Proclamation -- Parade -- Halleck -- Diplomats -- Herodians --
Inspired Men -- War Powers -- Rosecrans -- Butler -- Seward --
Doctores Constitutionis -- Hogarth -- Rhetors -- European Enemies
-- Second Sight -- Senator Wright the Patriot -- Populus Romanus
-- Future Historian -- English People -- Gen. Mitchell -- Hooker
in Command -- Staffs -- Arming Africo-Americans -- Thurlow Weed,
&c.
_Jan. 1._--The morning papers. No proclamation! Has Lincoln played
false to humanity?
The proclamation will appear. All right so far! Hallelujah! How the
friends of darkness, how the demons must wince and tremble.
There! Red-tape commander-in-chief, field marshal (who never saw a
field of battle!) parades at the head of victorious generals, of
intelligent staffs, of active pontoon providers, and of really and
highly qualified quartermasters general. To the White House! They
will congratulate Mr. Lincoln. Upon what? Upon Fredericksburgh and
other massacres; but especially they will congratulate Mr. Lincoln
upon the fact of his being surrounded by such a bright galaxy of
know-nothings and do-nothings!
Death-knell to slavery and to the slaveocracy. The foulest relic of
the past will at length be destroyed. The new era has a glorious
dawn; it rises in the glories of sacrifices made by a generous and
inspired people. Yes! The new era rises above darkness, selfishness,
and imbecility. The shades of the slaughtered are now at length
propitiated; their slaughter is at least in part atoned for; and
outraged humanity is, at least in part, avenged! Let rebels and
conservatives remain hardened in crime; a just and condign vengeance
shall overtake them.
_Nunc pede libero
Pulsanda tellus._
_Jan. 2._--Shallow and brainless diplomats sneer at the
proclamation. So did the Herodians sneer at the star of Bethlehem;
and where now are the Herodians? Oh! shallow and heartless
diplomats, your days are numbered, too!
_Jan. 2._--A man inspired by conviction and glowing with a fervent
faith, thoroughly knows what he is about. Strong in his faith, and
by his faith, he clearly sees his way, and steadily walks in it,
while others grope hither and thither amidst shadows and darkness
and bewildering doubts! Such a man boldly takes the initiative,
marches onward, and is as a beacon-light to a nation, to a people;
often, sometimes, even for all humanity. A man who has a profound
faith in his convictions has coruscations, fierce flashes of that
second-sight for the signs of the times. The mere trimming and
selfish politician is ever ready to swim with the stream which he
had neither strength nor skill to breast; he never ventures to take
the initiative. In issuing the proclamation, Mr. Lincoln gives legal
sanction, form, and record to what the storm of events and the loud
cry of the best of the people have long demanded and now inexorably
dictate.
History will pitilessly tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing
but the truth; and small credit will history give to Lincoln beyond
that of being the legal recorder of a righteous deed, and not even
that credit will be given to the countersigner, Seward.
Mr. Seward countersigned both proclamations of freedom. Europe is
filled with his despatches, written at first plainly for, then
lukewarmly tolerating, and, at length, flatly against, slavery.
European statesmen have thus the exact measure of Mr. Seward's
political character. They know that to the very last he defended
slavery, and then countersigned the decree of its destruction! In
Europe, self-respecting statesmen resign rather than countersign a
measure which they disapprove or have strongly opposed.
_Jan. 3._--Emancipation under war powers. A mistake by a
contradiction. Spoke of it before. And nevertheless: under war
powers alone, emancipation is palatable to a great many, nay, almost
to millions of small, narrow intellects, dried up by the formulas,
and who in the Constitution see only the latter, and not the
expanding, all-embracing principle and spirit. O, Rabbis! O,
Talmudists!
Lincoln is very unhappy in his phraseology. He invites the
sympathies of humanity on a measure decided by him to favor the war.
It is a contradiction; humanity and war are antipodic.
The papers in the confidence of Seward, such as the _Intelligencer_
(without intelligence,) the border-state friends of Lincoln, and all
that is muddy and rotten, even the supposed to be well-informed
diplomats unanimously assert that Mr. Lincoln has no confidence in
his proclamation. As for Seward--this Lincoln's evil genius--no
doubt exists concerning his contempt for the proclamation. Ask the
diplomats. But these highest pilots in this administration are
bound--as by a terrible oath--to violate all the laws of psychology,
of human nature, of sense, of logic and of honor, to make the people
bleed and suffer in its honor.
Well, pompous Chase; how do you feel for having sided with Seward?
Gen. Butler's farewell proclamation to New Orleans rings the purest
and most patriotic harmony. Compare Butler's with Lincoln's
writings. All the hearts in the country resounded with Butler; and
because he acted as he did, Lincoln-Seward-Blair-Halleck's policy
shelved Butler.
_Jan. 3._--By the united efforts of Lincoln-Seward-Blair, of the
_Herald_, and of that cesspool of infamies, the _World_, of
McClellan, and of his tail, by the stupifying influence of Halleck,
the Potomac army, notwithstanding its matchless heroism, and
equipped as well as any army in Europe; up to this day the Potomac
army serves to--establish--the military superiority of the rebels,
to morally strengthen, nay, even to nurse the rebellion.
Lincoln-Halleck dare not entrust the army into the hands of a true
soldier,--Stanton is outvoted. The next commander inherits all the
faults generated by Lincoln, McClellan, Halleck, Burnside, and it
would otherwise tax a Napoleon's brains to reorganize the army but
for the patriotic spirit of the rank and file and most of the
officers.
_Jan. 3._--What a pity that petty, quibbling constitutionalism
alone is understood by Lincoln and by his followers. To
emancipate in virtue of a war power is scarcely to perform half the
work, and is a full logical incongruity. Like all kind of war power,
that of the president has for its geographical limits the pickets of
his army--has no executive authority beyond, besides being
obligatory only as long as bayonets back it. Such a power cannot
change social and municipal conditions, laws or relations (see Vol.
I.)
The civil power of the president penetrates beyond the pickets, and
in virtue of that civil power, and of the sacred duty to save the
fatherland, the President of the United States, and not the
Commander-in-Chief, can say to the slaves: "Arise, you are free, you
have no servitude, no duties towards a rebel and traitor to the
Union. I, the president, dissolve your bonds in the name of the
American people."
_Jan. 4._--How the tempest of events changes or modifies principles.
The South rebelled in the name of State rights, and now Jeff Davis
absorbs all States and all parliamentary rights for the sake of
_salus populi_ or rather of _salus_ of slavocracy. Jeff Davis
nominates officers in the regiments whatever be the opposition of
the respective Governors. In the North, the Governors, all of them,
(Seymour?) true patriots, insist upon power and the right to
organize new regiments, and resist the centralization by the United
States Government. Perhaps--as the satraps and martinets
assert--thereby the organisation of the army is thrown on a false
track. Whether so or not, one thing is certain, but for the States
and Governors, Lincoln, Scott, Seward, McClellan, Halleck, or the
Union, would be nowhere.
_Jan. 4._--They fight battles in the West. Generals, to be
victorious, must be in spiritual and in electric communion with the
heroic soldiers. So it was at Murfreesborough. Rosecrans, at the
head of his cavalry or body guard, dashes in the thickest, and turns
the dame fortune, who smiles on heroes, but never smiled on
McClellan nor on his tail. Rosecrans sticks not to regulations, and
keeps not a few miles in the rear. Franklin, at Fredericksburgh
mounted not even his horse but stood in front of his tent. Similar
to Rosecrans here was Kearney, the bravest of the brave, more of a
captain than any of the West-Point high-nosed nurslings; so is
Heintzelman, Hooker, Reno, Sigel and many, many others, whom
McClellanism, Halleckism, Lincolnism kept or keeps down.
I positively learned that in the last days of the summer of 1862, a
list without heading circulated in the Potomac army, and all who
signed it bound themselves to obey only McClellan. The McClellan
clique originated this conspiracy, which extended throughout all the
grades.
What confusion prevails about the rights of existence of slavery.
How they discuss it. How they pettifog. Why not establish the
rights of existence of syphilis, of _plica_ in the human body. O,
casuists. O, _Intelligencers_. O, _Worlds_!
