The Victim: A Romance of the Real Jefferson Davis

by Thomas Dixon

  CHAPTER XXX

  THE DELIVERANCE

  From the moment Davis placed Lee in the saddle order slowly emerged fromchaotic conditions and the first rays of light began to illumine thefortunes of the Confederacy.

  Modest and unassuming in his personality, he demonstrated from the firsthis skill as an organizer and his power in the conception and executionof far-reaching strategy.

  From the moment he breathed his spirit into the army he made it a rapid,compact, accurate and terrible engine of war. The contemptible assaultof the Richmond _Examiner_ fell harmless from the armor of his genius.Davis was bitterly denounced for his favoritism in passing G. W. Smithand appointing Governor Letcher's pet. He was accused of playing a gameof low politics to make "a spawn of West Point" the next Governor ofVirginia. But events moved with a pace too swift to give the yellowjournals or the demagogues time to get their breath.

  Lee had sent Jackson into the Valley of the Shenandoah to make adiversion which might hold the armies moving on the Capital from thewest and at the same time puzzle McDowell at Fredericksburg.

  Lee, Jackson and Davis were three men who worked in perfect harmony fromthe moment they met in their first council of war at the White House ofthe Confederacy. So perfect was Lee's confidence in Jackson, he wassent into the Valley unhampered by instructions which would interferewith the execution of any movement his genius might suggest.

  Left thus to his own initiative, Jackson conceived the most brilliantseries of engagements in the history of modern war. He determined to usehis infantry by forced marches to cover in a day the ground usually madeby cavalry and fall on the armies of his opponents one by one beforethey could form a juncture.

  On May 23, by a swift, silent march of his little army of fifteenthousand men, he took Banks completely by surprise, crushed and capturedhis advance guard at Fort Royal, struck him in the flank and drove himback into Strassburg, through Winchester, and hurled his shattered armyin confusion and panic across the Potomac on its Washington base.

  Desperate alarm swept the Capital of the Union. Stanton, the Secretaryof War, issued a frantic appeal to the Governors of the Northern Statesfor militia to defend Washington. Panic reigned in the cities of theNorth. Governors and mayors issued the most urgent appeals forenlistments.

  Fremont was ordered to move with all possible haste and form a juncturewith a division of McDowell's army and cut off Jackson's line ofretreat.

  The wily Confederate General wheeled suddenly and rushed on Fremontbefore Shields could reach him. On June 8, at Cross Keys, he crushedFremont, turned with sudden eagle swoop and defeated Shields at PortRepublic.

  Washington believed that Jackson commanded an enormous army, and thatthe National Capital was in danger of his invading host. The defeatedarmies of Milroy, Banks, Fremont and Shields were all drawn in to defendthe city.

  In this campaign of a few weeks Jackson had marched his infantry sixhundred miles, fought four pitched battles and seven minor engagements.He had defeated four armies, each greater than his own, captured sevenpieces of artillery, ten thousand stands of arms, four thousandprisoners and enormous stores of provisions and ammunition. It requireda train of wagons twelve miles long to transport his treasures--everypound of which he saved for his Government.

  He was never surprised, never defeated, never lost a train or anorganized piece of his army, put out of commission sixty thousandNorthern soldiers under four distinguished generals and in obedience toLee's command was now sweeping through the mountain passes to the reliefof Richmond.

  While Jackson was thus moving to join his forces with Lee, Washingtonwas shivering in fear of his attack.

  On the day Jackson was scheduled to fall on the flank of McClellan'sbesieging army Lee moved his men to the assault. The first battle whichJohnston had joined at Seven Pines had only checked McClellan's advance.

  The Grand Army of the Potomac still lay on its original lines, andMcClellan had used every day in strengthening his entrenchments. Lee hadbuilt defensive works to enable a part of his army to defend the citywhile he should throw the flower of his gray soldiers on his enemy in adesperate flank assault in cooeperation with Jackson.

  On the arrival of his triumphant lieutenant from the Shenandoah ValleyLee suddenly sprang on McClellan with the leap of a lion. The NorthernCommander fought with terrible courage, amazed and uneasy over thediscovery that Jackson had suddenly appeared on his flank.

  Within thirty-six hours McClellan's right wing was crushed and inretreat. Within seven days Lee drove his Grand Army of more than ahundred thousand men from the gates of Richmond thirty-five miles andhurled them on the banks of the James at Harrison's Landing under theshelter of the Federal gunboats.

