My Diary North and South – William Howard Russell

Sept. 9th.—This morning, as I was making the most of my toilet after a ride, a gentleman in the uniform of a United States officer came up-stairs, and marched into my sitting-room, saying he wished to see me on business. I thought it was one of my numerous friends coming with a message from some one who was going to avenge Bull’s Run on me. So, going out as speedily as I could, I bowed to the officer, and asked his business. “I’ve come here because I’d like to trade with you about that chestnut horse of yours.” I replied that I could only state what price I had given for him, and say that I would take the same, and no less. “What may you have given for him?” I discovered that my friend had been already to the stable and ascertained the price from the groom, who considered himself bound in duty to name a few dollars beyond the actual sum I had given, for when I mentioned the price, the countenance of the man of war relaxed into a grim smile.” “Well, I reckon that help of yours is a pretty smart chap, though he does come from your side of the world.” “When the preliminaries had been arranged, the officer announced that he had come on behalf of another officer to offer me an order on his paymaster, payable at some future date, for the animal, which he desired, however, to take away upon the spot. The transaction was rather amusing, but I consented to let the horse go, much to the indignation and uneasiness of the Scotch servant, who regarded it as contrary to all the principles of morality in horse-flesh.

Lord A. V. Tempest and another British subject, who applied to Mr. Seward to-day for leave to go South, were curtly refused. The Foreign Secretary is not very well pleased with us all just now, and there has been some little uneasiness between him and Lord Lyons, in consequence of representations respecting an improper excess in the United States marine on the lakes, contrary to treaty. The real cause, perhaps, of Mr. Seward’s annoyance is to be found in the exaggerated statements of the American papers respecting British reinforcements for Canada, which, in truth, are the ordinary reliefs. These small questions in the present condition of affairs cause irritation; but if the United States were not distracted by civil war, they would be seized eagerly as pretexts to excite the popular mind against Great Britain.

The great difficulty of all, which must be settled some day, relates to San Juan; and every American I have met is persuaded Great Britain is in the wrong, and must consent to a compromise or incur the risk of war. The few English in Washington, I think, were all present at dinner at the Legation to-day.

Sept. 8th.—Rode over to Arlington House. Went round by Aqueduct Bridge, Georgetown, and out across Chain Bridge to Brigadier Smith’s head-quarters, which are established in a comfortable house belonging to a Secessionist farmer. The General belongs to the regular army, and, if one can judge from externals, is a good officer. A libation of Bourbon and water was poured out to friendship, and we rode out with Captain Poe, of the Topographical Engineers, a hard-working, eager fellow, to examine the trench which the men were engaged in throwing up to defend the position they have just occupied on some high knolls, now cleared of wood, and overlooking ravines which stretch towards Falls Church and Vienna. Everything about the camp looked like fighting: Napoleon guns planted on the road; Griffin’s battery in a field near at hand; mountain howitzers unlimbered; strong pickets and main-guards; the five thousand men all kept close to their camps, and two regiments, in spite of McClellan’s order, engaged on the trenches, which were already mounted with field-guns. General Smith, like most officers, is a Democrat and strong anti-Abolitionist, and it is not too much to suppose he would fight any rather than Virginians. As we were riding about, it got out among the men that I was present, and I was regarded with no small curiosity, staring, and some angry looks. The men do not know what to make of it when they see their officers in the company of one whom they are reading about in the papers as the most &c, &c, the world ever saw. And, indeed, I know well enough, so great is their passion and so easily are they misled, that without such safeguard the men would in all probability carry out the suggestions of one of their particular guides, who has undergone so many cuffings that he rather likes them. Am I not the cause of the disaster at Bull’s Run?

Going home, I met Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln in their new open carriage. The President was not so good-humored, nor Mrs. Lincoln so affable, in their return to my salutation as usual. My unpopularity is certainly spreading upwards and downwards at the same time, and all because I could not turn the battle of Bull’s Run into a Federal victory, because I would not pander to the vanity of the people, and, least of all, because I will not bow my knee to the degraded creatures who have made the very name of a free press odious to honourable men. Many of the most foul-mouthed and rabid of the men who revile me because I have said the Union as it was never can be restored, are as fully satisfied of the truth of that statement as I am. They have written far severer things of their army than I have ever done. They have slandered their soldiers and their officers as I have never done. They have fed the worst passions of a morbid democracy, till it can neither see nor hear; but they shall never have the satisfaction of either driving me from my post or inducing me to deviate a hair’s-breadth from the course I have resolved to pursue, as I have done before in other cases —greater and graver, as far as I was concerned, than this.

