McClellan"s tardiness was the alleged cause of his removal. No one in authority seemed to consider for a moment the necessity, which was apparent to their immediate commander, of affording the Federal troops an opportunity to recuperate from their exhausted condition. The serious losses sustained at South Mountain, Crampton"s Gap, and Antietam had left the army badly disorganized, and the privations and hardships to which they had been subjected, rendered a delay, for the purpose of allowing the worn and weary soldiers time to rest and recuperate, an absolute necessity. In the language of McClellan, "The Army had need of rest." After the terrible experiences of battles and marches, with scarcely an interval of repose, which they had gone through from the time of leaving the Peninsula; the return to Washington; the defeat in Virginia; the victory at South Mountain, and again at Antietam, it was not surprising that they were, in a large degree, dest.i.tute of the absolute necessities for effective duty. Shoes were worn out; blankets were lost; clothing was in rags; the army was unfit for duty, and time for rest and equipment was absolutely necessary.
McClellan at once notified the authorities of the condition of his troops, and made the necessary requisitions on the proper departments for the needed supplies. For some unaccountable reason--unaccountable to this day--the supplies ordered were so slow in reaching the men, that when, on the seventh of October, the command came for him to cross the river into Virginia, and give battle to the enemy, a compliance with the order was practically impossible.
Then, too, re-enforcements were needed. In ordering the advance, the President, through the General-in-Chief, had submitted two plans, of which McClellan could take his choice. One was to advance up the valley of the Shenandoah with reenforcements of fifteen thousand troops, the other was to cross the river between the enemy and Washington, in which case he was to be reenforced with thirty thousand men. McClellan"s first inclination was to adopt the movement up the Shenandoah Valley, believing, that, if he crossed the river into Virginia, Lee would be enabled to promptly prevent success in that direction by at once throwing his army into Maryland. Owing, however, to the delay of the supplies in reaching the army, it was nearly the end of October before the troops were ready to move. About the twenty-sixth, the army commenced to cross at Harper"s Ferry, and by the sixth of November the advance upon the enemy was begun. On the night of the seventh, therefore, when the order came relieving him from the command, McClellan"s advance guard was actually engaged with the enemy.
I had already learned that Longstreet was immediately in our front, near Culpepper, while Jackson and Hill"s forces were near Chester"s and Thornton"s Gap, west of the Blue Ridge. McClellan had formed the plan of attempting to divide the enemy, with the hope of forcing him to battle, when it was believed, an easy victory would be achieved.
At this juncture, however, and when the army was in an excellent condition to fight a great battle, when officers and men were enthusiastic in their hopes of being able soon to strike an effective blow, McClellan was removed, and Stanton had, at last, accomplished his revenge. Not only this, but he had also secured the failure of, what was undoubtedly destined to be, a great and decisively victorious campaign.
McClellan"s plan on discovering the position of the enemy"s forces, was to strike in between Culpepper Court House and Little Washington, hoping by this means to separate the rebel army, or at least to force their retreat to Gordonsville, and then advance upon Richmond, either by way of Fredericksburg or the Peninsula.
Burnside, on a.s.suming the command, submitted a plan of his own, which was to make a feint of doing, what McClellan really intended to do, before adopting the move upon Fredericksburg or the Peninsula, and then to advance from Fredericksburg.
This plan, however, did not meet the approval of General Halleck. That General had a long conference with Burnside, at Warrenton. Here their various plans were discussed, without either agreeing to the plan of the other, and the matter was finally referred to the President for his decision. After a further delay of several days, Mr. Lincoln adopted Burnside"s plan, and the advance was ordered.
The success of this plan depended upon the immediate possession of Fredericksburg by the Federal army. The intelligent student knows full well that this was not even _attempted_ until Lee had ample time to heavily re-enforce the rebel army already there. The subsequent results show Burnside"s delay to have been fatal to his success.
There was a time when he could certainly have taken Fredericksburg, with but little loss; but that time was pa.s.sed when he permitted the enemy to fully garrison the place, and make ample provision for its defense with an army of nearly ninety thousand men.
At this time, however, my connection with the Army of the Potomac, and with the military concerns of the government, ceased. Upon the removal of General McClellan, I declined to act any further in the capacity in which I had previously served, although strongly urged to do so by both President Lincoln and the Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton.
From my earliest manhood, I had been an ardent and active abolitionist, and I have endeavored to demonstrate this fact throughout these pages.
My deep admiration, therefore, for General McClellan, was the result of my knowledge, of my intimate acquaintance with him, and a consequent high regard, based upon his innate and intrinsic qualities, both as a man and a soldier, and not from any political affinity whatever.
