ; but to speak 
 the truth, I do not think the enemy s attacks had been very 
 severe. I found the officers agitated and restless, occupy 
 ing themselves with encouraging the soldiers, and trying to 
 restore order; for the companies had become mixed, having, 
 as I said, passed the bridge singly, and on getting to the 
 plain beyond, received the enemy without having time to 
 throw themselves into proper order for defence. I am per 
 suaded that there was a moment when a bayonet attack and 
 a charge of cavalry on our flank could have thrown us back, 
 and forced us into the Danube. In this situation the two 
 reserve companies ought to have been of great value ; but 
 the captains, in their hurry to get to the field of battle, would 
 not take time to form them after passing the bridge, and the 
 regiment involved them in its disorder. Happily darkness 
 was falling, and the Austrians were ignorant of our little 
 strength. Nevertheless we passed the night under arms, and 
 did not venture to make fires." 
 
 During the night M. de Fezensac learnt that he had 
 lost his kind friend and colonel, whose last words to an 
 officer who caught him as he fell were to " leave him, 
 and go back to the fight." Very different stones were 
 heard by the young subaltern of other regimental 
 acquaintances, new to the proof of war. 
 
 " One sergeant whom I knew (afterwards a good officer, 
 and killed in action) hid himself, nor was he the only one. 
 Each company had a similar anecdote to relate. These night 
 affairs are very convenient. You may lose yourself in the 
 wood, or tumble into the brook at your pleasure. I have 
 had occasion throughout my military career to admire the 
 skill of men who are always missing at the moment of danger 
 but never so as to be compromised by their absence." 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 
 
 The narrative of the surrender of Ulm which fol 
 lows is worth studying for its own sake, and for its 
 vivid picture of a well-known difference between Ney 
 and Murat, which ended in the former publicly chal 
 lenging the other, before Napoleon and the imperial 
 staff, to follow him under fire. This, too, was when all 
 was going well with the Grand Army. A less prescient 
 mind than Napoleon s might have foreseen in such dis 
 putes at critical moments the germs of disaster in after 
 days, when the tide of fortune should turn against the 
 commanders whose jealousies their master s presence 
 could hardly restrain. 
 
 M. de Fezensac has not failed to record his opinion, 
 very different from that usually accepted, of the sys 
 tem which in this instance placed 30,000 prisoners at a 
 stroke in the hands of the Grand Army. We quote, 
 with some omissions, his comments on the means 
 which led to this success, reminding our readers that 
 it is no holiday soldier who thus speaks : 
 
 "This short campaign was, as it were, an epitome of 
 those that followed. Excess of fatigue, want of provisions, 
 severity of weather, disorders and marauding, nothing was 
 wanting to it; and in that month I first felt what I was 
 destined to experience throughout my career. Brigades, and 
 . even regiments, being sometimes dispersed [for subsistence, 
 sake, the author means], the order for concentration would 
 come late, having to pass through a number of different 
 channels. From this it followed that the men had to march 
 day and night, falling asleep on their way, and arrived at the 
 place assigned without having eaten anything, or finding any 
 victuals there. Marshal Berthier used to write, In the war 
 of invasion that the Emperor is making, there are no magazines. 
 It is for the generals to find their own means of subsistence in 
 
2 1 8 DE FEZENSA C S RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 the country that they traverse. But the generals had neither 
 time nor means to procure regularly the wherewithal to feed 
 so numerous an army. Pillage, therefore, became authorized, 
 and the districts which we passed through suffered cruelly, 
 yet we were not the less famished throughout the campaign. . . . 
 Bad weather made our suffering still more severe. A cold 
 rain fell, or rather a half-melted snow, in which we plunged 
 deep, while the wind prevented our lighting fires. On Octo 
 ber sixteenth, the day when Philip Segur bore the first sum 
 mons to Mack, the weather was so frightful that no one kept 
 his post. There was no grand guard or sentry, the very 
 artillery was left unwatched, and each man sheltered himself 
 as best he could. I never, except in the campaign of Russia, 
 suffered so much, never saw the army in the like disorder." 
 
 Is this fairly written in the histories of the great 
 campaign around Ulm? The French writers slight it ;* 
 the more accurate Germans, as Riistow, have failed to 
 correct them in a matter exclusively French. As far 
 as we are aware, the truth would have been universally 
 slurred over but for the following notice, which shows 
 that history has in this respect submitted to be blinded 
 in her gaze by the sun of Napoleon s genius, and has 
 actually gone back in truth since the publication in 
 the year 1810 in London of a pamphlet in French by 
 an unknown Russian officer whom we shall here quote. 
 In it the actual truth was told, as now vividly re- 
 
 * The bad weather is mentioned by the various French writers and 
 their followers ; but no reference is made by any of them to the starvation 
 which accompanied it. Dumas, indeed, expressly says that Marmont s 
 men suffered from the weight of the rations they had to carry. As Mar 
 mont s corps came in by a sparate route through a plain country, it is 
 quite possible that it escaped the destitution which the rest of the army, 
 crossing the Black Forest and Suabian Alps in rapid succession, naturally 
 experienced. 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 219 
 
 produced by M. de Fezensac. The author appears 
 to have been on the staff of Kutusoff in 1805, or 
 to have had his information direct from those that 
 were : 
 
 " To surround Ulm it was necessary to concentrate. 
 Numerous columns defiled upon the same road, appeared at 
 the same point. 100,000 men, fatigued by long marches, 
 destitute of provisions, come to take up a position which 
 grows more and more confined. They are now no more 
 allowed to straggle from their post, for then the whole enter 
 prise would fail. What a critical moment ! The resources 
 of the country occupied by this mass are consumed in an 
 hour. 
 
 " To enhance the difficulty, the heavens seem to dissolve. 
 A heavy rain, continuing for many days, floods the country. 
 The streams burst their banks. The roads are frightful, and 
 in more than one place altogether disappear. The army 
 marches in mud, and bivouacks in water ; it is ready to per 
 ish with misery and hunger ; discouragement and murmuring 
 spread through it. What is to be done ? A proclamation [of 
 October twelfth ; see Napo. Corresp.] is read at the head of 
 each column, which praises, flatters, aud caresses the army, 
 pours eulogy on its constancy, tells it the enemy is enclosed, 
 and that only a few moments more of perseverance are needed. 
 Thus the soldiers are kept quiet; but as they must have 
 bread, active and intelligent officers are sent through all the 
 neighboring districts, to obtain it by threats, if requests fail. 
 All yields to the power of requisition, and in twenty-four 
 hours bread is procured, and the horses and vehicles of the 
 inhabitants are used to bring it in .... Ulm is invested, 
 blockaded, capitulates, and the French army reaps the fruit of 
 its endurance and of its incredible activity." 
 
 The writer of this essay had evidently nearly 
 
DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 reached the truth which French military writers have 
 obscured, but which de Fezensac s narrative enables us 
 to grasp. In fact, a general carrying on war on the 
 system which Napoleon adopted clearly does it at tre 
 mendous risk. The object to be gained may justify 
 him in a military sense for the time, but, on the other 
 hand, an unexpected detention on the way, a week of 
 bad weather, a slight check from the enemy, may ruin 
 the spirits of his army beyond recall. What is more 
 important still to note is this. The system of living 
 by requisition bears within it its own Nemesis in the 
 demoralization which it spreads through all ranks of the 
 army, and in the sure preparation thus made, even in 
 the midst of success, for the day when defeat shall be 
 come irreparable disaster. As this truth is admirably 
 summed up by M. de Fezensac at the close of the first 
 part of his work, we quote his words, themselves the 
 best condemnation of the popular historians of his 
 country, and the plain proof that the organization of 
 plunder is, even in the strongest hands, a deception 
 and a blunder : 
 
 " All these causes developed insubordination, want of 
 discipline, and the habit of marauding. When at such a time 
 soldiers went to a village to look for rations, they found them 
 selves tempted to stay there. Thus the number of stragglers 
 wandering through the country became considerable. The 
 inhabitants met with every sort of annoyance from them, and 
 wounded officers who sought to bring them to order were an 
 swered with threats. All these details are unknown to those 
 who read the history of our campaign, where there is only to 
 be seen a valiant army of devoted soldiers emulating the 
 glory of their officers. No one knows what sufferings are 
 often the price of the most brilliant successes, nor how ex- 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 221 
 
 amples of selfishness and cowardice are mingled with traits 
 of generosity and courage." 
 
 Can those who read this, wonder any longer at the ut 
 ter destruction of the Grand Army in Russia, and the 
 still more marvellous dissolution of the Cohorts of 1813 ? 
 Ulm taken, the army pressed on to occupy Vienna, 
 and conquer at Austerlitz ; but in these triumphs the 
 corps of Ney had no share, being left to guard Bavaria 
 and keep the Tyrol in check. The peace of Presburg 
 sent the 59th Regiment into four months canton 
 ments near Salzburg, where the sojourn of de Fezen- 
 sac himself was extremely agreeable, and was the ori 
 gin of a lifelong friendship with the Austrian family on 
 whom he was quartered. Why he became thus en 
 deared to his involuntary hosts is clear enough when 
 we recollect that he was a gentleman by birth and feel 
 ing, and that the ordinary occupation of his comrades, 
 even in his own friendly coloring, is shown to have 
 been alternately to bully the male inhabitants, and to 
 pay unsought civilities to the females of their respec 
 tive billets. Two anecdotes out of many are enough 
 to describe the miserable condition of things, of which 
 M. de Fezensac declares that, apart from the troubles 
 connected with the victualling and lodging of the troops, 
 the local authorities were often treated with wanton 
 disrespect : 
 
 " If a discussion arose, the soldier was always right, and 
 the inhabitant always wrong. A private of the sixth com 
 pany declared that thirty francs had been stolen from him, 
 and his captain, without any inquiry, ordered that it should 
 be made good .... The officers, often too far away, could 
 not stop these abuses ; besides the greater part of them gave 
 
222 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 an example of exaction. If any one wanted to go anywhere, 
 he made requisition for a carriage and horse, but offered no 
 payment. An officer of high rank wished to go in this way 
 to Schaffhausen, and was to have four relays ready, from 
 post to post. At one of these he was kept waiting, and by 
 way of punishment, sent twenty-five men extra to be quar 
 tered on the village." 
 
 To impress the government post service for every 
 kind of private journey seems to have been the uni 
 versal practice, even with those who, like de Fezensac 
 himself abstained from and condemned all personal 
 plunder. And it would have been, concludes the 
 writer with his usual truth and force, better for their 
 discipline to find the soldiers in regular rations than 
 to quarter them individually on the peasants. But 
 these were stripped, while the army was left without 
 pay, and even without clothing, in order that the stores 
 in France might be left untouched. Such was that 
 economy of Napoleon s military administration of 
 which so much praise has been written by certain 
 panegyrists. 
 
 From its cantonments in the Hereditary States 
 and Suabia the army at length was moving slowly 
 towards France, when Napoleon halted it, to await the 
 pending rupture and war with Prussia. Meanwhile, 
 de Fezensac s family had not forgotten him ; and feel 
 ing that his regimental prospects would naturally suffer 
 by the death of Colonel Lacuee, they had made inter 
 est at Paris with the friends of various generals high 
 in command to have him transferred to the staff. Re 
 fused in more than one quarter, their wish had found 
 favor with Ney ; and on October sixth, two days before 
 the campaign of Jena began, the sub-lieutenant left 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 2 2$ 
 
 his regiment to report himself at the Marshal s head 
 quarters in his new capacity of extra aide-de-camp. 
 From this date, until suddenly made colonel of a 
 regiment at Borodino, his service lay wholly with the 
 staff. 
 
 M. de Fezensac, at this point, digresses slightly 
 from his narrative to speak of the essential differences 
 which separate the mind and knowledge of the regi 
 mental from that of the staff officer. The latter, he 
 says, is often as ignorant of the habits of the soldier 
 and of the details of duty as the former of the purport 
 of the movements he is executing. Hence he con 
 cludes that to form a good general officer, or even a 
 good commander of a regiment,* a man should have 
 served in both departments. In this view he follows 
 strictly that of Napoleon, who abolished in name, at 
 least the practice of promoting officers on the staff 
 from one grade to another, and ordered that a captain, 
 to win rank as a field officer, must return to do duty 
 with a regiment. This rule was but nominal in the 
 case of a man of interest like our writer, who in spite 
 of it, received the rank of major of cavalry for services 
 done as a captain on Berthier s personal staff; but its 
 existence served, as Jomini, who was strongly pre 
 judiced against it, has particularly noticed, to drive 
 young men of energy and promise from the staff into 
 the line, and thus in his view to disorganize what he 
 declares to be the soul of a well-ordered army. The 
 system of Napoleon was abandoned by his successors 
 in French military administration, who restored and 
 
 * The colonel of a continental regiment, be it remembered, has 
 two, three, or even four battalions to superintend, and his duties in 
 many respects are those which we assign to the head of a brigade. 
 
224 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 completed the plan by which the staff is first selected 
 out of, and then kept altogether distinct from the 
 other services. This reform, the creation of a distinct 
 Staff Corps, has been supported by writers who, with 
 Jomini, declare that the plan of Napoleon failed to 
 give a sufficient supply of intelligent officers for the 
 higher posts. It has further been adopted in other 
 services, the Austrian especially ; and its non-existence 
 in our own has been often alleged as a defect by those 
 who see its advantages without all its drawbacks. The 
 effect of the French system is necessarily to draw so 
 strong a line between the staff and the body of the 
 army as to deprive the one of all sympathy with the 
 other, and to take away from the general mass of offi 
 cers all rational motives for studying the higher branches 
 of their profession. This last result may not seriously 
 matter where most of them are so little educated that 
 they would in vain strive to raise their minds above 
 the petty details of the regiment, nor the former 
 where occupation for a large Staff Corps can be found 
 in time of peace. With us these conditions are re 
 versed ; and to copy the French in this matter was 
 neither necessary nor expedient, however desirable it 
 might be to avoid the chance method of Napoleon. 
 Our own new system, imitated almost unconsciously 
 from Prussia before Prussian practice in matters mili 
 tary became the fashion, opens to every intelligent 
 young officer in the service the means of obtaining by 
 study and merit a qualification for the staff, and his 
 turn of five years service in an appointment ; and it 
 seems in every way better suited to our circumstances. 
 It needs but to be thoroughly and impartially applied 
 to give us a supply of instructed soldiers for our future 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 22$ 
 
 needs at a cost far less than that of the smallest Staff 
 Corps of supernumerary officers. 
 
 In Napoleon s army (as is still the case in our own) 
 all the personal staff of a general was selected from pri 
 vate considerations ; and when M. de Fezensac joined 
 that of Marshal Ney before Nuremburg, no one asked 
 if he had even the moderate qualifications of service 
 and knowledge which an aide-de-camp with us must 
 possess. The army was already in motion for Jena, 
 and M. de Fezensac having spent his whole means on 
 a single sorry horse, started with it. During the next 
 few days he had abundant practice in his new duties as 
 messenger, and arrived on the famous field with his 
 marshal early in the day that ruined Prussia, and gave 
 the death-blow to the tactics bequeathed by Frederic. 
 Here he saw Ney expose his person in the reckless way 
 which earned for him the title of " the bravest of the 
 brave," a fashion which on this occasion cost two of his 
 staff, wounds got at his side. The subsequent pursuit 
 of the Prussians is ordinarily remembered only for the 
 rapidity with which it was carried on. M. de Fezensac, 
 while giving the army full credit for the activity dis 
 played by chiefs and men, shows us another and a 
 darker side of the picture. " Pillage was never carried 
 further than on this march, and disorder reached the 
 height of insubordination." On the way the young 
 aide-de-camp was thrown into company with Jomini, 
 then simply a colonel on the staff, yet already a man 
 of mark; for before joining for this campaign he had 
 indicated Jena as the point where the decisive battle 
 would be fought. At Nordhausen they were both 
 nearly murdered by soldiers whose excesses they sought 
 to stop, and \vcre only saved by drawing sword and 
 5 
 
226 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 riding through these mutineers ; for " our subordina 
 tion," says the author, " does not rest on bases as solid 
 as that of other armies." This state of things caused 
 Ney to apply to the Emperor for special powers to ar 
 rest and punish the stragglers ; but it was checked for 
 the time by the halt of the corps to form the blockade 
 of Magdeburg, while the rest of the army completed 
 the pursuit and destruction of the Prussians. 
 
 The young aide-de-camp had (as already stated) 
 kept near to his chief on the field of Jena, but, except 
 on that occasion, saw little of him throughout the cam 
 paign ; for the new-made marshal was terribly afraid of 
 compromising his dignity in the eyes of his staff, the 
 more so, perhaps, as some of them were of the older 
 aristocracy of birth : 
 
 " Marshal Ney kept us at a great distance. During the 
 marches he went on alone in front, and never addressed a 
 word to us, unless obliged. The aide-de camp in waiting 
 never entered his room, save in the course of duty or by spe 
 cial summons, and it was the rarest of events to see the mar 
 shal conversing with any one of us. He ate alone, and never 
 gave an aide-de-camp an invitation. This apparent haughti 
 ness arose from the desire to maintain his posidon. The 
 transition was sudden from the days of 1796, when Augereau 
 had reproved his officers for allowing themselves to be ad 
 dressed as Monsieur. A few years later the Republican gen 
 erals of that date had become marshals, dukes, princes. 
 This change embarrassed Ney. who besides had reason 
 sometimes to believe that his elevation made others envious 
 of him ; so he thought to make himself respected by the 
 hauteur of his bearing, and sometimes carried it too far." 
 
 Before leaving the subject of the conquest of Prus- 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 22/ 
 
 sia, it should be remarked that this narrative effectually 
 dispels certain common illusions as to the perfection of 
 the details of the system on which the Grand Army 
 worked. One, which some of the best of French mili 
 tary writers have unfortunately propagated and con 
 firmed, relates to the personnel of the higher officers. 
 So far from these being invariably the efficient and 
 well-trained leaders they have been represented, in 
 Ney s own corps one of the divisions changed hands 
 twice during the two months ; once because the gen 
 eral (Vandamme) was of so proud and violent a temper 
 that he could not brook Ney as his superior; and again 
 because his successor proved so worn out as to be 
 physically and morally unfit for active service, so that 
 the marshal took upon himself the responsibility, a 
 great one for a lieutenant of Napoleon, of dismissing 
 him from his charge. Another relates to the care 
 which these rough, practical soldiers gave to the details 
 of their duty. What would Wellington have said, had 
 any division commander of the army, during one of 
 his sieges, changed his own quarters three times for 
 considerable distances, without notifying the fact to 
 headquarters? Yet this was done under Ney, during 
 the blockade of Magdeburg, by the general of a dra 
 goon division; and so little was such an irregularity 
 regarded, that when brought by his staff to the mar 
 shal s notice, he only shrugged his shoulders, and said, 
 " What a way to carry on duty ! " As to the internal 
 service of the staff, for which at one time Napoleon 
 got great credit, the truth, as told by M. de Fezensas, 
 enables us to fill up the outline suggested by certain 
 hints of Jomini in his narrative of the subsequent cam 
 paign of Poland, which imply that the army -then 
 
228 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 already felt deeply the deficiencies which their master 
 discovered too late. 
 
 " Long journeys on duty were made in carnages charged 
 at the post rate ; but some officers put the money in their 
 pockets and obtained horses by requisition. This was a 
 bad plan in every view, for apart from the dishonesty, they 
 were ill served, and lost valuable time. As for messages 
 taken on horseback, I have already said that no person took 
 the pains to inquire if we had a horse that could walk, even 
 when it was necessary to go at a gallop, or if we knew the 
 country, or had a map. The order must be executed without 
 waiting for the means, as I shall show in some special in 
 stances. This habit of attempting everything with the most 
 feeble instruments, this wish to overlook impossibilities, this 
 unbounded assurance of success, which at first helped to win 
 us advantages, in the end became our destruction." 
 
 From reflections thus darkened with the shadow 
 of the future, the author carries us forward into Po 
 land, whither Napoleon now transferred the scene of 
 conquest, determined, in his own phrase, " to win back 
 on land the colonies France had lost." 
 
 Here M. de Fezensac places the turning point of 
 Napoleon s career. The first entrance into Poland 
 brought the French into collision with Be.nningsen s 
 army ; and although the Russians had to retreat after 
 the battle of Pultusk, they did so without disorder or 
 loss, for " the time of half-successes, of incomplete 
 triumphs, had arrived. Then also began the miseries 
 of the army, the want of forage and provisions, the pri 
 vations of every kind which I shall afterwards have to 
 detail." Here the course of duty threw the young 
 aide-de-camp into the company of Bernadotte, with 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 229 
 
 whose courtesy he was much impressed, and whom he 
 suspects, from the excessive interest taken by him in 
 the people of Poland, to have already conceived hopes 
 of an elective throne. Losing his way a few days later 
 in the search for one of Ney s generals (who, like the 
 cavalry commander previously mentioned, had shifted 
 his quarters without informing the marshal), he fell in 
 again with Jomini, and was directed rightly by that 
 officer, from whom he learnt that the Russians were 
 suddenly advancing. The short winter campaign had 
 begun, which was to end in the desperate encounter of 
 Eylau, the first check that befell the Grand Army and 
 its master. 
 
 Who does not know how bloody and indecisive was 
 the struggle of that day ? Genius has reflected the 
 whole story in the ghastly picture at the entrance of the 
 Louvre. The idlest traveller turns arrested, in spite 
 of personal insensibility or national coldness, to gaze 
 on the sheet of snow, the burning villages, the agonized 
 group of wounded in the foreground, and above them 
 the pallor-stricken face of a man at whose bidding all 
 this misery was wrought, and who felt at that moment 
 (so the artist seems to tell us) some presage of Boro 
 dino s useless slaughter, the fires of Moscow, and the 
 ruin that followed. On this occasion Benningsen s 
 firmness was insufficient to maintain the equality his 
 army had asserted, and he slowly withdrew next morn 
 ing, leaving the ground to the enemy. M. de Fezensac s 
 share in the events of the day was an important one j 
 for he bore to Ney the message which was to bring his 
 corps to take share in the fight. His horse was already 
 worn out when he got his orders at eight A. M., and 
 with difficulty could he, being fortunately in funds, buy 
 
230 
 
 DE FEZENSAC S RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 a restive animal to carry him. He knew nothing of the 
 roads, and had no guide. " To ask for an escort would 
 have been of no more use than to ask for a horse. An 
 officer had always an excellent horse, knew the coun 
 try, was never taken, met no accident, and got rapidly 
 to his destination ; and of all this there was so little 
 doubt that often a second message was thought un 
 necessary." This want of proper precaution was near 
 costing the Emperor dear, for his orders did not reach 
 Ney till two P. M. ; and the corps only came up at the 
 end of the day. Bernadotte s was wholly absent, and 
 that, as Jomini assures us, solely for want of a good 
 system of messengers. What, then, are we to think 
 of the assertion of M. Thiers (which M. de Fezensac 
 quotes to flatly contradict it as regards Ney) that Na 
 poleon sent off seven officers the evening before to press 
 the two missing marshals to come up ? What are we 
 to think, may it not be further asked, of certain apoc 
 ryphal messages sent to Grouchy in the Waterloo 
 crisis ; messages taken as historical facts by M. Thiers, 
 though their receipt has been consistently denied from 
 the first, and no record of their dispatch exists, save in 
 the St. Helena " Memoires," an exile s apology for his 
 disasters, interesting no doubt for its ability, but hardly 
 fit material for serious history. 
 
 The battle of Eylau produced a four months ces 
 sation of hostilities, during which the Russians suffered 
 much, but their enemies still more. Sixty thousand 
 stragglers, M. de Fezensac assures us, were missing 
 from the French muster-rolls, and the greater part of 
 these were mere marauders, who stripped the country 
 of the supplies which should have been brought up and 
 husbanded by the commissariat. 
 
THE GRAND ARMY, 23! 
 
 " Never were more orders " [he adds] " given than by Na 
 poleon to insure subsistence to his army ; never were any 
 worse executed. Some of them indeed were wholly imprac 
 ticable. There might be traced in them the illusions or char 
 latanism of him who, in later days, ordered his troops to pro 
 tect the peasants who brought provisions into the markets of Mos 
 cow. To discover the hidden stocks, to bring them into 
 Warsaw, to repair the mills, to make regular issues of rations, 
 were all very well on paper ; but those who made the cam 
 paign knew what it all came to. It is wrong then to say " [the 
 writer has here M. Thiers and others of his class in view] 
 "that the army had enough, and sometimes even more. I can 
 declare, on the contrary, that with all these fine orders so 
 given in January, our army was dying with hunger in March." 
 
 In the latter month M. de Fezensac was captured 
 when on a message ; and having thus an unsought 
 opportunity of seeing how the enemy fared, gives his 
 evidence as follows : 
 
 " M. Thiers speaks of the sufferings of the Russian army 
 of Cossacks asking bread of our soldiers. I do not dispute 
 the matter, but at their headquarters appearances gave the lie 
 to this assertion. I saw the staff living in abundance, the sol 
 diers well clothed, the horses in good condition. Assuredly 
 the comparison was not in our favor." 
 
 Refused an exchange, as having seen too much of 
 the camp thus described, he was sent into Russia, and 
 remained a prisoner until the battle of Friedland and 
 peace of Tilsit released him. 
 
 Thus restored at last to Paris and the society in 
 which he had been brought up, M. de Fezensac met 
 and married the daughter of Clarke, Due de Feltre, the 
 
232 
 
 DE FE ZEN SACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 Minister of War. It is no reflection on an honest sol 
 dier to say, that he thus secured his military fortunes 
 more certainly than if he had followed Ney in the 
 famous echelon attack at Friedland, which overthrew 
 that army whose condition he had lately admired, and 
 which Benningsen too confidently exposed. Soon 
 afterwards he was entering Spain, once more on the 
 Marshal s staff, and with him pursued Moore s army to 
 Corunna. He had here just time to observe the bitter 
 enmity of the Spaniards to their conquerors, and the 
 ill working of the Napoleonic system of requisition in 
 a poor and hostile country, when he was recalled, with 
 many of the staff, to Paris. Napoleon was about to 
 carry the Grand Army once more into Germany. In 
 the fifth year of his service, and now holding the rank 
 of captain and the enviable position of aide-de-camp to 
 Berthier himself, M. de Fezensac followed the eagles to 
 Vienna and received a slight wound at Aspern, which 
 procured him his grade as major and a pension, with 
 the title of baron " rather for what I would have 
 done than for what I did, "adds the narrator, modestly. 
 His journal here was but a record of headquarter move 
 ments, and he has forborne to publish it. A short mis 
 sion to Spain, with some intructions to Macdonald, 
 composed the rest of his service until the fatal invasion 
 of Russia was begun, and he passed once more east 
 ward through Germany on Berthier s staff. 
 
 No part of the work is more interesting than that 
 which follows. In almost immediate attendance upon 
 Napoleon up to the day of Borodino, M. de Fezensac 
 was named three days later to the command of the 
 fourth regiment of the line, which had lost its colonel 
 in the fight, and thenceforward served through the 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 233 
 
 rest of the Russian tragedy in his new capacity, and in 
 the corps of his old chief, Ney. Of the whole library 
 of histories and memoirs devoted to the eventful retreat 
 from Moscow, there is no account more valuable than 
 his. A natural devotion to the responsibilities of his 
 new duty made him sympathize to the full with the 
 sufferings of his regiment ; while his six years service 
 on the staff enabled him to discern how much of these 
 were due to the shortcomings at headquarters. The 
 system of requisition alternated with pillage, which we 
 have seen him denounce for its inherent unsoundness, 
 had at last broken down altogether, and left the army 
 helpless and starving in wastes of mud and snow. The 
 bonds of organization and of regimental discipline, 
 imperfect in the day of victory, had snapped asunder at 
 this great disaster, leaving all ranks levelled into a 
 helpless selfishness, until the Grand Army, so long the 
 terror of Europe, became in its turn the sport and 
 booty of an avenging peasantry. One bright spot 
 only illumines the dark picture as M. de Fezensac has 
 painted it. The noble self-denial and inexhaustible 
 energy of Ney had never had such full justice done to 
 them before. No one who reads this narrative can 
 doubt that the marshal united in his person, to a 
 degree no other man has rivalled, the true physical and 
 moral qualifications for the rear-guard commander of a 
 retreating army. On this portion of the u Souvenirs," 
 we forbear to dwell further. It was not only published 
 (as before stated) many years before the remainder, but 
 to many English readers is especially known by the 
 excellent version of Sir W. Knollys, who has completed 
 his private translation of the original narrative care 
 fully from other sources, and thus made so complete a 
 
234 DE FEZENSACS RECOI LECTIONS OF 
 
 handbook of the campaign, as to cause regret that his 
 labor has never been offered to the general public. 
 For our present purpose it is sufficient to say that of 
 the 3,000 men who originally composed the fourth regi 
 ment, 200 only recrossed the Vistula after the retreat, 
 and of the missing number only 100 ever reappeared 
 from captivity; exactly nine tenths had been sacrificed 
 to Napoleon s spirit of adventure. The officers 
 naturally suffered less in proportion than the men; yet 
 of their original strength of 109, sixty perished, and 
 fourteen only escaped unhurt. M. de Fezensac con 
 ducted the remnant of his corps to Nancy at the end 
 of the winter, bearing from Ney the short but honor 
 able testimony (in a letter to General Clarke) : " This 
 young man has constantly proved superior to the criti 
 cal circumstances in which he was placed. I present 
 him to you as a true knight, and you may fairly look 
 on him henceforth as a veteran French colonel." His 
 father-in-law did not take the hint himself, but Ney s 
 recommendation reached the Emperor through others- 
 and while M. de Fezensac was in Paris soliciting pro 
 motion for his subalterns, he was himself gazetted gen 
 eral of brigade ; the Minister declaring himself as much 
 surprised as any one at his son-in-law s good fortune. 
 Soon afterwards he was on his way to Bremen, ap 
 pointed to a newly raised Army Corps, of which Van- 
 damme had assumed the charge, and in which the 
 author found the officers, almost without exception, 
 composed of two classes ; boys from the cadet-school 
 and worn-out middle-aged men. The serviceable 
 officers had for the most part disappeared, or attained 
 higher rank. Such was the confusion in the War 
 Bureau that a lieutenant of the 59th soliciting a com- 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 
 
 235 
 
 pany was forthwith gazetted, by mistake, to a major s 
 rank in another corps. When the error was found out, 
 it was not thought worth while to correct it, and the 
 new major took command of his battalion, at the head 
 of which he fell. Of trustworthy soldiers in any capaci 
 ty Napoleon began to feel the need, for he wrote to 
 Marshal Davoust, after sending him to command in the 
 north of Germany : "Take care and treat Vandamme 
 well : men who understand war are getting scarce." 
 This advice, according to M. de Fezensac, came not a 
 whit too soon, for the violent temper of the general 
 soon after caused an explosion in the presence of the 
 whole staff upon some point of military etiquette, which 
 tried Davoust s patience to the utmost. The war now 
 recommenced, and while the Grand Army was winning 
 Lutzen and Bautzen successively, causing Napoleon 
 vainly to fancy himself once more the arbiter of Europe, 
 Davoust recovered Hamburg and the Lower Elbe in a 
 series of well-managed, though not very difficult 
 manoeuvres. Vandamme here won much credit, and 
 General de Fezensac, who was often detached and act 
 ing on his own responsibility, was highly praised by his 
 new chief; so that when the latter, during the ensuing 
 armistice, was ordered to the Emperor s headquarters, 
 his brigadier followed him and again obtained a com 
 mand in his corps. Vandamme s manner, he tells us, 
 though unbearable to his superiors, was by no means 
 harsh to his own staff; and the energy and vigor of the 
 man, who was known to be ambitious beyond all things 
 of such distinction as should place him on a level with 
 more fortunate rivals, gave promise of brilliant opportu 
 nities to the force he led, numbered as the First Corps 
 of the newly raised levies with which Napoleon vainly 
 
236 DE FEZENSACS RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 hoped to revive the glories of the Grand Army whose 
 name they had assumed. 
 
 M. de Fezensac found in his new brigade a better 
 supply of officers than he had hoped ; for many, 
 invalided in the spring, had now rejoined the eagles. 
 On the other hand, the ranks were full of young 
 untrained recruits, and the non-commissioned officers 
 were ignorant of the very elements of their duties. 
 The dispersion of the force during the armistice for 
 subsistence sake rendered it the harder to complete 
 the necessary instruction, and the more impossible to 
 enforce discipline. " We were to fight all Europe," he 
 sums up his description, " and yet never was there a 
 more untrained force than ours. 5 "All the world 
 knows," it is significantly added, "how the countries 
 we occupied suffered ; in this respect, at least, our 
 young army was quite as knowing as its predecessors.^ 
 Under pretext of looking after the comfort of the men 
 various officers ransacked town and country, made 
 requisitions, and allowed themselves afterwards to be 
 bribed off." From such pursuits as these, and with; 
 unfinished training in its proper trade, the Grand Army: 
 was roused by the termination of the armistice. Aus 
 tria had thrown her slow but heavy sword into the bal 
 ance, and France and her conscripts were hopelessly 
 over-weighted. 
 
 There has been much discussion as to the exact 
 force brought to bear on either side in the new cam 
 paign, which exceeded in its dimensions any other the 
 world had seen. It seems to us more important to 
 note fully what has been here revealed to us of the 
 composition of Napoleon s army, and to remember that 
 no reinforcement of any importance reached it. We 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 
 
 237 
 
 nay then well understand how its body and substance 
 nelted away under the disasters that ensued, more 
 apidly than the historian can trace. For a moment 
 he brilliant victory of Dresden, enhanced by the mor- 
 .al wound of his old rival Moreau from a French shot 
 )n his first exposure, led Napoleon to believe that the 
 >tar of victory had risen on him once more : but in the 
 bame week that this triumph was won, his dreams of 
 -estored empire were rudely shattered into ruin by 
 :hree tremendous blows. Oudinot s Army of the North 
 ,vas defeated decisively within sight of the hated city 
 )f Berlin, which it had been detached to threaten. 
 Macdonald in Silesia received a fatal check on the 
 Katzbach, which so loosened the discipline of his con 
 scripts that the three days retreat that followed cost 
 aim ten times the number lost in the really trifling 
 action : the real cause being revealed in an intercepted 
 .etter to Macdonald from General Puthod, who speaks 
 of his division, before the combat, as quite unmanageable 
 n the existing want and bad weather. These two 
 misfortunes the Emperor s panegyrists charge to his 
 lieutenants, forgetting that he was solely and wholly 
 responsible for the choice he had made of them. The 
 third, however, that of Vandamme s corps at Culm, has 
 been so completely and unequivocally fixed upon his 
 own mismanagement by concurrent testimony, that 
 even M. Thiers scarce endeavors to disprove it, and 
 admits as true the charge against his hero, of striving to 
 excuse himself at first by blackening the memory of 
 his general, then reported to be slain. 
 
