Front matter (continued 9)

On the 16th another vexatious incident of a similar character occurred. After McClellan's reconnoitring on our left, he orally directed that the divisions of the Ninth Corps should be moved to positions designated by members of his staff. When Burnside had taken his position on a hill-top from which the positions could be seen and the movement accurately directed, another staff officer from McClellan came and requested that the movement be delayed for further consideration by the commanding general. It was this that occasioned a halt and our subsequent march in the dusk of evening, as has been narrated in its place. That evening the following note was written at McClellan's headquarters, but it was not delivered to Burnside till the next day, the day of the battle: [Footnote:Id., p. 308.] ---

"HEADQUARTERS, ARMY OF THE POTOMAC, September 16, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL BURNSIDE, Commanding Ninth Corps, etc.

GENERAL,--The General commanding has learned that although your corps was ordered to be in a designated position at 12 M. to-day, at or near sunset only one division and four batteries had reached the ground intended for your troops. The general has also been advised that there was a delay of some four hours in the movement of your command yesterday. I am instructed to call upon you for explanations of these failures on your part to comply with the orders given you, and to add, in view of the important military operations now at hand, the commanding general cannot lightly regard such marked departure from the tenor of his instructions.

I am, general, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

----------,

Lieutenant-Colonel, Aide-de-camp, and Act'g Ass't Adj't. Gen'l."

To this missive Burnside dictated the following answer on the field during the battle:-- [Footnote: Official Records., vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 314.]

"HEADQUARTERS, September 17, 1862.

BRIG. GEN. S. WILLIAMS, Assistant Adjutant-General.

GENERAL,--Your dispatch of yesterday this moment received. General Burnside directs me to say that immediately upon the receipt of the order of the general commanding, which was after twelve o'clock, he ordered his corps to be in readiness to march, and instead of having Captain Duane [Footnote: Captain Duane was senior engineer officer in the field, on the staff of McClellan, and had conducted the reconnoitring of the Antietam.] post the divisions in detail, and at the suggestion of Captain Duane, he sent three aides to ascertain the position of each of the three divisions, that they might post them. These aides returned shortly before three o'clock, and they immediately proceeded to post the three columns. The general then went on an eminence above these positions to get a good view of them, and whilst there, during the progress of the movement of his corps, an aide from General McClellan came to him and said that General McClellan was not sure that the proper position had been indicated, and advised him not to hasten the movement until the aide had communicated with the general commanding. He (General Burnside) at once went to General McClellan's headquarters to inform him that he had seen large bodies of the enemy moving off to the right. Not finding the general commanding, General Burnside returned to his command, and the movement was resumed and continued as rapidly as possible. General Burnside directs me to say that he is sorry to have received so severe a rebuke from the general commanding, and particularly sorry that the general commanding feels that his instructions have not been obeyed; but nothing can occur to prevent the general from continuing his hearty co-operation to the best of his ability in any movement the general commanding may direct.

I have the honor to be, general, very respectfully, your obedient servant, LEWIS RICHMOND, Assistant Adjutant-General."

The answer was of course conclusive, but it leaves the difficult problem, how came the reprimand to be written which General McClellan could not have dictated, as the interruption of Burnside's movement was caused by a message from himself? The blank for the name of a staff officer who was to sign it, and the indication of his rank and position point to Lieutenant-Colonel James A. Hardie as the one for whom it was prepared, but Colonel Hardie must have demurred to signing it, since Colonel Richmond's answer implies that General Seth Williams's name was finally attached. All of us who knew General Williams and his methods of doing business will be slow to believe that he volunteered a paper of that kind. He afterward served on Burnside's own staff and had his confidence. The responsibility must fall upon General Marcy, the chief of staff, and most of the officers of that army will be likely to conclude that he also would act only by the direction of McClellan or of some one whom he regarded as having decisive authority to speak for him in his absence.

I have already referred to an error contained in General Porter's report of the battle of Antietam, where he says that "Morell's division in reporting to General Burnside relieved his corps, which was at once recalled from its position in front of Antietam bridge." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. i. p. 339.] I mention it again only to say that since this was not only contrary to the fact, but is unsupported by the records, to accept it and to embody it in his official report certainly indicates no friendly disposition toward Burnside. To that extent it supports any other circumstances which point to Porter as the hostile influence which becomes so manifest at McClellan's headquarters after the 14th of September. I know by many expressions uttered by Burnside during those days and afterward, that though he was deeply grieved at some things which had occurred, he did not waver in his loyal friendship to McClellan. He uttered no unkind word in regard to him personally, either then or ever in my hearing. He sometimes spoke of what he believed to be mischievous influences about McClellan and which he thought were too powerful with him, but was earnest and consistent in wishing for him the permanent command of that army till success should give a glorious end to the war. It was after the irritating incidents I have narrated that the visit to McClellan to dine with him occurred, and I saw them frequently together till I left the army on the 5th of October. Their manner toward each other was more than cordial, it was affectionately intimate. Burnside never mentioned to me, although I was next him in command, the reprimand which is copied above. His real unwillingness to supersede McClellan, even when the final order came in November, is abundantly attested. McClellan only by degrees gave outward evidence of the souring of his own feelings toward Burnside, but his private letters show that the process began with the battle of South Mountain. By the time that he wrote his final report in the latter part of 1863 it had advanced far enough to warp his memory of the campaign and to make him try to transfer to Burnside the responsibility for some of his mishaps. When his "Own Story" was written, the process was complete, and no kindly remembrance dictated a word which could give any indication of the friendship that had died.

Those who are not familiar with the customs of military service might see little significance in the fact that the fault-finding with Burnside was put in the form of official communications which thus became part of the permanent documentary history of the war. To military men, however, it would be almost conclusive proof of a settled hostility to him, formally calling his military character in question in a way to make it tell against him for ulterior purposes. Nothing is more common in an active campaign than for a commanding officer to send messages hurrying the movement of a part of his army. These are usually oral, and even when delays are complained of, the commander, in the interests of cordial cooperation and cheerful alacrity, awaits a full opportunity for personal explanation from his immediate subordinates before administering a reprimand. It goes without saying that where intimate friendship exists, still more delicate consideration is used. To send such a letter as that of September 16th, and in the course of such deliberate movements as were McClellan's during those days, would be scarcely conceivable unless there had been a formal breach of personal relations, and it was equivalent to notice that they were henceforth to deal at arm's-length only.

McClellan's "Own Story" shows that in regard to the alleged delay on the morning of the 15th, he had a personal explanation from Burnside. [Footnote: O. S., p. 586.] Yet in the night of the 16th the same querulous inquiry was repeated as if it had not been answered, with the addition of the new complaint of a delay on the 16th which was caused by McClellan's personal request, and the whole accompanied by so formal a reprimand that the ordinary reply to it would have been a demand for a court of inquiry. The occurrence was unexampled in that campaign and stands entirely alone, although McClellan's memoirs show that he alleged delays in other cases, notably in Hooker's march that same afternoon to attack the enemy, of which no recorded notice was taken. [Footnote: O. S., p.590.] Considering the personal relations of the men before that time, and as I myself witnessed them from day to day afterward, it is simply incredible that McClellan dictated the letters which went from his headquarters.

Before ending the discussion of matters personal to these officers I will say a few words regarding Burnside's appearance and bearing in the field. He was always a striking figure, and had a dashing way with him which incited enthusiasm among his soldiers. Without seeming to care for his costume, or even whilst affecting a little carelessness, there was apt to be something picturesque about him. He had a hearty and jovial manner, a good-humored cordiality toward everybody, that beamed in his face as he rode through the camps or along the lines. When not on parade, he often discarded his uniform coat, wearing a light undress jacket, with no indication of his rank except the yellow silk sash about his waist which showed that he was a general officer. On one occasion when I accompanied him in a change of position, we passed the Ninth Corps column in march, and it was interesting to see how he was greeted by the troops which had been with him in his North Carolina campaign. He wore that day a "Norfolk jacket," a brown knit roundabout, fitting close to his person; his hat was the stiff broad-rimmed, high-crowned regulation hat, worn rather rakishly, with gold cord, acorn-tipped; his pistol-belt was a loose one, allowing the holster to hang on his hip instead of being buckled tight about the waist; his boots were the high cavalry boots reaching to the knee; his large buckskin gauntlets covered his forearm; he rode a large bony horse, bob-tailed, with a wall-eye which gave him a vicious look, and suited well the brigandish air of his rider's whole appearance. Burnside's flashing eyes, his beard trimmed to the "Burnside cut" with the mustache running into the side whiskers whilst the square, clean-shaven chin and jaws gave a tone of decision and force to his features, made up a picture that at once arrested the eye. As we went along the roadside at a fast trot, his high-stepping horse seemed to be keeping his white eye on the lookout for a chance to lash out at somebody. The men evidently enjoyed the scene, cheering him loudly. I was particularly amused with one group of soldiers at rest by their stacked muskets. They sat upon their haunches, and clapped their hands as he passed, exclaiming and laughing, "Just see the old fellow! just look at him!" Burnside laughed at their fun as jollily as they did themselves, and took no offence at the free-and-easy way in which they showed their liking for him. There was no affectation in all this, but an honest enjoyment in following his own whim in style and in accoutrement. His sincere earnestness in the cause for which he was fighting was apparent to all who met him, and no one in his presence could question the single-hearted honesty and unselfishness of the man. His bearing under fire was good, and his personal courage beyond question. He shrank from responsibility with sincere modesty, because he questioned his own capacity to deal with affairs of great magnitude. He was not only not ambitious to command a great army, but he honestly sought to put it aside when it was thrust upon him, and accepted it at last from a sense of obligation to the administration which had nominated him to it in spite of his repeated disclaimers. It carafe to him finally, without consulting him, as a military order he could not disobey without causing a most awkward dead-lock in the campaign.

