The Sun.
London, England, 1863-11-07 00:00:00

IHE. CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA,

(From z the Special Correspondent of the Times,)
NEW YORK, Oct. 23,

We have been for the whole week on the eve of
momentous events, but are left at the end with mere
fears—or hopes. The armies of the Potomac have
been going through all the figures of a regular
quadrille. Gen. Lee's army, or a part of it, drove
Meade. up to the defences of Washington, but has
now fallen back towards its former base of opera-
tions, at Lynchburg. Lee's forces are said to be be-
yond the Rappahannock, probably concentrated
sear Culpepper. The advance of the Federals is
posted at Warrenton. Gen. Meade was at Wash-
in on Thursday, in consultation with the Pre-
sident, by whom he was, in all probability, urged to
push on vigorously on the offensive.
The aim of General Lee in his forward movement
is clear to no man, It was apparently not to offer
battle, nor to obtain provisions. By the mere
feint of a flank attack, he drove Meade from his
position, and so effected his retreat as to break up
about 20 miles of the Alexandria and Grange Rail-
way) thus materially widening the distance between
him and his adversary. This was, perhaps, the only
object he hall in view—to steal a march on the
enemy, so as to have leisure to lead or to send part
of his fo'cces against Burnside, who was advancing
upon West Virginia, and had pushed his vanguard,
it was e aid, as far as Abingdon.
We. have no news whatever of warlike operations
either; at Chattanooga or Charleston. Gen. Rosen-
eranz is laid on the shelf; not, it would seem, with-
out sufficient reasons. It was whispered at Cincin-
nati, immediately upon the affair at Chickamauga,
that Rosencraz had in that battle performed neither
the duty of a commander nor of a soldier. The
charge is now loudly repeated, and gains credit. I
need not repeat all that is said to his disparagement.
The man had to contend withpskeolidticatlhaendceavtehnolic
ree
ligions antipathies. ‘Il
‘ e a
churches at Cincinnati to say masses for the success
of his army:'There was no great harm in. that,
surely, though a fuss is made about it. Rosencranz is
of German
extraction, sprung from a Jewish
family who embraced Catholicism, and brought
into the Church of their choice all the zeal of new
converts. The General's brother is Bishop of Cincin-
nati, and it was natural that the layman should
throw a good job in the way of his clerical relative.
The General's real offence, more probably, was dis-
regnrd of orders from Washington—either by going
be•iond Chattanooga against such orders, or by ad-
wincing more cautiously than seemed desirable to the
"wiseacres of the War Department," That the autho-
rities at Washington, with the President at their
head, are always ready to find fault with the slow-
ness of their commanding officers is a fact not to
be disputed. When in the killing heat of last July
someone suggested that Meade's inaction was per-
haps owing to the exhausting influence of the
season, Mr. Lincoln answered rather tartly, "If
our troops are hot in. Virginia, we are burning here
at Washington"—burning that is, with impatience.
Rosencranz, and his subordinates, M'Cook and
Crittenden, are not the only generals likely to fall
victims to the displeasure of the central Govern-
ment. Gen. Meade himself is said to have ten-
dered his resignation, and Generals Sedgewick and
Sickles are already boldly named as his probable
successors. At Charleston, also, if we may believe
public rumour, Admiral Dahlgren is about to be re-
moved from the command of the fleet, where, it is
asserted, he will be superseded by Captain Thomas
Turner, of the Ironsides. The man wanted in that
place, however, in the opinion of some persons here,
is " our fire-proof salamander, Admiral Farragut."
With all these changes contemplated or accom-
plished the public are mightily pleased, and there
is no limit to the splendid successes that are gene-
rally anticipated. The Western army, under Gen.
Grant, is described, with the proverbial Yankee
love of superlatives, as the " biggest host ever as-
sembled in one theatre of war by any one Govern-
ment in modern times." It combines the forces
hitherto led into the field by Grant himself, on the
Mississippi, with the Chattanooga army now pass-
ing from the hands of Rosencranz into those of
Gen. Thomas, with that of Gen. Burnside on the
