by Jeff Shaara
Meade looked at Grant now, and Grant could see the memories, Meade’s own experiences in Mexico, coming back to him. Meade said, “We were cut off from the coast, from Washington, from everybody. General Scott’s decision … to move the army inland on its own … we went through a different panic every night.” Meade smiled now, the first change in his expression. “There were supposed to be ten thousand Mexicans waiting for us around every turn.”
Grant nodded, smiled as well. “And behind us, and above us … Santa Anna was on top of every mountain, every water hole was poisoned, they moved like ghosts in the night.”
They sat in silence for a moment, absorbed the sudden rush of memories. But Grant focused, pushed the thoughts of Mexico away, looked at Meade, and Meade was serious again, said, “I had thought the reports were reliable … that General Sherman would be assuming command of this army.”
Grant was surprised, said, “Really? And where are you going? Tennessee?” Grant felt a sudden twinge of impatience.
Meade said, “I assumed … because of Washington’s lack of enthusiasm for my performance … I would be relieved. I would only request … that you inform me without delay. Washington has always had a policy of dragging these things out, letting the commanders … sweat a bit. There seems to be some delight on the part of the Secretary to maintain suspense, and General Halleck has a habit of launching surprise attacks on his subordinates.”
Grant felt a surge of anger, thought of Halleck, took a deep breath. “There is no surprise attack here. I have no intention of replacing you. We cannot run this army by trial and error. I know your record, I know how you command. I have no doubt you will continue to serve this army well. I have experienced the impatience of the Secretary. He makes grand judgments based on what he reads, not what he sees. And General Halleck is now …” He paused, had not thought of this before, of all the implications of his promotion. “General Halleck is now my subordinate. What pleases Washington is no longer to be your concern. What pleases me …” He paused, thought of his own words, felt the anger slip away, was suddenly embarrassed, surprised at himself. “Perhaps I should say that differently.…”
Meade slapped his hand hard on the desk. “No sir! You have made yourself quite clear. I am greatly relieved to hear that. We heard … the word was that your promotion might be … political. Something … for the newspapers to play with. I had thought, if you moved to Washington, you would probably …” He paused. “You would probably become one of them.”
Grant looked at the cigar again, said, “I have been advised to maintain my headquarters in Washington. I have no intention of doing so. I had thought … perhaps I would go back out West, Nashville. But General Sherman knows me well, he knows what I expect of him, and he knows his opponent there. Here … it is different. I believe you are correct about General Lee. How we deal with your opponent will determine the outcome of the war.”
Meade nodded, and Grant saw the enthusiasm building. Meade said, “Yes, Lee is all that stands between us and Richmond. If we can maneuver him away, move on Richmond again—”
Grant abruptly stood up, and Meade stopped, watched him. Grant tapped his hat against his leg, freeing a cloud of dust. His mind began to move, rethinking the plan he had sketched, hammered, and picked at for weeks. He paced for a moment, then stopped and looked at Meade.
“No. Our objective has always been Richmond. That is not our objective now. They are not beaten until he is beaten. If we seize Richmond, they will just move their government somewhere else. We will tie up our army occupying a place of small value and this war will go on for years. Richmond is a symbol, and three years ago this war was all about symbols. Symbols are for politicians and newspapers, something emotional to rally around. But if we have learned anything, it is that war is about fighting, about armies and guns and the death of men. As long as there are armies, there will be a war. I don’t care about symbols. Our objective is Lee.”
