by John Jakes
After unsuccessfully trying to doze while sitting upright on the train all night, George was exhausted when he reached Braintree. Old Sylvanus Thayer allowed him three hours in a comfortable bed, then woke him and served a breakfast more like a banquet. Usually a Spartan eater, George put away six fried eggs, four slices of ham, and six biscuits at five o’clock of a hot summer afternoon. While he ate, Thayer talked.
“Scapegoats, George. Men need them most—they are driven to find them—when matters are out of control and somehow cannot be set right. The human animal is willful and frequently stupid. Blame is often placed where it doesn’t belong simply because any explanation of chaos, however ludicrous, is better than none, and people would go mad without one. I do not claim that is always the case. In the war, the army was the focus of blame, and rightly so.” For Thayer, there was always and only one war: the last fought against Britain. “Now, however, I believe the tide’s flowing the other way. I take your brother’s warning seriously.”
He tapped a copy of Harper’s pulled from under recent issues of the New York Tribune. “This noxious rag—and Greeley’s paper—are both demanding the Academy close forever. Great men have come from our school, but that’s of no consequence. The army is failing again, and someone or something must be put up on the cross.”
George finished his coffee and lit a cigar. “I get so damn sick of them saying we trained the enemy.”
“I know, I know.” Thayer’s hands, white as the fine linen cloth covering the table, clenched. Dark blue veins rose up on the backs of them. “We have also trained many accomplished officers who have remained loyal. Alas, for all his effort and sincerity, the President can’t seem to utilize them properly. Perhaps he interferes too much, as they say Davis does. That is an observation, not an excuse for inaction. We cannot avoid the inescapable, George. West Point is at war.”
He plucked the cigar from his mouth. “What’s that, sir?”
“At war. Those of us who love the place must campaign as if the enemy has formidable leadership—which it does—” He whacked Greeley’s newspaper. “We must fight with intelligence, zeal, our whole soul—and never admit to even the remotest possibility of defeat. We shall not cower. We shall not wait passively to have our position overwhelmed. We shall mount an offensive.”
“I’d agree with that strategy, Colonel. But what are the tactics?”
The old man’s eyes sparkled. “We do not hide our light under a bushel. We promote our past—our performance on behalf of the republic in Mexico and on the frontier. We trumpet our case and our cause. We whisper into influential ears. We twist reluctant arms. We knock resistant heads. We attack, George—”
Thump went the fist on the table.
“Attack. Attack. Attack!”
They talked on into the night. Graduates and friends of West Point had to be recruited to speak or write in defense of it. George would send letters to six members of the Board of Visitors, and Thayer would do the same with the other ten. On the spot, George decided to visit the Academy on his way home. He didn’t put his head down till half-past three, but Thayer was up an hour ahead of him, at six-thirty, and saw him to the station. Even on the noisy platform, Thayer’s mind kept working.
“What influential allies have we in the Congress. Any at all?”
“The chief one I can think of is Wade’s fellow senator from Ohio—Cump Sherman’s brother, John. He and Wade don’t particularly like each other.”
“Cultivate Senator Sherman,” Thayer urged as he pumped George’s hand. George felt as though he had received marching orders. Thayer was still bobbing along beside the car calling suggestions as the train pulled out.
After a brief stop at Cold Spring and some mutual complaining with Benét, George crossed the Hudson to the Plain and began campaigning there. Professor Mahan promised to step up his writing about the institution. Captain Edward Boynton, a classmate of George’s and Orry’s who had returned as adjutant, said he would rush completion of the manuscript of his history of West Point, incorporating rebuttals of its critics into the final text. Washington-bound again on a crowded, sooty train, George felt a little better; the offensive was under way.
He hoped it hadn’t been launched too late. The appropriation would come up in Congress early next year. They had less than six months to conduct and win their small war while the larger one rumbled along a murky road whose end no one could see.