CHAPTER XIX

RETURN TO WEST VIRGINIA

Ordered to the Kanawha valley again--An unwelcome surprise--Reasons for the order--Reporting to Halleck at Washington--Affairs in the Kanawha in September--Lightburn's positions--Enemy under Loring advances--Affair at Fayette C. H.--Lightburn retreats--Gauley Bridge abandoned--Charleston evacuated--Disorderly flight to the Ohio--Enemy's cavalry raid under Jenkins--General retreat in Tennessee and Kentucky--West Virginia not in any Department--Now annexed to that of Ohio--Morgan's retreat from Cumberland Gap--Ordered to join the Kanawha forces--Milroy's brigade also--My interviews with Halleck and Stanton--Promotion--My task--My division sent with me--District of West Virginia--Colonel Crook promoted--Journey westward--Governor Peirpoint--Governor Tod--General Wright--Destitution of Morgan's column--Refitting at Portland, Ohio--Night drive to Gallipolis--An amusing accident--Inspection at Point Pleasant--Milroy ordered to Parkersburg--Milroy's qualities--Interruptions to movement of troops--No wagons--Supplies delayed--Confederate retreat--Loring relieved--Echols in command--Our march up the valley--Echols retreats--We occupy Charleston and Gauley Bridge--Further advance stopped--Our forces reduced--Distribution of remaining troops--Alarms and minor movements--Case of Mr. Summers--His treatment by the Confederates.

In war it is the unexpected that happens. On the 4th of October my permanent connection with the Army of the Potomac seemed assured. I was in command of the Ninth Corps, encamped in Pleasant Valley, awaiting the renewal of active operations. My promotion to the rank of Major-General had been recommended by McClellan and Burnside, with the assurance that the permanent command of the corps would be added. On that evening an order came from Washington directing me to return to the Kanawha valley, from which our troops had been driven. I was to report in person at Washington immediately, and would there get detailed directions. The order was as much a surprise to my immediate superiors as it was to me, and apparently as little welcome. We all recognized the necessity of sending some one to the Kanawha who knew the country, and the reasonableness, therefore, of assigning the duty to me. McClellan and Burnside both promised that when matters should be restored to a good footing in West Virginia they would co-operate in an effort to bring me back, and as this was coupled with a strong request to the War Department that my promotion should be made immediate, [Footnote: McClellan to Halleck, Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 383.] acquiesced with reasonably good grace.

Going to Washington on the eth, I received my orders and instructions from Halleck, the General-in-Chief. They were based upon the events which had occurred in the Kanawha valley since I left it in August. The information got by General Stuart from Pope's captured quartermaster had led to a careful examination of the letter-books captured at the same time, and Lee thus learned that I had left 5000 men, under Colonel Lightburn, to garrison the posts about Gauley Bridge. The Confederate forces were therefore greater than ours in that region, and General Loring, who was in command, was ordered to make at once a vigorous aggressive campaign against Lightburn, to "clear the valley of the Kanawha and operate northwardly to a junction" with the army of Lee in the Shenandoah valley. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. i. p. 1069; Id., vol. xii. pp. 940-943, 946. This correspondence fully justifies Pope's suspicion that Lee then planned to operate by the Valley of Virginia.] Loring marched, on the 6th of September, with a column which he reported about 5000 strong, expecting to add to it by organizing recruits and militia as Floyd had done in the previous year. His line of operations was by way of Princeton, Flat-top Mountain and Raleigh C. II. to Fayette C. H. His forces do not seem to have been noticeably increased by recruiting till ours had retreated out of the valley.

Lightburn's advanced positions were two,--a brigade under Colonel Siber of the Thirty-seventh Ohio being at Raleigh C. H. and another under Colonel Gilbert of the Forty-fourth Ohio, near the Hawk's Nest, and at Alderson's on the Lewisburg road. A small post was kept up at Summersville and one at Gauley Bridge, where Lightburn had his headquarters, and some detachments guarded trains and steamboats in the lower valley. Gauley Bridge was, as in the preceding year, the central point, and though it was necessary to guard both the Lewisburg and the Raleigh roads on the opposite sides of the New River gorge, a concentration on the line the enemy should take was the plain rule of action when the opposing armies were about equal. Or, by concentrating at Gauley Bridge, my experience had proved that we could hold at bay three or four times our numbers. In either case, fighting in detail was to be avoided, and rapid concentration under one leader to be effected.

On the approach of the enemy Siber was withdrawn from Raleigh C. H. to Fayette, and Gilbert to Tompkins farm, three miles from Gauley Bridge, but the brigades were not united. On the 10th of September Loring attacked Siber at Fayette, in the intrenchments made by Scammon in the winter. Siber repulsed the efforts of Loring to drive him out of his position, and held it during the day. Three companies of the Fourth Virginia under Captain Vance, and a squad of horse were sent by Lightburn from Gauley Bridge to Siber's assistance, but the latter, being without definite orders and thinking he could not hold the position another day, retreated in the night, setting fire to a large accumulation of stores and abandoning part of his wagons. He halted on the ridge of Cotton Hill, covering the road to Gauley Bridge, and was there joined by five companies of the Forty-seventh Ohio, also sent to his assistance by Lightburn. Loring followed and made a partial attack, which was met by the rear-guard under Captain Vance and repulsed, whilst Siber's principal column marched on to Montgomery's ferry on the Kanawha.

Meanwhile Lightburn had called in Gilbert's force to Gauley Bridge during the night of the both, and placed them opposite the ferry connecting with Siber, which was just below Kanawha Falls and in the lower part of the Gauley Bridge camp. On Siber's appearance at the ferry, Lightburn seems to have despaired of having time to get him over, and directed him to march down the left bank of the river, burning the sheds full of stores which were on that side of the stream. When Captain Vance with the rear-guard reached the ferry, the buildings were blazing on both sides of the narrow pass under the bluff, and his men ran the gantlet of fire, protecting their heads with extra blankets which they found scattered near the stores. Vance easily held the enemy at bay at Armstrong's Creek, and Siber marched his column, next morning, to Brownstown, some twenty-five miles below Kanawha Falls, where steamboats met him and ferried him over to Camp Piatt. There he rejoined Lightburn.

Gilbert's artillery was put in position on the right bank at Montgomery's Ferry, and checked the head of Loring's column when it approached the Kanawha in pursuit of Siber. Lightburn had ordered the detachment in post at Summersville to join him at Gauley, and Colonel Elliot of the Forty-seventh Ohio, who commanded it, marched down the Gauley with his ten companies (parts of three regiments) and a small wagon train. He approached Gauley Bridge on the 11th, but Lightburn had not waited for him, and the enemy were in possession. Elliot burned his wagons and took to the hills with his men, cutting across the angle between the Gauley and the Kanawha and joining Gilbert's column near Cannelton. A smaller detachment, only a little way up the Gauley, was also left to its fate in the precipitate retreat, and it also took to the hills and woods and succeeded in evading the enemy. It was about ten o'clock in the morning when Loring's head of column approached the Kanawha and drew the fire of Gilbert's guns. After about an hour's cannonade across the river, Lightburn gave the order to retreat down the right bank, after burning the stores and blowing up the magazine at Gauley Bridge. Loring found men to swim across the river and extinguish the fires kindled on the ferry-boats, which were soon put in use to ferry Echols's brigade across. This followed Lightburn down the right bank, whilst Loring himself, with Williams's and Wharton's brigades, marched after Siber down the left. The over-hanging cliffs and hills echoed with the cannonade, and the skirmishers exchanged rifle-shots across the rapid stream; but few casualties occurred, and after Elliot joined the column, it marched with little interruption to Camp Piatt, thirteen miles from Charleston, where Siber met them, and the steamboats he had used passed down the river to the Ohio.

Siber's brigade continued its retreat rapidly to Charleston, passed through the town and crossed the Elk River. Gilbert's brigade also retired, but in better order, and it kept up a skirmish with the advance-guard of Echols's column which was following them. When Gilbert reached the outskirts of Charleston, he checked the advance of the enemy long enough to enable the quartermasters at the post to move their trains across the Elk; but the haste of the evacuation was so great that the stores in depot there were not removed, and were burned to prevent their falling into the enemy's hands. Gilbert retired across the Elk, and the suspension bridge was destroyed. Loring's artillery made a dash for a hill on the left bank of the Kanawha, which commanded the new position taken up by Lightburn's troops, and the Confederate battery soon opened an enfilade fire across the river, taking the line of breastworks along the Elk in flank and in reverse. The trains and the stragglers started in direst confusion on the road to Ravenswood on the Ohio, which offered a line of retreat not subject to the enemy's fire. Siber's brigade followed, Gilbert's continued to bring up the rear. The road down the Kanawha was abandoned because it was in range of artillery from the opposite side of the river throughout its whole course down the valley. The road to Ripley and Ravenswood was therefore taken, and the flying troops were met at those towns on the Ohio by steamboats which conveyed part of them to Point Pleasant at the mouth of the Kanawha, where the whole command was concentrated in the course of a few days. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. i. pp. 1058-1060.] Siber's loss was 16 killed, 87 wounded, and over 100 missing. Gilbert reported 9 men killed and 8 wounded, with about 75 missing; but as the enemy do not enumerate any captured prisoners in their reports except a lieutenant and 10 men, it is evident that the missing were mostly men who outran the others. Loring's losses as reported by his surgeon were 18 killed and 89 wounded. The enemy claim to have captured large numbers of wagons, horses, mules, and stores of all kinds which Loring estimated at a million dollars' worth, besides all that were burned.

It was a panicky retreat after the hot little fight by Siber's brigade at Fayette C. H., and it is not worth while to apply to it any military criticism, further than to say that either of the brigades intrenched at Gauley Bridge could have laughed at Loring. The river would have been impassable, for all the ferry-boats were in the keeping of our men on the right bank, and Loring would not dare pass down the valley leaving a fortified post on the line of communications by which he must return. The topography of the wild mountain region was such that an army could only pass from the lower Kanawha to the headwaters of the James River by the road Loring had used in his advance, or by that leading through the post of Gauley Bridge to Lewisburg and beyond. The Confederate War Department seem to have thought that their forces might have passed from Charleston to the Ohio, thence to Parkersburg, and turning east from this town, have made their way to Beverly and to the Valley of Virginia by the route Garnett had used in the previous year. They would have found, however, as Loring told them, that it would have been easy for the National forces to overwhelm them with numbers while they were making so long and so difficult a march in a vast region most of which was a wilderness.

Lightburn's position had been made more embarrassing by the fact that a cavalry raid under Brigadier-General Jenkins was passing around his left flank while Loring came upon him in front. Jenkins with a light column of horse moved from Lewisburg by way of the Wilderness Road to northwestern Virginia, captured posts and destroyed stores at Weston, Buckhannon, and Roane C. H., and made a circuit to the lower Kanawha, rejoining Loring after Lightburn's retreat. Little real mischief was done by this raid, but it added to the confusion, and helped to disturb the self-possession of the commanding officer. In this way it was one of the causes of the precipitate retreat.

Several circumstances combined to make Lightburn's disaster embarrassing to the government. West Virginia had not been connected with any military department after Pope's command had been broken up. McClellan's authority did not extend beyond his own army and its theatre of operations. Halleck could hardly take personal charge of the affairs of remote districts. Thus the Kanawha valley had dropped out of the usual system and was an omitted case. The embarrassment was increased by the fact that Buell was retreating out of Tennessee before Bragg, Morgan had evacuated Cumberland Gap and was making a painful and hazardous retreat to the Ohio, and the Confederate forces under Kirby Smith were moving directly upon Cincinnati. Lightburn's mishap, therefore, was only the northern extremity of a line of defeats extending through the whole length of the Ohio valley from Parkersburg to Louisville. The governors of West Virginia and Ohio were naturally alarmed at the events in the Kanawha valley, and were earnest in their calls upon the War Department for troops to drive Loring back beyond the mountains and for an officer to command them who knew something of the country.

Halleck seems to have been puzzled at the condition of things, not having realized that Pope's retirement had left West Virginia "in the air." It took a week, apparently, to get satisfactory details of the actual situation, and on the 19th of September the first important step was taken by annexing the region to the Department of the Ohio, then commanded by Major-General Horatio G. Wright, whose headquarters were at Cincinnati. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xvi. pt. ii. p. 328.] Wright was directed to provide for the recovery of lost ground in West Virginia as rapidly as possible, but the campaign in Kentucky was the more important and urgent, so that no troops could be spared for secondary operations until the Confederates had ceased to threaten Cincinnati and Louisville.

On the 1st of October Halleck again called General Wright's attention to the need of doing something for West Virginia. Governor Peirpoint, of that State, represented the Confederates under Loring as about 10,000 in number, and this reflected the opinion which Lightburn had formed during his retreat. It became the basis of calculation in the campaign which followed, though it greatly exaggerated Loring's force. Three days later Brigadier-General George W. Morgan was known to have reached the Ohio River with the division he had brought from Cumberland Gap, and General Halleck outlined a plan of action. He ordered Morgan's division to be sent to Gallipolis to take part in the advance into the Kanawha valley, where some new Ohio regiments were also to join them. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 381.] He at the same time called me to Washington to receive instructions under which I was to take command of the whole force operating on the Kanawha line. Brigadier-General Milroy had already (September 25th) been ordered to proceed thither with his brigade, which was in Washington and was part of Banks's forces garrisoning the capital. [Footnote:Id., pp. 355, 359.] He was moved through Pennsylvania to Wheeling by rail, and thence down the Ohio River to Point Pleasant at the mouth of the Kanawha.

My order to leave the Army of the Potomac reached me on Saturday evening. Much business had to be closed up before I could properly turn over the command of the Ninth Corps, but I was able to complete it and make the journey to Washington so as to report to General Halleck on Monday morning. He received me very kindly, and explained the necessity they were under to send some one to the Kanawha valley who knew the country. He was complimentary as to my former service there, and said my return to that region would meet the earnest wishes of the governors of West Virginia and Ohio, as well as the judgment of the War Department and of himself. To compensate for separating me from the command of the Ninth Corps, it had been decided to make my promotion at once and to put the whole of West Virginia under my command as a territorial district. He inquired into some details of the topography of the Kanawha valley and of my experience there, and concluded by saying that reinforcements would be sent to make the column I should lead in person stronger than the 10,000 attributed to Loring. My task would then be to drive back the enemy beyond the mountains. When that was accomplished, part of the troops would probably be withdrawn. The actual position of Milroy's brigade was not definitely known, and Governor Peirpoint of West Virginia had asked to have it sent to Clarksburg. This gave me the opportunity to urge that my own Kanawha division be detached from the Ninth Corps and sent back to Clarksburg, where with Milroy they would make a force strong enough to take care of that part of the State and to make a co-operative movement toward Gauley Bridge. This also was granted, and immediate promotion was given to Colonel Crook so that he might command the division, and a promise was made to do the like for Colonel Scammon, who would then be available for the command of the division still under Lightburn, whose retreat was strongly condemned as precipitate. No soldier could object to an arrangement so satisfactory as this, and though I still preferred to remain with the Army of the Potomac, I could only accept the new duty with sincere thanks for the consideration shown me. The General-in-Chief accompanied me to the room of the Secretary of War, and Mr. Stanton added to my sense of obligation by warm expressions of personal good-will. His manner was so different from the brusque one commonly attributed to him that I have nothing but pleasant remembrances of my relations to him, both then and later. My own appointment as major-general was handed me by him, the usual promotions of my personal staff were also made, and directions were given for the immediate appointment of Crook to be brigadier.

I called to pay my respects to the President, but he was in Cabinet meeting and could not be seen. I had a short but warmly friendly visit with Mr. Chase later in the day, and was ready to leave town for my new post of duty by the evening train. The Secretary of War directed me to visit Wheeling and Columbus on my way, and then to report to General Wright at Cincinnati before going to the Kanawha valley. This was in fact the quickest way to reach the mouth of the Kanawha River, for the fall rains had not yet come to make the Ohio navigable, and from Columbus to Cincinnati, and thence by the Marietta Railway eastward, was, as the railway routes then ran, the best method of joining my command. The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was interrupted between Harper's Ferry and Hancock (about fifty miles) by the Confederate occupation of that part of Virginia. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. pp. 393, 394.] General Crook was ordered to march the division from its camp in Pleasant Valley to Hancock, where trains on the western division of the railway would meet him and transport the troops to Clarksburg. For myself and staff, we took the uninterrupted railway line from Washington to Pittsburg, and thence to Wheeling, where we arrived on the evening of October 8th. The 9th was given to consultation with Governor Peirpoint and to communication with such military officers as were within reach. We reached Columbus on the both, when I had a similar consultation with Governor Tod and his military staff in regard to new regiments available for my use. Leaving Columbus in the afternoon, we arrived at Cincinnati late the same night, and on Saturday, the 11th, I reported to General Wright.

He was an officer of the engineer corps of the regular army, a man of fine acquirements and of a serious and earnest character, whose military service throughout the war was marked by solidity and modesty. If there seemed at first a little hauteur in his manner, one soon saw that it was a natural reserve free from arrogance. The sort of confusion in which everything was, is indicated by the fact that he knew nothing of my whereabouts when informed from Washington that I would be ordered to the Kanawha, and on the same day (6th October) addressed a dispatch to me at Point Pleasant whilst I was receiving instructions from General Halleck in Washington. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xvi. pt. ii. p. 579.] Our personal consultation established a thoroughly good understanding at once, and as long as I remained under his orders, I found him thoroughly considerate of my wishes and appreciative of my suggestions and of the conduct of my own part of the work to be done.

Morgan's division, after reaching the Ohio River, had been moved to Portland on the Marietta Railroad, the nearest point to Gallipolis, which was twenty-five miles away and nearly opposite the mouth of the Great Kanawha. His retreat had been through a sparsely settled country, much of which was a wilderness, rugged and broken in the extreme. His wagons had broken down, his teams were used up, his soldiers were worn out, ragged, and barefoot. [Footnote:Id., pt. i. p. 990.] Many arms and accoutrements had been lost, and the command was imperatively in need of complete refitting and a little rest. The men had been largely recruited in East Tennessee and Kentucky, and were unwilling to serve in any other theatre of war. The Tennesseans, indeed, were reported to be mutinous at the news that they were to be sent to the Kanawha valley. General Wright issued orders for the refitting of the command, and promised such delay and rest as might be found practicable. He detached three regiments to serve in Kentucky, and directed their place to be made good by three new Ohio regiments then organizing. The division was permitted to remain at Portland till imperatively needed for my movement.

