The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Volume 1

by Jefferson Davis

After I had written the foregoing, and all the succeeding chapters on kindred subjects, a friend, in October, 1880, furnished me with a copy of a paper relating to the conference at Fairfax Court-House, which seems to require notice at my hands.

Therefore I break the chain of events to insert here some remarks in regard to it.

The paper appears to have been written by General G. W. Smith, and to have received the approval of Generals Beauregard and J. E. Johnston, and to bear date the 31st of January, 1862.

It does not agree in some respects with my memory of what occurred, and is not consistent with itself. It was not necessary that I should learn in that interview the evil of inactivity. My correspondence of anterior date might have shown that I was fully aware of it, and my suggestions in the interview certainly did not look as if it was necessary to impress me with the advantage of action.

In one part of the paper it is stated that the reënforcements asked for were to be "seasoned soldiers," such as were there present, and who were said to be in the "finest fighting condition." This, if such a proposition had been made, would have exposed its absurdity, as well as the loophole it offered for escape, by subsequently asserting that the troops furnished were not up to the proposed standard.

In another part of the paper it is stated that there were hope and expectation that, before the end of the winter, arms would be introduced into the country, and that then we could successfully invade that of the enemy; but this supply of arms, however abundant, could not furnish "seasoned soldiers," and the two propositions are therefore inconsistent. In one place it is written that "it was felt it might be better to run the risk of almost certain destruction fighting upon the other side of the Potomac, rather than see the gradual dying out and deterioration of this army during a winter," etc.; but, when it was proposed to cross into eastern Maryland on a steamer in our possession for a partial campaign, difficulties arose like the lion in the path of the sluggard, so that the proposition was postponed and never executed. In like manner the other expedition in the Valley of Virginia was achieved by an officer not of this council, General T. J. Jackson.

In one place it is written that the President stated, "At that time no reënforcements could be furnished to the army of the character asked for." In another place he is made to say he could not take any troops from the points named, and, "without arms from abroad, could not reënforce that army." Here, again, it is clear from the answer that the proposition had been for such reënforcement as additional arms would enable him to give. Those arms he expected to receive, barring the dangers of the sea, and of the enemy, which obstacles alone prevented the "positive assurance that they would be received at all."

It was, as stated, with deep regret and bitter disappointment that I found, notwithstanding our diligent efforts to reënforce this army before and after the battle of Manassas, that its strength had but little increased, and that the arms of absentees and discharged men were represented by only twenty-five hundred on hand. I can not suppose that General Johnston could have noticed the statement that his request for conference had set forth the object of it to be to discuss the question of reënforcement. He would have known that in Richmond, where all the returns were to be found, any consideration of reënforcement, by the withdrawal of troops from existing garrisons, could best be decided. Very little experience or a fair amount of modesty without any experience would serve to prevent one from announcing his conclusion that troops could be withdrawn from a place or places without knowing how many were there, and what was the necessity for their presence.

I was at the conference by request; the confidence felt in those officers is shown by the fact that I met them alone, and did not require any minutes to be made of the meeting. About four months afterward a paper was prepared to make a record of the conversation; the fact was concealed from me, whereas, both for accuracy and frankness, it should have been submitted to me, even if there had been nothing due to our official relations. Twenty years after the event, I learned of this secret report, by one party, without notice having been given to the other, of a conversation said to have lasted two hours.