8562-61 еле 185600.24.5 GENERAL MCCLELLAN'S PENINSULA CAMPAIGN. REVIEW OF THE REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE CONDUCT OF BY HIRAM KETCHUM, OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK, COUNSELLOR AT LAW. 1864. ив us 5600.24.5 By exchange TO THE PUBLIC. The following numbers were published in the Journal of Commerce through several successive months, ending in May, 1864, under the signature of the Author. They were designed to show that the Report of the Committee on the Conduct of the War had done great injustice to MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE B. MCCLELLAN. By request these numbers are now collected and published in pamphlet form, and the Author asks for them an attentive perusal, and a candid and impartial judgment. May 16, 1864. HIRAM KETCHUM. REVIEW OF MCCLELLAN'S CAMPAIGN. The Joint Committee of the Senate | report. It is evident to my mind power and influence I can exert, by the open use of my own name, and such reputation and character as I happen to possess in a city where I have lived for more than fifty years, shall be put forth without fear and without stint to accomplish a fair administration of justice in the case under consideration. and House of Representatives on the that there is a concerted, a party conduct of the war have made an ela- effort, aided by the government, to borate report, a part of which is calcu- pervert the truth, and by such perlated, probably intended, to impair version, to destroy General McClelpublic confidence in the military ca-lan. This effort shall not succeed pacity of General McClellan. A re- if my opposition, in concert with port from a committee derived from other, can defeat it. When I see a so high a source as the Legislative combination of the strong against the Department of the government will, weak, an exercise of the vast power as it ought, command public atten- and influence of the government tion, and influence to some extent the against an individual citizen who is mind of the country. The publica- innocent of any offence against that tion of that report preceded, by some government, my sympathies in every days, and even weeks, the publication such case are with the weaker party, of the evidence upon which it pro-and in the present case, whatever of fesses to be founded. The report has been published in many newspapers, and is industriously circulated in a pamphlet form. The opponents of General McClellan ought to be satisfled with the influence to his discredit which this document was diffusing, especially as he has not interposed one word to counteract that influence, and check its progress. The general has observed his characteristic silence; yet his persecutors are not content with the amount of influence already enlisted against him, but are constant and persevering in their efforts to destroy him. The New York Times, published yesterday, Friday, has a long and bitter article, in which, strangely enough, it resorts to rebel testimony taken from the Richmond Whig, to depreciate the military character of Gen. McClellan. Would the Times be willing to admit testimony in favor of his high military character from the same source? Such testimony the Times well knows is at hand, but I will not use it. Now I have read the testimony an. nexed to the report of the War Committee with some care, and in my opinion that testimony, in connection with well known facts of public notoriety, does not authorize the conclusions, unfavorable to Gen. McClellan, made public by the committee in their I intend, with permission, through the columns of the Journal of Com. merce, to submit, with as much brevity as is consistent with clear eluci dation, a fair and impartial examina tion of the material points connected with the operations of General Mc Clellan, brought out by the evidence before the War Committee. There are very few persons that have that evidence at command, for it is very voluminous. The newspapers could not be expected to publish the whole of it, but in making selections they might manage to be impartial. Es pecially those who condemn McClel lan ought to publish his testimony, but this they refuse to do. NO. II. My first proposition, which I mean to prove to the entire satisfaction of every reasonable man, is this: If General McClellan's plan had not been interfered with; his plan set. tled and concurred in by the government before he left Washington for the peninsula, he, would have captured Richmond certainly as early as the month of June 1862, The evidence in support of this proposition, to which I invite the candid and careful attention of the reader, shall now be given. Fortress Monroe." The Prince pro The testimony of Prince de Joinville, under his own name, was not drawn forth by the committee, but it was given to Europe and the world, and must have been known to the committee. This was the testimony of a highly intelligent witness, who communicated the truth of what he knew himself, and none can question Here then, when the army was behis truthfulness and impartiality. In fore Yorktown, and before the idea of quoting from the Prince's statement, a siege had entered any man's head, I shall have to reproduce what has was a sore disappointment. One of lately appeared in the editorial col- the foundations upon which the hope, umns of the Journal of Commerce. nay, almost certainty, of speedy sucWhen Gen. McClellan went to York-cess had been reared, was suddenly, town, he had no thought of besieging that position. The siege of that place was rendered necessary by causes entirely unforeseen, and unexpected by the general. He had made ample provision for the turning of that position. Prince de Jonville says (page 41): "The enemy held the James with the Merrimac and his gunboats; the York was closed by the Yorktown and Gloucester Point batteries. Nevertheless, by a disembarkation on the Severn, beyond Gloucester, he might carry the