 M. de Fezensac shared, of course, in all the events 
 of that terrible disaster. He rejoiced at the outset in 
 the bold movement which threw the First Corps into 
 
238 DE FEZEN SAC S RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 the rear of the vast mass of enemies retreating from 
 Dresden. He became anxious with others when it was 
 found that all connection with the other French corps; 
 was lost. He felt anxiety change into alarm when : 
 Vandamme, on the night before the battle, left his 
 corps exposed to be attacked by vastly larger forces in 
 the plain before Teplitz, while the heights behind him 
 were unoccupied, and no friends heard of in any quar 
 ter. " No one partook his illusions," says M. de Fezen-J 
 sac, who regretted then, no doubt, his choice of a lead-: 
 er. " Generals, officers, and soldiers alike wanted con 
 fidence. That is a bad feeling with which to enter 
 into action." When 40,000 troops in such condition, 
 and so placed, are suddenly attacked in front and rear 
 by forces double their own, the result cannot be doubt 
 ful. In two hours Vandamme s corps was either taken 
 or scattered in panic flight through the wooded emi-< 
 nences by which the Prussians had come behind it. 
 Acting on a maxim of Ney s, that " you should never 
 surrender till they take you by the throat," M. de 
 Fezensac forced his way through the enemy s skir 
 mishers and escaped, finding one-third of his brigade 
 remaining, when he rallied it under cover of Saint Cyr s 
 troops on the Dresden side of the hills. Less fortunate 
 than his brigadier, Vandamme was long ere that time 
 a prisoner in the market-place of Teplitz, his tall form 
 a show to triumphant townfolk, and his loud voice ap 
 pealing in vain for punishment on the excited soldiery, 
 who had plundered and threatened him with violence ; 
 for his harsh treatment of Silesia when quartered there 
 had made his name infamous throughout Germany. 
 
 " The moral effect of this defeat " [M. de Fezensac observes] 
 
THE GRAND ARMY. 
 
 "was worse than the numerical. Its result was a discourage 
 ment that lasted to the end of the campaign. Young sol 
 diers require success ; only old ones can bear up against re 
 verses. We saw no more those men who, the day before, had 
 so boldly attacked the enemy. On the morning of the twenty- 
 ninth, the First corps numbered 40,000 brave fellows ; on the 
 night of the thirtieth, 20,000 disheartened soldiers." 
 
 The spirits of the enemy rose proportionately, and an 
 officer dispatched next day to seek exchange of prison 
 ers, was refused reception at their headquarters. 
 
 Cheered by successes on all sides, the Allies now 
 set themselves firmly to the task of ridding Germany 
 of the French. Jealousies and divisions were laid aside 
 for the common good, and the personal ambition of 
 powerful monarchs sacrificed to the political object. 
 Alexander himself set the example of self-denial, by 
 refusing the supreme command, pressed on him by our 
 Prince Regent, on the plea that, without Moreau s aid 
 the task would over-weight him. From that time for 
 ward Napoleon s struggle was hopeless. Hemmed in 
 the basin of the Elbe by his false strategy, straightened 
 from the first, and soon starved, his young legions melt 
 ed away in the Saxon autumn as fast as their prede 
 cessors in the Russian winter, until the time came 
 when their enemies, better fed, in better heart, and 
 with recruited numbers, closed in and gave them the 
 final blow at Leipsic. The First Corps, now under 
 Count Lobau, saw little of all this, being placed in 
 Dresden to recover its condition, and finally abandoned 
 there by one of the many mistakes Napoleon made in 
 this campaign. His retreat from Germany of course 
 compelled the surrender of the force thus isolated, and 
 M. de Frezensac, again a prisoner, drew his sword no 
 
240 RECOLLECTIONS OF THE GRAND ARMY. 
 
 more. Those who follow his " Recollections " ever so 
 carelessly throughout will understand the mingled feel 
 ing with which he heard the abdication of his chief, 
 whose genius he had admired, though never blind to 
 his faults. He accepted the Restoration as the best 
 hope for the future of France ; and the tricolored cock 
 ade, which he doffed after ten years wear, was laid by 
 as his simple souvenir of the Grand Army. Few saw so 
 plainly what strength and weakness met in that vast 
 machine; none have better told the story of its 
 triumphs and its fall. 
 
HENRY VON BRANDT, A GERMAN SOLDIER 
 OF THE FIRST EMPIRE* 
 
 IN 1806 Prussia had enjoyed ten years of the 
 ignoble peace purchased by the Treaty of Basle. Her 
 king, though entering warmly at first into the coalition 
 against revolutionary France, had soon tired of a war 
 in which defeat would fall heavily on Prussia and 
 success would but strengthen her German rival by the 
 re-establishment of Austrian dominion in Belgium. 
 The campaigns of 1792-3 had added no lustre to Prus 
 sian arms. Long disuse of the practice of war had 
 unfitted for the field the stiff machines which in out 
 ward show alone represented the warriors of the Great 
 Frederic. Battalions in which each captain bought 
 recruits for his company from crimps at the cheapest 
 rate had proved as unequal to the proof of a campaign 
 as the untrained staff and commissariat which at 
 tempted with them the invasion of France. Military 
 pedantry had long had sway in the service, and com 
 bined with bad administration to cause the soldier s 
 trade to be shunned by all who could choose one for 
 themselves ; nor had a war undertaken nominally to 
 restore the Bourbons awakened the latent patriotism 
 of the Northern German. Peace, therefore, was 
 popular with all classes, and prince and people were 
 
 * A us dem Leben des Generals (Dr.) Heinrich von Brandt. Berlin : 
 
 1868-. 
 
2 4 2 
 
 HENRY VON BRANDT 
 
 alike content to withdraw from the inglorious struggle 
 to a not less inglorious neutrality, leaving Austria to 
 defend single-handed the integrity of the Empire over 
 which she nominally presided. 
 
 While the unequal contest went on from year to 
 year between revolutionary ardor and Hapsburg 
 obstinacy ; while worn-out veterans, failing on either 
 side, gave way to abler men ; while modern strategy 
 from the feeble warfare of 1792-3 rose suddenly, under 
 Napoleon and the Archduke Charles, to the highest 
 stage the art reached before the days of steam ; 
 Prussia, tranquil in her avoidance of the storm which 
 shook her neighbors, applied all her power to consoli 
 date the acquisitions made not long before as her share 
 of the partition of Poland. The struggle carried on 
 for centuries along the lower Vistula between the 
 Teuton and the Sclave had ended in the triumph of 
 the former. German capital flowed over to fertilize 
 Polish territory ; to farm a Polish estate was at once 
 the most profitable and aristocratic of employments 
 for the Prussian noblesse ; and the process of amalga 
 mation and absorption had fairly set in which has con 
 tinued steadily down to the present day, disturbed 
 only for a short season by the era of Napoleonic con 
 quest of which we are presently to speak. The old 
 university of Konigsberg in East Prussia was frequented 
 by the youth of both races alike in the first years of 
 this century, Among these was our autobiographer, 
 Henry von Brandt, one of a large and wealthy family 
 of noble race, who had cast their lot in the new terri 
 tories acquired by the House of Brandenburg ; and so 
 little, he tells us, was independence sought by the 
 Polish students of 1805, that it was the fashion for 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 
 
 243 
 
 them to mix freely with the Germans in class-room 
 and in sport, and to call themselves " South-Prus 
 sians," as the others were Brandenburgers or East-Prus 
 sians. 
 
 This tranquil process of amalgamation was not to 
 last long. Events were at hand which would shake 
 the foundations of prescriptive authority throughout 
 Europe, and change for a season the aspirations, fash 
 ions, and even the names, of doubtful nationalities. 
 Napoleon in his camp at Boulogne was already the 
 object of attention to the whole civilized world; and 
 young Brandt, like most of his fellow-students, paid 
 more attention to French than to his proper study of 
 law, and read the journals more diligently than the 
 works on jurisprudence which his professor recommend 
 ed. Bonaparte (for by his family name the Emperor 
 of the French was then universally known), unmatched 
 as administrator and general, elected sovereign of a 
 mighty people, yet not many years before a friendless 
 collegian, an unknown subaltern, was the object of ro 
 mantic admiration on the part of the simple students 
 of Konigsberg. Some of these would have made an 
 actual idol of their favorite hero, but that the sudden 
 execution of the Due d Enghein just before the coro 
 nation of his slayer, threw a damp over the ardor of 
 many who, until that dark deed, had counted Napoleon 
 as good as great, and had regarded his self-exaltation 
 to supreme power as the truest act of patriotism to a 
 distracted country. 
 
 Germany and her people were soon to be unde 
 ceived as to the purity of his motives. Foiled in his 
 designs upon England, Napoleon turned his arms east 
 ward, seeking to fix a-quarrel first upon the hereditary 
 
HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 enemy of France. A war with Austria was easy to 
 provoke, certain to be popular, and gave promise of 
 further results than a mere fresh humiliation of the 
 twice-vanquished Court of Vienna. The word was 
 given to pass the Rhine, and that campaign of Ulm 
 began in which (as De Fezensac has clearly shown) the 
 shortcomings of the grand army proved to be great, 
 even after its Boulogne training ; but which led to 
 successes so vast that all shortcomings were forgotten. 
 Russia came late to the aid of her threatened neighbor, 
 only to add to the triumph of the victor on the deci 
 sive field of Austerlitz. Prussia, on the other hand, had 
 long been trained to look coolly on at the defeats of 
 Austria, and would have regarded this fresh reverse 
 with complacency but for the sudden violation of her 
 own territory made for French advantage by Berna- 
 dotte s corps at the outset of the campaign. This out 
 rage at once raised her spirit against Napoleon, and all 
 ^Northern Germany doubt the wisdom of the policy of 
 isolation which had given the French their recent ad 
 vantage. Like the rest of the Prussian youth, the 
 Konigsberg students cried out for satisfaction ; but, 
 like others, were easily appeased by the annexation of 
 Hanover, offered their country as a sop by the wily 
 invader, who thus sought to gain time to concentrate 
 his army on his new base on the Main. He had gath 
 ered 190,000 men there ready to crush their independ 
 ence, while they were yet, as Brandt honestly tells us, 
 blindly rejoicing over the new addition to the " strength 
 of their fatherland." Then, indeed, the mask was 
 thrown off, and the struggle for the national life they 
 held dear was seen to have been but deferred at the 
 invader s pleasure. 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 24$ 
 
 " I can still most vividly remember," says our 
 writer, " the astonishment which fell upon all when 
 the news of our defeats reached Konigsberg." Citi 
 zens and students had shared to the full the singular 
 delusion entertained by high officers of the army, 
 and even published by General Riichel in a general 
 order to his corps at the outset of the campaign, that 
 the French successes of which they had heard had 
 been won against inferior enemies in spite of a bad 
 system, such as must inevitably fail when tested against 
 the better-trained battalions of Prussia. Jena has 
 been usually looked upon as the crucial shock in which 
 the old tactics handed down by Frederic were sud 
 denly found wanting; but, in truth, the proof of their 
 inadequacy to meet the more rapid and lighter move 
 ments of the enemy, was furnished abundantly at the 
 very first collision of the armies four days before on the 
 little plain of Saalfeld. On the other side came Lan- 
 nes, Napoleon s own favorite marshal, the best handler 
 of troops in action, according to his master s judgment, 
 of all the quick tacticians that followed the Imperial 
 Eagles. On the other was Prince Louis of Prussia, 
 chief of the war party in the Berlin Councils, "a man," 
 says the greatest of all German military writers, " now 
 thirty-three years of age, of vehement courage but 
 dissipated habits, burning for .military fame but un 
 versed in the practice of war, and counting on his own 
 personal valor to redeem every error of judgment." 
 Lannes had with him Suchet s division, veterans long 
 trained to war on the light method bequeathed by the 
 Revolutionary armies, and perfected by practice : and 
 these officered by men who had all won their posts in 
 real ^ervice. The Prussians opposed to them were not 
 
246 HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 much fewer in number, drilled with an exact pedantry 
 now unknown, confident in the hereditary reputation 
 of their army, but slow and unready in movement, and 
 led by officers of little but parade-ground practice. 
 The French division, pouring through a pass into the 
 plain in which the Prussians were drawn up, extended 
 swiftly to its left till it embraced the whole front of 
 the enemy, and then prepared to advance in columns 
 covered by the usual swarm of skirmishers thrown out 
 around the head of each. These the Prussian troops 
 at once began to fire heavily on, either mistaking them 
 for an attack in force, or irritated by their boldness ; 
 but the well-dressed lines and serried ranks of Louis 
 were vain against the crouching scattered foe, whose 
 deadly dropping shots his battalions returned in vain. 
 The Prussians fell thick and fast, until Lannes observ 
 ing his foe already shaken, and having placed his col 
 umns so as to seize readily each point of vantage 
 offered by the ground, threw them on swiftly to the 
 attack. Before the Prussian lines could change front, 
 they found the enemy penetrating between them and 
 gaining their unprotected flanks. In vain did Louis 
 ride from side to side encouraging his men ; in vain 
 did he try too late to use the slow infantry of the line 
 to support his few riflemen against the skirmishers 
 whose fire was mowing down his close formation. In 
 an hour from the time of the attack his force was in 
 flight, and he himself lay weltering in his blood in the 
 track of the fugitives, cut down by a French sergeant 
 after a brief summons to surrender, a vain sacrifice to 
 the long-cherished notion of the invincibility of the 
 tactics of a by-gone age. 
 
 Such, though in lesser detail, was the first irrtelli- 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 247 
 
 gence from the field of war that rang through Prussia. 
 Then came the fearful news of the defeats of Jena and 
 Auerstadt. The army had been all but destroyed, 
 three of the four chiefs taken or slain, the king was in 
 hasty flight. The defeat by Bernadotte of the last re 
 serves upon the Saal soon followed, the investment of 
 Magdeburg, the defection of the Saxons, the fall of 
 Berlin, the capture of Bliicher and his flying cavalry. 
 The evil now thickened day by day, and accusations of 
 rashness, of treachery, of imbecility, of cowardice, were 
 repeated whenever civilians spoke of the once admired 
 national army. At Konigsberg, and wherever the 
 German Sclavonic elements had met closely, there was 
 a sudden division of sentiment and separation of soci 
 ety. The Polish fellow-students of Brandt had natu 
 rally but little sympathy for the sufferings of Prussia. 
 They felt not the shame of her defeats ; they looked 
 with curious and not unfriendly eyes to the great con 
 queror who already turned his arms towards their en 
 slaved country. After the first positive news of the 
 course of the campaign, they withdrew from mixing 
 with the Germans, and forgetting their former assump 
 tion of Teutonism, called themselves Poles or Lithua 
 nians. Even the students from Dantsic, Brandt tells 
 us, kept apart from the genuine Prussians, among whom 
 the misfortunes of their country awoke a warlike spirit 
 which foreshadowed the glorious rising of 1813. All 
 were crying out for arms ; and when a royal aide-de 
 camp reached the city with orders to form new corps 
 of provisional battalions, a crowd of well-born young 
 men came forward to offer their services. Brandt was 
 one of those accepted for an ensign s duty in one of 
 eighteen battalions to be raised in East Prussia, the 
 
248 HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 ranks of which were to be filled by conscripts or dis 
 charged soldiers called back to service. Little but mis 
 ery could be expected in such quarters as he no\v found 
 himself, placed in a semi-Polish village for winter train 
 ing, under a government whose warlike means were 
 exhausted or in the enemy s hands, and with small 
 knowledge on the part of most of the officers and men 
 of the profession they had suddenly adopted. Cold, 
 dirt, and scanty rations were the chief features of the 
 life of the new ensign and his brother-soldiers, and the 
 only military necessary of which there was abundance 
 was the drill, which went on unceasingly. The training 
 was at first by companies, but these were soon formed 
 into battalions, and the latter before long were com 
 pleted and tolerably instructed. Probably the Prus 
 sian Government had not the means of putting them 
 into the field, for through the long spring of 1807 they 
 were left unemployed, not without murmuring on the 
 part of the officers, who envied the brave deeds of their 
 comrades at Eylau, and believed that a reinforcement 
 to Lestocq s corps before the battle might have made 
 of the indecisive struggle a glorious victory. Young 
 Brandt meanwhile did not waste his leisure, but gave 
 his spare hours to the study of the small library he had 
 brought with him, and almost learnt by heart Caesar s 
 " Commentaries," the " Seven Years War," and Vol 
 taire s " Charles XII.," in the intervals of drill, finding 
 this easier, he frankly says, than to command his squad 
 with the full confidence necessary in an inefficient offi 
 cer. At length an order reached the battalion to 
 march upon Tilsit, which was received with joy until 
 news came of the cause. Prussia s hitherto faithful 
 ally, the Czar Alexander, had seen his chosen general 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 249 
 
 Benningsen throw away the whole advantage of a long 
 and able defensive campaign by the one morning of 
 rashness that brought on the battle of Friedland. 
 Hoping vainly to surprise a French detachment, he 
 risked an army, inferior in numbers and less easily 
 moved than the French, in face of the enemy and with 
 a deep river in its rear. Napoleon seized on his ad 
 vantage with a readiness worthy of his young days of 
 Italy, and the victory which followed, though more 
 easily won than those of Marengo and Austerlitz, was 
 as striking and decisive as either. Russia abandoned 
 her ally a few days later, and the victor w^as able to 
 dictate his own terms to the prostrate monarchy of the 
 Hohenzollerns. Prussia came out of the struggle shorn 
 of half her territories, and a mere helpless vassal of the 
 French Empire. Among her losses were the recent 
 acquisitions of Polish soil, and her boundaries were so 
 freely clipped to make the new Grand Duchy of Warsaw 
 formidable, that some hundreds of thousands of pure 
 Germans were transferred to the latter, and became in 
 all but name, subjects of France. Among those thus 
 abruptly handed over was the family of Brandt, and 
 the young ensign was ordered forthwith to lay aside 
 his Prussian commission and repair to his home. His 
 discharge bore on its face the official endorsement of 
 its purpose, being " granted in order not to withdraw 
 the bearer from the service of the new authorities of 
 his country." 
 
 Following out the instructions handed him, the 
 ex-ensign made his way to Warsaw and presenting him 
 self to the commandant, was sent on to appear person 
 ally before Davoust, who held a sway, almost absolute 
 at that period of military rule, over the newly-formed 
 
HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 Grand Duchy, of which he was Governor-General. The 
 young Prussian, after some waiting, was ushered sud 
 denly into the presence of the redoubtable marshal. 
 He found leaning against a door-post a middle-sized, 
 strongly-built man, somewhat under forty years old, of 
 stern, hard features and thoroughly military bearing, 
 dressed in a simple uniform, with jack-boots and a plain 
 officer s sword, his rank being denoted only by the 
 silver baton embroidered on his epaulets. " You are 
 from the Memel," he asked, at once of Brandt ; " did 
 you see the Queen there ? " " Yes, your Excellency, I 
 saw her but the day before I came away." " Was she 
 in trouble ? Did she look sorrowful ? " were the next 
 questions put rapidly by the interrogator. " I only 
 saw her walking on the beach with the .two eldest 
 princes," was the reply, which produced a sharp * An 
 swer me my question ; did she look as if she were in 
 trouble ? " " Yes, indeed," replied Brandt more boldly ; 
 " and she had good cause, for they have taken half his 
 country away from the King." " And whose fault is 
 that ? " went x on the marshal, without showing any 
 anger at the Prussian sympathies of his hearer, but 
 seeking apparently to work up his own feelings of hos 
 tility to the injured royal house ; " was it not she who 
 forced the poor King into danger? Did. not she com 
 pel him to throw down the glove to the Emperor ? 
 Was not she herself at Jena, haranguing the regiments 
 in uniform ? But for her intrigues and the bluster of 
 the officers of the guard, the King would have now 
 been in alliance with us, and the monarchy of the 
 Great Frederic not have been dashed to pieces. How 
 ever," he suddenly added, recollecting himself, " all 
 this is no business of yours. Go back to your own 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 251 
 
 home, and be henceforward a faithful subject of your 
 new lord." 
 
 Brandt went, but only to find that all the comfort 
 and prosperity of his father s house was destroyed by 
 the waste of war. The exactions of the French com 
 missariat had almost ruined his own family, while all 
 around them there reigned the confusion of revolution, 
 for the Prussian functionaries had been removed and 
 their places were not yet supplied. Feeling his pres 
 ence at home to be but an additional burden on means 
 already overtaxed, and burning to put his lately ac 
 quired knowledge to some use, Brandt resolved, in 
 spite of Davoust s warning, to seek entrance once more 
 into the Prussian army. His father had once been 
 acquainted with Bliicher, who was at that time stationed 
 near the Polish frontier of Prvssia ; and armed with a 
 letter to the veteran, even then a distinguished officer, 
 young Brandt made his way to his quarters. The 
 general read carelessly the introduction handed him, 
 and roughly told the applicant that he knew already 
 of too many in the same case, and could do nothing 
 for him. The coarse, sharp manner with which 
 Brandt s suit was rejected, struck him all the more 
 after a visit made on quitting Bliicher to the heroic and 
 ill-fated Schill, whose personal courage and warm 
 patriotism had made him known in Prussia far better 
 than most officers of higher rank. He had already 
 come to be looked upon by many as the future cham 
 pion of their suffering country, and Brandt s friends had 
 advised him to try what an interview there would do 
 for him in case he failed to find aid in Bliicher. SchilJ, 
 though already the centre of a movement which gave 
 birth afterwards to the famous Tugcudbund, could 
 
252 HENR Y VON BRA ND T, 
 
 promise nothing for the young man who sought his 
 interest ; but his manner was in pleasing contrast to 
 that of the old general, and the writer pays our nation 
 the compliment of finding no word so suited to express 
 his admiration of it, as that of gentlemanlike, borrowed 
 into his text from our tongue. 
 
 Heart-sick with disappointments and weary with his 
 journey, Brandt once more gained the Polish town of 
 Sochaczew, near which his parents lived. He found 
 here an ex-Prussian officer and friend of his father s 
 who had been appointed to the nominal command 
 merely for the purpose of making him responsible for 
 the supplies of a French division which was in camp 
 not far off. French officials in the characters of town- 
 major and government secretary ruled the district 
 through the Commandant, and led the the poor man, 
 who knew but little of their tongue, a life of misery ; 
 while he dared not resign his post for fear some suc 
 cessor should be appointed, less reluctant than himself 
 to spare the inhabitants as much as possible from fur 
 ther exactions. Brandt offered his assistance in the 
 Commandant s office, and was gladly accepted, being 
 appointed, as the only equivalent his friend could give 
 to the rank of corporal unattached. Two months pass 
 ed away in this fashion, the young man s zeal and at 
 tention making him more and more useful, when there 
 reached the place a Polish major employed in gather 
 ing recruits for the troops then being raised for French 
 use on the banks of the Vistula. He applied to the 
 Commandant for the aid of a temporary adjutant, and 
 obtained the loan of the services of young Brandt, who 
 received his warm thanks, when he left the place a few 
 days later, for the assiduity and activity which had 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 253 
 
 enabled him to finish his business with unhoped-for 
 speed. But this officer, it soon appeared, had not con 
 tented himself with empty praise. Though he had 
 held out no promise of helping Brandt to a better po 
 sition, he remembered him to some purpose when he 
 reached Warsaw. Three weeks after his departure, a 
 French gendarme reached the Commandant s office at 
 Sochaczew, with a dispatch addressed to " M. Brandt, 
 late ensign in the Prussian service." Opening it, he 
 found, to his astonishment, that Marshal Davoust had 
 appointed him sub-lieutenant in the " Legion of the 
 Vistula," under authority granted to the Governor- 
 General to fill up the vacant commissions in the new 
 corps, and now directed him to proceed to the depot 
 of the regiment, which was to be located at Sedan, 
 then an almost forgotten fortress left far within the 
 frontiers of the new Empire, but destined to a sad 
 celebrity in later days, when the heritage of that Em 
 pire should be dashed to pieces before its walls. The 
 young Prussian was too well trained in submission to 
 local authority and too desirous of employment to do 
 more than cast one glance of regret at his lost chance 
 of fighting for his native country. In a few days more 
 he was on his march through it with 500 Polish recruits, 
 and ere long, traversing the great road by which Napo 
 leon was to flee ruined from Leipsic six years later, 
 arrived upon the Rhine at Mayence, and crossed the 
 river into France. 
 
 Marching in that country he found more pleasant 
 than in Germany, where the political circumstances of 
 the time had made the Poles peculiarly obnoxious. 
 " They left off calling us barbarians, and rascally 
 Chinese," he says, " though our village quarters were 
 
254 HEA T R Y VON BRA ND T, 
 
 still rough and unpleasant enough." Arrived at Sedan, 
 the new recruits were properly shoed, dressed, and 
 after a very brief delay, ordered forward to join the 
 armies gathering at the gate of the Pyrenees. Napo 
 leon s first Spanish adventure had disastrously failed, 
 through the incompetency of Dupont, hitherto a 
 favorite and distinguished general. Europe had heard 
 with astonishment of 20,000 disciplined French troops 
 laying down their arms to a mere mob of hasty levies. 
 All Spain had risen. English gold and arms were 
 pouring in to the aid of the insurgent Juntas. More 
 over, the French in Portugal had been completely 
 defeated about the same time by a young British 
 general, one Arthur Wellesley, hitherto unknown to 
 European fame, and had evacuated that country alto 
 gether. A small corner only of the Peninsula was left 
 to the king whom Napoleon had named to the throne 
 of which he had laid treacherous hold, under guise of 
 friendly intervention. Europe had witnessed the new 
 turn of events with astonishment, and there were not 
 wanting prophets to declare that the hour of Napoleon s 
 fall was near, and that fortune had for ever abandoned 
 the man who had used her favors so ill. But the Em 
 peror took better measure of the calibre of his enemies 
 and the immediate circumstances of the time, and pre 
 pared deliberately to enter Spain in person with resist 
 less strength, little dreaming of the tenacity of the 
 national resistance which was before him, or of the 
 fatal wound to his strength which "the Spanish ulcer" 
 was little by little hereafter to inflict. A quarter of a 
 million soldiers were passing the Pyrenees to avenge 
 the disaster of Baylen, and among them young Brandt, 
 and his squad of Polish recruits, left Bordeaux after a 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 
 
 brief halt to take their part in the great Peninsular 
 campaign of the autumn of 1808. He had time to 
 mark the true Southern looseness of manners which 
 showed itself in forms repulsive to his stricter senti 
 ment, as his detachment made its last marches to the 
 Pyrenean frontier of France ; to observe the strange 
 likeness of the sandy wastes and fir-clad heaths of the 
 Landes to the Polish plains in which his childhood had 
 been passed ; to gaze wonderingly at the building at 
 Bayonne, where the Emperor had meditated on and 
 fixed the fate of the Spanish princes who had trusted 
 themselves to his keeping ; to glance at the baths of 
 Biarritz lately used by Napoleon himself, while the 
 cavalry of the guard formed a chain of videttes from 
 sea to sea, circling round the bathing-place for the 
 protection of his sacred person ; to call up to memory 
 the mysterious legends of the stony pass of Fuentera- 
 bia into which the column next plunged ; to see at 
 every stage the individuality of the Polish depot melt 
 ing away in the gathering military stream in which it 
 formed but a drop ; and so the young subaltern found 
 himself in Spain, marching as already in the enemy s 
 presence, with van and rear-guard, and side patrols, 
 searching closely every lurking-place, and his illusions 
 as to the romance of the country vanishing as the prom 
 ised land of beauty resolved itself into a succession of 
 paltry villages of closely fastened houses, tenanted 
 chiefly by hideous old women, with here and there a 
 few peasants, dirty and degraded, but still defiant of the 
 invaders. 
 
 Brandt s first Spanish quarters proved more agreea 
 ble than the outer aspect of the house, a close-barred 
 decayed mansion, had promised. The host, a genuine 
 
256 HENR Y VCN BRA ND T, 
 
 hidalgo in birth and manners, did his best to converse 
 with his unbidden guests, " which, as he did not under 
 stand either French or German, and spoke chiefly on 
 religious subjects," was not at first an easy matter. 
 Having made out the tenor of his questions to concern 
 the faith of the strangers, Brandt wrote out for him in 
 Latin the Apostles Creed, which not only satisfied the 
 Spaniard of the soundness of their tenets, but led to 
 his raking up, for present use, the stock of that lan 
 guage he had brought many years before from the 
 University of Huesca, where he had studied with intent 
 to take orders. A conversation in this medium follow 
 ed, turning on the politics of the crisis, the host de 
 clining to give Napoleon the rank of " Caesar" or 
 " Imperator," and allowing him no more honor than 
 was implied in the title of " Supremus Dux Franco-Gal- 
 lorum." When, on further questioning, the guest de 
 clared himself not a Catholic but a Lutheran, and assur-j 
 ed the host that in Germany people of the two churches 
 could meet together, live together, and even marry one 
 another, the good Spaniard declined to give ear to 
 such wondrous stories, but declared that for him any 
 one who used the Apostles Creed was a good Catholic 
 and no heretic, and as such he would welcome him.j 
 "The conversation, adds the memoir, "affords such 
 an excellent illustration of the state of the land in which 
 I was to pass the next few years, that I have purposely^ 
 dwelt on its details." The next stage brought him to 
 Pampeluna, where he found leisure to visit the \vorksjj 
 of the citadel and examine the entrance where a party 
 of French soldiers, from an encampment outside, had 
 surprised the place in the preceding winter under cover 
 of a pretended snow-ball match, the players and spec- 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 
 
 257 
 
 tators having their arms at hand in a bread-cart. St. 
 Sebastian and Barcelona, with other lesser places, had 
 been occupied in a like treacherous manner, and their 
 seizure by a pretended ally, according to our writer, 
 had much to do with the hatred which brought on the 
 subsequent insurrection. 
 
 The campaign had fairly opened when Brandt 
 reached Pampeluna. It is not necessary for us to fol 
 low out in detail the childish strategy with which the 
 Spanish leaders, intoxicated by the success of Baylen, 
 sought to surround and cut off Napoleon s concentrated 
 masses. Against such imbecility the Emperor would 
 have triumphed with ease, even had he not wielded 
 jarmies superior in numbers as well as training to the 
 ; ill-organized bodies which were scattered on his front 
 jand flanks. An English reader may well take comfort 
 in the thought that the only exception to the faults of 
 Napoleon s enemies in that fatal autumn, was the gal 
 lant blow by which Moore, striking on the conqueror s 
 communications, released Madrid fora while from pres 
 sure, and gave the remnant of the Spanish forces time 
 to recover from their first disasters. When Brandt 
 came on the scene, and joined his regiment, the armies 
 of Estremadura and Galicia had been already scattered 
 by the French, and Lannes was marching against 
 those of Andalusia and Arragon, which formed the 
 western part of the great arc which the Spanish had 
 I formed round their enemy. Despite the misfortunes 
 ! of their comrades, the two commanders, Castanas and 
 Palafox, had too much jealousy or over-confidence to 
 unite, although both were close to Tudela and within 
 i sight of each other. Lannes paused, according to his 
 I orders, for a day or two, to give Ney, who was co-op- 
 
258 HENR Y VON BRAND T, 
 
 crating to the westward, time to cut the foe off from 
 Madrid, and then moved his columns against them. He 
 was suffering at the time from a severe accident, yet 
 exerted himself personally to reconnoitre the Spanish 
 positions, and discovered the two armies just so far 
 apart as to give him the opportunity, which he eagerly 
 seized, of beating them in detail. Turning first against 
 Palafox, whose troops were drawn up in a line so long 
 as to be far beyond their commander s power to ma 
 noeuvre, he rapidly attacked the Spanish centre with the 
 division of Mathieu, supported by the brigade of Ha- 
 bert, of which Brandt s regiment formed part. The 
 Spanish regiments menaced gave way at once, and 
 Lannes pouring his cavalry through the opening, the 
 whole army of Arragon was soon in ignominious con 
 fusion and retreat. Lannes then executed a rapid 
 change of front to his right to move against Castanos ; 
 but the troops of the latter were so intimidated by the 
 spectacle of the defeat of their comrades, that they 
 moved off without even waiting to receive the attack, 
 bringing on their commander by this conduct the vul 
 gar charge of treason, with which the generals of rev 
 olutionary armies are for ever assailed when unsuc 
 cessful. Brandt relates but briefly the events of this 
 important day, in which the imaginary strength of 
 Spain finally collapsed ; and his account of it is chiefly 
 given from notes made long after, partaking thus 
 rather of the historical than the personal view. In 
 fact, his own battalion being held in reserve, never ap 
 proached the enemy at all, and but that a cannon-shot 
 or two went over his head, he could with difficulty believe 
 he had shared in the great action, in which the enemy 
 left behind them 4,000 killed (including many drowned 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF 7 "HE FIRST EMPIRE. 2 $() 
 
 in the attempt to escape over the Ebro) and thirty 
 uns. The whole event seemed like a dream to the 
 young subaltern, who never saw the Spaniards dis 
 tinctly, and though continually advancing with his 
 egiment, only heard the shots getting more and more 
 aint in the distance, as the retreat changed into rapid 
 d unresisting flight. His corps, the third, which 
 ad done most of the work, had apparently reason 
 nough to despise their adversaries ; but were soon to 
 earn the old lesson, that troops contemptible in the 
 eld, may yet fight desperately under cover. The re- 
 jmains of Palafox s army sought refuge in Saragossa, 
 ind recovering heart when they found themselves un- 
 Dursued by Moncey (who now commanded in Lannes 
 :>lace), prepared for that defence which has made the 
 :ity for ever famous in the history of patriotism. Mon- 
 :ey was thought but poorly of by his soldiers, who from 
 :he first instinctively felt him to be but a slow and fee- 
 Die successor to the brilliant victor of Tudela. Al- 
 :hough the battle was won on November twenty-third, 
 lot two days march from Saragossa, it was a week 
 Defore the French commander came in sight of the 
 :ity ; and when fairly before it, want of means, or 
 pread of repeating the failure made earlier in the war, 
 held him back from any attempt to take the place by 
 a coup-de-main : nor was it until he had received a 
 fegular park of heavy guns, and been reinforced by the 
 whole corps of Mortier, that he commenced, about the 
 middle of December, after several vain summonses ,to 
 Palafox, the first operations of the memorable siege. 
 
 The story of that heroic struggle has never been so 
 agreeably told as in the memoirs of the young German 
 whose career we are following. Brandt was, indeed, 
 
2 6o HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 unfortunate enough to be detached at its opening to 
 Alagon, where the hospitals of the army had been 
 opened after the late victory, and to fall ill of an in- 
 fectious fever which was fatal to hundreds of the 
 wounded soldiers whose lives the Spanish bullets would 
 have spared. But after looking closely at death in c 
 form more frightful to the soldier than the worst to be 
 met on a battle-field, after wandering from his quarten 
 in a delirium, and unconsciously taking possession of c 
 bed in a ward full of dying privates, the young Prussiar 
 fell into the hands of a rough but kind-hearted docto] 
 of his own regiment, and speedily recovered. In Janu 
 ary he was again at the camp, and soon afterward 
 ready to take his turn of the most severe duty thai 
 subaltern was ever taxed with ; for Grandjean s divisior 
 (to which Habert s brigade belonged) was charged wit* 
 the principal attack, and no regiments were more dis 
 tinguished than those of the Vistula Legion, whose 
 chief, Colonel Chlopicki, here first earned the higl 
 name which he kept to the end of his career. 
 
 Brandt found his battalion regularly quartered witl 
 others in some former gardens of the suburbs. The 
 field officers and staff were, for the most part, housec 
 in the ruins of some sheltered building; but the bull 
 of officers and men alike were living in narrow excava- 
 tions covered over with earth laid on branches, anc 
 supplied with slender rations, eked out chiefly by fooc 
 purchased from certain adventurous suttlers of the 
 French side of the Pyrenees, who had swarmed acros; 
 the mountains the roads into France being then toler 
 ably safe to trade on the wants of their countrymen 
 The soldiers would in general have been poor custom 
 ers, but for irregular resources not recognized in the 
 

 A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 26 1 
 
 jS mperial pay-lists. The chief of these during the early 
 part of the siege was the plunder of the pockets of the 
 [Spaniards slain in the continuous skirmishing by which 
 ? ;he French carried the suburbs and olive-yards around 
 ;he city after a contest of many days. At that time 
 fche defenders were frequently more numerous than the 
 issailants, and among them were a large proportion of 
 patriotic volunteers who had flocked into Saragossa 
 i rom the country, bringing all their little worldly wealth 
 ppon their persons. There were in Brandt s regiment 
 nany gamekeepers and foresters from the woods of 
 East Prussia, accustomed to shoot from their youth, 
 jvho found the prospect of such human quarry so much 
 :o their taste, that they were never so pleased, during 
 his part of the siege, as when it fell to the turn of their 
 Battalion to furnish pickets for the front. 
 