  Instead of marching in triumph through the streets of the ConfederateCapital, McClellan congratulated himself and his Government on his goodfortune in saving his army from annihilation. His broken columns hadreached a place of safety after a series of defeats which haddemoralized his command and resulted in the loss of ten thousandprisoners and ten thousand more in killed and wounded. He had beencompelled to abandon or burn stores valued at millions. The South hadcaptured thirty-five thousand stand of arms and fifty-two pieces ofartillery.

  Lee in his report modestly expressed his disappointment that greaterresults had not been achieved.

  "Under ordinary circumstances," he wrote, "the Federal army should havebeen destroyed. Its escape was due to causes already stated. Prominentamong them was the want of correct and timely information. The first,attributable chiefly to the character of the country, enabled GeneralMcClellan skillfully to conceal his retreat and to add much to theobstructions with which nature had beset the way of our pursuing column.But regret that more was not accomplished gives way to gratitude to theSovereign Ruler of the Universe for the results achieved."

  Jackson, the grim soldier, whose habit was to pray all night beforebattle, wrote with the fervor of the religious enthusiast.

  "Undying gratitude is due to God for this great victory--by whichdespondency increases in the North, hope brightens in the South and theCapital of Virginia and the Confederacy is saved."

  A wave of exultation swept the South--while Death stalked through thestreets of Richmond.

  Instead of the tramp of victorious hosts, their bayonets glittering inthe sunlight, which Socola had confidently expected, he watched from thewindows of the Department of State the interminable lines of ambulancesbearing the wounded from the fields of McClellan's seven-days' battle.

  The darkened room on Church Hill was opened. Miss Van Lew had watchedthe glass rattle under the thunder of McClellan's guns, and then withsinking heart heard their roar fade in the distance until only therumble of the ambulances through the streets told that he had beenthere. She burned the flag. It was too dangerous a piece of bunting torisk in her house now. It would be many weary months before she wouldneed another.

  Through every hour of the day and night since Lee sprang on McClellan,those never-ending lines of ambulances had wound their way through thestreets. Every store and every home and every public building had beenconverted into a hospital. The counters of trade were moved aside andthrough the plate glass along the crowded streets could be seen the longrows of pallets on which the mangled bodies of the wounded lay. Everyhome set aside at least one room for the wounded boys of the South.

  The heart-rending cries of the men from the wagons as they jolted overthe cobble stones rose day and night--a sad, weird requiem of agony,half-groan, half-chant, to which the ear of pity could never growindifferent.

  Death was the one figure now with which every man, woman and child wasfamiliar. The rattle of the dead-wagons could be heard at every turn.They piled them high, these uncoffined bodies of the brave, and hurriedthem under the burning sun to the trenches outside the city. They piledthem in long heaps to await the slow work of the tired grave-diggers.The frail board coffins in which they were placed at last would oftenburst from the swelling corpse. The air was filled with poisonous odors.<
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  The hospitals were jammed with swollen, disfigured bodies of the woundedand the dying. Gangrene and erysipelas did their work each hour in theweltering heat of mid-summer.

  But the South received her dead and mangled boys with a majesty of griefthat gave no cry to the ear of the world. Mothers lifted their eyes fromthe faces of their dead and firmly spoke the words of resignation:

  "Thy will, O Lord, be done!"

  Her houses were filled with the wounded, the dying and the dead, butRichmond lifted up her head. The fields about her were covered withimperishable glory.

  The Confederacy had won immortality.

  The women of the South resolved to wear no mourning for their dead.Their boys had laid their lives a joyous offering on their country'saltar. They would make no cry.

  Johnston had lost six thousand and eighty-four men, dead, wounded andmissing at Seven Pines, and Lee had lost seventeen thousand five hundredand eighty-three in seven days of continuous battle. But the South wasthrilled with the joy of a great deliverance.

  Jefferson Davis in his address to the army expressed the universalfeeling of his people:

  "Richmond, July 5, 1862.

  "_To the Army of Eastern Virginia_:

  "_Soldiers_:

  "I congratulate you upon the series of brilliant victories which, under the favor of Divine Providence, you have lately won; and as President of the Confederate States, hereby tender to you the thanks of the country, whose just cause you have so skillfuly and heroically saved.

  "Ten days ago an invading army, vastly superior to yours in numbers and the material of war, closely beleaguered your Capital and vauntingly proclaimed our speedy conquest. You marched to attack the enemy in his entrenchments. With well-directed movements and death-defying valor you charged upon him in his strong positions, drove him from field to field over a distance of more than thirty-five miles, and, despite his reenforcements, compelled him to seek safety under the cover of his gunboats, where he now lies cowering before the army so lately despised and threatened with utter subjugation.