There were no trains running on the railroad on Sunday, and Monday morning, the 13th October, was the earliest possible start on the remainder of my journey. I left Cincinnati at that time, and with my personal staff reached Portland in the afternoon. Morgan's division was found to be in quite as bad condition as had been reported, but he was in daily expectation of the new equipments and clothing, as well as wagons for his baggage-train and fresh horses for his artillery. It was stated also that a paymaster had been ordered to join the division, with funds to pay part at least of the large arrears of pay due to the men. This looked hopeful, but still implied some further delay. Uneasy to learn the actual condition of affairs with Lightburn's command, I determined to reach Gallipolis the same night. Our horses had been left behind, and being thus dismounted, we took passage in a four-horse hack, a square wagon on springs, enclosed with rubber-cloth curtains. Night fell soon after we began our journey, and as we were pushing on in the dark, the driver blundered and upset us off the end of a little sluiceway bridge into a mud-hole. He managed to jump from his seat and hold his team, but there was no help for us who were buttoned in. The mud was soft and deep, and as the wagon settled on its side, we were tumbled in a promiscuous heap into the ooze and slime, which completely covered us. We were not long in climbing out, and seeing lights in a farm-house, made our way to it. As we came into the light of the lamps and of a brisk fire burning on the open hearth, we were certainly as sorry a military spectacle as could be imagined. We were most kindly received, the men taking lanterns and going to our driver's help, whilst we stood before the fire, and scraped the thick mud from our uniforms with chips from the farmer's woodyard, making rather boisterous sport of our mishap. Before the wagon had been righted and partly cleaned, we had scraped and sponged each other off and were ready to go on. We noticed, however, that the room had filled with men, women, and children from the neighborhood, who stood bashfully back in the shadows, and who modestly explained that they had heard there was a "live general" there, and as they had never seen one, they had "come over." They must have formed some amusing ideas of military personages, and we found at least as much sport in being the menagerie as they did in visiting it. Our mishap made us wait for the moon, which rose in an hour or so, and we then took leave of our entertainers and our audience and drove on, with no desire, however, to repeat the performance. We made some ten miles more of the road, but found it so rough, and our progress so slow, that we were glad to find quarters for the rest of the night, finishing the journey in the morning.

On reaching my field of duty, my first task was to inspect the forces at Point Pleasant, and learn what was necessary to make a forward movement as soon as Morgan's troops should reach me. General Wright had originally expected that inclusive of Milroy's and Morgan's troops, I should find at the mouth of the Kanawha, on arriving there, some 20,000 men. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 402.] In fact, however, Lightburn's diminished command had only been reinforced by three new Ohio regiments (the Eighty-ninth, Ninety-first, and Ninety-second) and a new one from West Virginia (the Thirteenth), and with these his strength was less than 7300, officers and men, showing that his original command was sadly reduced by straggling and desertion during his retreat. [Footnote: Id., p. 522.] The new regiments were made up of good material, but as they were raw recruits, their usefulness must for some time be greatly limited.

Two regiments of infantry and a squadron of cavalry with a howitzer battery were at Guyandotte, under Colonel Jonathan Cranor of the Fortieth Ohio, and the Fifth West Virginia was at Ceredo near the mouth of the Big Sandy River. They had been stationed at these points to protect the navigation of the Ohio and to repel the efforts of the Confederate Cavalry General Jenkins to "raid" that region in which was his old home. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. pp. 459, 522.] They formed, a little later, the Third Brigade of the Kanawha division under Crook.

I found General Milroy in command as the ranking officer present, and he had sent Cranor's command down the river. When Governor Peirpoint learned that Milroy's brigade had passed Wheeling on his way to the Kanawha, he applied urgently to General Wright to send him, instead, from Parkersburg by rail to Clarksburg to form the nucleus of a column to move southward from that point upon the rear of Loring's forces. Wright assented, for both he and Halleck accepted the plan of converging columns from Clarksburg and Point Pleasant, and regarded that from the former place as the more important. [Footnote:Id. p. 402.] If directions were sent to Milroy to this effect, they seem to have miscarried. Besides his original brigade, some new Indiana regiments were ordered to report to him. He had, with characteristic lack of reflection and without authority, furloughed the Fifth West Virginia regiment in mass and sent the men home. I gave him a new one in place of this, ordered him to reassemble the other as soon as possible, and to march at once to Parkersburg, proceeding thence to Clarksburg by rail. The new troops added to his command enabled him to organize them into a division of two brigades, and still other regiments were added to him later. Milroy was a picturesque character, with some excellent qualities. A tall man, with trenchant features, bright eyes, a great shock of gray hair standing out from his head, he was a marked personal figure. He was brave, but his bravery was of the excitable kind that made him unbalanced and nearly wild on the battle-field. His impulsiveness made him erratic in all performances of duty, and negligent of the system without which the business of an army cannot go on. This was shown in his furlough of a regiment whilst en route to reinforce Lightburn, who was supposed to be in desperate straits. It is also seen in the absence of Official Records of the organization of his command at this time, so that we cannot tell what regiments constituted it when his division was assembled at Clarksburg. He is described, in the second Battle of Bull Run, as crazily careering over the field, shouting advice to other officers instead of gathering and leading his own command, which he said was routed and scattered. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xii. pt. ii. pp. 342, 362-364.] Under the immediate control of a firm and steady hand he could do good service, but was wholly unfit for independent responsibility. His demonstrative manner, his boiling patriotism, and his political zeal gave him prominence and made him a favorite with the influential war-governor of Indiana, Oliver P. Morton, who pushed his military advancement.

The Kanawha division left the Army of the Potomac on the 8th of October and reached Hancock on the 10th. There it crossed the track of a raid of the Confederate cavalry into Pennsylvania, under Stuart. By McClellan's order one brigade was sent to McConnelsville to intercept the enemy, and the other was halted. [Footnote: Id., vol. xix. pt. ii. pp. 62-78.] By the 13th Crook had been allowed to concentrate the division at Hancock again, but was kept waiting for orders, so that he was not able to report to me his arrival at Clarksburg till the 20th. Colonel Scammon was on a short leave of absence during this march, and was promoted. [Footnote: His new rank dated from 15th October, that of Crook from 7th September. Army Register, 1863.] He reported to me in person in his new rank of brigadier a little later. The brigades of the Kanawha division were commanded by the senior colonels present.

The increase of troops in the district made immediate need of transportation and munitions and supplies of all kinds. The Kanawha division had not been allowed to bring away with it its admirably equipped supply train, but its energetic quartermaster, Captain Fitch, came with the troops, and I immediately made him chief quartermaster of the district. Milroy's division had no wagons, neither had Morgan's. The fall rains had not yet raised the rivers, and only boats of lightest draught could move on the Ohio, whilst navigation on the Kanawha was wholly suspended. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 433.] Four hundred wagons and two thousand mules were estimated as necessary to supply two moving columns of ten thousand men each, in addition to such trains as were still available in the district. Only one hundred wagons could be promised from the depot at Cincinnati, none of which reached me before the enemy was driven out of the Kanawha valley. I was authorized to contract for one hundred more to be built at Wheeling, where, however, the shops could only construct thirty-five per week, and these began to reach the troops only after the 1st of November. [Footnote: Id., pp. 535-537.] We hoped for rains which would give us navigation in the Kanawha in spite of the suffering which wet weather at that season must produce, and I ordered wagons and teams to be hired from the country people as far as this could be done. Similar delays and trouble occurred in procuring advance stores and equipments. Part of Morgan's men were delayed at the last moment by their new knapsacks coming to them without the straps which fasten them to the shoulders. General Wright blamed the depot officers for this, and took from me and my subordinates all responsibility for the delays; [Footnote: ., pp. 438, 475.] but the incidents make an instructive lesson in the difficulty of suddenly organizing a new and strong military column in a region distant from large depots of supply. It also shows the endless cost and mischief that may result from an ill-advised retreat and destruction of property at such posts as Gauley Bridge and Charleston. To put the local quartermasters at Gallipolis and other towns on the Ohio side of the river under my command, General Wright enlarged the boundaries of my district so as to include the line of Ohio counties bordering on the river. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. pp. 381, 421.]