Sept. 6th.—At 3.30 p.m. General McClellan sent over an orderly to say he was going across the river, and would be glad of my company; but I was just finishing my letters for England, and had to excuse myself for the moment; and when I was ready, the Genera and staff had gone ventre à terre into Virginia. After post, paid my respects to General Scott, who is about to retire from the command on his full-pay of about £3500 per annum, which is awarded to him on account of his long services.

A new Major-General—Halleck—has been picked up in California, and is highly praised by General Scott and by Colonel Cullum, with whom I had a long talk about the generals on both sides. Halleck is a West Point officer, and has published some works on military science which are highly esteemed in the States. Before California became a State, he was secretary to the governor or officer commanding the territory, and eventually left the service and became a lawyer in the district, where he has amassed a large fortune. He is a man of great ability, very calm, practical, earnest, and cold, devoted to the Union —a soldier, and something more. Lee is considered the ablest man on the Federal side, but he is slow and timid. “Joe” Johnson is their best strategist. Beauregard is nobody and nothing—so think they at head-quarters. All of them together are not equal to Halleck, who is to be employed in the West.

I dined at the Legation, where were the Russian Minister, the Secretary of the French Legation, the representative of New Granada, and others. As I was anxious to explain to General McClellan the reason of my inability to go out with him, I called at his quarters about eleven o’clock, and found he had just returned from his ride. He received me in his shirt, in his bed-room at the top of the house, introduced me to General Burnside—a soldierly, intelligent-looking man, with a very lofty forehead, and uncommonly bright dark eyes; and we had some conversation about matters of ordinary interest for some time, till General McClellan called me into an antechamber, where an officer was writing a despatch, which he handed to the General. “I wish to ask your opinion as to the wording of this order. It is a matter of importance. I see that the men of this army, Mr. Russell, disregard the Sabbath, and neglect the worship of God; and I am resolved to put an end to such neglect, as far as I can. I have, therefore, directed the following order to be drawn up, which will be promulgated to-morrow.” The General spoke with much earnestness, and with an air which satisfied me of his sincerity. The officer in waiting read the order, in which, at the General’s request, I suggested a few alterations. The General told me he had received “sure information that Beauregard has packed up all his baggage, struck his tents, and is evidently preparing for a movement, so you may be wanted at a moment’s notice.” General Burnside returned to my rooms, in company with Mr. Lamy, and we sat up, discoursing of Bull’s Run, in which his brigade was the first engaged in front. He spoke like a man of sense and a soldier of the action, and stood up for the conduct of some regiments, though he could not palliate the final disorder. The papers circulate rumours of “Jeff. Davis’s death;” nay, accounts of his burial. The public does not believe, but buys all the same.

Sept. 5th.—Raining all day. McClellan abandoned his intention of inspecting the lines, and I remained in, writing. The anonymous letters still continue. Received one from an unmistakable Thug to-day, with the death’s-head, cross-bones, and coffin, in the most orthodox style of national-school drawing.

The event of the day was the appearance of the President in the Avenue in a suit of black, and a parcel in his hand, walking umbrella-less in the rain. Mrs. Lincoln has returned, and the worthy “Executive” will no longer be obliged to go “browsing round,” as he says, among his friends at dinner-time. He is working away at money matters with energy, but has been much disturbed in his course of studies by General Fremont’s sudden outburst in the West, which proclaims emancipation, and draws out the arrow which the President intended to discharge from his own bow.

September 4th.—I rode over to the Chain Bridge again with Captain Haworth this morning at seven o’clock, on the chance of there being a big fight, as the Americans say; but there was only some slight skirmishing going on; dropping shots now and then. Walker, excited by the reminiscences of Bull Run noises, performed most remarkable feats, one of the most frequent of which was turning right round when at full trot or canter and then kicking violently. He also galloped in a most lively way down a road which in winter is the bed of a torrent, and jumped along among the boulders and stones in an agile, cat-like manner, to the great delectation of my companion.

