Author : Hiram Ketchum
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 78 pages
File Size : 49,5 Mb
Release : 2015-07-06
Category : History
ISBN : 1330826213
General McClellan's Peninsula Campaign (Classic Reprint) by Hiram Ketchum Pdf
Excerpt from General McClellan's Peninsula Campaign The Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Representatives on the conduct of the war have made an elaborate report, apart of which is calculated, probably intended, to impair public confidence in the military capacity of General McClellan. A report from a committee derived from so high a source as the Legislative Department of the government will, as it ought, command public attention, and influence to some extent the mind of the country. The publication of that report preceded, by some days, and even weeks, the publication of the evidence upon which it professes to be founded. The report has been published in many newspapers, and is industriously circulated in a pamphlet form. The opponents of General McClellan ought to be satisfied with the influence to his discredit which this document was diffusing, especially as he has not interposed one word to counteract that influence, and check its progress. The general has observed his characteristic silence; yet his persecutors are not content with the amount of influence already enlisted against him, but are constant and persevering in their efforts to destroy him. The New York Times, published yesterday, Friday, has a long and bitter article, in which, strangely enough, it resorts to rebel testimony taken from the Richmond Whig, to depreciate the military character of Gen. McClellan. Would the Times be willing to admit testimony in favor of his high military character from the same source? Such testimony the Times well knows is at hand, but I will not use it. Now I have read the testimony annexed to the report of the War Committee with some care, and in my opinion that testimony, in connection with well known facts of public notoriety, does not authorize the conclusions, unfavorable to Gen, McClellan, made public by the committee in their report. It is evident to my mind that there is a concerted, a party effort, aided by the government, to pervert the truth, and by such perversion to destroy General McClellan. This effort shall not succeed if my opposition, in concert with other, can defeat it. When I see a combination of the strong against the weak, an exercise of the vast power and influence of the government against an individual citizen who is innocent of any offence against that government, my sympathies in every such ease are with the weaker party, and in the present ease, whatever of power and influence I can exert, by the open use of my own name, and such reputation and character as I happen to possess in a city where I have lived for more than fifty years, shall be put forth without fear and without stint to accomplish a fair administration of justice in the case under consideration. I intend, with permission, through the columns of the Journal of Commerce, to submit, with as much brevity as is consistent with clear elucidation, a fair and impartial examination of the material points connected with the operations of General Mo Clellan, brought out by the evidence before the War Committee. There are very few persons that have that evidence at command, for it is very voluminous. The newspapers could not be expected to publish the whole of it, but in making selections they might manage to be impartial. Especially those who condemn McClellan ought to publish his testimony, but this they refuse to do. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com