Returning to duty, George found criticism of the army more ferocious than ever. Old Brains Halleck had been summoned from the West to be supreme commander. McClellan still had the Army of the Potomac, largely a Washington defense force now, and John Pope had been given the Army of Northern Virginia as a consequence of his success at Island No. 10. Pope quickly alienated most of his men by observing that soldiers in the western theater were tougher and fought harder. He then remarked that he was a commander who could be counted on to take the field; he would keep his headquarters in the saddle. Wags turned headquarters into hindquarters.
Lincoln’s Negro policies were causing fights in saloons and army camps. The only part of the Confiscation Act anyone seemed to like was that encouraging emigration of freedmen to some unspecified country in the tropics. “There’s all this talk of emancipation, and we’re not ready for it,” George said to his wife. “No one believes in it.”
“They should.”
“Yes, of course. But you know the realities, Constance. Most Northerners don’t give a damn for the Negro, and they certainly don’t think he has the same rights as a white man. This war is still being fought for one reason only—love of the Union and the grand old flag. I’m not saying it’s right. I’m saying it’s a fact. If emancipation comes, I fear the consequences.”
Late August brought a second major battle near Bull Run and a second outcome like the first. Beaten Union armies withdrew to Washington, where fear of a direct attack spread like fire on a prairie. Critics of the war stepped up their attack, saying the whole thing was misbegotten and negotiated peace should be sought at once.
The secretary called Stanley to his office on a stormy day in early September. Stanton had relinquished direct control of the armies to Halleck, but he was quietly gathering the lines of control of other areas into his hands. Once scornful of Lincoln, he had now ingratiated himself with the President and become a trusted adviser and professed friend. Not yet fifty, Edwin McMasters Stanton—small round spectacles, perfumed beard, and Buddha face—was said to be the second most powerful man in the country.
He had emphatic views about the mounting dissent:
“We must stamp it out. We must curb these peace Democrats and their milksop cronies and make it evident that if they continue to attack the government and its actions, they face arrest, prison, even charges of treason. The war must be prosecuted to its conclusion.”
Rain spattered the office windows; the noonday was dark as twilight. Thinking of the busy production lines at Lashbrook’s, Stanley gave a fervent nod. “I definitely agree, sir.”
“Secretary Seward formerly had responsibility for matters of government integrity and security—” Seward’s prosecution of those duties was legendary. It was said he had kept a little hand bell on his desk and boasted that if he rang it, any man anywhere could be put behind bars indefinitely. “But I am in charge now.” Stanley wondered why the secretary was stating the obvious. Stanton laced his plump hands together on the desk. “I need a deputy whom I can trust. One who will be zealous in seeing that my policies as well as my specific orders are executed with dispatch and without question.”
Stanley gripped the arm of the visitor’s chair to steady himself. Rain hit the office window. The vista of power Stanton spread before him in a sentence or two was awesome.
“We must organize the security function more completely and begin to take vigorous action against enemies in our own camp.”
“No doubt of that, sir. None. But I wonder how easily the goal can be accomplished. Just the habeas corpus matter has cr
eated a storm of debate and outcries about violations of Constitutional rights.”
Up jerked the ends of Stanton’s mouth, a sneer. Stanley’s knees shook. Hoping to demonstrate his grasp of the situation, he had instead enraged the secretary.
“Was the country made for the Constitution, Stanley? I think not. The reverse, rather. Still, I know the warped view of our enemies. If the country sinks to oblivion, they will no doubt take extreme comfort in knowing the Constitution is still safe.”
Quickly, Stanley leaned toward the desk. “People like that are not only misguided, they’re dangerous. That is all I meant to say, sir.”
Stanton leaned back, stroking his beard. Today it was perfumed with lilac. “Good. For a minute I thought I might have misjudged you. You’ve served me loyally, and absolute loyalty is one qualification for the job I am proposing. I need a man who can be discreet but firm about silencing our critics—and keep any onus from falling on this office.”
