CHAPTER XXVI.
Wherein Captain Galligasken has Something to say about the illustrious Soldier's Views of Strategy, and follows him across the Rapidan into The Wilderness.
The earnest man, now occupying the highest purely military office in the United States, meant business; and on the day after he received his commission, he paid a brief visit to the army of the Potomac, in company with General Meade, then commanding it. The next morning he started for the West, and was at Nashville when the order of the president appointing him to the command of the armies of the United States reached him. In a very brief, simple, and business-like order he assumed the command, announcing that his headquarters would be in the field, and with the army of the Potomac.
General Halleck, "at his own request," was relieved from command as general-in-chief, and assigned to duty in Washington as chief of staff of the army. Sherman was appointed to the military division of the Mississippi,—the position made vacant by the elevation of Grant,—and McPherson was placed in command of the army and the department of the Tennessee, thus stepping into Sherman's place. Halleck was "let down" as gently as possible, the order that promulgated these changes including the president's approbation and thanks for the zealous manner in which the late general-in-chief had performed his duties.
In this programme of appointments, of course, the lieutenant general had been consulted; indeed, so far as the force in the field were concerned, they were his assignments. Sherman and McPherson were placed where they could be felt; they were Grant's most intimate friends, made so by their zeal and devotion to the cause which he loved above every other consideration.
Six days after he had assumed the command of the armies of the nation, Grant arrived in Washington with his wife and his oldest son. He was the central figure in the gigantic drama of the American Rebellion. The eyes of the nation were fixed upon him, not alone of the loyal portion, but the jeers and the taunts of the South indicated that the rebels themselves had an interest in the movements of the hero who had wrested from them the dominion of the western portion of the Confederacy. Friend and foe on the other side of the broad ocean regarded him with almost breathless attention, for now the name of Grant flashed over the wires of another continent. His fame was as broad as the world itself.
Well might the lieutenant general have shrunk from the stupendous task imposed upon him by the acceptance of his lofty position. He had undertaken a duty which none had assumed but to fail—most miserably to fail. The prospect before him would have been appalling to an ordinary mind. Standing on the highest pinnacle of fame as a soldier, as Sherman said, "Your reputation as a general is now far above that of any man living," he stepped into the most difficult position that ever a man filled. He was exposed to all the perils of political influence, to all the darts of envy and malice behind him, as well as to all the combinations of a skilful and desperate foe before him. It required no little moral courage, after the failure of McClellan and Halleck, after the almost uniform disasters which had beset the Eastern armies, to undertake the hazardous task of bringing victory out of the elements around him.
Grant was solemnly in earnest. He was inspired with one great thought—the putting down of the Rebellion. His predecessors had indulged in showy reviews; balls and parties had enlivened the tedium of the waiting hours in the camp; and beauty's flashing eye had gladdened the heart of the soldier. In accordance with the traditions of the army, the ladies waited upon Lieutenant General Grant, and suggested a ball as a fitting festivity in connection with the grand review of the army of the Potomac which was proposed. Gently, but firmly, he objected, and declared that "this thing must be stopped." He was not opposed to reasonable pleasures at suitable times, but he pointed out to them the condition of the country in the throes of a death-struggle with treason, and insisted that it was no time for festivities among the army officers. He spoke of the wounded and the dying in the hospitals, and manifested such a simple and genuine sensibility, that the ladies, who were true at heart, promptly abandoned the project.
The grand review took place; yet it was not a holiday show, but a means of acquainting the general with the material of the army which was now to do the principal work in suppressing the Rebellion. It was a splendid army which marched in column before him, and the heart of the great commander was strengthened by the display, not of gilt and feathers, but of numbers, of muscle, of courage.
Although in the spring of 1864 the Rebellion had been cut in two, the sundered parts, like the fabled reptile, were still vital. The Confederacy had been weakened, but by no means overpowered. Its supplies of food had been greatly reduced, but still it maintained large armies in the field. The South, nominally struggling for what it was pleased to call liberty, was the most absolute despotism on the face of the earth, and every energy and resource of the people, willing or unwilling, was turned into the channel of its defence. "The cradle and the grave were robbed" to recruit its armies.
Terrible reverses had befallen the rebel arms, and perhaps impaired the faith of the Southern people in ultimate success; but their spirit was not broken, and still they howled about the "last ditch." Misfortune, instead of bringing thoughts of submission and peace, brought desperation, a mad and fanatical zeal, like that of a band of pirates who fight tenfold more savagely to escape the halter than to win a prize. Ill success, so far from moderating the fury of the rebel soldiers, transformed them into reckless zealots, more dangerous than ever before in the path of an army of civilized men. This is not a theory deduced from the insane protestations of rebel brawlers and newspaper writers, but from the conduct of rebel soldiers on the battle-field; a truth derived from The Wilderness, Cold Harbor, and Petersburg, not from Jeff. Davis and his co-rebel declaimers.