 The work became closer and more serious about 
 he time that Brandt resumed duty. Under the guid- 
 ince of a veteran sergeant who had fought in former 
 lays in Italy, Austria, and Poland, he learned ail the 
 Hysterics of loopholing to advantage, so as to keep 
 lis own men under cover, at the same time, as far as 
 possible, observing the enemy. Attacks now went on 
 anceasingly, and before long the besiegers made good 
 i lodgement in the city: but their real work still re 
 named to be done, for Saragossa was crowded with 
 riassive stone buildings, convents for the most part, 
 vith walls of such portentous thickness as to make of 
 -ach a separate fortalice ; while the narrow, devious 
 treets were so wholly commanded by the windows or 
 oopholed openings used by the defenders, that they 
 were almost useless for purposes of approach. The 
 French were reduced to winning their way to the heart 
 
2 62 HENRY VON BRANDT 
 
 of the place by the slow process of mine and sap, vari( 
 by sharp assaults upon the strong buildings successive 
 breached by their explosions, and in each case obs 
 nately defended. Thus week passed after week, \vi 
 constant losses, frequent displays of individual heroisi 
 and a regular though often very slow advance ; f 
 Lannes had returned to take command of the arm 
 and his energetic spirit breathed itself through all belc 
 him. Lacoste, the general of engineers, who hi 
 become known in person to every soldier of the attac 
 ing force, fell a sacrifice to a needless exposure of h 
 person on a subaltern s duty ; but Rogniat, in lat 
 days the severest critic of his imperial master s methc 
 of war, took up the work with zeal, and it went forwai 
 steadily, each lodgement in a building newly gainc 
 being thoroughly strengthened by Lannes own orde 
 before a new one was made : until, on the eighteenl 
 of February, the University buildings, which cor 
 manded the junction of the two principal streets, ar 
 had resisted all attempts at assaults, were blown 
 with 1,500 Ibs. of powder, and the column of attac 
 that followed the explosion safely lodged within. P 
 afox then at once wisely treated, and three days afte 
 wards the remains of his once formidable garrisc 
 defiled before the French army and laid down the 
 weapons. The imperial soldiers viewed with son 
 indignation the cortege of about 10,000 ill-clad irreg 
 lars who appeared. Their ranks were full of gra; 
 bearded men and lads, their discipline was nomine 
 their uniform for the most part confined, except for tl 
 officers, to a gray cloak and red cockade, these vo 
 unteers being clad otherwise just as they had left the 
 distant homes, in peasants or artisans dress. Tl 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 263 
 
 7 rench soldiers murmured audibly that they should be 
 
 drawn up in parade order to receive so mean a set of 
 )risoners ; but the Spaniards (our writer judges) looked 
 
 on their defenders with very different eyes, and the 
 pirit of earnest resistance which began at Saragossa 
 dndled at every opening, and made the subjugation of 
 he Ebro provinces the hardest task a French marshal 
 
 ever accomplished. 
 
 There is nothing novel in the admiration extorted 
 rom Brandt by the obstinacy of the defence ; but he 
 >hows us that there is another less popular but equally 
 rue side to the story of Saragossa, which is that the 
 esistance made by Palafox reflects not less credit to 
 hose who had to overcome it, and involved losses to 
 he gallant Spaniards out of all proportion to their 
 
 number. The glory, he says, which the world has 
 >estowed upon the latter, should by right belong first 
 o their conquerors. Deducting the divisions detached 
 
 o watch against attempts made to relieve the place, 
 Cannes had but about 15,000 men available for the ac- 
 ual attack. Of these nearly a third succumbed to the 
 :nemy s fire, or the more dreaded typhus ; but they 
 managed to hold within their works a fighting force 
 stimated at the outset at 30,000 soldiers and irregulars, 
 and to destroy or take the whole. The service was 
 naturally unpopular as well as severe. " Why did not 
 fall at Eylau or Friedland," said a dying officer of 
 renadiers to Brandt, " where we were fighting against 
 worthy enemy? It was only the devotion of the 
 ligher staff which maintained in the soldiers for weary 
 nonths the necessary zeal and fire. Brandt himself on 
 various occasions saw not only his brigadier, Habert, 
 % but Junot and Lannes, take up a musket in the trenches, 
 
264 HENRY VON BRANDT 
 
 and exchange shots with the enemy s marksmen. Th( 
 latter exposed himself repeatedly like the meanest sol 
 dier, and on one occasion Brandt watched him con 
 tinuing to fire, until the enemy, annoyed at the persis 
 tence of the unknown skirmisher, deliberately trainee 
 a howitzer on the portion of parapet behind which he 
 stood, the first shell from which killed a captain of 
 engineers at the marshal s side. Junot was more reck 
 less still than his chief, fully justifying his reputation 
 won at Toulon, where he first owed Napoleon s notice 
 to this quality of daring. He delighted apparently in 
 sitting coolly under a hot fire, discussing the proceed 
 ings around him in rough soldier s phrase with any one 
 who was near ; and it was after such a conversation, at 
 a time of special danger, that Brandt heard a veteran 
 major near him grumble forth, " Is it possible that this 
 man, who is so hopelessly mad, can be kept at the head 
 of an Army Corps ? " 
 
 At times it needed something more than cool con 
 duct towards the enemy to preserve the sway of these 
 rough leaders over the rougher elements they ruled. 
 General Habert, a tall, powerful man, a type of the 
 coarse but daring officer of the Republican era, was 
 stooping one day to gain cover as he passed along a 
 trench by a party of recruits who had just joined one 
 of his French regiments. " Ha ! your generals are afraid 
 sometimes, then," cried one of the coarse jesters who 
 are to be found in every company of common soldiers. 
 Foaming with sudden anger, the brigadier turned upon 
 the daring speaker, seized him by the collar, and pull 
 ing him out of his cover, held him on the top of the 
 parapet, standing himself by his side. A volley was 
 poured on them at once by the enemy, and the 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 
 
 265 
 
 unhappy joker fell dead, while the general escaped with 
 a slight flesh wound in the arm. " It serves the con 
 script right," was the only comment made by the com 
 rades of the slain soldier, " for speaking like that 
 of such a general as ours." And to the end of the 
 siege, the brigadier, despite other outbreaks of vio 
 lence, was as popular as ever with those whose perils 
 he shared. 
 
 For some months after the fall of Saragossa the 
 campaign in Arragon languished. General Habert 
 was unfortunate enough to fail thanks partly to his 
 own fierce temper in the only operation of importance 
 entrusted to his brigade ; and the failure was a signifi 
 cant proof of the difficulties nature had placed in the 
 w r ay of the conquest of that rugged country. The 
 general was engaged in crossing the Cinca river, which 
 he had approached by a forced march, and hurrying 
 on the passage of the advance guard of his brigade in 
 the only two skiffs available, when he was interrupted 
 by one of the boatmen, who was seen by Brandt to 
 rush up and hastily accost him, as though remonstra 
 ting at the continuance of the attempt. The Spaniard 
 was repelled with a loud curse, accompanied by a kick, 
 for his interference, and the passage went on for a 
 brief space, until the eight flank companies of the bri 
 gade and a small detachment of horse were safely 
 across. Then the wisdom of the warning became 
 apparent. The river suddenly rose, as the boatman 
 had predicted, and poured down its bed in a few sec 
 onds in a raging torrent, which at once forbade all 
 thoughts of further crossing. The companies already 
 sent over were cut off from the bulk of the force, and 
 the noise of the stream prevented all attempts at com- 
 
 
2 66 HENRY VON BRANDT 
 
 municating with them. The flood showing no signs 
 of abating, and no orders from their chief being likely 
 to reach them, they were seen to move off, and disap 
 peared from the sight of their comrades, no one knew 
 whither, while General Habert, after vainly trying to 
 pass at other points, and waiting the whole day in 
 hopes of communicating with them, returned the next 
 morning to Barbastro, from which he had marched. 
 Two days later the lost cavalry suddenly appeared, 
 but only to bring the ill news that the whole of the 
 infantry that had passed, the picked troops of the bri 
 gade, had fallen into the enemy s hands. Their senior 
 officer had formed the idea, on discovering his isolated 
 condition, that his safest course was to march due east 
 ward through the Pyrenees into France ; but the 
 Spanish garrison of Lerida, with the aid of the gueril 
 las who swarmed in that district, had headed his 
 column off on every side, until, worn out with fatigue 
 and hunger, it had been compelled to surrender. Ha 
 bert, who had forced them into peril, and been unable 
 to devise means for their succour, was in despair over 
 the loss of his favorite companies. The rough soldier 
 was seen to burst into tears, exclaiming frantically, 
 " Oh ! mcs pauvres grenadiers ! mes braves voltigeurs ! " 
 with genuine self-reproach for his own want of precau 
 tion. Suchet has not omitted to note the disaster in 
 his memoirs, nor to remark that for ages this river 
 Cinca had been noted for the sudden and dangerous 
 floods which sweep down its bed from the mountains 
 without warning. 
 
 This failure, and some others less important, had 
 seriously depressed the spirits of the third corps, which 
 ha4 been left under Junqt after Saragossa. fell ; but the 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 2 6/ 
 
 advent of Suchet, who was appointed to the command 
 in the summer of 1809, soon worked a wondrous change. 
 Then was seen to the full how completely, in time of 
 active service, the character of a chief is infused through 
 the army placed under him, and influences even its low 
 est ranks. The new general won the respect of his 
 troops at once by the practical skill \vith which he ex 
 amined their appointments in his first inspection, and 
 their affection by the praise he bestowed freely where 
 officers and men deserved it. Each private felt from 
 that time that he had over him a general who cared 
 honestly for his wants, and exacted from him no un 
 necessary toil, though the enemy were to feel his activ 
 ity against them to be unsparing when activity was of 
 service. Discipline was rigidly enforced, and the 
 country people so fully protected from all individual 
 exaction, that Brandt tells us of a soldier being sent 
 before a court-martial for robbing a peasant of a few 
 eggs. Hence trade forthwith resumed its natural 
 course wherever not interrupted by the guerillas and 
 the presence of these became more dreaded than that 
 of a French garrison. The regular taxes, aided by 
 forced rations for troops on the march, sufficed for the 
 fair wants of the army, and supplied means for the 
 series of operations which the new chief soon began, 
 and which was continued, with almost unvaried success, 
 until his sway was extended over a third of Spain. In 
 these campaigns, of which Suchet himself has ably 
 written, Brandt shared to the full. The young Prus 
 sian subaltern came to be personally known to the 
 marshal ; had the command throughout the years 
 1810-11 of a picked company of skirmishers; and saw 
 Blake s army driven out of the field, shut up in Valen- 
 
HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 cia, and finally forced to surrender to a force but very 
 little exceeding its own numbers. Two years and a 
 half had then passed by in the operations which caused 
 Napoleon to declare Suchet the best general he pos 
 sessed, and which left the marshal, at the opening of 
 1812, in almost undisturbed possession of all that part 
 of Spain which Wellington s operations could not reach. 
 Brandt judges Suchet rather to have been a man of 
 exceeding energy in action and carefulness in prepara 
 tion, than a soldier of great genius. He lived with 
 remarkable simplicity even when ruling absolutely three 
 large provinces ; and although his wife was w 7 ith him 
 whenever he halted, his table was invariably of the 
 plainest description. " Vegetables of the country and 
 the inevitable mutton cutlet, the whole consumed in a 
 quarter of an hour," formed the simple entertainment, 
 atwhich Brandt, in his capacity of officer on guard at 
 headquarters, was often present. He had gained the 
 marshal s confidence by this time very specially for 
 one of his rank, and had received from him the Cross 
 of the Legion of Honor after a second wound, with a 
 promise of promotion, which however accident with 
 held from him for some time after. He was therefore 
 but little surprised when sent for by his chief, and told 
 that he was selected to escort the captive Spanish gen 
 eral on the first stages of his journey towards France. 
 At this his last interview with his renowned leader, 
 Brandt could observe plainly a depression ill correspond 
 ing to the recent triumph that had rewarded such long 
 toils, and believed it to be the consequence of the news 
 which had just reached the army of a fresh outbreak 
 of the insurrectionary spirit of Arragon, extending to 
 the very gates of Saragossa. Possibly the marshal, in 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 269 
 
 the midst of his successes, foresaw the day when the 
 faults of others would undo all the advantages he had 
 won for France, and force her to abandon his hardly- 
 won conquests. " Marmont calls him a mediocre officer 
 not one of those special men who grow greater with 
 danger," observes our writer justly ; " but for all that 
 he was the only French general in Spain who uniform 
 ly succeeded in all his undertakings." The marshal 
 gave his instructions as to Blake in the few significant 
 words, "Treat him like a Commander-in-chief, but 
 watch him as you would a rascal ; " renewed his prom 
 ise of obtaining Brandt his early promotion, and dis 
 missed him to his new duty with the kindly expressed 
 hope of seeing him soon again in Valencia a hope 
 not destined to fulfilment, for the young lieutenant was 
 never again to meet the chief under whose teaching 
 he had been trained into a practised soldier. 
 
 The escort set out on its way, and Brandt, before 
 his task was ended, found good reason to remember the 
 marshal s caution. The frontier of the province of 
 Valencia had not long been passed when he found him 
 self compelled to halt at Uldecona, a small place which 
 had been vacated for some reason by the French gar 
 rison. This being the first time he had been com 
 pelled to trust to his own detachment for security 
 through the night, and the vicinity being thickly 
 wooded, he spent the evening in placing his posts so 
 carefully as if possible to guard against surprise from 
 without or escape from within. Some steps from the 
 balcony of General Blake s chamber led direct into the 
 garden, and near this point the anxious lieutenant not 
 only placed a special post, but visited it repeatedly 
 after darkness came on. It was an hour after midnight 
 
270 HENR Y VON BRA ND T, 
 
 that he was thus inspecting his watch, when he heard a 
 door open quietly on the balcony, and saw the general 
 appear full dressed. Finding himself however observ 
 ed by Brandt, who now ascended from below, the 
 Spaniard asked who was there, and receiving the reply, 
 " The commander of your Excellency s guard," retired 
 either disconcerted from his attempt or annoyed at the 
 appearance of suspicion. Although the exercise of this 
 vigilance by Suchet s orders towards a high officer on 
 his parole might seem at first unjustifiable, it must be 
 remembered that Generals O Donoghue and Renovales 
 had just before disappeared from similar custody, vio 
 lating their words of honor under pretence that these 
 were made void by a guerilla attack upon their escort. 
 
 Next day the party arrived at Tortosa, but on the 
 way were joined by a Colonel Pepe, a Neapolitan in 
 the French service, who had been appointed to con 
 duct the Spanish commander thence into France. 
 Blake having complained to Pepe of the surveillance 
 under which he had been placed the night before, the 
 colonel took, or pretended to take, the captive s part, 
 and reproached Brandt roundly even threatening to 
 report him, although the latter showed that he had but 
 carried out Suchet s orders. The subaltern was not 
 sorry when a slight return of an old fever came on him 
 at Tortosa, and gave a fair excuse of his leaving his 
 detachment for the time, and with it the obnoxious 
 duty. This was his last employment in Spain ; for 
 making his way on recovery to his battalion, he found 
 it under sudden orders for France with the rest of the. 
 Vistula Legion. The spring of 1812, had now set in. 
 Napoleon s gigantic scheme for completing the subju 
 gation of continental Europe was about to be put in 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 07 1 
 
 execution ; and Polish troops could least of all be 
 spared from this greater design to share any longer in 
 the Spanish struggle which he deemed of such minor 
 importance. Yet Wellington had now wrested Portu 
 gal a second time from the grasp of the Imperial 
 Eagles, and, firmly established on its strong eastern 
 frontier, was preparing to pierce the barrier of fortress 
 es which separated him from Spain, and to win fresh 
 triumphs from the divided armies of Joseph in the 
 new year s campaign. The spring was to give him 
 Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajos ; the summer to behold 
 him scattering in rout the army of Napoleon s favorite 
 marshal at Salamanca ; the autumn to find the French 
 authority tottering throughout the Peninsula in every 
 province save those held by Suchet. But this year, 
 destined to be so fatal to his armies in Spain, was 
 selected by the Emperor for throwing the bulk of his 
 forces to the very opposite extremity of Europe, thus 
 leaving his brother s marshals wholly beyond reach of 
 succor, if fortune should declare itself for the patient 
 and watchful enemy who had just baffled them in Por 
 tugal. Such rashness was not unnoticed by those in 
 the French army to whom a long course of training 
 under the Eagles had left an independent thought. 
 Murmurs were audible among the officers ordered from 
 Spain, and the thoughts of many were put into plain 
 words by Chlopicki, the favorite chief of the Polish 
 Legion, whose saying, " Our good Napoleon has light 
 ed his candle at both ends, and will be burning his 
 fingers very soon," expressed pithily the doubts of the 
 hour, and reads now with all the force of fulfilled 
 prophecy. 
 
 Although expecting soon to revisit their own coun- 
 
HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 try, and possibly to assist in restoring her past glories, 
 the Polish soldiery had many regrets in leaving Spain. 
 Hard as their service had been (for Suchet s campaigns 
 were in fact a series of sieges, varied by marches and 
 combats), it had had its alleviations. The character of 
 the commander had caused his troops to be everywhere 
 respected. Except where the professional guerillas, 
 little better often than bandits on a grand scale, held 
 sway over a district, Suchet s forces had of late met 
 with but little of that persistent hostility with which 
 the French had to struggle in other parts of Spain. 
 They had advanced gradually in the career of conquest 
 from the rugged districts of Arragon and Catalonia into 
 the smiling plains of Valencia, which Brandt declares 
 to have struck him as worthy of the Spanish saying 
 which makes of them "a Paradise," though he will not 
 admit that the violent passions of the natives, though 
 remarkable enough even in Spain, deserve the qualifica 
 tion which the proverb adds, " peopled with devils." 
 The rough Polish soldiery fully appreciated the produc 
 tiveness, if not the scenery, of their late quarters, and 
 a veteran sergeant, as he turned his back on the last 
 view of the district, was heard to declare, what was no 
 uncommon sentiment, " One can live better there by 
 soldiering than by hard work in our country ; " words 
 which clothe with reality the old tale of the avidity 
 with which the barbarian invaders of the Roman Em 
 pire poured down upon the sunny lands of Southern 
 Europe. 
 
 Brandt himself had his personal regrets as he turned 
 his face towards the Pyrenees. The mountains shut 
 from the young man s gaze a spot to him sacred, which 
 he was never more to revisit, the small town of Cata- 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 273 
 
 layud, where, two years before, he had passed through 
 what he terms the " Idyll of my Life," an innocent 
 love passage with the young ex-novice. All the senti 
 ment of a true German lover is poured forth in his 
 description of his short acquaintance with the fair Inez, 
 whose guardian, a hard uncle of the true Spanish type 
 and deep hater of French rule, removed her suddenly 
 from the place during one of the absences on duty of 
 her young adorer. Brandt from that day never saw nor 
 heard more of his Inez. Happy for them both as he 
 admits this separation to have been (since there could 
 have been no good issue to such an attachment, and their 
 one hope, to escape from her family and get married 
 in France, was practically a dream), yet the sorrow of 
 that loss he declares to have dwelt with him through 
 fifty years of prosperous after-life and a long and happy 
 marriage with one of his own rank and nation. No 
 other love, he will have it, is so deeply tender and 
 unselfish as that of a Spanish maiden.; and in reading 
 his picture of the simple grace and loveliness of the fair 
 girl of Catalayud, one may realize the truth and beauty 
 of those minor romances of Cervantes, which are so 
 much less known than the world-admired u Don 
 Quixote," though hardly less picturesque or less illus 
 trative of the people of whom he wrote. 
 
 Brandt found his march through France, when 
 fairly entered on, an agreeable change enough. The 
 Poles were everywhere looked on as good friends and 
 worthy soldiers, and the Cross of Honor, borne by the 
 young sub-lieutenant, attracted constant notice. The 
 decoration was in those days not easily earned. It 
 was something, he says, that men turned round to look 
 at ; and princes would do well to remember how vastly 
 18 
 
274 HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 the indiscriminate distribution of such honors de 
 teriorates their practical use as genuine yet cheap 
 rewards of faithful service. Readers of the " Fezensac 
 Souvenirs" will remember how rapidly promotion in 
 the Grand Army fell upon those who had good military 
 connections. It speaks volumes for the difficulty of 
 obtaining it without such help that Brandt, after hav 
 ing been chosen before the enemy for the command 
 of a flank company (for such, with its full complement 
 of officers and men, his charge had been), leading it 
 constantly in a succession of combats and sieges for 
 two years, and winning favorable notice and special 
 military honors from a marshal of France, yet left 
 Spain still a sub-lieutenant, though he was soon, as we 
 shall see, to receive his long promised step. The 
 Legion marched leisurely at first, but was hurried for 
 ward through Central France, and at Montlieu the 
 commanding officers of battalions received sudden 
 orders to send their men forward in country carts. 
 The account of the whole march speaks ill enough for 
 the internal discipline under pressure of the Imperial 
 regiments. The colonel was never seen by the men ; 
 the battalion leaders only appeared now and then, 
 instead of sharing the march step by step ; and when 
 the carts were provided, for want of any proper super 
 vision, parties were allowed to fill each and drive off 
 just as they chose, and to straggle at night from their 
 already dispersed quarters. It was not surprising that 
 from three to four hundred men were absent when the 
 Legion mustered at Versailles, many of whom did not 
 rejoin their standards until the regiment was marching 
 from Paris some days later. 
 
 On March twenty-second, 1812, the Legion entered 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 2 ?$ 
 
 the capital, and as it stood waiting for orders on the 
 Place Vendome, Brandt heard his name called out, 
 and saw his colonel holding a paper, which proved to 
 be his long-expected brevet of lieutenant. It was 
 dated on March twenty-fifth, 1812, an obvious mistake 
 as he judged, for that day year had been the date 
 from \vhi,ch Suchet had recommended him, as that on 
 which he had specially distinguished himself by sup 
 pressing with his company a serious emeute in the bat 
 talion against an unpopular major. Moreover, the 
 commission was a duplicate copy, and the original 
 had of course been sent to his late headquarters in 
 Spain. But before Brandt had had full time to dis 
 cover the mistake, much less to take steps to have it 
 rectified, he was on his way to Russia, where the rav 
 ages of the dreadful campaign that followed were to 
 give him further well-earned promotion. He was yet 
 therefore in the first flush of unalloyed pleasure when 
 the regiment was ordered to move on to the Tuileries, 
 and making its way with difficulty through the crowd 
 of vehicles which even in those days choked the Rue 
 St.-Honore, turned into the Place du Carrousel, where 
 the Emperor was in the act of reviewing a large mass 
 of troops. There was little attempt at show ; the 
 divisions were drawn up in column ; and the Polish 
 Legion took the place assigned to it near the Guard 
 in a very confused state, for it was only by degrees 
 that its ranks were brought out of the disorder caused 
 by hurrying through the crowded streets. But the 
 purpose of the day was not mere parade, nor even the 
 evolutions with which commanders of peace armies are 
 wont to act dramas hardly possible in war. The troops 
 had been summoned together for the special object, 
 
HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 more important than these in Napoleon s eye, of bring 
 ing his own person into that familiar contact with his 
 soldiery which he had long proved a most powerful 
 means of calling forth their ardor at the commence 
 ment of some great undertaking. The Polish Legion 
 waited its turn for inspection patiently, while above 
 them in a gallery a party of gaily-dressed spectators 
 made comments on the scene below. Among them 
 one gentleman was conspicuous for the marked indif 
 ference with which he turned his back on the review, 
 while keeping up a lively conversation with the ladies 
 he accompanied ; and some of Brandt s Polish com 
 rades recognized by his uniform the Russian ambas 
 sador, not yet dismissed from the Court already openly 
 hostile to his master. In fact, that last exchange of 
 diplomatic forms was still in progress, by which great 
 nations bent on war strive to hide from the world their 
 willingness to enter on the contest, and to throw on 
 their opponents as much as possible the responsibility 
 of the evils which it must needs bring in its train. 
 
 A half-hour or more had thus passed, when a sud 
 den call from their commander brought the Legion to 
 attention ; and in a few minutes more the historic form, 
 which was recognized by all as soon as seen, approach 
 ed the head of the regiment. The Emperor was on 
 foot, with but a few attendants ; and among them were 
 Chlopicki, some time since made general, and one or 
 two other well-known Polish officers, to whom he first 
 expressed his general satisfaction with the conduct of 
 the Legion. Then he walked slowly down the side 
 of the column, and, stopping suddenly every now and 
 then, interrogated the oldest looking captain as to his 
 exact country and length of service, inquired the 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 
 
 cause of the absence of another whose place with his 
 company was filled by a junior officer, asked Brandt 
 himself sharply how often he had been wounded to get 
 that cross, and, satisfied with the reply, added, "You 
 are young enough still ; you will be a captain in good 
 time." Then he pulled from a private s haversack a 
 piece of his morning s ration of bread which was pro 
 jecting, tasted it, and with an emphatic " Pas mal" 
 passed on. His eye falling next on a man of the light 
 company who was exceptionably obese, he told the 
 Polish general to question him as to where he had con 
 trived to get so fat, and having the answer re-transla 
 ted, " Since I got back to France," ordered him to be 
 told, " You are quite right to take good care of your 
 self now ; you may be obliged to fast by-and-bye. " 
 Passing on, the Emperor indicated one or two men to 
 be called out and show their packs and cartridge- 
 boxes, and expressing his satisfaction with the con 
 dition of these, told them to fall in again. Had he 
 unrolled the great-coats, Brandt adds, he might have 
 seen that they were in a miserable condition, the hasty 
 march of seventeen days which had brought the regi 
 ment to Paris having ruined those which the Spanish 
 bivouacs had spared ; but this discovery was spared 
 the colonel, whom Napoleon complimented by declar 
 ing loudly that his regiment did not the least show the 
 effects of the hard campaign it had just shared. Be 
 fore passing from it, he selected a veteran sergeant out 
 of those he saw decorated with the Polish medal (the 
 ordinary reward of good conduct in the Legion) to 
 question him publicly as to his services, and finding 
 him to have been five times in the list of the wounded, 
 ordered him the coveted distinction of the Cross of 
 
HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 Honor. This last stroke done, he left the regiment, 
 telling the colonel to express officially for him his 
 pleasure at its condition. That afternoon at their 
 quarters an order was read out, conferring a number 
 of decorations on officers and men, those of the former 
 carrying the title of Knight of the Empire and pen 
 sions varying from 500 to 3,000 francs. The payment 
 of these, however, was not charged upon the military 
 chest which the Emperor watched so closely, but on 
 certain taxes on the trade of the Rhine, or on the 
 newly conquered districts of Valencia. Prize-agents 
 forthwith appeared, who in those days made a regular 
 traffic of buying up such donations; and the officers 
 who had the Rhenish pensions found no difficulty in 
 obtaining advances : but even Suchet s successes had 
 not made Spanish securities marketable, and the few 
 recipients who lived through the coming campaign 
 found the value of the Valencian grants limited to the 
 accompanying title of Chevalier. 
 
 Brandt, with about five thousand other officers, was 
 that night invited to a huge banquet to be given by 
 the Emperor, at which, however, the Imperial presence 
 was represented vicariously by Marshal Bessieres. The 
 scene was confusing enough, and seemed suited rather 
 to the headquarters of a conquering army than to an 
 emperor s court. Loud bands, rough soldier waiters, 
 and coarse crockery, all strangely smacking of the 
 canteen, were intermingled with choice wines and 
 viands of true Parisian excellence. The music of the 
 instruments, and the clatter of the French voices (none 
 but Frenchmen could be heard, says Brandt, in such 
 a din) ceased for a few seconds after the meal was 
 over, and a loud Vive / Empereur to the single toast 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 2/9 
 
 of the night resounded through the building. Then 
 the assembly dispersed through the city to seek 
 amusement elsewhere. Brandt and his party found 
 places at the theatre, where the QEdipus Coloneus was 
 performed in a French dress ; but, except the acting 
 of Talma (which was well suited to the tragic part of 
 Sophocles s unhappy hero), the taste of the young 
 Prussian, trained to the classic original in his student 
 days, found the whole representation unreal and almost 
 grotesque. 
 
 A long inspection by Marmont, who had not yet 
 left Paris for the duel with Wellington which was to 
 ruin his rising fame, occupied the next morning, the 
 whole interior economy of the regiment being looked 
 into by the marshal in his capacity as Inspector-Gen 
 eral of Reviews. Then followed hasty visits to the 
 chief sights of Paris, among which it is strange to note 
 that, despite the presence of Imperialism which perva 
 ded the atmosphere, the death-place of the slaughtered 
 D Enghien was especially sought out by curious Polish 
 and German eyes, and its site found to be already made 
 a show-place. Three days later, the regiment was on 
 its march to Sedan, where its depot had been stationed 
 ever since the Legion was raised. One only of the 
 four brother officers who had left the place for Bor 
 deaux with Brandt four years before, came back to it 
 again, so severe had been the demands of the Spanish 
 war. The regiment was now, with some others of the 
 Legion, assigned to a newly formed division, and the 
 Emperor lost all the popularity he had gained among 
 them on his late inspection, when the Poles heard that 
 their beloved chief Chlopicki had been passed over in 
 favor of a French general, Claparede, one noted too for 
 
2 SO HENRY VON BRANDT, 
 
 an overbearing brutality of manner, uncommon even 
 in those of the rough school of the Revolutionary 
 armies in which he had been trained. " We shall find 
 him," said the old adjutant-major, " a very unpleasant 
 comrade, a perfect roaring lion, seeking whom he may 
 devour ; " while another officer bitterly remarked that 
 Napoleon \vas imitating with the Polish Legion what 
 the allies had done with their country, Poland ; tearing 
 it in pieces, and distributing it out to foreigners. The 
 soldiers were as little pleased as their officers, nor had 
 they as solid consolation as the latter, who, on the 
 same day that gave them their new commander, receiv 
 ed through him the Imperial order for the instant 
 formation of the skeleton of a third battalion to the 
 regiment, an order repeated throughout the Legion. 
 
 This augmentation of the strength of the corps was 
 carried out with the celerity which probably in no 
 other service but that of Napoleon has ever been at 
 tained consistently with the least approach to efficiency. 
 The promotion of all the junior ranks was made over 
 to the colonel, who forthwith told off a sub-lieutenant 
 to take temporary charge of each of the new compa 
 nies, whose commission as lieutenant was to follow as 
 matter of course. Similarly a non-commissioned officer 
 was selected for each to act as sub-lieutenant, to be 
 confirmed in the rank after a short trial. The higher 
 commissions, however, were reserved, and Brandt 
 found himself for the present in command of the new 
 light company, composed, besides its three officers, of 
 a few picked corporals, and some recruits from the 
 depot. A few hours later, he had drawn up his charge 
 for Claparede s inspection, and had to face the sneer 
 with which his new general expressed his doubts 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 2 8l 
 
 whether so young a man could really have deserved 
 the decorations he bore. A warm retort from the lieu 
 tenant, declaring that he had won what he wore under 
 Marshal Suchet s own eyes, produced no more apology 
 than the coarse advice, " Don t get hot about it, 
 Mister Officer ; " but the rest of the inspection went on 
 quietly enough ; and as the new battalion marched 
 early next morning in advance of the rest of the regi 
 ment, Brandt was for the time freed from any disagree 
 able consequence of the collision. Claparede s conduct 
 it may be observed, at the head of the division, fully 
 justified the reports that had been heard of his charac 
 ter ; but his brutal severity fell oftener during the 
 campaign upon luckless peasants and others who came 
 by chance within his grasp than upon his own soldiery. 
 It is in time of peace, or in the comparative leisure of 
 a garrison, that the exactions of the martinet press 
 most odiously on those he commands. On the march 
 or before the enemy, there is less opportunity for the 
 exercise of petty tyranny ; and soldiers will then forgive 
 much that would be obnoxious within the barrack- 
 walls in a general who shows himself fertile in resource 
 and fearless in peril in the field. 
 
 In joining his new battalion Brandt had parted 
 from the more educated part of his comrades, and so 
 found little companionship in what would have been 
 otherwise a most interesting journey to one whose rec 
 ords at every step show him to have been an intellec 
 tual observer of scenery and manners. At Metz, how 
 ever, he was fortunate in a fleeting acquaintance with a 
 young artillery officer, who escorted him over the works 
 of the great fortress, and in whom modesty and knowl 
 edge seemed, his German listener thought, strangely 
 
2 g2 HENR Y VON BRA ND T, 
 
 mingled for one just emerged from cadethood, and 
 joining the most renowned and successful army the 
 world had ever seen. The controversy not yet wholly 
 settled in our own country as to the value of practical 
 or theoretical training for officers, even then occupied 
 men s minds in some degree ; for Brandt s new friend 
 lamented the length of the time he had been compelled 
 to pass in studying exact sciences, as so much deduct 
 ed from that in which he might have been traversing 
 the world with his regiment, and perhaps witnessing, 
 instead of reading of, deeds of arms. The young men 
 parted next day, but they were destined to meet once 
 again. In the crisis of the great battle of Borodino, 
 when Brandt s division was ordered to hold the great 
 redoubt just carried from the Russians, it was flanked 
 by a battery of artillery which had lost all its officers 
 but one young subaltern, whose valor and exertions 
 awoke admiring comment from Berthier, Davoust, and 
 the Viceroy Eugene, who were all near the scene, and 
 opposite the Russian centre. Seeing him suddenly 
 struck by a cannon-shot towards the close of the fight, 
 the Viceroy desired Brandt to take a surgeon to the 
 spot, and in the dying youth, who was fearfully man 
 gled, our writer recognized the newly-commissioned 
 artillerist of Metz, and thought sadly of the aspirations 
 for real service which were so soon to be fatally real 
 ized. 
 
