A CONGRATULATORY ORDER. and 913 missing, making a total of 10,721.** General McClellan's dispatch, dated near Sharpsburg, September 29th, made the return "at South Mountain, 443 dead, 1,806 wounded, and 76 missing; at Antietam, 2,010, killed, 9,416 wounded, and 1,043 missing-a total loss in the two battles of 14,794. The loss of the rebels in the two battles, as near as can be ascertained from the number of their dead found upon the field, and from other data," says the same authority, "will not fall short of the following estimate: Major Davis, assistant inspector-general, who superintends the burial of the dead, reports about 3,000 rebels buried upon the field of Antietam by our troops. Previous to this, however, the rebels had buried many of their own dead upon the distant portion of the battlefield, which they occupied after the battle-probably at least 500. The loss of the rebels at South Mountain cannot be ascertained with accuracy, but as our troops continually drove them from the commencement of the action, and as a much greater number of their dead were seen on the field than of our own men, it is not unreasonable to suppose that their loss was greater than ours. Estimating their killed at 500, the total rebels killed in the two battles would be 4,000. According to the ratio of our own killed and wounded, this would make their loss in wounded 18,742. As nearly as can be determined at this time, the number of prisoners taken by our troops in the two battles will, at the lowest estimate, amount to 5,000. The full returns will no doubt show a larger number. Of these about 1,200 are wounded. This gives a rebel loss in killed, wounded and prisoners of 25,542. It will be observed that this does not include their stragglers, the number of whom is said by citizens here to be large. It may be safely concluded, therefore, that the rebel army lost at least 30,000 of their best troops. From the time our troops * Report of General Halleck, December, 1862. 653 first encountered the enemy in Maryland until he was driven back into Virginia we captured thirteen guns, seven caissons, nine limbers, two field forges, two caisson bodies, thirty-nine colors and one singal flag. We have not lost a single gun or a color. On the battlefield of Antietam 14,000 small arms were collected, besides the large number carried off by citizens and those distributed on the ground to recruits and other unarmed men arriving immediately after the battle. At South Mountain no collection of small arms was made, but owing to the haste of the pursuit from that point, 400 were taken on the opposite side of the Potomac." A congratulatory order by General McClellan, on the 3d of October, confirms these statements of spoils taken from the enemy, and pays an honorable tribute to the corps commanders and the army. "The commanding-general extends his congratulations to the army under his command for the victories achieved by their bravery at the passes of the South Mountain and upon the Antietam creek. The brilliant conduct of Reno's and Hooker's corps under Burnside, at Turner's Gap, and of Franklin's corps at Crampton Pass, in which, in the face of an enemy strong in position and resisting with obstinacy, they carried the mountain, and prepared the way for the advance of the army, won for them the admiration of their brethren in arms. In the memorable battle of Antietam we defeated a numerous and powerful army of the enemy, in an action desperately fought, and remarkable for its duration, and for the destruction of life which attended it. The obstinate bravery of the troops of Hooker, Mansfield and Sumner, the dashing gallantry of those of Franklin on the right, the steady valor of those of Burnside on the left, and the vigorous support of Porter and Pleasanton, present a brilliant spectacle to our countrymen, which will swell their hearts with pride and exultation. Four Hatteras shortly after its capture, took part in the occupation of Norfolk, and was Military Governor at Suffolk, Va. In the battle at Antietam he commanded the corps previously under General Banks. teen guns, thirty-nine colors, 15,500 placed in charge of the fortifications at stand of arms, and nearly 6,000 pris- Washington. He was in command at oners, taken from the enemy, are evidence of the completeness of our triumph. A grateful country will thank the noble army for achievements which have rescued the loyal states of the East from the ravages of the invader and driven him from their borders. While rejoicing at the victories which, under God's blessing, have crowned our exertions, let us cherish the memory of our brave comrades who have laid down their lives upon the battlefield, martyrs in their country's cause. Their names will be enshrined in the hearts of the people." General Reno, who fell on the 14th, at the battle of South Mountain, had passed a life of steady usefulness. A native of Virginia, he had entered West Point from Pennsylvania; graduated in 1846; was appointed Second Lieutenant of Ordnance, and continued in the discharge of various duties of that service and the coast survey till the rebellion brought him into the field as Brigadier-General of Volunteers. His gallant services with General Burnside, at Roanoke, Newbern, and elsewhere, will be remembered by the reader. Summoned from North Carolina to the army of the Potomac, he had fought in the campaign with Pope, and was now called to meet death on the field in the moment of victory. Among the Confederate losses was Brigadier-General Lawrence O'Brien Branch, of North Carolina, who, it will be remembered, was in command of the Confederate forces at Newbern, on the capture of that place. General Starke, of Mississippi, was also killed. Six brigadier-generals, Anderson and Ransome, of North Carolina; Wright and Lawton, of Georgia; Armistead, of Virginia; Ripley, of South Carolina, and other officers in proportion, were report ed wounded. The Union success in the overthrow of the army of invasion, as we have seen, had its full price. The number of field and general officers in the