Well, to me, slavery seems to legally (cursed legality) exist in
virtue of the special State rights, and not in virtue of the
Constitution. But for the State rights, the Africo-American is a man
and citizen of the United States--and this under the Constitution
which is paramount to State rights. The rebellion annihilates the
State rights, and all special constitutions guaranteed by the Union,
and at the same time annihilates the relation of the Africo-American
to the specific States or constitutions. It restores to him the
rights of man guaranteed to him as man by the Union and the
Constitution of the United States. The Africo-American recovers his
rights, lost and annihilated by specific State rights and municipal,
local laws. The president had to issue his proclamation as guardian
and executor of the Constitution, and then Africo-Americans
recovered their citizenship on firmer and broader grounds than
under, or by the war power. Calhoun, the father of the rebellion--as
Milton's Satan--and all the rebels now curse or cursed the preamble
of the Constitution as Satan cursed the light. I suppose Calhoun's
and the rebels' reasons are similar to me. _Inde irae._
The commanders in the West bear evidence of the devotion, the
heroism and the endurance of the Africo-Americans, sacrificing their
lives without hope; martyrs by the rebels as well as by Hallecks and
the like.
I met a farmer from Maine. He was rather old and poor. Had two
sons--lost them both--they were all his hope. He spoke simply of it,
but to break one's heart. _He grudged not_, (his own words,) his
hopes and blood for the cause, and considered it good luck to have
recovered the body of one of his boys, and brought it back home to
the "old woman," (wife, mother.) I shook hands with him. I ought to
have kissed him. Unknown, unnamed hero-patriot! and similar are
hundreds of thousands, and such is the true people. And so
sacrilegiously dealt with by insane helplessness.
_Jan. 5._--The _Doctors Constitutionis_ break their formula brains
concerning the constitutionality of the proclamation, and foretell
endless complications. If so, if complications arise, the reasons
thereof are moral, logical and practical. 1st.--The emancipation was
neither conceived nor executed in love; but it was for Lincoln as
Vulcan for Jupiter. The proclamation is generated neither by
Lincoln's brains, heart or soul, and what is born in such a way is
always monstrous. 2d.--Legally and logically, the proclamation has
the smallest and the most narrow basis that could have been
selected. When one has the free choice between two bases, it is more
logical to select the broader one. The written Constitution had
neither slavery nor emancipation in view, but it is in the preamble,
and the emancipation ought to be deduced from the preamble. Many
other reasons can be enumerated pregnant with complications and
above all when Lincoln-Seward are the _accoucheurs_. My hope and
confidence is in the logic of events always stronger than man's
helplessness and imbecility.
_Jan. 5._--European rulers, wiseacres, meddlers, humbugs, traitors,
demons, diplomats, assert that they must interfere here because
European interests suffer by the war. Indeed! You have the whole old
continent and Australia to boot, and about nine hundreds millions of
population; can you not organise yourself so as not to depend from
us? And if by your misrules, etc., our interests were to suffer, you
would find very strange any complaint made on our part. Keep aloof
with your good wishes, and with your advices, and with your
interference. You may burn your noses, and even lose your little
scalps. You robbers, murderers, hypocrites, surrounded by your
liveried lackeys, you presumptuous, arrogant curses of the human
race, stand off, and let these people whose worst criminal is a
saint when compared to a Decembriseur--let this people work out its
destinies, be it for good or for evil.
_Jan. 5._--Early in December, 1860, therefore soon after Mr.
Lincoln's election, a shrewd and clear-sighted politician, Gen.
Walsh, from New York, visited Springfield, and made his bow to the
rising sun. On his return from the Illinois Medira, I asked the
general what was his opinion concerning the new President. "Well,
sir," was the general's answer, "in parting, I advised Mr. Lincoln
to get a very eminent man for his private secretary."--_Sapienti
sat._
_Jan. 6._--Oh for a voice of thousand storms to render justice to
the patriots in Congress, to make the masses of the people know and
appreciate them, and to show up the littleness and the ignorance of
the pillars of the Republican press. Never and in no country has the
so-called good press shown itself so below the great emergencies of
the day as are the old hacks semperliving in the press.
_Jan. 7._--The great military qualities shown by Gen. Rosecrans,
thrilled with joy all the best men in the Potomac Army. The war
horse Hooker is the loudest to admire Rosecrans. Happy the Western
heroes to be beyond the immediate influence of Washington--of the
White House--and above all, of such as Halleck!
Rosecrans has revealed all the higher qualities of a captain;
coolness, resolution, stubbornness and inspiration. His army began
to break,--he ordered the attack on the whole line, and thus
transformed defeat into victory. Not of McClellan's school, is
Rosecrans.
_Jan. 7._--Senator Sumner who, during the ministerial crisis, ought
to have exposed to the country the mischievous direction given by
Mr. Seward to our foreign relations, and who ought to have done it
nobly, boldly, authoritatively, patriotically, and from his
Senatorial chair, Senator Sumner's preferred to keep stoically
quiet, notwithstanding that his personal friends and the country
expected it from him. Yet next to Chase, Senator Sumner, more than
any body, attacks Seward in private conversation! I read in the
papers that Senator Sumner's influence on Mr. Lincoln is
considerable (nevertheless Seward remained as the greatest curse to
the country,) and that he, Sumner, is a _power behind the throne_.
Has Sumner insinuated this himself to some newspaper reporter in
_extremis_ for news? _Power behind the throne_, what a tableau:
Sumner and Lincoln! O, Hogarth, O, Callot! Oh, for your crayon! and
now--of course--the country is safe, having such _Power behind the
throne_.
_Mr. Lincoln's good intentions_ I hear talked about right and left.
Oh, for one sensible, good, energetic action, and all his intentions
may go where the French proverb puts them.
_Jan. 7._--The city crowded with Major Generals and
Brigadier-Generals not in activity. When Mr. Lincoln is cornered,
then he makes a Brigadier or a Major General, according to
circumstances and in obedience to political or to backstairs
influence. From the beginning of the war, no sound notions directed
the nominations, either under Cameron, Scott, or McClellan, or now;
at the beginning of the war they had Generals without troops, then
troops without Generals, and now they have Generals who have not
commanded, or cannot command, troops. If, during the war in Poland
in 1831, Warsaw, the Capital, had been overrun in such a way by
do-nothing Generals, the chambermaids in the city would have taken
the affair into their fair hands, and armed with certain night
effluvia made short work with the military drones.
_Jan. 8._--A poor negro woman with her child was refused entrance
into the cars. It snowed and stormed, and she was allowed to shiver
on the platform. A so-called abolitionist Congress and President
gave the charter to the constructors of the city railroad and the
members of Congress have free tickets, and the Africo-American is
treated as a dog. Human honesty and justice!
_Jan. 8._--Horse contracts the word. Never in my life saw I the
horse so maltreated and the cavalry so poorly, badly, brainlessly
organised, drilled and used. Some few exceptions change not the
truth of my assertions, and McClellan is considered a great
organiser. They ruin more horses here in this war than did Napoleon
I. in Russia, (I speak not of the cold which killed thousands at
once.)
How ignorant and conceited! Halleck solicits Rarey, the horse-tamer,
for instructions. O, Halleck, you are unique! Officers who have
served in armies with large, good, well-organised and well-drilled
cavalry--such officers will teach you more than Rarey. But such
officers are from Europe, and it would be a shame for a West-Point
incarnation of ignorance and conceit to learn anything from an
officer of European experience. Bayard, however, thought not so.
Justice to his name.
The rebels are not so conceited as the simon pure West-Pointers.
Above all the rebels wish success, and have no objections to learn;
they imported good European cavalry officers, and have now under
Stuart (his chief of staff is a Prussian officer) a cavalry which
has made a mark in this war.
_Jan. 8._--O rhetors! O, rhetors! malediction upon you and upon the
politicians! You have no heart, no sensibilities. Not one, not one
has yet uttered a single word for the fallen, for the suffering, the
dying and nameless heroes of our armies. It seems, O rhetors and
politicians! that the people ought to bleed that you may prosper.
Corpses are needed for your stepping stones! The fallen are not
mentioned now in Congress, as you never mentioned them in your poor
stump speeches. O, you whitened sepulchres!
O rhetors and politicians! O, powers on, before, and "behind the
throne!" In your selfish, heartless conceit, you imagine that the
Emancipation is and will be your work, and will be credited to you.