 The Legion recrossed the Rhine, marching stead 
 ily eastward. The smiling plains of Saxony and the 
 rougher districts of Silesia were passed in turn; Brandt 
 giving his few leisure hours to the study of a Russian 
 grammar which he had bought upon the way. The 
 roads grew sandier and heavier as the Oder was ap- 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 283 
 
 preached, until the march was so toilsome that wagons 
 were furnished, contrary to the usual practice, to carry 
 the knapsacks and rations, so that the soldiers should 
 be weighted with nothing but their arms. The villages 
 now grew dirtier and more poverty-stricken at every 
 stage, until the German frontier was fairly passed, and 
 the Poles found themselves once more in their own 
 country under the shadow of the White Eagle, which 
 everywhere marked the spurious sovereignty of that 
 hybrid creation, neither province nor kingdom, the 
 Grand Duchy of Warsaw. French protection had 
 indeed done little for the physical aspect of the country. 
 Focus of Napoleonic intrigue, debateable land between 
 the aggressive Frank and unyielding Muscovite, Poland 
 had had for years to bear much of the pressure of war 
 without its excitement or its glories ; and now, as 
 forming the base from which the Grand Army was to 
 move to its greatest enterprise, the burden lay doubly 
 heavy upon her. Yet no one complained of the gov 
 ernment, or threw the odium of crushed trade and 
 exhausted means on French domination. No one 
 expressed a wish to have the Prussian rule restored in 
 Posen. No one, amid all the poverty and misery of 
 the land, murmured at anything more than the general 
 hardness of the times. The Grand Ducal Government 
 was national and popular, because it was felt to sympa 
 thize with its subjects. This is strange testimony to 
 gather from a Prussian pen ; but it is more striking still, 
 and may bring a lesson to other rulers than the coun 
 sellors of the Hohenzollern, to find from such unbiassed 
 authority that the reasons of this strange and complete 
 acquiescence of the Poles in the revolution which had 
 overthrown their late masters, lay in the intense dislike 
 
284 HENRY VOA T BRANDT, 
 
 entertained towards the Prussian officials, with their 
 cold, rigid measurement of Polish inferiority, their zeal 
 for forcing improvements and education of a strictly 
 North-German type upon a country unprepared to 
 receive them in short, what Brandt, seeking for a single 
 words, terms the Borussomania, which had led his 
 countrymen, during their years of possession, to strive 
 to bring the whole of the institutions of their conquest 
 into the exact mould of their own. It was not what 
 Prussia had desired to do for Poland, but the manner 
 of her doing it, which had made her government so 
 obnoxious that amid the standing exactions caused by 
 protracted preparations for war, none regretted the 
 change of rulers ; none, at least, except the few who, 
 like Brandt s own family, born and bred Germans, had 
 settled in Posen, and thus been severed by the political 
 circumstances of the time from the land which still held 
 their affections. For these Prussian settlers, represent 
 atives of the Teutonic civilization which, w r ith the 
 sword in one hand and the spade in the other, had in i 
 the struggle of long centuries been winning the broad 
 basin of the Vistula from the Pole, now suffered no 
 less in property than sentiment by the conditions of 
 the struggle in which Napoleon had embarked. " You . 
 have come to a beggar s house," was Brandt s father s j 
 salutation, as he clasped the young lieutenant in his 
 arms ; and their greeting was not ended when word j 
 was brought that the foragers of a passing French col 
 umn were taking the very crop off the ground for their 
 horses. " What am I to do ? " said their commander, | 
 in answer to Brandt s remonstrance. " I will give the 
 bons " (the orders for repayment of the supplies by the 
 commissariat). " I make myself responsible to the 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 285 
 
 Emperor for all I take. But I must carry out my 
 instructions, and collect whatever is really necessary for 
 my party. And I find the magazines all cleared 
 already." Empty they were, indeed, those stores 
 which in Brandt s early years had expanded only to 
 grow fuller year by year. Ney and his whole staff had 
 been lodging here for days not long before. The 
 Crown Prince of Wurtemburgand his retinue had suc 
 ceeded closely the marshal and his attendants; and 
 the roomy mansion was no sooner freed from the 
 pressure of this uninvited presence of royalty, when it 
 became the quarters of a battalion of French infantry. 
 Brandt s visit to his former home was necessarily short, 
 and, with a saddened heart and much anxiety for his 
 parents future, he turned his back on Sochaczew, and 
 made his way to rejoin his battalion near Thorn. 
 
 Early experience had skilled Brandt in his present 
 duty of training Polish recruits rapidly for the field. 
 Supplies of the necessary clothing and arms were abun 
 dant and freely dispensed, most of the former having 
 been prepared near the frontier ready for the design 
 which Napoleon had framed long before. Brandt saw 
 the Emperor but once at this period, when he rode 
 hastily on to the ground at the close of a brief review 
 held for him by Mortier, and called sharply for the pre 
 fect to complain of the youth of the Polish conscripts, 
 adding, " Young lads do nothing but keep the hospi 
 tals full" words which he must have had a hundred 
 occasions to repeat when the wild enterprise in which 
 he was embarking had left him to struggle during the 
 year following against united Europe with armies built 
 up of the youthful material he thought so ill of. 
 
 Anecdotes of the Emperor s sayings and doings 
 
2 86 HENR Y VON BRAND T, 
 
 abounded at this era among the vivacious Poles, and 
 circulated freely through the motley force which was 
 gathering at his orders. Brandt repeats as one of the 
 most prominent of these the well-known address of 
 Napoleon to the Polish deputies, in which he declared 
 himself that in place of court dress he would have 
 desired to see them " booted and spurred like their 
 ancestors in presence of a threatened Tartar invasion." 
 This story has been often told before ; but the over 
 bearing manner of the Emperor to his allies is better 
 illustrated by his personal treatment of certain distin 
 guished individuals who attended his levees. Among 
 these came the Count Szoldrecki, the richest land-owner 
 of Poland, whose name Napoleon mistaking for some 
 manufacturer of whom he had heard, addressed him 
 with the abrupt interrogatory, " How many hands do 
 you employ in your works?" Receiving no reply from 
 the puzzled nobleman, he added sharply, " You own 
 porcelain factories, do you not?" and when the pre 
 fect, horrified at the mistake, whispered who the Count 
 really was, his questioner, far from apologizing, merely 
 turned away with an "Ah! cest tr ts-bien" and spoke 
 to the next comer. So at a special reception of the 
 Polish ladies, he addressed to a young noble-woman of 
 rather gross proportions the startling words, " How 
 many children have you?" "None, sire," was the 
 reply. " What, then, are you a divorcee ? " " I am 
 not married at all," said the lady. " Better not take 
 long in choosing ; you have not much time to lose," 
 was the gallant reply which closed the conversation. 
 There were even severer stories than these afloat ; and 
 Brandt meeting an old friend who moved in the best 
 Warsaw society, heard that the impression made by 
 
A GERMAN SOLDJER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 2 8/ 
 
 Napoleon was of the most unpleasant character. " His 
 manners are thought bad, his voice sharp and creaking, 
 his address imperious and overbearing." There was 
 current at this time everywhere an epigram on the new 
 ruler of Poland by a nobleman who had been well 
 known for his intimacy with the former king, Stanislaus, 
 and who gave his verdict on the head of the newly 
 revived Court in the sententious Latin words, Nee 
 affabilis, nee amabilis, nee adibilis. In fact, the singular 
 elevation which Napoleon had reached, his sense of the 
 enormous means of offence he wielded, the servility of 
 the vassal princes who obeyed his edicts, had altogether 
 blinded his eyes to the insecurity of his position. The 
 muttered threats of hatred and vengeance which had 
 followed his triumphal progress through Europe were 
 unheard by its dictator. The growing dimensions of 
 the Spanish war which threatened his rear, the activity 
 of the Tugendbund,vr\i\c\\. spread its ramifications across 
 (the vast territory that lay between him and his faithful 
 [France, was unknown or unheeded. Even in Poland 
 pis policy was suspected, and the strength which that 
 Kill powerful country might have put forth against his 
 enemies, lay dormant because he lacked the political 
 courage to promise, as the price of victory, her longed- 
 for independence. To pledge himself to this, it is true, 
 might have cost him the half-hearted support of an 
 illy; but the secresy with which he preferred to veil 
 lis future policy was sufficiently alarming to Austria to 
 Drevent her from exerting herself heartily for the over- 
 
 hrow of Russian power, while it checked the beating 
 :>f the national pulse of Poland, and made the enter- 
 
 Drise seem to be for the aggrandisement of an individ 
 ual rather than the liberation of a people. The most 
 
2 gg HENRY VON BRANDT 
 
 eminent of the many writers who servilely worship 
 Napoleon s genius as a chief, has pointed out, in an 
 eloquent passage of " The Consulate and Empire," 
 that this political error, at the very crisis of his for 
 tunes, was an irremediable misfortune to his cause. 
 It has been said of late that he lost his last campaign 
 mainly for want of boldness and decision. The histo 
 rian who cannot credit his idol s having in the least 
 degree been found waiting in those qualities on the 
 plains of Belgium, condemns their absence in his Polish 
 policy with severity as bitter as any hostile critic could 
 employ ; and this opinion of M. Thiers is fully sup 
 ported by that of General Brandt, reviewing, in the 
 long years of calm that followed, the stormy scenes in 
 which he had borne a part. 
 
 We should need space for a volume rather than an 
 essay were we to attempt to follow our author through 
 the story of the last six months of 1812. No passage 
 of history has been more brilliantly or abundantly 
 illustrated by the actors in it than the fatal invasion of 
 Russia; and yet it is not too much to say that no 
 commentary on its details, nor any narrative of its suc 
 cessive phases, has ever been given to the world sur 
 passing that of General Brandt in vivid interest. We 
 may add that the future critic or historian of Napo 
 leon s great disaster can hardly accomplish his task 
 completely without viewing the expedition as it ap 
 peared to one who has combined in his description a 
 personal sympathy with the Grand Army with the un 
 biassed judgment of a foreigner on its shortcomings ; 
 and who being by education a German, by country a 
 Pole, and by profession a Frenchman, was able to 
 regard the whole struggle of the eventful year without 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 289 
 
 sharing the delirium of national passions amid which 
 Europe arose to tear off the chains that had bound 
 her. Without entering here into any discussion of the 
 general causes of Napoleon s failure, it may be said 
 that, in Brandt s opinion, the aggravated sufferings and 
 vast losses of the retreat from Moscow were due almost 
 entirely to the shameful lack of discipline which had 
 crept into the Grand Army. Probably the very dimen 
 sions of his overgrown force prevented Napoleon from 
 knowing its disorderly condition. When the frost had 
 once set in with its attendant miseries, it was alto 
 gether too late, in Brandt s opinion, to attempt to 
 restore control : but had the staff not previously lost the 
 respect of the soldiers by avoiding its share of the hard 
 ships of the campaign, had the same energetic means 
 of punishing stragglers been resorted to as in the equal 
 ly severe winter of 1806-7, order might have been 
 retained through the most trying periods that followed. 
 A few examples of corporal punishment, such as were 
 administered on the bloody field of Eylau to the ab 
 sentees who came in after the battle, an execution or 
 two at the head of each column of the first men who 
 wilfully threw away their arms after turning their faces 
 homeward : and the retreating army might have pre 
 served its cohesion. The stores formed upon the road 
 would then have been properly distributed, instead of 
 being dissipated by plunder and waste, leaving those 
 who came late to starve even where plenty had been 
 laid up for all. Supplied with food, the combatants 
 might have held together, and, by showing a good front, 
 have obtained rest for themselves and given time for 
 the staff to collect and organize the stragglers. But all 
 order had fled before the frost set in and found thou- 
 
290 
 
 HENRY VON BRANDT 
 
 sands of unarmed soldiers and disorderly followers, 
 mixed with equipages laden with plunder, impeding 
 and confusing the columns of march. The cold and 
 suffering that ensued only completed the demoraliza 
 tion of the army which lax discipline had begun. As 
 to the part played by the Russians, General Brandt 
 asserts that but for their faults no single Frenchman 
 should have recrossed the Beresina, much less have 
 made his way safely, as he did himself, though suffer 
 ing from a wound, back into Poland, where he was 
 received and nursed to recovery at his father s house. 
 It was not until the end of May 1813 that he was able 
 to rejoin the Legion, now shrunk into a single regi 
 ment, with the well-won rank of captain and senior 
 adjutant. 
 
 The eventful autumn which followed saw Napoleon, 
 after temporary successes, expelled from Germany by 
 a succession of disasters which only the greater dimen 
 sions of those endured the year before in Russia have 
 cast into the shade. Brandt shared to the full in the 
 last and worst of these reverses, and at Leipsic fell des 
 perately wounded into Russian hands. His memoirs, 
 if continued to this point, would have been invaluable 
 to the student of the War of Independence ; but his 
 capture and subsequent illness prevented his preserv 
 ing even the most fugitive notes of the events of 1813, 
 and as far as the military portion of the work is con 
 cerned, it closes at the escape of the author from 
 Russia. When next the life of the veteran of Spain 
 and Moscow is continued in detail, we find him once 
 more serving under the flag beneath which the young 
 student of Konigsberg had been enrolled ten years 
 before in the hour of Prussia s calamity. It was the 
 
A GERMAN SOLDIER OF THE FIRST EMPIRE. 2 QI 
 
 policy of the victorious House of Hohenzollern to show 
 that Prussia s late temporary losses of territory had 
 been the mere consequences of military calamity, and 
 to ignore the attendant political circumstances now that 
 military success had restored the kingdom to its former 
 dignity and possessions. The involuntary transfer of 
 allegiance which had placed Brandt beneath the Im 
 perial Eagles found easy pardon, and he was received 
 on his own application into the Prussian service, 
 resigning with pleasure the commission proffered him in 
 the Polish army, now absorbed into that of Russia. 
 The remainder of the long and varied career we have 
 too briefly reviewed was passed in honorable employ 
 ment under his legitimate sovereign. He lived to 
 serve under Gneisenau and Clausewitz as a confidential 
 staff officer, during the armed neutrality which Prussia 
 maintained upon her eastern frontier in the Polish 
 Revolution of 1831. He became noted as a military 
 essayist, his pen attracting such attention as to single 
 him out by royal choice to defend the Prussian admin 
 istration against certain virulent attacks made on it by 
 the Paris journals in the early days of Louis Philippe s 
 reign. His ability thus becoming fully known to his 
 sovereign, it was a natural choice which sent him soon 
 after, as the Military Commissioner of Prussia, to 
 report on the condition of the French army under the 
 new regime. At the camp of Compiogne, where the 
 chief force of the Citizen King was then exercised, 
 Brandt met on equal terms many ex-Napoleonist gen 
 erals whose names had been historic when he was yet 
 serving as a subaltern under Suchet ; he discussed 
 Prussian organization with Marshal Soult, and was 
 introduced to Thiers, then in the early prime of par- 
 
2 9 2 
 
 HENRY VON BRANDT. 
 
 liamentary power, and to the Duke of Orleans, study 
 ing hard his part for the crown he was never destined 
 to wear. Among the incidents of the chief review he 
 attended, Brandt observed a young aide-de-camp twice 
 thrown from his horse, yet remounting each time to 
 pursue his duties as actively as if refreshed by his fall. 
 He asked and noted the name of this energetic officer, 
 then Lieutenant Macmahon of the 1st Cuirassiers, 
 and before closing his own memoirs lived to recog 
 nize in him the victor of Magenta and favorite marshal 
 of France. That these memoirs were not published 
 until after the writer s decease, is sufficiently explained 
 by the outspoken views they express on Prussian pol 
 icy in Poland. As a record of the achievements of 
 Marshal Suchet in Spain, as a contribution to our 
 knowledge of the ever-fresh tragedy of the Russian in 
 vasion, as an impartial criticism of the process by which 
 Northern Germany absorbed the Sclavonic provinces 
 on her borders, these volumes are of deep importance 
 to the student of the stormy period with which this 
 century opened. But above all these in interest, in 
 the eyes of many, will be the author s description of 
 the realities of military life under the First Empire. 
 It is hardly too much to say that the study of this 
 work, following that of the Fezenac " Souvenirs," 
 throws more light upon the details of the Grand 
 Army, and upon the working of the system which all 
 but enslaved the world, than had been shed by all 
 the national histories and official biographies with 
 which Europe has been deluged these sixty years 
 past. 
 
CORN WALL IS AND THE INDIAN SERVICES* 
 
 To rule a subject empire with wisdom, vigor, and 
 purity ; to make the name of England respected 
 throughout the decaying empires of Asia ; to infuse 
 into the stagnant material of Oriental civilization the 
 life that springs from European progress ; such have 
 been some of the tasks which our supremacy in India 
 has imposed upon those who there serve the state. 
 Great missions often seem to call forth great men ; or 
 if these are not always to be found, at least the high 
 est qualities of those employed are brought out and 
 nourished by the very difficulties of their task. Thus 
 it has happened, that if in India the baser elements of 
 the ruling race have not failed sometimes to take 
 advantage of the ductility of the subject, England has, 
 on the whole, good cause to be proud of the services 
 to whom her charge has been confided. From the 
 time of Lord Cornwallis to the present day, it may 
 truly be affirmed that Indian officials, as a body, would 
 bear favorable comparison for energy and purity with 
 the public men of any empire in the world. More 
 than this ; as the personal conduct of the administrator 
 may there influence the destiny of millions, so the 
 chivalrous side of the dominant race has found an op 
 portunity denied in the close atmosphere of European 
 
 * Lives of Indian Officers, illustrative of the History of the Civil and 
 Military Services of India. By Sir John Kaye. 
 
294 CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 politics. The services of India have had in their ranks 
 men of such saintly lives and heroic action as mediaeval 
 writers dreamed of, if they did not see. But that the 
 names of men of this type, and of others eminent 
 under the Company s rule, have become household 
 words in the land that sent them forth, is due chiefly 
 to the special knowledge of a small band of writers. 
 Those only who themselves are acquainted with the 
 East can make the conditions of life there, and espe 
 cially those that affect our rule of interest to far-off 
 British readers. And among them none has done so 
 much to bring the scenes of modern Indian history, 
 and the figures that move among them, home to his 
 countrymen as the veteran author Sir J. Kaye. In his 
 more important works he has made familiar among 
 English families the deeds of their kinsmen who have 
 lived and died to preserve and consolidate our empire. 
 In his " Lives of Indian Officers" he presents us with 
 a gallery of portraits of characters, of various types 
 indeed, but of all of whom their countrymen may well 
 speak with pride. 
 
 Cornwallis, statesman and soldier, forms a worthy 
 foreground to the group selected from the civil and 
 military services which owe their high character to 
 him. A great man and a good, his heart was in his 
 work, and his work lives after him. His success in 
 Indian administration contrasts so strongly with the 
 sad story of his American enterprises as to justify those 
 who attribute the failure of the latter to any cause 
 rather than want of zeal or judgment. We could have 
 wished to avoid following Sir J. Kaye into the history 
 of the difference between General Clinton and his great 
 lieutenant. This, and the military events with which 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 29$ 
 
 it is interwoven, are rather touched upon than written 
 in the work before us ; and for its purpose it would 
 have been better to have kept to that Indian ground 
 where the biographer treads more safely than in the 
 swamps of Carolina and Virginia. It would certainly 
 have been juster to Cornwallis. His name is of ne 
 cessity so connected with the disasters which closed 
 the Revolutionary War of America, that an imperfect 
 notice of these is in the very nature of things almost 
 an injury to him. Nor is this repaired by extracts 
 given us from one or two of the less important letters 
 of the series relating to the occupation and defence of 
 Yorktown. This correspondence, published originally 
 by Cornwallis himself in 1783, should be read as a 
 whole by those interested. Thus treated, it proves 
 abundantly what he asserts in his introduction : " When 
 the arrival of the French fleet, and the approval of 
 General Washington, were made known to Sir Henry 
 Clinton, it will appear that his promises of relief in 
 person were uniform, without giving me the smallest 
 particle of discretionary power, different from holding 
 the posts that I occupied." That he did not attempt 
 to break out of the toils in the early part of the invest 
 ment, is thus explained by Cornwallis with a clearness 
 which seems to defy contradiction : " The enemy were 
 in a strong position and considerably superior in num 
 ber, but I should have attacked them without hesita 
 tion if I had thought myself at liberty, after a victory, 
 to escape into the Carolinas [from whence, be it ob 
 served, he had but lately marched triumphantly] with 
 the troops that were able to move. No other object 
 appeared sufficient to justify this measure. But a 
 defeat would probably have been followed with the 
 
296 
 
 CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 immediate loss of our post, which until the end of Sep 
 tember was in a most defenceless state : and as I could 
 never have proved that I should not have been relieved, 
 I should have been exposed to public execration, as a 
 man who, having reason to expect the early arrival of the 
 Commander-in-Chief to supersede him in his command, 
 had, in hopes of personal reputation from a victory, 
 sacrificed the essential interest of his country." 
 
 Thus much in justice to a great man who struggled 
 manfully against the fates that bore him down, and 
 with him the last hope of recovering America by the 
 sword. Billow, the Prussian military writer, a man of 
 genius as brilliant as his fate was unhappy, witnessed 
 the struggle in person, and has borne disinterested 
 evidence that these hopes were not as chimerical as it 
 is now the fashion to assert. From the day, however, 
 that Britian lost the control of the ocean which divided 
 her from her revolted colonies, the war could have had 
 but one result. A success on Cornwallis s part in Vir 
 ginia might have added to his laurels already gained 
 in New Jersey and the Carolinas, but would have only 
 delayed the issue for a little space. Such a free com 
 munication as the Federal fleets had along the coast 
 of the revolted states during the Civil War was equally 
 needed in our case. Without it Sherman s overland 
 march from Savannah, made eighty years afterwards, 
 might have had little better issue than that of Corn- 
 wallis through precisely the same district. With such 
 aid the modern commander established his fame, as the 
 elder, for lack of it, came nigh to ruin his reputation. 
 Happily the discussion of the circumstances of the 
 Yorktown surrender produced a clearer impression in 
 Cornwallis s favor among the statesmen of the time 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 297 
 
 than Sir J. Kaye s narrative will, we fear, among his 
 readers. Hardly was the American War concluded, 
 when we find both Fox and Pitt, amid the acrimony 
 of the Indian debates, looking to Cornwallis as the man 
 who best might wield supreme control in our new great 
 dependency. "The name of such a man," said the 
 "ormer, " might make Parliament consent to the vest- 
 ng of such powers in a Governor-General ; but certain 
 [ am that nothing but the character of that noble Lord 
 could ever induce the legislature to commit such pow 
 ers to an individual at the distance of half the globe." 
 The latter, when his new India Bill was in a fair way to 
 3ass, offered the Earl his choice of the offices of Gov 
 ernor-General or Commander-in-Chief ; and when he 
 persistently declined then, and again after the Macart 
 ney interregnum, to accept either separately, or to take 
 the former office at all, unless with independent power 
 n cases of emergency, the amending Bill of 1786 was 
 ntroduced, under which he could no longer refuse to 
 act. By this, which became henceforward the rule of 
 [ndian government the functions of the Supreme Coun 
 cil were reduce to those of mere advice or remon 
 strance, whenever the Governor-General chose to de 
 cide for himself. The members might in such case col- 
 .ectively or severally recommend or object, but action 
 belonged to the Governor-General, on whom hencefor 
 ward lay the real responsibility of administration, 
 checked only by the higher authority at home. As 
 the latter could always receive the recorded opinions 
 of the councillors, the Governor-General would natu 
 rally take good care not to override them without show 
 ing good cause. This system had been devised at the 
 time of the introduction of the Indian Bill in 1784, but 
 
298 CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 Mr. Pitt had abandoned the proviso which to Corn 
 wallis and others seemed the pith of the whole Act, ir 
 order the more easily to secure its passage. Two year; 
 later, however, it was found necessary to supply th( 
 omission ; and in spite of Burke s powerful opposition 
 the arguments of Dundas (then President of the Boarc 
 of Control) prevailed, and the Governor-General receivec 
 the vast powers he has ever since held. One weak 
 point was left in the measure. It was open, from the 
 nature of the government, for the Governor-General tc 
 reduce himself from his rank as responsible ruler to the 
 mere President of a Committee, by ceasing to exercise 
 his individual authority, and referring each business 
 to a single member or to the voice of the Council. 
 This is the temptation natural to any Yiceroy who 
 would avoid excessive responsibility ; and if report be 
 true, it is precisely in this direction that the Supreme 
 Government has on the whole for some time past 
 tended. 
 
 To return to Cormvallis. Voyaging to Calcutta 
 with Shore, afterwards Lord Teignmouth, for his chief 
 fellow-passenger, he landed on September fourteenth 
 1786, and began that career of administrative reform 
 on which his future fame was to rest more surely than 
 on American campaigns. It is not necessary to peruse 
 the twenty pages which Sir. J. Kaye has devoted to the 
 earlier history of the Indian Civil Service, in order to 
 see that Cornwallis had before him an Augean taskj 
 To pay collectors, judges, even councillors, rather less 
 than the salary of a merchant s junior clerk, and to 
 leave these high officials to eke out their pittance by 
 jobbery and corruption, had been the normal practice 
 of the good old company. Nearly two centuries 
 
THE INDIAN SER VICES, 2 gg 
 
 before, Sir Thomas Roe had written the golden truth, 
 which it was left for Cornwallis to reduce to practice. 
 " Absolutely prohibit," said the far-seeing ambassador 
 of James I., " the private trade, for your business will 
 be better done. I know this is harsh. Men profess 
 they care not for bare wages. But you will take away 
 this plea if you grant great wages to their content ; 
 and then you know what you part from." As has been 
 well added, Roe was in this matter a great man, ob 
 viously in advance of his age. So far from profiting 
 by his wisdom, the company adopted the very con 
 trary policy, attempting by the ridiculous device of 
 temporary edicts, framed 16,000 miles off, to keep the 
 daily habits of their servants down to their meagre 
 salaries. As their rule extended from factories to 
 provinces, and from provinces to kingdoms, the childish 
 fetters they had imposed were silently laid aside or 
 openly scoffed at, and the picking of the Pagoda tree 
 became a recognized art, dividing the attention of the 
 civilian with his care of his office. Thus, as soon as 
 Cornwallis had investigated the state of things, we find 
 him writing of one of the company s civil servants in a 
 manner that gives a lively picture of the existing 
 regime : 
 
 " 111 as I thought of the late system of Benares, I found 
 it on inquiry much worse than I could have conceived. The 
 Resident, although not regularly vested with any power, en 
 joyed the almost absolute government of the country without 
 control. His emoluments, besides the thousand rupees per 
 month allowed him by the company, certainly amounted to 
 little less than four lacs a year, exclusive of the complete 
 monopoly of the whole commerce of the country, with the 
 power of granting perwannahs, etc. It has been generally 
 
CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 supposed that in return for all these good things, the Residents 
 at Benares have not been ungrateful to the friends of the 
 Governor-General. I have no reason to suppose that Mr. - 
 took more than his predecessors. God knows what he gave. 
 But as he was on bad terms with the Rajah and his servants, 
 and as new measures are more likely to succeed with new 
 men, I thought it better to remove him." 
 
 In the same letter he adds, in a passage quoted by 
 Sir J. Kaye: "I am sorry to say that I have every 
 reason to believe that at present almost all the collec 
 tors are, under the name of some relative or friend, 
 deeply engaged in commerce, and by their influence as 
 collectors and judges of Adaulet they become the most 
 dangerous enemies to the company s interest, and the 
 greatest oppressors of the manufacturers." So much for 
 the state of things : then came the cause, and the 
 remedy which Cornwallis had already, not having been 
 in the country a year, brought into use without waiting 
 for the directors sanction to his reform. " I hope you 
 will approve of the additional allowances that we have 
 given, for without them it was absolutely impossible 
 that an honest man could acquire the most moderate 
 competence. After this liberality I made no scruple 
 of issuing the revenue regulations against embarking 
 in trade, and will make an example of the first 
 offender." 
 
 The remedy in such a case was, in fact, clear as the 
 Disease, being no other than that which Sir Thomas 
 Roe had so long since recommended. Yet it needed 
 all the prestige and influence which Cornwallis had 
 brought with him, to enforce his views on the slow 
 hearing of the directors. The earnestness with which 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 301 
 
 he insisted upon what he felt to be the cardinal point 
 of Indian administration is abundantly illustrated by 
 the " Cornwallis Correspondence/ which Sir. J. Kaye 
 has freely and usefully employed. The sweeping 
 inferences he has drawn from this valuable work seem 
 to us, in one case, hardly justified, for an expression 
 quoted as written with reference to the company s civil 
 servants " I sincerely believe that, excepting Mr. 
 Charles Grant, there is not one person on the list who 
 would escape prosecution " appears in the original 
 letter to be applied to a special " list " of persons 
 whose cases were submitted to the Court of Directors 
 for lenient consideration, on the score of their having 
 been coerced by their superiors. The word " list " 
 thus specially used by Cornwallis in the sentence im 
 mediately preceding could hardly be applied by him in 
 the next, that already quoted, to the whole civil service 
 without qualification. If not a very elegant writer, he 
 was certainly by no means a loose one. 
 
 Be this as it may, the measures already taken for 
 the amendment of the service by the Earl were 
 approved at home, where Dundas rendered him due 
 support. In vain was it asserted that however well 
 men were paid in India, at that distance they could 
 not refrain from fee-taking or corruption in some form. 
 The honorable soul of Cornwallis revolted at this 
 theory ; and the objections raised by the Directors to 
 his grants of salaries were thus met by him in a private 
 letter to Dundas of August twenty-sixth, 1787 : 
 
 "If the essence of the spirit of economy of the whole Court 
 of Directors could be collected, I am sure it would fall very 
 short of my anxiety on that subject. ... If it is a maxim that, 
 
302 
 
 CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 pay our servants as we please, they will equally cheat, the 
 sooner we leave this country the better. . . . From the spirit 
 of this letter" [of the Directors] " I-conclude that the commis 
 sion given to the collectors, the allowances to the residents, will 
 all be disapproved of. I see the pay of the sub-treasurer is 
 objected to. When I came I found the sub-treasure playing 
 with the deposits, amounting to three or four lacs. I fancy 
 of the two he had rather I had taken his salary from him. I 
 have saved" [he forcibly concludes] "since I came, upon the 
 salt upon the various contracts, upon remittances, balances, and 
 jobs of different kinds, ten times, I may say fifty times the 
 amount of the salaries that are retrenched. I am doing every 
 thing I can to reform the Company s servants, to teach them 
 to be more economical in their mode of living, and to look 
 forward to a moderate competency ; and I flatter myself I 
 have not hitherto labored in vain. But if all chance of sav 
 ing any money and returning to England without acting dis 
 honestly is removed, there will be an end of my reformation." 
 
 A better destiny than he hoped awaited his vigor 
 ous measures. The promise made to him by Dundas, 
 "You may depend upon my giving the most exact 
 attention to every suggestion you communicate to 
 me," appears to have been literally fulfilled. As the 
 minister observed in the same letter, " We never before 
 had a government of India, both at home and abroad, 
 acting in perfect unison together upon principles of 
 perfect unity and integrity ; these ingredients cannot 
 fail to produce their consequent effects." Those effects 
 began to appear sooner than Viceroy or Minister could 
 have hoped ; for we find Cornwallis writing but four 
 months after the receipt of this assurance, " The Com 
 pany has many valuable servants ; the temper of the 
 times is changing. Men are beginning to contrast their 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 
 
 303 
 
 present expenses and their future views." His 
 unwearied war upon sinecures, jobbery, and fraud had 
 already reduced the expenditure within the estimates, 
 "which never," he writes, " happened before;" while 
 the civil service was beginning to feel the advantage 
 held out to it by the honester system which refused 
 (to use Cornwallis s words) " to place men in great and 
 responsible situations, where the prosperity of our 
 affairs must depend on their exertions as well as integ 
 rity, without giving them the means in a certain num 
 ber of years of acquiring honestly and openly a mod 
 erate fortune." 
 
 Not that Dundasand Cornwallis had the opposition 
 of the Directors for their only difficulty. A still more 
 scandalous one lay in the system of sending out to 
 Calcutta the needy and improvident hangers-on of 
 court officials or party leaders, in expectation that the 
 Governor-General would provide for them. This prac 
 tice the innate honesty of Cornwallis did more to check, 
 it is not too much to say, than the spirit of his times 
 could possibly have taught him. In truth, his conduct 
 in this matter was before the age ; although to say of 
 him " he could not perpetuate a job to please the 
 King," is an instance of the misuse of high-flown lan 
 guage which is our author s besetting sin ; and it is the 
 less excusable, as in a note to the next page we find 
 that he quotes from a letter of Cornwallis, explaining 
 his rejection of William Burke s suggestions of modes 
 of serving him : " I have treated him with the greatest 
 personal attention, and I have done little favors, as 
 ensigncies in the King s service, etc., to his friends." It 
 was quite consistent, at that period, with the honorable 
 character of the man that such gifts should be made to 
 
304 
 
 CORNWALL1S AND 
 
 conciliate the cousin of Edmund Burke, and yet that 
 Cornwallis should absolutely decline proposals for 
 alterations in the mode of payment of the troops, 
 which were intended to put large sums of money into 
 the pocket of this same Burke, then Paymaster-General 
 in India. In the same spirit a gentleman coming out 
 to be provided for with a recommendation from the 
 Queen, was put off with a clerkship at 250 rupees a 
 month ; but Cornwallis s own friends fared much worse. 
 Their claims were met with inexorable refusal, while 
 that of a mere acquaintance was treated as summarily 
 as if the pressing it were a crime. " If I was inclined 
 to serve you," he writes to such a one, " it is wholly 
 out of my power to do so without a breach of my duty. 
 I most earnestly advise you to think of returning to 
 England as soon as possible. After the first of Janu 
 ary next I shall be under the necessity of sending you 
 thither." 
 
 Such vigor and wisdom as this portion of the " Cor 
 respondence" shows is well worthy the first place in a 
 work which set out with the design of illustrating the 
 high qualities of the Indian services. The measures 
 which Cornwallis adopted for the improvement of the 
 civil branch won their way to acceptance. His rule of 
 securing the whole devotion of the official by paying 
 him so liberally as " to enable him to save honestly and 
 openly," became the charter of a great body of gentle 
 men; and by their aid the foundations of our growing 
 empire were laid deep and strong. 
 
 The care of Cornwallis for the military force was no 
 less. Justice indeed has hardly been done by Sir J. 
 Kaye or any other writer to this portion of the subject ; 
 for the abuses which had crept into the contingents 
 
THE INDIAN SER VICES, 30$ 
 
 raised by native states were hardly less than those in 
 the political offices, while the regular troops of the 
 Company were in a very low condition, the recruiting 
 of respectable Englishmen being practically interdicted 
 by home jealousies. Of the European troops Corn- 
 wallis wrote : " They are such miserable wretches I 
 should be ashamed to acknowledge them for country 
 men ; " and added, as the only remedy, some words 
 that seem to us well worth quoting for their curious 
 acknowledgment of the early jealousy of the royal 
 troops towards their brethren of the Company, a jeal 
 ousy afterwards amply repaid by Indian officers, and 
 which lasted until the Company was merged in the 
 Crown : " I know it will be unpopular with my brother 
 officers at home ; but it is my duty to state, that if 
 these dominions are worth preserving, it is absolutely 
 necessary that the East India Company should be per 
 mitted to treat publicly for recruits, and to keep them 
 under martial law until the time of their embarkation." 
 In the same spirit he set himself to abolish all the 
 invidious distinctions hitherto made in India between 
 the military services. 
 
 Before his arrival, all field officers of the King s 
 were wont to receive special brevet rank, so as to super 
 sede those of the Company who were of the same 
 standing, while the local commissions of the latter were 
 often altogether ignored, as far as it lay in the power 
 of the royal officer, who looked on their holders as 
 irregular rivals of his profession. Representations on 
 this head came with peculiar force from one who was 
 known at home as the favorite general of the royal 
 troops in the field, the leader who had come out of our 
 American disasters with honor unsullied and military 
 20 
 
CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 reputation raised. In 1788 CornwalHs received the 
 needful powers for bestowing, in the sovereign s name 
 local commissions for India on the company s officers 
 while the special higher rank of the King s field officers 
 was ordered to be absolutely swept away after eighteen 
 months notice. From this day forward the officers of 
 the three local armies already in pay under the com 
 pany saw the road open to the highest honors of their 
 profession ; at least as regarded service in their adopt 
 ed country. It needed, however, three-quarters of a 
 century s habit, and a formal assumption by the Crown 
 of the imperial authority in India, before British states 
 men could learn the simple elementary lessons that the 
 military strength derived from our Eastern possessions 
 is but part of the general strength of the state, and 
 that our Indian Empire is the natural base of all our 
 warlike operations in the East. 
 
 With certain very irregular contingents raised in 
 the subject native provinces, the existence of which 
 was a private profit and no public benefit, Lord Corn- 
 wallis dealt in the most summary fashion. How 
 abused the power of our Residents had been in this 
 direction may be gathered from the following letter, 
 addressed by him to a certain captain, whose pretend 
 ed battalion had been disbanded, and who made a 
 large claim on his own account against the Vizier of 
 Oude: 
 
 " Near PL ASSY, November 22, 1787. 
 
