Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 Part 14

This battle of Fair Oaks is another evidence of the transcendent incapacity of the chief of the staff of the army of the Potomac, and of Gen. McClellan's veracity. In a subsequent bulletin the general confesses that he was misinformed concerning the conduct of Gen. Casey's division.

In any other army in the world, a chief of the staff who would a.s.sign to a division a post so advanced, so isolated, so cut off from the rest of the army, as was Gen. Casey's position,-such a chief of the staff would be at once dismissed. Here, oh here, n.o.body is hurt, n.o.body is to be hurt-only the bleeding people.

As to the conduct of the soldiers, they fought well; thorough veterans scarcely could have behaved better. McClellan turns out worse even than I expected.

The President's campaign against Jackson-very unsuccessful. Fremont came not up to the mark; disobeyed orders. No excuse whatever for such disobedience.

One is at a loss which is to be more admired, the ignorance or the impudence of such opinion-confusing and opinion-poisoning sheets as the New York Times, the World, the Herald, etc. They sing hosanna for McClellan's victories. In advance they praise the to-be-fought battles on selected fields of battle, and after the plans have been matured for weeks, nay for months.

A plan of a whole campaign, a general survey of it, may be prepared and matured long before the campaign begins. But to mature for weeks a plan of a battle! All the genuine great captains seldom had the selection of a field of battle, as they rapidly moved in search of or to meet their enemies, and fought them where they found them. For the same reason, they scarcely had more than forty-eight hours to mature their plans. Such is the history and the character of nine-tenths of the great battles fought in the world.

When Napoleon overthrew Prussia and Austria, he beforehand prepared those campaigns; but neither Jena, Eylau, Friedland, Austerlitz or Wagram were the fields of battle of his special choice. But Napoleon moved his armies as did all the great captains before him, and as must do all great captains after him. Only American great captains sit down in the mud and dig.

At times in the West, Pope, Mitch.e.l.l, Nelson, Grant moved their forces, and beat the enemy. I am sure that these brave generals and the braves of the army of the Potomac most certainly are early risers. A certain Napoleon never is visible before nine o'clock in the morning. So I hear from a French officer who is not in the service, but follows the movements of the Potomac army.

In McClellan's army Heintzelman, Hooker, Kearney, Sumner, and many others, would move quick, would fight and beat; but a leaden weight presses, and solders them to the mud. I must write an article to the press concerning the rapidity of movements,-this golden rule for any conduct of a war.

Since he was in the field, McNapoleon neither planned nor a.s.sisted in person in any encounter. When are his great plans to burst out?

In one of his recently published dispatches, Mr. Seward makes an awful mistake in trying to establish the difference between a revolution and a civil war, as to their respective relations to foreign interference and support. A little knowledge of history, and a less presumption, would have spared to him such an exposure. A revolution in a nation can be effected, and generally is effected, without a foreign intervention, and without even an appeal to it. Most of the civil wars look to foreign help. So teaches history, whatever may be Mr. Seward's contrary generalizations.

Mr. Seward is unrelenting in his efforts to build up the Union-saving slavery party, and is sure, as he says, to be able to manage the Republicans, in and out of Congress. We shall see.

Senator Sumner very well discusses the tax-bill, and again shows the practical side of his intellect. Sumner proves that a laborious intellect can grasp and master the most complicated matters. If Sumner could only have more experience of men and things, he would not be so Germanly-nave.

Mr. Seward triumphantly publishes the Turkish hatti, by which pirates are excluded from the Ottoman ports. Oh, Jemine! to be patronized by the Turks! Misfortune brings one with strange bedfellows.

On the occasion of the organization of slaves at Beaufort, Mr. Lincoln exclaimed, "Slavery is a big job, and will smother us!" It will, if dealt with in your way, Mr. President.

McClellan sends for mortars and hundred-pounders; these monsters are to fight, but not he. Well, even so, if possible.

The Southern leaders send to Europe officers of artillery to buy arms and ammunition, and are well served. Our good administration sends speculators, railroad engineers, agents of sewing machines, and the arms bought by them kill our own soldiers, and not the enemies.

English papers taunt the Americans that in one hundred years the country must become a monarchy. The Americans have now a foretaste of some among the features of monarchy, among others of favoritism. The Pompadours and the Dubarrys could not have sustained a McClellan at the cost of so many lives and so many millions. Then the dabbling in war, and other etc.'s, performed in the most approved Louis XIV.'s or Nicolean style.

