map and asked his Secretary of War for the latest on the whereabouts of McClellan and Lee. "Our army has finally put all its units across the Potomac into Virginia," Stanton reported. "It's been seven long weeks since Antietam." Lincoln nodded and asked for specifics. McClellan's headquarters was in now Rectortown, near Warrenton; the general was complaining of lack of shoes for his men, and wanted more carbines and muskets, but he was un- doubtedly on the move to engage the enemy. Lee's army was again separated by the Blue Ridge Mountains, with Jackson's corps on the western side in the Shenandoah Valley and Longstreet's troops down at Culpepper Court House. Apparently McClellan planned to strike down the east side of the mountain range at Longstreet, driving him back on Gordonsville before Jackson could unite with him. From there, Mac could take the Fredericksburg route to Richmond or try to talk Lincoln into letting him try the Peninsula route again. The President noticed something as Stanton was talking; strange, how maps could speak to you about armies. If Longstreet was in Culpepper, that meant he was in McClellan's front; no longer could Lincoln hope that the Federal forces could cut off Lee's army from the rear. A case could be made, then, and would readily be understood by the public, that Lee's army had "escaped." Although he could no longer relieve McClellan on the grounds that he was not actively pursuing Leeindeed, McClellan seemed in the process of making a major attackhe could relieve the general on the grounds that he had allowed Lee to slip his army between McClellan and Richmond, to escape. The President could say that had always been his crite- rion for replacing his field commander. Because replace him he must. The victory of the Democrats in the elec- tions, combined with what Schurz rightly recognized was the West Point crowd's unhealthy dominance of the army, had flung down a gauntlet. Lin- coln knew he faced a stark choice: either back away from emancipation, ease up on the Democratic dissidents, woo the Republican conservatives, and ac- cept the policy laid down in McClellan's Harrison's Landing planor do just the opposite; ignore the election results, crack down on the agitators, lay a strong hand on the colored element by using them as soldiers, fire McClellan and root out the West Point mind-set in the army. The President crossed to the desk, took out a quill and ink, rummaged in the drawer for paper, and composed a message. "Take this to Halleck," he told Stanton, knowing the Secretary would approve without hesitation. "I want this under his signature, not mine or yours." That was what Halleck was for: professional military coloration. , Stanton read it aloud: "By direction of the President, it is ordered that Major General McClellan be relieved from command of the Army of the Potomac; and that Major General Burnside take command of that Army." Stanton nodded vigorously. "Leave it undated," he said. "We want to give Halleck some discretion in sending it. It should be taken to Burnside first by a high-ranking officer, then to McClellan in person only after Burnside says he is willing to do his duty. I would not trust this to the telegraph; it may be that McClellan will listen to the traitors around him and try to march his army to take control of Washington." Lincoln agreed, glad that Stanton had not tried to make an argument for Chase's choice, General Hooker; Burnside seemed more solid than the flam- boyant "Fighting Joe." Also, McClellan was a longtime friend of Burnside, and that choice of a successor would be less likely to ignite an army coup. Stanton gave Lincoln another suggestion: "Perhaps you should relieve Por- ter in the same order and give his command to Hooker. If Burnside gets an attack of modesty, Hooker and not Porter would be next in line to take command, and we need somebody like Hooker to stop what the West Pointers call 'a change of front to Washington.' And then I want to court-martial Porter for not supporting Pope back at Bull Runthat will break the back of the whole cabal." Lincoln saw the wisdom in that and wrote it out: "That Major General Fitz-John Porter be relieved from the command of the corps he now com- mands in said Army; and that Major General Hooker take command of said corps." That was the sort of tough-minded response to the election needed to whip the North into line. Lincoln knew it was not his usual way, of pushing others out ahead of him and appearing to be led in their direction, but sometimes a sharp blow needed a more forceful return blow. Stanton said he would dispatch a general in his office to carry the secret order to Burnside, and then to McClellan, putting a new man in command of the 142,000 well-organized troops of the Army of the Potomac. "No one else is to know," Stanton sternly adjured him, "no other member of the Cabinet, Blair especially. This must not get out to McClellan through any source but the general I send to him." Lincoln pledged absolute secrecy; it would be hard playing shut-pan with Old Man Blair, who was coming to see him that night at the Soldiers' Home, but it was clearly necessary. "We'll have to inform Chase," Stanton said, adding with what struck Lin- coln as an unfortunate note of vindictiveness: "Chase has an officer who will make sure we get the right verdict in the court-martial of Porter." Lincoln was fairly sure that the only way to overcome electoral defeat and a loss of thirty-two seats in the 179-man House was surely a defeatwas a show of renewed authority, followed by military victory. The place would be the gateway to Richmond, perhaps in the vicinity of Fredericksburg, and the man of the hour would be Ambrose Burnside. CHAPTER 18 1 PLAYING SHUT-PAN Francis Preston Blair drove his carriage the short distance from his Silver Spring home to the Soldiers' Home, where the President was staying. Lin- coln, sitting on the porch in the crisp early winter evening, seemed curiously relaxed for a man whose party has just been trounced in an election. He congratulated Blair on his son's victory amidst the general Republican deba- cle in the House, and allowed as how the election result was largely caused by the absence of good Republicans who were away from home fighting the war, and the baneful effect of the newspapers. The Old Man did not argue. Above all, he was determined not to become an I-told-you-so on the effect of emancipation in New York, where Greeley now looked the fool and Weed and Seward the wizards. Presidents, he knew, did not welcome advisers to tell them why they had been wrong. At times like these, presidents needed sympathetic listeners to the lame excuses, and men who could offer sensible advice as to what to do next to ameliorate the losses. "I would like to make the case for retaining McClellan," he said at the appropriate moment. "Monty tells me you're on the verge." "I have tried long enough," Lincoln replied, "to bore with an auger too dull to take hold." "A certain torpidity of McClellan's must be infuriating at times," Blair admitted, rolling with the President's evident distaste toward the com- mander, "but consider the difficulty, as I am sure you must have, of finding any other general capable of wielding so great a force and so complicated a machine." "He has got the slows, Mr. Blair." "You're right. That is why it would be important to send some common friend of yours and his to reach an explicit understanding with him. Tell him what the President expected him to do and when, and tell him that absolute and prompt obedience was the tenure by which alone he held his command." Lincoln looked at the night sky. It seemed to Blair that the President felt his talks with McClellan at Antietam obviated the need for an intermediary. Those talks had produced merely a six-week delay, at a time Lincoln needed a pre-election military victory. "I'm not qualified to make the military argument," said Blair, he hoped disarmingly. "Maybe it took too long, but he's now across the Potomac, aggressively seeking out the enemy. He surely has a plan to divide the forces of Lee and Jackson and defeat them in detail, but I understand he has been unwilling to share that plan with you. That should be rectified right away." "You're giving the military argument," Lincoln reminded him. "Let's talk politics, then. What would be the political result of your super- seding McClellan? You would be seen as yielding once more to the ultras in our party, and acting in defiance of the majority that just spoke in the elec- tion. That would weaken you at a time you cannot afford to be weakened." "No doubt the bottom is out of the tub," the President said. "If, on the contrary," the Old Man continued, "McClellan could be pushed hard now, on the line he has taken, and compelled to make a vigorous winter campaign, what political effect would that have?" , The President just listened. Blair took that uncharacteristic response to mean that Stanton and Chase had persuaded him to get even with the voters by ridding himself of McClellan. Why? It was illogical, on the basis of the facts in hand; the Old Man sensed that there must be another element in all this of which the Biairs were in the dark. Ever since midsumme.", when Lincoln returned from his meeting with the general at Harrison's Landing, the Blair espousal of McClellan's cause had been met with a certain numb- ness. Had the general said anything insubordinate or overtly political? "Consider for a moment what your strong support of McClellan would mean," he went on, squinting at the expressionless face of the President. "The Democrats in the Congress, who are in heart on the side of oligarchy and the South, would be compelled to make war on McClellan. In turn, McClellan would be compelled to take sides with you, bringing to your support in the Congress the real War Democrats." "Interesting theory, Mr. Blair." The former adviser to Jackson warmed to his theme. "After that, those trying to resuscitate the Democratic Party to carry the presidency in 1864 would necessarily take an anti-McClellan man for their candidate. That would split the Democrats and enable you to win again." "And if, as a general, McClellan fails?" "He fails as a Democrat and the Democrats fail with him. At least your cause would best be served by retaining him until he failedand I do not believe he would, given a new impetus." The President slowly shook his head. Blair, losing him, tried one last time: "If you replace him now, on the very eve of battle, and his replacement fails, then the Democrats will unite behind a formidable ticket in sixty-four: Mc- Clellan and Seymour. That could beat you, and everything we all stand for." Lincoln seemed on the brink of confiding something, then held back. He rose, stretched his arms, and closed the discussion with, "I'm sorry to play shut-pan with you." Let Lincoln keep his own counsel; it would not be the first time that advisers who had been all too accurate in their dire predictions were snubbed by a President stung by the consequences of not listening to good advice. On his way back to Silver Spring, the elder Blair focused on his goal: the best route for his youngest son to the vice-presidential nomination in two or six yearsas either Republican or Democrat. A partnership with Lincoln would be best. If that did not work out, there was always the possibility of an alliance with Horatio Seymour. CHAPTER 19 BLOODLESS WATERLOO "Pinkerton reports a special train from Washington arrived at Rectortown a couple of hours ago," Colonel Thomas Key told McClellan abruptly, "with Stanton's aide, General Buckingham." "Secure the flap," McClellan said, motioning toward the tent entrance, "the snow is coming in." , Key moved to the entrance, but backed away as Captain Custer struggled in out of the storm. "Buckingham is not coming here," Custer added to Key's report. "He's ridden to Bumside's headquarters at Salem, about five miles from here." "That's worrisome," Key told McClellan. "If Stanton is dealing directly with your corps commanders, it could mean a change of command is in the works." McClellan nodded understanding. "Judge, I have been told about your young nephew's gallant death at Perryville. I've written to your brother John"he interjected sadly"the former Major Key. He must be doubly crushed." Key took off his greatcoat before answering and moved near the stove for warmth. McClellan noted his pallor, and the film of sweat on his face; he was ill, perhaps the typhus, picked upjust after the fighting at Antietam. "Sixteen, the boy was," Key replied. "Picked up a regimental flag and led a charge. I suppose that balances the family disgrace." "Mightn't that change the President's mind?" Key said with sadness that his brother's appeal, notwithstanding the death of the boy, had been turned down. Evidently, to President Lincoln, a lesson was a lesson: there could be no mercy in the setting of an example to the military. "I can imagine what they're conspiring in Burnside's tent," said Custer, getting to the central issue. "But the army won't stand for it." "Don't talk that way, Captain," Key snapped. "The Secretary of War has the right to send an aide to see any commander in the army. It's no conspir- acy." "Stanton is doing his best to sacrifice this army again," Custer replied hotly. "For God's sake, Colonel, just one week ago, Lincoln telegraphed how pleased he was with the movement of this army. Why is Stanton sending messengers to talk to Burnside behind the general's back?" "It could be that we haven't taken Washington into our confidence suffi- ciently, General," Key said to McClellan. "That isn't the problem," McClellan said. He felt at the peak of his powers more sure of himself, satisfied with his line of supply from Harpers Ferry, no complaints about needed reinforcementsand confident, after Antietam, that he could defeat Lee again. He had won two in a row, counting the last battle on the Peninsula. He knew how to take advantage of Lee's rashness and over-reliance on Jackson. "Halleck certainly knows how I intend to interpose my army between Longstreet and Jackson," he explained. "Mr. Lincoln may not agree with my strategy, but he surely knows what it is." "Lincoln needed a military victory so he could win a political victory," said Custer flatly and, McClellan thought, accurately. "Simple as that." "Just as we think the President wanted us to speed up the battle to take place before the elections," Key said carefully, "the radicals think we have been waiting until after Election Day to launch our offensive." The general found some truth in that suspicion, too; it was easy to sit in Washington and order a tired and bloodied army of 140,000 men, short of shoes, to march immediately. Experienced generals knew that it took at least sixty days to reprovision and reorganize between major engagements. "You don't understand," said Custer urgently. "They're planning to court- martial us all. The black Republicans cannot admit that their darling Pope lost at Second Bull Run, and that the man they hate won at Antietati. They have to prove that Pope's loss was our fault, and blacken our names forever. They'll court-martial McClellan, Porter, you, meeverybody who isn't a damned abolitionist." Key's shudder told McClellan there was something in what Armstrong Custer was saying: rumors were rife of a court-martial board aimed at Mc- Clellan, Fitz-John Porter, and other unnamed "West Pointers" unsympa- thetic to abolition. Lincoln's personal cashiering of Key's brother John was a deliberate signal; now that the elections were over, and the radical defeat blamed on McClellan's "inactivity," Wade and the rest would be going after the scalps of all those at the top of the Army of the Potomac. But Bumside was exempt, as was Hooker, both outspoken abolitionists. The charge of treason would probably be leveled at McClellan, surely at Porter, and perhaps others who had failed to get Pope out of his scrape. Small wonder, the general thought, that the reaction of a portion of the officer corps to the beheading of McClellan's army would be to demand that McClellan march on Washington. If the officers were to be denounced as traitors any- way, why notas Patrick Henry once put itmake the most of it? "Lincoln and Stanton and Halleck have fought you every step of the way," Custer was pressing on. "At the Peninsula, when reinforcements would have enabled you to take Richmond from the rear, they brought McDowell's forty thousand men back to sit in Washington to guard the Mansion." The general nodded. "In the end, whoever is in command will have to follow my plan," he predicted calmly. "From Games' Mill, Cold Harbor, the Federal forces will have to move to the James River to make Richmond untenable." "Then they abandoned the only way to take Richmond," Custer said, "and put their favorite abolitionist, Pope, in charge of a doomed campaign. And in that disaster, not only do they blame you for not coming to his rescue but, by God, Lincoln was willing to surrender Washington rather than give the com- mand back to you!" "Stanton, Chase, and Halleck," McClellan corrected him. "Not Lincoln. Be fair." "Halleck was wrong every step of the way toward Antietam," Custer went on. "I have all the telegrams warning you against following Lee north into Maryland. If you had listened to that nonsense, Lee would be in New York today. You were the only one who could organize this army, and the only one who saw where it had to move to stop Lee from defeating the North. Lincoln and his crowd were all wrong, first to last. Now they want to disgrace and maybe hang you, take the army into battle with a damned incompetent who couldn't get his men across a bridge at Antietam all day longand all be- cause the damned politicians want to be sure you don't emerge the hero of the war!" "Take care not to talk treason," warned Key, mindful of his brother's fate. "You know as well as I do what Stanton said to the radical senators," Custer shot back. "He said, It is not on our books that McClellan shall take Richmond.' I say that is the real treason. General, the radicals hate you and they fear you, and they are willing to sacrifice this army rather than see it victorious under you." McClellan looked to his older aide, a man of the law and a good Democrat, albeit an abolitionist, to counter Ouster's passion. "Armstrong, we do not know what message it is that General Buckingham bears, if any," said Colonel Key. "We also know that General Bumside, who may be irritated at the moment because of our criticism of his inaction at Antietam, knows his limitations." "That's fair to say," judged McClellan. "He turned down the command before, when they gave it to Pope. Burn knows better than anybody that he cannot command the entire army in the field." "He'll follow political orders," disagreed Custer, "and take the Army of the Potomac to bloody disaster." "Let's hope Bumside asks Buckingham for a delay," said Key, speaking his hopes. "We only need a few days, then we'll be out of telegraphic contact with Washington and into battle." "We'll see," McClellan said. "I don't have to make any decision yet." "General," Custer pleaded, "this army loves you. You have a responsibility to save tens of thousands of these brave men from certain death. Do not submit to an order that history will condemn as the most brazen injustice ever motivated by politics. Lead us, Generalthe Army of the Potomac will follow you." McClellan studied the pen he had been using to write to his wife. The post- election dismissal of a general on the eve of battleespecially a general loved by the troops, to be replaced by one distrusted by the troopswould send a wave of anger through every corps and regiment. The army knew it was ready to fight, and about to fight, and the injustice, not to say the danger, of firing a commander on the pretext of not being ready or about to fight would profoundly affect the main body of troops. All it would take would be one moment of anger, and in twenty-four hours the coup d'6tat would be accom- plished. "History does not remember Cromwell kindly," Key said. "It remembers Caesar kindly enough," countered Custer. "This is the United States of America, a republic," Key said. "For nearly a century we have abided by a constitution, as no other nation in history ever has. General, do you want to be the man remembered as the one who shat- tered that tradition of political stability?" When McClellan remained impas- sive, Key put in a practical point: "Besides, Lincoln will never get Burn to agree to