A plump hand rose to indicate a large inked diagram hanging on one wall. The diagram consisted of many connected circles and boxes, each with its neat legend inside or below. “For example, the official descriptive charts illustrate the structure of this department. Should we find it wise to establish a special unit to suppress treasonous activity, it must never appear on the chart.”
“I can make sure of that, sir. I can do everything you ask, and I will.”
“Excellent,” Stanton murmured. Then, slyly, he peeked at Stanley over his round spectacles. “I should think that if you go about your new duties efficiently, you will still have ample time to sell footwear to the army.”
Stanley sat still, not daring to reply.
The secretary murmured on for another fifteen minutes, and toward the end gave Stanley a folder containing his confidential plan for strengthening the police arm of the War Department. At Stanton’s suggestion, Stanley took a few moments to leaf through the half-dozen pages of the document, paying special attention to the philosophic preamble.
“This opening statement is exactly right, sir. We need to tighten up. It will be even more important if the President goes through with his plan to free the nig—the black people in the rebelling states.”
“He’s adamant about doing so. As I see it, in his mind the step has undergone a change from a punitive measure to a moral imperative. Just yesterday he told the cabinet that although he has doubts about a great many things, from generals to weapons, he has none in regard to the Tightness of emancipation. However, Seward and I and some others have convinced him to withhold the proclamation until the time is more propitious.” He seemed to hunch, his face and form darkening along with the clouds outside. From the dark mound came the intense voice. “The policy change the President proposes is so unusual, not to say radical, we dare not make it public when the war’s going against us. For the proclamation to meet even minimum acceptance, it must be announced at a peak of public confidence and euphoria. We must have a victory.”
Stanley closed his hand on the folder—his key to expanded authority and power. The secretary had made it clear. He didn’t want a brilliant thinker but an obedient soldier. Stanley had learned that kind of soldiering under one of the best, now in exile.
“Most definitely, sir,” he said with an excess of sincerity, even though he loathed the thought of all those strange, hostile, dark-skinned people being set free to roam the North at will. “A victory.”
After scouting around Frederick, Maryland, Charles and Ab turned back toward White’s Ford on the Potomac. It was the fourth of September, autumn coming on.
The scouts, both dressed as farmers, proceeded at a slow trot along a rutty road between steep, heavily treed hillsides. The leaves had not begun to change color, but Charles was already afflicted with the melancholy of the coming season. Despite his aversion to writing letters, he had sent three to Barclay’s Farm in recent months and received no replies. He hoped that was just another example of the wretchedness of the army mails, not a sign Gus had forgotten him.
Light through overhanging branches flashed and flickered over the bearded men. Charles had his wool coat open, his revolver within reach. They had found good forage at a stable near Frederick last night. Sport acted livelier today. So did Ab’s horse, Cyclone. Of late the army had provided only green corn.
Before hunting up the stable yesterday, they had ventured into Frederick itself—a nervous two hours for Charles because his accent demanded that he remain mute and let Ab do the talking. He poked about the town by himself for a while, speaking to no one and arousing no suspicion. Ab visited a saloon and came back with a disconcerting report.
“Charlie, they ain’t a damn bit interested in bein’ liberated. You think Bob Lee got the wrong information? I was told we could expect a big uprisin’ of locals to help us out when we invaded this here state.”
“I was told the same thing.”
“Well, most of them boys in that grogshop acted like they didn’t care whether I was from hell or Huntsville. I got a few stares, one offer to sit in a card game, a glass of whiskey I bought myself, and a good look at a lot of backs. The people hereabouts aren’t gonna feed us or fart on us, either one.”
Charles frowned. Had the army miscalculated again? If so, it was too late; the advance was under way. Mr. Davis and the generals did appear to be at odds on the status of Maryland. The President insisted the state belonged to the South, and they would come as liberators—a judgment Ab’s report contradicted. Camp talk said they were marching to strike a blow on enemy soil for a change: invading Yankee territory to strip it of cattle and produce and, not incidentally, give the farmers of Virginia a chance to harvest their crops without fear of bluebellies pouring over their rail fences and trampling their fields.
