Note 48 — Chapter XII · Otis and the War (Continued)

For the details of this march, see War Department Report, 1900, vol. i., pt. 4, p. 309. Captain Batchelor had neither orders nor permission to do what he did. When he cut loose from the command he belonged to, he took very long chances on finding subsistence for his men in the unknown country he had set out to conquer, to say nothing of the highly probable chances of annihilation of his whole command. When an officer commanding troops does this in time of war, he does so at his peril, and signal success is his only salvation.