Abraham Lincoln

by William Eleroy Curtis

The President confesses that he was exasperated almost beyond endurance. Mrs. Frémont, he says, "sought an audience with me at midnight, and attacked me so violently with many things that I had to exercise all the awkward tact I had to avoid quarrelling with her. She more than once intimated that if General Frémont should decide to try conclusions with me, he could set up for himself."

While the weary President was spending sleepless nights planning the reorganization of the Army of the Potomac and an offensive campaign to satisfy public clamor, he endeavored to arbitrate the quarrel between Frémont and the Blairs. In the midst of his efforts at conciliation, General Frémont startled the country and almost paralyzed the President by issuing an emancipation proclamation and an order that all persons found with arms in their hands should be shot. The President wrote him a gentle but firm remonstrance, "in a spirit of caution and not of censure," he said, and sent it by special messenger to St. Louis, "in order that it may certainly and speedily reach you." Mrs. Frémont brought the reply to Washington. It was an apology mixed with defiance. Frémont asserted that he had acted from convictions of duty with full deliberation, and proceeded at length to argue the justice and expediency of the step; and he was as much encouraged in his defiance as Lincoln was embarrassed by the radical Republican leaders and newspapers of the North. Frémont's proclamation was revoked by order of the President, but it was not so easy to correct the mistakes he had made in administration. Finally, after long deliberation and upon the advice of three experienced officers in whom he had great confidence and who had been with Frémont and were familiar with his conduct and the political and military situation, the President relieved him from command.

Frémont accepted the inevitable with dignity. He issued a farewell address to his army, was given ovations by radical Republicans in different parts of the country, but was not again intrusted with an independent command.

After he arose from his sleepless bed the morning following the battle of Bull Run, Lincoln devoted every spare moment to the study of the map of the seat of war and to reading military history. A shelf in his private library was filled with books on tactics, the histories of great campaigns, and such military authorities upon the science of warfare as might afford him ideas, valuable information, and suggestions. He undertook the preparation of a plan of campaign precisely as he had been accustomed to prepare for a trial in court, and before many days his quick perceptions, his retentive memory, and his reasoning powers had given him wider knowledge than was possessed by any of his generals. He did not fail to consult every person in whom he had confidence both upon abstract military questions and geographical and political conditions, and before long he developed a plan which he submitted to the military committees of Congress a few days after Congress assembled in December, 1861. Several of the most influential Senators and Representatives who did not belong to the committees were invited to be present. He proposed, first to maintain the military force along the Potomac to menace Richmond; second, to move an army from Cairo southward within easy communication of a flotilla upon the Mississippi; and, third, to send an army from Cincinnati eastward to Cumberland Gap in East Tennessee. Preliminary to the latter movement he proposed the construction of a railway from Cincinnati to Knoxville by way of Lexington, Kentucky, in order to avoid the difficulties and delays of transportation through the mountains, and military authorities now agree that if his advice had been followed the war would have been shortened at least two years. Mr. Nicolay, his private secretary, reports the substance of the President's appeal to Congress, as he stood before a map of Tennessee in the President's room at the Capitol:

"I am thoroughly convinced that the closing struggle of the war will occur somewhere in this mountain country. By our superior numbers and strength we will everywhere drive the rebel armies back from the level districts lying along the coast, from those lying south of the Ohio River, and from those lying east of the Mississippi River. Yielding to our superior force, they will gradually retreat to the more defensible mountain districts, and make their final stand in that part of the South where the seven States of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, and West Virginia come together. The population there is overwhelmingly and devotedly loyal to the Union. The despatches from Brigadier-General Thomas of October 28 and November 5 show that, with four additional good regiments, he is willing to undertake the campaign and is confident he can take immediate possession. Once established, the people will rally to his support, and by building a railroad, over which to forward him regular supplies and needed reinforcements from time to time, we can hold it against all attempts to dislodge us, and at the same time menace the enemy in any one of the States I have named."

