Hill meanwhile had been watching the bluecoats down in the sunken road. He believed they were about to attack him. Such an attack would surely be successful, weak as he was, and the only way he knew to delay it was to attack them first. However, when he called along his line for volunteers, there was no answer until presently one man said he would go if Hill would lead. Quickly taking him up on that, Hill seized a rifle and started forward with a shout, joined by about two hundred others who were persuaded by his example. The attack was brief; in fact, it was repulsed almost as soon as it began; but Hill believed it served its purpose. Here opposite the denuded Confederate center, the Federals stayed where they were for the rest of the day. According to Hill, this was either because he had frightened them into immobility or else it was an outright miracle.
It was neither, unless it was something of both. What it really was was Sumner-and McClellan. Franklin had come up by now, and though he had left one division on Maryland Heights, he still brought more than 8000 soldiers onto the field. One brigade had shared in the fight on the right, and now he wanted to use the other five in an a.s.sault on the gray line beyond the sunken road. But Sumner stopped him. The old man"s corps had lost 5100 men today, more than Hooker"s and Mansfield"s combined; apparently he had seen enough of killing north of the Dunker Church and here in front of b.l.o.o.d.y Lane. The thirty-nine-year-old Franklin tried to argue, but Sumner, who not only outranked him but was also nearly twice his age, kept insisting that the army was on the verge of disintegration and that another repulse would mean catastrophe. Presently a courier arrived from McClellan, bringing a suggestion that the attack be pressed by both commands if possible. Sumner-to whom, except for his long, pointed nose, old age had given the glaring look of a death"s head-turned on him and cried hotly: "Go back, young man, and tell General McClellan I have no command! Tell him my command, Banks" command, and Hooker"s command are all cut up and demoralized. Tell him General Franklin has the only organized command on this part of the field!"
When McClellan received this message he came down off the hill and crossed the creek to see for himself the situation in the center. Sumner and Franklin presented their arguments, and now that he had a close-up view of the carnage, McClellan sided with the senior. He told them both to hold what had been won; then he rode back across the creek. It was now about 2 o"clock, and the second battle, which like the first had lasted about four hours, was over. The third was about to begin.
In a broader sense, it had already been going on for as long as the other two combined. That is, the opponents had been exchanging shots across the lower reaches of the creek since dawn. But, so far, all that had come of this was the maiming of a few hundred soldiers, most of them in blue. Despite McClellan"s repeated orders-including one sent at 9 o"clock, directing that the crossing be effected "at all hazards"-not a man out of the nearly 14,000 enrolled in Burnside"s four divisions had reached the west bank of the Antietam by the time the sun swung past the overhead. "McClellan appears to think I am not trying my best to carry this bridge," the ruff-whiskered general said testily to a staff colonel his friend the army commander sent to prod him. "You are the third or fourth one who has been to me this morning with similar orders."
As he spoke he sat his horse beside a battery on a hilltop, looking down at the narrow, triple-arched stone span below. He watched it with a fascination amounting to downright prescience, as if he knew already that it was to bear his name and be in fact his chief monument, no matter what ornate shafts of marble or bronze a grateful nation might raise elsewhere in his honor. So complete was his absorption by the bridge itself, he apparently never considered testing the depth of the water that flowed sluggishly beneath it. If he had, he would have discovered that the little copper-colored stream, less than fifty feet in width, could have been waded at almost any point without wetting the armpits of the shortest man in his corps. However, except for sending one division downstream in search of a local guide to point out a ford that was rumored to exist in that direction, he remained intent on effecting a dry-shod crossing.
Admittedly this was no easy matter. The road came up from the southeast, paralleling the creek for a couple of hundred yards, and then turned sharply west across the bridge, where it swung north again to curve around the heights on the opposite bank. Just now those heights were occupied by rebels-many of them highly skilled as marksmen, though at that range skill was practically superfluous-which meant that whoever exposed himself along that road, in the shadow of those heights, was likely to catch a faceful of bullets. Nevertheless, this was the only route Burnside could see, and he kept sending men along it, regiment by regiment, intermittently all morning, with predictable results.
Observing from across the way the ease with which this lower threat was being contested, Lee all this time had been stripping his right of troops in order to strengthen his hard-pressed left and center. By noon he was down to an irreducible skeleton force; so that presently, when he learned that Hill had lost the sunken road and was calling in desperation for reinforcements, he had none to send him. Like Hill in this extremity, knowing that he probably could not withstand an a.s.sault, he decided that his only recourse was to deliver one-preferably on the left, which had been free of heavy pressure for two hours. Accordingly, he sent word for Jackson to attack the Federal right, if possible, swinging it back against the river. Stonewall was delighted at the prospect, and set out at once to reconnoiter the ground in that direction. "We"ll drive McClellan into the Potomac," he said fervently. Back at Sharpsburg, meanwhile, Lee was doing what little he could to make this possible. When the captain of a shattered Virginia battery reported with his few surviving men, he instructed him to join Jackson for the proposed diversion. One of the smoke-grimed cannoneers spoke up: "General, are you going to send us in again?" Lee saw then that it was Robert. "Yes, my son," he told him. "You all must do what you can to help drive these people back." The battery left, heading northward; but no such attack was delivered. Reconnoitering, Stonewall found the Union flank securely anch.o.r.ed to the east bank of the river and well protected by ma.s.sed artillery. He had to abandon his hopes for a counterstroke. "It is a great pity," he said regretfully. "We should have driven McClellan into the Potomac."
By the time Lee learned that the proposed attack could not be delivered, that no diversion to relieve the pressure against the sagging center would be made, the urgent need for it had pa.s.sed. Hill"s thin line-along which, in accordance with his instructions now that his feeble two-hundred-man charge had been repulsed, the colorbearers flourished their tattered battle flags, hiding his weakness behind gestures of defiance-went unchallenged by the bluecoats ma.s.sed along the sunken road. But Lee was not allowed even a breathing s.p.a.ce in which to enjoy the relaxation of tension. Catastrophe, it seemed, was still with him; had in fact merely withdrawn in order to loom up elsewhere. Immediately on the heels of the news that the Federal advance had stalled in front of the center, word came from the right that the contingency most feared had come to pa.s.s. Burnside was across the bridge at last.