replace you." The general, ever the tactician, smiled ruefully: "Unless he threatens to appoint Hooker instead. Burn couldn't stand that." "I am unfit for the command," Bumside told Stanton's messenger unequiv- ocally. "Do you have any idea what it is like to try to figure out what Bobby Lee and Thomas Jackson are about to do? And then to be responsible for the lives of thousands of men who trust your judgment, when you do not trust it yourself?" In Ambrose Bumside's tent, snow swirling outside, Brigadier General Catharinus Putnam Buckingham began what he knew to be the only impor- tant military mission of his life: to persuade the man Lincoln had chosen to be commander of the Army of the Potomac to accept the assignment, clearing the way for the relief of George McClellan. "I taught a little topography at West Point thirty years ago," Buckingham said. "Ever since, I've been a professor of mathematics at Kenyon College in Ohio. Couple of years ago, I built a grain elevator; that's my only accomplish- ment. I wear this star because Stanton thinks his adjutant should have one. I'm not a military man, sir. I can't answer your question." Burnside sighed. "What does Stanton expect me to do that McClellan cannot do?" "The Secretary of War has no confidence in McClellan's military ability." "He's wrong. If he thinks I am a better general than McClellan, he's out of his mind. Ask the officers, ask the men. Ask me." "Moreover," Buckingham carried on, "he has grave doubts about McClel- lan's patriotism and loyalty." "Just as George doubts Stanton's, but that's a personal dispute between two men. Surely President Lincoln does not subscribe to the Secretary's harsh indictment of a loyal soldier's patriotism." "The President doesn't take me into his confidence, General, but I know this: Mr. Lincoln has said that if McCleHan permitted Lee to slip away, he would fire him." "What the hell does that mean?" "I was hoping you'd know." "But that's nonsense." Buckingham biinked. It seemed to make sense to most of those who heard it. "Don't tell the President I said this," Burnside reasoned, "but that cannot be the reason he wants to remove McClellan. General Lee is not a fool. He is not going to let any Union army get behind him to attack Richmond. There has never been any chance of thatnot right after Antietam, not now. Every time McClellan moves South to threaten Lee's communications, Lee retreats South. Pete Longstreet just isn't the sort to let us run around behind him. To think that is justsilly. Is that what Stanton expects the commander to do?" "No," Buckingham said hastily. "Not nowthat chance to stop Lee's escape has passed. Lincoln and Halleck have a plan to drive Lee down to the Rappahannock, cross on pontoon bridges, and strike him near Fredericks- burg." "McClellan has a better plan," said Burnside. "To catch Lee much sooner, near Gordonsville, with Jackson the other side of the Blue Ridge." "Lincoln's plan would offer more protection to Washington," the mathe- matics professor said, "I think. But General, I cannot really argue strategy. I must know if you are willing to do your duty and accept command." "I have always done my duty. Sometimes duty demands that you inform your superiors of a mistake." "But you don't understand, Burnsideunless I have your agreement, I cannot deliver the order to McClellan relieving him of command." "Why not?" Buckingham decided that Burnside might just be as thick as he made himself out to be. "Because if we do not have a man immediately in place when we dismiss him, McClellan might just take the army to Washington tomorrow and proclaim himself dictator. That's why." Burnside thought that over. "Lincoln complains that McClellan has the slows. And yet we are now on the eve of battle, if McClellan stays. If I were to take over, I would need at least a month to organize staff, to get into position. More likely six weeks before any major engagement." "The President and the Secretary are aware of that. You won't be rushed." Burnside frowned, stroking his strange whiskers. "Then delay is not Lin- coln's reason either, is it?" Buckingham was on the verge of giving up. He played his last card. "My orders, General, are first to obtain your agreement, and secondly, with you at my side, present General McClellan with his dismissal. But if you fail to accept your responsibility, my orders are to proceed to General Hooker and make the same arrangement with him. I am told he is sufficiently recovered from his wound to take command." Burnside snorted. "Some 'wound'! If Joe Hooker had had the courage to stay and fight at Antietam, I would have carried that bridge early in the day apd Lee would have been routed and the war over. Hooker's appointment would be a disaster." "In effect, you are ceding the command to him." Buckingham let Burnside agonize in silence. Finally Burnside said, "My appointment is merely a mistake. Hooker's would be a catastrophe." He sighed. "Let's go and tell George." A half hour before midnight, as he was writing to his wife, McClellan heard a tap on the tent pole. He called out for whoever it was to enter, and was not surprised to see Burnside and Halleck's adjutant, the mathematics teacher. He greeted them cordially, ignoring the solemn looks on both faces, and engaged them in conversation to show his lack of concern at their mission. "I think we had better tell General McClellan the object of our visit," Buckingham told Burnside, who nodded glumly. Stanton's adjutant handed over the orders signed by Halleck: "General: On receipt of the order of the President, sent herewith, you will immediately turn over your command to Maj. Gen. Burnside, and repair to Trenton, N. J., reporting on your arrival at that place, by telegraph, for further orders." McClellan saw that both men, especially Buckingham, were watching him most intently as he read the order and the attachment making the removal official. The mathematics teacher in a general's uniform from Stanton's office surely knew McClellan had the power to reject the order, to protect himself and his leading officers from courts-martial and possible execution, and to make himself commander in chief. Poor Burn was probably hoping McClel- lan would do just that, saving him from the terrible choice of taking un- wanted command or handing this fine army over to Hooker. McClellan knew what he had to do because he had no doubt about what he was: an officer of the United States Army and a loyal American citizen. He handed the papers to his unhappy and fearful friend with a brief, "Well, Burnside, I turn the command over to you." He said it as if no other course were thinkable; George McClellan hoped that never again would a military officer of the United States be faced with the temptation presented to him that night. Buckingham closed his eyes and took a deep breath, as if the other course had been narrowly averted. Stanton had probably poisoned the man's mind, McClellan assumed, causing him to expect a loyal soldier to turn traitor and usurper. "I will leave in the morning, Burn. You have been as near as possible to me on this march, and I have kept you closely informed on the condition of affairs. You ought to be able to take the reins in your hands without a day's delay." McClellan had planned for this eventuality, assuming that Lincoln would turn to Burnside, who was acceptable to the radicals, rather than to the respected Fitz-John Porter, the only general other than himself capable of facing Lee. He wondered which of them would face court-martial, Porter or himself, or both. The trial of George McClellan would certainly be dramatic, but perhaps too divisive; the radicals would probably go after Fitz instead. He had hoped for more from Lincoln, especially after that last message of encouragement. Surely the President knew the next battle would be decisive, and it was less than a week away. Had he shown the commander in chief the proper respect? On mature reflection, he had to admit not always, certainly not in the beginning. But now that McClellan was showing his willingness to work in tandem with the civilian side, his service was rejected. He could see an irony in that, a belated justice that became injustice. "I beseech you," Burnside said, "stay a few days, settle the officers down. I need you to transfer their loyalty over to me, as much as possible." "To stay a revolt," Buckingham put it plainly. Poor Burn; again, McClellan would have to try to save him, at least loni enough to stumble into an engagement planned by Lincoln himself. Stayin. on as the replaced commander would be painfully demeaning, but McClellai would do his duty. He consented. His two visitors shouldered their way out o the tent into the driving snow. He took up his pen and continued the one comfort of his life in the field, i letter to Nellie. "Another interruption, this time more important. It was ii the shape of Bumside, accompanied by Gen. Buckingham. They brough with them the order relieving me from the command of the Army of thi Potomac. No cause is given. "Alas for my poor country! I know in my inmost heart she never had i truer servant. Do not be at all worried, my dear Nellie1 am not. I havi done the best I could for my country; to the last I have done my duty as understand it. That I must have made many mistakes, I cannot deny. I do no see any great blunders, but no one can judge of himself. Our consolation mus be that we have tried to do what is right." What would have been wrong was to seize the presidency. What he ha( come to see was right was to challenge Lincoln legitimately, in two years time, as the candidate of the Democratic Party. CHAPTER 20 IN JACKSON'S CHAIR Darkness fell early in late November and Lincoln nodded gratefully to Wil- liam for lighting the gas lamp on his desk. Hill Lamon was running a political errand; Nicolay and Hay had gone to eat at Willard's. William asked if he would be taking dinner at his desk and he nodded; Mrs. Lincoln was in New York on one of her shopping trips. Angry at him for refusing to appoint one of her most unworthy favorites to an undeserved position, for three days before she left for Boston and New York she had refused to sleep in the room next to his. These petulant moods of hers came and went. Stoddard, the third secretary, came in with a couple of pins to put in the map on the table. The pins with blue sealing wax on their heads signified Union battalions. After both William and Stod left, Lincoln rose from his desk chair, studied the map, and was pleased to see that Burnside was moving south toward Fredericksburg where the Union troops could fall upon Lee's <army. Burnside, though not one to inspire confidence, at least did what he was told. A year ago, Lincoln had been intimidated by the general officers, partic- ularly the West Pointers, persuaded by his ignorance of military maneuver to rely on them for decisions in the war. Now he felt that he knew as much as any of them, and Hallecka first-rate clerk and nothing moreWould serve to reassure the public that well-trained military minds were in charge. But he had concluded that military men never understood the political dimensions of military strategy. Sometimes action or just activity, even if premature in purely military terms, was needed to enable the government to spur the peo- ple to raise troops and money. Ambrose Burnside might cavil at a point of tactics here and there, but he showed a refreshing humility when it came to sharing plans and carrying out orders. Rocking back and forth in his shoes, looking at the pins in the map, Lin- coln was glad he had not been forced to choose Hooker to replace McClellan. Too rash, just as George was too cautious. Had he been wise to relieve the Young Napoleon on the eve of battle, after he had finally begun to move on Lee's army? Lincoln thought that over again and decided he had been right. With the elections over, the Peace Democrats who had been using McClellan, along with the West Point element that wished to settle the war, had to be dealt with firmly. Besides, the radicals were desperate for an excuse for the Republican election defeat, and McClellan's tendency to delay was as good a reason as any. Lincoln could not deny a personal affection for George, despite the man's fits of arrogance. He felt a twinge of conscience when he recalled the way the young general had stepped forward to defend the capital when Stanton and the others were ready to evacuate, and the way the general had manfully accepted his dismissal, showing none of the mutinous inclinations that Stan- ton and the others had feared. But McClellan's goal in this war was not Lincoln's goal, as the episode with Major Key had demonstrated; moreover, the Collector of the Port of New York, Hiram Bamey, Chase's man, had reported to him the discussions McClellan had been holding with Barlow, the New York Democratic leader. Barlow had told Bamey, and Bamey passed it along to Lincoln and Welles, that General McClellan planned to pursue a policy line of his own, regardless of the Administration's wishes and objects. Lincoln, remembering, shook his head at such perfidy. Yes, the evidence was hearsay, but he believed it because it was of a piece with the Harrison's Landing letter. Perhaps if George had taken on Frank Blair as his chief of staff, as old Francis Blair had wanted him to, communications between field headquarters and the Executive Mansion would have been much improved; but no, Mc- Clellan had seen that as an effort to put a Lincoln man in his tent, and had rejected the idea. In retrospect, Lincoln assured himself, firing McClellan after his organizational\usefulness had ended was inevitable; the Union could not remain whole with a commander more inclined to peace than victory. Grant, out West, had been a possibility as a replacement, but he had a way of being away from his troops at critical moments, and the drinking was a problem. Even Congressman Washburne, whose prot6ge Grant was, was now having his doubts: Chase had come in with a letter from Washburne's brother, a general in Grant's command, printing a disturbing picture of con- ditions at Grant's headquarters. Not merely drinking and carousing, but commercial corruption. Grant was a fighter, and Lincoln respected that, but he could ill afford to take a chance with the most important command in the nation. Bumside, whose only personal quirk was a pair of silly muttonchop whiskers, offered the least risk. Thinking of Chase reminded him of a worry. He went back to his desk, reached in the drawer, and took out a new greenback. The signature of the Treasurer looked real; that was the trouble, it looked too real. Did that not suggest infinite possibilities of fraud and embezzlement? Lincoln had to sign every commission of every assistant paymaster for it to be legal, and his hand hurt from signing sometimes; he was aware, too, that all government bonds were signed by hand by the Treasurer. That the paper currency seemed to be so signed, but was instead engraved, troubled him. He would have to talk with Chase about that in the morning. Nor did he relish the likelihood that the Executive Mansion would be accused of mismanagement of funds. "Honest Abe," he was called; he hated the "Abe" but he intended to keep the "honest" part. He wished he could fire Watt, the gardener, but Mother protected him fiercely; it was all Lincoln could do to keep the stationery fund out of his hands. And he was the one she had taken with her to New York. He walked out of his office, through the anteroom that served as the office of Nicolay and Hay, across the dark hallway to Stoddard's mailroom, hoping to find the young writer from Springfield. Stod had lent a helpful hand in the early political campaigns. He was a bit on the stuffy side, but was a fair writer and a good listener; Lincoln liked to try out speeches and important letters on him. Nicolay and Hay treated Stod like dirt, so Lincoln compensated from time to time by taking him along at night to visit Seward across the park. Nobody in the office. Lincoln turned up the gaslight and looked at the mountain of mail on the deskmostly, he knew, from conservatives com- plaining about his dismissal of McClellan or from radicals complaining about his failure to dismiss Seward. "Billy Bowlegs" was the new target of the radicals, Wade and Chandler stirring everyone up, Stanton and probably Chase quietly encouraging them; to their taste, Seward was insufficiently abo- litionist. To Lincoln's taste, his Secretary of State was just right on slavery, and had supported a gradual approach from the start. The radicals, having tasted blood on McClellan, were now lusting after Seward. Lincoln had been prepared to toss them McClellan for his own reasons, but he was not about to sacrifice the man he was most comfortable with in the Cabinet. His gaze lit on Andy Jackson's chair. Placed near the fireplace in Stod's room was that strange-looking chair, unlike any other item of furniture in the Mansion. Designed for reclining, it sloped backward, the slender mahogany frame held together by finely tooled leather. The Mexican-made chair had been in the Mansion since it had been sent to President Jackson; Mother didn't like the looks of it, and Lincoln preferred his cushioned couch, so the historic chair had found its way into the third secretary's office. Lincoln decided to try it out. He sat his long frame in it, gingerly at first, and found to his surprise that it accommodated him nicely. Perfect for contemplating the ceiling, the Mexican recliner was conducive to rumination. Wiggling himself comfortable, Lincoln concluded that An- drew Jackson must have used it rarely. Jackson, a military man of action, had known how to enlarge his powers to fit his responsibilities; that could have had much to do with the fact that he was the last American President to have been reelected. Strange that he should understand Jackson's needs now; for so many years, as a Whig, Lincoln like his political allies had denounced the monarchic hunger of "King Andrew the First." "Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud?" he said aloud into the silence, stretching out as far as he could and preparing to recite the entire poem. Then he changed his mind: the lines that came to him were from Shakespeare's Richard II, and he closed his eyes to visualize the monarch's cry of despair: "For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground And tell sad stories of the death of kings: How some have been depos'd, some slain in war . . ." Lincoln groped for the next lines, could not remember them, and skipped ahead: "All murder'd: for within the hollow crown That rounds the mortal temples of a king Keeps Death his court, and there the antick sits, Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp; Allowing him a breath, a little scene, To monarchize, be fear'd, and kill with looks, Infusing him with self and vain conceit As if this flesh which walls about our life Were brass impregnable; and humor'd thus Comes at the last, and with a little pin Bores through his castle wall, and farewell king!" Lincoln's fingers held the imaginary pin and twisted it through the castle wall to dispatch the king. That reminded him of the blue-headed pins on the map in his office; he frowned, breathed deeply, and allowed himself to feel guilty about avoiding work on his second message to Congress. He had to write his portion of that in the next week. He would give the border states one last chance to join with the Democrats and conservative Republicans in preventing the drastic action contemplated in the proclamation of emancipation. The more he thought of it, the more that proclamationto take effect five weeks from now unless the South re- lentedseemed not merely radical, but revolutionary. The Biairs and Weed had been right about the voters' reaction to an act that Lincoln knew was so clearly unconstitutional. He had struck back hard at that reaction, cleaning out the army and letting Stanton go to work on the disunionists in the North; now, having demonstrated his willingness to use the stick, perhaps it was time for the carrot. He had little doubt that once carried out on January I, the edict of emanci- pation would make impossible any negotiated settlement of the war. Jeffy D. would see that as the final challenge to the South, the political lunge for the jugular when the North's military campaign was not succeeding. But having issued the threat, could he now not offer a stay of its execution? There was no magic in the date of January 1, 1863; the date of