Year: 1864

paign.


The London papers bear their usual por-
ton of variously prejudiced criticism in
relation to the late great battles. All con-
tess that Grants campaign furnishes the
severest chapter of modern war; yet none,
however willing to deny it, pretend to deny
that great advantage rests with the national
generals, while all the friends of America
seem confident of the success of Grant. The
London Times, of the 25th ult contains the
best measured Anglo-rebel view of the sit
uation, but really appears to be as ignorant
and puzzled as the rebels themselves. We
extract the following: ...
| The details of the great battles in Amer
lea are calculated rather TO enhance than
diminish the sensation with which the tele-
grams were received. There has been no
exaggeration, no overstrained description
of the conflicts or the carnage. If, indeed,
| it be recollected that even the long reports
Of furious fighting, which we yesterday
| published, still leave two days of sanguin-
ary action unaccounted for, it must be al
lowed that war has never come before us in
shape so appalling. Perhaps the Ameri-
cans may be proud of the pre-eminence,
but they have certainly fought more despe-
rately, for a longer time, and with more
dreadful slaughter than any nation before
them. 1t would not be impossible to match
the results of any one days battle with sto-
ries from the wars of the Old World; but
never, we should think, in the history of
man, were five such battles as these
compressed into six successive days. 1t is
hard to conceive how nature could have
supported the exhaustion of the strain. We
have been told that after a single days hard
fighting the lassitude and reaction in even
a victorious army are such that any fresh
force might snatch the laurels from it;
whereas here are two armies hotly engaged
in the work of slaughter from the morning
of Thursday till the night of Tuesday, with
scarcely an intermission for an hour. On
every day except Saturday there was a
pitched battle, contested with the utmost
fury; and even Saturday was devoted to
marching and fighting on the march. Nor
were these prodigious operations divided
among immense numbers brought into ac-
tion by relays. Neither army numbered
apparently over one hundred thousand men,
and of these every man seemed to have
been engaged in every battle. Indeed, we
are expressly told that the Federal ''re-
serves" were brought up on the very first
day. The desperate ferocity of the fighting
may be inferred from the fact now reported
that the slaughter was produced without
the aid of artillery. No ritled guns or muir
derous shells did execution among crowded
masses. The great battle of Friday, which
is said to have cost the Federals alone up
ward OF ten thousand men, was hand-to-
hand fight. The Confederates were posted
in the well-known woods in the vicinity of
Charlottesville, where Hooker once re-
ceived so bloody rcpulse, and so dense
was the thicket that cannon could not come
into play. Regiment against regiment, and
man against man, the combatants fired and
hacked at each other in this tangled will
derness till night closed in; and an inter-
cepted report from Gen. Lee actually tells
us that on his side the heaviest loss was in
men killed outright and that he had COM
paratively few wounded. If this be cor
rect version of the dispatch, it gives more
impressive idea of the fury of the conflict
than any other of the incidents reported. IL
is clear indeed, that whatever may be said
of the composition of the Northern armies,
and of their inferiority in this respect to the
patriot legions of the South, they have
fought in this campaign with a valor as OBJ
stinate as that of their enemies. No mere
Indifferent or disaffected mercenaries could
have been led from battle at Wilderness
to three more such battles at Spottsylvania
Be the impulse what it may, the Federals
are fighting in stern reality, and with
spirit as resolute as that of ftheiradversaries.
Grant has stamped q
new character on Jllc bdCJlCS Vi Ulle reueTdlS.
No other general would either have ad-
vanced upon the Wilderness after the Sc
we're battle of the 9th, or followed up an al
most victorious though retiring enemy af-
ter the still harder fighting on the 6th.-
None but he, again, would have attacked
his adversary so resolutely on the Sth and
on the 9th, or held his ground so tenacious
ly in spite of failure. Under his command
the Army of the Potomac has achieved in
invading Virginia an amount of success
never achieved before, except in repelling
invasion. The Confederate forces were once
arrested by Mcclellan, and once by Meade,
but that was when they thought to carry
war into Northern territory. Grant alone
has done more than this. He has advanced
toward Richmond, and though he has made
but little way, and has lost half his army,
he has not been driven back. Whether his
position can be retained, or his success i'm
proved, is question which the next mail
will resolve for us.