Part 17 (1/2)
The authorities looked almost hourly for the announcement of two preliminary movements which had been preparing for many days: one, to attack rebel batteries on the Virginia sh.o.r.e of the Potomac; the other to throw bridges--one of pontoons, the second a permanent bridge of ca.n.a.l-boats--across the river at Harper's Ferry, and an advance by Banks's division on Winchester to protect the opening of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad and reestablish transportation to and from the West over that important route.
On the evening of February 27, Secretary Stanton came to the President, and, after locking the door to prevent interruption, opened and read two despatches from McClellan, who had gone personally to superintend the crossing. The first despatch from the general described the fine spirits of the troops, and the splendid throwing of the pontoon bridge by Captain Duane and his three lieutenants, for whom he at once recommended brevets, and the immediate crossing of eighty-five hundred infantry.
This despatch was dated at ten o'clock the previous night. ”The next is not so good,” remarked the Secretary of War. It stated that the lift lock was too small to permit the ca.n.a.l-boats to enter the river, so that it was impossible to construct the permanent bridge. He would therefore be obliged to fall back upon the safe and slow plan of merely covering the reconstruction of the railroad, which would be tedious and make it impossible to seize Winchester.
”What does this mean?” asked the President, in amazement.
”It means,” said the Secretary of War, ”that it is a d.a.m.ned fizzle. It means that he doesn't intend to do anything.”
The President's indignation was intense; and when, a little later, General Marcy, McClellan's father-in-law and chief of staff, came in, Lincoln's criticism of the affair was in sharper language than was his usual habit.
”Why, in the name of common sense,” said he, excitedly, ”couldn't the general have known whether ca.n.a.l-boats would go through that lock before he spent a million dollars getting them there? I am almost despairing at these results. Everything seems to fail. The impression is daily gaining ground that the general does not intend to do anything. By a failure like this we lose all the prestige gained by the capture of Fort Donelson.”
The prediction of the Secretary of War proved correct. That same night, McClellan revoked Hooker's authority to cross the lower Potomac and demolish the rebel batteries about the Occoquan River. It was doubtless this Harper's Ferry incident which finally convinced the President that he could no longer leave McClellan intrusted with the sole and unrestricted exercise of military affairs. Yet that general had shown such decided ability in certain lines of his profession, and had plainly in so large a degree won the confidence of the Army of the Potomac itself, that he did not wish entirely to lose the benefit of his services. He still hoped that, once actively started in the field, he might yet develop valuable qualities of leaders.h.i.+p. He had substantially decided to let him have his own way in his proposed campaign against Richmond by water, and orders to a.s.semble the necessary vessels had been given before the Harper's Ferry failure was known.
Early on the morning of March 8, the President made one more effort to convert McClellan to a direct movement against Mana.s.sas, but without success. On the contrary, the general convened twelve of his division commanders in a council, who voted eight to four for the water route.
This finally decided the question in the President's mind, but he carefully qualified the decision by two additional war orders of his own, written without consultation. President's General War Order No. 2 directed that the Army of the Potomac should be immediately organized into four army corps, to be respectively commanded by McDowell, Sumner, Heintzelman, and Keyes, and a fifth under Banks. It is noteworthy that the first three of these had always earnestly advocated the Mana.s.sas movement. President's General War Order No. 3 directed, in substance: _First_. An immediate effort to capture the Potomac batteries. _Second_.
That until that was accomplished not more than two army corps should be started on the Chesapeake campaign toward Richmond _Third_. That any Chesapeake movement should begin in ten days; and--_Fourth_. That no such movement should be ordered without leaving Was.h.i.+ngton entirely secure.
Even while the President was completing the drafting and copying of these important orders, events were transpiring which once more put a new face upon the proposed campaign against Richmond. During the forenoon of the next day, March 9, a despatch was received from Fortress Monroe, reporting the appearance of the rebel ironclad _Merrimac_, and the havoc she had wrought the previous afternoon--the _c.u.mberland_ sunk, the _Congress_ surrendered and burned, the _Minnesota_ aground and about to be attacked. There was a quick gathering of officials at the Executive Mansion--Secretaries Stanton, Seward, Welles, Generals McClellan, Meigs, Totten, Commodore Smith, and Captain Dahlgren--and a scene of excitement ensued, unequaled by any other in the President's office during the war. Stanton walked up and down like a caged lion, and eager discussion animated cabinet and military officers. Two other despatches soon came, one from the captain of a vessel at Baltimore, who had left Fortress Monroe on the evening of the eighth, and a copy of a telegram to the ”New York Tribune,” giving more details.
President Lincoln was the coolest man in the whole gathering, carefully a.n.a.lyzing the language of the telegrams, to give their somewhat confused statements intelligible coherence. Wild suggestions flew from speaker to speaker about possible danger to be apprehended from the new marine terror--whether she might not be able to go to New York or Philadelphia and levy tribute, to Baltimore or Annapolis to destroy the transports gathered for McClellan's movement, or even to come up the Potomac and burn Was.h.i.+ngton; and all sorts of prudential measures and safeguards were proposed.