The experience of three years of war had demonstrated that, man for man, the North fought as well, at least, as the South. If at one time pluck and persistency seemed to predominate at the South, the table would be turned at another time. For every rebel victory there was always more than one offset in national triumphs. While everything worth holding in the West had fallen, Richmond maintained its bold front. The army of the Potomac had been tilting at it from the day it was organized; had repeatedly advanced, and as often been driven back. Thus far the national arms had failed to reach Richmond.
While the rebel capital had been the objective point of the North, the national capital had been the objective point of the South. Whenever a Confederate army, flushed with success in Virginia, crossed the Potomac, it was driven back. Lee in Pennsylvania was even more unlucky than McClellan in Virginia. Chickahominy and Malvern were paralleled by South Mountain and Antietam; Fredericksburg by Gettysburg. Between Richmond and Washington, up to the time of Grant's appointment as general-in-chief, the contest had been a "drawn game." Neither side gained any permanent advantage. When the North rushed down to Richmond, it was driven back, shattered and wasted. When the South swept around Washington, it recoiled and went back, leaving its dead, wounded, and prisoners behind. Up to this time the fighting material of both armies was not only about equal, but in generalship and officers the contending forces were well matched. The loyal nation was tired of this marching back and forth, with nothing but the waste of battle to mark the result, and the coming of Grant was hailed as the beginning of a new era.
General Lee was the ablest soldier in the Southern Confederacy, and its hope in the coming shock of battle rested on him. All the available troops of the South were sent to him, and though he was outnumbered, he had the advantage of position; he had "the inside track," which was worth more to him, in a military point of view, than the disparity in force was to Grant. Lee was not only strongly intrenched in his position at the opening of the campaign, but he had been over the ground between the Rapidan and the James time and again, till he knew every foot of ground and every strategic point. Behind him were the earthworks he had prepared in former campaigns, ready built for use.
This was the man, and this the situation, which Grant had to encounter; and he sounded with a new significance the old cry, "On to Richmond!" He agreed with those who came before him that the rebel capital must be taken, and he intended to take it, not by a series of chess-board movements, retiring when the enemy checkmated him, but by "persistent hammering." He assigned to strategy its real value; but strategy had been tried by the cunningest men in the army, and it had failed. Lee was clear-headed, quick, cool, brave, adroit. He made blunders, but so seldom that it was hardly worth while to wait for one.
Strategy, as I, Bernard Galligasken, understand it, is simply the taking advantage of the enemy's mistakes and weak points, without exposing yourself in a similar manner. Suppose two generals, in command of opposing armies, to be absolutely perfect strategists, and each incapable of making a mistake. With the forces equal in numbers, pluck, and endurance, the first general taking position could hold it, in theory, to the end of time. A reënforcement or a mistake alone can change the conditions, and give the victory to either. If Lee would kindly make a bad blunder, it would be easy to whip him; but he profited by his own blunders as well as by those of his enemy. If Grant would obligingly leave a weak point, Lee could drive him out of Virginia.
Strategy and tactics were splendid qualities in Mexico, where the officers of the two armies had been graduated from different military institutions. There strategy overcame all odds, confounding the Mexicans with its brilliant results. On the battle-fields of Virginia, West Point fought on both sides, and the difference in weight and mobility of brain gained victories.
Grant had solved this problem of strategy out of his own and the experience of the unfortunate generals of the army of the Potomac. He believed in strategy as fully and firmly as any general; but the sad spectacle of the splendid army whose movements he was to direct in the closing campaign, marching back, beaten, but undismayed, from Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and Chickahominy, assured him that strategy alone could not cut the gordian knot of rebel power.
After the fierce battles of Chattanooga, where skill and science had done their perfect work, Grant was smoking his cigar at his headquarters in Nashville, in company with Quartermaster General Meigs and General W.F. Smith, who had greatly distinguished himself in the engineering operations of the campaign just closed. Smith was pacing the room, absorbed in his own thoughts, and lost to everything around him.
"What are you thinking about, Baldy?" asked Meigs, breaking the silence which had continued for some time.
General Smith was so intensely engaged in his meditations, that he did not notice the question, and made no reply.
"Baldy is studying strategy," added Meigs, turning to Grant with a laugh.
"I don't believe in strategy in the popular understanding of the term," said Grant, very seriously, as he removed the cigar from his lips. "I use it to get as close as possible to the enemy with little loss."
"And what then?" asked Meigs.
"Then? 'Up, guards, and at them!'" answered Grant, with more fire than usual.
His practice was an exemplification of his rule; but he believed that, after strategy had done its utmost, there was, in this war of the Rebellion, a deal of terrible fighting to be done. With this view Grant placed himself where he could direct the movements of the army of the Potomac. Long before he assumed his present office, he had studied the problem, and he was now prepared to act vigorously and in earnest. He purged the army of incompetent men, sternly banished all fancy work from its lines, and gathered himself up for the mighty struggle.
