The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1875-01-12

l. 50
kindress if any one detecting mistakes II
nv book will call my attention to them. d~s
80 j. WIN. JONES.
Richmond, January II, 1915.
LyscHBUEe, Va, January 2, 1875.
Ny Dear Sir,-The copy of your Persona
"reminiscences Of General Il. Il. Lee Wnlc[
you were kind enough to order to be sent tc
me has been received, and l have read IL WIFI
great interest and pleasure. Though you
have done me the honor to incorporate into
your first chapter my very Imperfect sketcf
Of General Lees military career, l Will say
that your book is by far tie most valuable o.
all the books in regard to bin which have vel
appeared, and by it's publication you nave
entitled yourself to the gratitude of all bis
friends and admirers. Men OF the present
day, according to their personal or political
bias, may form different estimates OF General
Lee as soldier but we who knew him, and
had an opportunity of forming an opinion
blsed upon accurate knowledge OF the re-
sources at his command, can well afford to
trust his military fame to the Judgment
of future ages, feeling we'll assured that by
it the great Confederate captain will be
placed In the very front rank oil
the most renowned military cheltains Of all
3gcs and countries. The greatest value OF
your book consists in the picture which II
gives Of General Lee as man, citizen, pa
triot, ard Christian; and I'doubt whether in
the writings of any mere man there is to be
found more thorough system Of morals,
ard one better adapted to all ages and con-
ditions Of men, than that which is contained
in the letters from him which you have now
made public. The book ought to be in the
hands of all, and it should be especially COM
lnended to the attention of the rising gene
ration. Certainly many of our public men
might read General Lees letters with great
profit if they could only learn to appreciate
the upseifshness and unfinchipg integrity of
ais character under all circumstar css and in
all positions. public or private.
Bavipg said thus much, will add thai
there are one or two inaccuracies in your
book which, though of no great Importance,
ought TO be corrected, because they are mac
curacies. For instance, on page 74you attri-
bue the paperin Black,oo0dS Magazine from
which you give extracts on pages 1916, 10
Another English soldier-ColoNel Law
Ier." The author of that paper Is Mr.. Fran
els Law'ey, who is connected with the Lon
don TELEGRAPH, and who was in Virginia for
some time during the war as the correspond
ent of that paper, and, believe, was never
a soldier. have had correspondence with
Mr. LaNiy upon the subjects treated OF IN
that paper, and some other matters, ana
therefore speak knowingly. And here Will
say that it is little singular that MIR. Law
~ has adopted the statement OF Sir Charles
james Mar ier (if the latter is accurately
uuoted) thu when Hannibal invaded Italy
the Romans, with their allies, "could bring
into the feed eight hundred thousand men
in arms The best means of judging what
peo;le could have done Is to ascertain what
they did do, and by consulting Poly bus
and Liyy you will find that when Han
nibal entered northern Italy the whole
number of men the Romans had raised
for the service OF that year, including
the Roman legions and all auxllaries,
was something under seYenty.ive thousand
men, for Sicily, Africa, Spain, and Italy
and that is DO reason for assuming that Han
nDal was outnumbered in any OF the battles
he fought except that of CanrR, when he
had fifty thousand veterans, and the Roman
army was about eighty-seven thousand
strong, and composed mainly of raw levies.
Mr.. LaWley is, therefore, wrong in saying
that General Lee did not have such ODDS
against him as Hannibal had. If we are to
bel eve thut Alexander, the other captain of
ancient history mentioned by Mr.. LaWley in
with Hannibal, had the fabulous
numbers to encounter Of which it is said
Darius's army was composed, we must bear
in mind that in all the elements OF real
strength Grants army, with its splendid
equipment and new engines of war, was i'm
meusely superior to the et1eminate multi
tude which followed Darius. Liyy says of
Alexander: "Had he marched against the
Romans be would soon have found that he
wss no longer combating against Darius,
who, encountered with gold and purple, the
vain equipage Of his grandeur, and dragging
after him multitude of women and
eunuchs, came as prey rather than as an enc.
my; and whom Alexander conquered without
shedding much blood, and without wanting
any other merit than that OF daring to despise
what was really contemplate" Compare
this army to that with which Grant crossed
the Rapidau in May, 1864, and then say
whether Mr.. Lawley is warranted In saying
that General Lee did not have against him
as great odds as Alexander any more than
be is in making similar remark in regard to
Hannibal.
The affair mentioned on page BIT as having
occurred with my division, then un-
der General Gordon, on the 10th of
May, really occurred on the 18th, when the
salient on Johnson's part of the line was
broken. On the 10th, when the enemy for
q brief space of time got possession of q
part of Rodes's line, the brigade to which
the Forty-ninth Virginia regiment belonged
did not take any part in the recapture of the
line, but was held in reserve. The emer-
gency on that occasion was not 80 pressing
as to require of General Lee any extraor-
binary exposure of himself On the 18th,
however, when Hancock broke our line in
the centre, the destruction OF our whole
army appeared imminent, and 1t was then
that General Lee really contemplated lead
ing the force that was brought up to arrest the
progress Of the enemy. Fortunately he had
men who had never failed him, and who did
not require so extraordinary an incentive as
that of being led in person by the comman-
der-in-chief to induce them to do their duty
The brigade in front of which General Lee
placed himself on that OCCASION was Pegram's
Virginia brigade, then commanded by Colo
mel John S. Hoffman, of the Thirty-first Vir-
GINA, and an opening was made in the Fifty
second Virginia by the color-company, COM
manded by Captain Bumgardner, to let Gen.
eral Lee pass to the rear. The charge made
by Pegram's Virginia and Gordon's Georgia
brigades, under the lead of Gordon, did ar
rest the progress of the enemy, so as to en-
able new line to be taken up in the centre,
but the whole of the broken line was never
recovered. Doubtless number Of cases &C.
CURED in which General Lee exposed him
self 30 much that the men called out to him
to go to the rear, for there was not a man in
his army who did not realze the fact that
his fall would have been the loss of the