On visiting Lightburn's command at Point Pleasant, I ordered a brigade to be sent forward next day (15th) to Ten-mile Creek, repairing the road and bridges, whilst a scouting party of experienced men started out at once to penetrate the country by circuitous ways and to collect information. [Footnote: Id., p. 433.] In two or three days bits of news began to arrive, with rumors that Loring was retreating. The truth was that he in fact withdrew his infantry, leaving Jenkins with the cavalry and irregular forces to hold the valley for a time, and then to make a circuit northward by way of Bulltown, Sutton, etc., gaining the Beverly turnpike near the mountains and rejoining the infantry, which would march to join Lee by roads intersecting that highway at Monterey. Such at least was the purpose Loring communicated to the Confederate War Department; but he was not allowed to attempt it. His instructions had been to march his whole command by the route Jenkins was taking and at least to hold the valley stubbornly as far as Charleston. On receipt of the news that he was retreating, orders were sent him to turn over the command to Brigadier-General John Echols, the next in rank, and to report in person at Richmond. [Footnote: ., pp. 661, 667.] Echols was ordered immediately to resume the positions which had been abandoned, and did so as rapidly as possible. Loring had in fact begun his retreat on the 11th, three days before I reached Gallipolis, but the first information of it was got after the scouting had been begun which is mentioned above. By the 18th I was able to give General Wright confirmation of the news and a correct outline of Loring's plan, though we had not then learned that Echols was marching back to Charleston. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 449.] We heard of his return two or three days later. As evidence of the rapidity with which information reached the enemy, it is noteworthy that Lee knew my command had left the Army of the Potomac for West Virginia on the 11th October, three days after Crook marched from camp in Pleasant Valley. He reported to Richmond that four brigades had gone to that region, which was accurate as to the number, though only half right as to identification of the brigades. [Footnote:Id., pp. 662, 663.] On the 13th he sent further information that I had been promoted and assigned to command the district.

By the 20th there had been a slight rise in the Kanawha River, so that it was possible to use small steamboats to carry supplies for the troops, and Lightburn was ordered to advance his whole division to Red House, twenty-five miles, and to remove obstructions to navigation which had been planted there. [Footnote: Id., pp. 456, 459.] One brigade of Morgan's division was in condition to move, and it was ordered from Portland to Gallipolis. The rest were to follow at the earliest possible moment. The discontent of the East Tennessee regiments had not been lessened by the knowledge they had that powerful political influences were at work to second their desire to be moved back into the neighborhood of their home. On the 10th of October a protest against their being sent into West Virginia was made by Horace Maynard, the loyal representative of East Tennessee in Congress, a man of marked character and ability and deservedly very influential with the government. [Footnote:Id., vol. xvi. pt. ii. pp. 604, 635, 651.] Maynard addressed Halleck a second time on the subject on the 22d, and on the 29th Andrew Johnson, then military governor of Tennessee, wrote to President Lincoln for the same purpose. It hardly need be said that the preparation of those regiments would proceed slowly, pending such negotiations. Their distant homes and families were at the mercy of the enemy, and it seemed to them intolerable that their faces should be turned in any other direction. I suggested an exchange for new Ohio regiments, but as these were not yet filled up, it could not be done. General Wright assured them that they should be sent to Kentucky as soon as we were again in possession of West Virginia. Most of these regiments came under my command again later in the war, and I became warmly attached to them. Their drill and discipline were always lax, but their courage and devotion to the national cause could not be excelled.

It was not till the 23d that any of Morgan's men really entered into the forward movement in the valley. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. pp. 474, 475.] On that day the brigade of Colonel John F. DeCourcey (Sixteenth Ohio), composed of Ohio and Kentucky troops, reached Ten-mile Creek and was ordered to march to Red House the day after. [Footnote: Colonel DeCourcey was an Irishman of good family, who took service in our army, and was a good officer. He afterwards inherited an Irish baronage.] Lightburn was busy clearing the river of obstructions and preparing to move to Pocataligo River as the next step in advance. Of the other brigades belonging to Morgan, that of Brigadier-General Samuel P. Carter, composed partly of Tennesseans, was at Gallipolis, intending to enter the valley on the 24th. The remaining brigade, under Brigadier-General James G. Spears, was entirely Tennessean, and was still at Portland where the paymaster had just arrived and was giving the regiments part payment.

My purpose was to concentrate the force at Pocataligo, assume the command in person, and attack the enemy in the positions in front of Charleston, in which Wise had resisted me in the previous year. I should have been glad to make the expected movement of a column from Clarksburg under Crook and Milroy co-operate directly with my own, but circumstances made it impracticable. The operations of the Confederate cavalry under Jenkins were keeping the country north of the Kanawha in a turmoil, and reports had become rife that he would work his way out toward Beverly. The country was also full of rumors of a new invasion from East Virginia. Milroy's forces were not yet fully assembled at Clarksburg on the 20th, but he was ordered to operate toward Beverly, whilst Crook, with the old Kanawha division, should move on Summersville and Gauley Bridge. Both had to depend on hiring wagons for transportation of supplies. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. pp. 459, 481, 482.] Separated as they were, they would necessarily be cautious in their movements, making the suppression of guerillas, the driving out of raiders, and the general quieting of the country their principal task. Their rôle was thus, of course, made subordinate to the movement of my own column, which must force its own way without waiting for results from other operations.

Half of Carter's brigade was, at the last moment, delayed at Gallipolis, the clothing and equipments sent to them there being found incomplete. Just half of Morgan's division with two batteries of artillery were in motion on the 24th. On that day Lightburn was moved to Pocataligo, about forty miles from the river mouth, where I joined him in person on the 27th. A cold storm of mingled rain and snow had made the march and bivouac very uncomfortable for a couple of days. General Morgan accompanied me, and during the 28th the active column of three and a half brigades was concentrated, two or three other regiments being in echelon along the river below. Tyler Mountain behind Tyler Creek was, as formerly, the place at which the enemy was posted to make a stand against our further progress, though he had no considerable force on the south side of the river at the mouth of Scary Creek. Reconnoissances showed nothing but cavalry in our immediate front, and it afterwards appeared that Echols began a rapid retreat from Charleston on that day. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 685.] He had called to him Jenkins with the greater part of the cavalry, and entrusted to the latter the duty of holding us back as much as possible. Suspecting this from evidence collected at Pocataligo, I determined to put Siber's brigade and a battery, all in light marching order, on the south side of the river, accompanied by a light-draught steamboat, which the rise in the river after the storm enabled us to use as far as Charleston. This brigade could turn the strong position at Tyler Mountain, and passing beyond this promontory on the opposite side of the river, could command with artillery fire the river road on the other bank behind the enemy in our front. The steamboat would enable them to make a rapid retreat if the belief that no great force was on that side of the river should prove to be a mistake. Siber was also furnished with a battery of four mountain howitzers, which could be carried to the edge of the water or anywhere that men could march. [Footnote:Id., pp. 504, 509, 530.]

On the right bank of the river (north side) the principal column of two brigades (Toland's and DeCourcey's) advanced on the turnpike near the stream, having one six-gun battery and a section of twenty-pounder Parrots with them. What was present of Carter's brigade was sent by the mountain road further from the stream, to cover our left and to turn the flank of the Tyler Mountain position, if a stubborn stand should be made there. A light six-gun battery accompanied it. All moved forward simultaneously on the morning of the 29th. [Footnote: Ibid.] The dispositions thus made rendered it vain for the enemy's cavalry to offer any stubborn resistance, and Jenkins abandoned Tyler Mountain on our approach, thus giving us certain knowledge that he was not closely supported by the infantry. Our advance-guard reached the Elk River opposite Charleston in the afternoon, and I made personal reconnoissance of the means of crossing. The suspension bridge had been ruined in Lightburn's retreat, and the enemy had depended upon a bridge of boats for communication with their troops in the lower valley. These boats had been taken to the further bank of the river and partly destroyed, but as the enemy had continued his retreat, we soon had a party over collecting those that could be used, and other flatboats used in the coal trade, and a practicable bridge was reconstructed before night of the 30th. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 530.] Meanwhile I entered the town with the advance-guard as soon as we had a boat to use for a ferry, and spent the night of the 29th there. We had friends enough in the place to put us quickly in possession of all the news, and I was soon satisfied that Echols had no thought of trying to remain on the western side of the mountains. [Footnote: Id., pp. 515, 520.]

The column crossed the Elk late in the afternoon of the 30th, and I pushed Toland's and Carter's brigades to Malden and Camp Piatt that evening, Siber's brigade advancing to Brownstown on the other side of the Kanawha River. Lightburn's division was ordered forward next day to Gauley Bridge, Carter's brigade at Malden was ordered to send strong parties southward into Boone County, to reconnoitre and to put down guerilla bands. [Footnote: Id., p. 530.] DeCourcey's brigade was halted at Charleston, and Spears' Tennessee brigade was directed to remain at Gallipolis till further orders. Communication was opened with Crook, who was ordered to press forward via Summersville to Gauley Bridge as quickly as possible. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 520.] The retreating enemy had burned the bridges, obstructed the roads with fallen timber, and cut and destroyed the flatboats along the river; so that the first and most pressing task was to reopen roads, make ferries and bridges, and thus renew the means of getting supplies to the troops. [Footnote:Id., p. 536.] The river was still low, unusually so for the season, and the water was falling. Every energy was therefore necessary to get forward supplies to Gauley Bridge and the other up-river posts, for if the river should freeze whilst low, the winter transportation would be confined to the almost impassable roads. [Footnote: Id., p. 537.] I reported to General Wright the re-occupation of the valley, our lack of wagon-trains for further advance, and all the facts which would assist in deciding whether anything further should be attempted. I did not conceal the opinion which all my experience had confirmed, that no military advantage could be secured by trying to extend operation by this route across the mountains into the James River valley.

