Daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1859-1865, 1863-08-13

. or to mitigate in any way the severe ye
most righteous disappointment of those
ardent friends of the Coufederacy who have
cherished with desperate tenacity the hu.
o name and enlightened hope OF seeing 8
o great military power based on slavery sue
Q cessfully established in the New World
Not Mt one point only, but Mt every point in
line of military operations extending over
: more than a thousand miles, the Coafede.
. rates are forced helplessly back. On the
6 Mississippi and in the West the war is vir-
tually over, the enemy's stfongholds be
> ling captured aud his armies destroyed
while in the centre and in the East the ON
Q " organized forces that still keep together
) are in full retreat.
5 The details OF these great events SO far
as they are at present known 10 NOT at all
, diminish the impression of se'ere OOnted-
j crate defeat, if not of impending ruin.
which they produce as a whcfe. General
Lee must have been far more severely de-
feated at Gettysburg thanrhis friends were
u disposed 4osailoAs or be saFely @Qiild, -
they confidently suggested have held the
strong position he took up before Hagers-
town, and tried the fortune of war once
more, before abandoning SO vast an enter
prise in dispair. From the address to his
army found at Hagerstown this appears to
have been his original intention; but the
prospect being very doubtful, and his COM
municatons being threatened, he speedily
| abandoned it, aud remained at Hagerstown
only to cover the retreat OF his army. The
federe cavalry have, however, not only
harassed his retreat, bnt cut off one of his
baggage trains aud captured brigade of
| infantry with their guns. The capture of
| Vickshurg and Port Hudson will set free
hardly fewer than one hundred and fifty
! thousand veteran troops, TO be employed
elsewhere as occasion may require. 1t ap-
pears clear that Johnston has no force that
eau stand before even division of Grants
army, and Bragg seems to be in the same
position with regard to Rosecrans. This
can only arise from one cause, but that
the most hopeless of all in a war of such
magnitude and eXtent-the want of sol
diers. The confederacJ has but too clear
ly exhausted its recruiting ground, and is
practical denuded of men. The large
armies it had raised having been gradually !
weakened at all points cannot be replaced. |
Had it been humanity possible By any means
to raise an army in the West, Yicksburg |
would assuredly have been relieved.
The mere fact that Grant was allowed |
to sit quietly for nearly two months be
fore the place without being attacked from |
without is decisive as to the military ex-
haustion of the confederacy in the West.
This want of men, it need hardly be said,
is the most fatal of all wants, and there |
seems no prospect of its being in any way
supplied All that skill aud effective or
ganization could do has been done. The
confederacy has energetic leaders aud able
generals, and they have, we may be sure,
turned the resources az their disposal to |
the utmost account. They have brought |
every available man to the front, aud kept |
up HII AIOuE5 -Iruc Il ugcaEtiVe anDear-
ance of strength to the very last moment.
We see the result. At the very crisis of
the struggle, when the great strain really
comes, their strongholds fall, their armies
are defeated, and through nearly half of
it's whole extent the invncible confederacy
falls into state of almost hopeless col
lapse The North, on the other hand, is
still in u state of unimpaired efficiency.
In Grant, Rosecrans and Meade it has |
three generals who have shown the high
est military skill, aud have not yet been
defeated. They are Mt the head of three |
victorious armies, who largely outnumber
any force that can be brought against
them, and whose strength will be kept up |
by the conscription now in active progress. |
This further "gleam of success to the |
federal arms" will help to relieve the |
American war from that see-5aw monUtOny |
of alternate success and failure of which |
our COuIeQerdLe nave
ing the past week rather incOnsiderately |
complained. The news is probably one |
sided enough to satisfy even the most |
exactiug and incredulOus partizan of the |
slave power. While the intelligence is |
indeed monotonOas, no one with Justice |
can complain that it is the see saw mo- |
notony of alternate failure aud success
In reality, however, there has never been, |
during the whole progress of the war, even |
the smallest substantial ground for such |
complaint. From the capture OF Port Royal |
| soon after the breaking cut of the war in
1861, dowR to the fall of Port Hudson,
! fortnight ago, the advance of the North, |
| its acquisition of territory at the expense
of the ConfedeTacy, has been not only uni
form and steady, but, considering the i'm
mense area of the war, surprisingly rapid.
In the autumn of 1861 the Confederates
not only occupied the border States, but
| firmly held the whole line of the Mississ
! ippi and the Western States beyond. The
! The campaigns of last year, resulting in
| the capture and permanent occupation OF
Fort Donelson, Fort Pulaski, Memphis,
| Corinth and New Orleans, forced back the
! Confederate lines two hundred miles, and
| secured TO the Federals both the mouth
and the upper part of the Mississippi. The
camT aigns of this year have already, by
securing the river through its whole length,
cut the Confederacy hopelessly in two, and
| if, as seems to be the case, Bragg cannot
make any stand, the armies of Grant and
Rosccrans will soon divide again even the
Gulf States that are left. At this moment
seven at least of the so called Confederate
States are in whole or 10 part occupied by
Federal troops. Judged by results, the
South has never gained single sdyan,
tage from the day Fort SumPter was hted
upon. Though it has had great victories
in the field it has not only never succeeded
] in holding foot of Northern soil, but has
steadily lost one liue of railway after an
other, one river after another, one strong
hold after another, one State after another,
till at length it is difficult, ii not impossl-