Oh yes, but by old women.
The people's blood, the fallen heroes, tore the divine work of
emancipation, from the hands of jealously watching demons. To the
shadows of the fallen the glory, and not to your round, polished or
unpolished phrases. Not the pen with which the proclamation was
written is a trophy and a relic, but the blood steaming to heaven,
the corpses of the fallen, corpses mouldering scattered on all the
fields of the Union.
_Jan. 8._--As a rapid spring tide, so higher and higher, and with
all parties--even, with the decided Copperheads--rises the haughty
contempt toward the crowned, the official, the aristocratic, and the
flatfooted (livery stable) part of Europe. Good and just! Marshy,
rotten rulers and aristocrats who scarcely can keep your various
shaky and undermined seats, you and your lackeys, you take on airs
of advisors, of guardians, of initiators of civilization! Forsooth!
I except Russia. In Russia the sovereign, his ministers and
nine-tenths of the aristocracy are in _uni sono_ with the whole
nation; and all are against slavery, against the rebels, against
traitors. The Russian government and the Russian nation often are
misrepresented by their official or diplomatic agents.
Any well organized American village in the free States contains more
genuine, moral and intellectual civilization than prevails among
European higher circles, those gilded pasteboards. This is all that
you, you conceited advisors, represent in that splendid,
all-embracing edifice of civilization! At the best you are
ornaments, or--with Wilhelm von Humboldt--you are culture, but not
the higher, man-inspiring civilization. A John S. Mill, a Godwin
Smith, and those many outside of the _would-be-something_ strata in
England, in France, almost the whole Germany, those are the
representatives of the genuine civilized Europe.
The freemen of the North, on whom you European exquisites look
superciliously down with your albino eyes, the freemen of the North,
bleeding in this deadly struggle, are the confessors for the general
civilization, and stand on the level with any martyrs, with any
progressive people on record on history.
_Jan. 9._--Quo, quo scelesti ruitis.........
It is maddening to witness for so many months the reckless waste of
men, of time, of money, and of material means, and all this
squandered by governmental and administrative helplessness and
conceit. In the military part, notwithstanding Stanton's devotion
and efforts, that Halleck, _excrementum Scotti_, as by appointment,
carries out everything contrary to common sense, to well established
and experienced (Halleck and experience, ah!... military practice,
and Mr. Lincoln is as perfectly) charmed by it, as is the innocent
bird by the snake.
And thus the sacrifices and the blood of the people run out as does
the mighty Rhine--they run out in sand. O, Lincoln-Seward's domestic
policy. O, Lincoln-Halleck's war power! You make one shudder as with
a death pang.
_January 9._--The worshippers of slavery, that is, the Democrats, of
the Seymour's, Wood's, and the _World's_ church, call the war waged
for the defence of human rights, for civilization and for
maintaining the genuine rational self-government, they call it an
unholy war. In some respects the Copperheads are right. The holy war
loses its holiness in the hands of Lincoln, Seward, Halleck, and
their disciples and followers, because those leaders violate all the
laws of logic and of reason, this holy of holies. At times I would
prefer peace than see devoted men so recklessly murdered by such....
A critique of the first volume of the "Diary" asserts that all my
statements are made after the events occurred, _ex post_. To a very
respectable General I showed a part of the original manuscript which
squared with the printed book. Often I am ashamed to find that the
bit of study and experience acquired by me goes so far when compared
with many around me, and in action. I foresee, because I have no
earthly personal views, no cares, nothing in the world to think of
or to aim at, no charms, no ties--only my heart, my ideas, my
convictions, and civilization is my worship. Nothing prevents me,
day and night, from concentrating whatever powers and reading I can
have in one single focus. This cause, this people, this war, its
conduct, are the events amidst which I breathe. Uninterruptedly I
turn and return all that is in my mind--that is all. And I am proud
to have my heart in harmony with my head.
Almost every event has its undercurrent, and of ten the little
undercurrents pre-eminently shape the events themselves. The truth
of this axiom is illustrated principally in the recall of the
resolute, indefatigable, far and clear-sighted patriot and
statesman, General Butler. To jump to a conclusion without much ado,
the recall of Butler from New Orleans is due principally, if not
even exclusively, to the united efforts--or conspiracy--of Mr.
Seward and Mr. Reverdy Johnson. Thirteen months ago Mr. Seward
expected, as he still expects for the future, an uprising of a Union
Party in the hottest hot-bed of Secessia. That such are the
Secretary of State's expectations, I emphatically assert, and as
proof, it may be stated that only yesterday, January 9th, Mr. Seward
most authoritatively tried to impress upon foreign diplomats the
speedy reunion and _restoration_ of the Union as it was,
notwithstanding the Proclamation, _still considered by the Secretary
of State_ as being _a waste of paper_. How far the foreign diplomats
believe the like oracular decisions, is another question; certain it
is that they shrug their shoulders.
But to return to Butler and New Orleans. The patriotic activity by
which General Butler won, conquered and maintained the rebel city
for the Union, was emphatically considered by Mr. Seward, as
crushing out every spark of any latent Union feeling among the
rebels. Thurlow Weed, then abroad, urged Mr. Seward to find out the
said Union feeling, to blow it into almighty fire and to rely
exclusively upon it. Here Reverdy Johnson was and is, the principal
Union crony of the Secretary of State, and Seaton of the
_Intelligencer_; but above all, since the murder of Massachusetts
men at Baltimore in 1861, Reverdy Johnson was the devoted advocate
of all rich traitors, as the Winans and others, who were called by
him "misled Union men." When Gen. Butler dealt deserved justice to
rich traitors in New Orleans, the Washington Unionists surrounding
Mr. Chase and Mr. Seward--some of them from New Orleans--urged an
investigation. The Secretary of State eagerly seized the occasion to
dispatch to the Crescent City Mr. Reverdy Johnson with the principal
secret mission to gather together the elements of the scattered
Union feeling in Louisiana and in the South, and to make them
blaze--in honor of the Secretary of State. It was a rich harvest in
every way for Reverdy Johnson; he harvested it, and on his return
fully convinced the Secretary of State, that the Union could not be
saved if Gen. Butler remained in his command in the Department of
the Gulf.
This surreptitious undermining of General Butler by the Secretary of
State, is one more evidence of how truly patriotic was the effort of
the Republican Senators and Congressmen to liberate the President
and the country from the all-choking and all-poisoning influence of
Mr. Seward, and how cursed must remain forever the conduct of Mr.
Chase, who, after having during two years cried against Seward,
accusing him almost of treason, when the hour struck, preferred to
embarrass the patriots and the President rather that to let Mr.
Seward retire and deprive the people of his _patriotic_ services. It
was moreover expected that, thus warned by the patriots, the
President would seize the first occasion to infuse energy into his
Cabinet. But there is a Mr. Usher, a docile nonentity, made
Secretary of the Interior; of course the Secretary of State will be
strengthened thereby.
_January 10._--Senator Wright of Indiana, in an ardent and lofty--of
course, not rhetorical, speech, hit the nail on the head, when,
rendering due homage to Rosecrans, he called him "the first general
who fights for the people and not for the White House." The greatest
praise for the man, and the most saddening picture of our internal
sores.
_January 10._--As the pure _populus Romanus_ had an inborn aversion
to Kings and diadems, and could not patiently bear their
neighborhood, so the genuine American Democrat, one by principles
and not by a party name or by a party organization, such a Democrat
feels it to be death for his institutions to have slavocracy in his
country or in its neighborhood.
_Jan. 10._--O how is to be pitied the future historian of this
bloody tragedy! Through what a loathsome cesspool of documentary
evidence, preserved in the various State Archives, the unhappy
historian will have to wade, and wade deep to his chin. Original
works of Lincoln, Seward, etc.
It is easy to play a game at chess with a far superior player, then
at least one learns something; but impossible to sit at a chess
board with a child who throws all into confusion. The national
chessboard is very confused in the White House. Cunning is good for,
and only succeeds in dealing with, mean and petty facts.