On the 2d of November Brigadier-General Scammon reported for duty, and I ordered him to Gauley Bridge to assume command of the division which was then under Colonel Lightburn, who resumed the command of his brigade. [Footnote: Ibid.] Scammon was directed to inspect carefully all our old positions as far as Raleigh C. H., to report whether the recent retreat of troops from Fayetteville had been due to any improper location of the fortifications there, to examine the road up Loup Creek, and any others which might be used by the enemy to turn our position at Gauley Bridge, to state the present conditions of buildings at all the upper posts, and whether any storehouses had escaped destruction. In short, we needed the material on which to base intelligent plans for a more secure holding of the region about the falls of the Kanawha, or for a further advance to the eastward if it should be ordered.

The information which came to me as soon as I was in actual contact with the enemy, not only satisfied me that Loring's forces had been greatly exaggerated, but led me to estimate them at a lower figure than the true one. In reporting to General Wright on 1st November, I gave the opinion that they amounted to about 3500 infantry, but with a disproportionate amount of artillery, some twenty pieces. The cavalry under Jenkins numbered probably 1000 or 1500 horse. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 531.] About the first of October Loring, in a dispatch to Richmond, stated his force at "only a little more than 4000," [Footnote: Id., p. 635.] which probably means that the 5000 with which he entered the valley were somewhat reduced by the sick and by desertions. He seems to refer to his infantry, for Jenkins's command had been an independent one. It would be reasonable, therefore, to put his total strength at some 6000 or a little higher. On our side, the column with which I actually advanced was just about 9000 men, with 2000 more of Morgan's command within reach, had there been need to call them up from the Ohio River.

On the 8th of November Halleck telegraphed to General Wright that no posts need be established beyond Gauley Bridge, and that about half of my command should be sent to Tennessee and the Mississippi valley. [Footnote: Id., pp. 556, 557.] On the same day General Wright formally approved my views as submitted to him, and ordered Morgan's division to be sent to Cincinnati at once. [Footnote: Id., p. 537.] It was thus definitively settled that my task for the winter would be to restore the condition of affairs in West Virginia which had existed before Loring's invasion, and organize my district with a view to prompt and easy supply of my posts, the suppression of lawlessness and bushwhacking, the support of the State authorities, and the instruction and discipline of officers and men. My first attention was given to the question of transportation, for the winter was upon us and wagons were very scarce. The plan of using the river to the utmost was an economy as well as a necessity, and I returned to my former arrangement of using batteaux for the shallow and swift waters of the upper river, connecting with the movable head of steamboat navigation. A tour of inspection to Gauley Bridge and the posts in that vicinity satisfied me that they were in good condition for mutual support, and for carrying on a system of scouting which could be made a useful discipline and instruction to the troops, as well as the means of keeping thoroughly informed of the movements of the enemy.

The line of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was kept under the control of General Kelley, and his authority extended to active co-operation with the Army of the Potomac in keeping open communication with Washington. In case of need, the commander of that army was authorized to give orders to General Kelley direct, without waiting to transmit them through my headquarters. General Milroy was established on the Beverly front, communicating on his left with General Kelley and on his right with General Crook, at Gauley Bridge. General Scammon had his station at Fayette C. H., covering the front on the south side of New River, whilst Crook watched the north side and extended his posts in Milroy's direction as far as Summersville. Colonel Cranor remained on the Ohio near Guyandotte, scouting the valley of the Guyandotte River and communicating with Charleston and other posts on the Kanawha.

On the 12th of November reports were received from General Kelley that authentic information showed that Jackson was advancing from the Shenandoah valley upon West Virginia. Similar information reached army headquarters at Washington, and in anticipation of possible necessity for it, I directed Milroy to hold himself in readiness to march at once to join Kelley, if the latter should call upon him. I telegraphed General Wright that I did not think the report would prove well founded, but it put everybody upon the alert for a little while. Kelley had beaten up a camp of Confederates under Imboden about eighteen miles above Moorefield on the south branch of the Potomac, causing considerable loss to the enemy in killed and wounded and capturing fifty prisoners. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. pp. 572, 573, 578, 585, 586.] Some movement to support Imboden probably gave rise to the story of Jackson's advance, but Lee kept both corps of his army in hand and moved the whole down the Rappahannock soon afterward, to meet Burnside's advance upon Fredericksburg.

The invasion of the Kanawha valley by Loring had stirred up much bitter feeling again between Union men and Confederates, and was followed by the usual quarrels and recriminations among neighbors. The Secessionists were stimulated to drop the prudent reserve they had practised before, and some of them, in the hope that the Confederate occupation would be permanent, persecuted loyal men who were in their power. The retreat of the enemy brought its day of reckoning, and was accompanied by a fresh emigration to eastern Virginia of a considerable number of the more pronounced Secessionists. I have said [Footnote: Ante, p. 154.] that Mr. George Summers, formerly the leading man of the valley, had studiously avoided political activity after the war began; but this did not save him from the hostility of his disloyal neighbors. Very shortly after my re-occupation of Charleston he called upon me one evening and asked for a private interview. He had gone through a painful experience, he said, and as it would pretty surely come to my ears, he preferred I should hear it from himself, before enemies or tale-bearers should present it with such coloring as they might choose. During the Confederate occupation he had maintained his secluded life and kept aloof from contact with the military authorities. Their officers, however, summoned him before them, charged him with treason to Virginia and to the Confederate States, and demanded of him that he take the oath of allegiance to the Southern government. He demurred to this, and urged that as he had scrupulously avoided public activity, it would be harsh and unjust to force him to a test which he could not conscientiously take. They were in no mood to listen to argument, and charged that his acquiescence in the rule of the new state government of West Virginia was, in his case, more injurious to the Confederate cause than many another man's active unionism. Finding Mr. Summers disposed to be firm, they held him in arrest; and as he still refused to yield, he was told that he should be tied by a rope to the tail of a wagon and forced to march in that condition, as a prisoner, over the mountains to Richmond.

He was an elderly man, used to a refined and easy life, somewhat portly in person, and, as he said, he fully believed such treatment would kill him. The fierceness of their manner convinced him that they meant to execute the threat, and looking upon it as a sentence of death, he yielded and took the oath. He said that being in duress of such a sort, and himself a lawyer, he considered that he had a moral right to escape from his captors in this way, though he would not have yielded to anything short of what seemed to him an imminent danger of his life. The obligation, he declared, was utterly odious to him and was not binding on his conscience; but he had lost no time in putting himself into my hands, and would submit to whatever I should decide in the matter. It would be humiliating and subject him to misconstruction by others if he took conflicting oaths, but he was willing to abjure the obligation he had taken, if I demanded it, and would voluntarily renew his allegiance to the United States with full purpose to keep it.

He was deeply agitated, and I thoroughly pitied him. My acquaintance with him in my former campaign gave me entire confidence in his sincerity, and made me wish to spare him any fresh embarrassment or pain. After a moment's reflection, I replied that I did not doubt anything he had told me of the facts or of his own sentiments in regard to them. His experience only confirmed my distrust of all test oaths. Either his conscience already bound him to the National government, or it did not. In either case I could not make his loyalty more sure by a fresh oath, and believing that the one he had taken under duress was void in fact as well as in his own conscience, I would leave the matter there and ask nothing more of him. He was greatly relieved by my decision, but bore himself with dignity. I never saw any reason to be sorry for the course I took, and believe that he was always afterward consistent and steady in his loyalty to the United States.

CHAPTER XX

WINTER QUARTERS, 1862-63--PROMOTIONS AND POLITICS

Central position of Marietta, Ohio--Connection with all parts of West Virginia--Drill and instruction of troops--Guerilla warfare--Partisan Rangers--Confederate laws--Disposal of plunder--Mosby's Rangers as a type--Opinions of Lee, Stuart, and Rosser--Effect on other troops--Rangers finally abolished--Rival home-guards and militia--Horrors of neighborhood war--Staff and staff duties--Reduction of forces--General Cluseret--Later connection with the Paris Commune--His relations with Milroy--He resigns--Political situation--Congressmen distrust Lincoln--Cutler's diary--Resolutions regarding appointments of general officers--The number authorized by law--Stanton's report--Effect of Act of July, 1862--An excess of nine major-generals--The legal questions involved--Congressional patronage and local distribution--Ready for a "deal"--Bill to increase the number of generals--A "slate" made up to exhaust the number--Senate and House disagree--Conference--Agreement in last hours of the session--The new list--A few vacancies by resignation, etc.--List of those dropped--My own case--Faults of the method--Lincoln's humorous comments--Curious case of General Turchin--Congestion in the highest grades--Effects--Confederate grades of general and lieutenant-general--Superiority of our system--Cotemporaneous reports and criticisms--New regiments instead of recruiting old ones--Sherman's trenchant opinion.

Early in December I established my winter headquarters at Marietta on the Ohio River, a central position from which communication could be had most easily with all parts of the district and with department headquarters. It was situated at the end of the railway line from Cincinnati to the Ohio River near Parkersburg, where the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad met the Cincinnati line. The Baltimore road, coming from the east, forked at Grafton in West Virginia and reached Wheeling, as has been described in an earlier chapter. [Footnote: Ante, pp. 40, 42.] The river was usually navigable during the winter and made an easy communication with Wheeling as with the lower towns. I was thus conveniently situated for most speedily reaching every part of my command, in person or otherwise. It took but a little while to get affairs so organized that the routine of work ran on quietly and pleasantly. No serious effort was made by the enemy to re-enter the district during the winter, and except some local outbreaks of "bush-whacking" and petty guerilla warfare, there was nothing to interrupt the progress of the troops in drill and instruction.