In the afternoon, however, apprehension was greatly quieted. That very day a cable was laid across the bay, giving direct telegraphic communication with Fortress Monroe, and Captain Fox, who happened to be on the spot, concisely reported at about 4 P.M. the dramatic sequel--the timely arrival of the _Monitor_, the interesting naval battle between the two ironclads, and that at noon the _Merrimac_ had withdrawn from the conflict, and with her three small consorts steamed back into Elizabeth River.
Scarcely had the excitement over the _Monitor_ and _Merrimac_ news begun to subside, when, on the same afternoon, a new surprise burst upon the military authorities in a report that the whole Confederate army had evacuated its stronghold at Mana.s.sas and the batteries on the Potomac, and had retired southward to a new line behind the Rappahannock. General McClellan hastened across the river, and, finding the news to be correct, issued orders during the night for a general movement of the army next morning to the vacated rebel camps. The march was promptly accomplished, notwithstanding the bad roads, and the troops had the meager satisfaction of hoisting the Union flag over the deserted rebel earthworks.
For two weeks the enemy had been preparing for this retreat; and, beginning their evacuation on the seventh, their whole retrograde movement was completed by March 11, by which date they were secure in their new line of defense, ”prepared for such an emergency--the south bank of the Rappahannock strengthened by field-works, and provided with a depot of food,” writes General Johnston. No further comment is needed to show McClellan's utter incapacity or neglect, than that for full two months he had commanded an army of one hundred and ninety thousand, present for duty, within two days' march of the forty-seven thousand Confederates, present for duty, whom he thus permitted to march away to their new strongholds without a gun fired or even a meditated attack.
General McClellan had not only lost the chance of an easy and brilliant victory near Was.h.i.+ngton, but also the possibility of his favorite plan to move by water to Urbana on the lower Rappahannock, and from there by a land march _via_ West Point toward Richmond. On that route the enemy was now in his way. He therefore, on March 13, hastily called a council of his corps commanders, who decided that under the new conditions it would be best to proceed by water to Fortress Monroe, and from there move up the Peninsula toward Richmond. To this new plan, adopted in the stress of excitement and haste, the President answered through the Secretary of War on the same day:
”_First_. Leave such force at Mana.s.sas Junction as shall make it entirely certain that the enemy shall not repossess himself of that position and line of communication.”
”_Second_. Leave Was.h.i.+ngton entirely secure.”
”_Third_. Move the remainder of the force down the Potomac, choosing a new base at Fort Monroe, or anywhere between here and there; or, at all events, move such remainder of the army at once in pursuit of the enemy by some route.”
Two days before, the President had also announced a step which he had doubtless had in contemplation for many days, if not many weeks, namely, that--
”Major-General McClellan having personally taken the field at the head of the Army of the Potomac, until otherwise ordered, he is relieved from the command of the other military departments, he retaining command of the Department of the Potomac.”
This order of March 11 included also the already mentioned consolidation of the western departments under Halleck; and out of the region lying between Halleck's command and McClellan's command it created the Mountain Department, the command of which he gave to General Fremont, whose reinstatement had been loudly clamored for by many prominent and enthusiastic followers.
As the preparations for a movement by water had been in progress since February 27, there was little delay in starting the Army of the Potomac on its new campaign. The troops began their embarkation on March 17, and by April 5 over one hundred thousand men, with all their material of war, had been transported to Fortress Monroe, where General McClellan himself arrived on the second of the month, and issued orders to begin his march on the fourth.
Unfortunately, right at the outset of this new campaign, General McClellan's incapacity and want of candor once more became sharply evident. In the plan formulated by the four corps commanders, and approved by himself, as well as emphatically repeated by the President's instructions, was the essential requirement that Was.h.i.+ngton should be left entirely secure. Learning that the general had neglected this positive injunction, the President ordered McDowell's corps to remain for the protection of the capital; and when the general complained of this, Mr. Lincoln wrote him on April 9:
”After you left I ascertained that less than twenty thousand unorganized men, without a single field-battery, were all you designed to be left for the defense of Was.h.i.+ngton and Mana.s.sas Junction; and part of this, even, was to go to General Hooker's old position. General Banks's corps, once designed for Mana.s.sas Junction, was divided and tied up on the line of Winchester and Strasburg, and could not leave it without again exposing the upper Potomac and the Baltimore and Ohio railroad. This presented (or would present when McDowell and Sumner should be gone) a great temptation to the enemy to turn back from the Rappahannock and sack Was.h.i.+ngton. My explicit order that Was.h.i.+ngton should, by the judgment of all the commanders of corps, be left entirely secure, had been neglected. It was precisely this that drove me to detain McDowell.