“Old Pap,” as the soldiers called General George H. Thomas, was
aggravatingly slow at a time when the President wanted him to “get
a move on”; in fact, the gallant “Rock of Chickamauga” was evidently
entered in a snail-race.
“Some of my generals are so slow,” regretfully remarked Lincoln one day,
“that molasses in the coldest days of winter is a race horse compared to
them.
“They’re brave enough, but somehow or other they get fastened in a fence
corner, and can’t figure their way out.”