A good deal of obscurity still hangs about the subject of guerilla warfare, and the relation of the Confederate government to it. There was, no doubt, a good deal of loose talk that found its way into print and helped form a popular opinion, which treated almost every scouting party as if it were a lawless organization of "bush-whackers." But there was an authoritative and systematic effort of the Richmond government to keep up partisan bodies within our lines which should be soldiers when they had a chance to do us a mischief, and citizens when they were in danger of capture and punishment. When Fremont assumed command of the Mountain Department, he very early called the attention of the Secretary of War to the fact that Governor Letcher was sending commissions into West Virginia, authorizing the recipients to enlist companies to be used against us in irregular warfare. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xii. pt. iii. p. 75.]

The bands which were organized by the Confederate Government under authority of law, but which were free from the control of army commanders and unrestrained by the checks upon lawlessness which are found in subordination to the operations of organized armies, were called "Partisan Rangers," and protection as legitimate soldiers was promised them. They were not required to camp with the army, or to remain together as troops or regiments. They wore uniforms or not, as the whim might take them. They remained, as much as they dared, in their home region, and assembled, usually at night, at a preconcerted signal from their leaders, to make a "raid." They were not paid as the more regular troops were, but were allowed to keep the horses which they captured or "lifted." They were nominally required to turn over the beef-cattle and army stores to the Confederate commissariat, but after a captured wagon-train had been looted by them, not much of value would be found in it. Their raids were made by such numbers as might chance to be got together. Stuart, the brilliant Confederate cavalry commander, whilst crediting Mosby with being the best of the partisans, said of him, "he usually operates with only one-fourth of his nominal strength. Such organizations, as a rule, are detrimental to the best interests of the army at large." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxiii. p. 1082.] General Lee, in forwarding one of Mosby's reports, commended his boldness and good management, but added: "I have heard that he has now with him a large number of men, yet his expeditions are undertaken with very few, and his attention seems more directed to the capture of sutlers' wagons, etc., than to the injury of the enemy's communications and outposts.... I do not know the cause for undertaking his expeditions with so few men; whether it is from policy or the difficulty of collecting them. I have heard of his men, among them officers, being in rear of this army, selling captured goods, sutlers' stores, etc. This had better be attended to by others. It has also been reported to me that many deserters from this army have joined him. Among them have been seen members of the Eighth Virginia Regiment." [Footnote: Id., vol xxix. pt. ii. p.652.] In the "Richmond Examiner" of August 18, 1863 (the same date as General Lee's letter), was the statement that "At a sale of Yankee plunder taken by Mosby and his men, held at Charlottesville last week, thirty-odd thousand dollars were realized, to be divided among the gallant band." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxix. pt. ii. p. 653.]

The injury to the discipline of their own army gradually brought leading officers of the Confederates to the conviction that the "Partisan Rangers" cost more than they were worth. In January, 1864, General Rosser, one of the most distinguished cavalry officers of the South, made a formal communication to General Lee on the subject. "During the time I have been in the valley," he said, "I have had ample opportunity of judging of the efficiency and usefulness of the many irregular bodies of troops which occupy this country, known as partisans, etc., and am prompted by no other feeling than a desire to serve my country, to inform you that they are a nuisance and an evil to the service. Without discipline, order, or organization, they roam broadcast over the country, a band of thieves, stealing, pillaging, plundering, and doing every manner of mischief and crime. They are a terror to the citizens and an injury to the cause. They never fight; can't be made to fight. Their leaders are generally brave, but few of the men are good soldiers, and have engaged in this business for the sake of gain." [Footnote: Id., vol. xxxiii. p. 1081.] After classifying the mischiefs to the regular service, he continues: "It is almost impossible to manage the different companies of my brigade that are from Loudoun, Fauquier, Fairfax, etc., the region occupied by Mosby. They see these men living at their ease and enjoying the comforts of home, allowed to possess all that they capture, and their duties mere pastime pleasures compared with their own arduous ones, and it is a natural consequence, in the nature of man, that he should become dissatisfied under these circumstances. Patriotism fails, in a long and tedious war like this, to sustain the ponderous burdens which bear heavily and cruelly upon the heart and soul of man." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxiii. p. 1081.] General Rosser recommended the absorption of the partisan bodies into the ordinary brigades, using their supposed talents for scouting by sending them on expeditions as regular patrols and reconnoitring parties, reporting to their proper command as soon as the duty was done.

It was upon Rosser's communication that Stuart made the endorsement already quoted, and Lee sent it forward to the War Department, further endorsed thus: "As far as my knowledge and experience extend, there is much truth in the statement of General Rosser. I recommend that the law authorizing these partisan corps be abolished. The evils resulting from their organization more than counterbalance the good they accomplish." The Secretary of War, Mr. Siddon, drafted a bill to abolish them, and it passed the Confederate House. Delay occurring in the Senate, the matter was compromised by transferring all the Rangers except Mosby's and McNeill's to the line. [Footnote: Id., pp. 1082, 1253.] As it was to Mosby's that the reported facts applied, and all agreed that his was the best of the lot, we may imagine what must have been the character of the rest.

In the first two winters of the war, these organizations were in the height of their pernicious activity, and the loyal West Virginians were their favorite victims. We knew almost nothing of their organization, except that they claimed some Confederate law for their being. We seldom found them in uniform, and had no means of distinguishing them from any other armed horse-stealers and "bush-whackers." We were, however, made unpleasantly certain of the fact that in every neighborhood where secession sentiments were rife, our messengers were waylaid and killed, small parties were ambushed, and all the exasperating forms of guerilla warfare were abundant. Besides all this, the Confederate authorities assumed to call out the militia of counties into which they were intending to make an expedition, so that they might have the temporary co-operation of local troops. They claimed the right to do this because they had not recognized the separation of West Virginia, and insisted that the whole was subject to the laws of Virginia. The result was that the Union men formed companies of "Home Guards" for self-protection, and the conflict of arms was carried into every settlement in the mountain nooks and along the valleys. In this kind of fighting there was no quarter given, or if prisoners were taken, they were too often reported as having met with fatal accidents before they could be handed over to the regular authorities. As all this could have no effect upon the progress of the war, the more cool and intelligent heads of both sides opposed it, and gradually diminished it. Severe measures against it were in fact merciful, for the horrors of war are always least when the fighting is left to the armies of responsible belligerents, unprovoked by the petty but exasperating hostilities of irregulars. The trouble from this source was less during the winter of 1862-63 than it had been the year before, but it still gave occupation to small movable columns of our troops from time to time.

The organization of my staff was somewhat increased with the enlargement of responsibilities. Lieutenant-Colonel McElroy, who had been my adjutant-general in the campaign of 1861, returned to me as inspector-general and took the whole supervision of the equipment, drill, and instruction of the troops of the district. Major Bascom, who had received his promotion at the same time with mine, continued to be adjutant-general. The increased work in looking after supplies made more force in the commissariat a necessity, and Captain Barriger of the regular army was sent to me, my former commissary, Captain Treat, continuing on the staff. Barriger was a modest, clear-headed officer of admirable business qualifications, whom I had the good fortune to be again associated with late in the war. Three principal depots of supply were established at the bases of the principal lines of communication in the district,--Wheeling, Parkersburg, and Gallipolis. At each of these, depot commissaries and quartermasters were located, and the posts and commands at the front drew their supplies from them. Captain Fitch, my quartermaster, supervised his department in a similar way to that of the commissariat. My aides were Captain Christie and Lieutenant Conine, as before, and I added to them my brother, Theodore Cox, who served with me as volunteer aide without rank in the battles of South Mountain and Antietam, and was then appointed lieutenant in the Eleventh Ohio Infantry. He was my constant companion from this time till peace was established. The medical department remained under the care of Major Holmes, Brigade-Surgeon, who combined scientific with administrative qualities in a rare measure.

There was no military movement during the winter of sufficient importance to be told at length. Constant scouting and reconnoissances were kept up, slight skirmishes were not infrequent, but these did not prevent our sense of rest and of preparation for the work of the next spring. General Crook, with a brigade, was transferred temporarily to the command of Rosecrans in Tennessee, and Kelley, Milroy, and Scammon divided the care of the three hundred miles of mountain ranges which made our front. My own leisure gave me the opportunity for some systematic and useful reading in military history and art. An amusing interlude occurred in a hot controversy which arose between General Milroy and one of his subordinates which would not be worth mentioning except for the fact that the subordinate had afterward a world-wide notoriety as military chief of the Paris Commune in 1870.

Gustave Cluseret was a Frenchman, who was appointed in the spring of 1862 an aide-de-camp with the rank of colonel upon the staff of General Frémont, who (with questionable legality) assigned him to command a brigade, [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xii. pt. i. pp. 9, 35.] and recommended his appointment as brigadier for good conduct in the May and June campaign against Jackson. The appointment was made on October 14th, [Footnote: Army Register, 1863, p. 95.] and during the fall and winter he had a brigade in Milroy's division. Milroy was, for a time, loud in his praises of Cluseret as the beau ideal of an officer, and their friendship was fraternal. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxi. p. 779.] In the winter, however, their mutual admiration was nipped by a killing frost, and a controversy sprung up between them which soon led to mutual recrimination also in the superlative degree. They addressed their complaints to General Halleck, and as the papers passed through my headquarters, I was a witness of their berating of each other. They made a terrible din, on paper, for a while, but I cannot recall anything very serious in their accusations. Halleck pigeon-holed their correspondence, but Milroy had powerful political friends, and Cluseret, learning that his appointment would not be confirmed by the Senate, anticipated their action, and terminated his military career in the United States by resigning two days before the close of the session of Congress. [Footnote: Army Register, 1863, p. 101. His name does not appear in the lists in the body of the Register, because he was not in the Army April 1, 1863, the date of publication.]

