Like McClellan, Johnston had not the good fortune to be in accord with his Executive. "Not only," said an Old Virginian to him as he lay suffering from his severe wounds, "not only do we deplore this cruel affliction upon you, General, but we feel it to be a national calamity."
"No, sir," said Johnston, fiercely, rising suddenly upon his unbroken elbow. "The shot that struck me down was the best ever fired for the Southern Confederacy, for I possessed in no degree the confidence of this government, and now a man who does enjoy it will succeed me, and be able to accomplish what I never could."
The man who succeeded him, General Lee, wrote to the Secretary of War: "If General Johnston was not a soldier, America never produced one. If he was not competent to command the army, the Confederacy had no one who was competent." But even Lee could not control the opinions of the Executive. General Johnston was relieved from his command in 1864. General McClellan's treatment, as the world knows, was hardly less severe and quite as undeserved.
Richmond heard the guns of this bloody battle. As soon as the storm allowed them, crowds of anxious listeners repaired to the hills, from which the cannonading and rattle of musketry could be distinctly heard. The city waked up to a keen realization of the horrors of war. All the next day ambulances brought in the wounded—and open wagons were laden with the dead. Six thousand one hundred and thirty-four Confederate soldiers had been killed; the Federal loss was five thousand and thirty-one,—eleven thousand one hundred and sixty-five brave men gone from the country that gave them birth!
The streets of Richmond presented a strange scene—ambulances of wounded and dying men passed companies arriving on their way to the front, and each cheered the other. Batteries of artillery thundered through the streets; messengers and couriers ran hither and thither.
The streets were filled with a motley crowd, citizens hurrying to and fro, negroes running on messages, newsboys crying "extras" printed on short slips of the yellow Confederate paper; on one side of the street regiments arriving from the far South, cheering as they passed; on the other a train of ambulances bearing the wounded, the dead, the dying. Now and then a feeble cheer answered the strong men going in to win the victory these had failed to win, but for which they never ceased to look until death closed the watching eyes.
Every house was opened for the wounded. They lay on verandas, in halls, in drawing-rooms of stately mansions. Young girls and matrons stood in their doorways with food and fruit for the marching soldiers, and then turned to minister to the wounded men within their doors.
It has been estimated that five thousand wounded men were received in private houses and hospitals from the field of Seven Pines. The city was thrilled to its centre. The city had "no language but a cry"! And yet there was no panic, no frantic excitement. Only that Richmond, the mirth-loving, pleasure-seeking, was changed into a city of resolute men and women, nerved to make any sacrifice for their cause.
At all times during the war the Capitol Square was a rallying place where men met and received news and compared chances of success. They would sit all day on the hills outside the city and congregate in the square in the evening to discuss the events of the day and the probable chances for the morrow.
My news of this battle was coupled with the information that my General had fallen ill from malarial fever, and had kept up until the army approached Richmond, but that he was now lying sick in his tent a few miles from the city.