terrible bill of mortality-whether ten or fifteen thousand-bears witness to the fearful nature of the conflict. Of the officers who fell, we have seen Generals Mansfield and Reno in active occupation since the beginning of the war. The former, in his fifty-ninth year, was one of the veterans of the service. Born in New Haven, Conn., he had passed through Major-General Israel B. Richardson, West Point with singular credit; entered died of wounds received in the battle of the Engineers; served with distinction Antietam, at Sharpsburg, on the following in the Mexican war, being severely November. A native of Burlington, Vt., wounded at Monterey, and brevetted he graduated at West Point in 1841, 2d Colonel for his gallantry at Buena Vista ; | Lieutenant in the 3d Infantry. Eminently and at the breaking out of the rebellion distinguished by his valor in the Mexican created Brigadier-General and war, he was brevetted Captain for his gallantry at Contreras and Cherubusco, was * Ante, p. 320–321. Brigadier-General Isaac Peace Rodman, of Rhode Island, also a hero of Roanoke Island and Newbern, was another of the victims of Antietam. Educated to mercantile pursuits, as a woollen manufacturer, he had entered the service as Captain of Colonel Slocum's 2d Rhode Island regiment. After his gallant services in North Carolina which gained him his promotion, he had been compelled to return home by an attack of fever, rejoining General Burnside in Virginia to take part in the campaigns of Pope and McClellan. He had just completed his fortieth year. and Major for his services at Chapulte- noble character. On the breaking out pec. Resigning his commission in 1855, of the war he forsook his profession, he settled as a farmer in Michigan, to be came to Berkshire in Massachusetts, his recalled to arms by the rebellion, and re-native place, joined a regiment raised join the service as Colonel of the 2d there, and gave his services and his life, regiment of volunteers from his adopted if necessary, to the cause of his country. State. He was in the first list of Briga- His life was required of him. Those dier appointments, dating from May, who sorrow for his death have at least the 1861; will be remembered for the emi- mitigation of reflecting that he died in a nent part he bore in the battles of Bull great, just and holy cause. The sweet Run, and for his services on the Penin- but somewhat fantastic lines of Collins sula, at Fair Oaks, and the retreat to have yet a profound truth in them, and Harrison's Landing, which gained him his haunt the mind like a strain of unearthly Major-Generalship. When he met his music: death at Antietam, "he was leading a regiment that had shown signs of wavering, under a fierce artillery fire, when a shell, bursting, struck him in the left breast, and his Aid bore him from the field. Tell General McClellan,' said he, that I have been doing a Colonel's work all day, and am now too badly hurt to do a General's.'"* "How sleep the brave who sink to rest "By fairy hands their knell is rung; We might multiply this list with the To dwell, a weeping hermit, there." names of Colonel Kingsbury, of Connec- At the funeral of Major Sedgwick at ticut Crossdale, Childs and McNeill, of the family home at Lenox, the Rev. Dr. Pennsylvania; Hinks, of Massachusetts; Dewey, after paying his tribute to the Coleman, of Ohio; Lieutenant-Colonel worth of the deceased, improved the ocDwight, of Boston; Captain Manross, who casion to arouse in his hearers a sense left a professor's chair of chemistry, at of the iniquity of the treason which had Amherst, for the field, and others, but brought them to the sad ceremonial. must close the sad record with a brief" Far from the battlefield," said he, obituary of an honored son of New Eng-"from the confused noise and garments land, from a friendly hand. Major rolled in blood-amidst the hills of New William Dwight Sedgwick," says an edi- England, amidst the peaceful scenes of torial of the New York Evening Post, of his nativity, these precious remains are October 11, "who has just died of the now to be laid down to their last rest. wounds he received at the bloody battle Dwelling as I do amidst such peaceful of Antietam, was a member of the well-scenes, in the quiet and security of our known Massachusetts family of that name, eminent for its talent. On the mother's side his intellectual inheritance was not less remarkable, belonging, if our recollection serves us rightly, to the stock of Jonathan Edwards, the illustrious metaphysician. He was settled in St. Louis, a young lawyer of high promise and Northern homes, unvisited by the horrors of war, I have been saying, with myself, for months past, 'It must strike deeper!the discipline must strike deeper before it accomplishes the end; before this nation understands what God is teaching it; before it awakes to its solemn trust of selfgovernment; before a due horror of treason is stamped upon the national heart.'" CHAPTER LXXIX. GENERAL MCCLELLAN'S ADVANCE INTO VIRGINIA-REMOVAL FROM HIS COMMAND, NOVEMBER 7, 1862. troops about the capital, leaving only a garrison, promising, "if I am reinforced, as I ask, and am allowed to take my own course, I will hold myself responsible for the safety of Washington." To ascertain the condition of the army and make himself acquainted with the scene of the recent military operations, President Lincoln, on the 1st of October, visited the camps in the vicinity of Harper's Ferry, reviewed the troops, whose condition he found to be, upon the whole, satisfactory, and was everywhere in Maryland, on his route, received with enthusiasm. On his return to Washington, General Halleck, on the 6th of October, sent an explicit order to General McClellan: "The President directs that you cross the Potomac and give battle to the enemy or drive him South. Your army must move now while the roads are good." The President, it was added, advised the passage of the river below Harper's Ferry, by which an interior line might be gained, Washington protected, and large reinforcements added to the army. In reply, the