final emancipation might just as well be January 1, 1900, provided everyone agreed the day of slavery's demise would surely come. He thought it only fair that the large portion of the body politic that was not represented by the radical Republicans had a final opportunity to embrace gradual, compensated emancipation. Jackson's chair was growing uncomfortable but he did not want to change position while a new approach was forming in his mind. The only way to make abolition constitutional was by amending the Constitution. The amendment he had in mind would put off the abolishment of slavery until the year 1900, which would mitigate the opposition of those who held slaves today. It would provide just compensation, with a bond issue to finance the purchase of freedom. And it would provide for voluntary deportation in congenial climes when new homes could be found for negroes in lands of their own blood and race. What could be more reasonable? If the Congress or the states in rebellion wanted to stop his emancipation edict set to come on January first, all they had to do was to adopt the amendment and then appropriate the money to buy up and manumit all slaves by the start of the next century. He had worked out the figures: Since the revolution, the nation had been growing at the rate of 35 percent every ten years. By 1930, if the present trend of growing by one third every ten years continued, that American family would be over 250,000,000 peoplegreater than that of Europe, provided the nation did not split up or otherwise inhibit the natural growth of its popula- tion. Nobody could say he had failed to try. The case, thus put, was new; per- haps the Congress, too long held in thrall by the slavery issue, could be made to see that it had to think anew and act anew. In giving freedom to the slave four decades hence, the amendment would assure freedom to the free in the meantime and after. By paying hard cash for every slave, it would not offend the Founders' compromise; by encouraging the freedmen to emigrate, it would not upset white workers. Lincoln would have no trouble with the peroration of such a message: it should exhort the Congress to nobly save the last best hope of earth, lest inaction cause the Congress to meanly lose it. That thought could be put more positively. He asked himself, as a practical politician: would the amendment idea be accepted or rejected by the Congress? As matters stood now, probably the radicals would holier that he had sold them out and the conservatives would still not seize their last chance, and the proposal would fail. But his con- science would be clearer in usurping property rights on the first of January and more to the point, if Bumside was able to whip Lee's army at Fredericks- burg, his amendment would suddenly look much more attractive to the states in rebellion, and the loyal slave states too. With another Union military victory, and the path to Richmond opened, little "military necessity" for unconstitutional emancipation would exist. In- stead, a political necessity might well be created to reunite North and South under terms that would guarantee the abolishment of slavery, but by constitu- tional means and not until the next generation. Lincoln resolved to meet with General Bumside at Aquia Creek, near his headquarters, at dark tomorrow night. Nothing was more urgent than a triumph at Fredericksburg soon. He would go over every detail with the man; the army would have everything it needed this time. Lincoln was pleased with his amendment alternative; it was a way to re- state his central idea of majority rule, with a practical and absolutely consti- tutional solution to the matter that was more on the minds of the people. He slid down even farther in the Jackson chairbetter for his back but his feet overhung the end. The chair, he decided, was better left here in Stod's office than moved to his own. He saw the occasion to be piled high with difficulty. But it was surely as difficult for the Southern leaders, now faced with squabbling within the Con- federate states as Georgia resisted the dictates of Richmond. Was he doing all he could to make it easier for voices of reason and reunion to be heard down there? The finality of his promised January I edict troubled him as that date approached all too quickly. He did not want to give at least half the North cause to criticize him for closing the door to peace: in New York, for example, Fernando Wood was passing the word that only an amnesty from Lincoln was needed to enable Southern leaders to return to the next session of the Con- gress. Did Mayor Wood and Governor-elect Seymour have any secret contact with like-minded men in the South, or were they making mischief? Lincoln turned his shoes overhanging the chair inward and outward, as he could do without pain since his corns had been miraculously attended to. Zacharie. The Israelite had family in the South, had volunteered to make contact with Southern leaders, and pointed out that Judah Benjamin was a co-religionist. Lincoln knew that General Nat Banks wanted the Israelite along in New Orleans when he relieved Ben Butler, to help with the unofficial gold exchange. It might seem slightly ludicrous to send Dr. Zacharie south to attend to the feet of the Union Army, and while he was at it, to see if the rumors about Southern interest in amnesty had any foundationbut it would do no harm. Certainly the corncutter would arouse no suspicion and his real purpose could readily be denied, even laughed off. Generals Grant and Sherman, Lincoln was aware, believed fiercely that Jewish peddlers in their command were a cause of the army's corruption, and the President had heard that there was an unofficial ban on admitting any more Israelites to the area, but that would not apply to anyone with a pass from him. He strongly doubted that the men in Richmond would be ready to talk peace until Bumside was at the gates and Lee whipped, but he wanted to be sure. Lincoln pulled himself out of Jackson's chair to return to his office and write out a pass. But more important than sending an unlikely agent on what was likely to be a wild-goose chase, it was time for him to get started on the draft amendment in the message to Congress. The beliefs of the past were inadequate to the present, he would exhort them; rewriting in his head, as he walked back through the dark hall to his office, he added "quiet" to the past and "stormy" to the present, for the emphasis of contrast. And "beliefs" did not have the negative connotation he sought; "dogmas" was the word. CHAPTER 21 JEPHTHA'S DAUGHTER A man Chase recognized as Lincoln's bodyguard, Marshal Lamon, showed up at the do8r df.the house at Sixth and E before breakfast. "The President is worried about the integrity of our financial system," the broad-shouldered Westerner told the Treasury Secretary. "He wants you to come as soon as you can." Chase looked hard at the man. His portion of the annual message was not due until the next day. Was Lincoln trying something to make him look dishonest? Had anyone been poisoning the President's mind about the deal- ings with Jay Cooke? "I'll be in to see him before the Cabinet meeting." "Sooner would be better," Lamon replied. "Right now would be best." Chase turned to Kate, who appeared behind him. "The imperial sum- mons." "If Mr. Lincoln is so worried," she asked Lamon coldly, "why didn't he come over with you this morning?" That irritating thought had crossed Chase's mind too; when Lincoln wanted to see Seward, the President did not send for him; rather, he strolled across Lafayette Square to the Secretary of State's house. Seward was ever- more Lincoln's eminence grise; now that McClellan had been driven from the scene, the man who next needed removal was the Secretary of State. "I'm sure the President knows I'm always available to him," Chase said through his daughter to Lamon. With a twinge of conscience troubling him, Chase did not want to appear to stand on ceremony; perhaps Lamon, who was as much crony and confidant to Lincoln as bodyguard, knew what the President had on his mind. On the ride over, Chase could frame the answers about Cooke's exclusive and lucrative representation of the Treasury in the sale of its notes. Climbing into the carriage, Chase asked, "What's bothering the Presi- dent?" "The greenback currency. Up to last night, he thought that Spinner was signing each bill himself," Chase rode to the Mansion in silence, relieved that the integrity being questioned was the system's and not his own. Surely Lincoln could not be so naive as to think that old Spinner signed every single greenback issued; that was the way it had been done at the start, and the poor fellow had found himself scribbling his signature twenty hours a day. Engraving the signature was the only way to keep up production. Lincoln must know that; what was really going through his suspicious mind? At the entrance to the Mansion, Lamon reined in the horse and tui.aed the reins over to the black man at the door, offering Chase a hand down from the carriage. The Treasury Secretary declined the help. "Chase, there are not sufficient safeguards to afford any degree of safety in the money-making department," Lincoln said at once, no offer of coffee or anything. The President expressed his worry that some unscrupulous operators could run off thousands of greenbacks and no one would be the wiser until the day of redemption, when a huge fraud would be discovered and his administra- tion would be covered with shame. Chase tried to reason with him. "In the nature of things," he told the nervous Lincoln, "somebody must be trusted in this emergency. You have entrusted me, and I have entrusted Francis Spinner, the Treasurer, with un- told millions. When he was a Congressman, they called him 'the watchdog of the Treasury.' We have to trust our subordinates." The President was not in a trusting mood. He wanted to know exactly how Chase was protecting the public from the counterfeit printing of millions in excess greenbacks. As Lincoln's words waxed warmer, Chase began to won- der about his own lack of concern; could Lincoln be onto something? Who was actually counting the money that was being printed? "It strikes me that this thing is all wrong, and dangerous." Lincoln had never before taken such an interest in the Treasury operations. "I and the country know you and Mr. Spinner, but we don't know your subordinates' who have the power to bankrupt the government in an hour." Chase was nonplussed; he had gone along with the idea of greenbacks at Lincoln's urging. Indeed, when he had expressed his reservations on constitu- tional grounds, the President had told him that he was prepared to violate the Constitution to save the Union. The idea of paper money had worked, amaz- ingly so; public trust was such that the paper was treated like real money, and was in effect a huge, interest-free loan from the people to the government. "Spinner has been hiring women," Chase blurted, so that he could not be accused later of concealing anything of moment from the President. "As employees of the government?" Lamon was surprised. "They're very good at counting money," Chase explained. "Nimble fingers, good on the close detail work, and they never miss a day's work. I am prepared to take whatever criticism the policy causes." Chase was well aware that the potential for scandal existed when men and women were placed in close proximity, with the advancement of the women employees in the hands of male supervisors, but skilled money counters were in short supply. Now the unprecedented employment of women was Lincoln's problem as much as his. "Perhaps we can protect ourselves by involving the Congress," Marshal Lamon offered. Lincoln nodded, and urged Chase to talk it over with his friends in the Senate. "Yes, in particular Senator Sprague," Chase suggested. "Very sound on this. And he can keep financial matters to himself, which we need." He added a warning about the matter that had originally triggered the President's con- cern: "Not a word of your worries about the engraving of signatures on greenbacks, Lincoln, must get to the public. Jay Cooke and I have enough trouble maintaining confidence. Don't you start a run on the bank." The President, with a pained last look at his own face on a greenback, nodded agreement. Chase took his leave and walked across the street to his Treasury office, satisfied that Lincoln's fears could be handled, but worried about discovery of his relationship with Cooke. He was also vulnerable to misunderstanding on his dealings with Hiram Barney, Collector of the Port of New York. What if Thurlow Weed and Seward, who resented the way Chase had snatched away their New York patronage, found out and made a fuss in the newspapers? His chance at replacing Lincoln on the Republican ticket in 1864 would be ruined. It was awkward for a man in his position, dealing in millions, to be person- ally short of funds. Nor was the problem likely to disappear in years to come; if anything, it would grow worse with the need to entertain potential dele- gates and keep up appearances. And every time the President sent Lamon over on some silly worry, Chase knew his own too-sensitive conscience would afflict him with the fear that somebody was impugning his integrity. That thought depressed him further. Kate was at the office when he arrived. He shook his head to the unasked question, saying only, "Just some foolishness about Spinner's signature being engraved on the paper. If Lincoln knows as little about military affairs as he does about finance, the country is in worse trouble than I feared." She closed the door to the office and faced her father across his desk. "I suppose the time has come when we have to make some sacrifices." "You've been very good, Kate, about making do with last year's ward- robe," he began, and would have gone on in a fatherly way, but her grim look told him she had more far-reaching sacrifices in mind. "Bill Sprague and I had a quarrel last week," she said. "I didn't like the way he was drinking, and making a mess all over himself in public. I told him I wouldn't put up with it any more." Chase winced, hoping his daughter had not pushed Sprague too far. His support was absolutely essential to their plans. The Rhode Island Legislature had accommodated its state's richest family by electing the former governor and general to be senator; Sprague now had control of future convention delegates, and his influence reached into Massachusetts. "I'm certain your good advice will encourage him to reform. He adores you, as you know. He's told me that often." "He tells that to everybody when he's in his cups," Kate said sourly. "No, he won't reform. He's a drunkard and always will be. Let's not fool ourselves about the boy governor." Chase's heart sunk; would she never see Sprague again? Would she throw herself away on the effete Lord Lyons or the defeated Roscoe Conkling, or indulge her desires with young Hay, or become scandalously involved with a married man like Garfield? Sprague had his faults, but there were compensa- tions, and his redemption from an unfortunate tendency toward a reliance on John Barleycorn might be possible under the influence of a good woman. Chase could not bring himself to say that. If Kate intended to put her selfish interests ahead of their mutual dream, he would not try to dissuade her. Any such suasion he judged to be morally wrong. He thought of the biblical general Jephtha, who vowed if he won a victory to make -a burnt offering of the first living thing that came through his door; to his horror, his daughter and only child was first, and she expressed her love by willingly becoming his sacrifice. NoChase told himself that Kate had her own life to lead; he had hoped their ambitions were parallel, but the painful compromises demanded by politics were better understood by those who had suffered as he had. "I am aware," he began, drawing a deep breath, "that you have been brought up to enjoy the company of men of substance and temperance. Lord Lyons. Senator Sumner" "And Salmon Portland Chase, who has the strength of character never to make a fool of himself. Father, you've spoiled me for men the likes of Sprague." He hardly knew what to say to that, except, "Perhaps you underestimate him." "Bill Sprague is impossible to underestimate. John Hay is quite righthe's a small, insignificant youth who bought his place." She seated herself and looked at her father levelly. "When would the announcement be most advan- tageous?" He had been looking at the portrait of Alexander Hamilton over the fire- place, thinking of the cruel shortening of the first Treasury Secretary's career. He did not quite comprehend the import of his daughter's question. "An- nouncement?" "My betrothal to Senator William Sprague of Rhode Island," Kate said, seeming to test the words for a printed invitation, "savior of our nation's capital in the early days of the rebellion, gallant general in command of his state's fighting men, confidential adviser to the President and Treasury Secre- tary on financial affairs, darling of the social salons of Washington, and well- known drunkard." "Kate, are you serious? If you are, you must not act in a spirit of hypocrisy. Marriage is a sacred covenant before God" "I am deadly serious, Father. Becoming President is a serious business, and I am prepared to make the necessary sacrifices. And never, never speak to me of hypocrisy." He was torn between delight at her sensible decision and his dread of sacrilege. After a moment, Chase was able to dismiss the latter as unworthily judgmental; who was he to dismiss a long tradition of marriages of conve- nience, which so often led to warm lifelong companionships, based as they were on shared interests rather than youthful passion? His own first marriage, to the unforgettable Katherine, had been a love match that had ended with her death of childbed fever; his second wife was also the object of his love, and died giving birth to Kate; but the third time he had been more prudent, selecting a judge's daughter of strength and health and social background, who served as a fine, if necessarily stern, stepmother for seventeen years before her death. If Kate could show the maturity in her early twenties that it had taken him much longer to attain, so much the better. "I'm very proud of you, Katie. I know you will be happy." "I'll be happy as the official hostess in the Executive mansion," she said with what he felt was unnecessary calculation, "with the country in the hands of President Chase." He hoped his expression bore the proper humility. She drummed her fin- gers on his desk. "The spring would be the best time. We have the household money to hold out till then. Sprague's mother is a smart old lady, and she likes me; I can talk to her about the finances of a big wedding without involving you or the boy gov." "I do not think that a proper sobriquet for your chosen husband-to-be," Chase said disapprovingly. "He is familiarly known as Bill. Or you could now call him 'the senator.' And you should not go ahead with this with avarice in your heart, Katie, I won't allow anything of" "Don't tell me what should or should not be in my heart," she snapped. "It's not love and it's not avarice. I don't need fancy clothes and expensive furnishings, you know that. I want to amount to something, and I want you to be all you should be." He nodded, understanding that her decision was, if not based on love for her prospective husband, at least rooted in love for her father. He reproved himself for thinking her at first selfish and later calculating. She was a good daughter and, he was certain, would make an excellent wife. He went around the desk, assisted her to her feet, and embraced her with pride and tender- ness. "You have my blessing, Katie." She bugged him tightly for a moment, the way she had when she was small and had fled from her stepmother, and then stepped back to look directly up at him. "I want more than a blessing, Father. I want a promise. I'll do my part." "And I'll do mine," he said, hoping she would not become specific. "You know what I expect," she said. He knew exactly: no more letters to the office from Adele Douglas, no more visits at home from Anna Carroll, no possibility of remarriage until after the presidency, if then. The sacrifice was realprolonged celibacy would be new to himand he could not avoid the feeling that her demand was somehow unnatural. But her own sacrifice was at least as great, and the thought of his