Worse than the rebels, and by far more abject and degraded, are the defenders of slavery, of treason, and of rebellion in the Congress, in the press, and in the public opinion. No gallows high enough for them.

McClellan crowds the marshes with heavy artillery, and may easily lose them at the smallest disaster. His army is overburdened with artillery in a country where the moving of guns must be exceedingly difficult, nay, often impossible. And then the difficulty of having such a large number of men drilled for the service of guns. Scarcely any army in Europe possesses artillerists in such numbers as are now required here. Few guns well served make more execution than large numbers of them fired at random.

Instead of concentrating his army and attacking at once the rebels in Richmond, McClellan extends his army over nearly sixty miles! To keep such an extensive line more than 300,000 would be required. Oh, heavens! this man is more ignorant of warfare than his worst enemies have suspected him.

It is reported that at Corinth the rebels had not only wooden guns, but cotton manikins as sentries. G.o.d grant it may not be true, as it would make the slow, pedantic Halleck even below McClellan.

The future historian will be amazed, bewildered, nay, he may lose his senses, discovering the heaps of confusion and of ignorance which caused the disasters of Banks, the escape of Jackson, etc., etc.

It is impossible to resist the admiration inspired by the skill, the daring, the fertility of intellectual resources displayed by the rebels; all this is so thoroughly contrasted by what is done by our legal chiefs.

Pity that such manhood is shown in the defence of the most infamous cause ever known in the history of the world. To conquer an independence with the sole object to procreate, to breed, to traffic in, and to whip slaves!

The navy is glorious everywhere, and not fussy. The people can never sufficiently remunerate the navy, if patriotic services are to be remunerated. The same would be with the army but for the Napoleons!

The published correspondence between the rebels Rust and Hunter fully justifies my confidence in Louis Napoleon's sound judgment. That publication clearly establishes how the press here is wholly unable to conceive or to comprehend the policy of the great European nations. The press heaps outrages and nurses suspicions against Napoleon. The Sandfords and others knowingly stir up suspicions to make believe that their smartness averts the evil. Poor chaps! When great interests are at stake, neither their fuss, nor any dispatch, however elaborate, can exercise a shadow of influence.

It seems that a Babylonian confusion prevails in the movements, in the distribution, and in the combination of the various parts of the army under McClellan. I should wonder if it were otherwise, with such a general and supported by such a chief of the staff.

Brave old Gideon Welles (Neptune) instructing his sailors to fight, and not to calculate, and "not to deliver anybody against his personal wish."

These imbecile reporters and letter-writers for the press, and other sensationists, make me enraged with their sneers at the poverty of the rebels. If so, the more heroism. They forget the "beggars" of the Dutch insurrection against Philip II.

The cat is out, and I am sorry for it. The world is informed that the revolution is finished, and now the civil war begins. Oh generalizer! oh philosopher of history! oh prophet as to the speedy end of the civil war! Oh stop, oh stop! Not by digging will your pet McClellan bring the war to a speedy close.

I am often enraged against myself not to be able to admire Mr. Seward, and to be obliged to judge his whole policy in such, perhaps too severe, a manner. What can I do, what can I do? No one, not even Gen. Scott and Mr. Lincoln, since January, 1861, has exercised an influence equal to Mr. Seward's on the affairs of the country, and amicus Plato, etc., sed magis amica veritas.

Mr. Seward believes that July 4th will be celebrated by us in Richmond. He and McClellan spread this hope; Doolittle believes it. We could be in Richmond any day under any other general, not a Napoleon; we may never be there if led on by McClellan, inspired by Mr. Seward's policy.

The French amateur in McClellan's army is disgusted with McNapoleon, and speaks with contempt of the reckless waste of men, of material, etc. He calls it cruel, brainless, and uses a great many other exclamations.

The healthful activity of Stanton, his broad and clear perception of almost all exigencies of these critical times, are continually baffled and neutralized by the allied McClellan, Blair, Seward, New York Times and New York Herald. Such an alliance can easily confuse even the strongest brains.

The colonization again on the tapis, and all the wonted display of ignorance, stupidity, ill-will, and phariseeism towards genuine liberty.

