Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1863-07-02
CONCENTRATION OF FORCES.


not the instant necessity, Of Withdrawing the de-
tachments of our forces which are scattered at diff
ferent points in the South--on the Virginia Pc
ninsula under Gen. Keyes, at Suffolk under Gen.
Peck, in North Carolina under Gen. Foster and
in South Carolina under Gen. Gilmore. From
these detachments our contemporary thinks the
Government might combine an aggregate force OF
at least fifty thousand men, not, as itsays, militia
men, who, with all their discipline and knowledge
of the manual of arms, have yet never seen bat
tie field, nor raw recruits or volunteers who take
musket in their hands for the first time on the day
of their enlistment, nor yet colored troops, as we
are fend of calling the negro soldiers, who will
enter the field under strong and almost invete-
rate prejudice against them on the part of many
white officers and men, but staunch, stalwart,
sturdy, veteran troops who have seen service
for one or two years, who accustomed to
the life of the camp, Injured to toll privation, and
labor hardened to the incemencies of the seasons,
practised in the arts of war; and eager to meet an
enemy whom they have frequ emily met before, and
always with honor to their gallantry and prowess
The Post processes its inability to divine what
theory of these troops got where they are,
and, with re gard to the theory which has common
ly been alleped in explanation of these descents
the Southern coast, namely that they were design
ed from different positions to threaten Richmond
to cut off the railroad lines southwark from that
place and to assist in an attack upon Charleston
it suggests that if such plan ever had any war
rant in fact its feasibility has now been dsproved
by experience. We have learned, it thinks, or
ought to have learned, by two years trial, that
small forcef on the Peninsula and at Norfolk do
not menaco Richmond, that small forces in North
Carolina do not cut off Southern railroads, and that
small forces at Hilton Head do not assist in the
capture of Charleston or Savannah.
We suppose that these descents on the Southern
coast, when they were originally planned and exc
cuted, had sufficient justification in theory to
which the Post does not advert. When the COM
bined military and naval expeditions were project
ed the insurgent authorities proposed to themselves
the task of defending the entire seacoast as well as
the inland borders of the territory embraced in the
Seeded States In the effort to protect that coast
at all points, and in their ignorance where such
expeditions as that of Gen. Sherman associat-
ed with Admiral Dupont, and that of Gen. Burn
side associated with Admiral Goldsborough, would
make their attack, the military energies of the in
surgents were to a very considerable degree dis
tracted and paralyzed Movements which they
might have otherwise made in force during the
autumn Of 1861 and during the winter of 1867
were doubtless prevented by the impending menace
of the formidable expeditions then planned by the
General-in- Chief of our armies.
But when the success of the expeditions sent
out under the command of Generals Sherman and
Burnside, in effecting landing on the Southern
coast, had taught the insurgent military author-
ties that the attempt to protect their entire
board from such occupation was futile, and when
they recognised the fact by ceasing any longer to
waste their energies in what was seen to be an i'm
possible task, these expeditions lost their utility,
and with it their claim to be retained in their pre-
sent position 1t will be remembered that Gen.
Jefferson Davis, in his message to the Confederate
Congress which assembled Immediately after his
Inauguration as President, on the 22d OF Februa-
ry, 1862 (and therefore after the descent of Gen.
Sherman on the coast of South Carolina, and of
Gen. Burnside on the coast of North Carolina, }
aumltJeu Lndb VIC ihsuiSehb udu unuel
taken more than they could accomplish when they
sought to guard all points of their territory from
maritime and inland invasion. He then said, in
the opening words Of his message:
In obedience the constitutional provision requiring
the PresdeDt from time to time to give TO Congress nor
nation of the state Of the Confedeacy and
their consideration such he shall Judge
sary and expeden have to communicate that, my
at the last session of the Provisional Congress
events have demonstrated that the Government had
tempted more than it had power successfully to achieve
Hence effort protect By arms the ,ohoc terrific
ru of the Confederate States eaboard and inland hare
been exposed recently encounter serious
When Gen. Davis made this acknowledgment,
and acted on it by longer directing his attention
to such side issues" as the descents on South
Carolina and North Carolina, these descents lost
their chief value to the National Government in a
military point Of view, and our troops have subse-
auently been retained in their Judgments within
those States for which pass our comprehen-
sion on any theory that We can conceive. Too weak
to do any thing more than hold the narrow region
they occupy, they powcrloss, in their segrega-
tion to accomplish any thing of substantial mill
tary achievement, while, by their concentration,
they might be made to constitute force which
would be as potential it is now imbccic, and as