dutiful and self-assured daughter as hostess in his White House appealed to him. Kate would be far better received than Mary Lincoln. "I hope always to live up to your expectations, Katie," he said, hoping she would find a meaning in that beyond his words. She kissed him lightly on the cheek and made ready to leave. She drew on a vest espagnole, which he presumed to be the latest fashion since he had seen Addie Douglas in one recently, and the black-embroidered Moresco cloak brought down the week before by Jay Cooke. She had adorned her bonnet with wood violets and ties of lilac ribbon. "Say nothing for the time being, Father. I have some loose ends to tidy up. Perhaps you do too. Wait a week, and then arrange for thefor Bill to be summoned to Washington." As she left, it occurred to him that hers would be the most glittering wedding that wartime Washington had yet seen. He began to think of a guest list. Which of their acquaintances would be most likely to determine the delegates to the next Republican convention? CHAPTER 22 JOHN HAY'S DIARY DECEMBER 7, 1862 Dr. Zacharie, our favorite foot man, is back from a couple of months at Fort Monroe, where he says he operated successfully on the feet of 5,000 of our soldiersor 5,000 individual feet, I don't recall which. After uprooting these vast cornfields, he has returned to Washington to check on the impedimenta of the President. I should not make sport of his profession because he brought both the Prsdt and the SecState great relief. The Tycoon used to hobble about in the King of Morocco's huge gift slippers because he could not stand shoes. No more; thanks to his friend Isachar, with whom he has these extended conver- sations after his treatments, the Prsdt bounds about as I have never seen before. The Israelite came into the office devastated that word of his ministrations to the President had leaked. The Israelite assured us that the editorial in the New York Herald last week was not of his doing, and was anxious lest the notoriety impinge on his confidential relationship. Isachar did not know his man. I had put the cutting on the Prsdt's desk, and he read portions aloud to the somewhat uncomfortable foot surgeon with great glee. "Says here, 'we have a cornucopia of information' about your activities, Doctor," Lincoln grinned, reading on: " 'The President has been greatly blamed for not resisting the demands of the radicals; but how could the President put his foot down firmly when he was troubled with corns?' That's pretty good. Says the bickermg in the Cabinet has beenhere'caused by the honorable Secretaries inadvertently treading on each other's bunions un- der the council board.' " "Not a word of any of this came from me," Zacharie said, looking misera- ble. Lincoln positively cackled at the editorial. " 'No human being could be expected to toe the mark under such circumstances, which originated not so much with the head as with the feet of the nation.' " The Tycoon gave one of his great hee-hee laughs, hardly able to finish with " 'Dr. Zacharie has shown us precisely where the shoe pinches.' By jings, that's all right." Zacharie perked up as it became clear that the Tycoon was amused and not upset by the public notice of his corns. Foot doctors must be sensitive to the way people poke fun at their profession, but Zacharie, I am sure, is torn between fear of ridicule and desperation for recognition. Well, he has claim to fame now. He is without doubt the most famous Jewish foot doctor in the world. I suspect the President is pleased with the publicity for another reason. He intends to use the Israelite as an agent to get information from the South. The corn cutting that all of us are so quick to mock has the virtue of removing all suspicion from his clandestine activities. "I see that you are sending General Banks to replace Butler in New Or- leans," Zacharie said. Lincoln nodded; Banks had been a better governor of Massachusetts than a general in the field against Stonewall Jackson, but Lin- coln trusted Banks to manage our biggest Southern capture more honestly than "the Beast." Zacharie looked at me, wishing I were out of the room, I suppose, and said, "I think the time is ripe for my mission." Since the Prsdt did not throw me out, I looked at the ceiling, and Zacharie went on with his half-concealed plans: "The sister of the gentleman in Richmond is in New Orleans now, and in some distress. I should intercede on her behalf with the new Union com- mander." I presumed "the gentleman in Richmond" was Judah Benjamin, the rebel Secretary of State and Zacharie's co-religionist. I doubt that we are planning to get any military information out of Jeff Davis's Cabinet; could it be that Mr. Lincoln has in mind a roundabout exploration of the peace rumors? He wants to do something before January first. "I'll need a personal letter from you to Banks," said Zacharie, "telling him to take me to New Orleans with him." Lincoln nodded. "While there is nothing in this which I shall dread to see in history, it is, perhaps, better for the present that it should not become public." That was putting it mildly. Zacharie could pass the word broadside about his corn-curing prowess, but on checking into supposed peace probes, the Tycoon expected great discretion. "The pass," Zacharie reminded him. Lincoln went to his writing table and wrote a note to General Banks. When he finished, he read it aloud to the two of us: "Dr. Zacharie, who you know as well as I do, wishes to go with you on your expedition. I think he might be of service, to you, first, in his peculiar profession, and secondly, as a means of access to his countrymen, who are quite numerous in some of the localities you will probably visit." "There's the problem of the prohibition of my people," Zacharie put in. "Grant and Shermanfine officers, don't misunderstand me, but they don't want any Jews in their area. They blame us for all the trading with the enemy not true, I assure you, and not fair, but such a feeling exists. We all know it." Lincoln was aware of Grant's policy to make it difficult for Israelites to come near his command. The Prsdt did not want to involve himself in the general's efforts to stem corruption, however, and as long as the anti-Israelite policy was unwritten, and unapproved by the President, it posed no constitu- tional difficulties. He added in his note to Banks: "This is a permission merely, excepting his case from a general prohibition which I understand to exist." That acknowl- edgment of Grant's tacit prohibition may be putting too much in writing, but no other way presented itself. "My desire is to serve you," Zacharie said, picking up the pass, "in such a manner that my services may redound to your honor." That was Old-World style, but Lincoln seemed to appreciate it. I took the doctor into my office, put the pass in an envelope, and while I was at it handed him the latest cutting from the New York World: "The President has often left his business- apartment to spend an evening in the parlor with his favored bunionist." "Mr. Hay, believe me, I had nothing to do with this notoriety." Zacharie tucked the clipping in his wallet and set off on his perhaps impossible assign- ment. What is there in that fellow that makes the President want to spend long hours talking with him? What do they have in common? Mystifies me. I went back in with some newspaper reaction to his annual message; most of the radical press, like the Evening Post, said that Lincoln's idea of freeing the slaves by installments was like cutting off a dog's tail by inches to get him used to the pain. The conservatives and Democrats pretty much ignored it; Browning says there's no hope for a two-thirds vote in the Congress for such an amendment. Curiously, this does not upset the Prsdt; he did what he felt he had to do to show his willingness to make a deal. The Tycoon, feet on the desk, smiling at his shoes, waved off the tut-tutting about his message. The editorial in the Herald about the cornucopia was still tickling him. "I tell you the truth, John," he told me, "when I say that genuine wit has the same effect on me that I suppose a good square drink of whiskey has on an old toper. It puts new life in me." The Tycoon is in fine whack. I have rarely seen him more serene and busy, managing the war, foreign relations, the rambunctious Cabinet, and the ma- jority of the country that needs to be dragged along on emancipation. With McClellan gone, and a more loyal general now actively pursuing Bobby Lee, Lincoln is at last fully in charge. I remember his saying back before Antie- tam, "if what I feel were equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on the earth"; ISO-degree turn. A. Lincoln would never be cocking an ear toward any peace talk if he weren't sure he was on the verge of a great victory. I think he senses a turning point. He sent for Halleck. "I had a long conference with General Bumside," he told the general-in-chief, who was scratching only one elbow today. "He believes that General Lee's whole army is in front of him at or near Freder- icksburg." "He's right," said Halleck promptly. "Bumside has one hundred and ten thousand men to Lee's sixty thousand. Does he say he wants more men?" Lincoln shook his head, "No, he could not handle them to advantage." That was a far cry from McClellan. "Bumside thinks he can cross the river in the face of the enemy. But that, to use his own expression, is somewhat risky. I wish the case to stand more favorable than this." He suggested a plan of attack to Halleck that did not rely so much on a frontal assault. Lincoln's scheme was to delay an attack until a second force could cross the Rappahannock, and then a third force swing around via the Pamunkey River to cut off Lee's line of retreat toward Richmond. Halleck listened to what seemed to me to be a brilliant maneuver, and shook his head. "We cannot raise and put in position a force behind Lee in time. If we don't strike him now, he'll get away. That's what Bumside thinks, too, I'm sure." The Tycoon nodded uneasily. Curious; Lincoln was in the McClellan role now, not wanting to risk Union lives on a single assault across a river,.prefer- ring a three-pronged attacknot unlike Antietam, which might have been more successful if all three of our corps had attacked at the same time. Now it was Bumside and Halleck who wanted to strike massively, quickly, before Lee could get reinforcements. "Can't waste time," concluded Halleck confidently. "You gave Bumside the command, his army is in fine shape. We can't fight the war from here." The Prsdt nodded again; Bumside did not have the McClellan slows. "What news from Tennessee?" Only a few months ago, with Lee invading Maryland and Bragg invading Kentucky, the war was one gigantic Union retreat. But after Antietam in Maryland and the standoff at Perryville in Kentucky, the tide turned. Bragg lost his nerve and pulled back. "Bragg's army in Tennessee doesn't threaten Kentucky and Ohio any- more," said Halleck. "He's trouble for Grant out West, though, who cannot turn his back completely and attack Vicksburg, not with Morgan's raiders storming around his supply lines. Soon our forces under Rosecrans will move on Bragg's headquarters at Murfreesboro, on Stones River." I asked why Bragg had wilted. Halleck shrugged that off with, "His com- manders hate him, I hear, and only Jeff Davis backs him up. We should not underestimate Bragg. He cut loose from his base, marched two hundred miles and beat an army of ours twice the size of his." Lincoln asked for a detailed plan on the Rosecrans move on Murfreesboro in Tennessee, but we could see that his mind was on the more important battle impending between Bumside and Lee at Fredericksburg. That could be decisive. The war could be over by Christmas and then the question of an emancipation proclamation might become moot. Which reminds me that I had better think of getting into uniform before it is over and I have no heroic answer to "What did you do in the war, Daddy?" But Washington has its compensations: Kate has never been so warm and winning as she has been in the past week. I shall soon have to put out some feelers of my own to see what sort of family life I shall be building when the war is over. CHAPTER 23 FIRING SQUAD "You must not execute this boy, Bragg. He's no deserter." General Braxton Bragg, standing at the window facing the courtyard where the execution of Corporal Asa Lewis was to take place, did not look at Breckinridge. "He had a fair court-martial. He deserted. The firing squad will send a message to every troublemaker in your brigade." "He went home to help with the planting," Breck pleaded, "to put in next year's crop. He was coming back; he did the same thing last year." "You should have shot him last year, then. Kentucky blood is a little too feverish for the health of the army." Breckinridge, steaming, held his temper. He was certain that Bragg had been driven from Kentucky by his own lack of zest for battle. The Mississip- pian was a maneuvering general, a fine marching officer, a classic disciplinar- ian, but not a commander of men in battle. When the citizens of Breck- inridge's state failed to welcome the Confederate troops, and even went so far as to deny them supplies, Bragg directed his hatred at all Kentuckians. Breck knew that Bragg bile was especially directed at him, because the little chim- panzee had assumed that the Breckinridge name would rally all residents of the bluegrass state to the Southern side. Now that Bragg was conscripting any Kentuckian who fell into his hands, he would soon have plenty of desert- ers for hanging. "If you won't listen to me," Breck pressed, "General Clebume has asked to" "Waste of time. Don't you belong out there when the sentence is carried out? They're your men." The Kentuckian withdrew, mounted, and rode into the courtyard where the condemned corporal was being blindfolded. The tall boy declined the blindfold at first, but the lieutenant told him that the men of the firing squad preferred not to have him looking at them when they did their distasteful duty. Breckinridge dismounted. He walked to the corporal and told him his final appeal had failed, but that all his Kentucky comrades knew he was no de- serter. He suggested that the condemned man say something to the soldiers about to carry out an abhorrent order. Corporal Lewis complied. "Do not be distressed," he called out from be- hind his blindfold. "I beg of you to aim to kill, it will be merciful to me. Goodbye." Breckinridge, who had seen so much death in the past year, was swept by an unaccustomed sense of dread. He went back and remounted. General Pat Clebume, muttering Irish curses, moved his horse next to him. The clicking of the hammers could be heard in the morning cold on the command of "Ready." The men of the Orphan Brigade, drawn up in three formations to the rear of the firing squad facing the condemned man, tensed. Breckinridge, sweating, shuddered in the cold. As the order to fire was given, Breckinridge started to lose consciousness. He felt Clebume's hand grabbing his arm as he was falling off his horse. His aide, the boy who had replaced Cabell, ran up and helped the commander of the Orphans to the ground. He leaned against his horse, breathing deeply, until consciousness returned. That had not happened to him before; only women fainted. Breck was mortified that it had happened in front of the entire brigade; at Clebume's suggestion, he remounted and they rode off together. "Bad business. Bragg's a vindictive fool," the Irishman said. "This will cause more desertions than it will discourage. You all right now?" "I never saw us shoot one of our own before," Breck said. The corporal had given him his comb and pocketbook to pass on to his mother, and he could feel the presence of the dead man's effects in his pocket. "No news about your son yet?" Clebume was trying to change the subject with a duller, deeper pain. "He isn't on any of the prisoner lists." Breck was fighting off the sense of certainty that the boy was dead. Cabell was about the age of the corporal just executedin fact, the same height and build. He shook his head and gulped the cold air. "There was a Yankee nurse named Breckinridge we captured in Lewis- burg," General Cleburne said, trying to be helpful. "I figured you all must be related, so I sent her up to Louisville to tell your Union relations to look out for him." "Her name?" "Margaret Elizabeth; said her father was Judge John Breckinridge." That was Uncle Robert's kin; if the girl got to that famous Union loyalist with a question about Cabell, he would know to get in touch with Anna Carroll in Washington, and she would press General Dix to search the prison camps. The possibility existed that the boy was still alive, his memory shocked out of him; or perhaps he was afraid to reveal his identity as the son of a man condemned as a traitor by the U.S. Senate. False hopes, probably. "You were right about Lincoln and the slaves, Pat. He's going to enlist them in his army, maybe hundreds of thousands." "That's what we should be doing." The Irishman was off on his favorite forbidden subject. "Lincoln was willing to take a gamble, and stand up to the hollering of most of his own people. That's the difference between him and Jeff Davis." Breck was not sure. Lincoln's proclamation promising emancipation to the slaves of rebels was a stunning political act, wiping out all hope of ending the war by compromiseif he went through with it at the end of the month. But maybe Lincoln was searching for an excuse to delay the edict: his message to Congress last week, reported with some interest by the newspapers in the South, mentioned the proclamation only as something to be stayed. Was he trying to elicit a peace offer? "The question is," Cleburne was saying, "why is Lincoln gambling now? Is he convinced the North is losing, and he must enlist black troopsor is he convinced the North is winning, and he can afford to challenge us to a fight to the finish?" That was the question that had been nagging at Breck ever since late September, when he had read the news of Lincoln's two proclamations free- ing the slaves and jailing the dissenters. Was Lincoln acting out of weakness or strength? Was the reason what he said it wasmilitary necessity, which would mean weaknessor was that a pose, and Lincoln's ulterior motive to whip up the war spirit in the North to subjugate the South once and for all? He remembered his arguments with Lincoln in the White House eighteen months ago. The man was then torn between his disgust for slavery and his solemn promise not to strike at the peculiar institution where it existed. The stunning way he resolved that dilemma had surprised Breckinridge, who had thought of his former presidential rival as a born compromiser. This was a decision, coming down hard on one side. The war must have changed Lincoln, made him more certain of his tenta- tive ideas, just as it had changed Breckinridge, making him unsure of what he was fighting for, or why he was fighting at all. Not for independencehe had always opposed disunion; not slaverythat was no cause to inspire a willing- ness to die; and not even individual liberty, since Richmond was now just as eager to suspend habeas corpus in the name of national security as Washing- ton ever had been. For Kentucky? The people of his state had just been given the chance to rise to greet its liberators, and had decided against that; their apathy or indecision was as authentic a plebiscite as could be conducted. His only certainty at the moment was that the picture would never leave him of a Kentucky firing squad killing a Kentucky boy for the crime of slipping away to do some planting. The Breckinridge family was on both sides, and so, in a sense, was he. Cleburne brought him back. "Maybe we'll sound out some of the hi-muck- a-mucks about recruiting the slaves at the Morgan wedding." John Hunt Morgan, the hothead turned heroic cavalry raider, was to be married the following week. His forays behind enemy lines had disrupted Union logistics and provisioned Confederate soldiers with Yankee supplies, the leaders of the army and the government would assemble for that wedding. "He's the only Kentuckian who gets along with Bragg." "They can have each other," Breck said sourly. "But maybe a good woman will settle John down." "Or take the fight out of him." "Is that why you're a bachelor, Pat? You want to keep your fighting edge?" When Breck was Cleburne's agethirty-threehe had been married a dozen years. Breck now