Robert Toombs was in command there, holding the heights with three slim Georgia regiments against four Federal divisions. Lately, just as previously he had wearied of his cabinet post, he had been feeling disenchanted with the military life. Exasperated, now as then, by the obtuseness of those around him, he had decided to resign his commission, but not before he had distinguished himself in some great battle. "The day after such an event," he wrote his wife, "I will retire if I live through it." Such an event was now at hand, and he had been in his glory all that morning, successfully challenging with 550 men the advance of more than twenty times their number. At 1 o"clock, after seven hours of fitful and ineffectual probing, Burnside at last sent two regiments pounding straight downhill for the bridge, avoiding the suicidal two-hundred-yard gauntlet-run along the creek bank. They got across in a rush, joined presently by others, until the west-bank strength had increased to a full division at that point. Meanwhile the downstream division had finally located the ford and splashed across it, the men scarcely wetting their legs above the knees. About to be swamped from the front and flank, Toombs reported the double crossing and received permission to avoid capture by withdrawing from the heights. He did so in good order, proud of himself and his weary handful of fellow Georgians, whom he put in line along the rearward ridge. There on the outskirts of Sharpsburg with the rest of Longstreet"s troops-not over 2500 in all, so ruthlessly had Lee thinned their ranks in his need for reinforcements on the left and center-they prepared to resist the advance of Burnside"s four divisions.
What came just then, however, was a lull. After forming ranks for a forward push, the commander of the lead blue division found that his men had burnt up most of their ammunition banging away all morning at the snipers on the heights. Informed of this, Burnside decided to replace them with another division instead of taking time to bring up cartridges. This too took time though. It was nearly 3 o"clock before the new division started forward. Off to the left, after crossing the ford and floundering in the bottoms, the other division at last recovered its sense of direction and joined the attack. Few though the rebels seemed to be, they were laying down a ma.s.s of fire out of all proportion to their numbers. A New York soldier, whose regiment was pinned down by what he termed "the hiss of bullets and the hurtle of grapeshot," later recalled that "there burst forth from it the most vehement, terrible swearing I have ever heard." When the order came to rise and charge, he observed another phenomenon: "The mental strain was so great that I saw at that moment the singular effect mentioned, I think, in the life of Goethe on a similar occasion-the whole landscape for an instant turned slightly red."
Across this reddened landscape they came charging, presenting a two-division front that overlapped the Confederate flank and piled up against the center. Down at his headquarters, beyond the town (the lull had been welcome, but he could only use it to rest his men, not to bring up others; he had no others, and would have none until-and if-A. P. Hill arrived from Harpers Ferry) Lee heard the uproar drawing nearer across the eastern hills, and presently the evidences of Federal success were visual as well. The Sharpsburg streets were crowded with fugitives, their demoralization increased by sh.e.l.ls that burst against the walls and roofs of houses, startling flocks of pigeons into bewildered flight, round and round in the smoke. Blue flags began to appear at various points along the ridge above. The men who bore them had advanced almost a mile beyond the bridge; another mile would put them astride the Shepherdstown road, which led west to the only crossing of the Potomac.
Observing a column moving up from the southeast along the ridge line, Lee called to an artillery lieutenant on the way to the front with a section of guns: "What troops are those?" The lieutenant offered him his telescope. "Can"t use it," Lee said, holding up a bandaged hand. The lieutenant trained and focused the telescope. "They are flying the United States flag," he reported. Lee pointed to the right, where another distant column was approaching from the southwest, nearly perpendicular to the first, and repeated the question. The lieutenant swung the gla.s.s in that direction, peered intently, and announced: "They are flying the Virginia and Confederate flags." Lee suppressed his elation, although the words fulfilled his one hope for deliverance from defeat. "It is A. P. Hill from Harpers Ferry," he said calmly.
It was indeed. Receiving Lee"s summons at 6.30 that morning, Little Powell had left one brigade to complete the work at the Ferry, and put the other five on the road within the hour. Seventeen roundabout miles away, the crash and rumble of gunfire spurred him on-particularly when he drew near enough for the sound to be intensified by the clatter of musketry. Forgotten were Stonewall"s march regulations, which called for periodic rest-halts; Hill"s main concern was to get to Sharpsburg fast, however bedraggled, not to get there after sundown with a column that arrived well-closed and too late for a share in the fighting. Jacket off because of the heat, he rode in his bright red battle shirt alongside the panting troops, prodding laggards with the point of his saber. Beyond this, he had no dealings with stragglers, but left them winded by the roadside, depending on them to catch up in time if they could. Not many could, apparently; for he began the march with about 5000 men, and ended it with barely 3000. But with these, as was his custom, he struck hard.
In his path, here on the Federal left, was an outsized Connecticut regiment, 900-strong. That was a good many more soldiers than Hill had in any one of his brigades, but they were gra.s.s green, three weeks in service, and already considerably shaken by what they had seen of their first battle. To add to their confusion, a large proportion of the rebels bearing down on them wore new blue uniforms captured at Harpers Ferry. The first thing they received by way of positive identification was a close-up volley that dropped about four hundred of them and broke and scattered the rest. A Rhode Island outfit, coming up just then, was likewise confused, as were two Ohio regiments which arrived to find bluecoats fleeing from bluecoats and held their fire until they too were knocked sprawling. With that, the Union left gave way in a backward surge, pursued by Hill, whose men came after it, screaming their rebel yell. The panic spread northward to the outskirts of Sharpsburg, where several blue companies, meeting little resistance, had already entered the eastern streets of the town; Burnside"s whole line came unpinned, and presently the retreat was general. Toombs" Georgians, along with the rest of Longstreet"s men, took up the pursuit and chased the Northerners back onto the heights they had spent the morning trying to seize.
And now in the sunset, here on the right, as previously on the left and along the center, the conflict ended; except that this time it was for good. Twilight came down and the landscape was dotted with burning haystacks, set afire by bursting sh.e.l.ls. For a time the cries of wounded men of both armies came from these; they had crawled up into the hay for shelter, but now, bled too weak to crawl back out again, were roasted. Lee"s line was intact along the Sharpsburg ridge. McClellan had failed to break it; or, breaking it, had failed in all three cases, left and center and right, to supply the extra push that would keep it broken.
