 That summer Garfield suffered from jaundice and significant weight loss. He was forced to return home, where his wife nursed him back to health. While he was home, Garfield's friends worked to gain him the Republican nomination for Congress, although he refused to politick with the delegates. He returned to military duty that autumn and went to Washington to await his next assignment. During this period of idleness, a rumor of an extra-marital affair caused friction in the Garfield marriage until Lucretia eventually chose to overlook it. Garfield repeatedly received tentative assignments that were quickly withdrawn, to his frustration. In the meantime, he served on the court-martial of Fitz John Porter, a sensational trial in which Porter was tried for his tardiness at the Second Battle of Bull Run. He was convinced of Porter's guilt, and voted with his fellow generals to convict. The trial lasted almost two months, from November 1862 to January 1863, and by the end of it, Garfield had at last procured an assignment as Chief of Staff to Major General William S. Rosecrans.