_Jan. 10._--Halleck's congratulatory order to Rosecrans and to the
Western heroes. How cold and pedantic. How differently, how
enthusiastically and fiery rang Stanton's words on the capture of
forts Henry and Donelson and to Lander's (now dead) troops. Why is
Stanton silent? Is it the Constitution, the Statute, is it the
incarnate four years formula which seals Stanton's heart and brains?
or is Stanton eaten up by the rats in the Cabinet?
_January 10._--The messages of the loyal Governors, not copperheads,
(as is Seymour of N. Y.) above all, the message of Andrew of
Massachusetts, throw a ray of hope and promise over this dark, cold,
unpatriotic confusion so eminent here in Washington. This confusion,
this groping, double-dealing and helplessness can be only cured by a
wonder, or else all will be lost. The wonder is daily perpetrated by
the all enduring, all-sacrificing people.
Those criminals who ought to have been shot, or, at the mildest,
cashiered for the slaughter at Fredericksburgh, the engineers,
mock-Jominis, the sham soldiers: all these Washington engineers of
that recent butchery, assert now, that, after all, the possession of
Fredericksburgh was immaterial; that Lee would have then selected a
better position. All this is thrown to the public to palliate the
crime of the Washington military conclave, and to weaken and
invalidate Hooker's evidence before the War Committee. It must be
admitted that if Hooker--having fifty thousand in hand, and one
hundred thousand in his rear, had seized the Fredericksburgh
heights, he would not have allowed Lee to so easily select a
position and to fortify it. Nay, I suppose, that not only Hooker,
but even a Halleck, a Cullum or a Meigs would have prevented Lee
from settling in any comfortable position. However, I might be
mistaken. Corinth, Corinth, for Halleck. Those great nightcaps here
have so original and so new military conceptions, their general
comprehension of warfare so widely differs from science, experience,
and from common sense, that, holding Fredericksburgh they might have
invited Lee to select whatever he wanted as a strong position.
I learn that Halleck is at work to translate some French military
book. What an inimitable narrow-minded pedant. If Halleck had
brains, he could not have an hour leisure for translation. But in
such way he humbugs Mr. Lincoln, who looks on Halleck as the
quintessence of military knowledge and genius. A man who can
translate a French book must be a genius. Is it not so, Lincoln? And
thus Halleck translates a book instead of taking care that the
pontoons be sent in time; and Halleck prepared sheets for the press,
and our soldiers to be massacred.
Burnside prepares a movement; Franklin, to undermine Burnside, to
appear great, or to get hold of the army, denounces Burnside
secretly to the President: the President forbids the movement. What
a confusion! Mr. Lincoln, either accept Burnside's resignation,
which he has repeatedly offered, or kick down the denouncers.
Accident made me discover almost next day, the names of the two
generals sent by Franklin on this denunciatory errand--John Cochran
and Newton. I instantly told all to Stanton, who was almost ignorant
of Franklin's surreptitiousness. I also told it to several Senators.
The Army of the Potomac is altogether demoralized--above all, in the
higher grades. It could not be otherwise if they were angels.
McClellanism was and is propitious to general disorder, and how Mr.
Lincoln improves is exemplified above. Independent men, independent
Senators and Representatives who approach Mr. Lincoln, find him
peevish, irritable, intractable to all patriots. _All these are
criteria of a lofty mind and character._ Weed, Seward, Harris,
Blair, and such ones alone, are agreeable in the White House.
So much is spoken of the war powers of the President; I study, and
study, and cannot find them as absolute as the Lincolnites construe
them. All that I read in the Constitution are the real _war powers_
in the Congress, and the President is only the executor of those
powers. The President must have permission for every thing, almost
at every step--and has no right to issue decrees. He has no war
powers over those of Congress, and can act very little on his own
hook. It seems to me that Congress, misled, confused by casuists,
expounders, and by small intellects worshipping routine, that
Congress rather abdicated their powers, and that the bunglers around
Lincoln, in his name greedily seized the above powers.
Poor Lincoln! As the devil dreads holy water, so Mr. Lincoln dreads
to be surrounded with stern, earnest, ardent, patriotic advisers.
Such men would not listen to stories!
_January 11._--The thus-called metropolitan press is in the hands of
old politicians, old hacks--and no new forces or intellects pierce
through. It is a phenomenon. In any whatever country in Europe, at
every convulsion the press bristles with new, fresh intellects.
Here, the old nightcaps have the monopoly. Farther: those
respectable fossils reside at a distance from the focus of affairs,
are not directly in contact with events and men, and are in no
communion with them. The Grand Lamas of the press depend for
information upon the correspondents, who catch news and ideas at
random, and nourish with them their employers and the public.
_January 11._--Senator Sumner has made a motion to give homesteads
to the liberated Africo-Americans. That is a better and a nobler
action than all his declamations put together.
_January 12._--Sentinels in double line surrounding the White House.
Odious, ridiculous, unnecessary, and an aspect unwonted in this
country--giving the aspect to the White House of an abode of a
tyrant, when it is only that of a shifting politician. It is
Halleck, who, with the like futilities and absurdities, amuses
Lincoln and gets the better of him.
Mr. Lincoln is very depressed at the condition of the Army of the
Potomac, and decides--nothing for its reorganization. But for
Halleck, Stanton would reorganize and give a new and healthy life to
the army. I mean the upper grades, and not the rank and file, who
are patriotic and healthy.
After Corinth, Halleck-Buell disorganized the Western, now Halleck
is at work to do the same with the Potomac Army. I know that in the
presence of a diplomat, Halleck complained that he is paid only five
thousand dollars, and earned by far more in California. He had
better return to California and to his pettifogging.
Since the beginning of this Administration, Mr. Seward wrote, I am
sure, more dispatches than France, England, Prussia, Russia,
Austria, Spain, and Italy put together during the Crimean war, and
up to this day. Great is ink, and paper is patient!
_January 13._--It is more than probable that Mr. Mercier stirred up,
or at least heartily supported the mediation scheme. The Frenchmen
in New York maintain that Mr. Mercier derives his knowledge of
America and his political inspirations from that foul sheet, the
_Courrier des Etats Unis_. There is some truth in this assertion, as
the reasons enumerated to justify mediation can be found in various
numbers of that sheet. I am sorry that Mr. Mercier has fallen so
low; as for his master, he is a fit associate for the _Courrier_.
_January 13._--Ralph Waldo Emerson, inspired and not silenced by the
storm. He alone stands up from among the Athenian school. He alone
is undaunted. So would be Longfellow, but for the terrible domestic
calamity whose crushing blow no man's heart could resist. I never
was a great admirer of Emerson, but now I bow, and burn to him my
humble incense.
_January 15._--The patriotic, and at times inspired orator--not
rhetor--Kelly, from Pennsylvania, told me that all is at sixes and
sevens in the Administration, and in the army. I believe it. How
could it be otherwise, with Lincoln, Seward and Halleck at the head?
Mr. Seward did his utmost to defeat the re-election of Judge Potter
from Wisconsin, one among the best and noblest patriots in the
country. For this object Mr. Seward used the influence of the
pro-Catholic Bonzes. Then Mr. Seward wrote a letter denying all
this--a letter which not in the least convinced the brave Judge, as
I have it from himself.
If all the lies could only be ferreted out with which Seward
bamboozles Lincoln, even the God of Lies himself would shudder.
_January 15._--The noble and lofty voice of the genuine English
people, the voice of the working classes, begins to be heard. The
people re-echo the key-note struck by a J. S. Mills, by a Bright, a
Cobden, and others of like pure mind and noble heart. The voice of
the genuine English people resounds altogether differently from the
shrill _falsetto_ with which turf hunters, rent-roll devourers,
lords, lordlings, and all the like shams and whelps try to
intimidate the patriotic North, and comfort the traitors, the
rebels.
_January 16._--But for the truly enlightened and patriotic efforts
of the Senators Wade, Lane, (of Kansas) and Trumbull, the debate of
yesterday, Thursday, on the appropriation for the West Point
Military Academy would have gone to the country, absolutely
misleading and stultifying the noble and enlightened people. It was
most sorrowful, nay, wholly disgusting to witness how Senators who,
until then, had stood firmly against small influences and narrow
prejudices, blended together in an unholy alliance to sustain the
accursed clique of West Point engineers. Much allowance is to be
made for the allied Senators' ignorance of the matter, and for the
natural wish to appear wise. The country, the people, ought to
treasure the names of the ten patriotic Senators whose voices
protested against further sustaining that cursed nursery of
arrogance, of pro-slavery, or of something worse.
