Charles Francis Adams, Jr., to Henry Adams
H.Q. Cav’y Escort, A. of P.
July 22d, 1864
Today is my family letter day. I have only to report all quiet before Petersburg and this week, in comprehensive return for all your favors, I report that much to you. My last, I believe, was written from City Point. I came up from thence on Saturday evening last . . .
Meanwhile things here are curiously dull; there is nothing that I know of going on. Since I came up from the Point I have moved round more than formerly. Monday I went over to see Barlow and had a talk with him. He does n’t seem to lose any health in the field. Just as I was leaving his quarters I ran across General Meade and accompanied him back to Head Quarters where he summoned me to dine with him; which indeed I did, but I did n’t pick up any crumbs of learning to speak of at his table. The General’s mess consists of himself, General Humphreys and Theodore Lyman, and Meade, I noticed had not allowed anxiety or care to destroy his appetite. Wednesday I ran down to see Ned Dalton and found Henry Higginson and General Barlow there, and as Charming Clapp came up to dinner, we had quite a little Harvard re-union. George Barnard too happened in, coming down with his regiment on his way to Washington to be mustered out. The time of service being over George is going home and looks with great gusto to the exchange of “before Petersburg” for Lynn. Henry Higginson has come down to try his hand on Barlow’s staff. I have no idea that he can stand it as he is n’t at all recovered from his wounds, but it is best that he should try it on as he must resign if he can’t do duty. It is now thirteen months since he was wounded at Aldie.
After dinner I rode back with Barlow to the camp by moonlight, he indulging in his usual vein of conversation. It’s pleasant and refreshing to meet a man like Barlow among the crowds of mediocrity which make up the mass of an army. Here’s a man who goes into the army and in everything naturally recurs to first principles. The object of discipline is obedience; the end of fighting is victory, and he naturally and instinctively sweeps away all the forms, rules and traditions which, originally adopted as means to the end, here, in the hands of incompetent men, ultimately usurped the place of the ends they were calculated to secure. In every regular army this is seen: principles are lost sight of in forms. I am more disposed to regard Barlow as a military genius than any man I have yet seen. He has as yet by no means attained his growth. Should the war last and he survive, I feel very confident that he will make as great a name as any that have arisen in this war. He now contemplates going into the colored troops, raising a large corps and organizing them as an army of itself. Should he do so I shall doubtless go in with him and have a regiment of cavalry with just as much of a future before me as I show myself equal to. However I freely confess that no military promotion or success now offers much attraction to me. My present ambition is to see the war over, so that I may see my way out of the army. I am tired of the Carnival of Death. . . .