Sheridan was called from the West, and placed in command of all his cavalry. Meade, the hero of Gettysburg, was retained in command of the army of the Potomac. Butler was sent to operate on the south side of the James. Sigel commanded the force in the Shenandoah Valley, which was to protect Washington from a rebel force approaching in that direction. More important than all, Sherman, at the head of the combined armies which Grant himself had commanded at Chattanooga, was to move on Atlanta. Grant had harmonized the various divisions of the army, so that they were no longer to pull "as in a balky team," but all together.
Richmond was the objective point of the army of the Potomac, while Atlanta—of vast importance to the rebels as a railroad centre, and for its founderies, machine-shops, military magazines, and storehouses for supplies—was the point to which the army of the Mississippi was directed. Grant had planned both of these campaigns, and he had thoroughly impressed it upon his subordinates that there was to be no giving up when strategy failed, no turning back, and no conducting war on peace principles. It was the rebel armies which constituted the power of the Confederacy, and these were to be destroyed. When they were used up, strategic points would lose their value.
Through the month of April the busy notes of preparation for the strife were heard; men and material were gathered together, and nothing was left undone which could add even its mite to the prospect of success. Though the plan of the campaign was kept a profound secret in the breasts of only a few, so that it might not, as often before, be carried to the rebel leaders, yet the people were not blind to the signs of the times. Great bodies of men, and vast supplies of provision and ammunition, were moved to the front, and it was certain that operations on a grand scale were about to be commenced.
Whatever attention Grant had before attracted,—and certainly he had been the "observed of all observers,"—he was now regarded with the most intense interest, which could not but be attended with a certain painful anxiety. All these preparations had been sounded through the land before during the three years of grievous solicitude. That grand army had been ready to move before, with the petted, the trusted, the victorious general at its head. But almost always the tidings of disaster, or, at least, of turning back, came soon after. Was the solemn tragedy to be repeated again? Were those marshalled hosts once more to be forced back, and another great man to be hurled from his high eminence? The people prayed for Grant, prayed for the army, prayed for success. But they believed in their hero. So modest, so gentle, so simple, he was a man to be trusted, and there was more of hope than of fear in their souls. The general-in-chief, unlike his predecessor, had gone into the field, and the people saw how earnest, how confident he was. He made no parade, sounded no trumpet before him, and they felt that God would bless such a man.
The army of the Potomac was on the north side of the Rapidan, while on the south side was the rebel army. Grant's headquarters were at Culpepper Court House. Just before the order was given to move across the river, the president and the lieutenant general exchanged letters which illustrate Grant's position, while his own exhibits the noble manliness of his nature. I must give both.
Executive Mansion, Washington, April 30, 1864.
"Lieutenant General Grant: Not expecting to see you before the spring campaign opens, I wish to express in this way my entire satisfaction with what you have done up to this time, so far as I understand it. The particulars of your plan I neither know nor seek to know. You are vigilant and self-reliant, and, pleased with this, I wish not to obtrude any restraints or constraints upon you. While I am very anxious that any great disaster or capture of our own men may be avoided, I know that these points are less likely to escape your attention than they would be mine. If there be anything wanting which is within my power to give, do not fail to let me know it. And now, with a brave army and a just cause, may God sustain you.
Yours very truly,
A. Lincoln."
"Headquarters Army of the U.S.,}
Culpepper C.H., Va., May 1, 1864.}
"Mr. President: Your very kind letter of yesterday is just received. The confidence you express for the future, and satisfaction for the past, in my military administration, is acknowledged with pride. It shall be my earnest endeavor that you and the country shall not be disappointed. From my first entry into the volunteer service of the country to the present day, I have never had cause of complaint, and have never expressed or implied a complaint against the administration or the secretary of war for throwing any embarrassment in the way of my vigorously prosecuting what appeared to be my duty. Indeed, since the promotion which placed me in command of all the armies, and in view of the great responsibility and importance of success, I have been astonished at the readiness with which everything asked for has been yielded, without even an explanation being asked. Should my success be less than I desire and expect, the least I can say is, the fault is not with you.
Very truly your obedient servant,
U.S. Grant, Lieutenant General."
This reply, so characteristic of the man, is noble in itself, and sublime in contrast with the views of some other generals. "The fault is not with you." Not thus spoke others even before they had failed.
On the 3d of May, General Meade was ordered to cross the Rapidan, and on the following day the passage was effected without opposition. The army entered that desolate region called The Wilderness, and the soldiers, borrowing speech from the Odyssey, might have exclaimed,—
"We went, Ulysses (such was thy command),
Through the lone thicket and the desert land."