a pontoon train other than that conveyed by the two telegrams of Lieutenant Comstock.

General Halleck had directed me, at first by telegraph, afterwards verbally, to take bridge material down to Aquia creek; but no one informed me that the success of any important movement depended, in the slightest degree, upon a pontoon train to leave Washington by land without such instructions which, I think, should have been made to me. I had no sufficient ground to seize teams or teamsters in Washington regardless of forms. I was left entirely to my own judgment. Without orders from any one, I brought down to Belle Plain (30) thirty pontoon wagons. To these we are indebted for the presence of a pontoon train in camp to-day.

The land train which left Washington Wednesday morning, the 19th, delayed by rains, reached the Occoquan Friday morning; then a pontoon bridge, with approaches, had to be made, causing a delay of one day or more. This delay, I am told, could only have been avoided, at any stage of the Occoquan, by crossing that stream at Wolf Run shoal, some six miles higher up, at the expense of (10) ten miles added to the length of the road. By a guide, just arrived, I am informed that there are other fords, but that the above route is the best.

South of the Occoquan the roads become impassable to pontoon trains, and Major Spaulding found it necessary to send for water transportation for his pontoons. Neither wagons nor pontoons have yet arrived.

In conclusion, I will state that I have never before been under arrest, and that I greatly regret the occurrence.

During the whole of this important war I have been working, certainly with zeal, and with whatever energy and intelligence I could command.

Respectfully,

D. P. WOODBURY, Brigadier General Volunteers.

WASHINGTON, December 19, 1862.

Major General AMBROSE E. BURNSIDE Sworn and examined.

By the chairman:

Question. You have seen the resolution of the Senate under which this committee is now acting. Will you now go on, and in your own way, without questioning, give such an account of the matters embraced in that resolution as you may consider necessary and proper? We do not want to go back to the time when you came into command.

Answer. In order that the whole matter may be entirely understoood, it may be well to go back a little.

Question. Very well. Make your statement in your own way.

Answer. When, after the battle of Antietam, General McClellan decided to cross the Potomac, I said to him that, in my opinion, he would never be able to take this army on that route beyond the Rappahannock, unless he succeeded in fighting the enemy at some place on this side; that if he proposed to go to Richmond by land, he would have to go by way of Fredericksburg; and in that he partially agreed with me. After we had started we had another conversation on that subject, and several other officers were present. On the 6th of November, after this conversation, General McClellan gave an order to Captain Duane, his chief engineer, to have all the pontoon bridges at Berlin and in that neighborhood that could be spared taken up and sent down to Washington, with a view of getting them down to this line, in case he decided to go by way of Fredericksburg. The letter conveying that order was written on the 6th of November, but, as I understand, was not received until the 12th of November.

On the 7th or 8th of November I received an order from the President of the United States directing me to take command of the army of the Potomac, and also a copy of the order relieving General McClellan from that command. This order was conveyed to me by General Buckingham, who was attached to the War Department. After getting over my surprise, the shock, &c., I told General Buckingham that it was a matter that required very serious thought; that I did not want the command; that it had been offered to me twice before, and I did not feel that I could take it. I consulted with two of my staffofficers in regard to it for, I should think, an hour and a half. They urged upon me that I had no right, as a soldier, to disobey the order, and that I had already expressed to the government my unwillingness to take the command. I told them what my views were with reference to my ability to exercise such a command, which views were those I had always unreservedly expressed-that I was not competent to command such a large army as this. I had said the same over and over again to the President and Secretary of War, and also that if matters could be satisfactorily arranged with General McClellan, I thought he could command the army of the Potomac better than any other general in it. But they had studied the subject more than I had, and knew more about their objections to General McClellan than I did.

There had been some conversation in regard to the removal of General McClellan when he was bringing away his army from before Richmond. The first of these conversations with the President and Secretray of War occurred at that time. And then, after General McClellan had got back to Washington, and before the commencement of the Maryland campaign, there was another conversation of the same kind. And on both of those occasions I expressed to the President the opinion that I did not think there was any one who could do as much with that army as General McClellan could, if matters could be so arranged as to remove their objections to him.

After I had consulted with my staff-officers, I went to see General McClellan himself, and he agreed with them that this was an order which I, as a soldier, had to obey. He said that he could not retain the command, for he, as a soldier, would have to obey the order directing him to give up that command.

I then assumed the command, in the midst of a violent snow-storm, with the army in a position that I knew but little of. I had previously commanded but one corps, upon the extreme right, and I had been upon the extreme right and in the advance since that campaign had begun. I probably knew less than any other corps commander of the positions and relative strength of the several corps of the army. General McClellan remained some two or three days to arrange his affairs, and came with me as far as Warrenton, and then left, having given me all the information he could in reference to the army.

