CONTENTS. AT THE MILITARY ACADEMY AND IN THE WAR WITH MEXICO. COMMENCEMENT OF THE WAR. CONDITION OF PUBLIC SENTI- MENT, AND OF THE MILITARY FORCE IN THE TWO CONTENDING GENERAL MCCLELLAN TAKES COMMAND IN WASHINGTON. THE BATTLE OF BULL RUN, AND THE CONDITION OF THE ARMY. CHANGE IN THE PROSPECTS OF THE WAR. REORGANIZATION OF PAGE. GENERAL MCCLELLAN AS COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF. CONSEQUENCES OF THE VICTORY OF MANASSAS AT THE SOUTH. PREPARATIONS FOR THE GENERAL ADVANCE OF THE ARMIES OF THE UNION IN THE SPRING. POPULAR IMPATIENCE. MR. LINCOLN SUPER- SEDES GENERAL MCCLELLAN AT THE END OF TWO MONTHS, PAGE. 128 GENERAL MCCLELLAN AS COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF. POSITION FOR ABOUT TWO MONTHS. GENERAL PLAN OF CAM- PAIGN AND POLITICS OF THE WAR, 143 CONGRESS AND THE WAR. THE JOINT COMMITTEE AND THE NEW WAR SECRETARY, MR. STANTON. THE PRESIDENT ASSUMES COMMAND OF THE ARMIES, AND SUPERSEDES GENERAL MCCLEL- LAN. PRELIMINARY HISTORY OF THE CAMPAIGN OF THE PEN- 160 THE ARMY OF THE POTOMAC IN MOTION. RETREAT OF JOHNSTON THE SIEGE OF YORKTOWN. RETREAT OF THE CONFEDERATES UPON RICHMOND. EVACUATION OF NORFOLK AND DESTRUCTION THE REMOVAL TO ACQUIA CREEK. THE FAILURE OF POPE'S CAM- GENERAL MCCLELLAN CROSSES THE POTO- THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION ISSUED BY THE NOMINATION OF GENERAL MCCLELLAN TO THE PRESIDENCY. THE CONDUCT OF THE WAR. MR. LINCOLN AND HIS AULIC CHAPTER I. BIRTH AND ANCESTRY OF GENERAL MCCLELLAN. HIS TRAINING AT THE MILITARY ACADEMY AND IN THE WAR WITH MEXICO. HIS VISIT TO THE CRIMEA. HIS RESIGNATION FROM THE ARMY AND RETURN TO CIVIL LIFE. MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE BRINTON MCCLELLAN was born in the city of Philadelphia, the seat of the Colonial Congress, the original capital of the American Union, the consecrated birthplace of our national greatness, on the 3d day of December, 1826. His father, a physician of eminence, was a native of Connecticut, into which "land of steady habits" and of sterling men his ancestors had migrated from the mountains of Scotland, bringing with them the ancient Scottish love of liberty and of law, the just, tenacious nature of that hardy and heroic race which has bulwarked freedom and beaten back oppression on so many a hard-fought field from the days of Bruce and Wallace to our own. The American people are not much given to inquiring into the ancestry of those who do the State service; but the faith which the republicans of old Rome held in the virtue of blood while still the Republic stood, was abundantly vindicated when the Roman people saw the shameless despotism of the worst of the Cæsars administered by men of base extraction and of corrupt birth. And wherever the permanence and the power of the commonwealth depend upon the virtue of its public servants, it should be no insignificant recommendation of a man to the confidence of his fellow-citizens that his |