Whatever might have been the efforts of the Senatorial patrons and
the allies of the engineers, the following facts remained for ever
unalterable: 1st. That the spirit of close educational corporation
which have exclusive monopoly and patronage, is perfectly similar to
the spirit which prevailed and still prevails in monasteries, and
permeates the pupils during their whole after life; 2d. That the
prevailing spirit in West Point was and is rather monarchical and
altogether Pro-Slavery; 3d, that of course some noble exceptions
are to be found and made,--but they are exceptions; 4th, that such
educational monasteries nurse conceit and arrogance; and this the
mass of West Pointers have prominently shown during this war in
their relations with the noble and devoted volunteers, and that this
arrogant spirit of clique and of caste works mischievously in the
army; 5th, that exceptions, noble and patriotic, as a Reno, a Lyons,
a Bayard, a Stevens, and other such heroes and patriots, do not
disprove the general rule; 6th, that Lyons, Grant, Rosecrans,
Hooker, Heintzelman, etc., have shown glorious qualities not on
account of what they learnt in West Point, but by what they did not
learn there; 7th, that these heroes rose above the dry and narrow
school wisdom, and are what they are, not because educated in West
Point, but notwithstanding their education there. And here I
interrupt the further enumeration to give an extract from a private
letter directed to me by one of the most eminent pupils from West
Point, and the ablest _true_, not _mock_, engineer in our army:
"In regard to your views of West Point's influence I am at a loss
to make any answer," (the writer is a great defender of West
Point,) "but would suggest that it may be after all not West
Point, but the want of _a supreme hand_ to our military affairs
to _combine_ and _use_ the materials West Point furnishes, that
is in fault. * * * _West Point cannot make a general_--no
military school can--but it can and does furnish good soldiers.
All the distinguished Confederate generals are West Pointers, and
yet we know the men, and know that neither Lee, nor Johnson nor
Jackson, nor Beauregard, nor the Hills are men of any very
extraordinary ability," etc., etc., etc.
To this I answer: the rebels are with their heart and soul in their
cause, and thus their capacities are expanded, they are inspired on
the field of battle. (Similar answer I gave to General McDowell
about six months ago.) So was our Lyon, so are Rosecrans, Hooker,
Grant, and a few others; and for such generals, Senators Trumbull,
Wade and Lane ardently called in the above debate.
I continue the enumeration: 8th. The military direction of the war is
exclusively in the hands of a West Point clique, and of West Point
engineers,--not _very much_ with their hearts in the people's cause;
9th, that that clique of West Point engineers from McClellan down to
Halleck prevents any truly higher military capacity getting a free
untrammelled scope, (General Halleck with all his might opposes giving
the command of the army to Hooker,) and this Halleck, an engineer from
West Point, who never saw a cartridge burnt or a file of soldiers
fighting, to-day decides the military fate of our country on the
authority of a book said to be on military science, but if such a book
had been written by any officer in the armies of France, Prussia or
Russia, the ignorant author would have had the friendly advice from
his superiors to resign and select some pursuit in life more congenial
to his intellectual capacities; further, this Halleck complains in
following words: "that they (the Administration) made him leave a
profitable business in San Francisco, and pay him only 5,000 dollars
to fight THEIR (not his) battles." So much for a Halleck. 10th. That
the West Point clique of engineers, the McClellans, the Hallecks, the
Franklins, etc., have brought the country to the verge of the grave,
as stated by Senator Lane.
Such were the facts established by the patriotic and not
would-be-wise Senators; and there is an illustration recorded in
history as proof that the above not engineering Senators were right
in their assertions. Frederick II. was in no military school; the
captains second to Napoleon in the French wars were Hoche, Moreau,
and Massena, all of them from private life.
--The clique of engineers has the Potomac Army altogether in its
grasp, and has reduced and perverted the spirit of the noble
children of the people. Oh, the sooner this army shall be torn from
the hands of the clique the nearer and surer will be the salvation
of the country.
The clique accuses the volunteers; but the clique, the engineers in
power have disorganized, morally and materially, and disgraced the
Army of the Potomac. They did this from the day of the encampments
around Washington, in the fall of 1861, down to the day of
Fredericksburgh. Fredericksburgh was altogether prepared by
engineers; at Fredericksburgh the engineer Franklin did not even
mount his horse when his soldiers were misled and miscommanded--by
himself.
--Stragglers are generated by generals. Besides, to explain
straggling, I quote from a _genuine_ book on genuine military
science, published in Berlin in 1862, by Captain Boehn, the most
eminent professor at the military school in Potsdam: "The greatest
losses, during a war, inflicted on an army are by maladies and by
straggling. Such losses are five times greater than those of killed
and wounded; and an _intelligent administration_ takes preparatory
measures to meet the losses and to compensate them. Such measures of
foresight consist in organizing depots for battalions, which depots
ought to equal one sixth of the number of the active army." O,
Halleck, where are the depots?
--"In any ordinary campaign, excepting a winter campaign, the losses
amount (as established by experience) to one half in infantry, one
fourth in cavalry, and to one third in artillery." (Do you know any
thing about it, O, Halleck?)
Let the people be warned, and they may understand the location of
the cause generating further disasters. If the Army of the Potomac
shall win glory, it will win it notwithstanding the West Point
clique of engineers. The disasters have root in the White House,
where the advice of such a Halleck prevails.
--I know very well that the formation of the volunteers in
respective States and by the Governors of such States raises a great
difficulty in organizing and preparing reserves. But talent and
genius reveal themselves by overpowering difficulties considered to
be insurmountable. And Halleck is a man both of genius and talent.
Taking into account the patriotism, the devotion of the governors of
the respective states, [not _a la_ Copperhead Seymour], it would
have been possible, nay, even easy to organize some kind of
reserves. O, Halleck, O, fogies!
_January 17._--Mr. Lincoln loads on his shoulders all kinds of
responsibilities, more so than even Jackson would have dared to
take. Admirable if generated by the boldness of self-consciousness,
of faith, and of convictions. True men measure the danger--and the
means in their grasp to meet the emergency; others play
unconsciously with events, as do children with explosive and
death-dealing matters.
_January 17._--General and astronomer Mitchel's death may be credited
to Halleck. Halleck and Buell's envy--if not worse--paralysed Mitchel
and Turtschin's activity in the West. Mitchel and Turtschin were too
quick, that is, too patriotic. In early summer, 1862, they were sure
to take Chattanooga, a genuine strategic point, one of those principal
knots and nurseries in the life of the secesh. How imprudent!
Chattanooga is still in the hands of the rebels, and if we ever take
it, it will cost streams of blood and millions of money. Down with
Mitchel and Turtschin. Mitchel's _excrementa_ were more valuable than
are Halleck's heavy, but not expanding, brains. Mitchel revealed at
once all the qualities of an eminent, if not of a great general.
Quickness of mind, fertility of resources. An astronomer, a
mathematician, Mitchel's mind was familiar with broad combinations.
Such a mind penetrated space, calculated means and chances, balanced
forces and probabilities. Not to compare, however, is it to be borne
in mind that Napoleon was a mathematician in the fullest sense, and
not an engineer, not a translator.
_January 18._--Mr. Lincoln's letter to McClellan when the hero of
the Copperheads was in search of mud in the Peninsula. The letter
rings as sound common sense; it shows, however, that common sense
debarred of strong will remains unproductive of good. Mr. Lincoln
commonly shows strong will, in the wrong place.
----ein Theil von jener Krafft,
Die stehts das Guthe will, und stehts das Boese schaff.
_January 18._--The emancipation proclamation is out. Very well. But
until yet not the slightest signs of any measures to execute the
proclamation, at once, and in its broadest sense. Now days, even
hours, are equal to years in common times. Had Lincoln his heart in
the proclamation, on January 2d he would begin to work out its
expansion, realization, execution. I wish Lincoln may lift himself,
or be lifted by angels to the grandeur of the work. But it is
impossible. Surrounded as he is, and led in the strings by Seward,
Blair, Halleck, and by border-state politicians, the best that can
be expected are belated half measures.
