San Marcos free press. [volume] (San Marcos, Tex.) 1877-1892, 1878-11-23
NlcC cCiellsu's 'rarAlness tn tho

A LErTER OF PRECEDENT LINCOLN
TO M'CLELLAN NOT HEREr0F0Rk
W.u PUBLIsHHD. SEM ltD
Al, WAsHINGroN, April 8, 1852.
Major General Mcclellan:
DEAR SIR-Your dispatches COM
planning that you are not properly
sustained, while they do not offend ne,
do pain me very much. Blsnoksr's
Division wss Withdrawn from you bs.
fore you left here, and you know The
pressure under which did it, and, a.
I thought, aoquiesced in it-certainly
not without reluctance After you
left uscertaiued that less than 2O,-
900 unorganized men, without single
field battery. were al you designed TO
be left for the defence of Manassas
Junction, and part Of this. even, was
to 60 to General Hookers old Division.
General Banks corps, once designed
for Manassas Junction, was divided
and tied up on tho liue Of the Win
chester AMI Strasburs, and could not
leave it without again exposing the
Upper Potomac and the Baltimore
and Ohio Railroad. This presented,
or would present, when McDougall
and Sumner should be gone, "a great
temptation to the enemy" to turn
back from the Rsppshannock, and
sack Washington. My explicit order
that Washington should. by the judg'
ment of all tho commanders of the
army corps. be left entirely secure had
been neglected. 1t was precisely this
that drove me to detain Mcdowell.
do not forget that was satisfied
with your arrangement to leave Banks
Manassas junction. but whens that
arrangement was broken up, and moth.
ing was substituted for it, Of course l
was not satisfied. / was constrained
to substitute something for it myself,
Now, allow me to ask, do you really
think l should permit the line from
Richmond via Manassas Junction to
this city to DO entirely open, exec pt
what resista nee could be presented by
less than 10000 unorganized troops?
d
This is u question which the country
will not allow me to evade. ' ''''i
There is q curious mystery about
the number of troops now with you.
When ! telegrsphed you on the 9th
saying you had over 100000 with you,
I had just obtained from the Secretary
of War statement taken, as he said,
from your own returns, making lOS,'
600 then with you and en- route to you.
You now say you will have but S5,'
600 when all en- route to you shall
have reached you. How can this dis
crepancy Of $1,000 be accounted for?
As to General Wool's command, l un-
derstand it is doing for you precisely
what like number Of your own would
have to d. if that command was away.
Isuppose the whole force which has
gone forward for you is with you by
this time, and if so. / think it is the
precise time for you to strike blow.
BY delay the enemy will relatively
gain upon you-that is, he will gain
faster by Notifications and reinforce
ments than you can by reinforcements
alone. And once mere let me tell you,
it is indispensa BILE to you that you
strike blow. am powerless to help
this. You will do me the Justice to
remember always insisted that going
down the bay in search Of field, in-
stead ol fighting at or near Manassas,
was only shifting and not surmount-
ing difficulty, that you would find the
some enemy, and the same or equal
intrenchmentS at either place. Inc
country will not fail to note-is now
nothing-that the present hesitation
to move upon an intreuched enemy is
but the story of Manassas repeated
beg to assure you that l have
never written you, or spoken to you in
greater kindness Of feeling than now,
nor with fuller purpose to sustain
you 90 far as 10 my most anxious judg-
ment / consistently can, but you must
act. Yours very truly.
A. LINCOLN.
Bill Longley was outdone by the