AS THE SPRING MOVED INTO VIRGINIA AND THE ROADS HARDENED, Grant began to put his plan into words. In the West, Sherman would press Joe Johnston, and as in Virginia, the goal was Johnston’s army, to draw him out into battle where Sherman’s numbers could prevail. If Johnston were defeated, Atlanta would fall, and the Confederacy would be divided even further, the great railroad connections cut. But Grant understood that merely confronting Lee would not make Lee fight on anyone else’s terms but his own, and so the plans in Virginia were more complicated. On the Virginia peninsula, a large force was assembled under the command of Ben Butler. Butler was no one’s friend, had not distinguished himself as a great leader of troops, but he was a powerful political force in Washington, a man Lincoln could not afford to antagonize. If Grant did not place much value on Butler’s abilities, Butler himself did, and so his influence and his ability to intimidate Washington meant that Grant had no choice but to put him in charge of a sizable command. Butler’s objective was to move up the James River, pressuring Richmond from the east. If Richmond was too heavily defended, then Butler could move south of the James and assault the valuable railroad junction at Petersburg.
To the west of Lee’s army, in the Shenandoah Valley, Grant assigned Franz Sigel to command a smaller force that would move south, up the valley, confronting whatever forces Lee had there. Early in the war Sigel had led the Eleventh Corps, made up mainly of New Yorkers and Pennsylvanians of German ancestry. He was a graduate of the German Military Academy, an experienced fighter who had emigrated himself because he happened to pick the wrong side in a brief revolution. He had seemed to be a natural choice to lead his former countrymen in the Eleventh, was an inspiration to the many Germans who had now taken up the Union cause. But he was undistinguished as a field commander, and he was replaced early in 1863 by Oliver Howard. It was Howard who would then carry the stain of the Eleventh, the men who would panic at Chancellorsville, collapsing from the surprise flank attack from Jackson, a failure that would always be theirs.
Since Howard had performed no better than Sigel, Sigel’s removal had angered many of the immigrants even more, and Grant understood that Sigel’s presence had value in drawing immigrants into the army. If he was undistinguished, at least he was already in place, in western Virginia. Sigel’s assignment in the valley would be to prevent Lee from reinforcing himself from the Confederate troops there. If Sigel moved hard into Virginia’s most fertile and productive farmland, it was a threat Lee could not ignore.
Grant made one more major change. The Federal army had never made the best use of its cavalry, and Jeb Stuart had embarrassed his blue counterparts consistently. As the war had gone on, the blue horsemen learned more about their enemy and his successes, and gradually they changed the way they fought. But the high command had still not understood fully the value of cavalry, and often they were held in the rear, guarding wagon trains or sent far off on useless raids. Grant intended to change that. In the West there was one division commander, a man who led infantry, who Grant believed could be given the new responsibility of commanding horsemen. The man had built a reputation as fiery, competent, as one who would not stop until his enemy was whipped. His name was Phil Sheridan.
Despite the advice of many in Washington that the new general-in-chief remain in the capital, and despite the advice from his friend Sherman that he return to the West, staying as far from Washington as possible, Grant moved his headquarters alongside the Army of the Potomac. He would accompany Meade’s army as it sought out the one man who stood in the way of the war’s conclusion, the one man whose army must be destroyed.
8. LEE
MAY 1864
THE COURIERS CAME NOW AT REGULAR INTERVALS, STUART’S MESsengers bringing a steady stream of information. The hard words for Stuart’s failure at Gettysburg had long faded from the newspapers, and if they mentioned Gettysburg at all now, if the papers still had a bitter need to find fault, the focus was shifting more in Longstreet’s direction. Stuart was the great and gallant hero, the mention of the name always painting an inspi
ring picture in the minds of the people, the dashing cavalryman, the plumed hat, mocking and humiliating the enemy’s inept horsemen. What had flickered through the newspapers, the hint of improper behavior, a brief public scolding for the playful ride around the enemy, was forgotten now by the reality of what the new year would bring.
The papers now gave more energy to new outrage against Lincoln, whose call for seven hundred thousand new troops demonstrated the aggressiveness of this unrelenting man who would still send his armies into their country. There was growing frustration with the length of the war, the casual confidence of a quick victory long erased. If blame had to be placed for that, then the angry headlines and political speeches were growing openly hostile toward Jefferson Davis as well, as though Davis himself was responsible for the great disparity in strength, the increasing void between the vast power and fertility of the North and the creeping starvation and emptiness of the South.