Stanton comprehends broadly and thoroughly the question of
emancipation and of arming the Africo-Americans. As I intend to
realize my plans of last year and organise Africo-American
regiments, I had conversations with Stanton, and find him more
thorough about the matter than is any body whom I met. He agreed
with me, that the cursed land of Secessia ought to be surrounded by
camps to enlist and organise the enslaved, as a scorpion surrounded
with burning coals. Such organizations introduced rapidly and
simultaneously on all points, would shake Secessia to its
foundations, and put an end to guerillas, _alias_ murderers and
robbers. We will again think and talk it over. But as is wont with
Lincoln, he will hesitate, hesitate, until much of precious time
will be lost.
_January 18._--A surgeon in one of the hospitals in Alexandria
writes in a private note:
"Our wounded bear their sufferings nobly; I have hardly heard a
word of complaint from one of them. A soldier from the 'stern and
rock bound coast' of Maine--a victim of the slaughter at
Fredericksburgh--lay in this hospital, his life ebbing away from
a fatal wound. He had a father, brothers and sisters, a wife, and
one little boy of two or three years old, on whom his heart
seemed set. Half an hour before he ceased to breathe, I stood by
his side, holding his hand. He was in the full exercise of his
intellectual faculties, and knew he had but a brief time to live.
He was asked if he had any message to leave for his dear ones
whom he loved so well. "_Tell them_," said he, "_how I died--they
know how I lived!_"
_January 19._--Senator Wright, of Indiana, stirred the hearts of the
Senate and of the people. It was not the oration of a rhetor--it was
the confession of an ardent, pure patriot. I never heard or
witnessed anything so inspiring and so kindling to soul and heart.
_January 20._--General Butler palsied and shelved, Halleck all
powerful and with full steam running the country and the army to
destruction--such is the truest photograph of the situation. But as
an adamantine rock among storms, so Mr. Lincoln remains unmoved.
Unmoved by the yawning, bleeding wounds of the devoted, noble
people--unmoved by the prayers and supplication of patriots--of
his--once--best friends. Mr. Lincoln answers, with dignity not
Roman, and with obstinacy unparallelled even by Jackson, that he
will stand or fall with his present advisers, and that he takes the
responsibility for all the cursed misdeeds of Seward, Halleck,
Chase, and others. So children are ready to set a match to a powder
magazine unconscious of the terrible results--unconscious of the
awful responsibility for its destructive action.
A death pang runs through one's body to see how rapidly the dial
marks the disappearing hours, and how unrelentingly approaches March
4th, and the death-knell of this present patriotic, devoted
Congress. For this terrible storm and clash of events, the people,
perhaps, feel not the immensity of the loss. Paralyzed as Congress
has been and now is, by the infernal machinations of Seward, Chase,
and others, and by Mr. Lincoln's stubborn helplessness, the patriots
in both Houses nevertheless, succeeded in redeeming the pledge which
the name of America gives to the expansive progress of humanity. The
patriots of both Houses, as the exponents of the noble and loftiest
aspirations of the American people, whipped in--and this literally,
not figuratively--whipped Mr. Lincoln into the glory of having
issued the Emancipation Proclamation. The laws promulgated by this
dying Congress initiated the Emancipation--generated the
Proclamation of the 22d September, and of January 1st. History will
not allow one to wear borrowed plumage.
--Congress ought not to have so easily abdicated its well established
rights of more absolute and direct control of the deeds of the
Administration and of its clerks, _alias_ Secretaries of Departments.
It is to be eternally regretted that Congress has shown such
unnecessary leniency; but in justice it must be said that the
patriotic and high-minded members of Congress wished to avoid the
degrading necessity of showing the nation the prurient administrative
sores. Advised, directed, tutored and pushed by Seward, Blair and
Chase, Mr. Lincoln is--innocently--as grasping for power, as are any
of those despots not over respectfully recorded by history.
With all this, the presence of Congress keeps in awe the reckless
and unscrupulous Administration, as, according to the pious belief
of medieval times, holy water awed the devil. But Congress once out
of the way, without having succeeded in rescuing Mr. Lincoln from
the hands of those mean, ignorant, egotistic bunglers, all the time
squinting towards the succession to the White House, and unable to
surround the President with men and patriots, then all the plagues
of Egypt may easily overrun this fated country. Such conjurors of
evil as the Sewards, Hallecks, and others, will have no dread of any
holy water before them, and they will be sure that the great party
of the "Copperheads" in the future Congress will applaud them for
all the mischief done, and lift them sky high, if they succeed in
treading down in the gutter, or in any way palsying emancipation,
tarnishing the people's noble creed, and endangering the country's
holiest cause.
General Fitz-John Porter's trial before court-martial ended in his
dismissal, but ought punishment to fall on him alone, when the
butchers of Fredericksburgh and when the pontoon men are in high
command? when a Franklin is still sustained, when a Seward and a
Halleck remain firm in their high places as the gates of hell?
_January 20._--Wrote a respectful letter to the President on
Halleck's military science, his book, and capacity. Told
respectfully to Mr. Lincoln that not even the Sultan would dare to
palm such a Halleck on his army and on his people.
Mr. Lincoln in his greatness says that "he will stand and fall with
his Cabinet." O, Mr. Lincoln! O, Mr. Lincoln! purple-born sovereigns
can no more speak so!
Mr. Lincoln! with the gang of politicians, your advisers and
friends, _you all desire immensely, and will feebly_. You desire the
reconstruction of the Union, and you almost shun the ways and means
to do it. And thus this noble people is dragged to a slaughter
house.
Parumne campis atque Neptuno super
Fusum est--[Yankee] sanguinis?
_January 21._--Deep, irreconcilable as is my hatred of slavocrats
and rebels, nevertheless I am forced to admire the high intellectual
qualities of their chiefs, when compared with that of ours. Of
Lincoln _versus_ Jeff Davis I spoke in the first volume. But now
Lee, Jackson, Hill, Ewall, _versus_ Halleck, McClellan, McDowell,
Franklin, etc.
_January 22._--Wendell Phillips's _Amen_ oration to the Proclamation
is noble and torrent-like oratory. Greeley is the better Greeley of
former times. I heartily wish to admire and speak well of Greeley,
as of every body else. Is it my fault that they give me no occasion?
_January 23._--General Fitz-John Porter, McClellan's pet, told me
to-day, that after the battle at Hanover Court House, he supplicated
McClellan to attack Richmond at once--which in Porter's opinion
could have been taken without much ado,--and not to change his base
to James River; and even Fitz-John could not prevail on this demigod
of imbeciles, traitors and intriguers.
_January 24._--Here is one of the thousand flagrant lies with which
Seward entangles Lincoln, as with a net of steel. Lincoln assured
General Ashley that the public is unjust toward Seward in accusing
him of having worked for the defeat of Wadsworth. That they have
been the best friends for long years; that, when Military Governor
of Washington, Wadsworth was a daily visitor in Seward's house; and
that, during the canvass, Wadsworth consulted with Seward concerning
his (Wadsworth's) actions.
Mr. Seward knows that every one of those assertions which he or
Thurlow Weed pushed down the throat of Mr. Lincoln is a flagrant
lie. Every one knows that for many, many years the high-toned
Wadsworth had in utter detestation Mr. Seward's character as a
lawyer or as a public man, and that he never spoke to him, and never
was his political or private friend.
I am sorry to bring such details before the public, but how
otherwise convict a liar? As for Thurlow Weed's secret and open
machinations against the election of Wadsworth, only an idiot or a
s.... doubts them. Ask the New York politicians, provided they have
manhood to tell the truth.
_January 24th._--_Caveant Senators and Representatives!_ cannot be
too often hurled into the ears of the people and of the Congressmen.
The time runs lightning like--the 4th of March approaches with
comet-like velocity. If the tempest is not roaring, its signs are
visible, and most of the helmsmen are blind or unsteady. Oh! could
every move of the pendulums of the clocks of the Senate Chamber and
the Representatives' Hall, thunder-like repeat that _caveant_,
transmitted by the purest and best days of Rome! The Republicans and
many of the war Democrats are faithful and true to the people and to
its sacred cause; but the names of the "filibustering" traitors in
both houses ought to be nailed to the gallows!
