The Bay State Monthly, Vol. II, No. 6, March, 1885 by Various

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8th. That the Staff Officer who delivered the order assured General
Wallace and his staff that the Federal line was successful and driving
the enemy at every point.

9th. That a movement at that time, toward Pittsburg Landing, would have
taken General Wallaces' Division out of possible contact with the enemy,
instead of supporting, and perfecting victory.

10th. That when the Division of General Wallace moved, as it did, within
ten minutes after receipt of the orders, "impatiently waited for," it
could see the distant smoke and hear the roar of battle, and moved
directly toward the point of danger by the shortest route, with the
greatest celerity and in harmony with the order received.

11th. That the defeat of the main army, the enforced retirement of
Sherman's Division, and, in fact, the withdrawal of the entire original
line, were new conditions, to be considered, when other Staff Officers
notified General Wallace of the same; and then, the addition of his
division to the rallying army, at Pittsburg Landing, seemed to be an
important element to the very safety of that army, except as it could
lean upon the divisions of Buel, already within supporting distance.

12th. That the original advance of General Wallace's Division on the
Purdy Road, while thoroughly suited to the original conditions as they
existed when the order was delivered to him, was, of necessity, useless
and dangerous, when he found himself alone and unsupported, and that the
enemy had already swept over the position which he expected to occupy.

13th. That there was no alternative, then, but to pass around the left
of the enemy, and rejoin the army, at such expense of time or labor as
the new conditions imposed; and that this was done, at great pains and
with great celerity, without straggling or loss.

14th. That the prominent idea of withdrawing General Wallace's Division
from Crump's Landing, to support the main army in its advance, is to be
kept in mind;--whereby, confusion ceases as to the hour of the day when
the order to report at Pittsburg Landing was delivered or became
operative;--thereby, also, reconciling memories with the incidents of
the day, with no discredit to any.

15th. That every theory of supporting an advanced line, from reserves
sent forward from the base, must so bend to facts, that it may be the
best thing possible, to strengthen the right of a successful line, even
to overlapping and turning the enemy; and that such a movement has the
emphatic endorsement of standard critics, and marked experience; while a
formal movement to the rear, in order to move to the front and the
right, as if on parade, would, under conditions such as presented to
General Wallace, have been, simply, to wear out his men in marching,
with small chance for taking any part in the assumed pursuit of a
defeated enemy.

16th. That it is an unsound way of dealing with the facts of history, to
gauge the responsibilities of officers and men, of small experience, by
the rules which apply to the same officers and men after their
experience has matured; and that, when the battle of Shiloh took place,
and citizen regiments took part, with very slight knowledge of arms, it
was equally true, that the officers themselves, both regular and
volunteer, were proportionately unfamiliar with battle action on a large
scale, and that, as a matter of fact, the Generals and Colonels, for the
most part, had never seen a batallion drill, unless at West Point, much
less drilled more than a company; and their conduct and opinions, in
1861-2, are not to be measured by the ripened experience of the years
succeeding and succeeding years of reflection.

And finally, that the orders, movements, and results of the sixth day of
April, 1862, must be judged by their relations to the passing hours and
issues of that day, as practical men would act under changing
conditions, and not by any formal order, which, however appropriate at
one time, would, at any other time, defeat the work in hand. The Rules
of Evidence, recognized by Civil and Military Courts alike, are but
expressions of sound judgment of past experience; and Military Science,
so called, has no other basis than that which belongs to the wise use of
means to ends in all applied science and in all human endeavor.
Whenever, therefore, the conduct of a battle is consistent with the
conditions, as at the time understood, it is not exactly just to measure
it by the terms of any instructions inconsistent with those
conditions;--so that while an order to march to Pittsburg Landing became
necessary upon the retirement of the original line, it ought not to be
technically applied back to a time when that line was supposed to be
sweeping on to victory and only sought fresh strength to mature that
victory.

That a general action was precipitated by the Confederate forces under
General Albert Sidney Johnson and was in the nature of a successful
surprise of the Union Army, is the fact which harmonizes the reports of
officers of both armies with the incidents of the day, and fairly
distributes responsibility, without reflecting the narrow escape of the
Union Army from destruction upon any single officer or command;
especially, where all did so well, and so much is to be credited to the
fall of General Johnson and the interruption of his deliberate plan,
first to surprise, and then sweep on to victory, at whatever cost.