  "The fortitude with which you have borne trial and privation, the gallantry with which you have entered into each successive battle, must have been witnessed to be fully appreciated. A grateful people will not fail to recognize you and to bear you in loved remembrance. Well may it be said of you that you have 'done enough for glory,' but duty to a suffering country and to the cause of Constitutional liberty claims for you yet further effort. Let it be your pride to relax in nothing which can promote your future efficiency; your one great object being to drive the invader from your soil, and, carrying your standards beyond the outer borders of the Confederacy, to wring from an unscrupulous foe the recognition of your birthright and independence."

  Within the year from the fatal victory at Bull Run the South had throughbitterness, tears and defeat at last found herself. Under the firm andwise leadership of Davis, her disasters had been repaired and her armybrought to the highest standard of efficiency.

  At the head of her armies now stood Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson.Their fame filled the world. In the west, Braxton Bragg, a brilliant andefficient commander, was marshaling his army to drive the Union linesinto Kentucky.

  From the depths of despair the South rose to the heights of daringassurance. For the moment the junta of politicians led by Senator Bartonwere compelled to halt in their assaults on the President. The people ofthe South had forgotten the issue of the date on Joseph E. Johnston'scommission as general.

  With characteristic foolhardiness, however, Barton determined that theyshould not forget it. He opened a series of bitter attacks on Davis forthe appalling lack of management which had permitted McClellan to savewhat was left of his army. He boldly proclaimed the amazing doctrinethat the wounding of Johnston at Seven Pines was an irreparable disasterto the South.

  "Had Johnston remained in command," he loudly contended, "there can beno doubt that he would have annihilated or captured McClellan's wholearmy and ended the war."

  On this platform he gave a banquet to General Johnston on the occasionof his departure from Richmond for his new command in the west. TheSenator determined to hold his faction together for future assaults.Lee's record was yet too recent to permit the politicians to surrenderwithout a fight.

  The banquet was to be a love feast at which all factions opposed toDavis should be united behind the banner of Johnston. Henry S. Foote hadquarreled with William L. Yancey. These two fire-eaters wereenthusiastic partisans of his General.

  Major Barbour, Johnston's chief quartermaster, presided at the head ofthe banquet table in Old Tom Griffin's place on Main Street. Foote wasseated on his right, Governor Milledge T. Bonham of South Carolina next.Then came Gustavus W. Smith, whose hatred of Davis was implacable fordaring to advance Robert E. Lee over his head. Next sat John U. Daniel,the editor of Richmond's yellow journal, the _Examiner_. Daniel's armwas in a sling. He had been by Johnston's side when wounded at SevenPines.

  At the other end of the table sat Major Moore, the assistantquartermaster, and by his side on the left, General Joseph E. Johnston,full of wounds in the flesh and grievances of soul. On his right wasJohn B. Floyd of Fort Donelson fame whom Davis had relieved of hiscommand. And next William L. Yancey, the matchless orator of secession,whose hatred of Davis was greater than this old hatred of Abolition.

  The feast was such as only Tom Griffin knew how to prepare.

  Johnston as usual was grave and taciturn, still suffering from hisunhealed wound. Yancey and Foote, the reconciled friends who had shakenhands in a common cause, were the life of the party.

  Daniel, the editor of the organ of the Soreheads and Irreconcilables,was even more taciturn than his beloved Chief. General Bonham sang alove song. Yancey and Foote vied with each other in the brilliancy oftheir wit.

  When the banquet had lasted for two hours, Yancey turned to Old TomGriffin and said:

  "Fresh glasses now and bumpers of champagne!"

  When the glasses were filled the Alabama orator lifted his glass.

  "This toast is to be drunk standing, gentlemen!"

  Every man save Johnston sprang to his feet. Yancey looked straight intothe eye of the General and shouted:

  "Gentlemen! We drink to the health of the only man who can save theSouthern Confederacy--General Joseph E. Johnston!"

  The glasses were emptied and a shout of applause rang from everybanqueter save one. The General had not yet touched his glass.

  Without rising, Johnston lifted his eyes and said in grave tones:

  "Mr. Yancey, the man you describe is now in the field--his name isRobert E. Lee. I drink to his health."

  Yancey's quick wit answered in a flash:

  "I can only reply to you, sir, as the Speaker of the House of Burgessesdid to General Washington--'Your modesty is only equaled by yourvalor!'"

  Johnston's tribute to Lee was genuine, and yet nursing his grudgeagainst the President with malignant intensity he left for the west,encouraging his friends to fight the Chieftain of the Confederacy withtooth and nail and that to the last ditch.