wished he had spent more time with Cabell. That notion was a dead weight on his line of thought and he shook it off. "I'll find the colleen one of these days, but not when I have to worry about leaving her a widow every time the moment comes to lead a charge. You have to be a little crazy to be a good raider like Morgan or Forrestbloodthirsty too. You suppose Jeff Davis will come to the wedding?" Everyone in the command, including Bragg, assumed that Breckinridge knew the President's plans. The Kentuckian never disabused anyone of that thought, because it helped him stand off the insufferable martinet of a com- manding general. He shrugged and said he hoped so. "Sure and we could use a council of war here in Murfreesboro," Cleburne said, slipping deep into his brogue. "The new Union general, Rosecrans, is a tad more headstrong than Buell. He'll be coming after us, because if he doesn't he knows Lincoln will be coming after him. Bragg had better be ready to fight. He can't keep blaming us for his own damn cowardice." "I hear Lincoln paid a visit one night last week to Bumside at the Virginia front," was all Breck could say. Cleburne nodded. They left unsaid their feeling that the Yankee general might be getting the better advice and greater inspiration. CHAPTER 24 THE PRESIDENT VISITS Jefferson Davis was glad of the chance to get out of Richmond, even for a few days. The wedding of Colonel Morgan, the dashing cavalry raider (why was "dashing" the only word to apply to a horse soldier?) to a young :voman known throughout Central Tennessee as the belle of Murfreesboro offered an occasion to reaffirm his support of his good friend, Braxton Bragg. Such a visit would also show the men of the Army of Tennessee that their commander in chief in Richmond considered the Central theater every bit as important as the Eastern, despite the likelihood that a great battle was im- pending on the banks of the Rappahannock near Fredericksburg. Even as he prepared to meet Bragg, President Davis found it hard to shift his concentration from Robert Lee in Virginia. General Lee wanted to fall back thirty miles, drawing the Union forces away from their water base at Aquia Creek, in hope of destroying Bumside's army completely if the Union attack failed; Davis had overruled that, recommending entrenchment on the heights overlooking the river, hoping to draw Bumside into a hopeless uphill charge. The leader of the Confederacy did not believe it necessary to destroy the Army of the Potomac; at this crucial post-election time a decisive repulse, with heavy casualties, would be more than even the unreasonable Lincoln could stand. Copperhead sentiment was obviously on the rise in the North, and needed fuel for its orators' fire. A stunning defeat of the army that expected to march on Richmond, coming just after Lincoln had staked all on the removal of McClellan and taken personal responsibility for this cam- paign, might well trigger angry uprisings in the North. A military defeat coming on the heels of a vote of no confidence might finally convince the English people that the North could not win, and that the South, as Glad- stone had said truthfully, had made itself a nation. Davis had more in mind with this visit to the West than assuring the soldiers of the Army of Tennessee of the importance of their task. Earlier that year he had chosen February 22, birthday of George Washington, to be inau- gurated as the permanent President of the Confederacy; like General Wash- ington, Davis saw the need for military daring designed for political effect. He was planning a mission for Colonel Morgan and his raiders that tran- scended the usual military tactics. Davis wanted to tell Morgan in person about that great raid, even as he promoted the gallant and fearless Ken- tuckian to brigadier general. The promotion would serve as a wedding pres- ent from the Confederacy in gratitude for the bridegroom's fervor in dis- rupting Union logistics by destroying railroads and bridges. The Richmond that the President left behind was turning, he was sad to admit, into a cauldron of bickering interests. The newly revered Robert Lee was the one who had advised Davis to press for conscription to offset the weight of numbers in the North, but the blame for this extension of the power of central government had been placed on Davis. When the President recog- nized the need to have the power to impose martial law in those Southern cities in danger of attack, the treacherousDavis did not feel that treacher- ous was too strong a wordeditors of the Richmond newspapers had vilified him for imitating Lincoln in suspending the privilege of habeas corpus. He found that comparison odious: it should have been clear that Lincoln had seized the power of arbitrary arrest illegally while Davis had obtained it lawfully, by seeking it through an action of the Confederate Congress. He had some constitutional advantages over his Federal counterpart: Davis was serving a single term of six years, no reelection permitted, which put him above the maneuvering to maintain control that must trouble Lincoln; and to counterbalance the South's presumed shift away from national authority, the Confederate Constitution gave the President the power to veto specific items within legislation. But there were disadvantages to rejection of central power: Lincoln might have his critics in the North, Davis mused, but at least he did not have his Vice President stabbing him in the back at every opportunity. "Little Aleck" Stephens was becoming impossible. The President found it hard to believe that Stephens, that emaciated gnome, was giving public politi- cal support to the Governor of Georgia, a states' rights fanatic who not only had been resisting conscription but refused to run military trains on Sunday. Davis had been told, on good authority, that Vice President Stephens had been saying of the President of the Confederacy that he was "a man of good intentions, weak and vacillating, petulant, peevish, obstinate but not firm, and now I am beginning to doubt his intentions." Davis remembered every slight from an opponent and every insult from the press. His wife Varina kept telling him that his inability to forget an insult was a flaw in a political leader, and Davis knew he was more thin-skinned than he ought to be, but such sensitivity to slights had been part of his character since he had been a boy in Kentucky and nothing could be done about it now. His daughter Maggie had the sunny nature that allowed her to smile away people who snapped at her; Davis marveled at the way she had the forbearance to turn away from the cats as well as the snakes, but such charity was not in him. He felt every jab and remembered everyone who wounded him, but the Confederate President consoled himself that he also remembered those who loyally spoke up for him in times of trial. His old Mexico comrade Braxton Bragg was one of those, especially when that French popinjay Beauregard tried to blame Davis for failing to capture the Federal capital after First Manassas. Seated in the room of the Murfreesboro Hotel, preparing for the prerecep- tion visits of Bragg, Breckinridge, and the others, Davis wondered whether Lincoln was afflicted with the same sensitivity to criticism. Probably not; he and Lincoln had been born in the same Kentucky county within a year of each other, but the Davises were a distinguished and wealthy family, the Lincolns a poor and uneducated lot. Lincoln had campaigned hard for the presidential nomination, trading promises for support, and been elected by a minority of the people; in contrast, Davis had not sought the leadership of his nation, had even chosen not to attend the convention in Montgomery that selected him unanimously. Out of a sense of duty, he had accepted the re- sponsibility to lead the seceded states. To Davis's mind, there was a coarseness to Lincoln, part and parcel of an innate hunger to triumph over his betters. Davis was a West Point graduate, experienced in command in the Mexican War, Secretary of War in the Pierce administration, and could deal knowledgeably with military affairs; Lincoln's military background was practically nonexistent, and yet he presumed to consider himself a great strategist and was known to meddle in the planning of campaigns. Worst of all, thought Davis, Lincoln's coarseness had turned to sheer sav- agery in the crucible of war. His toleration of General Pope's barbarism was indicative, but his proclamation of abolition revealed a man so desperate to keep his dominion over the states that he would actually seek to incite a servile rebellion. For drawing that weapon of terrorisme, Davis was certain the Union leader would be remembered in history as a man capable of the most monstrous acts. Lincoln's sly recommendation to the Southern blacks "to abstain from violence unless in necessary self-defense" was particularly infuriating, since it was an unmistakable hint to encourage the assassination of their masters. Every slave being disciplined now had the "right" from the President of the United States to strike out at his owner. Davis detested Lincoln for putting forward the most execrable measure recorded in the history of guilty man, and was fearful that it might have the effect intended of setting slaves on a path of rapine and murder on thousands of undefended plantations. He was convinced that Lincoln's protestations of the past two years that he had no intention of striking at slavery where it existed were a sham; the man was an abolitionist at heart, determined to impose his ways on an independent people just as had George III on the American colonists. Braxton Bragg was the President's first caller. Davis assumed that the general, in constant strife with his subordinates, wanted to be sure that the President understood his side of any disputes before he heard them from the likes of John Breckinridge. Bragg was an irritating fellow, Davis was aware as U.S. Secretary of War, he had accepted Bragg's angry resignationbut when General Beauregard failed, it was the abrasive but effective Bragg that Davis had turned to, and the stern disciplinarian had justified that faith with his march northward into Tennessee and Kentucky. "You have not been receiving the praise you deserve in Richmond, Gen- eral," Davis told him, going to the heart of what must be bothering his friend. "The venal press want you to remove me from command," Braxton Bragg announced. "The Richmond Whig says the Kentucky campaign turned out to be a fizzle." "I ignore the press completely," said Davis, wishing he could. "A fizzle is exactly what it was," said Bragg, surprising him, "thanks to Breckinridge. If he had been with me a month sooner, when he should have been, he might have helped with those damned Kentuckians. Selfish, misera- ble people, wouldn't volunteer a crust of bread to the army. And our Ken- tucky Brigade is a joke, thanks to Breckinridge's coddling." "I was born in Kentucky," Davis reminded him. "We Kentuckians have an independent turn of mind." He suppressed his irritation with Bragg's congen- ital derogation of his own subordinates, because the unfortunate man's simian looks and dyspeptic demeanor denied him friends and followers. Certainly he had too few supporters in the press: in his invasion of Kentucky, Bragg had accomplished as much as Lee in his invasion of Maryland, at less cost, yet it was Lee who was hailed by his countrymen as a hero while Bragg bore the brunt of criticism as a retreater. The pity was that both Confederate generals had been forced to fall back; valor was no match for railroad lines of supply to bring up ammunition and new shoes. As Bragg launched into a series of complaints about his other officers, Davis interrupted to ask whether there were any men in Bragg's command worthy of promotion. He had in mind that day's groom, who, Davis had been told, would be married by General Polk with a bishop's robes worn over his uniform. Bragg submitted a list for promotion. Davis saw the name of a colonel, recommended for general of a brigade, who had recently written a letter critical of the Davis administration that had been published in the newspa- pers. He struck that name off the list, along with several others he knew to be overly outspoken. Bragg did not always understand that the need for disci- pline also had to include political reliability. He came to Patrick Cleburne's name. "You like the Irishman?" "Young and ardent, but sufficiently prudent," Bragg nodded. "A fine drill officer. Has the admiration of his command." "So does Breckinridge," Davis observed, knowing it would get a rise out of Bragg. "Popularity with the troops does not always mean good generalship," he said, adding, "although Breck is a superb commander and, like you, a colleague of long standing." "Breckinridge is soft," Bragg said. "And he drinks." Davis frowned, not wanting to hear this, but Bragg would not desist. "He came into my tent the other night and I could tell he was drunk. Mumbling something about his damned 'orphans,' and tried to get me to pardon a deserter. He's been drunk in the presence of the troops, too. Fell off his horse at a formation, dead to the world, made a fool of himself. As far as I'm concerned, you can send him back out West, along with his brigade of riff- raff." "I'm glad you can spare the troops," said Davis, ignoring the serious charge. "I want you to detach Morgan's raiders for a mission I have in mind." "I cannot spare Morgan's cavalry," Bragg said abruptly. "He has five thou- sand fighters under him. I expect an attack from Rosecrans soon, and I need every man I can get, excluding the shirkers under Breckinridge. You should not split my command more than it is already." "I must. You are to send one division," the President ordered, "full strength, ten thousand men, to Mississippi right away. We must stop Grant from taking Vicksburg." Nothing was more important to Davis, not even the defense of Richmond, than the continued denial of the Mississippi River to the North. He fervently hoped that the importance of Vicksburg would not assume an overriding significance in Lincoln's war strategy. He counted on Lincoln to remain transfixed with the battles along the Potomac. "And you're taking Morgan's cavalry," said Bragg. "That's quite a loss." Davis knew what he was doing with Morgan's force. He would take For- rest's cavalry raiders from Bragg as well, to harass Grant in the West and thereby prevent an attack on Vicksburg, but that could wait a few days. "Fight if you can," he told Bragg, "and fall back if you must, beyond the Tennessee River." He drew himself to his feet. "I expect you to work together with Breckinridge and General Hardee. I will promote Cleburne to major general, as you suggest, and will promote Colonel Morgan to brigadier. We will now attend the festive occasion." "They'll come at us right here at Murfreesboro," said Bragg. As Davis expected, the general did not argue further; it was for him to try to work out what he could do with the forces remaining with him. "We don't have much of a natural defense at Stones River, but if we can stop them here, we can chase them up past Nashville." Davis liked that spirit, and resolved to protect this faithful soldier from the wolves of Richmond. He cautioned Bragg to use entrenchment whenever possibleneither Bragg nor Lee liked that device, thinking that it robbed the men of their warlike spirit and undermined their discipline, but Davis was persuaded that earthworks and trenches improved the prospects of successful defense. "I must do all in my power," the President told him as they walked out together, "to overcome the impression that I am an austere and unfeeling person." When the general demurred, Davis pressed the point that pained him, but was true: "No, that is an unfortunate burden I bear. That is one reason for my coming to the wedding, General, to show the officers and the troops that I am not the cold and distant person I am made out to be in the press." He was telling Bragg this not merely because it was true, but to suggest subtly that the general suffered from a similar reputation. Some political men could succeed without appearing warm and outgoingGeorge Washington was the outstanding example of one who had maintained his reserve and dignitybut on the whole, Davis felt, men like Bragg and himself were weak- ened as leaders by a modesty or taciturnity that made it hard for them to let their inner natures be seen by their countrymen. "There's going to be a lot of drinking at this wedding," said the general, "and a temptation to become lax in discipline. Your presence here will counter that, Mr. President." Davis sighed; Braxton Bragg would never understand human relationships. Better Bragg in command than Beauregard, however; the ambitious little Frenchman wanted to be President. Bragg had his sick headaches that crip- pled him for days on end, Davis knewmigraines, they were being called and his relationships with his fellow officers left much to be desired, but he would not run out on his President. One thought troubled President Davis, however: "About General Breckinridge. You realize that he is a braver man than either of us." Bragg looked up sharply, as Davis knew he would. "You are a resident of Louisiana," said the President, "a state that seceded legally from the Union. I am the former United States Senator from Mississippi, also a state that se- ceded. If we should lose this warand we must recognize that our maximum strength has been mobilized, while the enemy is just beginning to put forth his mightyou and I have an unassailable legal defense against vindictive charges of treason." He let that sink in. "Breckinridge, on the other hand, is from Kentucky. That state, unhappily, did not secede. If we should lose this war, or if General Breckinridge fell into enemy hands in the course of battle, he would surely be tried as a traitor. The likes of Tad Stevens and Ben Wade would settle for no less than the most severe punishment. And the likelihood is that Mr. Lincoln would see him hang." "That's a chance he takes," Bragg said coldly. "No excuse for drinking." CHAPTER 25 THE BANDIT TAKES A BRIDE Breckinridge could not understand what had come over John Hunt Morgan. The hothead of Lexington, the reckless risk-all raider, the Yankee-hating swashbuckler who had been loosely attached to the Orphan Brigade since the start had undergone a transformation. Morgan was moonstruck. To be in love was a fine thing, Breckinridge conceded, and let himself recall the innocent early days with Mary and the later days in Washington jousting and loving with Anna Carroll, but none of those experiences had intrinsically changed him; Colonel Morgan, in contrast, seemed positively lovesick. "You know what Mattie said last year, when a Yankee officer asked her name?" Morgan asked him, as he asked everyone on his wedding day. "It was a year ago, we hadn't met. She told him, 'Write down Mattie Ready now, but by the grace of God, one day I shall call myself the wife of John Morgan.' There's a woman for you." "She knows her mind," Breckinridge said to the groom, "for someone that young. And she's a lot better-looking than some of those women you've been slipping into camp." "At least all my men are men, Breck," the cavalryman responded merrily. Breckinridge smiled; in his brigade, as elsewhere in the army, there were more than a few young women masquerading as boys. These volunteers usu- ally buddied up, concealing their sex from the officers but not from the men in the ranks, for whom they performed their services profitably and well. Some of the disguised girls even charged nothing, considering it their contri- bution to the Cause. In battle, these hardened young women in soldiers' garb were among the steadiest under fire, and the noncoms passed the word up the line that it would harm morale if their services day or night were withdrawn. Breckinridge pretended to know nothing about it. He sloshed around some of the purplish fluid that had been put in his glass. "What kind of God-awful wine is this?" "Scuppemong," said the cavalryman, "and over there you can find all the applejack and peach brandy you want. I suppose they can break out a little bourbon for you, Breck." Morgan looked across the large reception room of the house of the bride's father at the figure of President Jefferson Daviscadaverous, pale, almost at the edge of infirmityentering at the side of Braxton Bragg. "I think I rate a honeymoon with this incredible girl," Morgan was saying in a lower