There were those in the Federal ranks who had been urging him to do just that all afternoon. Nor did he lack the means. The greater part of four divisions-two under Franklin, two under Porter: no less than 20,000 men, a solid fourth of his effective force-had stood idle while the battle raged through climax after climax, each of which offered McClellan the chance to wreck his adversary. But he could not dismiss the notion that somewhere behind that opposite ridge, or off beyond the flanks, Lee was ma.s.sing enormous reserves for a knockout blow. The very thinness of the gray line, which was advanced as an argument for a.s.saulting it, seemed to him to prove that the balance of those more than 100,000 rebels were being withheld for some such purpose, and when it came he wanted to have something with which to meet it.
"At this critical juncture," he afterwards reported, "I should have had a narrow view of the condition of the country had I been willing to hazard another battle with less than an absolute a.s.surance of success. At that moment-Virginia lost, Washington menaced, Maryland invaded-the national cause could afford no risks of defeat. Lee"s army might then have marched as it pleased on Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, or New York...and nowhere east of the Alleghenies was there another organized force able to arrest its march."
It never occurred to him, apparently, to look at the reverse of the coin: to consider that Lee"s army, like his own, was the only organized force that blocked the path to its capital. But it did occur to Sykes, who appealed to him, late in the day and in the presence of Porter, to be allowed to strike at the rebel center with his regulars. Part of one of his brigades had been up close to the western ridge, serving as a link between Sumner"s left and Burnside"s right, and its officers had seen that D. H. Hill was about to buckle-indeed, had buckled already, if someone would only take advantage of the fact. Let him launch an attack against that point, Sykes said, supported by Porter"s other division and one from Franklin, and he would cut Lee"s line in two, thereby exposing the severed halves to destruction.
At first McClellan seemed about to approve; but in the moment of hesitation he looked at Porter, and Porter slowly shook his head. "Remember, General," one witness later quoted him as saying, "I command the last reserve of the last army of the republic." That cinched it. The attack was not made. Porter and Franklin, who between them lost only 548 of today"s more than 12,000 casualties, remained in reserve.
As night came down, the two armies disengaged, and when the torches of the haystack pyres went out, darkness filled the valley of the Antietam, broken only by the lanterns of the medics combing the woods and cornfields for the injured who were near enough to be brought within the lines. Lee remained at his headquarters, west of Sharpsburg, greeting his generals as they rode up. Jackson, the two Hills, McLaws and Walker, Hood and Early, all had heavy losses to report. The gray commander spoke with each, but he seemed unshaken by the fact that more than a fourth of his army lay dead or wounded on the field. Nor did he mention the word that was in all their minds: retreat. "Where is Longstreet?" he asked, after he had talked with all the others. Presently Old Pete arrived, still limping in carpet slippers and still chewing on the unlighted cigar; he had stopped in the town to help some ladies whose house was on fire. Lee stepped forward to greet him. "Ah," he said, placing his crippled hands on the burly Georgian"s shoulders. "Here is Longstreet. Here is my old warhorse."
This last report was as gloomy as the others. The army was bled white and near exhaustion, with all its divisions on the firing line. Aside from a trickle of stragglers coming in, Lee"s only reserve, and in fact the only reserve in all northern Virginia, was the one brigade A. P. Hill had left to complete the salvage work at Harpers Ferry. All the generals here informally a.s.sembled were agreed that another day like today would drive the surviving remnant headlong into the Potomac. All, that is, but Lee. When he had heard his lieutenants out, he told them to return to their men, make such tactical readjustments as would strengthen their defenses, and see that rations were cooked and distributed along the present line of battle. If McClellan wanted another fight, he would give him one tomorrow.
McClellan, it seemed, wanted no such thing. Despite an early morning telegram to Halleck: "The battle will probably be renewed today. Send all the troops you can by the most expeditious route," and a letter in which he told his wife: "[Yesterday"s battle] was a success, but whether a decided victory depends on what occurs today," he soon took stock and found the portents far from favorable. Reno and Mansfield were dead, along with eight other general officers; Hooker was out of action, wounded; Sumner was despondent; Burnside was even doubtful whether his troops could hold the little they had gained the day before. After what he called "a careful and anxious survey of the condition of my command, and my knowledge of the enemy"s force and position," McClellan decided to wait for reinforcements, including two divisions on the way from Maryland Heights and Frederick. As a result, the armies lay face to face all day, like sated lions, and between them, there on the slopes of Sharpsburg ridge and in the valley of the Antietam, the dead began to fester in the heat and the cries of the wounded faded to a mewling.
There were a great many of both, the effluvium of this bloodiest day of the war. Nearly 11,000 Confederates and more than 12,000 Federals had fallen along that ridge and in that valley, including a total on both sides of about 5000 dead. Losses at South Mountain raised these doleful numbers to 13,609 and 14,756 respectively, the latter being increased to 27,276 by the surrender of the Harpers Ferry garrison. Lee had suffered only half as many casualties as he had inflicted in the course of the campaign; but even this was more than he could afford. "Where is your division?" someone asked Hood at the close of the battle, and Hood replied, "Dead on the field." After entering the fight with 854 men, the Texas brigade came out with less than three hundred, and these figures were approximated in other veteran units, particularly in Jackson"s command. The troops Lee lost were the best he had-the best he could ever hope to have in the long war that lay ahead, now that his try for an early ending by invasion had been turned back.
Orders for the retirement were issued that afternoon, and at nightfall, in accordance with those orders, fires were kindled along the ridge to curtain the retreat across the Potomac. Longstreet went first, forming in support of Pendleton"s guns on the opposite bank. Two brigades of cavalry followed, then moved upstream, prepared to recross and harry the enemy flank in case the withdrawal was contested. Walker"s division was the last to cross. At sunup, as Walker followed the tail of his column into the waist-deep water of the ford, he saw Lee sitting his gray horse in midstream. Apparently he had been there all night. When Walker reported all of his troops safely across the river except some wagonloads of wounded and a battery of artillery, which were close at hand, Lee showed for the first time the strain he had been under. "Thank G.o.d," he said.
That was in fact the general reaction, though in most cases it was expressed with considerably less reverence. Crossing northward two weeks ago, the bands had played "My Maryland" and the men had gaily swelled the chorus; but now, as one of the round-trip marchers remarked, "all was quiet on that point. Occasionally some fellow would strike up that tune, and you would then hear the echo, "d.a.m.n my Maryland."" Another recorded his belief that "the confounded Yankees" could shoot straighter on their home ground. Nor was this aversion restricted to the ranks. "I have heard but one feeling expressed about [Maryland]," one brigadier informed his wife, "and that is a regret at our having gone there." A youthful major on Lee"s own staff wrote home to his sister: "Don"t let any of your friends sing "My Maryland"-not "My Western Maryland" anyhow."