The Documents are as follows:

1st. Letter of Major General Lew Wallace to General U.S. Grant, February
26, 1869.

2nd. Letter of Lieutenant Colonel Ross, A.D.C. to General Wallace,
January 25, 1868.

3rd. Letter of General J.A. Strickland to General Wallace, January 24,
1868.

4th. Letter of General G.F. McGinnis to General Wallace, February 20,
1868.

5th. Letter of General Fred. Knefler to General Wallace, February 19,
1868.

6th. Letter of Captain Ad Ware, A.D.C., to General Wallace (without
date).

7th. Letter of General John M. Thayer to General Wallace, March 4, 1868.

8th. Letter of General U.S. Grant to General Wallace, March 10, 1868,
commenting upon the letters cited and suggesting their publication, in
justice to General Wallace.

[Illustration: The map of the Compte de Paris has been utilized. 1, 2
and 3 give location of Wallace's Brigades in line, perpendicular to the
river, with right at Adamsville (3), 2. Concentration of Division. 4.
Crossing at Snake creek to take the right of General Sherman. 4-5.
Countermarch to lower crossing after retirement of the right. 6. Lower
crossing which had for several days previously been under water.
Wallace's division, on the 7th, held the right of Sherman, as indicated
for the 6th, when he moved to take part in the general action.]

General Wallace to General Grant:

WASHINGTON CITY, Feb. 29, 1868.

GENERAL:

About a year after the battle of Pittsburg Landing, it came to
my knowledge, that I was suffering, in your opinion, from
erroneous information upon the subject of my conduct and
movements as commander of the Third Division of your army during
the first day of the battle named. To place myself right in your
estimation and in that of the army generally, I asked a Court of
Inquiry, by letter to the Secretary of War (Mr. Stanton) July
17, 1863. After several months, during which the application
received no attention from the Secretary, I withdrew it, by
advice of friends, General Sherman amongst others. The course I
then resolved upon, that counselled by General Sherman, was to
carry my explanation directly to you; and such continued my
intention until the battle of Monocacy, after which your
treatment of me became so uniformly kind and considerate that I
was led to believe the disagreement, connected with Pittsburg
Landing, forgotten; a result, to which I tacitly assented,
notwithstanding the record of that battle as you had made it, in
the form of an endorsement on my official report, was grievously
against me.

A recent circumstance, however, has made it essential to my good
name, which I cannot bring myself to believe you wish to see
destroyed, to go back to my former purpose; in pursuance of
which, the object of this letter is simply to introduce certain
statements of gentlemen lately in the army, your friends as much
as mine, in hopes that the explanations to be found therein will
be sufficent to authorize you to give me a note of acquittal
from blame, plainly enough, to allay the suspicions and charges
to which I have been so painfully subjected. The statements are
in the form of extracts pertinent to the subject from letters
now in my possession, from General Fred Knefler, General George
McGinnis, Colonel James R. Ross, General Daniel MacCaulay,
Captain Ad Ware, General John A. Strickland, General John M.
Thayer, now United States Senator from Nebraska--all, of my
command, on the day in question, present with me, well known to
you, and of unimpeachable honor. I could have obtained many
others, of like import, but selected these because their authors
had peculiar opportunities for information upon points
considered of chief importance. It is possible that my
explanations of the matter would be sufficient for the purpose
in view. However that may be, it is my judgment now, that the
charges against me have gone so far, and been put in such grave
form, that public opinion may require an exoneration, though it
come from your hand, to be based upon the testimony of others.

Permit me to say, further, that as to the order you started to
me by Captain Baxter, I do not understand there is any question
of veracity between us. You tell me, that from the battle-field
you dispatched a verbal order by the officer named, to be
delivered to me, at Crump's Landing, directing me to march my
division to Pittsburg Landing by the road, parallel with the
river; and, supposing, as you did, that the order would reach me
by 11 o'clock, A.M., you reasonably concluded my command would
be on the field by 1 o'clock, P.M.