tone, "but we've been told to be ready to set out on a raid right after the wedding." He seemed sorry for himself; that was the first time Breckinridge could recall that Morgan had not approached action with the eyes of a man who loved war more than a man should. Morgan was not the only Southern hotblood who was becoming more sober about the game of war, Breck had observed; the fighting was lasting too long and the adventure was losing its piquancy. He could not fault Jeff Davis on that. His former colleague in the United States Senate had warned of a long war from the start; Breck had agreed, remembering his conversations in the Executive Mansion with Lin- coln, who was obsessed with what he insisted was "an oath registered in Heaven" to prevent Southern independence at all costs. Breck stayed away from the bar, moving instead to a table laden with quail, doves, and roast pork. Supplies were plentiful in Murfreesboro, a city crowded with wives and sweethearts of officers. He wished Mary had been well enough to come; it would be good to be with her in this soul-wrenching time of uncertainty about Cabell. No word about the boy in a month; the longer there was no news, the more the likelihood of never seeing him again grew. His name had not appeared on any of the prisoner lists. The gaiety of the party, the whooshing of silk skirts, and the laughter of Morgan's raiders oppressed him. How many of these reveling raiders would come home across the backs of their horses after the next foray, and how many brides and sweethearts would soon be searching for replacements, just as generals demanded replacements that so seldom came? That led to-another thought: why was Morgan's force being sent on a mission when the likelihood was that Bragg would be called upon to defend this area any day now? Cavalry provided an army its eyes, and the talent of Southern horsemen in scouting and harassing an approaching enemy provided the Confederacy an edge of supremacy that sometimes made up for the Northern advantage in artillery. General Breckinridge hoped Davis had a good reason for stripping Bragg's army of Morgan and his men at a critical moment. At a nod from President Davis, who seemed unusually convivial and atten- tive to the guests this afternoon, Breckinridge went into the study to await his audience with the leader of the South. He was surprised and glad to see Pat Clebume waiting there already, poking the fire, complaining about the bone- chilling dampness of these rambling mansions. "I'm either going to be promoted or cashiered," General Clebume told him quickly. "I'm afraid I couldn't keep my Irish mouth shut, Breck. I didn't take your advice." "You didn't put anything in writing about recruiting and freeing slaves, I hope." General Clebume shook his head as the President entered. Jefferson Davis took their hands and motioned them to chairs before the fire. "My friends, with constant labors in the duties of office, and borne down by care, I have had such little opportunity for social intercourse," the Presi- dent saidit seemed to Breckinridge stiffly, like a politician incapable of warmth even among his closest supporters. "I hope the time may come when, relieved of the anxieties of the hour, we may have more social intercourse." "The war is not going well, then," Clebume probed. "On the contrary, I see nothing in the future to disturb the prospect of the independence for which we are struggling." Breck knew the President had been profoundly troubled by the setback at Sharpsburg, but knew also that Davis would brook no defeatist talk. "Have you spoken to the bride and groom? With such noble women at home and such heroic soldiers in the field, we are invincible." "Sure and you're a man of great faith," Clebume replied, "but we just lost Kentucky. And with all respect, Mr. President, our glorious invasion of the North, by both Bragg and Lee, is a thing of the past. If we're to win, we need some radical changes." Davis biinked, rubbed his bad eye, and changed the subject. "Breck, first let me say I have nothing to report to you about your son. The official channels, through the exchange commission, say he is not listed as a pris- oner." Breckinridge nodded numbly and said he was grateful for his concern. "We have an informal means of communication with the North," the Presi- dent continued. "Judah Benjamin's sister in New Orleans is in touch with a doctor of some sort attached to the headquarters of the Union occupiers. Some inquiries are being made through that channel, which was initiated by Mr. Lincoln, I suspect, when he replaced that madman Butler. Perhaps he is coming under pressure to see if negotiations for peace are possible. We will telegraph you immediately if there is any news of your gallant boy. Our prayers" "Send news about peace negotiations, too," said the irrepressible Clebume. "The only basis for talks would be a recognition of the Confederacy's independence," Davis said with great firmness. "The possibility that the North is interested is encouraging. It may be a sign of weakness. Demands for peace are growing every day in the North." But not in the South, Breckinridge noted, and wondered why. Possibly because the North was the aggressor, striking against an attempt at peaceful secession; the way Lincoln had goaded the South into firing the first shot had been a transparent trick. More likely, peace talk was muted in the South because it was equated with a suggestion to surrender. Life in the two sections was surely of a different character (lending some credence, Breck would grant, to the idea of independence), and part of that difference was the incli- nation of the Southerner to consider a defeat of his cause to be a loss of personal honor. If a Yankee thought of losing the war, he did not worry about the occupation of his land by Southerners; but every Southerner had to con- sider the personal humiliation in store when the Yankee overlords came down to see that the slaves were in the saddle. And then Breck felt another, unstated, slowly smoldering reason that peace talk was not heard in the South: not every Southerner was partial to the peculiar institution, particularly when slavery did him no personal good. To talk of peace was to doubt the necessity for slavery, which was to attack the aristocracy, and you didn't do that if you knew what was good for you. But plenty of poor Southern soldiers resented having to fight to help the planta- tion owner keep his slaves; Cabell had taught him that. And Breck knew that at least some well-bred officers felt that slaverywhich might be justified on abstract economic grounds, and was surely permitted by the writers of the Constitutionwas not the sort of cause that made its justifiers proud. "Independence, then, is the Southern cause," Clebume was saying to Da- vis, "the very essence of the war and the reason for the glorious struggle. Not the preservation of slavery." Davis nodded unhesitatingly. "Abolition is merely the excuse for the war on the part of some Northern zealots," he explained, as if this were a lecture he had given often. "The real design of most of the Yankee bankers and politicians is to subjugate the South totally, dominating our economy and imposing their culture upon our own. The abolition of slavery was merely their excuse, and a device to keep foreign nations from recognizing us." "If they're not really fighting to end slavery," said the Irish-born general in seeming innocence, "and we're really fighting for independence and not to save slaverythen why don't we emancipate the slaves ourselves, and use negro troops to fight for our independence and their own freedom?" "There's been some talk of that around," Breckinridge put in, to soften the sound of Cleburne's heresy. "It's not disloyal in any way, Mr. President. Just take it as a suggestion to help swell our ranks." "How would we pay for it?" Davis asked. Breck biinked and Clebume smiled; that practical reaction was a surprise. "The Confederacy would have to buy the slaves to use in the army, at eight hundred dollars a head for a good field hand, and then free those who served honorably. Where's the money for that? We hardly have enough to pay for ammunition, for shoes even, and could not think of affording a million slaves." "Is that all that stands in the way?" Davis smiled his bleak smile. "Tell me where to find eight hundred million dollars for the first million slaves. But of course that is not the only drawback to the scheme. Some of our states would try to secede from the Confederacy to protect the peculiar institutionGeorgia, South Carolina." "We're outnumbered in every battle, sometimes two to one," Breckinridge put in. "The North outnumbers us three to one in men of military age avail- able for the draft." As an experienced politician, Breckinridge was not pre- pared to endorse Clebume's idea at this early stage. But that the notion evidently did not trigger automatic rejection by the President of the Confed- eracy was encouraging. "Until our white population shall prove insufficient for the armies we re- quire, to employ the negro as a soldier would scarcely be deemed wise or advantageous. Certainly not now, and the less said the better," said Davis. "The notion is quite premature." "But if recruitment fell off," Cleburne pressed, and Breck wished he would not keep assaulting the position, "and we really needed the men" Davis shrugged. "Should the alternatives be subjugation of the South or the employment of the slave as soldier, there seems no reason to doubt what should then be our decision. We are not, of course, faced with those alterna- tives." Breckinridge was stunned. Here was the President of the Confederacy coolly facing the prospect of ending slavery in order to maintain an indepen- dent state. Hundreds of thousands of men were dying for whatfor indepen- dence? He would have to think hard about the politics of that, because he had not departed the Senate of the United States, to be branded a traitor by his peers, because he favored disunion; on the contrary, he had done his damned- est to avoid disunion, short of war. Nor was he an advocate of the property rights that enshrined human slavery. Then what was he fighting for? What was the "cause"? Was resentment at the Republicans' political insistence that slavery not be extended to the West- ern territories worth this fratricidal war? His young cousin Margaret, Uncle Bob's daughter, intruded on his thoughts. She was a nurse for the Union, swabbing blood off the injured in hospitals that no belles like the girl mar- rying the lovesick Morgan had ever seen. Margaret Breckinridge had a pur- pose, simple, clearthe abolition of slavery, the end of the degradation of a race, the fulfillment of the American revolutionary promise that all men were created equal. That was something to drive her to serve in ways that no well- bred Kentucky girl would ever have considered in peacetime. What opposing cause gave strength to John Morgan's bride? Resentment of the majority's iron rule? Independence from an already independent Union? It was under- standable for proud and sensitive Southerners to despise the arrogance of individual Yankees, but something else entirely for Southerners to hate the Union their fathers had helped create. As these thoughts crowded in, Breckinridge felt as if his roots were rotting. He wished he could have a long talk about the underlying motives of North and South with Anna Carroll, who might have the wrong answer but would at least understand the question. "As general officers," President Davis was saying, "you are both undoubt- edly concerned about my decision to remove men from this command in the face of an impending attack on Murfreesborowhy, particularly, I am send- ing Morgan north for a long foray. I realize that your relationship with General Bragg is not close, and he is unlikely to explain my rationale." Breckinridge broke away from his disturbing line of thought and looked up sharply: had Bragg been complaining about him again? The leader of the Orphan Brigade felt a surge of anger at the martinet willing to trouble the President of the Confederacy with petty squabbles. "The copperhead movement is gaining strength in the North," Davis ex- plained. "Horatio Seymour has been elected Governor of New York, the largest state in the Union, on a pledge to end the war with 'the Union as it was.' Clement Vallandigham of Ohio has introduced a resolution in the House of Representatives accusing Lincoln of trying to establish a dictator- ship. Rumors are rampant that Seward intends to negotiate a peace on the basis of separation" "How did Val's resolution do?" Breckinridge wanted to know. "Voted down seventy-nine to fifty, strictly according to party lines," Davis said. Breck was impressed; when the leader of the copperhead faction of the Democrats in Congress could impose party discipline to support a calumni- ous attack on Lincoln, that meant the opposition was hardening. The South had no such opposition in place; no two-party system had been given time to develop. That made the Northern political system stronger in the long run, in Breck's reckoning, but vulnerable now. "This is the time to do all we can to contribute to copperhead sentiment in the North," Davis said, "particularly in the fertile Western groundOhio, Illinois, Kansas." The President lowered his voice, requiring his generals to lean forward to catch his words. "I have been visited by men hatching what they call the Northwest Conspiracya rising of the copperhead secret societ- ies, a riot in Chicago, open agitation to free our prisoners and negotiate an end to the war. That is where Morgan, and perhaps Forrest in a few weeks, can fit instriking north and west, making the message plain that the war cannot be won by the Union." Breck looked at Clebume; did Davis know something about Northern mo- rale that they did not know? He had no feel for the depth of support of the peace movement in the North, but if the movement could turn out every Democrat in the House to denounce the President of the United States as a dictator, perhaps Davis's faith in the value of raids in the Northwest was well placed. He wondered if Lincoln would be rattled by an explosion of peace talk in Ohio and Illinois; somehow, he doubted it. He could not be wearied of making war, because he was sustained by his obsession with Union and ma- jority rule. The only way to defeat Lincoln was to beat his army. "This is the critical time," said President Davis. "Now, this month. Our victory could come not so much from our strength, but from weakness in the Northern will. Do you agree, Breck? You have a surer grasp of politics than I do." "We need more than successful raids," was his judgment. "We need some victories in the field here in Tennessee, leading back up into Kentucky, threat- ening Ohio. And we need General Lee to crush Lincoln's army at the Rappa- hannock in the East." "Defense is the key," the newly promoted Clebume put in. "If there is anything we've learned, 'tis the effect of the rifled barrel on all warfare. The guns can start killing at over five hundred yards, not one hundred, and that means the attackers are at a terrible disadvantage against prepared positions. That should be our strategy here, if you can get it through Bragg's thick skull." "It is the plan of General Lee at Fredericksburg," said Davis, ignoring the slight to his local commander. "That is the way to weaken Lincoln's resolve," Breckinridge concluded. "The removal of McClellan was all his doing. The next battle is his defeat or his victory, no matter who the Union general is. A military setback there, followed by a repulse of the Federals here, would force him to listen to the Democrats and settle the war. Only then would he make a deal for 'the Union as it was,' with slavery." "Which I, of course," said Davis, "will never accept. We are two nations now." The practical Irishman made Breckinridge's point. "First let's get him to make us an offer." CHAPTER 26 ALONE AGAIN Governor Chase had never before come to see her at her flat in The Washing- ton House. Her lodgings, Anna Carroll assured herself, were respectable enough, and the bedroom-work office had a certain genteel seediness attribut- able to the war. Certainly the quarters were not as grand as he was accus- tomed to at the Chase mansion at Sixth and G, but her sitting room had been host to a parade of Congressmen and office seekers. Not a month ago, she had made the final arrangements in this drab room with Senator Henry Wilson for the appointment of a middle-level assistant in Chase's Treasury Depart- ment, which did nothing to pay the rent but at least enhanced her reputation as a person of some influence. That reputation, in turn, led to writing assign- ments. She wished the War Department would pay the $6,500 she was owed, or at least made an offer to settle the bill. Anna was flustered when the bellboy arrived at the door with the Chase calling card, but she was not about to waste the governor's time by plumping up the pillows or brushing her hair. She wished she had bought a Christmas wreath to put on the door to show her piety. She also wished she had not worn her high-necked blouse but now was no time to change. She sent the boy down to the desk clerk with word to escort the Secretary of the Treasury upstairsshe was eager for the management to know that her visitors were of the first rankand ordered tea. "I trust I am not coming at an inopportune time," Chase said formally, handing her his hat and heavy overcoat, damp from the snow. She was in- clined to say that of course the time was inopportune, she and her apartment looked a mess, and she was glad to have him here in her own domain without his possessive elder daughter looking on. Instead, as she did whenever she felt nervous, Anna let herself pour forth a cascade of small talk about grand strategy. She took his wet hat and coat and heaved them up onto the brass hatstand, chattering about the likelihood of a battle on the Rappahannock, which struck her as being blown out of all proportion by the war correspondents. "They should be out West with Grant, focusing attention on Vicksburg. Why is Lincoln sending John McClemand, a hack politician playing general if there ever was one, down the Mississippi with a force to assault Vicksburg from the river side? That's doomed. The fortress can only be taken from the back, on land, by siege." "I'm sure you know more about that than anyone, my dear lady," he said heavily, sinking into the only chair in the sitting room suitable for a big man. "As you know, the war appears to be drawing to a successful close. Even Seward admits that." That was news to her; Anna doubted this would be a war lasting less than two years. The emancipation policy had not worked, and Lincoln seemed to be backing away from it; Orville Browning told her he hoped a way would be found to delay the proclamation's effect past the New Year's deadline. Chase's hopes for a quick Northern victory seemed misplaced to her, but Anna did not want to argue; perhaps he had come on other business and was making preliminary conversation. "With McClellan finally gone, and some new spirit finally in our troops," Chase was saying, "we should be in Richmond in a matter of weeks." She wondered about his optimism; did Stanton agree? That was not what she was hearing from young Bates at the telegraph office. The operator re- ported that "Hosanna"that was the Union code name for Jefferson Davis, although the operators were more accustomed to hearing Lincoln call his counterpart "Jeffy D"was confident enough about the defense of Richmond to make a visit to Murfreesboro to attend a wedding. The thought of that Tennessee city reminded her of "Old Rosey" Rosecrans, the new Federal commander facing Bragg and Breckinridge there, and she was glad to be able to pass on a tasty piece of political gossip to Chase. "Whenever the war ends, Governor, I hear the Democrats intend to run every general they can lay their hands on for every major office in the North." "I've heard those rumors about McClellan for President" "I've heard the Democrats want Rosecrans for Governor of Ohio." She knew that thought would worry him; Ohio was home territory for Chase, his base of political power, and she had this information from no less an Ohioan than Senator Ben Wade. She sat back to hear what it was he had come for, telling herself to restrain her tongue and to remain self-possessed, as if pro- posals of marriage came regularly. The fact that the governor had come calling