Presently there was apparent cause for greater regret than ever. Leaving Pendleton with forty-four guns and two slim brigades of infantry to discourage pursuit by holding the Shepherdstown ford, Lee moved the rest of his army into bivouac on the hills back from the river, then lay down under an apple tree to get some badly needed sleep himself. Not long after midnight he woke to find Pendleton bending over him. The former Episcopal rector was shaken and bewildered, and as he spoke Lee found out why. McClellan had brought up his heavy guns for counterbattery work, Pendleton explained, and then at the height of the bombardment had suddenly thrown Porter"s corps across the Potomac, driving off the six hundred rear-guard infantry and the startled cannoneers. All the guns of the Confederate reserve artillery had been captured.
"All?" Lee said, brought upright. Lee said, brought upright.
"Yes, General, I fear all."
Unwilling to attempt a counterattack in the dark with his weary troops, Lee decided to wait for daylight. But when Jackson heard the news he was too upset to wait for anything. He had A. P. Hill"s men turn out at once and put them in motion for the ford, arriving soon after sunrise to find that things were by no means as bad as the artillery chief had reported. A subordinate had brought off all but four of the guns, and only a portion of Porter"s two divisions had crossed the river. "With the blessing of Providence," Stonewall informed Lee, "they will soon be driven back." They were. Hill launched another of his savage attacks: one of those in which, as he reported, "each man felt that the fate of the army was centered in himself." Something over 250 Federals were shot or drowned in their rush to regain the Maryland bank, and when it was over, all who remained in Virginia were captives. Hill drew back to rejoin the main body, unpursued.
What at first had been taken for a disaster turned out in the end to be a tonic-a sort of upbeat coda, after the crash and thunder of what had gone before. The army moved on to Martinsburg, where by September 22 enough stragglers had returned to bring its infantry strength to 36,418. A week later, with all ten divisions-or at any rate what was left of them-resting between Mill Creek and Lick River, Lee wrote Davis: "History records but few examples of a greater amount of labor and fighting than has been done by this army during the present campaign.... There is nothing to report, but I desire to keep you always advised of the condition of the army, its proceedings, and prospects."
He had occupied his present position near Winchester, he told the President, "in order to be prepared for any flank movement the enemy might attempt." It soon developed, however, that he had no grounds for worry on that score. McClellan was not contemplating a flank movement. In point of fact, despite renewed pressure from Washington, McClellan was not contemplating any immediate movement at all. After completing the grisly and unaccustomed work of cleaning up the battlefield, he reoccupied Harpers Ferry with Sumner"s corps and spread the others along the north bank of the Potomac, guarding the fords. The main problem just now, as he saw it, was the old one he had always been so good at: reorganizing, drilling, and resupplying his 93,149 effectives. Lee"s strength-precisely tabulated at 97,445-forbade an advance, even if the Federal army had been in any condition to make one, which McClellan did not believe to be the case.
As he went about the familiar task of preparing his men for what lay ahead, he looked back with increasing pride on what had gone before. Originally he had been guarded in his p.r.o.nouncements as to the outcome of the battle on the 17th. "The general result was in our favor," he wrote his wife next morning; "that is to say, we gained a great deal of ground and held it." But now that he had had time to consider the overall picture, he said, "I feel that I have done all that can be asked in twice saving the country." He felt, too, "that this last short campaign is a sufficient legacy for our child, so far as honor is concerned." And he added, rather wistfully: "Those in whose judgment I rely tell me that I fought the battle splendidly and that it is a masterpiece of art."
3 For Lincoln it was something less, and also something more. The battle had been fought on a Wednesday. At noon Monday, September 22, he a.s.sembled at the White House all the members of his cabinet, and after reading them an excerpt from a collection of humorous sketches by Artemus Ward, got down to the business at hand. "When the rebel army was at Frederick," he told them, "I determined, as soon as it should be driven out of Maryland, to issue a proclamation of emanc.i.p.ation, such as I thought most likely to be useful. I said nothing to anyone; but I made the promise to myself and"-hesitating slightly-"to my Maker. The rebel army is now driven out, and I am going to fulfill that promise." And with that he began to read from a ma.n.u.script which was the second draft of the doc.u.ment he had laid aside, two months ago today, on Seward"s advice that to have issued it then would have been to give it the sound of "our last shriek shriek on the retreat" down the Peninsula. Second Bull Run had been even worse, particularly from this point of view. But now had come Antietam, and though it was scarcely a "masterpiece," or even a clear-cut victory, Lincoln thought it would serve as the occasion for his purpose. on the retreat" down the Peninsula. Second Bull Run had been even worse, particularly from this point of view. But now had come Antietam, and though it was scarcely a "masterpiece," or even a clear-cut victory, Lincoln thought it would serve as the occasion for his purpose.
It was highly characteristic, and even fitting, that he opened this solemn conclave with a reading of the slapstick monologue, "High Handed Outrage at Utica," not only because he himself enjoyed it, along with most of his ministers-all except Stanton, who sat glumly through the dialect performance, and Chase, who maintained his reputation for never laughing at anything at all-but also because it was in line with the delaying tactics and the att.i.tude he had adopted toward the question during these past two months. With the first draft of the proclamation tucked away in his desk, only awaiting a favorable turn of military events to launch it upon an unsuspecting world, he had seemed to talk against such a measure to the very people who came urging its promulgation. Presumably he did this in order to judge their reaction, as well as to prevent a diminution of the thunderclap effect which he foresaw. At any rate, he had not even hesitated to use sarcasm, particularly against the most earnest of these callers.
One day, for example, a Quaker woman came to request an audience, and Lincoln said curtly: "I will hear the Friend." She told him she had been sent by the Lord to inform him that he was the minister appointed to do the work of abolishing slavery. Then she fell silent. "Has the Friend finished?" Lincoln asked. She said she had, and he replied: "I have neither the time nor disposition to enter into discussion with the Friend, and end this occasion by suggesting for her consideration the question whether, if it be true that the Lord has appointed me to do the work she has indicated, it is not probable he would have communicated knowledge of the fact to me as well as to her?"