latter position, and open the way of the Federal gunboats into the York River. A subsequent movement up the left bank, in the direction of West Point, would put us so far in the rear of the army charged with the defence of the lines of Yorktown that it would have been in a most perilous position. This accomplished, the Confederates must have abandoned Gloucester, and fallen back hastily upon Richmond. The execution of this coup de main had been left to a corps of the army commanded by Gen. McDowell. This corps was to be the last to embark at Washing. ton, and it was calculated that it ought to reach Yorktown in a body on its transports at the moment when the rest of the army, moving by land, should appear before that post from unexpectedly removed by a power which the leader of the army could not control. Let us pause here for a single moment to consider what the present position and fame of this commander would be at this moment if his just expectations had not been cruelly disappointed; but what is of infinitely more consequence, what, at this time, would have been the position of our country but for this fatal step! But disappointments do not stop here. After the siege of Yorktown, and after the army had reached the front of Richmond, another opportunity was supplied by the vigilance and skill of the commanding general to retrieve the great error of the past and to capture Richmond. By the command of Gen. McClellan, Gen. Fitz John Porter, with a portion of our army, marched in a furious storm to Hanover Court House, twenty miles north of Richmond, routed the enemy, some 8,000 or 10,000 strong, killed 200, took 700 prisoners, and captured one piece of artillery. The victory was gained on the 26th day of May, The advance guard of McDowell, says Prince de Joinville, "was then at Bowling Green, fifteen miles from that of Porter. It needed only an effotr of the will; the two armies were united, and the possession of Richmond certain! Alas! this effort was not made. I cannot," says he, "recall these fatal moments without a real sinking of heart.” What loyal man in the country does not at this day join in the lament of the illustrious stranger? Here then another opportunity was lost to secure the great object of the peninsular campaign. It has long since been admitted that if this opportunity had been improved, Richmond must have been taken, and in that case McClellan would have been the idol of his country, for the rebellion against that country would have been crushed. Was it any fault of this general that the opportunity was not improved? Certainly not. Yet what man in the eountry has suffered so severely for the failure to seize an opportunity for certain success, which his sagacity as a military leader had created? Yet his sufferings bear no comparison to those of his beloved country, and I doubt not he grieves far less for himself, for the loss of immortal renown, than for that country. The Prince de Joinville adds: the Potomac, was a witness before the committee. He yet remains in the army of the Potomac, and is, I am informed, much relied upon, not only as an officer of great skill in his line of duty, but confided in as an intelligent, truthful man, receiving the respect of his brother officers. Gen. Hunt fully concurs in the statement above quoted from De Joinville. The general says, (page 571): "As I understood it, McDowell's corps, which was the last to embark, was to move across to West Point, or near to that place, a portion of it touching at Gloucester, so as to throw itself between the enemy's works at York. town and Richmond. Of course the withholding of that corps prevented the plan, if that was the plan, from being executed as intended." further says: "The next cause for the failure of that campaign was this: I think if a junction of all our forces had been made after the battle of Hanover Court House, we should have made a sure thing of it." He Thus then it is made manifest by the testimony and statements above referred to, that if General McClel lan's plans had been executed, Richmond would have fallen. I can find nothing in Part I. of the committee's Report, containing 754 pages of printed matter, to countervail this testimony. Now I confidently submit to every candid reader, was not General Mc Clellan entitled to the benefit of this fact in the report of the committee. ? It might have been impracticable for the government to furnish the means promised, but even that should not have deprived him of the credit of hav ing conceived and adopted those plans. It might be, that though his original plans were interfered with, and frustrated by those in authority over him, yet still the plans were credi table, as their execution was certain to lead to success. "Not only did the two armies unite, but the order came from Washington, to burn the bridges which had been seized. This was the clearest way of saying to the army of the Potomac, and to its chiefs, that in no case could they count on the support of the armies of Upper Virginia." This statement of De Joinville is substantially confirmed by evidence given before the joint committee. General Franklin testifies at page 625 that the primary cause of the failure of the peninsula campaign was "the detachment of McDowell's corps from the army of the Potomar, at the particular time it was detached. I think the detachment of that corps left General McClellan on the peninsula with all his plans disarranged." Franklin was not questioned further on this point, but the tommittee immediately changed the In my future numbers I shall inves course of inquiry. The question which tigate, first, whether there were good called forth the above answer was put and satifactory reasons for not allow. by Mr. Odell, and seemed quite ac-ing General McDowell's command to cidental. General HENRY J. HUNT, render the service which it was to chief in command of the Artillery of perform; and second, whether, not L |