European winds bring Louis Napoleon's opening speech, and the
confession, that although once rebuked, he, the dissolute, the
profligate, with his corrosive breath still intends to pollute the
virginity of our country; for such is the indelible stain to any
nation, to any people which accepts or submits to any, even the most
friendly, foreign mediation or arbitration. Never, never any great
nation or any self-respecting government, accepted or submitted to
any similar foreign interference. Of the peoples, nations and
governments, which allowed such interference, some collapsed into
degradation for a long time, only slowly recovering, like Spain;
others, like Poland, disappeared. Those who advocate such mediation
unveil their weakness, their thorough ignorance of the world's
history and of the historic and political bearings of the words,
_mediation_, and _arbitration_; and to crown all, these advocates
bring to market their imbecility.
The Africo-Americans ought to receive military organization and be
armed. But it ought to be done instantly and without loss of time;
it ought to be done earnestly, boldly, broadly; it ought to be done
at once on all points and on the largest scale; it ought to be done
here in Washington, under the eyes of the chief of the people; here
in the heart of the country; here, so to speak, in the face of
slave-breeding Virginia, this most intense focus of treason; it
ought to be done here, that the loyal freemen of Virginia's soil be
enabled to fight and crush the F. F. V's, the progeny of hell; it
ought to be done here on every inch of soil covered with shattered
shackles; and not partially on the outskirts, in the Carolinas and
Louisiana. Stanton, alone, and Welles among the helmsmen, are so
inspired; but alas, for the rest of the crew.
On the flags of the Africo-Americans under my command, I shall
inscribe: _Hic niger est! hunc tu (rebel) caveto!_ I shall inculcate
upon my men that they had better not make prisoners in the battle,
and not allow themselves to be taken alive.
_January 25th._--So Gen. McClellan's services to the rebellion are
acknowledged by the gift of a splendid mansion situated in New York,
in the social sewer of American society. The donors, are the shavers
from Wall Street, individuals who coin money from the blood and from
the misfortunes of the people, and who by high rents mercilessly
crush the poor; who sacrifice nothing for the sacred cause; who, if
they put their names as voluntary contributors of a trifle for the
war, thousand and thousand times recover that trifle which they
ostentatiously throw to gull the good-natured public opinion; not to
speak of those so numerous among the McClellanites, who openly or
secretly are in mental communion with treason and rebellion.
Naturally, all this gang honors its hero.
McClellan's pedestal is already built of the corpses of hundreds of
thousands butchered by his generalship, poisoned in the
Chickahominy, and decimated by diseases. His trophies are the wooden
guns from Centreville and Manassas.
_January 25th._--What from the beginning of this war, I witness as
administrative acts and dispositions, and further the debates in
Congress on the various bills for military organizations and for the
organization of the various branches of the military medical,
surgical, and quartermaster's service; all this fully convinces me
that the military and administrative routine, as transmitted by Gen.
Scott, or by his school, and as continued by his pets and remnants,
is almost the paramount cause of all mischief and evils. In the
medical, surgical, and in the quartermasters' offices, ought have
been appointed young civilians and business men as chiefs, having
under them some old routinists for the sake of technicalities of the
service. Such men would have done by far better than those old
intellectual drones. A merchant accustomed to carry on an extensive
and complicated business would have been by far a better
quartermaster-general--_Intendant des armees_--than the wholly
inexperienced Gen. Meigs. This last would serve as an aid to the
merchant. At the beginning of the war, I suggested to Senator Wilson
to import such quartermasters from France or Russia, men experienced
and accustomed to provide for armies of 100,000 men each. By paying
well, such men could have been easily found, and the military
medical and surgical bureau, as organized by Scott, was about sixty
years behind real science. These senile representatives of
non-science snubbed off Professor Van Buren of the New York
academy, to whom they compare as the light of a common match to that
of calcium. If men like Dr. Van Buren, Dr. Barker, and others of
real science from New York, Boston, Philadelphia, etc., had been
listened to, thousands and thousands of limbs and lives would have
been saved and preserved.
_January 25th._--Mr. Lincoln relishes the idea that if the cause of
the North is victorious, no one can claim much credit for it. I put
this on record for some future assumptions. Mr. Lincoln is the best
judge of the merits of his clerks and lieutenants. But Mr. Lincoln
forgets that the success will be due exclusively to the people--and,
_per contra_, he alone will be arrayed for the failure. His friends
and advisers, as the Sewards, the Weeds, the Blairs, the Hallecks,
will very cleverly wash their gored hands from any complicity with
him--Lincoln.
The army to be formed from Africo-Americans is to be entrusted to
converted conservatives. It is feared that sincere abolitionists if
entrusted with the command, may use the forces for some awful,
untold aims. It is feared that abolitionists once possessed of arms
and troops, may use them indiscriminately, and emancipate right and
left, by friend and foe, paying no attention to the shrieks of
border-States, of old women, of politicians, of cowards, of
Sewardites; nay, it is feared that genuine abolitionists may carry
too far their notions of absolute equality of races, and without
hesitation treat the white rebels with even more severity than they
threaten to treat loyal armed Africo-Americans. And why not?...
The history of England, the history of any free country has not on
record a position thus anomalous, even humiliating, as is that of
the patriots in Congress, thanks to Mr. Lincoln's helpless
stubbornness. The patriots forcibly must consider Mr. Lincoln, even
Sewardised, Blairised, Halleckised as he is, as being the only legal
power for the salvation of the country. The patriots must support
him, and instead of exposing the wretched faults, mistakes, often
ill-will of his administration, must defend the administration
against the attacks of the Copperheads, who try to destroy or
disorganize the administration on account of that atom of good that
it accidentally carries out on its own hook. And thus the patriots
must suffer and bear patiently abuses heaped on them by the
treasonable or by the stupid press, by intriguers and traitors; and
patriots cannot make even the slightest attempt to vindicate their
names.
_January 26th._--The visits to the White House and the "_I had a
talk with the President_," are among the prominent causes of the
distracted condition of affairs. With comparatively few exceptions,
almost everybody expands a few inches in his own estimation, when he
says to his listeners, nay, to his friends: "I had a talk with the
President." Of course it is no harm in private individuals to have
such _a talk_, but I have frequently observed and experienced that
public men had better refrain from having any talk with him. Very
often he is not a jot improved by their talk, and they come out from
the interview worsted in some sort or other.
Sumner, the Roman, the Cicero, was to-day urged by several
abolitionists from Boston to expose the mischief of both the foreign
and the domestic policy of Seward. The Senator replied that he is
more certain to succeed against that public nuisance and public
enemy by not attacking him openly. I vainly ransack my recollection
of my classic reading for the name of any Roman who ever made such a
reply.
_January 26th: Two o'clock P. M._--Hooker is in command! And
patriotic hearts thrill with joy! Mud, bad season, mortality, loss
of time, demoralization, such is the inheritance left by McClellan,
Halleck and Burnside--such are the results prepared by the infamous
West Point and other muddy intriguers in Washington, and in the
army,--such is the inheritance transmitted to Hooker, by the cursed
Administration procrastinations. In all military history there is
seldom, if ever, a record of a commander receiving an army under
such ominous circumstances. If Hooker succeeds, then his genius will
astonish even his warmest friends.
When Hooker was wounded, and in the hospital, he repeatedly
complained to me of the deficiency of the staffs. I reminded him of
it, and he promised to do his best to organize a staff without a
flaw.
I immediately wrote to Stanton, sending him several pages translated
from the German works of Boehn (before spoken of) to give to the
Secretary a general idea of what are the qualities, the science, the
knowledge and the duties of a good chief of staff. I explained that
the staff and the chief of the staff of an army are to it what the
brains and the nervous system are to the human body.
_9 o'clock, P. M._--I am told that Hooker wished to have for his
chief of staff General Stone, (white-washed) who is considered to be
one of the most brilliant capacities of the army. If so, it was a
good choice, and the opposition made by Stanton is for me--at the
best--unintelligible.
Hooker selected Butterfield. What a fall from Stone to Butterfield.
Between the two extend hundreds, nay, thousands, of various
gradations. Gen. Butterfield is brave, can well organize a regiment
or a brigade, but he has not and can not have the first atom of
knowledge required in a chief of staff of such a large army. Staff
duties require special studies, they are the highest military
science; and where, in the name of all, could Butterfield have
acquired it? I am certain Butterfield is not even aware that staff
duties are a special science. All this is a very bad omen, very bad,
very bad. Literally they laugh at me; now they hurrah for Hooker.
