The incidents of the battle of Shiloh are familiar to the world. It constitutes, perhaps, the most melancholy of that series of “lost opportunities” in the Confederate conduct of the war, upon which history will dwell with sad interest. The first day’s victory promised fruits the most brilliant and enduring. The action of the second day can only be construed as a Confederate disaster. Such was the sentiment of the South, and such must be the verdict of history.
Shiloh was, perhaps, the sorest disappointment experienced by the South, until the loss of Vicksburg, and the defeat of Gettysburg threatened the approaching climacteric of the Confederacy. The public grief at the death of General Johnston was tinged with remorse, for the unmerited censure with which the popular voice, encouraged by the press, had previously assailed him. Not until his death did the South appreciate the worth of this great soldier. Never, perhaps, had there been a more sublime instance of self-abnegation than was displayed by Sidney Johnston.
All through the autumn and winter of 1861 he had maintained his perilous position in Kentucky, confronted by forces quadruple his own, and yet assailed by an impatient and ignorant public, for not essaying invasion, with a force which subsequent events proved inadequate for defense. But not even the hideous array of facts following the reverses of February secured his vindication; still he was assailed by an unreasoning public, instigated by a carping, partisan press. He was ridiculed as incompetent—as one who had traversed the curriculum of West Point, only to become educated in the frippery of military etiquette. For the first time, President Davis was charged with a desire to reward favorites, even at the risk of the public welfare, as illustrated by his retention in high command, of one whom actual trial had proven incapable, and undeserving of his previous reputation.
But President Davis, happily for his own fame, not less than for the fame of this illustrious victim of popular clamor, was unmoved by the censures of the public, and the invectives of the newspapers. He did not permit the confidence which, upon deliberate judgment, and upon a long and intimate acquaintance, he had reposed in General Johnston, to be shaken, and sternly repelled the clamor against him, as he afterwards did in the case of Lee, and even of Stonewall Jackson. His habitual reply to importunate petitions for the removal of Johnston was: “If Sidney Johnston is incompetent to command an army, then the Confederacy has no general fit for that position.”
Humanity rejoices in no attribute more noble than the capacity for warm and enduring friendship; and there is nothing more exalted in the character of Jefferson Davis than his devotion to his friends. At all times as true as steel to those for whom he professes attachment, he knows no cold medium, cherishes no feeling of indifference, but his nature kindles responsively to the warmth in the bosom of others. A like enthusiasm towards himself has usually been the reward of his heroic constancy. In Sidney Johnston there was that touching union of chivalric generosity and tender sympathy, which peculiarly qualified him for fellowship with Jefferson Davis. Such friendship, as that which united them, rises to the sublimity of the noblest virtue, and presents a spectacle honorable to human nature.
President Davis commemorated the death of General Johnston in a communication to Congress, and in terms of touching and appropriate feeling. Said he:
“But an all-wise Creator has been pleased, while vouchsafing to us His countenance in battle, to afflict us with a severe dispensation, to which we must bow in humble submission. The last, long, lingering hope has disappeared, and it is but too true that General Albert Sidney Johnston is no more. My long and close friendship with this departed chieftain and patriot forbid me to trust myself in giving vent to the feelings, which this intelligence has evoked. Without doing injustice to the living, it may safely be said that our loss is irreparable. Among the shining hosts of the great and good who now cluster around the banner of our country, there exists no purer spirit, no more heroic soul, than that of the illustrious man whose death I join you in lamenting. In his death he has illustrated the character for which, through life, he was conspicuous—that of singleness of purpose and devotion to duty with his whole energies. Bent on obtaining the victory which he deemed essential to his country’s cause, he rode on to the accomplishment of his object, forgetful of self, while his very life-blood was fast ebbing away. His last breath cheered his comrades on to victory. The last sound he heard was their shout of victory. His last thought was his country, and long and deeply will his country mourn his loss.”
The battle of Shiloh was an incident of the war justifying more than a passing notice. Never since Manassas, and never upon any subsequent occasion, had the Confederacy an opportunity so abundant in promise. The utmost exertions of the Government had been employed to make the Western army competent for the great enterprise proposed by its commander. The situation of Grant’s army absolutely courted the tremendous blow with which Johnston sought its destruction, a result which, in all human calculation, he would have achieved had his life been spared. At the moment of his death a peerless victory was already won; the heavy masses of Grant were swept from their positions; before nightfall his last reserve had been broken, and his army lay, a cowering, shrunken, defeated rabble, upon the banks of the Tennessee. That, at such a moment, the army should have been recalled from pursuit, especially when it was known that a powerful reinforcement, ample to enable the enemy to restore his fortunes, was hastening, by forced marches, to the scene, must ever remain a source of profound amazement.
It was the story of Manassas repeated, but with a far more mournful significance. It was not the failure to gather the fruits of the most complete victory of the war, nor the irreparable loss of Sidney Johnston, which filled the cup of the public sorrow. Superadded to these was the alarming discovery that the second great army of the Confederacy, in the death of its commander, was deprived of the genius which alone had been proven capable of its successful direction. Johnston had no worthy successor, and the Western army discovered no leader capable of conducting it to the goal which its splendid valor deserved.
A very perceptible diminution of what had hitherto been unlimited confidence, not only in the genius, but even in the good fortune of Beauregard, was the result of his declared failure at Shiloh. Not even his distinguished services, subsequently, were sufficient to entirely efface that unfortunate record. Military blunders, perhaps the most excusable of human errors, are those which popular criticism is the least disposed to extenuate. The reputation of the soldier, so sacred to himself, and which should be so jealously guarded by his country, is often mercilessly mutilated by that public, upon whose gratitude and indulgence he should have an unlimited demand. We shall not undertake to establish the justice of the public verdict, which has been unanimous, that the course of General Beauregard involved, at least, an “extraordinary abandonment of a great victory.” It only remains to state the material from which a candid and intelligent estimate is to be reached.