Refusing longer to continue with the army under its new commander, I was afterwards employed by the government in the work of investigating the numerous claims that were presented against the United States. While acting in this capacity, I was instrumental in unearthing a vast number of fraudulent claims, and, in bringing to justice a large number of men who were engaged in the base attempt to swindle and defraud the nation in the dark hours of her need and peril.
In the Spring of 1864, I was transferred to the Department of the Mississippi, under General Canby, and my headquarters were located at New Orleans. Here I was engaged in looking after cotton claims, and the frauds which were sought to be perpetrated against the government in that region of the country.
In 1865, I severed my connection with the "Secret Service of the United States," and returned to Chicago, where I have since been engaged in the active prosecution of my profession as a detective.
Very often, as I sit in the twilight, my mind reverts back to those stirring scenes of by-gone days; to those years of war and its consequent hardships, and I recall with pleasure my own connection with the suppression of the rebellion. My subsequent life has been none the less happy because of my having a.s.sisted, as best as I could, in putting down that gigantic act of attempted disunion, and in upholding the flag of our fathers. More than all do I rejoice in the freedom it brought to nearly half a million of people, who, prior to that time, had been held in inhuman bondage,--striking the shackles from their bruised limbs, and placing them before the law free and independent.
My task is done. In a few brief pages I have attempted to depict the work of years. The war is over, the rebellion has been crushed, peace and plenty are everywhere apparent. The flag of the Union floats from every port in the United States, the slave is free, the South is recovering from the ravages of war, and the stories of those stirring times seem now like the legends of an olden time.
One more scene remains, and I will then draw the curtain.
It is a Sabbath morning, the air is fragrant with blossom and flower, the birds are carolling sweetly a requiem for the dead. Around us, sleeping the sleep that knows no waking, lie the forms of those whom we knew and loved. We are in the "city of the dead." The wind sighs through the waving branches of the trees, with a mournful melody, suggestive of the place. Near by is the bustling city, but here we are surrounded only by the mute, though eloquent testimonies of man"s eternal rest. Here beneath a drooping willow let us pause awhile. Flowers are blooming over a mound of earth, saturating the atmosphere with a grateful aroma.
Let us lean over while we read what is inscribed upon the marble tablet.
SACRED
TO THE MEMORY OF
TIMOTHY WEBSTER,
WHO
WAS EXECUTED AS A SPY,
BY THE
REBELS, IN RICHMOND, VA.,
APRIL 29, 1862,
AFTER GALLANT SERVICE IN THE WAR OF THE REBELLION.
HE SEALED HIS FIDELITY AND DEVOTION
TO HIS COUNTRY
WITH HIS BLOOD.
Alike to him are the heats of summer, or the snows of winter.
Peacefully and quietly he sleeps. The Spy of the Rebellion is at rest.
APPENDIX.
THE HARDSHIPS AND PRIVATIONS OF A DETECTIVE"S LIFE
Every person who may have survived the experience has undoubtedly a lively recollection of the wild groups of people which the building of the Union and Central Pacific Railroads brought together from all directions, and from all causes.
There were millions upon millions of dollars to be expended; and as the points of construction neared each other, and the twin bands of iron crept along the earth"s surface like two huge serpents, spanning mighty rivers, penetrating vast mountains, and trailing through majestic forests, creeping slowly but surely towards each other, there was always the greatest dread at the most advanced points, which, like the heads of serpents, always contained danger and death; and the vast cities of a day that then sprang into existence, and melted away like school-children"s snow-houses, were the points where such wild scenes were enacted as will probably never again occur in the history of railroad building.
Everything contributed to make these places typical of Babelic confusion, or Pandemoniac contention. Foreigners were told of the exhaustless work, and the exhaustless wealth, of this new country which was being so rapidly developed, and they came; men--brave men, too--who had been on the wrong side during the late irritation, and who had lost all, having staked all on the result of the war, saw a possible opportunity of retrieving their fortunes rapidly, and they came; the big-headed youth of the village whose smattering of books at the academy, or the seminary, had enlarged his brain and contracted his sense so that he was too good for the common duties and everyday drudgeries which, with patience, lead to success, learned of the glory and grandeur of that new land, and he came; the speculating shirk and the peculating clerk came; the almond-eyed sons of the Orient in herds--herds of quick-witted, patient, plodding beings who could be beaten, starved, even murdered--came; the forger, the bruiser, the counterfeiter, the gambler, the garroter, the prost.i.tute, the robber, and the murderer, each and every, came; there was adventure for the adventurous, gold for the thief, waiting throats for the murderer; while the few respectable people quickly became discouraged, and fell into the general looseness of habits that the loose life engendered, and gradually grew reckless as the most reckless, or quickly acquiesced in the wild orgies or startling crimes which were of common occurrence. In fact, as in the human system, when any portion of it becomes diseased and all the poison in the blood flows to it, further corrupting and diseasing it until arrested by a gradual purification of the whole body, or by some severe treatment, so from every portion of the country flowed these streams of morally corrupt people, until nearly every town west of Missouri, or east of the mountains, along these lines, became a terror to honest people, and continued so until an irresistible conflict compelled a moral revulsion, sometimes so sweeping and violent as to cause an application of that unwritten, though often exceedingly just law, the execution of which leaves offenders dangling to limbs of trees, lamp-posts, and other convenient points of suspension.