 " SIR, I am sorry to say that on my arrival at Lucknow 
 1 could not meet with any person, either European or native, 
 that knew anything of your battalion, or had seen any part of 
 iU Although I could not help placing proper confidence in 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 
 
 307 
 
 your assurances of its being perfectly complete, both in offi 
 cers and men, yet as there was not a trace of it existing at 
 the headquarters where it was raised, and had been so lately 
 disbanded, and you had been so improvident as to keep no 
 voucher for any of your disbursements, you did not put it in 
 my power to say to the Vizier or his ministers that part of the 
 large sum of money which you received was not issued to dis 
 charge your personal pay and allowances. Circumstanced, 
 therefore, as your claim is, I do not think that my interference 
 would be warranted by the order of the Board relative to the 
 reduction of your corps. I am, etc. 
 
 " CORNWALLIS." 
 
 In short, the care of his lordship for the military 
 departments, as might have been expected from his 
 previous training, was as great as that which he be 
 stowed on the civil service ; and, fortunately for the 
 future of the Indian army, he remained long enough 
 at its head to see his recommendations carried into 
 practical working. Under this wiser rule the heart 
 burnings and discontents of the company s officer van 
 ished, and a commission in the Indian army became an 
 honorable object for the ambitious and energetic of the 
 youth of England. A class pressed into the service 
 from this time by which the government has been 
 doubly strengthened. The Viceroys have found in it 
 some of the most able administrators that India has 
 known, having in its vast list the ready means of rein 
 forcing the civil element in their higher departments ; 
 while the army has furnished sabreurs as bold, artille 
 rists and engineers as skilful, staff officers as sagacious, 
 as any modern military school from the time of Gusta- 
 vus downwards. 
 
308 
 
 CORN WALL] S AND 
 
 It has been the fashion of late to suppose that 
 Cornwallis, as a reformer, was but an instrument in the 
 hands of better-informed men, experienced in Indian 
 affairs. A late popular history of India takes this view 
 of his viceroyalty, which would regard him almost as 
 simply an able and honest, yet ordinary executive 
 officer. A mere glance at the first part of the " Cor 
 respondence" should dissipate for ever this theory, 
 which deserves to stand with that of a worthy officer 
 not many years dead, who published a work in three 
 volumes to prove that Napoleon rose to the crown 
 of France and the sway of Europe by a series of lucky 
 accidents. Sir J. Kaye has done his subject more jus 
 tice. He has shown, among other points, that the 
 care of Cornwallis reached not only to financial and 
 administrative measures of every kind, but to the moral 
 and social condition of the Anglo-Indian community. 
 To reform this by mere austerity and simplicity of 
 living would have been impossible. Banquets and 
 balls were the more rational mode adopted by Corn 
 wallis, whose genial hospitality kept him in his proper 
 social position as the head of Calcutta society, and 
 enabled him to influence its tone largely for present 
 and future good. With his usual industry our author 
 has adduced extracts from newspapers of the day, and 
 from an interesting work on Indian society, written 
 soon after Cornwallis had left, which sufficiently proves 
 the vast change for the better made by his personal 
 influence and example. It would seem, therefore, that 
 the very habits of our countrymen in the East are 
 indebted to the same far-seeing wisdom and energy 
 which the best informed of them declare to have 
 founded the prosperity and usefulness of the services 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 309 
 
 of the company, and to have left traces of its happy 
 influence on every succeeding generation of officials. 
 
 Cornwallis had not too long a space allowed him for 
 his reforms. They were scarcely complete when the 
 troubles in the Presidency of Madras began, which 
 were to keep us constantly engaged in or expecting 
 war until the death of Tippoo Saib many years later. 
 The account of Cornwallis s expeditions in Mysore is 
 well worth study, were it only for the purpose of see 
 ing how he prepared the way for the final triumph of 
 our arms under Harris and Wellesley. But it is more 
 important to follow him back to Calcutta after he had 
 wrested a hard-won peace from Tippoo, and see him 
 devote the remainder of his Indian career to the com 
 pletion of his administrative reforms, and their com 
 plement of legislation. Those who would understand 
 exactly how far Cornwallis deserves the credit of the 
 famous Regulations of 1793, which have formed the 
 basis of our later administration of. justice in India, 
 should study the memorandum of Sir George Barlow 
 (which Sir J. Kaye was the first to bring to light), ex 
 plaining in the most precise terms what he did in this 
 matter. His reform was that which came naturally 
 from a wise ruler in a country hitherto administered 
 by individual officials who acted personally for the gov 
 ernment according to their own views and their sep 
 arate instructions. He reduced these instructions to 
 definite published laws, and enforced by their means 
 uniformity of practice in the courts. That in doing 
 this he was acting rightly, and indeed anticipating what 
 otherwise his successors must perforce have undertaken, 
 is admitted by men of all parties, and stands deservedly 
 to his credit as a statesman. 
 
3 1 o CORN WALLIS A ND 
 
 It is far otherwise with the celebrated Revenue 
 Settlement effected under his rule. Our author seems 
 to avoid offering any opinion of his own on this 
 debated question, to which he devotes but a single 
 page. Yet as he gives room for the reproval of James 
 Mill, who in his History asserts of this measure that 
 " the aristocratical person now at the head of the gov 
 ernment avowed his intention of establishing an aris 
 tocracy upon the European model," he, in justice, does 
 not omit to show that the arguments of the perpetual 
 Zemindar Settlement were far older than the days of 
 Cornvvallis, having been completely exhausted in re 
 ports made before his appointment. Mr. Law, then 
 collector of Behar, he terms u the father of the Perma 
 nent Settlement ;" but the praise or blame should in 
 truth be allotted rather to the whole service of which 
 Mr. Law was but one active member. A large part of 
 the second volume of the " Cornwallis Correspondence" 
 is devoted to papers concerning this vexed question ; 
 and it is there abundantly shown that what the Gov 
 ernor-General recommended was enforced by the delib 
 erate opinion of all the chief administrators of revenue 
 in Bengal, and of his own councillors, excepting always 
 Mr. Shore, afterwards Lord Teignmouth. The latter 
 argued earnestly in favor of the settlement being 
 renewable every ten years, instead of being made in 
 -perpetuity, and his arguments were fully weighed before 
 the final decision was arrived at by Pitt and Dundas, 
 who (as appears plainly shown from the " Correspon 
 dence") were the ultimate judges, assisted only by 
 Charles Grant. It is plain, however, that Shore dis 
 sented merely on the question of the length to which 
 the settlement should run. There was no difference 
 
THE INDIAN SER VICES. 3 r j 
 
 of opinion at the time among those who knew the 
 newly-acquired country, as to the wisdom of creating 
 from the Zemindars of Bengal a territorial aristocracy, 
 or rather of confirming them in the tenure they had 
 already acquired by prescription. The only question 
 much discussed was as to the terms on which this 
 should be done. Possibly Mill s attack upon Corn 
 wallis would have been spared had he known the " Cor 
 respondence," or had he written after it had become 
 the fashion with recent Indian rulers, warned by Dal- 
 housie experience, to copy in other districts the orig 
 inal prescription under which Lower Bengal has proved 
 the model portion of our dominions for tranquillity and 
 wealth of produce. 
 
 Sir J. Kaye follows Cornwallis from India to Ireland, 
 and gives an epitome of the important events which 
 marked his viceroyalty there. These belong, however, 
 in no sense to the story of our Indian empire, and, as 
 with the American portion of the biography, are too 
 briefly treated to do full justice to the subject. Corn- 
 wallis s connection with the Union measures might 
 well have a work to itself, and is at any rate too impor 
 tant a matter in national history to be treated merely 
 as an episode of his Indian career. While occupied 
 thus at home, and subsequently in diplomacy on the 
 Continent, he watched the brilliant schemes and daring 
 policy of Lord Wellesley with the natural anxiety of 
 an ex-ruler who sees much of what he judged a sound 
 policy reversed by his successor. Even the great suc 
 cesses which it was given to the new Governor-General 
 to organize in council, and to see achieved by his broth 
 er s sword in the field, hardly reconciled Cornwallis 
 to our new and comparatively aggressive position. 
 
312 
 
 CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 What was written by him at this time, embodies 
 exactly the opinions and difficulties of many able and 
 honest men from that day to the present. " The ques 
 tion is, have we not too much ? But I hardly know, 
 when the power was in our hands, what part of our 
 acquisitions we could prudently have relinquished." 
 At last came the supersession of Wellesley, and the 
 almost inevitable recourse to Cornwallis as his suc 
 cessor. The story of the quarrel of the Directors with 
 their representative has nothing very new or striking 
 in it, being but the natural collision between a board 
 of commonplace, narrow-minded men and the bold, 
 ambitious Viceroy whom they sought to restrict by 
 drafting instructions for his guidance from the other 
 side of the world. To displace so able and successful 
 a Governor-General as Wellesley was a serious step, 
 and fully accounts for the warm desire of the Directors 
 to secure Cornwallis s return to the post without sup 
 posing (as some have done) that his great name was 
 the only help open to the British Government in a 
 dangerous crisis, which, but for him, might have ruined 
 our Eastern Empire. For although Cornwallis accepted 
 the offer and went, he went, as is well known, only to 
 die, and left his former administration of India the 
 single and sufficient groundwork of his reputation in 
 that country. 
 
 Before passing from the subject of these two great 
 men and their varying views of Indian policy, it is but 
 just to pause and point out that it was not in the 
 power of either, or of any of their successors, wholly to 
 shape or even to control the limits of our sway in Hin- 
 dostan. There is a general darkness on this subject 
 of Indian conquest which is hardly creditable to a 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 313 
 
 nation whose public writers are usually well informed 
 on questions of merely practical policy. It has not 
 been either a national or individual lust of empire which 
 has carried our standards from the Hooghly to the 
 Indus. The force of circumstances has been too strong 
 
 o 
 
 for the most pacific in our list of governors. In fact, 
 from the day that our factories began to hire troops 
 and take independent dealings with the native states, 
 the result was sure. It must be remembered that when 
 we first set foot in India, the foundations of the old 
 Mogul Empire were thoroughly broken up. Wave 
 after wave of conquest had passed over it, destroying 
 and altering ancient landmarks, but without raising up 
 any single central power strong enough to control the 
 rest, and to restore order to the peninsula. The seeds of 
 such a one once planted by the company, the process of 
 growth went on in the same constant form. Insult and 
 aggression on the new civilization came naturally from 
 the native states whose robber-chiefs had made inva 
 sion of peaceful neighbors the normal practice of their 
 rule. Defeat of the invader must needs involve pun 
 ishment for the past and indemnity for the future, and 
 these could rarely be secured but by the rough expe 
 dient of annexation. That this process should be con 
 stant until Afghanistan was reached was simple neces 
 sity for a reason too generally overlooked. There 
 never was any strategic frontier to our dominions until 
 they touched the mountains which separate Hindostan 
 from the rest of the world ; and an empire like ours, 
 won by the sword, and mantained at first mainly by 
 the force of arms, must needs find such to cover it 
 before it can rest. Only since we were secure from 
 outward enemies has it been found possible to throw 
 
CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 the energy of our government into the path of peace 
 ful development of its resources. A military empire, 
 such as ours was purely until of late, must conform 
 its policy to military necessities : a truth we have been 
 unconsciously illustrating ever since Clive began the 
 long series of conquests forced on us by those we have 
 conquered. 
 
 We have dwelt before on what Cornwallis did for 
 the services which owe to him their efficiency and 
 virtue. The absorbing policy of Wellesley and suc 
 ceeding Governors-General, willingly or unwillingly 
 pushing our frontiers ever forward, gave to the young 
 Englishman who entered them such a field for energy 
 and ability as the whole world beside could not offer. 
 The constant political changes of the peninsula, and 
 the increasing dominions forced against our will as it 
 were on us, raised up a class of officers in whom the 
 military and administrative elements seem to combine 
 so closely that it is hard to distinguish where the sol 
 dier ends and the diplomatist or ruler begins. Of such 
 men in the earlier part of this century, Malcolm, 
 whose life in the work before us follows that of Corn 
 wallis, may be taken as the type, or at least as a very 
 happy example. Sir J. Kaye has so fully written on 
 the same subject in his " Life and Correspondence of 
 Sir. John Malcolm," that we proceed to deal with this 
 part of his volume chiefly for the purpose of entering 
 a gentle remonstrance against his treatment of his 
 subject. The whole picture of Malcolm which he 
 gives is one overcharged with colors existing in the 
 biographer s brain rather than in the realities of his 
 hero s life. The Malcolm of Kaye is a man not merely 
 of eminent abilities and buoyant spirits, but of perfect 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 315 
 
 purity of motives; badly rewarded for his services, yet 
 unwilling to conceive himself ill-used ; exquisitely sen 
 sitive to disappointment, yet always hopeful and 
 cheery ; overflowing with kind feelings for his friends, 
 and seeking promotion and honor solely to glorify a 
 beloved service. This just man, it is implied, won his 
 way slowly up to fame and fortune in spite of official 
 neglect, infirmities of health, and personal unwilling 
 ness to remain in ungrateful duties. Of course this 
 statement is not put into so many words, either in the 
 " Life and Correspondence" or in the works before us ; 
 but such is the general effect the author would, per 
 haps unconsciously, impress on his readers. The tra 
 ditional view of Malcolm in India is a very different 
 one, and one which Sir J. Kaye sown materials appear 
 fully to justify. According to this, his hero was simply 
 a very hard-headed, pushing, active man, with a fund 
 of remarkable spirits and energy, who never lost any 
 thing for want of asking for it, and had the good luck 
 to start early in life in as fine an opening as young 
 " political" ever knew, at the most stirring period in 
 the whole of our stormy annals. Let us look a little 
 closely at his early progress and see if the latter opin 
 ion be not that which best agrees with the facts as 
 they come before us. 
 
 After a course of boyish dissipation and indebted 
 ness we find Malcolm carried with his regiment into 
 the field at the age of twenty. He sees service, and, 
 what is more to the purpose, observes the professional 
 advantage the " politicals," of whom there are several 
 in camp, possess over the mere soldier. Not until after 
 this, having been now seven years in Madras, does he 
 begin seriously to study, and in the next year we find 
 
CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 him applying for an appointment of the coveted civil 
 order. In Sir J. Kaye s characteristic words : 
 
 " A subordinate post was vacant : he applied for it, and 
 was just half an hour too late. It had been bestowed on 
 another young officer. His disappointment and vexation were 
 great. He went back to his tent, flung himself down on his 
 couch, and gave way to a flood of tears. But he lived, as 
 many a man before and since has lived, to see in his first 
 crushing miscarriage the crowning mercy of his life. The 
 officer who carried off the prize so coveted by John Malcolm 
 went straight to his death. On his first appearance at the 
 native court at which he was appointed an assistant to the 
 Resident, he was murdered. This made a deep impression 
 at the time on Malcolm s mind, and was afterwards gratefully 
 remembered." 
 
 Disappointed of his first hopes, he was willing to 
 put up with an interpretership to a detachment. He 
 left this soon to go home on sick leave ; and here was 
 more fortunate, for we find him returning to Madras as 
 aide-de-camp to General Clarke. Clarke went on later 
 to Bengal to command there, but " there were circum 
 stances which prevented him from appointing John 
 Malcolm to the military secretaryship in that Presi 
 dency." In plain words, General Clarke had some one 
 whom he cared more to serve by the bestowal of a 
 very valuable situation. However, Malcolm had now 
 become known as an active and useful man, and Harris 
 who succeeded to the command at Madras, kept him 
 on his own staff at first, and from this put him tempo 
 rarily into the then lucrative post of town-major, of 
 which he wrote, being then apparently more bent on 
 making money than seeking fame, " I cherish hopes 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 
 
 317 
 
 of being town-major a few months longer. If I remain 
 one year I shall have a little foundation on which to 
 erect a goodly castle." 
 
 Lord Wellesley (then Lord Mornington) now 
 touched at Madras on his way to Calcutta. The town- 
 major took advantage of the opportunity to call on the 
 new Viceroy and submit some reports he had prepared 
 on our relations with the native states, and soon after 
 wards received his reward in the appointment of assist 
 ant to Kirkpatrick, then Resident at Mysore, for which 
 he had made instant application on the vacancy occur 
 ring. He was twenty-nine years old when this first 
 step in the desired ladder was gained. 
 
 He reached Hyderabad just as the French trained 
 levy in the Nizam s service was mutinying. In the 
 dispersion of this contingent he played a prominent 
 part, being aided partly by his own address and bold 
 ness, and partly by his being recognized by some 
 sepoys of a French battalion as an old officer of the 
 regiment they had once served in. He carried the 
 colors of the extinct corps to Calcutta, and received 
 the warm thanks of the Governor-General, whose pat 
 ronage he had now fairly earned. When the Nizam s 
 contingent soon after joined General Harris s force for 
 the siege of Seringapatam, Malcolm accompanied it 
 officially. On the fall of Tippoo, Lord Wellesley 
 rewarded him for his share by appointing him to a spe 
 cial mission to Persia, and from this time forward his 
 official fortune was made. He wrote hard, worked 
 hard, and did excellent service, though not without 
 some strange blunders here and there, as when he 
 wrote to General Lake of the Mahrattas that " one 
 short campaign" would for ever dissipate their power. 
 
2 1 8 CORN WA LLIS A ND 
 
 Attached to the force of Arthur Wellesley in the new 
 war at its opening, sickness took him from the camp 
 before Assaye was won, and his absence, in his biogra 
 pher s hardly appropriate phrase, " was long afterwards 
 a thorn in his flesh." 
 
 Regaining his health, he settled into his appoint 
 ment as Resident of Mysore. He declined to follow 
 Lord Wellesley to England, in order to defend the 
 policy he had carried out for his patron, and prepared 
 instead to assist in carrying out Cornwallis s desire " to 
 wind up the Mahratta war with all possible dispatch." 
 There was much in the pacific policy of the time " that 
 was distasteful to Malcolm," adds the biographer, who 
 takes rather unnecessary credit to the diplomatist for 
 cheerfully carrying out the orders of his superiors, 
 though not in accordance with his personal views. 
 
 Malcolm was now thirty-seven years old. He had 
 begun his political life but eight years before, and had 
 ever since enjoyed employment and remuneration as 
 high as the Government of India could give. Yet it 
 appears plainly that he was restless and dissatisfied 
 because he had received no special mark of favor from 
 the Crown. " I have been rewarded, I admit," he 
 writes, "by distinction in the service ; but if a man is 
 wished to go on, further stimulus must be found. . . . 
 I have determined, on the most serious reflection, to 
 retire. . . . If it is conceived that any ability, knowl 
 edge, or experience I possess can be usefully directed 
 to the promotion of the public interest, I must be stim 
 ulated to exertion by a fair prospect of just and honor 
 able encouragement." Could any man put a higher 
 estimate on his own services than the still young officer 
 who thus wrote to the same Lord Wellesley on whom 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 
 
 319 
 
 not ten years before, he had been thrusting his first 
 essays in political writing with a view to a subordinate 
 post ? 
 
 Those who know the Malcolms of real life will not 
 be surprised that he did not carry out his " most serious 
 reflection " into earnest, and retire. On the contrary, 
 he stayed and carried on the duties of his Residency 
 with tact and ability until something better came. 
 Sent again to Persia to threaten, and to obtain the 
 material guarantee of an island in the Gulf, his mission 
 was suddenly stopped in favor of a more pacific one 
 dispatched from England. His next employment was 
 an unfortunate one, being to quell the mutinous spirit 
 of the garrison of Masulipatam, where his too lenient 
 management brought on him the disapproval of his 
 immediate superior, the then governor of Madras. 
 From this he was, however, soon relieved by a new and 
 genuine appointment as Ambassador to Persia, and the 
 varied ability he displayed there increased his already 
 high reputation, and gave him the fair claim he enjoys 
 to literary distinction. Another visit to England sent 
 him back to a further course of honorable service in 
 India, where, however, he appears as little satisfied as 
 after the Mahratta war. The government of Bombay 
 was vacant and sought by him, but conferred on 
 Elphinstone. " He regarded such a nomination as a 
 supersession of his rightful claims." Nor was he less 
 disappointed when Sir Thomas Munro was soon after 
 appointed to be governor of Madras, the other post he 
 desired. Some years later, however, he won the dignity 
 he had long sought, and was appointed to the govern 
 ment of Bombay, his last official employment. He 
 soon (1830), in his biographer s words, " was eager for 
 
320 
 
 CORNWALLIS AND 
 
 England and for rest," having in reality the vision of a 
 seat in parliament in his ever active brain. He gained 
 it ; but only to lose it in a few months by the borough 
 being disfranchised under the Reform Bill, where his 
 public life may be said to have ended. 
 
 Of such an one, to assert with Sir J. Kaye that " he 
 was a man sui generis! seems to us a misconception. 
 No doubt it is correctly said that u of all those written 
 of in these volumes he had the most perfect physical 
 organization ; " and this, and perhaps the high value he 
 put on his own services, are his distinguishing marks, 
 when we separate the man from the special opportuni 
 ties of his time. Many others of the same bustling type, 
 quick with the pen, and ready with the sword, have 
 succeeded him, and to their conjoint efforts we owe 
 much of what we are in India. Those who read care 
 fully the " Life of Burnes," as our author gives it, will 
 discern at once the family likeness ; the same fondness 
 for writing, the same love for stirring work, the same 
 discontent too if his reward proved anything less than 
 his highest desires. Indeed there are several of whom 
 Sir J. Kaye has written who have shared the energy 
 and talent which carried Malcolm to fame and fortune, 
 and shared his foibles too. But in Sir Henry Lawrence 
 a nobler and higher model is offered ; for he was one 
 of those great men whose unselfish heroism rose 
 beyond the thought of his own desert and reward, and 
 who throughout life, as he wrote for his own brief 
 memorial, " tried to do his duty," rather than to win 
 fame. Take indeed our governing classes in India for 
 all in all, no other nation administering wide conquests 
 can boast of servants who, amid all the temptations set 
 before those who rule a subject race, have so steadfastly 
 
THE INDIAN SERVICES. 
 
 321 
 
 sought the public good, and even in their very ambi 
 tion advanced the prosperity and cared for the welfare 
 of those committed to their charge. 
 
 Or for mere soldiership, a quality hardly less neces 
 sary, take from the records before us the story of Nich 
 olson name ever to be bound up in history with the 
 turning point of the great Mutiny, the fall of Delhi 
 one of whom it is impossible for even so eulogistic a 
 writer as Sir J. Kaye to speak in exaggerated terms. 
 Those who are most conversant with the details of that 
 season of trial are most ardent in their praise of the lost 
 hero. While the gallant little band, wasted by sick 
 ness and by sword, held with unflinching constancy 
 their post in view of the rebellious fortress, awaiting the 
 reinforcements preparing in the Punjab, it was the arm 
 of Nicholson which first quelled each attempt to spread 
 disorder in that province, and then brought them 
 timely succor. From that day the British forces, no 
 longer struggling for their own existence, became in 
 truth a besieging army instead of a camp beleaguered 
 by the rebels. They went to their hard but glorious 
 work with confidence, for their long line of supply was 
 guarded with a fierce vigilance that mocked the enemy s 
 attempts to break it. When the day arrived on which 
 their hopes were to be crowned, none murmured that 
 the post of honor at the head of the attack was given 
 to one whose name seemed a pledge of victory. And 
 when Nicholson fell, sacrificing his life to give an 
 example to reluctant followers although the breach 
 was won, the avenging column lodged within the city, 
 the hopes of the mutineers broken for ever the joy of 
 the victorious army and their sympathizing countrymen 
 was dimmed by the knowledge of the hero s fall. His 
 21 
 
322 
 
 CORN WALLIS AND THE INDIAN SER VICE. 
 
 late chief, Lord Lawrence, but expressed the universal 
 feeling when he wrote, " his loss is a national misfor 
 tune." " Few men," adds Sir J. Kaye, in words whichj 
 we borrow with pleasure, "have done so much at the 
 early age of thirty-five few men thus passing away 
 from the scene in the flower of their manhood, havei 
 ever left behind them a reputation so perfect and 
 complete." 
 
 And if the Indian services have been thus honor 
 ably distinguished, if purity has gone hand in hand| 
 with the valor, zeal, and energy that have gained and con 
 solidated for us the inheritance of the Mogul, it is due ; 
 far more than to any other personal cause to the far-see 
 ing judgment and wise liberality of the true founder, 
 the great and good Cornwallis. From the time he 
 bequeathed his finished work to others, India has never 
 lacked our severest critics admit it such administra-i 
 tors and defenders as subject empire never knew before, j 
 And if this be indeed so ; if men like Malcolm, Law- 
 rence, and Nicholson be but fair specimens of the 
 growth which Indian responsibilities and Indian work! 
 can nourish from the British stock ; shall we lament the 
 existence of our Eastern empire, and shrink from the 
 duties its possession devolves upon us? Rather let us 
 take heart for the work, in faith that the same honesty, 
 courage, and sagacity that have won Hindostan for 
 Britain will be found ready at call to maintain the trust, 
 and make the mingling of their races a blessing to far 
 generations. 
 
A CAROLINA LOYALIST IN THE REVOLU 
 TIONARY WAR. 
 
 [The following memoir is strictly authentic, and is here published 
 nearly as left by the narrator for the information of his children. A 
 family interest in it would be no proper excuse for the introduction of it 
 here. But it paints the American Revolutionary War in the Southern 
 States, where Cornwallis won his military fame, from a point of view 
 that has been hitherto quite unknown to English readers at any rate. 
 And to mention but one of several curious parallelisms in the two strug 
 gles ; in the account of the chief action the writer shared in, the fight at 
 King s Mountain, military men may discover the birth of that tactical 
 use of mounted infantry with which Sheridan won the battle of Five 
 Forks, and ended at a blow the greater American Civil War of our own 
 day.] 
 
 I WAS the eldest son of a large family who emigrated 
 from Ireland at the advice of some relatives who had 
 been settled for several years in South Carolina. In 
 1773 our family were living on Packolet River, about 
 twelve miles from where it empties itself into Broad 
 River, fifty miles below where the line of the Cherokee 
 Indian reserve then existing crossed that river. The 
 plantation was about 200 miles north-west of Charles 
 ton. We were established in our new residence, and 
 working hard at the usual farming occupations, increas 
 ing stock, and clearing additional land, when in 1775 
 resolutions were presented for signature at the meet 
 ing-house by the Congress Party, and I opposed them. 
 
324 A CAROLINA LOYALIST IN 
 
 When war broke out between England and America, 
 the Congress Party, early in 1775, were sending a 
 quantity of ammunition and clothing as presents to 
 the Indians; on which the loyalists who had not joined 
 them assembled, and went to Fort 96, a post on the 
 Georgian frontier made against the red men, and after 
 besieging the fort for several days took it and the 
 stores. After distributing the ammunition among the 
 loyalists, both parties agreed to a cessation of arms for 
 some weeks, until several of the leading men could 
 receive directions in the business from Lord William 
 Campbell, the governor at Charleston. 
 
 Owing to the assistance I early afforded, and my 
 activity in the cause of my king, I was shortly after 
 made a prisoner by the revolutionary party, my house 
 being ransacked, and was kept a prisoner in the camp 
 on Reedy River for about a week. Colonel Richard 
 son released me ; but the Congress Party wished that I 
 should be tried at Richardson s Camp, or be forced to 
 join the rebel army ; which latter alternative I should 
 have been driven to choose, in order to save my 
 father s family from threatened ruin ; for he had been 
 made prisoner already for harboring some loyalists, and 
 his life was in danger. But the first disturbances ended 
 soon after. 
 
 I returned to farming in June 1777, when I pur 
 chased a tract of land on Packolet River, where I 
 remained a short time. But at a muster soon after 
 wards, when the Indians rose, taking advantage of our 
 divisions, I was chosen lieutenant in Captain Bullock s 
 company of militia by my loyal friends. I went with 
 a party to Earlsfort, on the Indian line, at the head of 
 Packolet River, about fifty miles from home, and 
 
THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 325 
 
 repaired the fort ; continued some months there, and 
 was relieved the May following (1778) by the white 
 inhabitants making peace with the Indians at Duet s 
 Corner. 
 
 It was firmly believed in the beginning of this year 
 that Charleston would be reduced by the British, which 
 happened accordingly, on May twelfth following ; and 
 Sir Henry Clinton having issued a proclamation com 
 manding all his Majesty s faithful subjects to embody 
 for the defence of his government, I obeyed it. About 
 the middle of June, being embodied with the militia 
 as lieutenant, I commanded in an affair at Bullock s 
 Creek, when the rebel party was defeated in attempt 
 ing to cross the ford. 
 
 I then joined Colonel Balfour, and was in an affair 
 at Wood s house, above the Iron Works on Packolet 
 River. Colonel Balfour then returned to Fort 96, and 
 Major Ferguson, who had raised a corps of loyalists 
 known as Ferguson s Sharp-shooters, succeeded to the 
 command, under the title of Colonel and Inspector-Gen 
 eral of Militia. Shortly afterwards he marched to 
 Thickety Creek, encamped, and requested me to carry 
 an express to Captain Moore, then Commandant of 
 Anderson s Fort, on the North Carolina side, with a 
 private message to hold the fort till the last minute. 
 Before I could return the army had moved, about mid 
 night, and retreated towards Tiger River, where I 
 joined them ; and we got an account that Colonel 
 McDale had, without opposition, reduced Anderson s 
 Fort and made the garrison all prisoners, Moore hav 
 ing shamefully surrendered it. This disappointed 
 Ferguson s scheme of bringing the Americans to battle 
 while attacking it. Major Gibbs came to me in this 
 
326 A CAROLINA LOYALIST IN 
 
 situation of affairs, showed me a paper containing 
 instructions to go to McDale s Congress camp at the 
 Cherokee Ford, on Broad River, and learn their com 
 mander s name, what carriages they had, how many 
 horses and foot, and whenever they made any move 
 ments towards Colonel Ferguson. I was to return and 
 let him know, and he added that there would be a 
 handsome reward. I told Major Gibbs that what ser 
 vices I could do were not with any pecuniary view, and 
 that I would undertake this difficult task for the good 
 of his Majesty s service, since he could not procure a 
 better qualified person to undertake it. I set out imme 
 diately (August eighth), and at Packolet got a man to 
 go with me who was acquainted with the North Caro 
 lina people. We went to McDale s camp at night, 
 without being noticed, and found who were their lead 
 ers, and that 500 horsemen were gone over to attack 
 Michell s Fort. With this news I returned, and found 
 a loyalist in whom I could confide, and sent him off 
 with the particulars by one route to Colonel Ferguson 
 while I went by another, and the colonel got intelli 
 gence in time enough to intercept the enemy at the 
 Iron Works and defeat them. In returning I was taken 
 by a party of rebels, who took from me a rifle borrowed 
 of my brother-in-law ; but as soon as they set out for 
 the rebel camp I made my escape, joined Colonel Fer 
 guson, and received his thanks and friendship. 
 
 On August ninth I was appointed captain and 
 assistant adjutant-general to the different battalions now 
 gathered under Colonel Ferguson. The same day we 
 attacked the enemy at the Iron Works, and defeated 
 them with little trouble to ourselves and a good deal 
 of loss to the Americans, in whose hands I found some 
 
THE RE VOL UTIONA RY WAR. 327 
 
 of our men prisoners, whom I released. Our next 
 route was down towards the Fishdam Ford, on Broad 
 River, where there was a fight (August twelfth) near 
 the mouth of Brown s Creek, with Neil s militia, where 
 we made many prisoners, among the rest Esau Smith, 
 one of those who had taken me so recently. After this 
 we crossed that river and formed a junction with the 
 troops under the command of Colonel Turnbull and 
 the militia under the command of Colonel Phillips, and 
 having received accounts that Sumter, with a detach 
 ment of General Gates s army, had cut off our retreat to 
 Lord Cornwallis s camp at Camden, we had it in con 
 templation to cross Broad River and retreat to Charles 
 ton. At this time the half-way men (as those not 
 hearty in the cause were called) left us ; we then 
 marched to an estate of the rebel Colonel Winn s and 
 encamped there, waiting for more authentic accounts. 
 On the sixteenth we heard a heavy firing towards 
 Camden, which kept us in the utmost anxiety until the 
 eighteenth, when a letter was received from Captain 
 Ross, aide-de-camp to Lord Cornwallis, informing us 
 that his lordship had attacked and defeated Gates s 
 army, and killed or taken 2,200 men, 1 8 ammunition 
 wagons and 350 common ones, with provisions and 
 other stores. But the next night we received an ex 
 press that the rebels had defeated Colonel Ennis at the 
 Enora. This occasioned a rapid march that way. The 
 main body having crossed the Enora, I was left behind 
 in command of the rear-guard, and being attacked in 
 that situation, we maintained our ground until the 
 main body recrossed to our support. The Americans 
 retreated after suffering some loss (August twenty-first). 
 While at the Iron Works shortly afterwards a party 
 
228 A CAROLINA LOYALIST IN 
 
 of loyalists with whom I was, defeated Colonel Banner 
 man s party, and dispersed them. I was present also 
 at a small affair at Fair Forest, the particulars of which 
 as well as the numerous other skirmishes, have escaped 
 my memory ; scarcely a day, however, passed without 
 some fighting. 
 
 A dissatisfaction prevailed at this time among the 
 militia, founded on General Clinton s proclamation, 
 which required every man having but three children, 
 and every single man, to do four months duty out of 
 their own province when required. This appeared like 
 acting under compulsion, instead of voluntarily, as they 
 conceived they were doing, and they were in conse 
 quence ready to give up the cause ; but, owing to the 
 exertions of their officers (and, indeed, I believe very 
 greatly through my instrumentality), the tumult was 
 happily appeased, and the same night we marched with 
 all the horse and some foot past Gilbertstown against 
 Colonel Grimes, who was raising a body of rebels to 
 oppose us. We succeeded in dispersing them and 
 taking many prisoners, and then joined the force at 
 Gilbertstown, and encamped there for some time, send 
 ing away the old men to their houses, and several offi 
 cers to raise men to supply their places and strengthen 
 us. Colonel Ferguson soon after got intelligence that 
 Colonel McDale was encamped on Cain and Silver 
 Creeks, on which we marched towards the enemy, 
 crossed the Winding Creek twenty-thre e times, and 
 found the rebel party strongly posted towards the 
 head of it near the Blue Mountains. We attacked 
 them instantly, and after a determined resistance de 
 feated them and made many prisoners. The rest fled 
 towards Turkey Cove, in order to cross the mountains 
 
THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 
 
 329 
 
 and get to Holstein.* On this occasion I commanded 
 a division, and took the person prisoner who was 
 keeper of the records of the county. 
 
 Our spies from beyond the mountains brought 
 intelligence in October that the rebels were embodying 
 rapidly. Other spies brought in word that Colonel 
 Clarke, with a corps of backwoodsmen raised in the 
 mountains towards the Tennessee, had taken Fort 
 Augusta with its stores. This proved to be false, for 
 he had been beaten off by the loyalists there after 
 a stout fight. However, we at that time believed it 
 and marched towards White Oak and Green River to 
 intercept him on his return from Georgia. Colonel 
 Ferguson detached the horse in three divisions, one 
 under my command, with orders to proceed along the 
 Indian line until I could make out Clarke s route and 
 join Captain Taylor at Earl s Fort. I proceeded as 
 far as Tiger River, and there learning that Clarke was 
 gone up the Bushy Fork of Saluda River, I took six 
 of the best mounted men, and got on his track until I 
 overtook the main body, and made one of the enemy 
 prisoner within view of it. I carried him to Colonel 
 Ferguson, who then obtained the required information. 
 Our spies from Holstein, as well as some left at the 
 gap of the mountains, brought us word that the rebel 
 force amounted to full 3,000 men ; on which unex 
 pected news we retreated along the north side of 
 Broad River, and sent the wagons along the south side 
 as far as Cherokee Ford. Here they joined us, and we 
 proceeded to King s Mountain with the view of ap- 
 
 * Now known as the Holston Valley, in which is Knoxville, success 
 fully defended by Burnside against Longstreet at the crisis of the Ameri 
 can Civil War in 1863. 
 