There was no response to this appeal, except from the Senators and Representatives from East Tennessee, where nearly the entire population were loyal to the Union. One of the motives of the President in planning this campaign was to protect them from the raids of the Confederate cavalry. The Congressmen who heard him, however, were determined to gratify the public demand for an assault upon Richmond. All eyes were upon the Army of the Potomac, and it was popularly believed that if an assault were made and the Confederate capital captured, the rebellion would be promptly crushed. The President then undertook to carry out his plan with the forces at his disposal, but General Buell was too stubborn and too slow, either refusing to carry out his orders or wasting his time and strength in arguments against the practicability of the plan. If the same time, money, and military strength that were expended in his attempted march from Corinth to East Tennessee during the following summer had been devoted to the construction of a railroad, as proposed by the President, the entire situation in the Mississippi Valley would have been changed, and the battles which made Grant, Thomas, and Sherman famous would never have been fought. This is the opinion of the military experts after a quarter of a century of controversy, and the longer the subject is discussed the more firmly established is the verdict in favor of the wisdom and practicability of Lincoln's plan.

General McClellan was not the only military commander to annoy and perplex the President by procrastination and argument. The official records of the war at this time are filled with letters and telegrams addressed by Lincoln to Buell and Halleck, appealing to them to obey his orders and move towards the enemy. Buell kept promising to do so, but his delay was exasperating, and, differing in opinion from his superiors, he was, like McClellan, continually guilty of insubordination. Halleck, who was considered one of the ablest and best-equipped officers in the Union army, and was intended to be the successor of General Scott, was equally dilatory, although he had a better excuse, because, when he assumed command at St. Louis, succeeding General Frémont, he found the whole department in a deplorable condition, and was working with great energy and ability to organize and equip an army for the field. It is undoubtedly the case that both Buell and Halleck lacked confidence in the President's military capacity and placed a higher value upon their own judgment; but, whether the President realized this or not, he laid out the plan of a campaign and gave orders to both generals to co-operate in a joint land and river expedition up the Tennessee or Cumberland River. Neither made the slightest preparation for it or communicated with each other on the subject,—an act of insubordination that would not have been tolerated in any other country in the world. Then, when the President began to press his generals, Halleck excused himself for refusing to carry out his orders on the ground that it was bad strategy, and Buell made no reply whatever.

The patience of the President seemed inexhaustible. He kept his temper, and finally persuaded General Halleck to make a demonstration, which resulted in the capture of Forts Henry and Donelson and the famous campaign of General Grant in the early spring of 1862. The results of that campaign might have been much more conclusive had General Buell obeyed orders and responded to the appeals of General Halleck for assistance and to the President's orders for him to co-operate. Lincoln watched every step of the march with anxious interest, and his telegrams show that he anticipated Grant's movements with remarkable accuracy. His suggestions show how familiar he was with the country and the location of the Confederate forces. One of his telegrams to Halleck illustrates his knowledge of detail. It reads,—

"You have Fort Donelson safe, unless Grant shall be overwhelmed from outside; to prevent which latter will, I think, require all the vigilance, energy, and skill of yourself and Buell, acting in full co-operation. Columbus will not get at Grant, but the force from Bowling Green will. They hold the railroad from Bowling Green to within a few miles of Fort Donelson, with the bridge at Clarksville undisturbed. It is unsafe to rely that they will not dare to expose Nashville to Buell. A small part of their force can retire slowly towards Nashville, breaking up the railroad as they go, and keep Buell out of that city twenty days. Meantime, Nashville will be abundantly defended by forces from all south and perhaps from here at Manassas. Could not a cavalry force from General Thomas on the upper Cumberland dash across, almost unresisted, and cut the railroad at or near Knoxville, Tennessee? In the midst of a bombardment at Fort Donelson, why could not a gunboat run up and destroy the bridge at Clarksville? Our success or failure at Fort Donelson is vastly important, and I beg you to put your soul in the effort. I send a copy of this to Buell."

Imagine his sensations when he received a reply from General Halleck: "Make Buell, Grant, and Pope major-generals of volunteers and give me command in the West. I ask this in return for Fort Henry and Donelson."