As a rule, in these places, every man, whatever his business and condition, was thoroughly armed, the question of self-defense being a paramount one, from the fact that laws which governed older communities were completely a dead letter; and the law of might, in a few instances made somewhat respectable by a faint outline of ruffianly honor, alone prevailed, until advancing civilization and altered conditions brought about a better state of society; so that in these reckless crowds which pushed after the constantly changing termini of the approaching roads, any instrument of bloodshed was considered valuable, and stores where arms and ammunition could be secured did quite as large a trade as those devoted to any other branch of business; while so outrageous was the price extorted for these instruments of aggression or defense, that they have often been known to sell for their weight in gold; and just as, during the war, the army was followed by enterprising traders who turned many an honest penny trafficking at the heels of the weary soldiers, so the same cla.s.s of people were not slow to take advantage of such opportunities for gigantic profits which, though often lessened by the many risks run in such trading, were still heavy enough to prove peculiarly attractive.
As a consequence, there were many firms engaged in this particular business, but probably the heaviest was that of Kuhn Brothers, who were reported to be worth upwards of one hundred thousand dollars, which had princ.i.p.ally been made along the line of the road, and who, with headquarters at Cheyenne, had established various "stores" at different points as the Union Pacific was pushed on, always keeping the largest stock at the most advanced point, and withdrawing stocks from the paper cities which had been left behind, though only in those towns which had not been altogether destroyed by the periodical exodus occasioned by each change of terminus.
For this reason the firms were obliged to entrust their business to the honesty of many different employes, who were subject to the vitiating influences and temptations, which were unusual and severe under the circ.u.mstances already mentioned, while the distances between the points, and the scarcity of secure means of safely keeping the large sums of money which would occasionally unavoidably accrue at certain points, left Kuhn Brothers, in many instances, really dependent on those dependent on them.
In this condition of affairs, and after a slight defalcation had occurred at one of their smaller stores in the spring of 1867, the firm were seeking a man whom they could place in actual charge of one or two of their establishments at the larger towns, and give a sort of general supervision over the others, when the senior member of the firm, being in Laramie, casually met a young gentleman, who happened to be able to do him so great a favor that the incident led to a close friendship and ultimate business relations, eventually resulting in this narrative of facts.
It was a pleasant May evening, and Mr. Kuhn had decided to returned to Cheyenne in order to secure a proper man for the superintendency nearer home. He was to have left Laramie for the East at a late hour of the evening and, being at a loss how to pa.s.s the intervening time, strolled out from the hotel with no particular destination in view and his mind fully occupied with the cares of his business, only occasionally noticing some peculiarity or strange sight more than usually striking among the thousands of weird things, to which his frontier business had compelled him to become accustomed, when suddenly he found himself in front of a mammoth dance-house, and, yielding to a momentary impulse of curiosity, turned into the place with the stream of gamblers, adventurers, greasers, and, in fact, everybody respectable or otherwise, who, so far from civilization, found such a place peculiarly attractive.
The dance-house was a sort of h.e.l.l"s bazaar, if the term may be allowed--and it is certainly the one most befitting it--and was really no "house" at all, being merely a very large board enclosure covered with a gigantic tent or series of tents, bedecked with flags and gaudy streamers. The entrance fee to this elegant place of amus.e.m.e.nt was one dollar, and you had only paid an initiatory fee when you had gained admission.
On either side as you entered were immense bars, built of the roughest of boards, where every kind of liquid poison was dispensed at the moderate sum of twenty-five cents a drink, five-cent cigars selling at the same price, and the united efforts of a half-dozen murderous looking bar-tenders at each side were required to a.s.suage the thirst of the quite as murderous looking crowd that swayed back and forth within the s.p.a.ce evidently prepared for that purpose.
Beyond this point, and to either side, as also down the center for some distance, could be found almost every known game of chance, dealt, of course, "by the house," while surrounding the lay-outs were every description of men crazed with drink, flushed with success, or deathly pale from sudden ruin; while everywhere the revolver or the bowie intimated with what terrible swiftness and certainty any trifling dispute, rankling grudge, or violent insult would be settled, one way or the other, and to be marked by the mere pitching of an inanimate form into the street!