330 
 
 A CAROLINA ROYALIST IN 
 
 preaching Lord Cornwallis s army and receiving support 
 from Charlottetown or from some of the detachments 
 of his regulars. By Colonel Ferguson s order I sent 
 expresses to the militia officers to join us here ; but 
 we were attacked (October ninth) before any support 
 arrived by 1,500 picked men from Gilbertstown, on the 
 Blue Mountains side, under the command of Colonels 
 Cleveland, Selby, and Campbell, all of whom were 
 armed witJi rifles, and being well mounted could move 
 witk the utmost celerity. So rapid was the attack, that 
 I was in the act of dismounting to report that all was 
 quiet when we heard their firing about half a mile dis 
 tant. I immediately paraded the men and posted the 
 officers. During this short interval I received a wound, 
 which, however, did not prevent my doing my duty, 
 and on going towards my horse I found he had been 
 killed. 
 
 King s mountain,* from its height, would have 
 enabled us to oppose a superior force with advantage, 
 had it not been covered with wood, which sheltered 
 the Americans and enabled them to fight in their fa 
 vorite manner. In fact, after driving in our pickets, 
 they were enabled to advance in three divisions, under 
 separate leaders, to the crest of the hill in perfect safety, 
 until they took post, and opened an irregular but 
 destructive fire from behind trees and other cover. 
 Colonel Cleveland s was first perceived, and repulsed 
 
 * It is a far-outlying spur of the Blue Mountains. The defeat and 
 death of P erguson here crushed the royalist cause on the mountain bor 
 der of South Carolina entirely and decided Cornwallis to retire from 
 Charlottetown and abandon his inland operations in North Carolina. 
 The reader will notice that the victors owed their surprise of and success 
 over the loyalist militia as much to their acting as mounted riflemen as 
 to superior force. 
 
THE RE VOL UTIONAR Y WAR. 
 
 331 
 
 by a charge made by Colonel Ferguson ; Colonel Sel- 
 by s next, and met a similar fate, being driven down 
 the hill; lastly, the detachment under Colonel Camp 
 bell, and by desire of Colonel Ferguson I presented a 
 new front, which opposed it with success. By this time 
 the other Americans who had been repulsed had 
 regained their former stations, and, sheltered behind 
 trees, poured in an irregular, destructive fire. In this 
 manner the engagement was maintained near an hour, 
 the mountaineers flying when there was danger of 
 being charged by the bayonet, and returning again so 
 soon as the British detachment had faced about to repel 
 another of their parties. Colonel Ferguson was at last 
 recognized by his gallantry, although wearing a hunt 
 ing-shirt, and fell pierced by seven balls at the moment 
 he had killed the American Colonel Williams with his 
 left hand, the right being useless. I had just relieved 
 the troops a second time by Ferguson s orders, when 
 Captain de Poyster succeeded to the command. He 
 soon after sent out a flag of truce ; but as the Ameri 
 cans renewed their fire afterwards, ours was also 
 renewed under the supposition that they would give 
 no quarter, and a dreadful havoc took place until the 
 flag was sent out a second time; then the work of 
 destruction ceased. The Americans surrounded us 
 with double lines, and we grounded arms with the loss 
 of one-third of our number. 
 
 I had been wounded by the first fire, but was so 
 much occupied that I scarcely felt it until the action 
 was over. We passed the night on the spot where we 
 surrendered, amid the dead and groans of the dying, 
 who had neither surgical aid nor water to quench their 
 thirst. Early next morning we marched at a rapid 
 
332 
 
 A CAROLINA LO YALIST IN 
 
 pace towards Gilbertstown, between double lines of 
 mounted Americans. The officers in the rear were 
 obliged to carry two muskets each, which was my case, 
 although wounded and stripped of my shoes (for 
 the silver buckles) in an inclement season, without cov 
 ering or provisions, until Monday night, when an ear of 
 Indian corn was served to each. At Gilbertstown a 
 mock trial was held and twenty-four sentenced to 
 death ; ten of them suffered before the approach of 
 Tarleton s loyalist cavalry force obliged our captors to 
 move towards the Yadkin, cutting and striking us by 
 road in a savage manner. Colonel Cleveland then 
 offered to enlarge me on condition that I would teach 
 his regiment for one month the exercise practiced by 
 Colonel Ferguson, which I refused, although he swore 
 I should suffer death for it when we got to Moravian 
 Town. Happily, his threat was not put to the test, as 
 I had the good fortune to make my escape one evening 
 when close to that place. In the hurry to get away I 
 took the wrong road, and did not discover my error 
 until I was close to the town. I then retraced my 
 steps until close to the pickets I had left, and taking a 
 fresh departure I crossed the Yadkin River before 
 morning, and proceeded through the woods towards 
 home. John Wedyman, one of my company, had sup 
 plied me with a pair of shoes, which were of great use 
 on this occasion ; but as he remained a prisoner, I never 
 had an opportunity of making him a return. 
 
 The first night I slept in the woods, and next day 
 I was supported by haws and grapes as I could find 
 them. 
 
 The second or third day, in pushing through the 
 woods to get to a ford, I heard a noise of some people 
 
THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 
 
 333 
 
 (whom I knew to be Americans by white paper in their 
 hats), on which I lay down, and was so close to them 
 that I could have touched one of their horses in pass 
 ing ; fortunately, I was not observed, and soon after 
 crossed the creek after them. I then made for the 
 mountains in order to be guided by the Apalachian 
 range (the higher part of the Blue Mountains), and get 
 over the rivers with greater facility. After crossing 
 Broad River, I met one Heron, who had been with me 
 in King s Mountain, and who had, with some others, 
 taken flight early in the action, putting white paper in 
 their hats, by which disgraceful stratagem they had got 
 through the American lines. I passed a night at 
 Heron s house, and one at another man s on whom I 
 could depend ; from both I got some provisions : all 
 the other nights I slept out, amounting to about twelve 
 or fourteen. 
 
 I reached my home on the Packolet on October 
 thirty-first, and found the Americans had left me little 
 there. But not knowing where to find any British 
 troops, I continued for some time about the place, 
 during which, as the Americans had possession of the 
 country, I was obliged to conceal myself in a cave dug 
 in the branch of a creek; here, with two of my cousins, 
 we remained, although there was not room to sit 
 upright. My cousin s wife brought us food and intelli 
 gence every night. After learning that Colonel Tarleton 
 had defeated the rebels under Sumter at Blackstock s 
 Fort on Tiger River, and so revived the King s cause, 
 I raised with great difficulty a company, and joined a 
 strong party at Colonel Williams s house on Little 
 River, where there was a force under General Cun- 
 
334 A CAROLINA LOYALIST IN 
 
 ningham, a loyalist colonel who had just been appoint 
 ed brigadier of militia by Lord Cornwallis. 
 
 Major Plumber having been wounded at King s 
 Mountain, the command of our regiment of militia 
 devolved on Major First, who directed me to assemble 
 my company and follow him to an appointed place on 
 the Enora. On coming to the rendezvous, I found to 
 my surprise and mortification that it was occupied by 
 Major Roebuck, an American officer. His detachment 
 immediately disarmed us and marched us of. Major 
 First, in order to retrieve the blunder, pursued Roebuck, 
 and attacked him when advantageously posted. First 
 was killed, and his party retreated. Roebuck, who 
 was formerly acquainted with me, parolled me to Fort 
 96, where I was exchanged for a Captain Clarke. I 
 was then directed to assume the command of the fort 
 which I strengthened. Soon after Colonel Tarleton 
 came into the district in quest of General Morgan, who 
 had been sent that way with a brigade by Gates, the 
 Commander-in-Chief of the rebels in this country. 
 Failing to get intelligence of his situation, Tarleton 
 sent me for that purpose, as well as to compel the mills 
 to grind for the army. My knowledge of the country 
 enabled me soon to discover the enemy ; but I found 
 that his party had destroyed or carried away every 
 thing from my own house. 
 
 On January seventeenth 1781, Colonel Tarleton 
 attacked the enemy near the Cowpens on Thicket Creek. 
 We were totally discomfited. The Americans were 
 posted behind a rivulet, with their riflemen in front 
 and cavalry in the rear. Colonel Tarleton charged at 
 the head of his regiment of cavalry called the British 
 Legion, which had been completed from the prisoners 
 
TUB REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 
 
 335 
 
 taken at the battle of Camden by Lord Cornwallis. 
 The cavalry were supported by a detachment of the 
 /ist Regiment under Major McArthur. The enemy s 
 riflemen were broken without difficulty, but the late 
 prisoners, seeing their own regiment opposed to them 
 beyond, would not proceed against it, and broke ; the 
 remainder charged, but were repulsed ; this gave the 
 front line of the enemy time to rally and form in the 
 rear of his cavalry, which charged the /ist (who were 
 then unsupported), making many prisoners. The rout 
 was almost total. I was with Tarleton in the charge, 
 who behaved bravely but imprudently. The force was 
 dispersed in every direction, besides losing the guns and 
 many prisoners.* 
 
 My men being dispersed, I desired them to meet 
 me at General Cunningham s, and proceeded towards 
 my home, now despoiled of everything. I had not 
 even a blanket left, or a change of clothes ; added to 
 this, I had no money and no pecuniary resources. 
 Being unable to persuade General Cunningham to use 
 any exertions towards embodying his regiment again, I 
 proceeded to Charleston, where unexpectedly I met 
 several British officers who had been taken at King s 
 Mountain. These aided me in getting remuneration 
 for some cattle and provisions I had supplied Colonel 
 Ferguson s detachment with, and superadded the kind- 
 
 * This action of the Cowpens, fought by Lord Cornwallis s orders to 
 clear his rear of Morgan, before commencing a second contemplated 
 invasion of North Carolina, caused him to abandon his design, and so 
 gave the last blow to the loyal interest in that quarter. Its details have 
 never before been fully explained. In all these petty affairs defeat to 
 the loyalists proved almost annihilation, says a local historian a strong 
 proof of the unpopularity of their cause. The " rebels," when beaten, 
 soon got together again, as they found shelter and friends in all quarters. 
 
336 A CAROLINA LOYALIST IN 
 
 ness of introducing me to Colonel Balfour, Comman 
 ant of Charleston, who, hearing from them of n 
 great activity, and that I had lost my all, gave me ; 
 order to Mr. Cruden, commissioner of sequestrat< 
 estates, to accommodate me in one of them with n 
 family. This produced an order to Colonel Balling; 
 and Mr. Kinsay at Jacksonsborough, who ordered n 
 a house and provisions, with the use of three negro 
 to attend my family. Thus was I at once introduc< 
 to a new set of loyalists ; and I immediately remove 
 to my new residence near Parker s River on Pondpor 
 River. 
 
 The rebels however increased much in the neig 
 borhood of Pondpond, and a general rising beir 
 expected, I sent an express to Colonel Balfour : 
 acquaint him with it. He detached 100 men to brir 
 off the militia from Pondpond. By his desire I wei 
 to communicate confidential intelligence to Capta: 
 Kime at Mott s house, near Nelson s ferry, on tl 
 Santee River, which journey of 120 miles I performs 
 in twenty-four hours. I then returned to Charlesto 
 and, at the instance of Colonel Balfour, raised a troc 
 of horse, and was stationed at Dorchester, a stron 
 British post, and moved my family thither. We ha 
 not been at this place long before I ascertained th; 
 Major Snipe, Colonel Haynes, and Marion, the famoi 
 rebel cavalry partisan, had returned, crossed Pom 
 pond River, and were embodying troops. I commun 
 cated this to Lord Rawdon (afterwards Lord Has 
 ings), who had served in the first Carolina campaign i 
 brigadier under Cornwallis, and took command whe 
 the latter general went northwards to Petersbur 
 under orders to make a junction with Clinton in Vi: 
 
THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 
 
 337 
 
 ginia. His lordship immediately ordered out a detach 
 ment, of which I was one. We crossed Pondpond 
 River at Parker s ferry; and the boats having been 
 removed to impede our march, I swam my horse over, 
 accompanied by some others, and procured feather 
 beds to transport those across who could not swim. 
 We then proceeded rapidly and reached Snipe s plan 
 tation by daylight, which we soon cleared of him and 
 his party, driving them out with loss. On this occa 
 sion I was wounded in the thigh with a spear by a 
 man concealed in a ditch while in the act of leaping 
 my horse over it ; but I took him prisoner, and con 
 veyed him with the others made on this occasion to 
 Dorchester. About this time a detachment was sent, 
 and succeeded in taking Colonel Haynes, who soon 
 after deservedly suffered for treason, as it was dis 
 covered that he had communicated with the rebels 
 while acting as a British commissary. At this period 
 there were daily skirmishes, the Americans constantly 
 contracting our posts in every direction. 
 
 In the beginning of July I joined the army under 
 Lord Rawdon,- then marching towards Fort 96 to 
 relieve the place. On our approach, the Americans 
 who were besieging it broke up, crossed Broad River, 
 and proceeded along the left bank towards Charles 
 ton. This was our last movement inland, for the 
 loyalist party was now either exterminated or forced 
 to hide its opinions. Lord Rawdon, finding that the 
 country must be abandoned, detached his light troops 
 towards Longcanes (a branch of Savannah River), to 
 bring away the loyalists and their families, taking 
 himself with the main body the route of Charleston 
 as far as Conquer. Here the Americans had recrossed 
 15 
 
333 
 
 A CAKOLIXA LO YALIST 
 
 the river, and made a fruitless effort to oppose his 
 march by preventing our passage across the creek. 
 This we effected, however, without difficulty, and pro 
 ceeded to Orangeburgh, where we expected to meet 
 reinforcements from Charleston, and be joined by 
 the light troops and loyalists. But we were disap 
 pointed in both, and soon after surrounded by the 
 Americans, who pressed us so closely that we had at 
 length but one pound of wheat in the straw served to 
 each man in ever}* twenty-four hours. The parties 
 going out daily to forage had constant skirmishes with 
 the enemy. On one occasion, Lord Edward Fitzgerald 
 having broken his sword on the back of an American, 
 I supplied him with another to continue the attack, 
 for which he expressed himself greatly obliged. 
 
 A day or two afterwards Major Doyle came to me 
 with a message from Lord Rawdon, to know if I could 
 find any one well acquainted with the road to Charles 
 ton, and willing to go thither with a message of great 
 importance, for all the expresses sent hitherto had 
 either been killed or taken prisoners. Being perfectly 
 acquainted with the whole of the neighboring country, 
 I immediately went and offered my services to his 
 lordship, which were readily accepted. I was offered 
 any horse in the camp I might think better than my 
 own, but conceiving myself the best mounted officer 
 present, I preferred my own. I found before many 
 minutes, use for every muscle of the good animal that 
 carried me. I set out instantly for Charleston, and 
 had scarcely passed the sentries when I found myself 
 pursued by four or five of the enemy, two of whom 
 kept up with me about twenty miles through the 
 woods. My intention was to come into the Charles- 
 
THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 
 
 339 
 
 ton road where it crosses the Cypress Swamp at Cun 
 ningham s house, two miles above Dorchester, but I 
 unintentionally kept too much to the right, and crossed 
 the swamp by another path a little lower down ; and 
 soon after I saw a picket of the enemy on the Charles 
 ton side of the swamp, who in all probability must 
 have taken or killed me had I not providentially missed 
 the common path, which they were carefully guarding. 
 I passed through Dorchester and remained there while 
 a fresh horse could be saddled and I could give Cap 
 tain Brereton a message from Lord Rawdon to Colonel 
 Cootes (at Monk s Corner), of the iQth Regiment, 
 desiring him to be on the alert, as the Americans had 
 crossed Broad and Santee rivers in great force. This 
 was sent express to the colonel, and I continued my 
 route to Charleston, where I delivered my letter to 
 Colonel Balfour (the commandant), at four o clock 
 P.M., twelve hours after I received it from Lord Raw 
 don, at Orangeburg a distance of eighty miles. The 
 force was immediately turned out and marched to 
 relieve Lord Rawdon from his uncomfortable situation. 
 On reaching Dorchester I found to my grief that the 
 American cavalry had visited that place during my 
 short absence and taken away my horse, with 300 
 others. So soon as we joined Lord Rawdon, he found 
 himself strong enough to force his way through the 
 enemy, which he did immediately, marching towards 
 Charleston, and encamped without opposition near 
 Monk s Corner, where we had some trifling skirmish 
 ing, but no important occurrence. 
 
 In October the Americans by degrees got posses 
 sion of all the country except the small part inside the 
 Quarter House where I was .posted, Lord Rawdon 
 
340 A CAROLINA LOYALIST, ETC.} 
 
 having then moved his force to another part of the 
 country. I then joined a force of three companies 
 raised for the protection of sequestered estates by the 
 Commissioner, Mr. Cruden. In one of our excursions 
 up Cooper s River, with the view of obtaining a supply 
 of rice, the schooner upset and twelve men were 
 drowned. I saved myself by swimming, as did six or 
 seven others; but I lost my watch, sword, and other 
 articles. 
 
 Soon after this period (December 1781) the British 
 were obliged to abandon the neighborhood of the 
 Quarter House and confine themselves entirely to 
 Charleston Neck. Considerable quantities of wood 
 being required for fuel, I was appointed to superintend 
 the operation, which was giving employment to a vast 
 number of people. I selected the destitute loyalists 
 who were within the lines, and thus afforded them 
 immediate relief. In consequence, however, of dan 
 gerous ill health and affliction, I relinquished the 
 charge to Captain McMahon early in January 1782. 
 My illness continued without much hope of recovery, 
 so taking my passage in the Lady Susan transport, we 
 sailed for Europe on April fifth, under convoy of the 
 Orestes sloop-of-war, commanded by Sir Jacob 
 Wheaton. The fleet consisted of fifty-two sail, and we 
 had a pleasant passage. We made Mizen Head, on 
 the coast of Ireland, May nineteenth, and put into 
 Castle Haven next day, in a hard gale of wind. From 
 thence we proceeded to Cork by land, and purchasing 
 a horse, I proceeded to Dublin, accompanied by 
 Charles Philip Campbell and Solomon Smyth, both 
 like myself from Charleston. From this time for 
 ward, I need hardly say, I saw no more of America. 
 
SIR WILLIAM GORDON OF GORDON S BAT 
 TERY. 
 
 (Originally published by the Institution of Civil Engineers.) 
 
 MAJOR-GENERAL SIR J. WILLIAM GORDON, K. C. 
 B., was the eldest son of Colonel T. Gordon, of Har- 
 perfield, in Lanarkshire. This estate came to him 
 while he was still young, at his father s death ; and 
 through his mother, Miss Nisbet, the heiress of Carfin 
 in the same county, niece of Andrew last Earl of Hyn- 
 ford, he not long after inherited Carfin and Maudslie 
 Castle, formerly part of the Hyndford property. He 
 was therefore born to such good prospects as w r ould 
 have indisposed most young men to steady exertion ; 
 but of his own choice he entered a hard-working pro 
 fession, thenceforward devoting himself wholly to it, 
 and throughout life he literally may be said to have 
 treated his ample means, on principle, as a steward for 
 others rather than an owner. From a private school 
 at Bexley, in Kent, he passed the entrance examina 
 tion, not very difficult in those days of nomination, 
 into Woolwich Academy. During his cadet life he 
 was remarkable chiefly for his great physical powers, 
 his carelessness of danger, and his steady application to 
 work. To the latter almost entirely for young Gor 
 don had not been gifted by nature with quickness of 
 
342 SIR WILLIAM GORDON OF 
 
 parts he owed the prize he worked for, a commission 
 in the Royal Engineers. 
 
 The times were those of the most profound peace 
 modern Europe has known. In no part of our army 
 did mere soldiership promise any special advantage, 
 and perhaps least of all in the Engineers, whose war 
 duties were almost ignored from the day that each 
 officer left the school of instruction established for his 
 corps at Chatham. Gordon passed from his first home 
 station to North America, undistinguished from other 
 subalterns ; for his simple habits of life, which were to 
 him as a nature, prevented his being even known 
 generally to be more wealthy than his fellows. He 
 left Halifax after a long term of duty there, much 
 regretted by a few friends who had discovered the 
 sterling worth which was concealed by a reserved 
 exterior, and learnt something of the kind deeds which 
 he had already begun to practice the doing of in secret. 
 But to the many he was known chiefly by his great 
 height and the endurance and activity which he dis 
 played in the moose-hunts for which Nova Scotia was 
 then noted, or for his avowed adherence to earnest 
 and, to those not conversant with Scotch Presbyte- 
 rianism, what seemed somewhat gloomy religious con 
 victions. Promotion was of course in those days very 
 slow in a seniority corps, and Gordon looked a middle- 
 aged man when, in 1845, ne was raised, after sixteen 
 years service, to the rank of captain, and sent to Chat 
 ham to take charge of the first company of Engineers, 
 or Sappers and Miners as they were then called. 
 
 A neglected cold at this time brought out a predis 
 position to chest disease, and to those about him 
 seemed to threaten his life; but his company was 
 
GORDON S BA TTER Y. 343 
 
 under orders for Bermuda, and the change to that 
 mild climate soon restored him to his natural vigor 
 and the out-of-door habits in which he always delighted, 
 though never allowing them to interfere with the 
 duties of the desk. During the next five years he 
 was constantly employed on the large works which 
 were to create out of the sand-hills that ages have 
 solidified into Bermuda stone the Gibraltar of the West. 
 His spare time, of which he allowed himself but little, 
 was devoted wholly to the manly exercises which he 
 looked on as due to his profession, to practice, and to 
 the good works which formed part of his daily life. 
 Among the latter was a night-school kept by himself 
 for the instruction of his men, and which he never 
 allowed any engagement to interfere with. Frugal 
 and temperate in his own habits, his ready hospitality 
 was known to all passers-by who visited his sta 
 tion. Sparing in expenditure on himself, his liberality 
 towards the poor near him, or in cases made known from 
 any distance, was exhausttess. He not only gave as a 
 matter of course to those that asked, if they deserved 
 it, but his delight was to send help to those who 
 deserved it and had not asked. The venerable bishop 
 of the diocese, revealed after Gordon s death the fact 
 that he maintained the private charities which he 
 began at Bermuda for many years after he had left the 
 island, and that his name is still familiar there among 
 those who have heard it blessed by the aged and 
 infirm whose special wants he had carefully ministered 
 to. No case of distress or difficulty in his own corps, 
 however far from him, but received instant attention 
 when brought to his knowledge. 
 
 But it was not so much for his large-hearted chari- 
 
344 SIJ t WILLIAM GORDON OF 
 
 ties that he by degrees became well known at this time 
 as for his marvellous physical powers and endurance. 
 The former he made it a principle to conceal, as 
 though practicing literally the injunction " Let not thy 
 left hand know what thy right hand doeth ;" but his 
 feats of strength and swiftness, done on water and on 
 land as regularly as other men took their dai.ly meals, 
 could not be hid, and the report of them spread far 
 beyond the little world of his garrison. His theory 
 was, that a soldier, to do his duty properly to his 
 country, must keep his body in the highest perfection 
 of its powers. Acting stringently up to this idea, he 
 lived constantly, except in his exceeding temperance 
 of diet, in such a state of regular training as few men 
 ever reach, even for a special purpose and a brief time. 
 His work never slackened any where in consequence of 
 this. It was confessed that no one ever saw so much 
 labor got out of working parties of soldiers or of con 
 victs as Gordon did, and that without a harsh word. 
 No office detail, however petty, was below his atten 
 tion. A favorite fancy of his was the preparing of 
 working drawings, which he might well have left to his 
 subalterns, but for his passion for labor; and after 
 returning from a run of twelve miles, done within two 
 hours, he would go straight to his high desk, without a 
 moment s intermission, and fall to work with a steady 
 hand in the standing attitude which he invariably 
 used. 
 
 He returned to England about the time of the 
 Great Exhibition of 1851, which was designed to usher 
 in an era of universal peace. His reputation for 
 strength and fearlessness, for liberality and honesty of 
 purpose, went before him ; but many of his comrades 
 
GORDON S BATTERY. 34$ 
 
 were ready to laugh at his favorite theory of being 
 ready for the active service which in their time could 
 never come. Two years afterwards the nation was 
 rushing into the Crimean war, and no department 
 which had the choice would have overlooked such a 
 born warrior and practical engineer as the subject of 
 this memoir. Gordon was at once put under orders 
 for the Crimea, being then a captain of some standing, 
 and fifth in seniority of the Royal Engineers selected 
 for service in the east. But \vhen the siege of Sebas- 
 topol was a month old, casualties had already made of 
 the captain the Commanding Royal Engineer of the 
 army, and honors and rank were coming thick upon 
 him. Gordon carried on his duties under the superin 
 tendence of Sir John Burgoyne, who had come out as 
 adviser to Lord Raglan; and he acted afterwards as 
 second to Sir Harry Jones, when government sent that 
 officer to take Sir John s place. To write, it may truly 
 be said, the story of the duties of Gordon of Gordon s 
 battery, and how they were performed, would be to 
 write the history of the siege. His long-practiced 
 endurance now enabled him to do without difficulty 
 far more than any other man would have attempted in 
 the way of personal supervision of the works as they 
 went on unceasingly; and during one bombardment it 
 is reported of him that he never sat down to take a 
 meal for three days and three nights, and at its close 
 was seen still walking along the trenches, sound asleep 
 though refusing himself rest. His valor was not so 
 much mere courage as a perfect indifference to danger, 
 which became a proverb in the lines. It won for him 
 the special favor of the Naval Brigade, whose soubri 
 quet of "Old Fireworks" expressed their keen sense 
 
346 
 
 SIR WILLIAM GO K DON OF 
 
 of his constant readiness to give the example of facing 
 the enemy s fire whenever personal example could be 
 of use. Nor was his influence felt only in leading 
 others on to deeds of daring. He made no secret to 
 those who questioned him on his habits of his never- 
 failing daily study of his Bible. At such a time hearts 
 were easily impressed by a few words coming from one 
 whose heroic character and unsparing devotion to the 
 work in hand had made him conspicuous to the whole 
 army. And the great siege, more than any other part 
 of his career of usefulness, has left abundant witness 
 of the marvellous influence that pure life had on others 
 for good. 
 
 A severe wound received in the right hand and arm in 
 the great March sortie, and much neglected afterwards, 
 broke down his health just before the siege closed, and 
 he was absent when the strong hold was surrendered 
 which, more than any other single man, he had contrib 
 uted to make our prize. In the following year, being 
 still regimentally a captain of engineers, but a colonel by 
 brevet and aide-de-camp to the Queen, he was called 
 suddenly from a holiday in Scotland to be practically 
 the military head of his corps as Deputy Adjutant- 
 General. " It s a splendid appointment," he said, in 
 answer to a friend s congratulations, " but one I would 
 rather not have, for the principal duty lies in refusing 
 different men different things they want." With this 
 somewhat morbid view of what discipline should be, 
 it is not surprising that he was not as popular at the 
 Horse Guards as his friends could have desired to see 
 him ; but his translation to the important charge of the 
 great fortifications of Portsmouth, the largest engineer- 
 command then in the world, which happened not long 
 
GORDON S BA TTEL V. 
 
 347 
 
 after, gave his zeal and energy and his natural kindli 
 ness better scope. His Sunday evening entertainments, 
 a custom begun by him when first in charge of a small 
 detachment long before, were open to all his command 
 weekly without special invitation, and drew his young 
 officers together once more, as they had another genera 
 tion of young officers fifteen years before, the survivors 
 of whom warmly own the valuable influence these genial 
 meetings had on them. With the design of the works of 
 the Portsmouth district Sir W. Gordon (who received his 
 knighthood while employed there) was not concerned. 
 His duty was merely executive, and as an executive 
 officer it may be fairly declared that he has never been 
 surpassed. His command was broken by a temporary 
 call to Canada at the time of the Trent affair ; but the 
 alarm over he returned once more to the charge of the 
 great works around Spithead,of the execution of which 
 his old opponent, Todleben, after being escorted by 
 him round them, publicly expressed his unalloyed 
 admiration. 
 
 As Deputy Adjutant-General of his Corps he had 
 become an Associate of the Institution of Civil Engi 
 neers, and his keen sense of duty to his profession made 
 him a constant attendant at its meetings ; but with his 
 usual extremely retiring habits he shrank from taking 
 any more active part than listening. Not many weeks 
 before his death, however, he rose to return thanks for 
 the mention made of his corps in the President s 
 address, which pointedly alluded to himself, and made a 
 short speech full of manly feeling and of sensible 
 acknowledgement of what the education of Royal 
 Engineers owes to the civil branch of the profession, 
 " their intercourse with which he desired to express 
 
348 
 
 SIR WILLIAM GORDON OF 
 
 his warm hopes might on all occasions be close and 
 friendly as it had been heretofore." He had then not 
 long been appointed by popular wish, as it were, no 
 less than by royal choice to the revived office of Inspec 
 tor-General of Fortifications, which his friends thought 
 to see him fill with the same dignity with which he spoke 
 that night. Alas, a secret disease, produced by the 
 irritation of his severe Crimean wounds acting on the 
 nervous system, was even then preying on his brain. 
 The pain in his arm had gradually increased, and lat 
 terly never left him. His very efforts to suppress out 
 ward signs of suffering served but to increase the mis 
 chief that was working within. Traces of aberration 
 of mind had been observed some time before by 
 watchful and anxious friends, and a few weeks later he 
 passed from among us by the saddest end a gallant 
 soldier could know. In strength a giant, in modesty a 
 maiden, in humility a child, so pure and noble a life 
 never came to a more painful close than his, when his 
 mind losing its self-control, he suddenly laid violent 
 hands on his own life. 
 
 Left by his parents at the age of twenty-one the 
 care of a younger brother and sister, he had discharged 
 his difficult duties as though he had been the most 
 loving and thoughtful of fathers. Of his practical 
 goodness let this one trait suffice : when defrauded of 
 several thousand pounds by an agent he had implicitly 
 trusted, he insisted on charging his own want of super 
 vision as chiefly in fault by the temptation it had offer 
 ed, and absolutely refused to prosecute the offender. 
 More than this, when he found the wretched man 
 afterwards starving (who had robbed his employer only 
 to fall into deserved penury), he himself, having long 
 
GORDON S BA TTER Y. 349 
 
 since forgiven him, and having sought him to express 
 his forgiveness, now ministered to the needs of the 
 only living being who had ever done him serious harm. 
 The sudden loss of such a hero may well have cast a 
 gloom over the service which was proud of him, even 
 had the circumstances been less painful. It had 
 seemed his part to bring visibly before their eyes, in a 
 hard and sceptical age that loves its own comfort and 
 doubts of others goodness, all the pure and knightly 
 qualities of the ideal " chevalier sans peur et sans 
 reproche." To his personal friends their bereavement 
 would have been most bitter in any case, and it 
 was doubly hard where the sad consolation lies chiefly 
 in the words our Laureate has addressed to such suf 
 ferers : 
 
 " Friends, this frail bark of ours 
 May wreck itself without the pilot s guilt, 
 Without the captain s knowledge." 
 
CHINESE GORDON AND THE TAIPING 
 REBELLION* 
 
 "THE Abyssinian campaign," wrote Sir Francis 
 Head soon after the fall of Magdala, " promoted the 
 corps of Royal Engineers from darkness to daylight. 
 For in the London War Office it had in former ages 
 been a time-honored axiom that a practical knowledge 
 of the attack and defence of fortified places, of the 
 application and construction of field-works, bridges, 
 pontoons, roads, water-supply, surveying, sketching, 
 and signalling, rendered an officer of Engineers incom 
 petent to command an army in the field for the very 
 reason expounded by Festus when, with a loud voice, 
 he exclaimed, Paul, thou art beside thyself; too 
 much learning hath made thee mad! But the Abys 
 sinian campaign, conducted throughout all its ramifica 
 tions by an Engineer, has indisputably established that 
 in that competitive examination which in the council 
 of statesmen must henceforth guide their selection of 
 the fittest officer to command an expedition, or to 
 defend the mother country, the corps of Royal Engi 
 neers can no longer be excluded." 
 
 If an apology were needed for publishing this brief 
 narrative of one of the most wondrous series of suc- 
 
 * The Ever- Victorious Army ; A History of the Chinese Campaign 
 under Lieut.-Col C. G. Gordon, C. B., R. E., and of the Suppression of 
 the Taiping Rebellion. By Andrew Wilson. 
 
CHINESE GORDON AND THE T A IP ING REBELLION. 35! 
 
 cesses that military annals record, it would be found in 
 that reticence of its hero, which combined with other 
 causes to keep his exploits too long unknown to his 
 countrymen ; so unknown indeed, that it is not surpris 
 ing that Sir Francis Head should have shared in the 
 popular belief, as his words just quoted imply, that the 
 Abyssinian expedition was the first occasion on which 
 a British engineer had held a soldier s most important 
 trust, the command of an army. Yet before his eulogy 
 of Napier appeared, a work was written which from its 
 title, recited at the head of this essay, would seem 
 intended to make known an earlier campaign, in which 
 an engineer was the sole general : a campaign where 
 the enemy was vastly more numerous, the powers of 
 the commander more limited, the supplies scantier, the 
 support more uncertain, the reward, oh ! how infinitely 
 less, than in the case of Abyssinia. And the issues! 
 Who shall compare the punishment of the drunken 
 tyrant of Magdala, and the rescue of a dozen British 
 captives from his grasp; or even the assertion of the 
 greatness of British power, of the reality of our eastern 
 resources, and, best of all, of our moderation ; with the 
 accomplishment of a task which restored tranquillity to 
 an empire whose population outnumbers that of Eu 
 rope, repaired her desolate cities, and gave her toiling 
 millions of peasantry the longed-for peace, waiting for 
 which in vain, they had ceased to till their paternal 
 lands, lest they should but be offering fresh tempta 
 tions to the spoiler? And in accomplishing this great 
 achievement a greater still was wrought. The victories 
 of the young Engineer-General of China shook to its 
 fall the foul fabric of a blasphemous religion, which at 
 one time had threatened to take rank in importance 
 
352 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 with those of Buddha and Brahma, and whose head 
 had aspired to usurp the most ancient of earthly 
 thrones, under the claim of a pretended revelation. 
 
 But in truth Mr. Wilson s work has buried a great 
 epic amid heaps of mere book-maker s rubbish. What 
 he intended no doubt to illustrate he has but obscured. 
 That which should have been the main subject is so 
 overladen by details often little relevant, that the 
 reader who desires to know the story of Gordon s cam 
 paign may leave the volume at its end with confused 
 impressions of the Chinese system of philosophy, the 
 foreign policy of Pekin, the ability of the arch-impostor 
 and his generals, the superiority, in a sense, of Chinese 
 officialdom to that of Europe, and a dozen other 
 collateral subjects, but without having thoroughly 
 grasped that which he came to seek. As Mr. Wilson 
 most truly remarks in his introduction, the book should 
 have been written in three volumes at the least. We 
 may add that the attempt to cram all the intended 
 matter into one has spoilt the whole as a general work 
 of reference, while it has confused and made tame his 
 narrative of that single episode of recent Chinese 
 history which, in the first page of his introduction, he 
 declares to be " the topic of this book." It is not our 
 business or wish to discuss at any length, what the 
 writer has intended for the philosophic accompaniment 
 of his particular task. He seems to us to have said a 
 great deal too much, or not enough, when he hints that 
 the Chinese empire is founded on principles similar 
 to those shadowed in " Plato s Republic ; " or declares 
 that the ordinary Chinaman is universally so educated 
 as to take an intelligent interest in the theory as well 
 as the practice of his government ; or states the para- 
 
THE T A IP ING REBELLION. 353 
 
 dox that the infanticide of China "does not arise from 
 any tendency among the Chinese to destroy infants ;" or 
 finally winds up his book with the alarming but some 
 what vague declaration that, in Great Britain, " there 
 must be a return to some connection between its 
 higher intelligence and the wielding of its power, other 
 wise it will soon share the fate of Carthage and Venice, 
 of Spain and Holland." A writer who is capable of 
 putting down on paper such nonsense as this, uncon 
 scious that he is merely jumbling historical names in 
 pairs, instead of drawing historical parallels, is not 
 likely to be a very safe guide through a survey of the 
 forty centuries of civilized life in China, or of the phi 
 losophy by which its government, in theory at least, 
 subsists. Not to dwell on these longer, we are con 
 tent with total dissent from the hints which he, though 
 " no Mandarin worshipper" by his own account, scat 
 ters plentifully through his pages, that modern Eu 
 rope in general, and England in particular, are vastly 
 behind the Flowery Land in civilization, decency, and 
 religion. Europe, it is true, has known evil days under 
 the hands of fierce conquerors, plundering and destroy 
 ing in religion s name ; but its annals may be ransacked 
 in vain, without finding any parallel to the miseries 
 endured in those provinces of China over which " The 
 Heavenly King," the Taiping prophet, extended his 
 fell sway for ten sad years. 
 
