The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1882-11-22
Why the Confederate Soldier
Failed.


(From McCarthy's Soldier Life in the Army
of Northern Virginia.O
The Confederate soldier opposed i'm
mense odds. In the "seven days bat
ties around Richmond, $4,000 drove to
the James River $4,000 of the enemy.
At fredericksburg, in 1862, $4,000 of
them routed 10000 Federal troops At
Charlottesville, in 1868, $1,000 under
Lee and jackson whipped, and but for
the death of Jackson would have an
initiated, an army of 10000 men,
more than double their own number.
At Gettysburg, $4,000 of them assailed
the heights manned by 10000. At the
Wilderness, in 1864, 63 900 met and sue
cessfully resisted AL 900 of the enemy.
At Appomattox, in 1865, 5000 of them
surrendered to the host commanded by
Grant. The United States government,
at the end of the war, mustered out Of
service l 100000 of men, and had in the
field, from first to last, 100000 If the
Confederate soldier had then had only
this disparity of numbers to contend with,
he would have driven every invader
from the soil of Virginia.
But the Confederate soldier fought, in
addition to these odds, the facilities for
the transportation and concentration of
troops and supplies afforded by the net
work of railways in the country north of
him, all of which were subject to the con-
troll of the government, and backed by a
treasury which was turning out money
by the ton, one dollar which was equal
to sixty Confederate dollars.
chOul1 ha -,
while the South was restricted to its own
territory for supplies, and its own people
for men, the North drew on the world
for material, and on every nation of the
earth for men
The arms and ammunition of the Fed
eral soldiers were abundant and good,
so abundant and so good that they sup
piled both armies, and were greatly pre-
ferred by Confederate officers The
equipment of the Federal armies was
well-nigh perfect. The facilities for
manufacture were simply unlimited, and
the nation thought no expenditure of
treasure too great if only the country,
the Union could be saved. The fac
tory and the foundry chimneys made
a pillar Of smoke by day and of fire by
night. The latest improvements were
hurried to the front, and adopted by
both armies almost simultaneously for
hardly had the Federal bought, when
the Confederate captured, and used, the
ve1y latest.
Commissary stores were piled up all
over Virginia. for the use of the invading
armies. They had more than they could
protect, and their loss was gain to the
hungry defenders of the soil.
The Confederate soldier fought host
of ills occasioned by the deprivation of
chloroform and. morphia, which were ex-
cluded from the Confederacy, by the
blockade, as contraband of war. The
man who has submitted to amputation
without chloroform, or tossed on a couch
of agony for night and day without
sleep for the want of dose of morphia,
may possibly be able to estimate the ad-
vantages which resulted from the pos
session by the Federal surgeons of an un-
limited supply of these.
The Confederate soldier fought boun-
ties and regular monthly pay the "Stars
and Stripes, the Star Spangled Ban
ner, Hail Columbia, Tramp, Tramp,
Tramp, John Browns Body" "Raliy
round the Flag, and all the fury and
fanaticism which skilled minds could
create, opposing this grand array with
the modest and homely refrain of
" Dixie" supported by mild solution of
" Maryland, My Maryland. He fought
good wagons, fat horses, and tons of
quartermaster' stores pontoon trains, of
splendid material and construction, by
the mile; gunboats, wooden and iron,
and men-ot-war; illustrated papers, to
cheer the Boys in Blue" with sketches
Of the glorious deeds they did not do
Bibles by the car load, and tracts by the
llon,-the first to prepare them for
death, and the second to urge upon them
the duty Of dying.
The Confederate soldier fought the
Sanitary Commission, whose members
armed with every facility and conve-
nience, quickly carried the sick and
wounded of the Federal army to COM
Portable quarters, removed the bloody
laid the sufferer on clean
and dry couch clothed him in clean
things, and fed him on the best the
world could afford and money buy.
He fought the well-built thoroughly |
equipped ambulances, the countless |
surgeons, nurses, and hospital stewards. |
and the best surgical appliances known
TO the medical world. He fought the |
If tho TTpited Ctotor IL III /