But there were some who did not pay much attention to the rants in the papers, who knew something of tactics and strategy, who remembered Gettysburg as more than some vague and horrible disaster. The conversations were brief and private, and even in Stuart’s camp the men understood that this brash and self-assured cavalier had for once let his commander down.
Stuart never spoke of it, but his staff knew something was different, noted something more serious, that he was more sober, his playful moods less prevalent. It had been nearly a year, but Stuart kept the memories fresh in his mind. His cavalry had finally returned to Lee’s army late in the fight at Gettysburg, but the damage had been done, the ground chosen for them by an enemy Lee was not ready to fight, the tide already turned against them. Had Stuart been where Lee needed him to be, the fight around Gettysburg might not have happened at all; they could have kept Meade at bay, moved farther into the enemy’s country, into the rich farmlands where the army could have sustained itself as long as it had to. Then, they could have struck in any direction, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and the panic in the northern cities, the reality that the bloody fields would be their own, could have put enough pressure on Washington to make the peace.
Stuart did not dwell on politics, but he had heard the talk, the bruises on his reputation. His anger at the “insults” had quickly faded. It was that one night that stayed with him, and he would lie awake staring up at bright stars, would focus on that, riding into Lee’s headquarters with all the boisterous pageantry that always swept along with him. He’d expected the face of a relieved parent, the fatherly warmth Lee had shared with him since he was a cadet at West Point, the enthusiasm for the return of the favorite son, but he saw instead a hard red-faced anger, a look he’d never seen before, Lee fighting himself to hold it down. The warmth was replaced by the deep chill of disappointment. It was something Stuart would never forget.
Now, the couriers went out toward headquarters at all hours with the smallest bit of new information. Lee would never be blind again.
LEE SAT AT HIS SMALL DESK, READ THE REPORTS. IT WAS CONfirmed now, the Federal Ninth Corps, Burnside’s troops, had moved east, had left their position around Knoxville and were on the trains, and very soon would add to the strength of Meade’s army. He put the paper down, realizing it would be in Virginia after all. He stood, walked to the opening in the tent, stared out down the wide hill, saw his men milling through their camps, some at drill, some gathered at the fires.
Taylor, sitting at a small table out in the open, saw him, and Lee saw the line of officers and a few privates waiting patiently, the daily complaints and requests. The look on Taylor’s face was a silent question: Do you need me? Lee shook his head, stepped into the open, suddenly felt the urge for coffee, moved toward the mess wagon. He saw Marshall now, the young man moving toward him, and Lee smiled as he walked; there was always something about Marshall that made him smile. He was young, nearly as young as Taylor, wore small round glasses that made him resemble a schoolboy, studious and efficient.
Marshall stopped, saw Lee focused on the wagon, said, “General, may I get you something?”
Lee said, “No, Major, quite all right. Just taking a bit of a break.”
Lee reached the wagon, and the mess sergeant had a cup ready, poured a thick black liquid from a tin pot, handed it slowly to Lee and said quietly, so as not to disturb his thoughts, “Sir.”
Lee took the cup and drew it up, caught the rising steam, breathed it in. The man held out a small metal box, and Lee took a spoon from it, scooped it full of the brown crystals, stirred the hard sugar into the cup. He stared at the thick swirl, slowly took a sip, felt his tongue curl at the bitterness, then glanced up at the sergeant, who was smiling, proud of his brew. Lee nodded, tried to smile, thought, Maybe … more sugar. The sergeant still held the box out, and Lee thought, No, we must make do … even the little things. He put the spoon back in the box, turned toward his tent, looked again into the cup. The men do not have the luxury of coffee, he thought, not real coffee anyway. He recalled seeing men grinding up straw and corn husks, peanut shells and tree bark, anything that could be boiled into a hot black liquid. He knew they were trading with the Yankees, that when the armies were close, the men along the picket lines would make their own quiet armistice, swapping their tobacco for coffee, newspapers for hardtack. He did not approve, but would not give the order to stop. The pickets know more than the rest of us, he thought. They are so close, and so they see it clearly.