 Hung Sew-tsuen (better known in China by his 
 assumed title, Tien Wang) must be a character with 
 some considerable attractions about him to a biogra 
 pher, for Mr. Wilson, unintentionally it may be, seems 
 disposed to make him his hero, forgetting that this 
 was not the purpose of the book. That he had the 
 
354 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 talent of imposing on others a sense of his divine mis 
 sion is undeniable ; but that he should have done this 
 with such ease and with so little question of proof; 
 should, unlike his prototype, Mahomet, have been able 
 to dispense personally with the fighting part of his 
 mission, and found others ready to do the hard work 
 for him; should never have attempted to create a 
 system that would spread and maintain itself without 
 an army ; and should have been allowed, so soon as he 
 gained his temporary throne at Nankin, to shut him 
 self up in seclusion and devote himself to foul licen 
 tiousness, undisturbed, save once, by the remonstrance 
 of one chief follower, who paid the penalty of his rash 
 ness with his life ; proves to demonstration the degra 
 dation of sense and manners to which the calm Philoso 
 phy of Harmony our writer so much admires had 
 reduced the people who had no better guide. As Mr. 
 Wilson so often strains for a comparison between 
 Chinese and European civilization, we will offer him a 
 special one ; that between the most bloody and ruth 
 less government of modern days in the West, and the 
 rule of the Taipings. Bad as the triumvirate of 1794 
 at Paris and their proscriptions were, their administra 
 tion was mild and decent nay, honest and even saint 
 ly when compared to that of the Heavenly King amid 
 his concubines and disciples at Nankin. Such as he 
 was, however, he was a power in the land, and one to 
 be taken much into account in considering the forces 
 acting in Western China in the years 1860-63. For 
 he was aided not only by the blind superstition of his 
 chief followers, but by two powerful extraneous sup 
 ports which seemed often ready to intervene and save 
 him, even when the reviving energy of the Imperialists, 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 
 
 355 
 
 and the detestation in which the subjugated people 
 around held his armies, seemed likely to turn the 
 balance of the war against him. 
 
 The first of these was the favor or indifferentism of 
 the European trading communities, who were now 
 strongly established on the coast at various points. To 
 many of these gentry, who had merely come to China 
 to make money and go away again, it was a perfect 
 matter of indifference which party succeeded in the 
 contest so long as trade went on. To them " the 
 Mandarins," the politest name they ever gave a gov 
 ernment 4,000 years or so old, and the arch-rebel who 
 had brought ruin on the southern provinces of China, 
 were regarded on equal terms as contending powers. 
 There is abundant evidence of this in the work of Mr. 
 Wilson, who knew the class well; and that the Tai- 
 pings could obtain supplies from some of these accom 
 modating merchants as freely as the Emperor s gov 
 ernment, is a patent fact in the whole history of the 
 war. But for the absolute folly of the rebels, which led 
 them unchallenged to threaten the Treaty Ports when 
 they found themselves in their vicinity, it would have 
 been as hard apparently to get the cosmopolitan soci 
 ety of these marts to declare itself against their pre 
 tensions, as to procure a decided intervention on the 
 part of the British Government. This local feeling, 
 nourished too often by personal differences with the 
 Mandarins, in which the foreign traders were in the 
 wrong, influenced our own national policy to some 
 extent: but a more powerful sentiment than even that 
 of gain held Britain back; for the missionary element 
 among her people had taken up the cause of the Tai- 
 pings with a perversity such as the whole History of 
 
356 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 Human Error, should it ever be written, will find it 
 hard to match. 
 
 In condemning that monstrous misuse of a divine 
 principle which made heroes of the Taiping chiefs, we 
 desire to guard ourselves from any charge of deprecia 
 ting the value of missionary effort. It is a noble boast 
 of Englishmen that, wherever their merchants have 
 penetrated into heathendom, preachers have been 
 found willing, without hope of gain, to stand by their 
 side. But the Founder of Christianity himself taught 
 its first missionaries to combine the wisdom of the 
 serpent with the harmlessness of the dove; and some 
 of their later successors have ignored this part of their 
 instructions altogether. Hence those noble efforts to 
 Christianize other nations which in their spirit adorn 
 the nation and the age, have been mingled with such 
 effusions of folly and bigotry as have tended, with 
 many harsh-judging minds, to throw contempt on the 
 whole cause. New Zealand, Africa, Jamaica, have 
 each their complaint to make on this score ; but never 
 was the erratic spirit of modern missionary enterprise 
 so wholly thrown away, and so open to the censure of 
 the prudent, as when a powerful party at home took 
 up the cause of the Taipings, misled by a few local 
 writers, whose ignorance of Chinese language and 
 customs was only equalled by their audacity. Tien 
 Wang had read Christian tracts, had learnt from a 
 Christian missionary ; and when he announced publicly 
 three years afterwards that part of his mission was to 
 destroy the temples and images, and showed in the 
 jargon of his pretended visions some traces of his 
 New Testament study, the conclusion was instantly 
 seized by the sanguine minds of a section set upon 
 
THE TAiriXG REBELLION. 
 
 357 
 
 evangelizing the East, that their efforts had produced 
 a true prophet, fit for the work. W r edded to this 
 phantasy, they rejected as the inventions of the 
 enemies of missions the tales of Taiping cruelty which 
 soon reached Europe : and long after the details of the 
 impostor s life at Nankin, with its medley of visions, 
 executions, edicts, and harem indulgence, became 
 notorious to the world, prayers were offered for his 
 success by devotees in Great Britain as bigoted to his 
 cause as the bloodiest commander, or " Wang," whom 
 he had raised from the ranks of his followers to carry 
 out his " exterminating decrees." The Taiping cause 
 was lost in China before it was wholly abandoned by 
 these fanatics in England, and their belief in its excel 
 lence so powerfully reacted on our policy, that it might 
 have preserved us from active intervention down to 
 the present time, had not certain Imperialist successes 
 elsewhere, the diminishing means of their wasted 
 possessions, and the rashness of their own chiefs, 
 brought the Taiping armies into direct collision with 
 us. And with the occasion there was happily raised 
 up the man whose prowess was to scatter their blood- 
 cemented empire to pieces far more speedily than it 
 had been built up. 
 
 South of the lower portion of the course of the 
 Yangtsze is Kiangnan, the district which was the scene 
 of the future operations of Gordon and the " Ever- 
 Victorious Army." It lies chiefly between the river 
 and the deep and narrow bay of Hangchow. The 
 width of the peninsula they form, from that city at the 
 head of the bay across to Nankin on the Yangtsze, is 
 150 miles ; its Ungth from this line to where the ocean 
 bounds it, about 200. The great treaty port of 
 
358 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 Shanghai lies near the extreme western point, some 
 twenty-five miles inland, on one of the numerous creeks 
 which are the main features of the country. To pic 
 ture to ourselves the events which were to follow, we 
 must conceive first the general features of the district, 
 as Mr. Wilson describes it, before being devastated by 
 the bloody partisans of the Heavenly King. Densely 
 peopled, it is generally but a few feet above the level 
 of the ocean, and in some places below that level. 
 Here and there isolated hills rise to the height of a few 
 hundred feet ; but for the most there is a dead level, 
 rich with trees, growing various kinds of cereals in 
 great abundance, thickly studded with villages and 
 towns, and intersected in every direction by rivers, 
 creeks, and canals. Look across any portion of this 
 vast plain, and boats, with mat-sails spread, seem to be 
 moving in every direction over the land. In some 
 places, and especially round the great city of Soochow, 
 the waters spread out into lakes of considerable size. 
 Except on a few lines there is no convenient land tran 
 sit but by raised foot-paths, so narrow that they must 
 usually be traversed in single file : but the net-work of 
 waters affords vast facilities for the movements of 
 boats and small steamers. Upon the peaceful people 
 of this plain the Taipings had descended in a desolat 
 ing swarm, half robbers, half fanatics. 
 
 "We must conceive them," [says Mr. Wilson] "coming 
 down on its rich towns and peaceful villages, moving flags, 
 beating gongs, destroying images and temples, seizing valu 
 ables, occupying houses, dealing with all disobedience accord 
 ing to the exterminating decree of heaven, and being a terror 
 unto young women ; but still not at first destroying the crops 
 
THE T A IP ING REBELLION. 359 
 
 or many of the houses, or slaying many of the males. Then 
 we have the Allies driving them back, firing into their masses 
 of men with long-range rifles, and pounding at their stockades 
 with heavy guns and shells. On the retirement of these we 
 have the rebels again advancing to the neighborhood of 
 Shanghai, but this time in an infuriated demoniac state, burn 
 ing and destroying everything in order that there may be a 
 waste around the starving city, and murdering or driving 
 before them all the villagers. Lastly, the Ever-Victorious 
 Army appears on the scene not by any means always victo 
 rious, but very frequently so and bringing European drill and 
 officers, with heavy artillery, to bear on a settlement of the 
 question. Let this be embellished (as the scene appeared to 
 me in 1860) with views of rich fertile plains, where the crops 
 are trampled down or consumed, a few narrow bridges of the 
 willow-plate pattern, a dilapidated pagoda or two, broken 
 blackened walls of village houses, the deserted streets of 
 towns, innumerable swollen blackened corpses lying on the 
 slimy banks of the muddy streams, or rottening underneath 
 the graceful bamboos, red flames at night flashing up against 
 the deep dark sky ; let us imagine, also, the Taipings throw 
 ing themselves into all sorts of postures impossible to the 
 European, and uttering cries scarcely less painful or hideous 
 than those from the ravished villages, 
 conception of the great Chinese tragc 
 
 inKiangnan." 
 
 Looking at this country in a 
 it is evident that warfare carried on ir? 
 atic way would necessarily have peculiar features of 
 its own. The narrowness of the roads, and the abun 
 dance of lateral creeks, would compel all land move 
 ments to be conducted on a very reduced front ; while 
 the aid of a flotilla would enable an attacking force not 
 
360 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 only to turn the opposing enemy undiscovered, but in 
 many cases to fall upon him in flank and cut his col 
 umns in two. The walled towns situated on the great 
 roads would become points of vast importance in a 
 strategical view. Furnished with high walls, huge 
 stockades, and large garrisons of fierce but rudely armed 
 Taiping soldiers, they were proof almost to impregna 
 bility against the unscientific assaults of the Imperialist 
 generals ; but were ready on the other hand to open to 
 the superior powers of a European siege-train, backed 
 by disciplined and properly armed troops. As several 
 of them, Soochow in particular, were situated partly on 
 great sheets of water crossed by causeways, they might 
 be completely blockaded by a force of resolute men 
 smaller in numbers than the enclosed garrison, but hold 
 ing the vital points of passage out. In this very man 
 ner, and for the same reason identically, was Napoleon 
 able to enclose Marshal Wurmser s corps within lake- 
 girt Mantua in 1796 with a mere detachment of his own 
 army, while with the bulk of it he met and beat the 
 relieving force of Alvinzi. Kiangnan is a country of 
 Mantuas, and Soochow the chief of all, as we shall by- 
 and-bye discern. Carrying further the same idea of 
 seizing and occupying points vital to the enemy, it was 
 evident that the capture of a few well chosen towns in 
 succession might at once give a line of supply to the 
 attacking force which held them ; a line which could 
 he held for it by inferior troops, and would thus enable 
 it to seize successively such places as would cut the 
 enemy s communications one by one, until his armies 
 should be divided and destroyed in detail, or compelled 
 to fly the province. Of course to do this any com 
 mander must have a fighting force morally and mate- 
 
THE TA1PING REBELLION. 
 
 361 
 
 rially superior at the actual points of contact to those 
 it would encounter. Of course it must further be sup 
 plied with locomotion by water far beyond those of its 
 opponents. And these conditions would be of little 
 avail, if it had not for its chief a man of genius, instinct 
 ively able to see the vital points in the theatre of war, 
 and of daring to seize them at all risks. Whether 
 the Ever-Victorous Army and its general were such a 
 force and such a chief, let our after-story tell, to which 
 these remarks are but a prelude, indispensable to the 
 understanding of what follows. 
 
 The Taiping rebellion was ten years old, and had 
 from a rapid series of conquests become a vast but 
 desultory struggle with the regular governments of 
 China, before its force came into collision with the new 
 power from without, the armed civilization of Europe, 
 represented by the protected settlements on the sea 
 board of the empire. The rapid growth of the move 
 ment and its chief successes were comprised in the 
 period between 1850, when Hung Sew-tsuen, the self- 
 styled Heavenly King, proclaimed his mission, and 
 1853, when, at the head of large armies, he established 
 his headquarters at Nankin, the second city of China. 
 But, as Mr. Wilson s work almost too mildly states it, 
 " the rebels were essentially destroyers, and possessed 
 no capability for reconstruction." The very extension 
 of their conquests limited their means of aggression 
 by reducing the productive powers of the unhappy pro 
 vinces which came under their sword. At first, indeed, 
 they were not everywhere so cruel as to destroy blindly 
 their own means of subsistence ; but large contributions 
 of provisions, of rice especially, were exacted as a con 
 dition of existence from the country districts; an4 
 
362 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 when the delivery of these became uncertain, owing to 
 the approach of Imperialist forces, or to any real diffi 
 culty of producing the necessary quantity, plunder, 
 devastation, and murder were the mild means em 
 ployed for bringing the refractory villages to submis 
 sion. Thus, as the rebellion became checked and local 
 ized by Imperial successes, its cruelties grew more 
 detestable, until the provinces that it had held became 
 the howling wilderness of ruin which that of Kiangnan 
 was, as described by Mr. Wilson in the latest stage of 
 the rebellion. The first great check sustained by the 
 Taipings was the destruction of the army sent by the 
 Heavenly King against Pekin soon after his establish 
 ment at Nankin. Growing ferocious under disaster, 
 he then began the series of " exterminating decrees" 
 by which his government was, during the rest 
 of his career, mainly carried on. Soon afterwards, 
 in 1856, he put to death, in a fit of jealousy, his chief 
 general, the true author of early Taiping success, known 
 as the Eastern King; and from that time his cause 
 began to languish, and that of the Imperialists, sup 
 ported by the naturally conservative element of the 
 Chinese people, made head against it even under the 
 walls of Nankin. In 1859-60 the humiliation of the 
 emperor s government by the French and English, 
 which followed upon the reactionary policy of the Pekin 
 government and its useless quarrel with the Allies, 
 once more gave a great .mpetus to the rebellion ; and 
 the Faithful King, one of the Hung Sew-tsuen s best 
 commanders, succeeded in raising for a time the Impe 
 rialist blockade of Nankin, driving the investing armies 
 down towards the estuary of the Yangtsze, and open 
 ing for the first time to the Taipings the rich province 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 363 
 
 of Kiangnan. Following up this advantage, he 
 advanced to the southwest, defeating and almost de 
 stroying the first Imperialist army which encountered 
 him. Another large force which held Soochow was so 
 terrified at the news of this disaster, that its comman 
 der committed suicide ; and the wealthy city, the cen 
 tral point of the peninsula before described, containing, 
 according to not extravagant estimates, two millions of 
 inhabitants and the chief silk manufactories of China, 
 fell unresistingly into the spoilers hands. Hangchow, 
 which is only inferior in importance to Soochow, next 
 was occupied ; the whole district, except a few posts 
 towards the mouth of the Yangtsze and near the city of 
 Shanghai, was in Taiping hands ; and the rebellion had 
 reached so great a height that, in the words of Mr. Wil 
 son (p. 57,) " had it not been for the assistance given by 
 foreigners towards its suppression, it might possibly 
 still be useless by devastating the country." 
 
 We have quoted these words the more particularly, 
 before proceeding to speak of the intervention, because 
 they directly contradict sundry hints of the same 
 author s that the liberation of China from the scourge 
 which had for twelve years oppressed it was not due to 
 foreign aid in general, nor to that of Colonel Gordon 
 in particular. There is such a thing as damning with 
 faint praise, and surely it is little better to quote high 
 panegyrics of the commander whose deeds one records 
 in order to follow them with a page of such remarks 
 as : 
 
 "There is no doubt that Gordon s force unaided could 
 not have cleared the province. While the brunt of fighting 
 fell upon him, he required Imperialists to hold the places 
 
3 6 4 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 which he took, and their forces fought along with him so as 
 greatly to contribute to his success. ... It is quite clear, 
 judging by the situation and its results, that the Imperialists 
 allowing the Taipings to advance against the posts was no 
 proof whatever of their being unable to deal with the rebellion 
 effectually in their own slow and systematic way." 
 
 To write in this fashion after the proofs his own 
 work furnishes that the campaign of the Ever-Victorious 
 Army found the rebellion active and flourishing, and 
 left it crushed, shows that if Mr. Wilson can tell the 
 story of Gordon s successes, he is wholly incapable of 
 drawing from them the broad and obvious conclusion. 
 In one still more contradictory passage on the campaign, 
 Mr. Wilson states that a right understanding of its mil 
 itary results and political relationship "is absolutely 
 essential to correct the erroneous supposition that the 
 Chinese w r ere in any very great need of an assistance 
 for the suppression of the rebellion." So far from cor 
 recting this supposition, we are certain that any one 
 who carefully weighs Mr. Wilson s own narrative will 
 come to the very conclusion which he deprecates. That 
 he himself should have missed it, having had the advan 
 tage of perusing the original documents since placed in 
 our hands, adds but another proof that it is useless 
 to look for the historian s judgment in one who has 
 been trained to regard the current events around him 
 with the petty view of a local politician. But it is 
 time to pass entirely away from the criticism of Mr. 
 Wilson s work to the story which he has undertaken to 
 tell. 
 
 In January 1862, despite the warnings previously 
 given by Admiral Hope, the Faithful King, now chief- 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 
 
 365 
 
 commander of the Taipings, put his army from Soochow 
 in motion for the second time against Shanghai. 
 According to the theory of Mr. Wilson which at this 
 point we beg to take leave of he moved because 
 pressed by the Imperialists that way. But as he had, 
 in fact, attacked the place in 1860, and been beaten off 
 by the French and British garrisons, when he was at 
 the height of his successes, we must decline to believe 
 that this aggressive policy was the result of certain 
 reverses of 1861. Its meaning was announced plainly 
 enough by the invader s proclamation, " We must take 
 Shanghai to complete our dominions/ as the manner 
 of warfare by which this was to be accomplished, by 
 the smoke of the burning villages which obscured the 
 city, and hid the surrounding country from the eyes of 
 its terrified inhabitants. The foreign residents formed 
 themselves into volunteer corps ; the allied admirals 
 prepared to act decisively against the invaders. General 
 Staveley resolved, with our Minister s countenance, not 
 merely to save the city, but to maintain a clear radius 
 around it of thirty miles. Finally great importance was 
 suddenly attached to the American adventurer Ward, 
 who with about a thousand half-disciplined Chinese, 
 held Sung Kiang, a place eighteen miles above Shang 
 hai on the Whampoa, which he had taken from the 
 rebels at the time of their advance in 1860, being com 
 missioned by the Chinese governor of the city, and paid 
 for his services from means furnished by some of its 
 leading merchants. His force was officered by such 
 wandering Europeans and Americans as he could 
 pick up ; and on the first repulse of the rebels (who 
 had occupied some places to the south of the city, from 
 which Ward, aided by the admirals, drove them) it 
 
366 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 received from Pekin the title by which it was afterwards 
 officially known, that of The Ever-Victorious Army. 
 
 During April and May 1862 the Allies, notwith 
 standing the death of Admiral Protet, shot dead at 
 Najou, obtained considerable successes. They recov 
 ered several walled towns in succession which had 
 been too easily given up to the Taipings, and seemed 
 likely without difficulty to maintain the clear radius 
 resolved on. No better thing could have happened to 
 the rebels, as afterwards appeared : but at this time 
 they obtained a sudden success which proved ulti 
 mately of most disastrous result to their cause, though 
 favorable to it for the moment. The Faithful King 
 learning that the Imperialists near Shanghai, embold 
 ened by the reverses of their enemies, had resolved to 
 advance against Taitsan, a considerable place on the 
 direct line between the former place and Soochow, 
 marched to meet them, and on May sixteenth suc 
 ceeded, by the old ruse of placing among them a body 
 of his own picked men under the guise of deserters, in 
 utterly routing them. A small part only escaped to 
 Kading, the place from which they had advanced. 
 This town was one of those recently recovered by the 
 Allies under Staveley: and that general, growing nat 
 urally anxious about the advanced positions into which 
 he had thrown his detachments, and their exposure to 
 overwhelming masses of the victorious Taipings, aban 
 doned these new acquisitions and withdrew to Shang 
 hai, a step not taken without some remonstrance on 
 the part of his staff. 
 
 Staveley s retreat naturally gave an impetus to the 
 Taiping advance. The Faithful King now occupied 
 the towns within the lately protected radius, and laid 
 
7 HE TAIPING REBELLION. 367 
 
 waste the country up to the city s walls. Beyond them 
 there was nothing free from the marauding parties he 
 sent out, but the ground the fire of the Allies could 
 reach and the two small towns of Singpo and Sung- 
 kiang. The latter place had been the headquarters 
 of Ward s force ever since it was raised in 1860; the 
 other was one of those lately taken by Staveley, and 
 now occupied by a detachment of the Ever-Victorious 
 Army. An attack was made on Sungkiang, but 
 repulsed by Ward, aided by a party from the fleet. 
 Singpo, on the contrary, was soon so closely invested 
 that it was resolved to abandon it, and great loss was 
 suffered in the attempt of the garrison to escape on 
 June eighteenth, in which their commander, Forester, 
 was captured by the Taipings. The Faithful King, 
 now master of all the district but Shanghai and a few 
 miles of the river, was for pressing his successes against 
 "the foreign devils ;" the rather so since he doubtless 
 hoped (as he had endeavored two years before) to gain 
 an entrance into the city by treachery. At this point, 
 however, he was recalled by his master, against whose 
 capital at Nankin new Imperial armies had moved 
 from the interior, and so Shanghai was left to breathe 
 freely again. The interest of Chinese affairs concen 
 trated for the rest of the year 1862 on the treaty 
 port of Ningpo, to the south of the bay of Hangchow, 
 which the Taipings had some time since seized. 
 Hither Ward repaired with part of his force to aid the 
 operations of Colonel Roderic Dew, of the navy. This 
 gallant officer (whose achievements are worthy of far 
 more notice than we can give them) had become 
 entangled in the conflict of the Imperialists and 
 Taipings for the possession of the city, and after a vain 
 
3 68 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 attempt at armed neutrality, took part so decisively 
 with the former as to recover the place for them, and 
 then, following up his success, cleared the desired 
 radius of thirty miles around it. The barbarities of 
 the defeated Taipings in their attempts to recover 
 this exceeded all description, and made the country 
 people their determined enemies ; so that, in spite of 
 the death of Ward in one of many affairs in which he 
 showed great gallantry, the district near Ningpo was 
 fairly freed from the Taipings by the beginning of 
 1863. 
 
 Ward s skill and courage in action caused him to 
 be much lamented ; but he had never been able to 
 restrain the marauding propensities of his force, which 
 the Ningpo successes had shown in their worst colors. 
 His successor, Burgevine, a young American of more 
 activity and pretension than genius, was so inflated by 
 his sudden elevation as at once to become almost im 
 mediately involved in quarrels with the Chinese gov 
 ernor (or Futai), the Imperialist generals near him, and 
 the bankers who supplied the means of payment to the 
 force. With the moral support of General Staveley to 
 back him, the Futai dismissed Burgevine, and took 
 officially over for his government the Ever-Victorious 
 Army, the command of which was refused by its next 
 senior officer. At the Futai s entreaty, Staveley gave 
 it in temporary charge to Captain Holland, one of his 
 staff, until authority should be obtained from Sir F. 
 Bruce at Pekin to attach a British officer permanently 
 to it as commander. Holland, unwilling to let his 
 force grow rusty, advanced forthwith against Taitsan, 
 a place already noted for Imperial disasters, but only 
 to be repulsed with heavy loss. At this juncture the 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 369 
 
 reply of Sir F. Bruce was received, and under his sanc 
 tion the command was conferred on Gordon, a young 
 captain of Engineers, just breveted major for his ser 
 vices in the previous operations. 
 
 Gordon had first seen war in the hard school of 
 " the black winter" of the Crimean war. In his humble 
 position as an engineer subaltern he had attracted the 
 notice of his superiors not merely by his energy and 
 activity (for these are not, it may be asserted, uncom 
 mon characteristics of his class), but by an extraordi 
 nary aptitude for war, developing itself amid the trench- 
 work before Sebastopol in a personal knowledge of the 
 enemy s movements such as no other officer attained. 
 " We used always to send him to find out what new 
 move the Russians were making" was the testimony 
 given years since to his genius by one of the most dis 
 tinguished of the officers he served under ; and the 
 reputation he then made he had fully sustained during 
 the brief services he had lately been engaged on in 
 China. If General Staveley had made any mistake in 
 the operations he personally conducted the year before 
 (and it must be remembered he was painfully hamper 
 ed by the doubt whether active intervention would be 
 approved), he more than redeemed it by the excellence 
 of his choice. The Ever-Victorious Army found itself 
 under a leader whose courage it had constant occasion 
 to admire, whose justice it honored, whose firmness 
 availed to suppress the daily quarrels of its officers 
 and to shield the men from abuse of their power. The 
 private plundering which disgraced the force when with 
 Ward disappeared under a general whose eye was as 
 keen as his soul was free from the love of lucre. Stern 
 against iniquity as the Baptist himself (for Gordon was 
 24 
 
370 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 of the religious type of soldier which England has 
 learnt to reverence in such characters as Havelock and 
 Hedley Vicars), he from the first taught his force to 
 " do violence to no man, and be content with their 
 wages ; " while the milder side of the gospel by which 
 he lived was displayed to the defeated Taipings ; and 
 the humane treatment which their prisoners met with 
 at his hands did almost as much, after the first, for the 
 cause which he served as his inborn skill in the art of 
 war. Among the strange medley of adventurers who 
 held commissions under him were Englishmen, Amer 
 icans, French, Germans, Spaniards. Some were ex- 
 mates of merchant ships, some old soldiers of good 
 character, some refugees of no character at all. 
 Among them were avowed sympathizers with the reb 
 els, and avowed defiers of Chinese law ; but all classes 
 soon learnt to respect a general in whose kindness, 
 valor, skill, and justice they found cause unhesitatingly 
 to confide ; who never spared himself personal exposure 
 when danger was near ; and beneath whose firm touch 
 sank into insignificance the furious quarrels and per 
 sonal jealousies which had hitherto marred the useful 
 ness of the force. The influence he gained over their 
 rude minds, arid the degree of education that qualified 
 them, may be illustrated together by the following 
 pithy note addressed to him by an excited subaltern 
 before the greatest of his conquests, and after some 
 very heavy losses of officers in previous assaults : 
 
 " Camp before SOOCHOW : 3rd De 63. 
 " Sir, i wish to volunteer my Service to be one of the 
 Stormers. 
 
 W. H. , Lieut. Regt" 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. ^\ 
 
 The difficulties that beset the commander in enforc 
 ing the most necessary discipline before the enemy 
 appear from the characteristic letter following, written 
 by an officer after the execution of a deserter at one 
 of the detachments, during a long series of desperate 
 engagements at the close of Gordon s operations, near 
 Chanchufu. (The colonel complained of for his sever 
 ity was killed, it should be noted, in a night affair, four 
 days later, when some of Gordon s own troops fired on 
 his party ; and it has been shrewdly doubted whether 
 the firing was wholly accidental.) 
 
 April 21, 1864. 
 
 " Sir, It is with Great Regret, that i ame forced to apply 
 for permission to retire from your force but the transaction 
 of this afternoon so Disgusts me that i can no longer serv in 
 So Corruptible a force i hope you will not forget an officer 
 whom has servd at Chingwan and at those hills at Whosun 
 lately, without the chance of any Loot. Sir i have hardly a 
 farthing i leave it to your generosity for the means of reach 
 ing Engeland but i cannot possibly serv in this force after 
 Col. s act of this afternoon. Now Sir Some men who 
 Deserted from Soochow and whom you ordered to be Shot, 
 were Sheltered and husbanded by Col. and eventualy 
 released, a Corpl who deserted from my late gunboat i was 
 told that i had Ill-Treated him, by Col., for why, because 
 he was one of his old croneys i could tell you more if I had 
 a private Conference with you. Sir I have servd in the 
 british army for a long time and never heard of a man being 
 Shot, for desertion (and without a court martial) Sir if you 
 cannot give me the means of returning to Engeland i hope 
 you will Give me a recommendation that i may obtain a Situa- 
 
372 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 tion and not join your Enemies the Taping rebils Sir it is 
 with Sincere regret i tender this resignation from 3ist. 
 
 " I remain your most Humble Servant. 
 
 " The late Capt. Artillery." 
 
 " Sir as authority for a Character i present you with my 
 discharge." 
 
 " Gen. C. GORDON." 
 
 The organization of Gordon s army we have not 
 space to give in detail, nor is this essential for the 
 purpose of our story. Its numbers, varying from 
 3,000 to 5,000 men, under about 150 officers, were 
 easily maintained, after the first successes, by recruit 
 ing among the captured Taipings. The infantry were 
 armed mostly with the smooth-bore musket, but had 
 plentiful supplies of ammunition ; and some picked 
 men had rifles. The artillery was very formidable, 
 comprising a well-arranged siege-train for the attack 
 of walled towns, and supplied with complete boat car 
 riage for water transport. A flotilla of armed steamers 
 and gun-boats served, in that water-intersected coun 
 try, both to cover and flank all movements, and also 
 by suddenly transferring the force from one point to 
 another to multiply it to the enemy s imagination. 
 A light pontoon equipment was ready for the passage 
 of the numerous creeks to be crossed on every march. 
 Though formidable in these particulars, the value of 
 so small and so irregularly formed a force, acting 
 against masses often tenfold its own numbers, must 
 needs depend greatly on the nature of the country 
 and the powers of strategy in the commander. Of the 
 former we have already spoken : the latter s operations 
 we have now briefly to recount. 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 
 
 373 
 
 The force now placed under Gordon, and the 
 means he commanded for its rapid transport, might 
 be employed by an active and daring commander in 
 two different ways. The one would be to carry on 
 connected operations, supported by, or at least bear 
 ing on, those of the Imperialist commanders in this part 
 of China, and directed, as before pointed out, against 
 the main lines by which the Taiping armies communi 
 cated one with another. A more obvious and appa 
 rently more brilliant course, but one leading to less 
 decisive results, would be to transfer the Ever-Victori 
 ous Army suddenly from one point to another in the 
 province, so as to strike a series of blows at isolated 
 posts of the enemy. It might be said, indeed, by one 
 reasoning from preceding events, that neither of these, 
 but rather a purely defensive attitude near Shanghai, 
 or the gradual recovery bit by bit of the places near 
 that city which had been lately captured, would have 
 been the natural way of employing the force at first. 
 But the new commander s instinctive genius told him 
 at once that a vigorous aggressive was, in a case like 
 this, certain to prove the best defensive; that the 
 Taipings would not attempt to hold the vicinity of 
 Shanghai when they found an active enemy in their 
 rear, threatening the places through which their 
 retreat would lie ; and that the moral superiority 
 attaching to such an offensive would not only be good 
 for his own men, but would extend its advantages to 
 the Imperialist armies, which would gain heart from the 
 moment they saw the common enemy reduced from 
 his usual threatening attitude to one of defence. The 
 feebler notion of protecting Shanghai by operations 
 confined to the thirty-mile radius was never therefore 
 
374 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 entertained by Gordon ; yet in resolving to attack 
 beyond it, in order to completely free the district near 
 the city, it is probable that he could not foresee wholly 
 how far success might lead him, and was content to 
 leave the thorough breaking of the Taiping power as a 
 question for future circumstances to decide. But for 
 the immediate present, before his entering on his more 
 regular operations, he resolved to try the second 
 mode indicated, and to strike one sudden blow at a 
 distant point, such as should give heart and cohesion 
 to his followers, and inspire them with confidence in 
 their new chief. 
 
 About seventy miles north-west of Shanghai, and 
 on the southern shore of the estuary of the Yangtsze, 
 lies Fushan, a town long infamous as a haunt of pirates, 
 and now held by the Taipings, who had captured it in 
 1862, for the second time, after it had once deserted 
 their cause. Their garrison not only held this place, 
 but shut off from the river Chanzu, a town ten miles 
 inland, which had returned to its allegiance at the same 
 time, and whose governor, closely pressed by a Taiping 
 force, had now great difficulty in restraining the Impe 
 rialist garrison from surrender, by which they hoped to 
 avert the threatened vengeance of the rebel commander. 
 To relieve this suffering garrison as swiftly as possible 
 was the first task to which Gordon applied himself 
 after taking command of the Ever- Victorious Army ; 
 and not many days after he was on his way thither, 
 carrying part of his artillery, and as many of the 
 infantry as his two available steamers would transport. 
 Under cover of an Imperialist force, which was 
 intrenched not far from Fushan, Gordon landed with 
 out opposition, and disregarding a large body of Taip- 
 
THE TA IP ING RE VOL UTJON. 
 
 37 
 
 ings which kept the open field to watch his proceed 
 ings, went directly to the attack of the town. 1 
 32-pounder planted cleverly in the night near the wa^ 
 made an easy breach in the defences next mornin: 
 (April 4th), and the garrison, losing heart, fled at th 
 advance of the assaulting column, and gave up th 
 place, which thus fell with very trifling loss. A marc] 
 to Chanzu relieved the faithful governor there (faithfu 
 probably because, as once having been a Taipinj 
 leader, he dared not risk a surrender), and showed sue] 
 traces of the cruelty of the rebels as might well hav 
 hardened any heart against their cause. The dreadfu 
 sight in one place of the putrefying corpses of thirty 
 five Imperialist soldiers, burned partly first, and thei 
 crucified, testified that the tenacity of the Chanzu gov 
 ernor had in it something of a wise discretion. Hav 
 ing executed his purpose, Gordon returned as speedib 
 as he had come to his headquarters Sungkiang. Hi 
 success had confirmed him in the good opinion of hi 
 force and of the Chinese authorities, from whom he wa 
 now able without difficulty to procure the necessan 
 means for that liberal payment of his officers by whicl 
 he superseded the loose practice of special rewards fo 
 their captures which had existed under Ward, and whicl 
 had supplemented a still more irregular system of privat* 
 plunder. Firm in maintaining his own authority as t< 
 discipline, he affected none of the autocratic airs of hi 
 predecessors, but loyally treated the Chinese governo 
 of the province, Li (the same who had got rid of 
 Burgevine by Staveley s aid), with the respect due t( 
 the representative of the government he served. Ir 
 vain did Burgevine intrigue at Pekin for restoration t( 
 his charge ; for even Burlingame, the American minis 
 
376 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 ter, was not in his countryman s favor. His successor 
 had already, both in the field and in quarters, won 
 golden opinions from all with whom he had to do ; and 
 Li, when appealed to from Pekin, wrote of him pithily 
 and truly : " He wishes to drill our troops and save our 
 money; he fully comprehends the state of affairs, and 
 in the expedition he is preparing his men delightfully 
 obey him and preserve the proper order." For Gor 
 don was now making ready for the campaign which 
 was to restore Kiangnan to the Imperial arms, and by 
 breaking the neck of the rebellion, lead to the general 
 pacification of China. 
 