The morning was intensely hot, so I was by no means indisposed to get back to cover again. Nothing would persuade people there was not serious fighting somewhere or other. I went down to the Long Bridge, and was stopped by the sentry, so I produced General Scott’s pass, which I kept always as a dernier ressort, but the officer on duty here also refused it, as passes were suspended. I returned and referred the matter to Colonel Cullum, who consulted General Scott, and informed me that the pass must be considered as perfectly valid, not having been revoked by the General, who, as Lieutenant-General commanding the United States army, was senior to every other officer, and could only have his pass revoked by the President himself. Now it was quite plain that it would do me no good to have an altercation with the sentries at every post in order to have the satisfaction of reporting the matter to General Scott. I, therefore, procured a letter from Colonel Cullum stating, in writing, what he said in words, and with that and the pass went to General McClellan’s head-quarters, where I was told by his aides the General was engaged in a kind of council of war. I sent up my papers, and Major Hudson, of his staff, came down after a short time and said, that “General McClellan thought it would be much better if General Scott had given me a new special pass, but as General Scott had thought fit to take the present course on his own responsibility, General McClellan could not interfere in the matter,” whence it may be inferred there is no very pleasant feeling between head-quarters of the army of the Potomac and head-quarters of the army of the United States.

I went on to the Navy yard, where a look-out man, who can command the whole of the country to Munson’s Hill, is stationed, and I heard from Captain Dahlgren that there was no fighting whatever. There were columns of smoke visible from Capitol Hill, which the excited spectators declared were caused by artillery and musketry, but my glass resolved them into emanations from a vast extent of hanging wood and brush which the Federals were burning in order to clear their front. However, people were so positive as to hearing cannonades and volleys of musketry that we went out to the reservoir hill at Georgetown, and gazing over the debatable land of Virginia—which, by the way, is very beautiful these summer sunsets—became thoroughly satisfied of the delusion. Met Van Vliet as I was returning, who had just seen the reports at headquarters, and averred there was no fighting whatever. My landlord had a very different story. His friend, an hospital steward, “had seen ninety wounded men carried into one ward from over the river, and believed the Federals had lost 1000 killed and wounded and twenty-five guns.”

September 3rd.—Notwithstanding the extreme heat, I went out early this morning to the Chain Bridge, from which the reconnaissance hinted at last night would necessarily start. This bridge is about four and a half or five miles above Washington, and crosses the river at a picturesque spot almost deserving the name of a gorge, with high banks on both sides. It is a light aerial structure, and spans the river by broad arches, from which the view reminds one of Highland or Tyrolean scenery. The road from the city passes through a squalid settlement of European squatters, who in habitation, dress, appearance, and possibly civilisation, are quite as bad as any negroes on any Southern plantation I have visited. The camps of a division lie just beyond, and a gawky sentry from New England, with whom I had some conversation, amused me by saying that the Colonel “was a darned deal more affeerd of the Irish squatters taking off his poultry at night than he was of the Secessioners; anyways,, he puts out more sentries to guard them than he has to look after the others.”

From the Chain Bridge I went some distance towards Falls Church, until I was stopped by a picket, the officer of which refused to recognise General Scott’s pass. “I guess the General’s a dead man, sir.” “Is he not Commander-in-Chief of the United States army?” “Well, I believe that’s a fact, sir; but you had better argue that point with M^cClellan. He is our boy, and I do believe he’d like to let the London Times know how we Green Mountain boys can fight, if they don’t know already. But all passes are stopped anyhow, and I had to turn back a Congress-man this very morning, and lucky for him it was, because the Sechessers are just half a mile in front of us.” On my way back by the upper road I passed a farmer’s house, which was occupied by some Federal officers, and there, seated in the verandah, with his legs cocked over the railings, was Mr. Lincoln, in a felt hat, and a loose grey shooting coat and long vest, “letting off,” as the papers say, one of his jokes, to judge by his attitude and the laughter of the officers around him, utterly indifferent to the Confederate flag floating from Munson’s Hill.

Just before midnight a considerable movement of troops took place through the streets, and I was about starting off to ascertain the cause, when I received information that General M^cClellan was only sending off two brigades and four batteries to the Chain Bridge to strengthen his right, which was menaced by the enemy. I retired to bed, in order to be ready for any battle which might take place tomorrow, but was roused up by voices beneath my window, and going out on the verandah, could not help chuckling at the appearance of three foreign ministers and a banker, in the street below, who had come round to inquire, in some perturbation, the cause of the nocturnal movement of men and guns, and seemed little inclined to credit my assurances that nothing more serious than a reconnaissance was contemplated. The ministers were in high spirits at the prospect of an attack on Washington. Such agreeable people are the governing party of the United States at present, that there is only one representative of a foreign power here who would not like to see them flying before Southern bayonets. The banker, perhaps, would have liked a little time to set his affairs in order. “When will the sacking begin?” cried the ministers. “We must hoist our flags.” “The Confederates respect private property, I suppose?” As to flags, be it remarked that Lord Lyons has none to display, having lent his to Mr. Seward, who required it for some festive demonstration.