General Halleck came down to see me on the 11th of November. On the 9th I made out a plan of operations, in accordance with the order of General Halleck, which directed me not only to take command of the army, but also to state what I proposed to do with it. That plan I wrote out on the morning of the 9th of November, and sent it by a special messenger to Washington, I can furnish the committee a copy of that plan if they desire it. I do not have it here now.

Questlon. State the substance of it, if you please; that may do as well. Answer. I stated, in substance, that I thought it advisable to concentrate the army in the neighborhood of Warrenton; to make a small movement across the Rappahannock, as a feint, with a view to divert the attention of the enemy and lead them to believe that we were going to move in the direction of Gordonsville, and then to make a rapid movement of the whole army to Fredericksburg or this side of the Rappahannock.

As my reasons for that, I stated that the further we got into the interior of Virginia the longer would be our line of communications, and the greater would be the difficulty we would have in keeping them open, as the enemy had upon our right flank a corps which at almost any time could, by a rapid movement, seriously embarrass us. If we were caught by the elements so far from our base of supplies, and at the same time in the enemy's country, where they had means of getting information that we had not, it might, I thought, prove disastrous to the army, as we had but one line of railway by which to supply it.

In moving upon Fredericksburg we would all the time be as near Washington as would the enemy; and after arriving at Fredericksburg we would be at a point nearer to Richmond than we would be even if we should take Gordonsville. On the Gordonsville line the enemy, in my opinion, would not give us a decisive battle at any place this side of Richmond. They would defend Gordonsville until such time as they felt they had given us a check, and then, with so many lines of railroad open to them, they would move upon Richmond or upon Lynchburg, and, in either case, the difficulty of following them would be very great.

In connexion with this movement, I requested that barges filled with provisions and forage should be floated to Aquia creek, where they could easily be landed; that materials be collected for the reconstruction of the wharves there, and that all the wagons in Washington that could be possibly spared should be filled with hard bread and small commissary stores, and with a large number of beef-cattle started down to Fredericksburg, on the road by way of Dumfries; and that this wagon train and herd of cattle should be preceded by a pontoon train large enough to span the Rappahannock twice. I stated that this wagon train could move in perfect safety, because it would be all the time between our army and the Potomac, or, in other words, our army would be all the time between the enemy and that train. But at the same time I said that if a cavalry escort could not be furnished from Washington, I would send some of my cavalry to guard the train. On the morning of the 14th of November, feeling uneasy with reference to the pontoons, as I had not heard of their starting, I directed my chief engineer to telegraph again in reference to them.

Question. To whom did he telegraph?

Answer. He telegraphed to General Woodbury or to Major Spaulding. It subsequently appeared that that was the first they ever had heard of my wish to have the pontoon train started down for Fredericksburg, although the authorities in Washington had had my plan sent to them on the 9th of November, and it had also been discussed by General Halleck and General Meigs, at my headquarters at Warrenton, on the night of the 11th or 12th of November; and, after discussing it fully there, they sat down and sent telegrams to Washington, which, as I supposed, fully covered the case, and would secure the starting of the pontoons at once. I supposed, of course, that those portions of the plan which required to be attended to in Washington would be carried out there at once. I could have sent officers of my own there to attend to those matters, and perhaps I made a mistake in not doing so, as General Halleck afterwards told me that I ought not to have trusted to them in Washington for the details. In reply to the telegram I had ordered to be sent, General Woodbury telegraphed back that the pontoons would start on Sunday morning, possibly, and certainly on Monday morning, which would have been on the 16th or 17th of November, and would have been in time. They did not, however, start until the 19th, and on that day it commenced raining, which delayed them so much, and the roads became so bad, that when they got to Dumfries they floated the pontoons off the wagons; sent to Washington for a steamer, and carried them down to

Aquia creek by water, sending the wagons around by land. The pontoons did not get here until the 22d or the 23d of November.

On the 16th of November I started the column down the road to Fredericksburg, not knowing anything about the delay in the starting of the pontoons, because the telegram announcing the delay did not reach Warrenton Junction until I had left to come down here with the troops, and that telegram did not reach me until I arrived here, on the morning of the 19th, when it was handed to me by an orderly, who had brought it down from Warrenton Junction.

After reaching here, I saw at once that there was no chance for crossing the Rappahannock with the army at that time. It commenced raining and the river began to rise, not to any great extent, but I did not know how much it might rise. There were no means of crossing except by going up to the fords, and it would be impossible to do that, because of the inability to supply the troops after they should cross.

General Sumner, with his command, arrived here in advance. He sent to me, asking if he should cross the river. He was very much tempted to take his own corps across to Fredericksburg by a ford near Falmouth, as there was no enemy there except a very small force. I did not think it advisable that he should cross at that time.