May they not cry very soon on account of Hooker's staff. When I
warn, Senators and Representatives tell me that I am very difficult
to be satisfied. We will see.
_January 27._--It is said that Franklin, Sumner, and even
Heintzelman declared they would not serve under Hooker. Let them go.
Bow them out, the hole in the army will be invisible. I am sorry
that Heintzelman plays such pranks, as he is a very good general and
a very good man. Well, a new galaxy of generals and commanders is
the inevitable gestation of every war. Seldom if ever the same men
end a war who began it. New men will prove better than the present
sickly reputations consecrated by Scott, West Point and Washington.
_January 27._--Governor Andrew--the man always to the point, or as the
French would say _toujours a la hauteur de la question_--insists on
forming African or black regiments in Boston from free blacks. Such
formations interfere not with my project, as I principally, nay
exclusively, look to contrabands, to actual slaves. Governor Andrew
wishes to give the start, to stir up the Government and other
Governors and to drag them in his footsteps. He is the representative
man of the new and better generation which ought to have the affairs
of the country in hand, and not these old worn-out hacks who are at it
now. If such new men were at the helm in both civil and military
affairs, Secesh would have been already crushed and Emancipation
accomplished. To such a new generation belongs Coffey, one of the
Assistant Attorney Generals, Austin Stevens, Jr., Charles Dana,
Woodman, etc., etc. The country bristles with such men, and only
prejudices, stupidity, and routine prevents them from becoming really
active and from saving the country.
_January 27._--The patriotic majorities of both Houses of Congress
pass laws after laws concerning the finances, arming the
Africo-Americans, increasing the powers of the President, etc., each
of which taken alone, would not only save the cause but raise it
triumphant over the ruins of crime and of slavery, if used by
patriotic, firm, devoted, unegotistic hands and brains. But alas!
alas! very little of such, except in one or two individuals, is
located in the various edifices in and around the presidential
quarters.
The military organization of Africo-Americans is a powerful social
and military engine by which slavery, secession, rebellion, and all
other dark and criminal Northern and Southern excrescences can be
crushed and pulverized to atoms, and this in a trice. But as is the
case with all other powerful and explosive gases, elements, forces,
etc. this mighty element put in the hands of the Administration must
be handled resolutely, and with unquivering hands and intellect;
otherwise the explosion may turn out useless for the country and for
humanity.
At present the indications are very small that the administration
has a decided, clear comprehension how to use this accession of
loyal forces on a large scale; how to bring them boldly into action
in Virginia, as the heart of the rebellion. Nothing yet indicates
that the administration intends to arm and equip Africo-Americans
here under the eyes of the government. Nothing indicates that it
intends to do this avowedly and openly, and thereby terrify and
strike the proud slave-breeders, the F. F. V's. of Virginia, in the
heart of treason, and do it by their own once chattels, now their
betters.
_January 28._--The Congress almost expires; and will or can the
incarnated constitutional formula save the country? It is a chilling
thought to doubt, yet how can we have confidence! All in the
people! the people alone and its true men will not and cannot
fail, and they alone are up to the mission.
The dying Congress can no more reconquer its abdicated power. This
noble and patriotic majority--many of them, are not re-elected,
thanks to Lincoln-Seward--provide the incarnate formula with all
imaginable legal, constitutional powers, more than twice sufficient
to save the country. Could only the brains and hands entrusted with
laws, be able to execute them! Oh for a legal, constitutional,
statute Cromwell, ready to behead treason, rebellion, slavocracy and
slavo-sympathy, as the great Oliver beheaded and crushed the
poisonous weeds of his time. If the democratic-copperhead vermin
had the possibility, they would make a McClellan-Seymour
dictatorship, and extinguish for a century at least, light, right,
justice, and freedom. Not yet! Oh, Copperheads! not yet.
_January 29._--They dance to madness in New York, they dance here
and give dancing parties! O what a heartlessness, recklessness,
flippancy, and crime, of those mothers, wives and young crinolines,
when one half of the population is already in mourning, when they
have fathers, brothers, husbands in the army. I hope that Boston and
New England as well as the towns and villages of the country all
over, spit on this example given by New York and Washington. My
friend N----, progressive, enlightened and therefore a true Russian,
is amazed and displeased with such an intolerable flippancy. During
the Crimean war, no one danced in Russia from the Imperial palace
down to the remotest village; the people's indignation would have
prevented any body--even the Czar, from such a sacrilegious display
of recklessness when the country's integrity and honor were at
stake, when the nation's blood was pouring in torrents.
Unspeakably worse, is the cold indifference with which many
generals, many men in power, the rhetors and the politicians, speak
of what is more than a sacrifice in a sacred cause, is an unholy and
demoniac waste of human life. But some one--some avenging angel,
will call them all to a terrible account.
_January 30._--I would have ex-Governor Boutwell, of Massachusetts,
Secretary of State. The conduct of European affairs requires pure
patriotism--that is, conscientiousness of being an American by
principle, in the noblest philosophical sense, sound common sense,
discretion, simplicity, sobriety of mind, firmness, clear-sightedness.
Boutwell would be a Secretary of State similar to Marcy.
_January 30._--Wrote a letter to Stanton with the following
suggestions for the organization of a large and efficacious force,
nay, army, from the Africo-Americans.
Some of the points submitted to this genuine patriot have been
already variously mentioned above; here are some others.
1. It may be possible--even probable--on account of inveterate
prejudices and stupidity, that an Africo-American regiment may be
left unsupported during a battle.
2. It would be therefore more available to organize such a force at
once on a large scale, so as to be able to have strong brigades, and
even divisions. At the head of six to eight thousand men, resistance
is possible for several hours if the enemy outnumbers not in too
great proportions--four or five to one, and if the terrain is not
altogether against the smaller force.
3. The Africo-Americans ought to be formed, drilled and armed
principally with the view to constitute light infantry--and, if
possible, light cavalry--but above all, for a _set fight_.
4. Their dress must be adapted to such a light service--as ought to
be the dress of our whole infantry, facilitating to the utmost the
quick and easy movements of the body and of the feet; both
impossible or at least difficult in the present equipment of the
American infantry. On account of the modern improvements in fire
arms, the fights begin at longer distances, and it is important that
the soldier be trained to march as quickly as possible, so as to
force the enemy from their positions at the point of the bayonet. In
this country of clay, bad roads, forests and underbrush, even more
than care must be bestowed upon the feet and legs of the infantry. I
suggested an imitation of the equipment of the French infantry.
5. In the case of the arsenals not having the requisite number of
fire-arms, I would have the third line armed with scythes. As a
Pole, I am familiar with that really terrible weapon.
6. To adapt the drill to the object in view--to free it as far as
possible from needless technicalities, and to reduce it to the most
urgently needed and the most readily comprehended particulars.
7. In view of the above-mentioned reasons, I would have the Tactics
now in use very carefully revised, or have an entirely new book of
Tactics and Regulations.
8. Suggested that General Casey should be entrusted with the matters
treated of in suggestions 6 and 7.
_January 31._--The Copperheads in Congress are shedding crocodile
tears over the doom that awaits those Africo-Americans who may
unfortunately be taken prisoners by the rebels. Now, in the first
place enlisted Africo-Americans are under the protection of the
United States Government, and that Government will not be guilty of
the infamy of seeing its captured soldiers murdered in cold
blood--and in the next place the Africo-American will prove anything
rather than an easily-made captive to Southern murderers. The
Africo-Americans will sell their lives so dearly as to disgust the
rebels with the task of attempting to capture them.
_January 31._--Few people can understand the intensity of the
disgust with which I find myself often obliged to mention Thurlow
Weed--that darkest incarnation of all that is evil in black mail,
lobbyism, and all hideous corruptions. It is not my fault that such
a man is allowed to exert a malign influence on the country's fate,
and I am obliged to give the dark as well as the bright parts of the
great social picture. How deeply I regret my inability to collect
and record, in part at least, if not as a whole, all the deeds of
heroism and devotion, of generous and brave self-abnegation, which
have been done by thousands, even by millions of those who are both
falsely and foolishly called the lower classes.