border between East Tennessee and West Virginia,
and the flying column under Gen. Hooker, now at
Stevenson, on the south-west, on the Alabama fron-
tier. All these troops, exceeding 200,000 com-
batants, may at a given time be brought to bear
upon Bragg's army on the defiles of Georgia. If
Meade or his expected successor on the one side,
end Grant with all his auxiliaries on the other, do
not " wind up this eventful month of October with
some stunning decisive victory" the lovers of the
Union cause will be grievously disappointed.
However "stunning," it is difficult to conceive
how any battle can be decisive in this wearisome
American contest. These Northern people have an
overweening conceit of the resources of their coun-
try. " The Europeans," they say, "talk of America
as if it was only a country ; they forget that we are
a continent, a world. What are the puny efforts
that could be put forth even by such Powers as
France and England compared with the energies of
a new country, to whom the loss of half a million
of men or the outlay of 2,000 million of dollars are
only ae a few drops of blood taken from the veins
of a young giant ? The last census shows an in-
crease in wealth between 1850 and 1860 of 128 per
Cent., the increase of population being only 35 per
cent. The might of the nation, as represented by
'wealth, is inexhaustible, and we defy any man to
show on this, the third year of a most wasteful war,
any ptoea of decline either in the splendour of
our cities or in the prosperity of our land."
The Americans seems to forget, however, that the
argument tells
both ways. If the Union is not a
country but a continent, the Confederacy is iu its
turn not a territory, but' less than half a world.
Their vastness of space presents an insurmountable
barrier against efficient conquest. Unless General
Grant had seven league boots how could he turn
even the most" stunning', victory—were he to gain
it—to any available purpose? Will the whole of
this "eventful month of October
"—will even the
whole fall of the year—enable hi
through the lands he has undertaken to subdue .
Whatever may be the vicissitudes of this
yea'r's
campaign, there are not many here
who flatter them-
selves that it will bring us nearer to the end of the
war ; and if war is to be prolonged, they are not
easy as to the means of filling up the ranks
of
the
fast-thinning army. The President's proclamation
for a levy of 300,000 men has not wrought the
most favourable impression. though great efforts are
made to give it the most cheerful response. T
carry on a war, we are told, "man and money are
required ;" but the people here had brought them..
selves to think, not perhaps without some show of
reason, that, to a great extent, " money makes men,
and men make money." The State, they said, which
commands the means to arm a certain number of
mercenaries has it also in its power to use these
hired men in the impressment of new recruits; and
when an army is once on foot it can be turned into
an instrument equally efficient
in plundering the
enemy or in grinning the people. The strength of
a nation may be indifferently gathered together by
free enlistment, or by forcible conscription. It may
be held, as in England, that the law has under no
Circumstances any control over the person of the
subject, and it may be established, as in France, or
more consistently in Prussia, that every citizen is
Vitally interested in the defence of the country—
liable, therefore, to compulsory military service,
whether at
regularly appointed periods, or on auy
extraoraiuor!
United emergency. The government of the
States seemed to think that the two methods
could be usefully mixed up and alternated. When
the first rush of ,
real volunteers.impelled by
patriotism, began to slacken they
shop for the purchase pened a huge
of hirelings, and when the
mercenary market was also exhausted they resorted
which Walt only a clumsy attempt to
make money by
to the draught,
as it put the screw on the
citizen, and called for h;
to t moneV or, his life,"
s the ?ewe -
he recruit
allowing' r to any them-
selves off, of which they were by no means loth to
avail thcmsclves.
as it was contrived yielded from
The draught
9,000,000 dots. to 10,000,000 dols.; but not only
was it an egregious failure in itself, go far as the
's making of men" was concerned, but it convinced
the most st.lh barn in the Government of the utter