 It must be remembered that the great city of 
 Soochovv forms both a natural capital and central 
 point to the peninsula which was to be the theatre of 
 war. About thirty-five miles north-west of Shanghai 
 lies the walled town of Taitsan, connected, by a main 
 road running onward through the still larger town of 
 Quinsan, with Soochow. Quinsan was a place of the 
 very greatest strategical importance ; for the principal 
 approaches to Soochow on the eastern side met there, 
 and it served also as the arsenal of the Taipings in 
 that country, they having established in it a manufac 
 tory for shot under some vagabond Englishmen. 
 Against this town Gordon was making his advance at 
 the end of April, sure of the after fall of Taitsan, which 
 in fact depended on it, when he was called aside sud 
 denly to the latter town to avenge one of the acts of 
 treachery by which a Chinese civil war, beyond that 
 of any other nation, is apt to be defiled. The Taiping 
 commander at that place, intimidated apparently by 
 the fall of Fushan, which left him exposed to an attack 
 on that side or from Shanghai (Taitsan lies halfway 
 
THE T A IP ING REBELLION. 
 
 377 
 
 between the two) had made proposals of surrender to 
 Governor Li. Either these meant nothing, or he 
 changed his mind after the first negotiations, for the 
 affair only ended in the surprise by treachery of the 
 first part of an Imperialist column which was marching 
 in by agreement to occupy the place. Three hundred 
 of the prisoners were slaughtered and beheaded, their 
 heads being sent to Quinsan as a proof of the fidelity 
 of the Taiping general ; but the news reaching Gordon, 
 he turned aside at once and moved swiftly to avenge 
 this act of barbarity. Reaching the south side of the 
 town on April thirtieth, he worked round to the east 
 of it, keeping out of gunshot, and capturing some 
 small forts which protected the Quinsan road, cut it off 
 from that place. His heavy guns, protected by mant 
 lets (for the slow process of trenchwork was seldom 
 needed against the imperfect fire to be met in these 
 sieges), opened on the place next day, and on the 
 second an effective breach was formed. Never did 
 the Taipings fight better than here. They had not 
 yet been discouraged by frequent defeat, and, more 
 over, had good reason to distrust the mercy of their 
 enemies. They mustered ten thousand strong, and 
 had among them to work their guns several of the reck 
 less and untameable adventurers whom European 
 merchant-ships cast out in the course of their distant 
 trade, and whose chief aim is to keep beyond the reach 
 of the civilized law, which they have probably too good 
 reason to dread. But all defence was in vain against 
 the perseverance and energy of the new commander. 
 On the first repulse of his attacking column, Gordon, 
 imitating Grahame at San Sebastian, caused a battery 
 of eight-inch howitzers to play over his stormer s heads 
 
373 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 and clear the breach. On the second essay the 
 defenders gave way and made a general attempt to 
 escape. It is to the credit of the soldiers of the Ever- 
 Victorious Army that they spared the Chinese pris 
 oners (seven hundred of whom were soon after enlisted 
 in their ranks), while the foreign adventurers naturally 
 met with little mercy. Seven of these were killed 
 after the assault, three of whom proved to be deserters. 
 At this early stage of the campaign it is curious to 
 observe that the old immoral sympathy for the Tai- 
 pings took the form of attacks on Gordon s force, who 
 were accused by anonymous writers in the press of the 
 treaty ports of acts of " the most refined cruelty" 
 towards their prisoners. Such letters would have 
 been of but little importance, had not the Bishop of 
 Victoria been misled by them, and addressed a 
 dispatch to Lord Russell on the subject. These 
 charges were not left to Gordon only to refute, though 
 he did so effectually by showing the confidence with 
 which the Taiping prisoners took service in the ranks 
 of the accused force. They were rebutted by General 
 Brown (who had succeeded Staveley in command of 
 the regular troops about Shanghai) upon the most 
 direct and detailed evidence ; and the origin of the 
 fiction was traced to its source in the execution by an 
 ordinary but cruel Chinese official mode, " the igno 
 minious death," of seven of the runaways of the late 
 garrison of Taitsan, who fell into the hands of an inde 
 pendent Imperialist force which lay six miles from the 
 place on the Shanghai side. 
 
 Taitsan had offered considerable temptation to 
 plunder, and Gordon was glad, therefore, to withdraw 
 the Ever-Victorious Army from its new conquest. His 
 
THE T A IP ING REBELLION. 
 
 379 
 
 abolition of the old license to pillage, and other 
 measures taken at this time to secure the necessary 
 regularity and discipline, were not carried out without 
 much resistance, especially from the European element. 
 At one time all the commanding officers of battalions 
 sent in their resignations simultaneously to support an 
 extravagant demand ; at another a number of those 
 below them became still more mutinous, and their 
 insubordination threatened to spread to their men. 
 Gordon quieted the seniors, who had most to lose, by a 
 firm but determined refusal, and replaced the obstinate 
 portion of the others by volunteers from General 
 Brown s troops ; so that before the end of May, with 
 order restored, a complete and well-organized commis 
 sariat, and the moral advantage of recent successes 
 attaching to it, the Ever-Victorious Army was moving 
 onwards to new achievements. There was no question 
 now of remaining on the defensive, or even of confin 
 ing the operations to the neighborhood of Shanghai 
 The capture of Taitsan had at once cleared more than 
 the necessary ruins around the city, the Taipings near 
 it naturally retiring as they found the enemy establish 
 ed between themselves and Soochow. The Imperial 
 forces taking advantage of this, followed them up west 
 ward to the neighborhood of Quinsan, and then 
 intrenched themselves under their general Ching, wait 
 ing till their disciplined ally should arrive to deliver 
 the place into their hands. 
 
 The importance of Quinsan in a strategical view has 
 been already noticed generally; but to understand it 
 more accurately it is necessary to point out that it 
 was the key to all further operations against Soochow. 
 It lies nearly thirty miles eastward of that city, being 
 
3 So 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 connected with it by a single causeway running along a 
 canal, to both the north and south of which the creeks 
 spread out into large lakes, making all other direct 
 land communication from that side impossible. Close 
 to the west of Soochow lies the principal of all the nu 
 merous lakes of Kiangnan, Taho, a sheet of water nearly 
 square-shaped, and forty miles long and broad. Hence 
 there are but three main accesses to the city, two run 
 ning north and south along the eastern side of the 
 lake, and the third through Quinsan, thus forming with 
 them the letter H , Soochow being at the cross, Quinsan 
 at the (proper) foot, and the Taho lake lying along the 
 top or left-hand side. Quinsan once taken would sup 
 ply a base for separate operations against the necks of 
 land north and south of the city ; and these once occu 
 pied and closed, the fall of the place, to a force having 
 command of the water communications, would be but 
 a question of time. A right understanding of these 
 broad features of the case will make clear the nature of 
 the operations that followed. 
 
 Gordon s reconnoissances and reports of Quinsan 
 told him that the place was strong. The ditch around 
 it was over 100 feet wide ; the various approaches were 
 furnished with forts inside stockades ; the garrison was 
 estimated at from 12,000 to 15,000 men. But if strong 
 in itself its communication with the rebel headquarters 
 at Soochow was extremely bad, being, as before stated, 
 along a single causeway, narrow in places, with lengthy 
 bridges across the creeks, and easily approached at any 
 point by Gordon s chief armed steamer the " Hyson." 
 This causeway then was the weak point of the defence, 
 and against it Gordon accordingly, seizing hold of the 
 fact with the clear insight of genius, led his attack on 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 381 
 
 May thirtieth, carrying as many of his land forces as 
 his flotilla would convey, under the protection of the 
 Hyson. This steam-vessel, a small iron river boat, 
 mounting a 32-pounder gun and a 12-pound howitzer, 
 having her crew and gunners protected by timber-proof 
 breastworks, and for her commander a rough but 
 valiant Yankee named Davidson, did extraordinary 
 service on several occasions, but never so much as on 
 this day, a memorable one in the annals of the Taiping 
 war. The point where Gordon s flotilla struck the 
 vicinity of the causeway on its south side was Chunye, 
 one-third of the way from Quinsan to Soochow. The 
 approach was protected by piles in the water, and 
 these again by stockades on the neighboring land, 
 within which was a strong stone fort. Gordon had 
 intended to carry the land defences, if necessary, by 
 assault, and thus cut the enemy s communication at 
 once by road and canal. The Taipings, however, saved 
 him all trouble on this occasion ; for no sooner had the 
 piles been torn up and the steamer appeared making 
 her way through, than a panic seized the defenders, and 
 stockades and forts were alike abandoned, their late 
 garrisons flying both ways, and spreading alarm to the 
 gates of Quinsan and Soochow. While Gordon landed 
 his troops, the Hyson was sent down the canal to 
 follow up the fugitives towards the latter place, and 
 fulfilled her task completely, clearing the causeway the 
 whole way to within sight of the city, and occupying 
 two stone forts which guarded it at different points. 
 Towards dusk she returned to Chunye, and not too 
 soon, for the road from Quinsan was now crowded 
 with a dense column of men, at the head of which Gor 
 don s troops were briskly firing. The Taiping garrison, 
 
382 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 finding their main outlet closed, while the passages 
 eastward from the town were held by the Imperialist 
 general Ching, had sallied forth at evening, determined 
 apparently by mere numbers to crush Gordon s small 
 force (one battalion of infantry and some guns were all 
 that had been brought up), and make their way out. 
 The fore-gun of the steamer was at once brought to 
 bear, and her 32-pound shells soon decided the engage 
 ment, driving the Taipings in a shrieking rout of fugi 
 tives back on the beleaguered town. So fearful was 
 their loss from the firing and their own panic crowding 
 (the steamer appearing to them, no doubt, a relentless 
 and invulnerable monster, which could neither be 
 escaped from, nor injured, nor stayed in her pursuit), 
 that no thought of further resistance was left to the 
 disheartened garrison, and the Imperialists, who had 
 been on the watch on the opposite side, entered the 
 town unopposed from the east next morning. Of the 
 Taipings many thousands dispersed over the country ; 
 but the villagers here, as after the capture of Taitsan, 
 revenged abundantly on the fugitives the oppression 
 they had long suffered from, and but few of the number 
 reached Soochow, or any other place of safety. Up to 
 this time Gordon s actions may be considered as having 
 cost the rebels not less than 25,000 men. This last 
 extraordinary success, gained, with a list of seven cas 
 ualties, by one decided and well-planted blow, did not 
 occur without being accompanied by some fresh- diffi 
 culties. General Ching s jealousy of his ally s achiev 
 ing with a handful of men what his own army had not 
 dared to attempt, broke out in a serious form, and led 
 to some of his gun-boats firing on a party of the Ever- 
 Victorious troops, whose flag they pretended to ignore. 
 
THE TA1PING REBELLION. 
 
 383 
 
 Governor Li, however, compelled the apology which 
 Gordon found it necessary to insist on, lest the mistake 
 should be repeated ; and this difference was settled for 
 the time. A more serious matter was a mutiny of the 
 artillerymen, who disapproved strongly of Gordon s 
 intended change of headquarters from Sungkiang to 
 Quinsan. The former was associated in their minds 
 with the easy days and loose discipline of Ward s com 
 mand, and they openly refused to obey orders when 
 they heard of the proposed transfer, adding threats of 
 destroying their officers rather than submitting to it. 
 It was not until Gordon, drawing the revolver which he 
 was never seen but on this single occasion to display, 
 had dragged from the ranks the foremost man of the 
 mutineers, and forced him to embark under threat of 
 instant death, that obedience was restored, and the 
 rest of the company, in the words of an eye-witness, 
 " obeyed their general s formal word of command and 
 embarked without hesitation or demur. It may be 
 said," continues the same narrative, " that any other 
 determined officer might have done likewise, and with 
 the same results. Not so. It was generally allowed 
 by the officers, when the event became known, that 
 the success in this instance was solely due to the awe 
 and respect in which General Gordon was held by the 
 men ; and that such was the spirit of the force at the 
 time, that had any other but he attempted what he did, 
 the company would have broken into open mutiny, 
 shot their officers, and committed the wildest excesses." 
 But this act of energy made him master of the situation 
 and he had no occasion to continue or repeat his sever 
 ity towards his Chinese rank and file. His artillery 
 officers were the next to give him trouble. They 
 
384 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 objected to a new commander whom he had given 
 them ; and it was not until he actually started on his 
 next expedition without them that they returned to 
 their allegiance and were restored to their posts upon 
 apology. This last difficulty overcome, and his force 
 considerably augmented by largely enlisting from his 
 Taiping prisoners, he moved, towards the end of July, 
 to a still greater achievement than those he had 
 attempted the conquest of Soochow itself. 
 
 The situation of this city has already been described. 
 Lt should be added that the Grand Canal, which 
 crosses the peninsula from Hangchow in the south to 
 Chinkiang on the Yangtsze, with a wide semicircular 
 bend to the eastward, passes by Soochow on its eastern 
 side. Certain branches or natural openings connect the 
 Grand Canal with the Taho Lake, cutting, at various 
 points, across the necks of land which, as before pointed 
 out, formed the only accesses to the city when Gor 
 don s force held Quinsan to the east, and his steamers 
 commanded the lake to the west. These points became 
 of the highest strategical importance to the series of 
 operations by which he designed to thoroughly invest 
 the place. The town of Wokong stands about four 
 teen miles to the south of the city, commanding one 
 of these points ; and on July twenty-eighth Gordon 
 moved against it so rapidly as to surprise some of the 
 stockades outside which had been left unguarded, and 
 to carry others with little loss. A judicious distribu 
 tion of the Ever-Victorious troops now enabled their 
 commander to shut in the garrison with ease, and the 
 Taipings, to the number of 4,000, soon afterwards sur 
 rendered. Here occurred the first of certain acts of 
 Imperialist treachery which ultimately caused Gordon s 
 
THE T A IP ING REBELLION. 385 
 
 retirement ; for General Ching, who had taken charge 
 of part of the prisoners, under promise of good treat 
 ment, violated his word, and put five of them to death. 
 Indignant at this causeless breach of faith, Gordon 
 resolved to lay down his command, and actually left 
 the force for Shanghai. But he arrived there on 
 August eighth to find that Burgevine (who, though car 
 rying on a friendly correspondence with him, had been 
 long in vain seeking to regain his lost command and 
 replace him) had suddenly left that place with 300 
 Europeans, to join the Taipings at Soochow, carrying 
 off also a small steamer, and throwing the great port 
 into a new fit of consternation. To abandon the Impe 
 rialists was not to be thought of now, for it would have 
 left his own troops to be seduced from their allegiance 
 by their old commander, who had had the art to 
 attempt to make them believe that this dismissal was 
 the result of his insisting on their rights. Gordon 
 started alone for Quinsan, and resuming his command, 
 took immediate steps to counteract the intrigues of the 
 American, sending his siege train temporarily back to 
 Taitsan till he should be surer of his being able to 
 maintain his advanced position. His troops near 
 Wakong remained on the defensive, but successfully 
 resisted the attacks directed against that place from 
 Soochow with a view to recover the southern passage 
 into the city ; and presently their general, having 
 received some reinforcements, resumed the offensive, 
 and advancing northward along the strip of it, carried 
 Patachiao, a small place close to the southern defences 
 of the place, and rested there purposely for awhile to 
 carry on negotiations with the foreign part of the 
 defenders. It was his two-fold object to bring these 
 25 
 
386 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 over, in order to weaken the Taipings and to save 
 European lives ; but in entering into the private pro 
 posals to treat, which he soon received from them, 
 Gordon undertook a task no less difficult and danger 
 ous than the most vehement assault upon the place. 
 Those he desired to win would inevitably try first to 
 seduce his own men. His ally, General Ching, was 
 carrying on independent operations against the garri 
 son. Burgevine, disgusted with his new service, where 
 he found himself kept by the chief Wangs in an infe 
 rior position, had new plans in his restless brain, and had 
 the audacity to communicate to Gordon one of them, 
 which involved their both betraying their employers, 
 and seizing Soochow as the seat of a new Eastern Em 
 pire for themselves. Over all these and other difficulties 
 Gordon s coolness and skill, as conspicuous in diplo 
 macy as in war, carried him triumphantly, and brought 
 him to his end without bloodshed. Before the end of 
 October the chief part of the foreign allies deserted the 
 garrison, under pretence of the sally : and soon after 
 wards Burgevine, by dint partly of Gordon s personal 
 entreaty to Moh Wang, the Taiping commander, was 
 allowed to follow them ; so that the great obstacle to 
 the fall of the city and the breaking up of the rebellion 
 was quietly removed. 
 
 Freed from this, Gordon resumed his operations 
 against the place, and soon worked his way almost up 
 to the city walls on the south side. Abandoning his 
 posts there to be tenanted by his Chinese allies, he 
 transferred his force round the west side, by the lake, 
 to the northern, the only remaining outlet, and on 
 November first carried by assault Leeku, a place not 
 many miles from the city, and which almost shut it in. 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 
 
 337 
 
 On the tenth and nineteenth of November further 
 points were captured and occupied which completed 
 the investment. In vain did the 30,000 Taipings 
 enclosed seek for a way out. In vain was another 
 army planted at Wusieh, twenty-five miles off on the 
 Grand Canal, in rear of Gordon s posts, while the Faith 
 ful King (still the chief general of the arch-impostor) 
 arriving from Nankin with another force of equal 
 amount, intended for the relief of Soochow, took up a 
 position in the open country between the city and 
 Wusieh in the vain hope of making Gordon relax his 
 grasp. Of the peculiar strategy of this campaign, which 
 neutralized numbers by the skilful distribution of the 
 better provided army, no higher instance can be found 
 than that by Gordon s arrangements. 14,000 men all 
 told, including the contingent which aided him under 
 Ching, sufficed for the immediate work in hand of hem 
 ming in a force of more than double their numbers, 
 and keeping off others nearly threefold in strength. 
 Judging the Taipings to be already dispirited by their 
 situation, Gordon, impatient for the surrender of the 
 place, resolved on a night attack on a portion of the 
 walls. It was made on November twenty-seventh, and 
 despite the daring self-exposure which seemed both 
 natural to the man and necessary as an example to this 
 motley army, but which in the commander of a more 
 regular force would have been a vice, Gordon found 
 himself repulsed with a loss of 200 of his force. This 
 success did not however alter the condition of the gar. 
 rison, who were now losing heart ; and two days later 
 an assault undertaken by daylight, after a heavy fire, 
 was made with success on the stockades and detached 
 works outside the east gate. Once more Gordon 
 
3 88 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 exposed himself in front of his own storming column, 
 armed as was his wont on such occasions, with no visi 
 ble weapon more formidable than his favorite cane : 
 and his men, nerved by his example, carried the points 
 of attack, so that on the thirtieth he was enabled to 
 issue a general order, congratulating the troops on 
 their success, which, it was pointed out, " had made 
 the city untenable by the rebels." Gordon was not 
 too sanguine ; for a day or two later dissensions broke 
 out among the rebel generals within ; Moh Wang was 
 murdered by his subordinates at the council-table ; and 
 on December fifth the city was surrendered to the 
 Imperialists. Then took place the saddest incident 
 which the British officer, acting with semi-civilized allies, 
 can have to endure. Gordon had not been able to 
 guarantee the safety of the Taiping chiefs ; but hear 
 ing from Ching that the highest authority, the gover 
 nor (who had lately arrived on the scene), had promised 
 them mercy, he removed his own force, with a promise 
 of two months pay, from the approaching scene of 
 plunder, and went into the city to have an interview 
 with the Wangs. They expressed themselves confi 
 dent in Li s word, and after a second interview left the 
 city to give themselves up, Gordon (whose force was 
 already on the march to Quinsan) remaining himself 
 with the intention of protecting those inside from the 
 Imperialist soldiers who were entering. 
 
 It was at this time, on December sixth, when the 
 deliverer of the provinces was surrounded by armed 
 Taipings, his troops removed from him, and the great 
 city, which had so long been the object of the campaign, 
 incapable of further resistance, that Li, under pretence 
 or on account of a difficulty in arranging terms with the 
 
THE TA1PING REBELLION. 389 
 
 Wangs, caused them suddenly to be seized and exe 
 cuted, and ordered the city to be given up to plunder. 
 Those who are curious in Chinese sentiment, and 
 wish to know exactly how far it justified Li s actions, 
 may consult the work of Mr. Wilson, which is very full 
 on this point. Unfortunately Gordon had not been 
 brought up in those broad principles of the Doctrine 
 of Harmony on which, we are assured, the Chinese 
 fabric rests, but in the narrower philosophy of Christen 
 dom. It is not surprising therefore that his grief and 
 indignation burst forth at the sight of the headless 
 bodies of the Wangs ; that he, in his first impulse, 
 sought Li to exact personal satisfaction from him ; and 
 that, failing to find the wily governor (who with good 
 reason kept out of his way), he departed after his force 
 to Quinsan. Here he remained in inaction with the 
 Ever-Victorious Army for the next two months, pend 
 ing the- inquiry which had been instituted at Pekin on 
 his demand into the governor s conduct, and refusing 
 curtly to receive the reward of a decoration and a pres 
 ent of 3,5oo/. transmitted by the Imperial Government 
 for himself on the first news of the capture of Soo- 
 
 chow. 
 
 The Ever-Victorious Army thus withdrawn, t 
 rebellion soon appeared likely to revive. Foreigners 
 once more began to join the Taipings. The province 
 was infested by lawless Chinese and still more lawlesi 
 foreigners ; and the Imperialist forces, despite the aid 
 of some of Gordon s disciplined artillery, appeared 
 unable to do more than hold their own against the 
 enemy. Mr. Hart, who had lately taken charge of the 
 Imperial Customs, now strongly urged Gordon s resum 
 ing the field, since his inaction was the strongest 
 
CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 encouragement to the disaffected, and pointed out 
 with great clearness that, as he had nothing more to 
 do to add to his reputation (since Soochow had fallen) 
 and constant personal risk to undergo, this action could 
 only be ascribed to his laying aside private feeling for 
 the welfare of the province he had delivered. Urged 
 by this and the like opinions, and with the special sanc 
 tion of Sir F. Bruce, who wrote that he had obtained 
 at Pekin "a positive promise in writing from this gov 
 ernment that, in cases of capitulations, where you are 
 present, nothing is to be done without your consent," 
 Gordon retook the field towards the end of February 
 1864. 
 
 To understand his remaining operations, it is neces 
 sary to remember that Soochow is at the central 
 point of the Kiangnan peninsula, and Nankin at its 
 north-west corner, 100 miles off; that the Taipings 
 were now confined chiefly to the western side of the 
 district, and that, if this were cut through by a line 
 carried across from Soochow to the Imperialist intrench- 
 ments near Nankin, their armies would be reduced to 
 acting within two separate strips of no great size, and 
 would probably be unable any longer to exist. Gor 
 don s plan, therefore, was to take and occupy the towns 
 of Yesing, Liyang, and Kintang, upon this line, and 
 thus connecting the Imperialists at Soochow with 
 those before Nankin, to divide their enemies com 
 pletely. Yesing, being on the Taho Lake, was cap 
 tured without much difficulty on March first, and Gor 
 don advancing rapidly on Liyang, and offering its gar 
 rison easy terms, it was surrendered without resistance 
 on the fourth. The district around was found to be 
 fearfully wasted by the Taipings, who had held it 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 39! 
 
 undisturbed for three years, and exercised a rule so 
 exacting as fully to account for that animosity of the 
 country people which has been already noticed. Gor 
 don proceeded next against Kintang, but here he was 
 forced to leave his steamers behind him, and some part 
 of his land forces had naturally remained to guard his 
 late captures. He had therefore with him but three 
 of his infantry regiments and his guns, when, after 
 some days delay, caused partly by bad weather, but 
 more by the necessities of the people of Liyang (who 
 had been plundered of their last stock of provisions to 
 fill the Taiping stores on his approach), he arrived 
 before the place. The garrison here proved obdurate 
 to his offers, and the heavy guns being brought up, a 
 breach was formed. Before this had been done a press 
 ing dispatch arrived from Governor Li for aid to the 
 Imperialist forces. The latter had advanced on their 
 own account against Chanchufu, a place about forty 
 miles to the east of Kintang, and had been repulsed 
 with much loss, the Taipings threatening in conse 
 quence to retake the offensive. A second dispatch 
 told him that they had detached a force down the 
 Yangtsze, turning the Imperialists by the north and 
 threatening Fushan, his own first conquest. This was 
 on March twenty-first, but Gordon s guns were now 
 brought up, and he, judging it too late to retire from 
 Kintang, resolved to assault. Once more he exposed 
 himself in the manner that for a year past had given 
 him among his men the reputation of being a magician, 
 bearing a charmed life but not again to escape, a 
 severe wound through the leg compelling him to be 
 carried off, after he had remained giving orders and 
 concealing it until he fainted from loss of blood. The 
 
392 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 attack then failed, and next day the wounded com 
 mander withdrew his force to Liyang, which was reached 
 on March twenty-fourth. The weather had been bad, 
 and the men required rest hardly less than their 
 wounded general : but when news was received on 
 arrival at Liyang that the Taipings had taken various 
 places on the way southwards towards Quinsan, and 
 had scattered on a long semi-circular line towards that 
 place the large force lately held about Chanchufu, he 
 thought the opportunity of striking at their flank too 
 good, and the object of checking their advance too 
 important, to be neglected. On the twenty-fifth he 
 was far on his way north-east to look for them, taking 
 with him, however, only two regiments, one of them 
 composed of Taiping recruits just enlisted at Liyang. 
 
 Never, surely, did commander show more confidence 
 in his own resources than this wounded man, pushing 
 forward along the creeks in his flotilla (for he was 
 unable to walk or ride) with a few hundred troops, part 
 of whom had been in arms against him a few days 
 before, into the heart of the district occupied by 
 unknown thousands of the Taipings. On the twenty- 
 sixth parties of their foragers were driven off from their 
 plunder, and a proclamation found which announced 
 to the villagers that their general was on his way to 
 Shanghai, and would take Soochow on his way. By 
 the thirtieth it was ascertained that the central point 
 of the Taiping line was at Waissoo, where they had a 
 strongly intrenched position, and that a creek con 
 ducted to it, up which the artillery and commander 
 might be carried by boat. His infantry about 1,000 
 strong were to march by a separate route, and the 
 combined attack was fixed for next day. 
 
THE T A IP ING REBELLION. 
 
 393 
 
 At dawn on March thirty-first both parties moved 
 but the flotilla reached the neighborhood of Waissoo 
 only to find themselves wholly unsupported, and to 
 escape with some difficulty (for the banks were high 
 and their guns useless) from a somewhat perilous posi 
 tion. Gordon s wound and his adventurous spirit had 
 here combined to cost his force rather dear ; for the 
 infantry arriving near Waissoo, had been surprised, in 
 the absence of the watchful eye of their commander, 
 by an attack in flank, and had been routed with a loss 
 of over one-third of their number, including seven 
 officers. All of these had perished, of course ; for the 
 Taipings, who had remorselessly murdered the vil 
 lagers by hundreds, in the country about, were not 
 likely to spare such of their enemies as fell alive into 
 their hands. On learning these particulars, Gordon, 
 who, though the very boldest of generals, was not an 
 imprudent one, fell back some distance from the neigh 
 borhood of Waissoo, and remained on the defensive 
 until he had brought up some fresher troops of his 
 force from Liyang to augment the demoralized regi 
 ments which had suffered, and had partly recovered 
 from his own wound. 
 
 When next he advanced, on April eleventh, to 
 attack Waissoo, he did so (to quote the words of his 
 own journal) " with the greatest caution, for the men 
 had not yet got over their fears." Threatening the 
 position by a feint from the south, on which side the 
 enemy was fully prepared for an attack, he quietly 
 moved round undiscovered with a regiment and two 
 guns to the north of the place, and surprised without 
 loss a stockade which laid bare to him the interior of 
 the position. The result of this successful stratagem 
 
394 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 was the speedy abandonment of their lines by the 
 Taipings. They were vigorously followed up by 6,000 
 Imperialists brought up by the governor himself (who 
 had waited, as usual in these operations, ready to profit 
 by the expected victory of their ally), and were driven 
 across the country they had lately harried without 
 mercy. " Armed with every sort of weapon," con 
 tinues the journal, " the peasantry fell upon the rebels, 
 who suffered fearfully among the creeks that abound 
 there. They were cut up in every direction." The 
 last advance of the rebellion was finally checked. 
 Three days later the Taipings were either dispersed 
 hopelessly through the country, or shut up in Chan- 
 chufu, whence they originally had started. 
 
 Hither Gordon and the governor had followed 
 them. Once having enclosed the rebels, the former 
 called up the rest of his force, borrowed 1,000 of the 
 Imperialist soldiers for his trenchwork, and carried on 
 the siege in due form ; for the place had in it 20,000 
 Taipings, was stoutly defended, and repulsed his first 
 attack. It fell on May eleventh to a combined assault 
 Gordon with his storming column effecting their 
 entrance just in time to prevent any ill consequences 
 from a panic which had seized the Imperialists after 
 they obtained a lodgment in the place. And well it 
 was this crowning mercy of the war had been thus 
 swiftly won, for on May thirteenth the Ever-Victorious 
 Army was on its way back to Quinsan to be paid off. 
 The British Government, which had never given more 
 than a half-hearted and, as it were, tentative support 
 to that of China, had become intimidated at the out 
 cry the massacre of the Soochow Wangs raised among 
 the party sympathizing with the Taipings, and had 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 395 
 
 withdrawn the permission under which Gordon served. 
 Had he been less energetic and decisive in his last 
 operations, the rebels would have taken heart at his 
 withdrawal, and the struggle might have been prolong 
 ed for years. As it was, their cause was shattered 
 beyond all revival. The southern district around 
 Hangchow, cut off from that near Nankin strategically 
 as before explained, by Gordon s advance in march on 
 Liyang, had succumbed to the army under Ching. 
 Notwithstanding the death of that general during these 
 operations, his successor, aided by a small Franco- 
 Chinese contingent, had captured Hangchow, and 
 driven the remnant of the Taiping force into a deso 
 late mountain district beyond its borders. In the 
 north Nankin itself was all that now remained to the 
 Heavenly King and his adherents. The Imperialists 
 shut him in more and more closely. Starvation did 
 its slow and dreadful work on the bodies of the invested 
 garrison, and the city fell finally on July nineteenth, 
 the impostor having shortly before ended his vile life 
 by the most fitting death, the hand of the despairing 
 suicide. 
 
 The disbandment of so peculiar a force as the 
 Ever-Victorious Army, under a weak administration 
 like that of China, was obviously no easy task. Its 
 chief handled this, his last duty in China, with the 
 same firm yet delicate touch which had brought him 
 through so many difficulties before, and let us add, 
 with an admirable disinterestedness which commanded 
 respect alike from the force, his countrymen, and the 
 Chinese officials, and greatly smoothed his immediate 
 difficulties. Refusing absolutely the munificent pecu 
 niary reward pressed upon himself, this young general, 
 
396 CHINESE GORDON AND 
 
 who had lived in the field an example of plainness and 
 economy, and spent his surplus pay in supplying the 
 needs of his force, now insisted on and obtained fair 
 gratuities for his officers and men, but especially for 
 those that had been wounded, before he laid his com 
 mission aside. 
 
 So parted the Ever- Victorious Army from its gen 
 eral, and its brief but useful existence came to an end. 
 During sixteen months campaigning under his guid 
 ance, it had taken four cities and a dozen minor strong 
 places, fought innumerable combats, put hors de combat 
 numbers of the enemy moderately estimated at fifteen 
 times its own, and finding the rebellion vigorous, 
 aggressive, and almost threatening the unity of the 
 Chinese Empire, had left it at its last gasp, confined to 
 the ruined capital of the usurper. Leaving his late 
 command well satisfied, Gordon himself sailed for 
 England, taking with him no more substantial treasure 
 than the highest military title of China (Titu, equiva 
 lent to commander-in-chief of an army), the rare Impe 
 rial decoration of the Yellow Jacket, and the good-will 
 and respect of all with whom he had to do. " Not 
 only, wrote the Prince of Kung, the Chinese Prime 
 Minister, to Sir F. Bruce, " has he shown himself 
 throughout brave and energetic, but his thorough 
 appreciation of that important question, a friendly 
 understanding between China and foreign nations, is 
 worthy of all praise." 
 
 Much has been said, and fairly said, in eulogy of the 
 moderation and patriotism of those volunteer generals 
 of the victorious armies of the Union who, at the close 
 of the American Civil War, laid down their important 
 charges to return cheerfully to the counting-house, the 
 
THE TAIPING REBELLION. 
 
 397 
 
 factory, or even to the humblest appointment in the 
 regular service on the frontier. Englishmen who 
 bestowed admiration on this conduct of their trans- 
 Atlantic kinsfolk, should certainly yield no less to that 
 of their own countryman ; since he, his task once 
 accomplished, sought for no irregular employment in 
 China, asked for no prolongation in any form of his 
 high command, but laid it down to return straightway 
 to the ordinary life of a captain of Engineers on home 
 duty, his highest ambition the furtherance of some 
 local good work, his daily business for years to come 
 the building obscure forts from the designs of others 
 on an Essex swamp. The very papers in which the 
 record of his services was inscribed lay thrust out of 
 sight, their existence forgotten save in Mr. Wilson s 
 mention of them. They might have mouldered for 
 him away unread, but for the appeal, made almost as 
 a demand, of certain of his brother officers, awakening 
 to the knowledge that out of their own corps there 
 were few who were aware of the extent and bearing 
 of Gordon s services, and the importance of the Chinese 
 campaigns of 1863-4. 
 
 The writer is far from being one of those who would 
 have the world racked with war in order that we may 
 learn what generals lie hid among us ; but he cannot 
 be insensible to the fact that England s interests are 
 so vast, so numerous, so complicated, that it is impos 
 sible to predict that the day shall ever come when the 
 hero s arm and the captain s brain shall be unnecessary 
 to her greatness or her safety. Ever and anon, too, 
 there comes across the ocean the cry of some one of 
 her scattered offspring, abandoned perhaps by a vacil 
 lating policy and false humanitarianism (akin to those 
 
393 
 
 CHINESE GORDON AND THE TAIPING REBELLION. 
 
 which misguided us in our Chinese dealings) to a dis 
 astrous war. Fitly, therefore, may we close this brief 
 record of great deeds done from no mere love of glory 
 or of gain, with words suggested long since by one 
 who, himself a soldier whose name has become a 
 household word in England, had been among the first 
 to note the warlike genius of young Gordon when 
 together they bore the fire of Sebastopol: "Another 
 Colonial war, and no help to be given ! If we can t 
 spare an army, if we can t spare a staff, let us at least 
 send them one captain of Engineers. If there is a 
 man in the world who can conduct such a war with 
 honor, thoroughness, and humanity, and bring it to a 
 satisfactory close without needless delay or expense, 
 England has that man in Chinese Gordon." 
 
 THE END. 
 
NO 
 
 
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