Similarly, on the day before the Battle of South Mountain, when a delegation of Chicago ministers called to urge presidential action on the matter, he inquired: "What good would a proclamation of emanc.i.p.ation from me do, especially as we are now situated? I do not want to issue a doc.u.ment that the whole world will see must necessarily be inoperative, like the Pope"s bull against the comet. Would my word free the slaves, when I cannot even enforce the Const.i.tution in the rebel states? Is there a single court or magistrate or individual that would be influenced by it there?... I will mention another thing, though it meet only your scorn and contempt. There are fifty thousand bayonets in the Union armies from the border slave states. It would be a serious matter if, in consequence of a proclamation such as you desire, they should go over to the rebels." In parting, however, he dropped a hint. "Do not misunderstand me because I have mentioned these objections. They indicate the difficulties that have thus far prevented action in some such way as you desire. I have not decided against a proclamation of liberty to the slaves, but hold the matter under advis.e.m.e.nt.... I can a.s.sure you that the subject is on my mind, by day and night, more than any other. Whatever shall appear to be G.o.d"s will, I will do."
Sadly the Illinois ministers filed out; but one, encouraged by the closing words, remained behind to register a plea in that direction. "What you have said to us, Mr President, compels me to say to you in reply, that it is a message to you from our Divine Master, through me, commanding you, sir, to open the doors of bondage that the slaves may go free." Lincoln gave him a long look, not unlike the one he had given the Quaker woman. "That may be, sir," he admitted, "for I have studied this question by night and by day, for weeks and for months. But if it is, as you say, a message from your Divine Master, is it not odd that the only channel he could send it by was the roundabout route by way of that awful wicked city of Chicago?"
These remarks were in any case supplementary to those he had made already in reply to Horace Greeley, who published in the August 20 Tribune Tribune an open letter to the President, t.i.tled "The Prayer of Twenty Millions," in which he charged at some length that Lincoln had been "strangely and disastrously remiss in the discharge of your official and imperative duty." The first such duty, as Greeley saw it, was to announce to the army, the nation, and the world that this war was primarily a struggle to put an end to slavery. Lincoln, having heard that the New Yorker was preparing to attack him, had asked a mutual friend, "What is he wrathy about? Why does he not come down here and have a talk with me?" The friend replied that Greeley had said he would not allow the President of the United States to act as advisory editor of the an open letter to the President, t.i.tled "The Prayer of Twenty Millions," in which he charged at some length that Lincoln had been "strangely and disastrously remiss in the discharge of your official and imperative duty." The first such duty, as Greeley saw it, was to announce to the army, the nation, and the world that this war was primarily a struggle to put an end to slavery. Lincoln, having heard that the New Yorker was preparing to attack him, had asked a mutual friend, "What is he wrathy about? Why does he not come down here and have a talk with me?" The friend replied that Greeley had said he would not allow the President of the United States to act as advisory editor of the Tribune Tribune. "I have no such desire," Lincoln said. "I certainly have enough on my hands to satisfy any man"s ambition." But now that the journalist had aired his grievance publicly, Lincoln answered two days later with a public letter of his own, headed "Executive Mansion" and addressed to Greeley: As to the policy I "seem to be pursuing," as you say, I have not meant to leave anyone in doubt.I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Const.i.tution. The sooner the national authority can be restored, the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was." If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that. What I do about slavery and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors, and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men everywhere could be free.
And having thus to some extent forestalled his antic.i.p.ated critics-particularly the conservatives, whose arguments he advanced as his own while pointing out the expediency of acting counter to them-he read to the cabinet this latest draft of what he called a Preliminary Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation. Two opening paragraphs emphasized that the paper was being issued by him as Commander in Chief, upon military necessity; that reunion, not abolition, was still the primary object of the war; that compensated emanc.i.p.ation was still his goal for loyal owners, and that voluntary colonization of freedmen, "upon this continent or elsewhere," would still be encouraged. In the third paragraph he got down to the core of the edict, declaring "That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." He closed, after quoting from congressional measures prohibiting the return of fugitive slaves to disloyal masters, with the promise that, on restoration of the Union, he would recommend that loyal citizens of all areas "be compensated for all losses by acts of the United States, including the loss of slaves."
In this form, after adopting some minor emendations suggested by Seward and Chase, Lincoln gave the doc.u.ment to the world next morning. Return to the Union within one hundred days Return to the Union within one hundred days, he was telling the rebels, and you can keep your slaves-or anyhow be compensated for them, when and if (as I propose) the law takes them away. Otherwise, if you lose the war, you lose your human property as well and you can keep your slaves-or anyhow be compensated for them, when and if (as I propose) the law takes them away. Otherwise, if you lose the war, you lose your human property as well. It was in essence counterrevolutionary, a military edict prompted by expediency. Whoever attacked him for it, whatever the point of contention, would have to attack him on his own ground.
This the South was quick to do. Recalling his inaugural statement, "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the inst.i.tution of slavery in the states where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so," southern spokesmen cried that Lincoln at last had dropped the mask. They quoted with outright horror a pa.s.sage from the very core of the proclamation which seemed to them to incite the slaves to riot and ma.s.sacre: "The Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof...will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom." What was this, they asked, if not an invitation to the Negroes to murder them in their beds? b.e.s.t.i.a.l, they called Lincoln, for here he had touched the quick of their deepest fear, and the Richmond Examiner Examiner charged that the proclamation was "an act of malice towards the master, rather than one of mercy to the slave." Abroad, the London charged that the proclamation was "an act of malice towards the master, rather than one of mercy to the slave." Abroad, the London Spectator Spectator reinforced this view of the author"s cynicism: "The principle is not that a human being cannot justly own another, but that he cannot own him unless he is loyal to the United States." Jefferson Davis, while he deplored that such a paper could be issued by the head of a government of which he himself had once been part, declared that it would inspire the South to new determination; for "a rest.i.tution of the Union has been rendered forever impossible by the adoption of a measure which...neither admits of retraction nor can coexist with union." reinforced this view of the author"s cynicism: "The principle is not that a human being cannot justly own another, but that he cannot own him unless he is loyal to the United States." Jefferson Davis, while he deplored that such a paper could be issued by the head of a government of which he himself had once been part, declared that it would inspire the South to new determination; for "a rest.i.tution of the Union has been rendered forever impossible by the adoption of a measure which...neither admits of retraction nor can coexist with union."