Seward gave up his Yucatan scheme. Chiriqui has the lead. And finally, some foreign diplomats try to make conspicuous their little royalties. So Denmark tries to cultivate the barren rocks of St. Thomas with the poor captives. It will be a new kind of apprentices.h.i.+p under cruel masters. I hear that Mr. Lincoln is caught in the trap, and that a convention ad hoc is soon to be concluded. This time, at least, Mr. Seward's name will remain outside.

I am uneasy, fearing we may commit some spread-eagleism towards France during this present Mexican imbroglio. I will do my utmost to explain to influential senators the truth concerning Louis Napoleon's political conduct towards the North, the absurdity of any hostile demonstration against France, and the dirt const.i.tuting the substratum of the new Mexican treaty.

"French policy may change towards us," say the anti-Napoleons; "Louis Napoleon will unmask his diplomatic batteries," etc., etc.

Well, Louis Napoleon may change when he finds that we are incorrigible imbeciles, and that the great interests, which to defend is his duty, are jeopardized; but not before. As for masked batteries, I considered worse than fools all those who believed in masked batteries at Mana.s.sas; and in the same light I consider all the believers in diplomatic masked batteries. I was not afraid of the one, and am not of the other.

Not one single French vessel has run, or attempted to run, the blockade; not one has left the ports of France, or of the French West Indies, loaded with arms or ammunition for the insurgents. As for the barking of French papers, or of some second or third rate saloons, barkings thus magnified by American letter-writers, I know too much of Paris and of society to take notice of it. I am sure that the whole rebel tross in Paris, male and female, have not yet been admitted into any single saloon of the real good or high society in Paris, and never will be. A thus called highly accomplished and fas.h.i.+onable lady from New Orleans, or from Was.h.i.+ngton, may easily be taken for a country dress-maker, or for a chamber-maid, not fit for first families of the genuine good and high society in Paris, and all over Europe.

Stanton, the true patriot, frets in despair at McClellan's keeping the army in the unhealthiest place of Virginia. Stanton's opponents, the rats, find all right, even the deaths by disease. In the end McClellan is to be all the better for it. Is there no penitentiary for all this mob?

New regiments pour in, the people are sublime in their devotion; only may these regiments not become sacrificed to the Jaggernaut of imbecility.

Whatever may say its revilers, this Congress will have a n.o.ble and pure page in American history. I speak of the majority.

The Congress showed energy, clear and broad comprehension and appreciation of the events and of men. The Congress was ready for every sacrifice, and would have accelerated the crus.h.i.+ng of the rebellion but for the formulas, and for the inadequacy of the majority in the administration. If the Congress had no great leaders, the better for it; it had honest and energetic men, and their leader was their purpose, their pure belief in the justice of their cause and in the people. Such leaders elevate higher any political body than could ever a Clay, a Webster, etc., etc.

The Congress is palsied by the inefficiency of the administration, and but for this, the Congress would have done far more for the salvation of the country. All the best men in Congress support Stanton, and this alone speaks volumes. It is a curse that the administration is so independent of the Congress. Oh, why this Congress possesses not the omnipotence of an English Parliament? Then the Congress would have prevented all the evils. .h.i.therto brought upon the country by the vacillating military and general policy. Step by step this policy brings the country to the verge of an abyss, and it will tax all the energy of the people not to be precipitated in it.

Mr. Lincoln has gone to get inspiration and information from Gen. Scott. Good G.o.d! Can this man never go out from this rotten treadmill? One more advice from the "great ruin," and the country will also be a ruin.

Flatterers, sensation writers, and all this magna clientum caterva extol to the skies Mr. Lincoln's firmness and straightforwardness. The firmness is located, and is to be discovered in various places-in the lips, in the chin, in the jaw, and G.o.d knows where else. I cannot detect any firmness in his actions beyond that of sticking to McClellan,-of whom he has the worst opinion,-and of resisting the emanc.i.p.ation and the arming of Africo-Americans. He has firmness in letting the country be ruined.

McClellan's bulletins const.i.tute the most original and strange collection of style in general, and of military style in particular. Capt. Morin says that the first thing is to teach McClellan how to write military bulletins.

Mr. Seward's crew of politicians is busily at work among congressmen, etc., to prepare a strong party in support of the administration's eventual concessions to slavery, in case Richmond is taken. Ultra Democratic, half secession Senators are sounded.