The plan I had in contemplation was, if the stores and those bridges had come here as I had expected, to throw Sumner's whole corps across the Rappahannock, fill the wagons with as many small stores as we could, and having beef-cattle along for meats, then to make a rapid movement down in the direction of Richmond, and try to meet the enemy and fight a battle before Jackson could make a junction there. We knew that Jackson was in the valley, and felt that there was force enough on the Upper Rappahannock to take care of him. We felt certain that as soon as the enemy knew of our coming down here the force under Jackson would be recalled, and we wanted to meet this force and beat it before Jackson could make a junction with them, or before Jackson could come down on our flank and perhaps cripple us. I had recommended that more supplies should be sent to the mouth of the Rappahannock, with a view to establishing a depot at Port Royal after we had advanced to Fredericksburg.

After the first delay in starting the pontoons, I think they were sent as quickly as they could have been, and the supplies and quartermaster's stores have been always in as great abundance as we could have expected; for after the 19th of November the weather and the roads were particularly bad. Horses and mules, &c., were sent down to us, so that our cavalry and teams were in very good condition.

After it was ascertained that there must be a delay, and that the enemy had concentrated in such force as to make it very difficult to cross except by a number of bridges, we commenced bringing up from Aquia creek all the pontoons we could. After enough of them had been brought up to build the bridges, I called several councils of war to decide about crossing the Rappahannock. It was first decided to cross down at Skinker's Neck, about twelve miles below here. But our demonstration in that direction concentrated the enemy at that place, and I finally gave up the idea of crossing there. I still continued operations at Skinker's Neck by way of demonstration, simply for the purpose of drawing down there as large a force of the enemy as possible. I then decided to cross here, because, in the first place, I felt satisfied that they did not expect us to cross here, but down below; in the next place, I felt satisfied that this was the place to fight the most decisive battle, because if we could divide their forces by piercing their lines at one or two points, separating their left from their right, then a vigorous attack with the whole army would succeed in breaking their army in pieces.

The enemy had cut a road along in the rear of the line of heights where we made our attack, by means of which they connected the two wings of their army, and avoided a long detour around through a bad country. I obtained from a colored man from the other side of the town information in regard to this new road, which proved to be correct. I wanted to obtain possession of that new road, and that was my reasons for making an attack on the extreme left. I did not intend to make the attack on the right until that position had been taken, which I supposed would stagger the enemy, cutting their line in two; and then I proposed to make a direct attack on their front, and drive them out of their works.

I succeeded in building six bridges, and taking the whole army across. The two attacks were made, and we were repulsed; still holding a portion of the ground we had fought upon, but not our extreme advance.

That night I went all over the field on our right; in fact, I was with the officers and men until nearly daylight. I found the feeling to be rather against an attack the next morning; in fact, it was decidedly against it.

I returned to my headquarters, and, after conversation with General Sumner, told him that I wanted him to order the ninth army corps-which was the corps I originally commanded-to form the next morning a column of attack by regiments. It consisted of some eighteen old regiments, and some new ones, and I desired the column to make a direct attack upon the enemy's works. I thought that these regiments, by coming quickly up after each other, would be able to carry the stone wall and the batteries in front, forcing the enemy into their next line, and by going in with them they would not be able to fire upon us to any great extent. I left General Sumner with that understanding, and directed him to give the order. The order was given,

and the column of attack was formed.

The next morning, just before the column was to have started, General Sumner came to me and said: 66 General, I hope you will desist from this attack; I do not know of any general officer who approves of it, and I think it will prove disastrous to the army." Advice of that kind from General Sumner, who has always been in favor of an advance whenever it was possible, caused me to hesitate. I kept the column of attack formed, and sent over for the division and corps commanders, and consulted with them. They unanimously voted against the attack. I then went over to see the other officers of the command on the other side, and found that the same impression prevailed among them. I then sent for General Franklin, who was on the left, and he was of exactly the same opinion. This caused me to decide that I ought not to make the attack I had contemplated. And besides, inasmuch as the President of the United States had told me not to be in haste in making this attack; that he would give me all the support that he could, but he did not want the army of the Potomac destroyed, I felt that I could not take the responsibility of ordering the attack, notwithstanding my own belief at the time that the works of the enemy could be carried.

In the afternoon of that day I again saw the officers, and told them that I had decided to withdraw to this side of the river all our forces except enough to hold the town and the bridge-heads, but should keep the bridges there for further operations in case we wanted to cross again. I accordingly ordered the withdrawal, leaving General Hooker to conduct the withdrawal of our forces from the town, and General Franklin to conduct it on our left. During that evening I received a note from General Hooker; and about 10 o'clock at night General Butterfield came over with a message from General Hooker, stating that he (General Hooker) felt it his duty to represent to me the condition in which I was leaving the town and the troops in it. After a long conversation on the subject with General Butterfield, I felt that the troops I proposed to leave behind would not be able to hold the