Whatever the answer, they had finished their mission. After leaving Frederick and stopping at the stable, they had slept in a secluded grove, halter tie-ropes fastened to their wrists and shotguns laid across their bellies.
Now Ab said, “Ask you somethin’, Charlie?”
“Go ahead.”
“You got a girl? Been curious about it because you never say.”
He thought of Private Gervais and Miss Sally Mills. “This is the wrong time and place for a man to have a girl.”
The other scout laughed. “That’s sure-God true, but it don’t answer my question. You got one?”
Charles tugged his dirty felt hat down over his forehead, watching the road. “No.”
It was an honest answer. He didn’t have a girl except in his imagination. If you had a girl, she wrote to you. Gus had kissed him, but how much did that mean? A lot of females gave away their kisses as if they were no more special than pieces of homemade pie.
The terrain changed rapidly. The hills were higher, steeper. There were no cottages or shanties in the few clearings and level places because there was no way to subsist on the land. Charles suspected they were close to the river and soon heard distant sounds to confirm it—the noise of the army of fifty-five thousand men leaving Virginia by way of the ford.
He saw insects in a shaft of sun and then Gus Barclay’s face. Oughtn’t to be muddling your head that way. He blinked; the insects returned. The noise grew louder. When Little Mac got word of the invasion, the Yanks would come out from Washington and fight. Scouting for the cavalry on the peninsula, Charles had done his share of fighting and had had two close scrapes, but he would never grow accustomed to it or regard it lightly.
They reached the river in time to watch the coming of the cavalry—five thousand horse, Ab claimed, including new brigades that contained old comrades. His old friend Beauty Stuart, the golden-spurred, plume-hatted, was major general of the division—and not yet thirty. Hampton was his senior brigadier, Fitz Lee his junior. Charles’s old friend had risen rapidly; from lieutenant to general in fifteen months.
Stuart’s innovative flying artillery batteries went rolling and crashing through the water. Then Ab let out a shout, spying Hampton’s men on the Virginia si
de. The brigade included the newly formed Second South Carolina Cavalry, put together around the nucleus of the four original troops of the legion.
Calbraith Butler was colonel of the regiment. He saw the two scouts hunched on their horses in the shallows and greeted them with a wave of his silver-chased whip. With Butler rode his second-in-command, Hampton’s younger brother Frank.
Charles felt like the schoolroom dunce. He was still a captain, and this was one of the occasions when it hurt. On the other hand, he couldn’t deny that he had come to prefer the dangerous but more independent life of a scout.
He reminded Ab that they should find Stuart’s headquarters and report. Suddenly spurring into the Potomac from the Virginia shore, came Hampton. He spied the scouts and rode toward them, scattering sunlit water. He took their salutes with a warm smile and shook each man’s hand.
Hampton’s color was good. He was a massive, martial figure on his prancing horse, even if his uniform did look shabby, like everyone else’s. Charles noticed three stars on his collar—the same insignia Stuart wore. You couldn’t tell one kind of Confederate general from another.
“I hear you like what you’re doing, Captain Main.”
“I’m better at it than I was at leading a troop, General. I like it very much.”
“Happy to hear it.”
“You look fit, sir. I’m pleased you’ve made such a fine recovery.” Commanding infantry at Seven Pines, Hampton had been on horseback when an enemy ball struck his foot. Fearing he would be unable to remount if he climbed down for treatment, he remained in the saddle while a surgeon yanked off his boot, probed and cut until the lump of lead was found and removed. With the wound bandaged, the boot shoved back on, and the bullet hole plugged, he stayed with his men until dark ended the fight and he could be lifted down. His boot was full of blood, which ran out over the top.
