Great as was the importance of success in Virginia, the Confederates had appreciated the fact as had not the political soldiers at the head of the Federal Department of War. Our resources always enabled us to keep more men, and more and better material, on this battle ground than the Confederates could do; but this strength was constantly offset by the ability of the Southern generals[3] and their independence of action as opposed to the frequent unskilfulness of ours, who were not only never long in command, but were then tied hand and foot to some ideal plan for insuring the safety of Washington.
[3] Italics ours. Author.
No impartial student of the history of the war can doubt that Colonel Dodge here touches the very marrow of the matter. In the operations in Virginia the North had more men, often by two or three to one, more guns and incalculably better supply departments. Their men were as good as the Southerners. Their guns were better, and their materials immeasurably superior both in quantity and quality. But until Grant was summoned from the West in 1864 to take command, the Army of the Potomac was commanded by no general who had capacity enough to make effective use of these superior advantages in a contest of strategic wits with Lee.
The real problem which the Washington authorities were set to solve was to find a general equal to this task, and so long as Halleck remained commander in chief of the Federal forces, there was no hope of success in that search. Commander after commander had been set up only to be promptly and disastrously bowled down again by Lee, in spite of the enormous disparity of numbers, guns and equipment.
But neither Grant nor Sherman was among those who had been appointed to try conclusions with Lee.
Halleck was still supreme as the military counselor of Mr. Lincoln. Grant, in spite of his victories, was a peculiarly objectionable person to him, and Sherman labored under the serious disability of enjoying Grant's favor and esteem in a very high degree.
But after Burnside's failure it was necessary to find a new commander for the Army of the Potomac, and Mr. Lincoln selected General Joseph Hooker to make the next attempt.
General Hooker was an old army officer. He was thoroughly equipped so far as military education was concerned, and he was so ardent in the work of the soldier that his men had lovingly nicknamed him "Fighting Joe Hooker." But he had never commanded an army or planned a campaign. He had made the last and most brilliant of that series of heroic charges up Marye's Heights which Burnside had so foolishly ordered at Fredericksburg. He had made the charge under protest, correctly deeming it a needless sacrifice of men's lives in a hopeless undertaking. But he had made it with extraordinary gallantry and had persisted in it until, as he sarcastically said, "he thought he had lost as many men as he was ordered to lose."
Of his devotion as a soldier, and of his unusual capacity in subordinate command, he had given adequate proof in every battle in which the Army of the Potomac had been engaged, from Manassas to Fredericksburg. But his capacity to lead a great army against a great enemy was wholly conjectural. Mr. Lincoln suggested this in the extraordinary letter in which he announced to Hooker his selection for this supreme trust. That letter was as follows: