GENERAL HALLECK TO GENERAL MCCLELLAN.

"September 1st-1.30 A.M.-Retain remainder of Couch's forces and make arrangements to stop all retreating troops in line of works, or where you can best establish an entire line of defence. I must wait for more definite information before I can order a retreat, as the falling back on the line of works must necessarily be directed, in case of a serious disaster."

'LITTLE MAC" REQUESTED TO USE HIS INFLUENCE WITH THE ARMY.

On the first of September, McClellan had an interview with the President and the General-in-Chief, the former of whom requested him to use his influence to ensure a cordial co-operation between the Army of the Potomac and General Pope, as he could accomplish such an object and no one else could. McClellan told the President that no such measure was necessary; that every man in the army was loyal; and that each one, officer and soldier, would do his best. But the President still insisted. In obedience to the request the following despatch was sent to General Porter. At the time this affair was grossly misrepresented, and was quoted, in more than one quarter, as a proof that the army was disloyal.

"WASHINGTON, September 1, 1862. "I ask of you, for my sake, that of the country, and the old Army of the Potomac, that you and all my friends will lend the fullest and most cordial co-operation to General Pope, in all the operations now going on. The destinies of our country, the honor of our arms, are at stake, and all depends now upon the cheerful co-operation of all in the field. This week is the crisis of our fate. Say the same thing to my friends in the Army of the Potomac, and that the last request I have to make of them is, that, for their country's sake, they will extend to General Pope the same support they ever have to me.

"I am in charge of the defences of Washington, and am doing all I can to render your retreat safe, should that become necessary. "GEORGE B. MCCLELLAN."

General Porter replied that all the friends of McClellan would cordially co-operate with General Pope, and would ever give their constant support in the execution of his plans.

THE SECOND BATTLE OF "BULL RUN."

That night the disastrous campaign of Pope culminated in the retreat of the whole Federal army on Washington. In this extremity, the eyes of the nation turned again towards McClellan. A large portion of the press recalled the fact that he had saved the capital once before, and insisted that he of all others was most competent to save it again. The popular mind, perhaps, even outran the newspapers. The telegraphs which had gone forth from Washington, representing him sitting alone in his tent, the battle raging within hearing, while, as we have seen, he had begged in vain to be allowed to go to the front, even without a command, had touched the hearts. of men profoundly. For the masses of the people had never lost confidence in McClellan. On the contrary,

they regarded him as the victim of the politicians. They said that he had been prevented from renewing on a larger scale the victories of Western Virginia, only by the clamor of men who knew nothing of military affairs, but who had possessed the power to frustrate his plans. Had he been allowed fully to prepare himself, they urged; had no premature movements been made; had the whole campaign commenced at once, and the rebels been attacked from every quarter simultaneously, victory would have been certain. In the army, these opinions were held almost unanimously. The men who had been with McClellan at Yorktown, and Fair Oaks, and Hanover Court House, at Seven Oaks, and Savage's Station, and Malvern Hill, had unbounded faith in their leader. In their talk around their camp,fires and in letters to their families at home, they delighted to recount especially the wonders of the seven days battles; how, at every halting place, they found their general had selected the very best point at which to make a stand; how his forethought in other respects had attended them through all that desperate

week; how he had always a kind word, and sometimes manly tears, for the wounded in the hospitals; how he had stirred the blood even of the most dispirited with his memorable address on the fourth of July.

The American soldier, too, is the most intelligent of all soldiers; and when he spoke and wrote in this strain, it was the opinion of no ignorant observer. In the present emergency the judgment of the army was, that McClellan was the one to rescue the republic. Wounded men, going home to die, hundreds of miles away, when they heard of the disastrous defeat of "the second Bull Run," told those around them that McClellan alone could save the country, and that if he was not restored to command, the cause was lost. These opinions in the army never developed into mutiny; for the American soldier is still a citizen, and does not forget what he owes to the law. But they were known to exist. It was known, also, that neither officers nor privates had felt any confidence in Pope; that they had gone into battle more than once, conscious of being about to be sacrificed by unskilful dispositions; and that, though they had manfully and loyally done their duty on the field, and would do it again, under similar circumstances, if ordered, yet that they would fight, without heart, and perhaps be defeated, when under a more popular commander, victory would be assured.

WHAT HISTORY WILL SAY.

It is now known that these opinions, on the part of the army, were fully justified by facts. We need only appeal to the official papers, in the preceding pages, to show that McClellan, if he had not been thwarted, would have taken Richmond, perhaps in May, certainly in June. This was the belief, at the time, of the Prince de Joinville, whose position as a foreigner, whose high character as a man, and whose presence as a participant in the campaign,

gives to his verdict something of the impartiality of his tory. A letter from General Keyes, not quoted in these pages, written from the army, and urging Senator Harris to use his influence to have reinforcements sent forward, is conclusive as to the causes why the Peninsular campaign was a failure. Throughout it all, McClellan had been sacrificed, and, with him, the country. In coming to this conclusion, it is not necessary to impugn the motives of the administration. No fair mind questions the sincerity of Mr. Lincoln, or of his chief advisers. But it could not be supposed that men who were ignorant of military affairs should be able to control a vast campaign without many and serious blunders. It was natural, also, that the executive should be nervously sensitive as to the safety of Washington; for, with the Capital in possession of the rebels, their recognition by foreign governments would be almost certain. But how best to protect Washington was a military problem, and it was a dangerous error to think that a military problem could be best solved by mere civilians. Now and then, in the world's history, a man is born a great military genius; an Alexander, a Julius Cæsar, a Napoleon; or, in a lesser degree, a Turrene, a Marlborough, a Wellington; but in the long run, and especially since the invention of gunpowder, nations have found that it is wisest to commit military operations to educated military men. This opinion, however, was not general in 1862, particularly in certain influential circles in Washington. Men, high in position, and who had the ear of the President, maintained, openly, after Fort Donelson, that they could march with fifty thousand men from the Potomac to Richmond and New Orleans; and there were tens of thousands throughout the nation, and among them many leading journalists, who entertained and expressed substantially similar sentiments.

Events have shown that they were wrong. Of all the

prominent actors in that earlier period of the rebellion, McClellan seems to have estimated most correctly the difficulties of the situation. Had his original plan of a campaign been adhered to, and had the men he asked for been given to him to carry it out, the rebellion would probably have been crushed in 1862 or 1863. But just when he was preparing the advance on Richmond, enlistments were stopped as unnecessary, though he moved with smaller forces than he thought advisable; and then, months later, when he had been compelled to fall back on Harrison's Landing for the want of these very men, he was told that the whole campaign must be abandoned because it was impossible to reinforce him. Perhaps, considering how much both the people and the Government had to learn after fifty years of virtual peace, these errors were unavoidable; but the army, which had never shared these delusions, cannot be blamed for justifying McClellan, as it is now clear impartial history will justify him. If any thing more was wanted to confirm the soundness of this view, it was soon furnished by the Antietam campaign, in which, with amazing celerity, within less than three weeks in all, McClellan not only reorganized the demoralized troops of Pope, but, no longer controlled by others, repeated, on a larger scale, the rapid victories of Western Virginia.

It is deeply to be regretted that the same mistaken judgment, which had rejected his counsels at Harrison's Landing, and which had, for a time, removed him from the chief command, should again, a few weeks later, displace him, as we shall see. For, to say nothing else, the nation lost, by that act, all the experience which McClellan had been acquiring for a year. If to the vigor of the Antietam campaign he had continued to add the wariness which had always distinguished him, there would have been little else left to desire.