next day, General McClellan stated his preference of and determination to advance upon the line of the Shenandoah for immediate operations against the enemy near Winadvantage-operations chester. It offered greater facilities, he thought, for supplying the army, and to abandon it would be to leave Maryland uncovered for another invasion. THE defeat of the enemy at the battle of Antietam, though not a decisive vitory in arresting the war, was a significant indication of the future fortunes of the struggle, and might well be received at the North with heartfelt congratulations, succeeding, as it did, to a series of disasters suffered by the Army of the Potomac. Much disappointment, however, was expressed at the successful retreat across the Potomac of the baffled host, which, inferior in numbers and equipment and with the discouragement of their heavy losses, speedily-as the reconnoissances sent over the river learnt to their cost-took up a position in Virginia, from which General McClellan thought it inexpedient for the time to make any attempt to dislodge them. The battle of Antietam was fought on the 17th of September. Ten days after, when the losses of the day had been ascertained and an estimate formed of the strength of the army, General McClellan pronounced it the best policy to retain his forces on the north bank of the river, render Harper's Ferry secure and watch the movements of the enemy until the rise of the Potomac should render a new invasion of Maryland impracticable; when, as it appeared advantageous, he might move on Winchester, or "devote a reasonable time to the organization of the army and instruction of the new troops preparatory to an advance on whatever line may be determined. In any event, I regard it as absolutely necessary to send new regiments at once to the old corps for purposes of instruction, and that the old regiments be filled at once." At the same time he called upon General Halleck for the General Halleck, at the same time, in a letter to General McClellan, replied to the latter's suggestions, that the army must move, with its crippled regiments, without waiting for the new men from the draft. The country," he wrote, "is becoming very impatient at the want ANOTHER CAVALRY RAID. 657 of activity in your army, and we must branch of the Coneocheague. The expepush it on. I am satisfied that the ene-dition was also specially authorized to my are falling back towards Richmond. supply itself with horses and "other neWe must follow them and seek to punish cessary articles on the list of legal capthem. There is a decided want of legs tures." All citizens met with on the in our troops. They have too much im- way, who were likely to give informamobility, and we must try to remedy the tion to the Union army, were to be ardefect." rested, and citizens of Pennsylvania, The same day General McClellan is-Tolding state or government offices, were sued a proclamation to the army, calling to be brought off as hostages, or "the attention to the recent Emancipation means of exchanges for our own citizens Proclamation by the President, of the that have been carried off by the enemy." 22d of September, which, with the pro- The region about Cumberland was to be ceedings relating to it, the reader will watched for a safe return, unless the exfind in a subsequent chapter. "A pro-pedition was led to the East, when it was clamation," said he, "of such grave moment to the nation, officially communicated to the army, affords to the General commanding an opportunity of defining specifically to the officers and soldiers under his command the relation borne by all persons in the military service of the United States towards the civil authorities of the government. The Constitution confides to the civil authorities, legislative, judicial and executive, the power and duty of making, expounding and executing the federal laws. Armed forces are raised and supported simply to sustain the civil authorities, and are to be held in strict subordination thereto in all respects. This fundamental rule of our political system is essential to the security of our republican institutions, and should be thoroughly understood and observed by every soldier." The Army of the Potomac was now aroused by another adventurous raid of the rebel cavalry General Stuart, similar to his exploit on the Peninsula. On the 8th of October, the Confederate General Lee ordered an expedition into Maryland, directing Stuart, with a detachment of from twelve to fifteen hundred well-mounted men, to cross the Potomac above Williamsport, and leaving Hagerstown and Greencastle on the right, to proceed to the rear of Chambersburg, in Pennsylvania, and endeavor to destroy the railroad bridge over the expected to cross the Potomac in the vicinity of Leesburg. Armed with these instructions, General Stuart left the main camp of the enemy, at Winchester, on the 9th, and making his way, by Darksville and Hedgesville, with a cavalry force of eighteen hundred men and four pieces of horse artillery, under command of Brigadier-General Hampton and Colonels W. H. F. Lee and Jones, at daylight the next day, with slight opposition, crossed the Potomac at McCoy's Ford, between Williamsport and Hancock. He then learnt that the division of General Cox, after its service with Pope and McClellan, had just passed westward, on its return to the Kanawha. "Striking directly across the national road," continues General Stuart in his report, "I proceeded in the direction of Mercersburg, Pennsylvania, which point was reached about twelve м. I was extremely anxious to reach Hagerstown, where large supplies were stored; but was satisfied from reliable information that the notice the enemy had of my approach and the proximity of his forces, would enable him to prevent my capturing it. I therefore turned towards Chambersburg. I did not reach this point till after dark, in a rain. I did not deem it safe to defer the attack till morning, nor was it proper to attack a place full of women and children without summoning it first to surrender. I accordingly |