without notice was a hopeful sign; maybe he did not wish to hold back an overdue impulse. "As the war ends, I must give serious thought to how best I can serve the nation," he said. "The Republican convention is no more than eighteen months away. Mr. Lincoln, happily, is not likely to be given much consider- ation for renomination. Seward must be stopped at all costshe and the Biairs would subvert the cause for which the war has been fought.," She nodded, forcing herself to listen without comment to a dubioas analy- sis, wondering what would bring him around to a more personal subject. "As Senator Wade has undoubtedly confided in you," he went on, "there is talk of urging Lincoln to remove Seward. Perhaps of precipitating a resigna- tion of the Cabinet en masse, and reconstituting it with myself as a sort of Premier." She remembered that was what Secretary Seward had tried and failed to do at the start of the Lincoln administration. Didn't Chase realize that Lincoln was too smart, or too strong-willed, to permit anything of the sort? Perhaps he thought Lincoln had been weakened by two years of war. But now, evi- dently, a great victory on the road to Richmond was expected; the prospect of impending peace would hardly cause the President to panic and turn over the reins to his strongest Republican rival. Just the opposite: victory would end the military necessity for sudden emancipation, allow Lincoln to regain his popularity as a man of moderation, and ensure his renomination. Anna frowned at the flaw in Chase's analysis, then caught herself, lest a frown be construed as disapproval, and smiled brightly. "Whatever happens, the next year or two will be a time of great political activity for me," he was saying, "and because of that, I am duty-bound to curtail all other interests and activities." She nodded. A busy time it would surely be for everyone. "Which means, my dear lady, that I will have to curtail all social activi- ties," he said, shifting in his chair. "I will be working later than ever. I will be traveling more. I will not be able to avail myself of the comfort and the stimulation of social intercourse that other men may indulge in." What was the man getting at? She looked at him sharply. "Say what you mean." "What I mean is that we cannot see each other as often as before. It means also," he added, as if in reassurance, "that I will be seeing none of the other friends who, unlike you, have little interest in public affairs." Anna took that to mean that Adele Douglas and a few other women friends of Salmon P. Chase were to be cast aside totally, along with her. Small solace there. "I would think that at such a time," she countered, "you would need more than ever the companionship and counsel of someone who cares for your future and cares for you." He shook his handsome head gently but firmly. "I have always conducted myself as a man of honor. I cannot honorably suggest to any woman, espe- cially one for whose intellect I have the greatest respect, the possibility of sharing a life that, in the end, cannot be shared." She was about to engage that argument and then stopped herself. This was not a discussion in which intelligent refutation of an opposing position would do any good. He was announcing a decision, and it was not the one she had hoped for. She took a deep breath, gave him the benefit of the doubt, and said only, "I do not understand." "Let me be frank, then. If we were to continue to see each other as in the recent past, we would surely reach the point of considering a more formal and lasting relationship." She nodded for him to go on. "Of course, I have no way of knowing what your decision would be to my suit, but I cannot honorably allow matters to go that far. I will let nothing not my personal happiness in a life that has seen such grief in marriage nothing cause me to swerve from my path of duty." Chase had buried three wives, she knew; certainly that affected his thinking about marrying again. But couldn't he see that in her case, she would be a political help, not a hindrancean active and useful ally, not a dead anchor? The thought occurred to her that his daughter Kate had pressed him to stop seeing his women friends, but celibacy was an unnatural state for a virile man, especially one determined to compete for power. She knew he wanted her completely, as she did him. What path of duty was he talking about? He was strong enough to deal with a possessive daughter. Instead of analyzing all he said for some hidden motive, she told herself to consider another possibility: it could be that this man, unlike all the others she had known in political life, was being sincere in seeking not to hurt her as others had. She would feel better if that were the reason, and she badly wanted to feel better. "I will support you in every way I can," she said, "and if that has to include not seeing you, so be it." Well put, she said to herself; she had a lifetime's experience in farewells without acrimony. She would not let herself think his withdrawal from imme- diate contact was final. At least this was not a bitter occasion; after Chase succeeded and was President, or failed and was not, perhaps there would be time for being together. She had learned not to close doors; men in public life suffered great changes in fortune that caused greater changes in mind, or else they found other ways to redress their emotional wrongs. "The Native American Party people" he began, and she smiled that away. "I'll talk to my old friend Millard Fillmore in New York," she said. "He hates Seymour and cannot work with Seward. I think you can count on our Know-Nothings." She put her finger alongside her nose and then touched thumb to forefinger, making a zero, the old signal for "nose-nothing." After the Treasury Secretary left the room, a tender kiss on her forehead his only expression of regret, Anna Carroll shook her head in wonderment at the gentleness of her own reaction to her latest disappointment. She actually felt more sorry for the man than for herself. She would miss a great deal, but he would be missing more. The pity was, he might find out too late to do either of them much good. She looked out the window at his carriage pulling away in the snow and hurried to put on her overcoat, the good one that Lizzie Keckley had de- signed three years ago. Since her job was now apparently to be her life, she had to plunge into it with new zest: the first place she wanted to visit was the War Department. Reverend Bob Breckinridge had written her with news passed on by his daughter, Margaret Elizabeth, the Union nurse who had been captured and released in Tennessee: John Breckinridge's son was miss- ing in action and the family was looking for some word of the whereabouts of the body, if hope had gone that he was a prisoner. Anna Ella Carroll was a personage in Washington, she reminded herself, one of the few women who knew whom to see and what could be done and how to ask for it. Being busy on important work always helped dispti disap- pointment, as would the realization that her loss of a married future was small compared to the loss being felt by the Kentuckian she had known so well so long ago. CHAPTER 27 JOHN HAY'S DIARY DECEMBER 12, 1862 I could not believe the words I was hearing. "Everything can be the same as before," she said, as if she had not just turned my world inside out. "We can remain friends, perhaps be closer than ever." "You are becoming another man's wife," I told her, as if explaining a mistaken step to a child, "and you are doing it for money, nothing else. For the money, and the position that Sprague family money can buy. Nothing will ever be the same, for you or for me." "And who are you to talk about selling your soul for an illustrious future?" she demanded, hating herself through me. "You're an able-bodied young man hiding behind your desk in the Executive Mansion while brave men your age are fighting and dying. You'll stick close to your beloved Father Abraham until the war is almost over, writing your Uttle diary that you can use later to twist history to suit your ends and make your fortune. And when the rebels are on the run, then you'll rush into uniform, with a high rank and a safe job, so that you can pretend to your children you were in the War when the bullets were flying." I told her, I regret to say, that my children would not be sired by a drunk who had bought his wife. In the heat of the moment, I thought she deserved my cruel riposte; she cannot compare her unnatural attachment to her father to my respect for a great man. But then she started to crynot the sniffles and tears from a child, but great sobs from a woman unaccustomed to crying, shaking her head in mortification at her weakness, forcing herself to face her shame. "It isn't so terrible," she insisted when she could speak again. "It's a mar- riage of convenience, to help the family; the French do it all the time. If you loved me, you'd understand the sacrifice I'm making." I will give her credit for composing herself quickly, lest some of the pas- sersby in Lafayette Park notice a blubbering young lady amidst the statuary of General Washington's foreign helpers; she extended her gloved hand and gathered what was left of her dignity to bid me goodbye. "I wish you success in your chosen profession," I said coolly, a remark as cruelly accurate as it was felicitously phrased. Now I wish I hadn't said it. She walked eastward in the late December afternoon, with that gait of independence and grace that I will not soon forget, the heavy woolen skirt concealing the long, slim, muscled legs that some damnable sot will soon know better than 1. I have the memories of the kisses and suppressed love cries, the sketches in my mind that one day I will transcribe to poetry or prose, and the comfortable weight of melancholy that only the savored expe- rience of rejection can bestow. And what does Kate have? Sprague, servants, and a bite at the apple of discord. I suppose I might have frozen to death, sitting on the bench in the park across from the Mansion for an hour or so of such wallowing in my misery, but for the sight of Anna Ella Carroll bustling along Pennsylvania Avenue past the Mansion on the way to the War Department. I hallooed and waved to her to join me; she hallooed back and pointed straight ahead. I ran to catch up to her. "You always told me Kate was a shrew and a vixen, entirely unworthy of a boy from Illinois," I said, with an attempt at lightheartedness, "and I want you to know that I was wrong and you were right." She immediately slowed her pace and listened to my news. It affected her more than I thought it would; evidently this fine woman has more of an affection for me than I had hitherto believed. Women are not universally betrayers; Anna Carroll is a good egg. "When did you learn of her engagement to Governor Sprague?" "The boy governor is now the boy senator. She told me the happy news of her engagement an hour ago." The timing seemed to mean something to Anna. She smacked her gloved fist into her palm and muttered some imprecation that, had Miss Carroll been a man, I would have taken as "that son of a bitch!" I assumed she meant that Kate had been acting the bitch in heat, which was all too true, and I agreed that the young lady had used me badly. We ducked inside the front entrance of the War Department and remained downstairs, out of the cold but in a spot where we could talk privately. I told her the only saving grace of this dismal experience was that it had happened behind a screen of discretion; at least nobody would know of my rejection when the world learned of Kate's infamous match. I had not even told Nico- lay. Anna's response was curious: "Tell me how Kate broke the news to you. Was she cold, or genuinely upset? Could you tell?" I recounted the conversation in some detail as I have put it down in this diary, perhaps with more detail about her looks because the pain was fresher in my mind. When I finished, Miss Carroll startled me with a wholly unex- pected reaction. "You'll get over this in a week, Johnyour pride is hurt, and that's not all badbut my heart goes out to that poor young woman." I stood agape, wondering if I had explained it all wrong, or left out the most important part. "He's letting her do this for him," she said with great conviction. "The impetus comes from Chase. He needs the Sprague fortune, and he induced his daughter to do this." When I suggested the idea more likely originated with her, and her father was merely the bystanding recipient of good fortune, Anna Carroll shook her head with the certitude that makes her difficult to argue with. "Kate is a bright, ambitious girl. But Governor Chase is a grown man who knows right from wrong. He could have stopped her from ruining her life for him. He chose to encourage this." "How can you be sure it wasn't her doing?" "I know exactly the bargain he offered." She did not reveal the information that might have been so fascinating, and I did not inquire. "John, it is really most important that President Lincoln know how desperately Chase is trying to undermine him. I know for a fact that Chase hopes to enlist the Senate in a push to make Chase the dominant force in the government." "Mr. Lincoln likes to say that when the presidential grub gets in a man, it hides well," I told her. "What's a grub?" "Some sort of chigger, I think, gets under your skin and you can't get it out." (I hate it when people ask me to explain some of the Tycoon's Kentucky figures of speech and I don't know them.) I asked her if Chase had hinted when and how he would make his move for this rather unlikely coup. "It will be aimed at Seward," she said slowly, "but Lincoln will be the target. Now that the radicals have McClellan's scalp, they want more. Essen- tially, they want Seward and the Biairs out, Lincoln turned into a eunuch, and Chase in charge. If you think the West Point clique around McClellan was a problem, you may find the radicals behind Chase a real threat." Something about the way she spoke took my mind off my pain and gave the strange scheme weight. Miss Carroll is an intimate of the Wades, and had been close to Chase; she ought to know whereof she speaks about radical cabals. I resolved to tell the Tycoon about this right away, or as soon as he can get his mind off the battle he has caused to be joined at Fredericksburg. Of late, when we turn to talk of politics, he has been worrying about the peace movement on one flank more than the radicals on his other flank. His prob- lem may be more Chase in his own backyard than Seymour up in New York. "Tell the President that Seward took the blame for ending the Chiriqui deportation plan," she told me. Miss Carroll had been assigned to work on that scheme for months, to assuage the worry of Northern workers that Emancipation Day would inundate the North with blacks. "Seward elicited an objection from the ambassadors from Central America to the colonization there of our negroes, and wrote back to them saying the whole deportation plan was off. Lot of people are angry at his high-handed ways. Chase and Wade will use that." Anna beckoned me to follow her upstairs to help on an errand, and I hoped it was not to present her bill for pamphleteering services rendered because I have been told to stay out of that. Fortunately, her quest was to find out whether some secesh soldier had been identified as dead by any of our grave details. I went in with her to one of Stanton's aides, and my presence led him to believe the Prsdt was interested in Miss Carroll's quest, but even in that cooperative state the lists he provided could corroborate nothing. She asked to see our prisoner lists, looked through the B's, found nothing. Nobody was much interested in helping, what with the battle shaping up at any moment in Virginia. We walked back slowly and she left me in front of the Mansion. I told her of my gratitude for her understanding and her absolute confidence, and she had some advice for me. "You're too quick to condemn women, John. You call Mrs. Lincoln 'the Hellcat,' and you may not mean to be cruel, but you are. She is a troubled woman who needs help, not scorn. And with Kate"she saw my warning scowl and ignored it completely"count yourself fortunate you never misled yourself into thinking that you and she might share a life together." To make myself feel better, I said maybe Kate had been too old for me. That may not have been the right thing to say to Miss Carroll, because she snapped, "Then it's for you to grow up. Stop feeling sorry for yourself, John, you're enjoying it too much." We walked along in silence until she added, "And when you see Kate again, be a man. A boy can be mean, but a man should be kind. She will learn, in good time, that the husband she chose is a disaster, and the father she is throwing away her life for is a sanctimonious fraud. As she grows older, Kate will see your success, and that will be all the vengeance you needand by then, if you're like a good strong man I used to know, you won't need any." She said she had another idea about the prisoner lists and whirled around to return to the War Department, leaving me with food for thought: I really should withdraw my first-flush-of-anger oratory. Perhaps a nice note is called for, showing real maturity and wishing her well, which will remove my sense of petty recrimination even as it makes her feel worse. Good idea. Meanwhile, my new philosophy: the sins of the daughters shall be visited on the fathers. CHAPTER 28 FREDERICKSBURG I WITH LINCOLN Lincoln was well aware that these last two weeks of the year could make or break the Union and his administration. In sixteen days, if Burnside pushed back Lee and if Rosecrans pushed back Bragg, he would be standing in the East Room at the New Year's reception, shaking the hands of thousands of admiring countrymen, seeing in their eyes the approval that could come only from military success. Perhaps that suc- cess would be swiftly followed by some response to the proposal, in his annual message, to amend the Constitution to bring about abolishment by the year 1900, with full compensation to owners. In that case, he would have to con- sider postponing the January I emancipation edict to see if the South was ready to end the rebellion on suitable terms. With military success, his would be the whip hand. Or that day that would begin 1863 might be draped in defeat. In that case, the gloom following setbacks in Virginia and Tennessee would be exaggerated by the holiday period if the generals he had hand-picked failed him and brought the wrath of public sentiment down on the head of the commander in chief. Following so soon on the rejection of his party at the polls, military defeat would cause conservatives to demand he postpone the date of effect of the proclamation for a different reasonlest the Northern resentment of his radical act topple the government and defeat his entire purpose. If he acqui- esced to that and stayed the political blow at the South, he would be ~bowing weakness everywhere, unable to carry the day in the field or carry-out his threat in the political arena. So much depended on at least a modest victory somewhere. To achieve his central purpose, Lincoln knew he had first to overcome the pervasive weari- ness of war; now as never before, he needed the infusion of optimism that only a military excuse for a political thunderbolt would bring. Of that central purpose Lincoln was in no doubt. The nearly two years of war had shaken him, drained him, aged and hardened him, but he was dead certain that he was right in his basic idea: if the experiment of this republic was to work, the majority had to ruleall the time, with no exceptions. That was the essence of self-government. If a city, or state, or section that was in the minority on any question could just pick up and go when the majority ruled the other way, then there would be no hope for democracy here or anywhere in the world. And if democracy could not take root in the New World, where the people had shown they had the will to overpower kings, then government by the people would stand revealed as an absurdity. Con- stant subdividing would lead to anarchy, followed by a return to monarchs, dictators, and despotism. He was certain of that in his soul. The success of the American experiment rested on the willingness of the minority to acquiesce in electoral defeat. True, the Republican candidate in 1860 had been the choice of a plurality and not a majority, but Abraham Lincoln had been duly elected