In the North, too, there were critics, some of whom protested that the proclamation went too far, while others claimed that it did not go far enough. Some, in fact, maintained that it went nowhere, since it proclaimed freedom only for those unfortunates now firmly under Confederate control. One such critic was the New York World World, whose editor pointed out that "the President has purposely made the proclamation inoperative in all places where we have gained a military footing which makes the slaves accessible. He has proclaimed emanc.i.p.ation only where he has notoriously no power to execute it." Not only were the loyal or semiloyal slave states of Delaware and Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri omitted from the terms to be applied, but so was the whole rebel state of Tennessee, as well as those parts of Virginia and Louisiana under Federal occupation. This was a matter of considerable alarm to the abolitionists. For if emanc.i.p.ation was not to be extended to those regions a hundred days from now, they asked, when would it ever be extended to them? What manner of doc.u.ment was this anyhow?
Yet these objections were raised only by those who read it critically. Most people did not read it so. They took it for more than it was, or anyhow for more than it said; the container was greater than the thing contained, and Lincoln became at once what he would remain for them, "the man who freed the slaves." He would go down to posterity, not primarily as the Preserver of the Republic-which he was-but as the Great Emanc.i.p.ator, which he was not. "A poor doc.u.ment doc.u.ment, but a mighty act," act," the governor of Ma.s.sachusetts privately called the proclamation, and Lincoln himself said of it in a letter to Vice-President Hamlin, six days later: "The time for its effect southward has not come; but northward the effect should be instantaneous." Whatever truth there was in Davis" claim that it would further unite the South in opposition, Lincoln knew that it had already done much to heal the split in his own party; which was not the least of his reasons for having released it. the governor of Ma.s.sachusetts privately called the proclamation, and Lincoln himself said of it in a letter to Vice-President Hamlin, six days later: "The time for its effect southward has not come; but northward the effect should be instantaneous." Whatever truth there was in Davis" claim that it would further unite the South in opposition, Lincoln knew that it had already done much to heal the split in his own party; which was not the least of his reasons for having released it.
Seward understood such things. Asked by a friend why the cabinet had done "so useless and mischievous a thing as to issue the proclamation," he told a story. Up in New York State, he said, when the news came that the Revolutionary War had been won and American independence at last established, an old patriot could not rest until he had put up a liberty pole. When his neighbors asked him why he had gone to so much trouble-wasn"t he just as free without it?-the patriot replied, "What is liberty without a pole?" So it was with the present case, Seward remarked between puffs on his cigar: "What is war without a proclamation?"
Something more it had done, or was doing, which was also included in Lincoln"s calculations. Abroad, as at home, a bedrock impact had been felt. In London, like the pro-Confederate Spectator Spectator, the Times Times might call the proclamation "A very sad doc.u.ment," which the South would "answer with a hiss of scorn"; a distinguished Member of Parliament might refer to it as "a hideous outburst of weak yet demoniacal spite" and "the most unparalleled last card ever played by a reckless gambler"; Earl Russell himself might point out to his colleagues that it was "of a very strange nature" and contained "no declaration of a principle adverse to slavery." Yet behind these organs of opinion, below these men of influence, stood the people. In their minds, now that Lincoln had spoken out-regardless of what he actually said or left unsaid-support for the South was support for slavery, and they would not have it so. From this point on, the editors might favor and the heads of state might ponder ways and means of extending recognition to the Confederacy, but to do this they would have to run counter to the feelings and demands of the ma.s.s of their subscribers and electors. Not even the nearly half-million textile workers already idle as a result of the first pinch of the cotton famine were willing to have the blockade broken on such terms. And the same was true in France. With this one blow-though few could see it yet: least of all the leader most concerned-Lincoln had shattered the main pillar of what had been the southern President"s chief hope from the start. Europe would not be coming into this war. might call the proclamation "A very sad doc.u.ment," which the South would "answer with a hiss of scorn"; a distinguished Member of Parliament might refer to it as "a hideous outburst of weak yet demoniacal spite" and "the most unparalleled last card ever played by a reckless gambler"; Earl Russell himself might point out to his colleagues that it was "of a very strange nature" and contained "no declaration of a principle adverse to slavery." Yet behind these organs of opinion, below these men of influence, stood the people. In their minds, now that Lincoln had spoken out-regardless of what he actually said or left unsaid-support for the South was support for slavery, and they would not have it so. From this point on, the editors might favor and the heads of state might ponder ways and means of extending recognition to the Confederacy, but to do this they would have to run counter to the feelings and demands of the ma.s.s of their subscribers and electors. Not even the nearly half-million textile workers already idle as a result of the first pinch of the cotton famine were willing to have the blockade broken on such terms. And the same was true in France. With this one blow-though few could see it yet: least of all the leader most concerned-Lincoln had shattered the main pillar of what had been the southern President"s chief hope from the start. Europe would not be coming into this war.
Another change the doc.u.ment had wrought, though this one was uncalculated, occurring within the man himself. Sixteen years ago, back in Illinois, when an election opponent charged that he was an infidel, Lincoln refuted it with an open letter to the voters; but this was mainly a denial that he was a "scoffer," and not even then did he make any claim to being truly religious. Herndon, who saw him almost daily through that period, as well as before and after, later declared that he had never heard his partner mention the name of Jesus "but to confute the idea that he was the Christ." The fact remains that in a time when even professional soldiers called upon G.o.d in their battle reports, Lincoln seemed not to be a praying man and he never joined a church. Concerned as he had always been with logic, he had not yet reached a stage of being able to believe in what he could not comprehend. But now, in this second autumn of the war, a change began to show. In late September, when an elderly Quaker woman came to the White House to thank him for having issued the Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation, Lincoln replied in a tone quite different from the one with which he had addressed her fellow Quaker the month before.
"I am glad of this interview," he told her, "and glad to know that I have your sympathy and prayers. We are indeed going through a great trial-a fiery trial. In the very responsible position in which I happen to be placed, being a humble instrument in the hands of our Heavenly Father, as I am, and as we all are, to work out his great purposes, I have desired that all my works and acts may be according to his will; and that it might be so, I have sought his aid. But if, after endeavoring to do my best in the light which he affords me, I find my efforts fail, I must believe that for some purpose unknown to me, he wills it otherwise. If I had had my way, this war would never have been commenced. If I had been allowed my way, this war would have been ended before this. But we find it still continues, and we must believe that he permits it for some wise purpose of his own, mysterious and unknown to us; and though with our limited understandings we may not be able to comprehend it, yet we cannot but believe that he who made the world still governs it."
