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F. P. BLAIR-SCOTT-PATTERSON.

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midst, even though he had to travel | Fourth, at latest. That we had ample

in an ambulance. Moving slowly, steadily, cautiously forward, our army should have been reënforced by two or three fresh regiments each day, being exercised in field maneuvers at every opportunity. On or before the 1st day of July, this array, one hundred thousand strong, should have been before Richmond, not then fortified to any serious extent, and should have replaced the Stars and Stripes on the steeples of that city by the

were free from the Confederate bayonets, they gave a majority of votes against Secession. The same was the case in Tennessee. Any such plan as that which The Times says is Gen. Scott's plan of carrying on the war would leave the unarmed Union men of the Border States and of the Southern States at the mercy of the armies of the Confederate States. It would leave the 25,000 majority in East Tennessee, the vast majority in Missouri, and everywhere else, at the mercy of

the Rebels.

"I say, further, that, if we remain idle for such a period of time, doing nothing upon the borders of these revolted States, however great an army we might possess, we should, by so doing, proclaim to the world that we were unable to enter those States and put down Rebellion; and the governments of Europe would make it a pretext for acknowledging the independence of those States.

"It is manifest, therefore, that such important political considerations must enter largely into any plan of campaign; and no plan is admissible which, by its delays, destroys the business of the country, leaves the Union men of the Border States and their property a prey to the Rebels, and gives a pretext to foreign Powers to interfere for the purpose of forcing our blockade."

That the policy of 'wait and get ready,' involved, in fact, a virtual admission of the independence of the Confederacy, while enabling the Rebels to crush out the last vestiges of Unionism in the South, as also to cover all the important points with impregnable fortifications, erected in good part by slave labor, is too obvious to need enforcement. It was the policy of all who wished to save the Union by surrendering at discretion to the Rebels, bidding them do what they pleased with the Constitution, the Government, the territories, so that they would but consent to endure us as fellow-countrymen.

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II. The flagrant disobedience and defection of Gen. Patterson," unaccountable on any hypothesis consist

cion' and 'invasion,' is no secret. How eagerly he jumped upon the finality' platform when nominated for President, in 1852, and ordered a grand salute of one hundred guns in honor of the passage of Mr. Guthrie's Compromise propositions in the "Peace Conference" of 1861, are matters of record. That he sought to have Fort Sumter evacuated, a month later, as a "military necessity," is well known. Two or three weeks thereafter, on the very morning that the Rebels opened fire on Sumter, The National Intelligencer, of April 12th, contained the following, which was widely understood to have been inspired, if not directly written, by him:

"There is a general and almost universal desire that no coërcive measures should be resorted to, so as to induce actual collision of arms be tween the States that say they have seceded and the Government of the United States, until all peaceful remedies have been exhausted, yet:

"Great confidence is inspired by an exhibition of the actual strength and power of the Government. It gratifies national pride to have the consciousness that the Government is in possession of power, and that, when it is not exer. cised, it may receive the credit of forbearance. There would be an objection that this attribute of power should be directed, at the present moment, to any specific end; even though that end should be the execution of the laws. But nothing can be more evident than that universal satisfaction is felt and security inspired by the knowledge that the power of the Government is ready, at a moment's notice, to be applied and used."

20 Pollard, in his "Southern History," blandly says:

The best service which the army of the Shenandoah could render was to prevent the defeat of that of the Potomac. To be able to do this, it was necessary for Gen. Johnston to defeat Gen. Patterson, or to elude him. The latter course was the more speedy and certain, and was, therefore, adopted. Evading the enemy by the disposition of the advance guard under Col

ent with the possession, on his part, of|oughly acquainted by their confedercourage, common sense, and loyalty."ates, left by Davis, Floyd, etc., in our III. The failure of Gen. Scott to service, with everything that took send forward with Gen. McDowell a place or was meditated" on our side; force adequate to provide against all and so were able to anticipate and contingencies. The fact that 20,000 baffle every movement of our ar Volunteers remained idle and useless, mies." Thus, a military map or plan throughout that eventful Sunday, in of the region directly west of Washand immediately around Washing- ington had been completed for use ton-Scott having obstinately resist at the War Department barely two ed entreaties that they should be dis- days before our advance reached Cenpatched to the front-insisting that terville; but, the movement being McDowell had "men enough"-that rapid, the Rebels left here many arhe needed no cavalry, etc.-of itself ticles in their hasty flight, and, among attests strongly the imbecility and them, a copy of this map, which was lack of purpose that then presided supposed to be unknown to all but a over our military councils.' few of our highest officers. It was so throughout. Washington swarmed

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IV. The Rebels were kept thor

Stuart, our army moved through Ashley's Gap to Piedmont, a station of the Manassas Gap railroad. Hence, the infantry were to be transported by the railway, while the cavalry and artillery were ordered to continue their march. Gen. Johnston reached Manassas about noon on the 20th, preceded by the 7th and 8th Georgia regiments and by Jackson's brigade, consisting of the 2d, 4th, 5th, 27th, and 33d Virginia regiments. He was accompanied by Gen. Bee, with the 4th Alabama, the 2d, and two companies of the 11th Mississippi. The president of the railroad had assured him that the remaining troops should arrive during the day."