according to the Constitution, and was bound by more than his oath to beat down the notion that the losers could set up shop for themselves. He was certain that if he failed to hold the Union intact, using its blood as its glue, not only would the dream of the nation's founders be dissipated, but the cause of human freedom throughout the world would be set back for centuries. The stakes in this struggle could not be higher or the core idea clearer: upon the outcome of this war of brothers hinged the ability of people to be their own masters. He rolled out of bed, took up the pitcher, and poured it over his head into the basin. That need to enforce the rule of the majority, he reminded himself, justified bending the Constitution occasionally. That justified opposing aboli- tion last year when such restraint helped win the war, or supporting abolition this year when such radicalism helped win the war. He had plunged the nation into war to put the flag back, not to put down slavery. Last year, to have undertaken abolition would have smacked of bad faith and weakened the cause of the Union. He had told his closest supporters that abolition's thunderbolt would keep. Now he needed a thunderbolt to energize and save the Union. Certainly it took a load off his mind to be able, finally, to use that thunder- bolt in a way that served rather than harmed the central goal: now he was in the happy position of being able to advocate both the preservation of the Union and an end to slavery. His previous position of promising not to strike at slavery where it existed, merely to prevent its extension, had not overly troubled himhe had been carrying out the contract of the founders and his own campaign promises. But his preliminary proclamation had opened a new vista: he was at last persuaded that his personal wish to end slavery would advance and not retard the saving of the Union. After the disastrous elections and the rise of Seymour and the peace movement, however, Lincoln needed at least a modicum of military progress to be sure. He finished dressing and straightened his hair with his fingers, ignoring the mirror. He thought about looking in on Mary in the bedroom across the hall and decided against it. She needed her rest, which came best in the mornings for her, and the sight of her ashen face these days with its pursed-lipped mouth made him sad. He remembered back to the days in Springfield, when her women's prob- lems that came just after the birth of Tad had ended their passion, such as it was, and they had agreed it would be safer and more comfortable to sleep apart. The year he ran for the Senate against Douglas, and lost, they had the house remodeled and separate bedrooms put in. In those days she would come in and wake him, sometimes with coffee; now he rarely saw her in the mornings, and he worried about what went on in her troubled mind after those late sessions with mediums and seers, or after the debilitating bouts with the sick headaches. Mary was usually a burden now, but not always; sometimes she was a source of strength, when he was afflicted with the hypo and could talk to nobody else. And he would not forget that when he was an awkward and woman-fearing young man, the well-bred Mary Todd had helped civilize and socialize him. On the way down the hall to his office, the President banged on Nicolay's door; though it was not yet six o'clock, his first secretary was already half dressed. Lincoln told him to get a horse and ride down to Fredericksburg to see if General Burnside had finally got his pontoon bridge across the Rappa- hannock. The damned pontoons had been delayed and Burnside would not consider any other way of getting his men and wagons across the river. Lincoln told his senior secretary he was worried that the general was going to be too busy to keep the War Department informed of the attack on Lee. "Maybe Chase was right," said Nicolay, stuffing his shirt in his pants. "Maybe Joe Hooker would have been better." "Burnside is better," Lincoln said with more certainty than he felt, "be- cause he is the better housekeeper." The expected look of puzzlement crossed Nicolay's serious face. Nicolay was better than young Hay when it came to predictable reactions. "Do you need a housekeeper or a general?" "I tell you, Nicolay, the successful management of an army requires a good deal of faithful housekeeping. More fight will be got out of well-fed and well- cared-for soldiers and animals than can be got out of those that are required to make long marches with empty stomachs." "Yes, Mr. President. I'll write a pass for you to sign." Lincoln strode to his office and wrote the pass himself: "Major General Burnside, My dear Sir: The bearer, Mr. J. G. Nicolay, is, as you know, my private Secretary. Please treat him kindly, while I am sure he will avoid giving you trouble." He signed it and soon sent Nicolay on his way with an admonition to stay out of the line of fire. Lincoln hated these days when a battle was raging nearby and he had to depend on busy or uncaring generals to send him news. He would likely spend the day and night at the telegraph office, hearing nothing. If the newspapers could afford a correspondent on the scene, so could the President of the United States. He put his fists on his hips and stretched his long body, wishing he could get some exercise. So much rested with Burnside, more daring than -McClel- lan, more cautious than Hooker. He had chosen the fellow with the weird whiskers partly because he was known to be a McClellan man, not eager to replace Little Mac, and thus would be least likely to provoke an army coup. Lincoln knew that Burn had had more than his share of disappointments in life; he had even brought a girl to the altar of marriage, only to hear her say "no" at the crucial moment; the President shook his head to clear it of doubt. He had provided Bumside with every available man and gun, more than he had ever done for McClellan. The Union force was said to be 170,000, more than double the size of Lee's army and, thanks to the preceding commander, far better equipped. Lincoln could not put the Young Napoleon out of his mind; the ousted general had planned to attack Lee in a place that might have had Stonewall Jackson's division far from Longstreet's; Bumside preferred a direct assault across the river. Was that wise? Lee surely was aware of the impending at- tack, delayed by the damned pontoons, and might have ordered Longstreet to dig in on the heights. Lincoln shook that thought off, too: Bumside could be counted on to smash the rebels now, before the end of the year. Nothing to do but wait for news from the front. He contemplated the papers on his desk. The Sioux had risen in the West, massacring white set- tlers; the order to hang three hundred warriors was prepared for his signa- ture. He wrote a note to the general asking him to select only those Indians who had actually participated in the killing of innocents in a massacre. That way, he estimated, he would approve the hanging of only about thirty. The North was poised for a victory. Halleck was confident; General Haupt, the quartermaster, was equally certain of victory, and had gone down to the front to observe the battle after promising to hurry back to Lincoln with news of the first decisive engagement. The rebels under Lee had already been beaten a few months ago; the Army of the Potomac had never been better prepared for the strike that would have them eating Christmas dinner in Richmond. Then, on New Year's Day, he would sign the proclamation free- ing the slaves under his war power. He looked in the outer office for Hay or Stoddard; neither was at work yet. Lincoln trotted down the stairs and went to the front door to see if the newsboy had arrived yet with the Intelligencer. CHAPTER 29 FREDERICKSBURG II NOT A CHICKEN ALIVE General James Longstreet, on his horse atop Marye's Heights, looked through his telescope down on the city of Fredericksburg, now being invested and looted by Federal troops. Behind them was the Rappahannock, which the men in blue had crossed on a pontoon bridge, taking some casualties from Confederate sharpshooters. He could see flashes of artillery from a wide arc facing him, as the Federals laid down one of the largest and longest barrages of the war. The incoming balls were not doing much damage to the Confeder- ate position, where the troops were properly entrenched, but the barrage announced that the Army of the Potomac was massing for an assault up a long, sloping field toward the butternut troops on the heights. "Pete, does our artillery cover that field?" General Lee asked him. "My artillery chief assures me, sir," Longstreet replied, "a chicken could not live on that field when we open on it." Never had the Confederate forces been in a more advantageous position to punish an attacking force. On Jeff Davis's orders, Lee had ordered entrench- ment; beyond that, a sunken road ran parallel to the expected line of attack, providing invisible cover for defending infantry. The field guns were ready with canister to inflict maximum casualties. "That sure isn't McClellan over there," he observed to General Lee. They had seen the order relieving their old adversary, replacing him with Burnside. The inventor of the best saddle had been replaced by the inventor of the best breech-loading rifle, and it apparently made a big difference in the way the battle would be fought. "In a way, I regret to part with McClellan," said Lee. "We always under- stood each other so well. I fear they may continue to make these changes till they find someone I don't understand." "The men don't like digging in, sir. They think it's cowardly work, unfit for white men. They call you 'the King of Spades'." "My army is as much stronger for these new entrenchments," Lee said evenly, "as if I had received reinforcements of twenty thousand men." They would need that advantage, because the oncoming Union Army was a sight to behold, massing as the morning fog lifted, for the onslaught up the long hills. Longstreet did not need his spyglass to see the polished arms and bright blue uniforms in array, battle flags fluttering, as on a holiday occasion. "They are massing very heavily," Lee said, which Longstreet took to be his commander's way of noting that the opposing army outnumbered the Con- federate troops by two to one. "If you put every man in the Union Army on that field," Longstreet re- plied, "to approach me over the same line, and give me plenty of ammunition, I will kill them all before they reach my line. Jackson over there may be in some danger, but not my line." He wondered why Burnside would be so foolhardy as to step into this trap. McClellan would never have put himself in this position, and if he found himself there, would have had the good military sense to swing around and concentrate his assault on Jackson's position and then try to roll up the line. Burnside was coming straight ahead, the whole of his army against the whole of the Confederate line. Maybe the Union general was acting under direct orders from Lincoln. If Jeff Davis ever gave him an order like that, Longstreet vowed, he would resign rather than try to force his men to commit suicide against the enemy in its stronghold. Or maybe Burnside was acting on his own, trying to make up for his indecision and delay at the bridge over the Antietam; whatever the reason, the result was command stupidity on a scale never before seen in this war. "They're coming," General Lee said. That was not an order to fire; Lee left such decisions to his lieutenants. Longstreet waited until the massed blue troops came forward into the open field, almost within range of the 2,500 men in Cobb's brigade, hidden in the sunken road behind a long stone wall. He raised and dropped his arm, order- ing his artillery to open fire. A sheet offlame seemed to lash down the hill and the carnage began. "It is well that war is so terrible," General Lee observed; "we would grow too fond of it." Longstreet watched the decimated ranks of blue resolutely march forward, maintaining a steady step and closing up broken ranks with more determina- tion than he had ever seen in battle, until they came within range of General Cobb's muskets. A storm of lead swept through the advancing ranks from Confederates hidden behind a long stone wall. No army, no matter how valiant, could long maintain discipline in the face of such crossfire. The massed muskets and artillery blasting grapeshot were chewing up the Union front and flank, while other artillery was devastating the rear. Longstreet thought ahead; if the Army of the Potomac kept sending wave upon wave of men to their death, the war could be ended today; if they fell back, perhaps a Confederate bayonet charge down from the heights could pin the remaining Federals against the river behind them. He wanted to talk to Generals Hood and Pickett about that. It was just possible that Lincoln and his new general had, in a gamble against impossible odds, thrown away the war. "I wish," he heard Lee say, in a kind of justification of the slaughter but also an offhand summary of his personal goal in the war, "I wish these people would go away and let us alone." CHAPTER 30 FREDERICKSBURG III WITH NICOLAY John Nicolay was frightened. He had cheerfully accepted the assignment to come down to Fredericksburg to observe the battle and to keep the President informed, but he had not realized the extent to which it might mean risk of life. He was a lawyer, not a soldier, and was willing to risk his eyesight studying late nights for his admission to practice before the Supreme Court, but physical exposure to enemy fire was not in his line. The city of Fredericksburg was in Union hands but that offered no comfort because rebel guns were in position on the heights facing the city. It was Sunday morning, gray and foggy, but no church bells were ringing: the churches were closed. Most of the Virginia city's inhabitants had fled, and many Federal soldiers not at the front were busy stealing valuables from Virginian homes. A bombardment could begin at any moment if General Lee saw fit to destroy Southern property occupied by Federal forces. Nicolay saw no need to stay for the shelling. The day before, he had learned, a great battle had begun. Late Saturday night, when the President's secretary arrived at Bumside's headquarters from Washington, he had found it difficult to determine the outcome. The Federal opening attack had been beaten back, and the talk was of terrible losses on both sides, but General Burnside was undaunted, which Nicolay supposed augured well. The secretary wondered whether he should have sent a tele- gram to the President, who was probably famished for news, but Nicolay could not figure out, in all the confusion and disagreement at headquarters, who was winning. It had been hard to tell anything from Bumside's head- quarters, located north of the Rappahannock across from Fredericksburg and out of sight of the fighting. Better to remain silent, he had decided, than to transmit a wild guess that might later come back to haunt him. When the thunder of artillery woke him at dawn, he had hurried to the telegraph operator to see what Bumside was reporting to Washington. The 4 A.M. dispatch was encouraging: "I have just returned from the field. Our troops are all over the river. We hold the first ridge outside the town, and three miles below. We hope to carry the crest today." But at a pre-breakfast council of war that Bumside allowed the President's representative to attend, a wholly different picture emerged. "Any movement to my front is impossible at present," General Franklin told his optimistic commander. "The truth is, my left is in danger of being turned." Franklin had been a McClellan favorite, Nicolay knew, and was not one of the more aggressive generals. Eyes swung to General Hooker, but "Fighting Joe" had as httle taste for more battle. "I lost as many men yesterday as your orders required me to lose," he said bitterly. "There has been enough blood shed to satisfy any reasonable man, and it is time to quit." Nicolay had understood from Stanton that no love was lost between Hooker and Bumside, rivals for the command of McClellan's army. Nor was Hooker a Lincoln man"Fighting Joe" was famous for his frequent calls for a dictator, and his visits to the Chase home. Bumside was unlikely to heed Hooker's advice, even when it was the opposite of rash. The crushing statement came from old General Sumner, leader of the Third Grand Division of Bumside's force. He had been in the army when Bumside was a child, and his reputation as ajoyous warrior was approaching legend. Nobody doubted his courage or zest for combat; Bumside, it was said, had ordered him to remain at headquarters the day before lest the old man get killed leading charges. "General, I hope you will desist from this attack," said Sumner. "I do not know of any general officer who approves of it, and I think it will prove disastrous to the army." That shook Bumside for a moment, but he evidently knew what Lincoln had appointed him to do. "Assemble my old brigade. They know me, they will follow me anywhere. I will lead them myself in a charge against the center, against the sunken road, and I will break Lee's line or die in the attempt." That struck Nicolay as foolhardy, even crazy, but he knew it was more than bravado; Bumside made it clear he had not come this far for a standoff, and was willing to do what none of his subordinates was ready to do. The others disagreed with the commander's desperate plan, and Bumsid<- agreed to reconsider; the council broke up with no decision made. The telegraph operator came in with a message from Lincoln to Nicolay. Five stem words: "What news do you have?" With that impetus Nicolay summoned what personal courage he had and rode across the pontoon bridge into the city of Fredericksburg. The town had been badly battered, the streets streaming with men carrying the wounded on litters to the chamel houses that the schools and churches had become. Nicolay stayed long enough to ride through two of the principal streets and to find a place where he could observe the heights from below. An officer lent him a small spyglass and angrily pointed to the area in front of the sunken road and low stone wall. Nicolay, to his horror, saw a long mound of blue bodies, with rebel soldiers creeping among them, pulling shoes off dead men's feet. The officer invited him into one of the larger houses, its roof partially caved in, for a cup of coffee with some of his comrades. Nicolay asked them what he should report to the President, hoping they would hurry and let him go before the bombardment began anew. "Tell Lincoln we might as well have tried to take Hell." "We've lost more than two men to their one," said a lieutenant from Ohio. "If we have to go up that hill again, we'll lose the whole damn army. At least with Little Mac, we had a chance. We were on the attack at Antietam, but Lee lost as many men as we did, and he had to leave the field." "Lincoln doesn't give a hoot how many of us he loses," a man with a bandaged hand told Nicolay. "He figures there's more of us than of them, and after a few years we'll grind 'em down. Burnside's his boy, and he'll shovel us in again today or tomorrow." "That's not the worst of it," said the first officer. "If Bobby Lee finds out the shape we're in, he'll send Jackson's division down here and catch us up against the river. The whole army will have to surrender, and there won't be a blue coat between here and Washington." Nicolay nodded quickly and headed back across the bridge, past the heavy artillery emplacements near the headquarters, back to Washington. He de- cided against answering the President's telegram with one of his own, because he could not legitimately advise whether Bumside was crazy or the rest of the generals were, like him, afraid for their lives. CHAPTER 31 FREDERICKSBURG IV JOHN HAY'S DIARY DECEMBER 14, 1862 Poor Nico got back from the front at dusk Sunday, much the worse for wear, to have the Tycoon bark at him, "What news do you have?" My rattled associate brought forth some isolated details about the battle scene and some second-guessing of the military commanders by low-level officers in a bar that was about to be blown to smithereens by rebel artillery. Maybe he was not the right observer to send. I might not have been much better. At times like these, the Prsdt is especially short-tempered because he thirsts for information. Strategy can be obtained in great dollops from Hal-