This was a theme that would bear developing. In the proclamation itself he had omitted any reference to the Deity, and it was at the suggestion of Chase that he invoked, in the body of a later draft, "the gracious favor of Almighty G.o.d." But now, out of the midnight trials of his spirit, out of his concern for a race in bondage, out of his knowledge of the death of men in battle, something new had come to birth in Lincoln, and through him into the war. After this, as Davis said, there could be no turning back; Lincoln had sounded forth a trumpet that would never call retreat. And having sounded it, he turned in these final days of September to the inscrutable theme he had touched when he thanked the second Quaker woman for her prayers. His secretary found on the presidential desk a sheet of paper containing a single paragraph, a "Meditation on the Divine Will," which Lincoln had written with no thought of publication. Hay copied and preserved it: The will of G.o.d prevails. In great contests each party claims to act in accordance with the will of G.o.d. Both may be, and one must be, wrong. G.o.d cannot be for and against the same thing at the same time. In the present civil war it is quite possible that G.o.d"s purpose is something different from the purpose of either party; and yet the human instrumentalities, working just as they do, are of the best adaptation to effect his purpose. I am almost ready to say that this is probably true; that G.o.d wills this contest, and wills that it shall not end yet. By his mere great power on the minds of the now contestants, he could have either saved or destroyed the Union without a human contest. Yet the contest began. And, having begun, he could give the final victory to either side any day. Yet the contest proceeds.
4 Whatever else it was or might become, whatever reactions it produced within the minds and hearts of men-including Lincoln"s-the proclamation was first of all a military measure; which meant that, so far, its force was merely potential. Its application dependent on the armies of the Union, its effect would be in direct ratio to their success, 1) in driving back the Confederate invaders, and 2) in resuming the southward movement whose flow had been reversed, east and west, by the advances of Lee and Bragg into Maryland and Kentucky. The nearer of these two penetrating spearheads had been encysted and repelled by McClellan, and for this Lincoln was grateful, though he would have preferred something more in the way of pursuit than an ineffectual b.l.o.o.d.ying of the waters at Shepherdstown ford. Even this, however, was better than what he saw when he looked westward in the direction of his native state. The other spearhead was not only still deeply embedded in the vitals of Kentucky, but to Lincoln"s acute distress it seemed likely to remain so. After winning by default the race for Louisville, Buell appeared to be concerned only with taking time to catch his breath; with the result that, near the end of September, Lincoln"s thin-stretched patience snapped. He ordered Buell"s removal from command.
His distress no doubt would have been less acute if he had known that, with or without pressure from Buell, Bragg was already considering a withdrawal. At the outset the North Carolinian had announced that he would make the "Abolition demagogues and demons...taste the bitters of invasion," but now he found his own teeth set on edge. From Bardstown, which he had reached three days before, he reported to Richmond on September 25 that his troops were resting from "the long, arduous, and exhausting march" over Muldraugh"s Hill. "It is a source of deep regret that this move was necessary," he declared, "as it has enabled Buell to reach Louisville, where a very large force is now concentrated." Then he got down to the bedrock cause of his discontent: "I regret to say we are sadly disappointed at the want of action by our friends in Kentucky. We have so far received no accession to this army. General Smith has secured about a brigade-not half our losses by casualties of different kinds. We have 15,000 stand of arms and no one to use them. Unless a change occurs soon we must abandon the garden spot of Kentucky to its cupidity. The love of ease and fear of pecuniary loss are the fruitful sources of this evil."
In saying this he took his cue from Smith, who-though privately he admitted, "I can understand their fears and hesitancy; they have so much to lose"-had written him from Lexington the week before: "The Kentuckians are slow and backward in rallying to our standard. Their hearts are evidently with us, but their blue-gra.s.s and fat cattle are against us." The day after Bragg reached Bardstown-with Buell still moving northward, more or less across his flank and rear-Smith told him that he regarded "the defeat of Buell before he effects a junction with the force at Louisville as a military necessity, for Buell"s army has always been the great bugbear to these people, and until [it is] defeated we cannot hope for much addition to our ranks." In other words, before the citizens would risk their lives and property in open support of the Confederates, they wanted to be a.s.sured that they would stay stay there. But to Bragg it seemed that this was putting the cart before the horse. He later explained his reluctance in a letter to his wife: "Why should I stay with my handful of brave Southern men to fight for cowards who skulked about in the dark to say to us, "We are with you. Only whip these fellows out of our country and let us see you can protect us, and we will join you"?" there. But to Bragg it seemed that this was putting the cart before the horse. He later explained his reluctance in a letter to his wife: "Why should I stay with my handful of brave Southern men to fight for cowards who skulked about in the dark to say to us, "We are with you. Only whip these fellows out of our country and let us see you can protect us, and we will join you"?"
And so for a time the two Confederate commanders, both flushed with recent victories, remained precisely where they were, Smith at Lexington and Bragg at Bardstown, fifty airline miles apart, gathering supplies and issuing recruiting appeals which largely went unanswered. The former kept urging the latter to pounce on Buell, claiming that he could whip him una.s.sisted, while he himself continued to load his wagons and round up herds of cattle. Bragg was unwilling to move on Louisville alone, and yet he was also unwilling to ask Smith to abandon the heart of the Bluegra.s.s region by moving westward to join him. Between the two, they had arrived at a sort of impa.s.se of indecision, behind which both were intent on the fruitful harvest they were gleaning against the day when they would retrace their steps across the barrens. What had been announced as a full-scale offensive, designed to establish and maintain the northern boundary of the Confederacy along the Ohio River, had degenerated into a giant raid.