Thus, while the Rebels concentrated, from Richmond on the south to Winchester on the

north, all their available strength upon Manassas, and had it in hand before the close of the battle, McDowell had but little more than a third of our corresponding forces wherewith to oppose ithe acting on the offensive. In other words, we fought with 35,000 men, a battle in which we might and should have had 75,000.

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" Mr. Julius Bing, a German by birth but British by naturalization, who was on the battlefield as a spectator, and was there taken prisoner, and conducted next morning to Beauregard's head-quarters, whence he was sent to Richmond, and who seems to have had the faculty of making himself agreeable to either side, stated, after his return, that among the men he met at Beauregard's head-quarters, at the Junction, was Col. Jordan, formerly of our War Department, who boasted that he had received,

Patterson was a Breckinridge Democrat of the extreme pro-Slavery type of that type whose views were expressed by The Pennsylvanian(see page 428). When, on the reception of the tidings of Fort Sumter's surrender, a great popular uprising took place in Philadelphia, as in other cities, and immense crowds paraded the streets, demanding that the flag of the Union should be everywhere displayed, Gen. Patterson's was one of the mansions at which this pub-patch from some well-informed person within lic exaction of an avowal of sympathy with the outraged symbol of our Union was longest and most sturdily resisted.

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"Before the attack at Bull Run, a cipher dis

our lines, giving full details of our movements, including the particulars of the plan of battle, the time at which operations would commence, and the number of our troops."

"A correspondent of The New York Tribune, in his account of the battle, says:

"A remarkable fact to be considered is, that the enemy seemed perfectly acquainted with our plans. The feint of Col. Richardson availed nothing, since the Rebel force had nearly all been withdrawn from that position. Our combined attack was thoroughly met, and at the very points where partial surprises had been anticipated."

CAUSES OF OUR DEFEAT-SHORT ENLISTMENTS.

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with traitors, many of them holding | After the mischief was done, Runofficial positions of the gravest re- yon's division was ordered forward sponsibility; and whatever it was from Fairfax-of course, to no purimportant to Beauregard to know he pose. But it should, at least, have speedily ascertained. To cross the been promptly employed to block Potomac, a little below or above our completely with its bayonets the camps, was never difficult; and, once roads leading to Washington, sternly across, trusty messengers knew where arresting the flight of the panicto find fleet horses and sure guides to stricken fugitives, and gathering them take them to the Rebel lines. The up into something which should bear Confederate chiefs knew which among once more the semblance of an army. our officers meant them any harm, and which might be confidently trusted never to take them at disadvantage. They evidently had no more apprehension that Patterson would obstruct or countervail the march of Johnston to Manassas than that Breckinridge or Burnett would do them mortal harm in Congress.

VI. The original call of President Lincoln on the States, for 75,000 militia to serve three months, was a deplorable error. It resulted naturally from that obstinate infatuation which would believe, in defiance of all history and probability, that an aristocratic conspiracy of thirty years' standing, culminating in a rebellion based on an artificial property valued at Four Thousand Millions of Dollars, and wielding the resources of ten or twelve States, having nearly ten millions of people, was to be put down in sixty or ninety days by some process equivalent to reading the Riot Act to an excited mob, and sending a squad of police to disperse it. Hence, the many prisoners of war taken with arms in their hands, in West Virginia and Missouri, had, up to this time, been quite commonly permitted to go at large on taking an oath" of fidelity to the Constitution

V. The fall, very early in the action, of Gen. David Hunter," commanding the 2d or leading division, was most untimely and unfortunate. He was so seriously wounded that he was necessarily borne from the field. Gen. Heintzelman," commanding the 3d division, was also wounded; not as severely, but so as to disable him. Gen. McDowell either had control of Runyon's division, guarding his line of communication, or he had not. If he had, he should have ordered the bulk of it to advance that morning on Centerville, so as to have had it well in hand to precipitate on the foe-a process which, in their view, was at the decisive moment; or, if he was so hampered by Scott that he was not at liberty to do this, he should have refused to attack, and resigned the command of the army, rather than fight a battle so fettered.

"Colonel of the 3d cavalry in the regular ser

vice.

Colonel in the regular service.

"For the first year of the war, no regular

about as significant and imposing as taking a glass of cider. The Government had only to call for any number of men it required, to serve during the pleasure of Congress, or till the overthrow of the Rebellion, and

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they could have been had at once. Regiments were pressed upon it from all sides; and the hotels of Washington were crowded by keen competitors for the coveted privilege of raising more batteries and fresh battalions. None asked for shorter terms to serve, or would have then hesitated to enlist for the war. It was entirely proper to call out the organized and uniformed militia as minutemen to defend Washington and protect the public property until volunteers could be raised; but no single regiment should have been organized or enlisted, during that springtide of National enthusiasm, for any term short of the duration of the war.

VII. It is impossible not to perceive that the Rebel troops were better handled, during the conflict, than

ours.