Now in all candor, if you have been, as I am informed, of
opinion that I received that order as it was given, and at the
time stated (11 o'clock, A.M.), and that for any reason, such as
personal feeling against you, or that I lost my way, or took the
wrong road, or lingered on the march, making but five miles in
seven hours, it must be admitted that you were justifiable in
any, even the most extreme judgment against me; and I must
confess that your moderation was greater than mine would likely
have been, had our positions been reversed. I do not flinch from
that conclusion, at all; but what I do say in my defence is that
the opinion and the conclusion, which is its corollary, are both
wrong, because the order admitted to have been dispatched was
not delivered to me, in form or substance, as dispatched. On the
contrary, the order I received from your messenger was in
writing, unsigned, and contained substantially the following
instructions:

"You will leave a force at Crump's Landing, sufficient to guard
the public property there; then march the rest of your division,
and _effect a junction with the right of the army_; after which
you will form your line of battle at right angles with the
river, and act as circumstances dictate."

This order was read by Colonel Ross, under circumstances well
calculated to impress it upon his memory. It was also given to
Colonel Knefler, then my Adjutant General, and by him read and
unfortunately lost. Finally, its purport, as stated by me above,
is vouched for by Captain Ware as the aide de camp. To refuse
credit to my version of its contents will be very hard, indeed,
corroborated as it is by so many gentlemen of unquestionable
veracity, and such excellent opportunity for information on the
point.

I think myself warranted now in asserting upon the credit of
the three officers just named, as well as my own, that by the
terms of the order, as it was delivered to me, the object of my
march was not Pittsburg Landing, as you intended, but the right
of the army, resting, when the battle opened in the morning, at
a point quite three miles out from the landing, on the road to
Purdy.

As a general principle it must be admitted that when you
entrusted the order to a proper messenger for delivery to me,
your responsibility ceased; but, I turn and ask you, appealing
to your experience and justice, how am I held responsible for
the execution of an order if it never reached me; or, if it
reached me, conveying an idea radically different from that
originally given? Of necessity, I was accountable for the
execution of the order, only as it was received, and if it was
not received in a form to convey your true design, but was
promptly executed, neither of us are responsible for the result.
It was not your mistake, nor was it mine.

Having established the purport, at least, of the order as it
came to my hand, the next inquiry is: "Did I proceed to execute
it, and how?"

On these heads all the letters on file are applicable. They
show, as I think, that I took measures anticipatory to the order
you gave me, personally, in your passage up the river to the
battle-field, viz: to hold myself in readiness to march in any
direction; that my brigades were ordered to concentrate at the
place most proper and convenient for a prompt execution of the
orders, whatever they might be, because it was at the junction
of two roads, one leading to Pittsburg Landing, the other to the
right of the army. To one of these points, it may be added, I
was sure of being ultimately sent, if the exigencies of the
battle required the presence of my command. They show, that
after you parted from me, going up the river, I took measures to
forward your messenger to me instantly upon his arrival (see
Colonel Ross' letters), then rode to the place of concentration,
and waited impatiently and anxiously the expected instructions;
that they came to hand about 12 o'clock (my own remembrance is
11:30 A.M.), and that the officer who brought them, also brought
the news that you were driving the enemy all along the line.
(See letters of General Knefler and Colonel Ross.) Up to that
time, therefore, I was certainly blameless.

But let me ask you to stop here, and consider the effect on my
mind and subsequent movements, of the information, thus reliably
obtained, that the battle was won. What inducement could I have
had to march away from or linger on the road to a victory? Upon
the hypothesis that the good news was true, how could I have
imagined, (had there been so much as a doubt as to the intent of
the order received,) a necessity for my command at Pittsburg
Landing?

But, proceeding. The letters further establish, that,
immediately upon receiving the order, I put my column _en
route_, to execute it.

Now comes the questions. Did I take the right road to effect the
junction with the right of the army, or one leading to Purdy,
away from the battle? Pertinent to these inquiries, General
Knefler says, that the road chosen for the movement had been
patrolled and picketted by my cavalry. By their report, if by
nothing else, I must have been posted as to its terminus. In
corroboration of this assertion please notice that General
Macaulay, General Strickland, General Thayer and General
Knefler, all allude to the fact that the head of the column was
approaching, not going away from the firing, when the
countermarch took place. Consider, further, that the most
imperative necessities of my situation, isolated as I had been
from the main army, were, to know all the communications with
that army, and to keep them clear, and in order for rapid
movement. _Not only did I know the road, but every step my
division took from the initial point of the march up to the
moment of the change of direction, was, as is well known to
every soldier in the column, a step nearer to the firing and
therefore a step nearer to the battle_. While on this inquiry,
let me add that the report of my being set right after marching
upon the wrong road has in it this much truth, and no more. When
about a mile from the position which had been occupied by the
right of the army (General Sherman's division), Captain Rowley
overtook me and told me that you had sent him to hurry me up,
and that our lines had been carried by the enemy and the army
driven back almost to the river, a very different story from the
one brought me by Captain Baxter. Captain Rowley set me right as
to the conditions of the battle, not as to the road I was
following. Colonel McPherson and Major Rawlins, the other
members of your staff, mentioned as having been sent to me, met
me after the countermarch, when my command was on the river road
moving to Pittsburg Landing.

