The part taken by Commodore Ellet was glorious. He was a brave, gallant, dashing officer, the son of a noble mother, who lived in Philadelphia. Mr. Stuart, President of the Christian Commission, relates that later in the war he called to see her, at her request, to receive a large donation. He found a lady eighty-four years of age. A grandson had been killed in battle, the body had been brought home, and was lying in the house. Said Mrs. Ellet: "I have given my two sons, Commodore Ellet and General Ellet, and four grandchildren to my country. I don't regret this gift. If I had twenty sons I would give them all, for the country must be preserved. And if I was twenty years younger, I would go and fight myself to the last!"
CHAPTER VIII.
INVASION OF MARYLAND.
August, 1862.
Great events were transpiring in Virginia. The magnificent army which passed down the Potomac in March, which had thrown up the tremendous fortifications at Yorktown, which had fought at Williamsburg, Fair Oaks, Gaines's Mills, Savage Station, Glendale, and Malvern, was once more at Washington. Manassas was a bloody plain. Pope had been defeated, sacrificed by Fitz John Porter. Day after day the booming of cannon had been heard in Washington, borne by the breezes along the wooded valley of the Potomac; far away at first, then nearer at Chantilly and Fairfax Court-House. Then came the stream of fugitives, and broken, disheartened ranks back to Arlington. The streets of Washington were thick with hungry, war-worn men. Long lines of ambulances wended into the city, with wounded for the hospitals, already overcrowded. The soldiers had pitiful tales to tell of the scenes of the Peninsula, and of the gory field of Manassas,—how near they came to victory,—how Hooker and Heintzelman rolled back the lines of Stonewall Jackson,—how Fitz John Porter lingered within an hour's march of the conflict, tardily coming into line, and moving away when lightly pressed by the enemy. There were curses loud and deep breathed against Porter, Pope, and McClellan. The partisans of Porter and McClellan called Pope a braggadocio, while the soldiers who had fought with obstinacy, who had doubled up Jackson in the first day's battle, retorted that McClellan was a coward, who, through all the engagements on the Peninsula took good care to be out of the reach of hostile bullets or cannon shot. The cause of the Union was gloomy. Burnside had been hurried up from North Carolina to aid in repelling the invader. The sun shone peacefully through the August days,—summer passed into autumn,
"And calm and patient Nature kept
Her ancient promise well,
Though o'er her bloom and greenness swept
The battle's breath of hell."
General McClellan at Williamsburg.