Gen. McDowell, who does not appear to have actively participated in any former battle but that of Buena Vista, where he served as Aid to Gen. Wool, seems to have had very little control over the movements of his forces after the beginning of the conflict. Gov. Sprague, who fought through the day as brigadier with the 2d Rhode Island, whose Colonel, Slocum, and Major, Ballou, were both left dead on the battle-field, observed to one who asked him, near the close of the fight, what were his orders, that he had been fighting all day without any. In short, our army was projected like a bolt, not wielded like a sword.

VIII. Although our army, before fighting on that disastrous day, was largely composed of the bravest and truest patriots in the Union, it contained, also, much indifferent material. Many, in the general stagnation and dearth of employment, had volunteered under a firm conviction that

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there would be no serious fighting; that the Rebels were not in earnest; that there would be a promenade, a frolic, and, ultimately, a compromise, which would send every one home, unharmed and exultant, to receive from admiring, cheering thousands the guerdon of his valor. Hence, some regiments were very badly officered, and others gave way and scattered, or fled, just when they were most needed.

IX. Col. D. J. Miles, a Marylander, commanding the 5th (reserve) division, was drunk throughout the action, and playing the buffoon; riding about to attract observation, with two hats on his head, one within the other. As, however, he was pretty certainly a traitor, and was not ordered to advance, it is hardly probable that his drunkenness did any serious damage, save as it disgusted and disheartened those whose lives were in his hands.

No one who did not share in the sad experience will be able to realize the consternation which the news of this discomfiture-grossly exaggerated-diffused over the loyal portion of our country. Only the tidings which had reached Washington up to 4 o'clock-all presaging certain and decisive victory-were permitted to go north by telegraph that day and evening; so that, on Monday morning, when the crowd of fugitives from our grand army was pouring into Washington, a heedless, harmless, worthless mob, the loyal States were exulting over accounts of a decisive triumph. But a few hours brought different advices; and these were as much worse than the truth as the former had been better: our army had been utterly destroyed-cut to

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pieces, with a loss of twenty-five to thirty thousand men, beside all its artillery and munitions, and Washington lay at the mercy of the enemy, who were soon to advance to the capture and sack of our great commercial cities. Never before had so black a day as that black Monday lowered upon the loyal hearts of the North; and the leaden, weeping skies reflected and hightened, while they seemed to sympathize with, the general gloom. It would have been easy, with ordinary effort and care, to have gathered and remanded to their camps or forts around Alexandria or Arlington, all the wretched stragglers to whom fear had lent wings, and who, throwing away their arms and equipments, and abandoning all semblance of military order or discipline, had rushed to the capital to hide therein their shame behind a cloud of exaggerations and falsehoods. The still effective batteries, the solid battalions, that were then wending their way slowly back to their old encampments along the south bank of the Potomac, depressed but unshaken, dauntless and utterly unassailed, were unseen and unheard from; while the panic-stricken racers filled and distended the general ear

* Gen. McDowell, in his official report, in giving his reasons for fighting as and when he did, says:

"I could not, as I have said more early, push on faster, nor could I delay. A large and the best part of my forces were three months' volunteers, whose term of service was about to expire, but who were sent forward as having long enough to serve for the purpose of the expedition. On the eve of the battle, the 4th Pennsylvania regiment of volunteers, and the battery of volunteer artillery of the New York 8th militia, whose term of service expired, insisted on their discharge. I wrote to the regiment, expressing a request for them to remain a short time; and the Hon. Secretary of War, who was at the time on the ground, tried to induce the battery to remain at least five days. But in vain. They insisted on their discharge that

| with their tales of impregnable intrenchments and masked batteries, of regiments slaughtered, brigades utterly cut to pieces, etc., making out their miserable selves to be about all that was left of the army. That these men were allowed thus to straggle into Washington, instead of being peremptorily stopped at the bridges, and sent back to the encampments of their several regiments, is only to be accounted for on the hypothesis that the reason of our military magnates had been temporarily dethroned, so as to divest them of all moral responsibility.

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The consequences of this defeat were sufficiently serious. Our 75,000 three months' men, whose term of enlistment, for the most part, expired within the three weeks following the battle, generally made haste to quit the service and seek their several firesides at the earliest possible moment. Our armies were thus depleted with a rapidity rarely equaled; and the Government, which, throughout the preceding month, had been defending itself as best it could against importunities and entreaties to be allowed to furnish a regiment here or a bat

night. It was granted: and, the next morning, when the army moved forward into battle, these troops moved to the rear to the sound of the enemy's

cannon.

"In the next few days, day by day, I should have lost ten thousand of the best armed, drilled, officered, and disciplined troops in the army. In other words, every day, which added to the strength of the enemy, made us weaker."

It should here be added, that a member of the New York battery aforesaid, who was most earnest and active in opposing Gen. McDowell's request, and insisting on an immediate discharge, was, at the ensuing election, in full view of all the facts, chosen Sheriff of the city of NewYork-probably the most lucrative office filled by popular election in the country.

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