This brings me to the subject of Congressional action in the matter of the promotions and appointments in the army during this winter session which closed the Thirty-seventh Congress. By it I was myself to suffer the one severe disappointment of my military career. The time was one of great political excitement, for the fall elections had resulted in a great overturning in the Congressional delegations. The Democrats had elected so many representatives for the Thirty-eighth Congress that it was doubtful whether the administration would be able to command a majority in the House. The retirement of McClellan from the command had also provoked much opposition, and in the lack of full knowledge of the reasons for displacing him, political ones were imagined and charged. Public policy forbade the President to make known all his grounds of dissatisfaction with the general, and many of his own party openly questioned his wisdom and his capacity to govern. Men whose patriotism cannot be questioned shared in this distrust, and in their private writings took the most gloomy view of the situation and of the future of the country. This was intensified when Burnside was so bloodily repulsed at Fredericksburg at the close of the first week of the session. [Footnote: Mr. W. P. Cutler, Representative from Ohio, a modest but very intelligent and patriotic man, wrote in his diary under December 16th: "This is a day of darkness and peril to the country... Lincoln himself seems to have no nerve or decision in dealing with great issues. We are at sea, and no pilot or captain. God alone can take care of us, and all his ways seem to be against us and to favor the rebels and their allies the Democrats. Truly it is a day of darkness and gloom." "Life and Times" of Ephraim Cutler, with biographical sketches of Jervis Cutler and W. P. Cutler, p.296.]

As is usual in revolutionary times, more radical measures were supposed by many to be the cure for disasters, and in caucuses held by congressmen the supposed conservatism of Mr. Lincoln and part of his cabinet was openly denounced, and the earnestness of the army leaders was questioned. [Footnote: Mr. Cutler reports a caucus of the House held January 27th, in which "Mr.---- stated that the great difficulty was in holding the President to anything. He prided himself on having a divided cabinet, so that he could play one against the other... The earnest men are brought to a deadlock by the President. The President is tripped up by his generals, who for the most part seem to have no heart in their work." Id., p.301. Mr. Cutler himself expresses similar sentiments and reiterates: "It really seems as if the ship of state was going to pieces in the storm." "How striking the want of a leader. The nation is without a head." "The true friends of the government are groping around without a leader," etc. Id., pp. 297, 301,302] Much of this was a misunderstanding of the President and of events which time has corrected, but at the moment and in the situation of the country it was natural. It strongly affected the conduct of the federal legislators, and must be taken into the account when we try to understand their attitude toward the army and the administration of military affairs.

In the Senate, at a very early day after the opening of the session, Mr. Wilson, chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs, offered a resolution (which passed without opposition) calling upon the Secretary of War for "the number and names of the major-generals and brigadier-generals in the service of the United States, and where and how they are employed." [Footnote: Senate Journal, 3d Session, 37th Congress, Dec. 8, 1862.] This was, no doubt, the offspring of an opinion in vogue in Congress, that the President had gone beyond the authority of law in the number of these officers he had appointed. If this were true, the course taken was not a friendly one toward the administration. The whole list of appointments and promotions would be submitted to the Senate for confirmation, and if the statutory number had been exceeded, that body could stop confirming when it reached the legal limit. There were, of course, frequent consultations between the Congressional committees or the individual members and the Secretary of War; but whatever efforts there may have been to reach a quiet understanding failed. On the 21st of January, the Secretary not having responded to Mr. Wilson's resolution, Mr. Rice of Minnesota offered another (which also passed by unanimous consent), directing the Secretary of War "to inform the Senate whether any more major and brigadier generals have been appointed and paid than authorized by law; and if so, how many; give names, dates of appointment and amounts paid." [Footnote:Id., Jan. 21, 1863.]

Two days later the Secretary sent in his reports in response to both resolutions. To the first he replied that the interests of the public service would not permit him to state "where and how" the general officers were employed, but he gave the list of names. He gave also a separate list of six major-generals who were not assigned to any duty. [Footnote: These were McClellan, Frémont, Cassius M. Clay, Buell (ordered before a military commission), McDowell, and F. J. Porter (both before military courts in connection with the second battle of Bull Run).] To the second resolution he replied that "It is believed by this Department that the law authorizing the increase of the volunteer and militia forces necessarily implied an increase of officers beyond the number specified in the Act of July 17, 1862, to any extent required by the service, and that the number of appointments is not beyond such limit." If the limit of the statute named were strictly applied, he said there would be found to be nine major-generals and forty-six brigadier-generals in excess. There had been no payments of increased salary to correspond with the increased rank, except in one instance. [Footnote: Executive Documents of Senate, 3d Session, 37th Congress, Nos. 21 and 22. The nine major-generals were Schuyler Hamilton, Granger, Cox, Rousseau, McPherson, Augur, Meade, Hartsuff, and N. B. Buford. If the number were thirteen, it would include Foster, Parke, Schenck, and Hurlbut.] The list submitted showed fifty-two major-generals in service, and one (Buford) was omitted, so that if forty should prove to be the limit, there would be thirteen in excess. This, however, was only apparently true, for the Secretary's list included the four major-generals in the regular army, whose case was not covered by the limitation of the statute. This seems to have been overlooked in the steps subsequently taken by members of Congress, and as the action was unwelcome to the President, he did not enlighten the legislators respecting their miscalculation. The business proceeded upon the supposition that the appointments in the highest rank were really thirteen in excess of the number fixed by the statute.

The state of the law was this. The Act of July 22, 1861, authorized the President to call for volunteers, not exceeding half a million, and provided for one brigadier-general for four regiments and one major-general for three brigades. The Act of 25th July of the same year authorized a second call of the same number, and provided for "such number of major-generals and brigadier-generals as may in his (the President's) judgment be required for their organization." In the next year, however, a "rider" was put upon the clause in the appropriation bill to pay the officers and men of the volunteer service, which provided "that the President shall not be authorized to appoint more than forty major-generals, nor more than two hundred brigadier-generals," and repealed former acts which allowed more. [Footnote: The several acts referred to may be found in vol. xii. U. S. Statutes at Large, pp. 268, 274, 506. The appropriation bill was passed July 5, 1862. The date July 17, 1862, in the Secretary's report seems to be a misprint.] This limit just covered those who had been appointed up to the date of the approval of the appropriation bill. Two questions, however, were still open for dispute. First, whether a "rider" upon the appropriation should change a general law on the subject of army organization, and second, whether the new limit might not allow appointments to be thereafter made to the extent of the numbers stated. The report of Mr. Stanton evidently suggests such questions.

The matter was now in good shape for what politicians call "a deal," and negotiations between members of Congress and the executive were active. The result appears to have been an understanding that a bill should be passed increasing the number of general officers, so as not only to cover the appointments already made, but leaving a considerable margin of new promotions to be filled by arrangement between the high contracting parties. On the 12th of February, 1863, the Senate passed a bill providing for the appointment of twenty major-generals of volunteers and fifty brigadiers. This was not acceptable to the House. The battle of Stone's River had lately been fought in Tennessee, and representatives from the West were urgent in arguing that affairs near Washington unduly filled the view of the administration. There was some truth in this. At any rate the House amended the bill so as to increase the numbers to forty major-generals and one hundred brigadiers, to be made by promotions, for meritorious service, from lower grades. As soon as it was known that the Military Committee of the House would report such an amendment, it was assumed that the Senate would concur, and a "slate" was made up accordingly. On the hypothesis that the list of major-generals was thirteen in excess of the forty fixed by statute, a new list of twenty-seven was made out, which would complete the forty to be added by the new bill. A similar list was prepared for the brigadiers and precisely similar negotiations went on, but for brevity's sake I shall confine myself to the list for the highest rank, in which I was personally concerned.

The House passed the amended bill on the 27th of February, and it went back to the Senate for concurrence in the amendments. But now an unexpected difficulty arose. The Senate refused to concur in the changes made by the House. It matters little whether the senators were offended at the determination of the lower House to have so large a share in the nominations, or desired to punish the President for having gone beyond the letter of the law in his promotions of 1862; the fact was that they voted down the amendments. A committee of conference between the two houses was appointed, and a compromise report was made fixing the additional number of major-generals at thirty and of brigadiers at seventy-five. Both Houses finally concurred in the report, the bill went to the President on the 1st of March, and he signed it on the next day.

There was but a single working-day of the session left, for the session must end at noon of the 4th of March. The list must be reduced. The manner in which this was done clinches the proof, if there had been any doubt before, that the list of twenty-seven was the result of negotiations with congressmen. No meddling with that list was permitted, though the use of patronage as "spoils" had some very glaring illustrations in it. The President had to make the reduction from his own promotions made earlier, and which were therefore higher on the list and in rank, instead of dropping those last added, as had seemed to be demanded by the earlier action of Congress. The only exception to this was in the case of General Schofield, whose even-handed administration of the District of Missouri and army of the frontier had excited the enmity of extreme politicians in that State and in Kansas, led by Senator "Jim" Lane, the prince of "jay-hawkers." Schofield was dropped from the twenty-seven.