It had taken him a long time to understand what the men on the front lines had accepted long ago. But Lee still saw the faces, knew the names, had served with so many of them, fought with them in Mexico, chased Comanches with them in Texas, had watched many of them work their way through West Point. The foot soldiers had no guilt, no difficulty killing the men in blue, no confusion about whether the Yankees were indeed the enemy. It is our sad duty, but I cannot think of them that way, Lee reflected. They are simply … those people.
He had believed from the beginning that there was a difference, something superior in his men that went beyond what they brought to the battlefield. But despite the poor commanders, the blue soldier had proven he would fight, and that if God gave him the chance, he would win the fight. Lee had finally begun to understand that the hand of God might cover more than just his army. Those boys, those other fellows, were not that different from them after all.
He thought, But God is still with us, He still watches over us, and He is still guiding us. If He is guiding them as well, if He puts the good fight in them, it is to test us, test our resolve. In the end, He will judge us for that, for our heart, for how we do our duty.
The wave of religious spirit had again swept through the winter camps. Just as the year before, the revival tents had spread out all through the army, the men gathering in great numbers before the renewed enthusiasm of the chaplains. There had been civilian visitors as well, preachers, men of great fiery oration. It was the perfect way for the men to spend the bleak winter, to relieve the boredom by the strengthening of their faith.
He looked northward, over the wide bleak fields, over distant rolling hills. It was not the same over there … across the river. They are such a mix of people, so little in common with us … even with each other. But even before Gettysburg he had been surprised, began to see something new in the spirit of the blue soldiers, the men who charged hard into his guns. He thought of the vast horror of the stone wall at Fredericksburg, how they still came, wave after wave. They do not fight for the same cause, he thought, they are not defending against an invader, they do not fight to protect their homes, but still … they fight.
He had not thought it possible that this would still go on. He’d assumed that after all the bloody fights, and so many utter defeats, those fellows would not have the stomach for this, they would simply go home. He’d thought it would come from the soldiers themselves, the men who saw the horrors, knew the fear, the panic, the sickening loss. He thought they would finally say, “Enough, there is no good reason for this, we are dying for fat men i
n silk suits who hide in clean white buildings.” The blue lines would thin, the enthusiasm for the fight draining away, and with that, the Federal army would cease to be.
He had not often seen them up close, but he understood who they were. He’d seen many prisoners, thought of the faces, the bitter sadness of men who were out of the fight. Yet they do not make the fight, he thought. It is not the foot soldier who brings this war against us. They are farmers and laborers and clerks, and surely they feel just as we do, that we all have the right to be left alone. We do not threaten their cities, we do not seek to destroy their homes, we do not blockade their ports or starve their families. Yet they are still inspired … by what? It is not the inspiration that comes from great leadership. There has never been great leadership. It was not Meade who turned us away in Pennsylvania. We were beaten by our own mistakes, and the fight of their soldiers. Now, Washington has given them a new commander, and like all the rest, he must bring them into our guns again. But this time, they will be different … they will know what it feels like to win.
He drank from the cup again, ignored the bitterness, stared out at the camps of his men, thought, We are fighting for our independence, and that is the greatest fight there can be. Throughout the winter he had thought of his men as akin to the men at Valley Forge, the small shivering army of George Washington, praying and enduring through the misery of the elements, surviving, somehow, so they could take the fight to the enemy again. Washington had prevailed against great odds, against the better equipped army of a great empire. It had always inspired him, the great fight against long odds, the success against a powerful enemy. There is not much difference between Washington’s army and ours, he mused. We are fighting, after all, for the same reasons, for the same cause. And, we can succeed. With the weather warming, the roads drying out, the army is rested, morale is high, and they are ready again.