Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1872-02-25
THE CONDUCT OF THE WAR.

Gen. BeRuregard on the Siege of
Charleston and Grants Last Cam
pRign.
In a recent number of the Southern Mag
Gzine Gen. Beauregard comments upon the
siege of Charleston and Grants last Vir-
GINA campaign. In regard to the attack of
the monitors upon Fort Sumter he is evil
deLtly Of the opinion that it failed chiefly be-
cause it was undertaken in the daytime in
stead of at night:
1--WE had great doubt as to the impend-
ing result, and / was always of the unqual-
fled opinion that, if the enemy's irOnclad
feet made night attack against Fort Sum-
ter, by ceming within sufficiently close
range to see the fort, which was a large and
elevated object, and yet not be seen from
the fort, The latter would certainly be 81
fenced or destroyed in the course of few
nights without serious injury to the mont
tors, and the channel to Charleston and
the harbor would have been opened to
them after having removed the torpedoes
placed at their entrance"
The failure of Gen. Gilmore to appre-
bend the true point from which to attack
Charleston is thus commented upon:
"Being an engineer by profession amp
dent as he assumed command of the forces
operating against Charleston, that he would
turn his attention to attacking Fort Sum-
ter, as he had done Fort Pulaski Cat the en-
trance of Savannah river the year before,
instead of employing his means to the tax
ing of Charleston, which could and should
have been done at that time by the way of
Stone river and James Island. l often re-
that the latter island was the door to Char
lesion, whereas Morris Island was only the
window to it; and it was fortunate indeed
for that city and the COnfederacy that Gen.
Gilmore preferred attempting to enter
through the window instead of the door"
Gen. Beauregard is plainly Of the opinion
that the siege Of Petersburg by Grant was a
mistake. lie says:
"What Gen. Lee and myself feared most
was that Gen. Grant should continue to
rotate around Richmond on the south side
of the James and Appomattox, as he had
done on the north side of the former river.
1t is evident that, with our inferiOrity OF
numbers at the time $50, 700 against 150,000)
and paucity of resources, we could not have
checked him by placing ourselves in his
front without uncOYering Petersburg and
hiCuIlOuuy NlDCu IGQlllICu very SbIOuB gar
T son (more than we could safely spare) to
be abandoned to themselves even for a mo-
ment. For the same reason we could not
have threatened his line Of communication
with City Point or the lower James River
where he could have re-establshed his base
ct any point most suitable for hun.
BY that movement of rotation Grant would
have efTectually destroyed the Weldon and
D AWHILE Railroads, the only two lines
which continued to furnish Richmond and
the army with scanty supplies Of pTOvi-
siOns and ammunition from Wilmington
aud the nearly exhausted States of South
Carolina and Georgia. We were living
then, as it were, from hand to mouth; and
any serious interruption to these lines OF
supply wonld have compelled an immedi-
ate evacuation of Virginia by the COnfed-
crate government and army for North and
South Carolina, or for Tennessee and Ken
lucky, where new 'theater of war might
have been established. But Gen. Grant
preferred to hammer away all the year on
that line against the Notifications Of Pc
tersburg) like an infatuated bull, which,
losing sight of its tOrmentors, rushes madly
al the red flag which is Haunted in his eyes.
As Gen. BOsquet said of the gallant charge
at Balaklava, Celia est MAGNITUDE, mdjs &c
NEST pas Ia gUeTre-'That is magnificent,
but it is not according to the art of war;"