St. Cloud Democrat. [volume] (Saint Cloud, Stearns County, Minn.) 1858-1866, 1862-08-14

mountable obstacles to our unalded suc'
cess.
We demonstrated, before Manassas that
We needed the aid Of tLc slaves. The
history Vi war dues not present; IN exam
pie Of such chronic Ignorance Of the enc
my's strength and movements as pe camp.
ed stolid under tor six months, within ten
miles of the toe... When they began to
eva. uute u co:n.6eld, which only our. thick
ignorance had converted into a Sevastopol
We knew nothing Of it. They marched
away with cannon, wagons, food, baggage,
evcry,h'ny-not leaving a dollars worth
Of property behind-making faultless
retlcat. We knew nothing OF it. "A ped
ler from Ntw Eng land State, driving u
horse Of the ba,ebunes breed, was the first
man to enter the evacuated Manassas, and
as he stood up in his wagon front, grip
ping his clotLes line reins, was the first
nlau to wonder at the puerile character Of
The school-yard dirt works before which
AN army OF over 100000 men had been
kept at lay. Nav, not kept at bay 10y the
childreL's dirt. works-but by the conse-
quences Of an Ignorance, which coul4 not
possibly have been nursed and maintained
had The right hand Of brotherhood been
stretched out to the negroes in Richmond,
aud had the President or Commander-in-
Chief said {: ''Tell US what youKWsr De-
partment does; where-thc rebel forces
are; how many they are; and tell US, this
daily, and you shall forever be free" -
Welles, Butterfeld Il Go. never ran a sur
er express between Buffalo aud Albany
than the underground military express
that would have been run between Rich
noud and Washington on this initial al
lance between the white Union meo of
the North and the black Union men Of
the South. Initial Alliance! Why, we
have everywhere been helpless without
these blacks, or exposed to hap. hazard
Landed at Fort Monroe, aud 1oundered
through .he main road up to Hampton
and al owe itr-where we're we? Without
maps, without guides. The country was
a wilderness. We had not Il scrap Of a
survey as big as the hand, tina, showed
the courses Of the innumerable wood roads
that wound through it. The old Coast
Survey chart OF the soundings of the York
aud James rivers, with the single turn
pike to Yorktown, Williamsburg and
Richmond, Was the guide over which Cen
erals, compass iu hand, guessed where
this road led tom what that debouched
There this would strike the Warwick
river--and if that would give firm bottom
to artillery. Where are the enemy? No
one knew. 1t was safe to conclude that
they were behind their line Of lefenses
which stretched across the PENINSULA
Where are their dejenscs? No one knew,
save thut when we got to orktown we
would find part Of them. The rest it
was proposed to butt on to. Forward -
Oh, how must the Genius Of Rebellion
have grinncd, from her outlook, at this
urguidcd wandering it. an un.napped will
derness Of an army OF invasion Maps
Useless works Of the engineering art, when
negroes, live maps, that could see, and
walk, and talk, aud point with the index
inger-crowds Of them-sttod expcctan,
within reach Of our army, and hungered
and thirsted to be employed to conduct
us to the enemy by the dricst an! best
pa:hs-maps capable of lsading US, with
unerring certainty, through the woods to
the lowest and weakest parts of the line of
entrcnchments the rebels had thrown up
between the York and the James rivers
aged maps, sold from plantation to plan
tation, through the Peninsula, and famil-
iar from ancient coon-;'uuting, and still
persistant night wandering, with every
road and swamp in it, who, turning their
backs upon those accursed cords Of shov-
els and pickaxes docked at Fortress Mon
roe, and walking away from them with
salvation speed, would have led our army
right up to the places of weakness, and
hating us in the wood, said to the COM
mander, ''Dis am de place, massa, where
de army Of dc Lord and of. Freedom can
bust fru. just as fru a garden fence Glib
EN- de bayonet, and leave de rest wild de
Lord l knew IO8 QUO men in April
last, who, under such guidance and such
God d-speed would have stormed the gates
of hell
How sclf-evident it is that this alliance
with the slaves would have saved the prec-
ious, timc-wastiny preparations to besiege
Yorktown--have avoided the lazar-house
cnrse ofexistance and toll on the Warwick
River, and avertcd that slaughter Of the
innocents of the Vermont Regiments at
Lees Mills, whom Ayers steel-gauntIet,ed
hands, stretched over, and dripping with
flames and. shooting shot and shell, could
scarcely pluck from the bloody ruin upon
Which i,nbecility had flung them You,
whose Grape dnd tears date from the sac
ri6cial day of Williamsburg, will it CON-
fort you to know that our attack there in
front was unncccssary--that roads circled
the enemies position--that slaves could