This did not mean that Bragg abandoned all his hopes. Unwilling though he was to risk a pitched battle while Buell hugged the Louisville intrenchments, he thought there still might be a bloodless way to encourage prospective bluegra.s.s volunteers by replacing the Unionist state government, which had fled its capital, with one that was friendly to the South. Moreover, he had the means at hand. In November of the previous year, an irregular convention had met at Russellville to declare the independence of Kentucky, establish a provisional government, and pet.i.tion the Confederacy for admission. All this it did, and was accepted; Kentucky had representatives in the Confederate Congress and a star in the Confederate flag. Presently, however, when Albert Sidney Johnston"s long line came unhinged at Donelson, the men who followed that star were in exile-including Provisional Governor George W. Johnson, who fell at Shiloh and was succeeded by the lieutenant governor, Richard Hawes. Hawes was now on his way north from Chattanooga, and it was Bragg"s intention to inaugurate him at Frankfort. With a pro-Confederate occupying the governor"s chair in the capitol, supported by a de jacto de jacto government of Confederate sympathies, the entire political outlook would be changed; or so Bragg thought. At any rate, he considered it so thoroughly worth the effort that he decided to see it done himself, lending his personal dignity to the occasion. government of Confederate sympathies, the entire political outlook would be changed; or so Bragg thought. At any rate, he considered it so thoroughly worth the effort that he decided to see it done himself, lending his personal dignity to the occasion.
Accordingly, leaving Polk in charge of the army around Bardstown, he set out for Lexington on September 28 to confer with Smith before proceeding to Frankfort. Joined by Hawes and his party two days later at Danville, he wrote Polk: "The country and the people grow better as we get into the one and arouse the other." October 1, he reached Lexington, where he arranged for Smith to move his whole army up to Frankfort for the inaugural ceremonies, two or three days later. By now, however, though he still expected much from the current political maneuver, his reaction to what he had seen during his ride through the Bluegra.s.s was mixed. "Enthusiasm is unbounded, but recruiting at a discount," he wired Polk. "Even the women are giving reasons why individuals cannot go."
Bragg was not the only army commander displaying symptoms of discouragement at this stage of the far-flung campaign. A Cincinnati journalist, watching Buell ride north through Elizabethtown at the head of his retrograding column on September 24, was unfavorably impressed: "His dress was that of a brigadier instead of a major general. He wore a shabby straw hat, dusty coat, and had neither belt, sash or sword about him.... Though accompanied by his staff, he was not engaged in conversation with any of them, but rode silently and slowly along, noticing nothing that transpired around him.... Buell is, certainly, the most reserved, distant and unsociable of all the generals in the army. He never has a word of cheer for his men or his officers, and in turn his subordinates care little for him save to obey his orders, as machinery works in response to the bidding of the mechanic." The reporter believed that this lack of cheer and sociability on the part of the commander was the cause of the army"s present gloom. McClellan, for example, had "an unaccountable something, that keeps this machinery constantly oiled and easy-running; but Buell"s unsympathetic nature makes it "squeak" like the drag wheels of a wagon."
More than the past was fretting Buell; more, even, than the present. After the lost opportunities down along the Tennessee River, after the long hot weary trudge back north to the Ohio, he was confronted with the prospect of having to fight two opponents who, inured by and rested from their recent victories, could now combine to move against him. Nor was this all. Near the end of his 250-mile withdrawal-aware that his superiors were hostile, ready to let fall the Damoclean sword of dismissal, and that his subordinates were edgy, ready to leap at his own and each other"s throats-he was also suffering forebodings: forebodings which were presently borne out all too abruptly. Pa.s.sing through Elizabethtown, he reached Louisville next day. Within another three days he had his whole army there. On the day after that, September 29, in the midst of a general reorganization, he was struck two knee-buckling blows, both of which fell before he had even had time to digest his breakfast.
The first was that, in a time when aggressiveness was at a considerable premium, he lost William Nelson, the most aggressive of his several major generals. He lost him because the Indiana brigadier Jefferson Davis, home from the Transmississippi on a sick leave, had come down to Louisville to a.s.sist Nelson in preparing to hold the city against Smith. Nelson was overbearing, Davis touchy; the result was a personality clash, at the climax of which the former ordered the latter out of his department. Davis went, but presently he returned, bringing the governor of Indiana with him. This was Oliver P. Morton, who also had a bone to pick with Nelson over his alleged mishandling of Hoosier volunteers during the fiasco staged at Richmond a month ago tomorrow. They accosted him in the lobby of the Galt House, Buell"s Louisville headquarters, just after early breakfast. In the flare-up that ensued, Davis demanded satisfaction for last week"s rudeness, and when Nelson called him an "insolent puppy," flipped a wadded calling-card in his face; whereupon Nelson laid the back of a ham-sized hand across his jaw. Davis fell back, and the burly Kentuckian turned on Morton, asking if he too had come there to insult him. Morton said he had not. Nelson started up the staircase, heading for Buell"s room on the second floor. "Did you hear that d.a.m.ned insolent scoundrel insult me, sir?" he demanded of an acquaintance coming down. "I suppose he don"t know me, sir. I"ll teach him a lesson, sir." He went on up the stairs, then down the hall, and just as he reached the door of Buell"s room he heard someone behind him call his name. Turning, he saw Davis standing at the head of the stairs with a pistol in his hand.
Davis had not come armed to the encounter, but after staggering back from the slap he had gone around the lobby asking bystanders for a weapon. At last he came to a certain Captain Gibson. "I always carry the article," Gibson said, producing a pistol from under his coat. Davis took it, and as he started up the stairs Gibson called after him, "It"s a tranter trigger. Work light." So when Nelson turned from Buell"s door and started toward him, Davis knew what to do. "Not another step farther!" he cried; and then, at a range of about eight feet, shot the big man in the chest. Nelson stopped, turned back toward Buell"s door, but fell before he got there. "Send for a clergyman; I wish to be baptized," he told the men who came running at the sound of the shot. Gathering around him, they managed to lift the 300-pound giant onto a bed in a nearby room. "I have been basely murdered," he said. Half an hour later he was dead.
Buell had Davis placed in arrest, intending to try him for murder, but before he could appoint a court or even prepare to conduct an investigation-indeed, before Nelson"s blood had time to dry on the rug outside his door-he found that he no longer had any authority in the matter. The second blow had landed. Halleck"s order for Buell"s removal, issued at Lincoln"s insistence, was delivered by special courier that morning. The courier, a colonel aide of Halleck"s, acting under instructions similar to the ones given in Fremont"s case the year before-that is, the order was not to be delivered if Buell had fought or was about to fight a battle-had left Washington on the 24th, before Lincoln or Halleck knew the outcome of the race for Louisville. Three days later, learning that Buell had reached the Ohio ahead of Bragg, Halleck wired the colonel: "Await further orders before acting." But it was too late. At noon of the 29th the reply came back: "The dispatches are delivered. I think it is fortunate that I obeyed instructions. Much dissatisfaction with General Buell." On its heels came a wire from Buell himself: "I have