Concerning the countermarch, I would remark that the condition
of the battle, as reported by Captain Rowley, made it prudent,
if not necessary. My column was only five thousand men, of all
arms. Reflecting upon it now, I am still of the opinion that it
did better service the next day in your new line of battle, than
it could have done, operating alone and unsupported in the rear
of the whole rebel army, where I was certainly taking it, when
"set right" by the captain.

Instead of making the change of direction, when it was resolved
on, by a countermarch, the result proved that it should have
been effected by a general right about. The former manoeuvre was
chosen, however, because I was confident of finding a cross road
to the river road long before the head of the column doubled
upon its foot. [See Colonel Ross' statement of the effort made
to accomplish that idea.]

One of the results I confidently anticipated from a reading of
the letter submitted, is, that you will be satisfied of the
wrong done me (unintentional, I believe), by Colonel Badeau,
when, in his book, he describes me as consuming seven hours in
marching five miles in the direction of the battle. The march
actually performed in that time was not less than fifteen miles,
over an execrable dirt road.

Your opinion, as advanced in your letter to the War Office,
July, 13, 1863, that General Morgan L. Smith, had he been put in
command, could have had the division in the battle by 1 o'clock
P.M., is in direct terms, based upon the condition that General
Smith received your orders as you supposed them communicated to
me. But, suppose he had not received the order as originally
given; suppose, on the contrary, the order actually received by
him had the effect to send him in another direction from
Pittsburg Landing; and suppose that, on approaching his
objective, he had found himself in the rear of the whole rebel
army, and in his judgment compelled, by that circumstance,
together with the bad fortune of our own army, to a further
movement of quite ten miles--all of which were terrible
realities in my case--I am sure you are too just a man to have
held him accountable for the hours, however precious, thus
necessarily lost.

With these remarks I place the letters of the officers named in
your hands. They will satisfy you, I think, that the exoneration
I seek will be a simple act of justice. The many misconceptions
which have been attached to my movements on that bloody Sunday,
have, it must be confessed, made me extremely sensitive upon the
subject. You can imagine, therefore, with what anxiety your
reply will be waited.

Very respectfully your friend,

LEW WALLACE.
To GENERAL U.S. GRANT, WASHINGTON CITY.

Colonel Ross to General Wallace:

CHICAGO, January, 25, 1868.

General: Having read the extract from "Badeau's Life of General
Grant," as published in the Chicago Tribune, of the twenty-fifth
of December, 1867, wherein he refers particularly to the battle
of Shiloh, and seeing the gross injustice done you, and the
false light in which you are placed before the country and the
world, I deem it my duty to make a brief statement of what I
know to be the facts in reference to your failure to reach the
field of battle in time to take part in the action of Sunday,
April 6, 1862.

I will first state the position of your command on that morning.
The First Brigade, Colonel M.L. Smith commanding, at Crump's
Landing; Second Brigade, Colonel John M. Thayer commanding, two
and one-half miles out on the Adamsville road; Third Brigade,
Colonel Charles R. Wood commanding, at Adamsville, five miles
out from the river. The first intimation you or any of your
staff had of the battle was between five and six o'clock, A.M.,
when my attention was called by one of the men on the boat on
which were your headquarters, to the heavy and continued firing
in the direction of the camp at Pittsburg Landing. You were at
once notified of this, and being satisfied that there was a
battle going on, directed me to go at once and order this
division to get ready to move at a moment's warning, and to
instruct Colonel Wood to move his baggage and camp equipage to
the river with the least possible delay, and march his command
to the camp of the Second Brigade, midway between his (then)
camp and that of the First Brigade, at the river.

After executing your order, as above, I returned to the Landing.
Soon after, you, together with your staff, went out to the camp
of the second Brigade, when the division had been ordered to
concentrate in order to be in position to take either one of two
roads, intersecting the Adamsville road from Crump's Landing to
Pittsburg Landing; one leading to Pittsburg Landing, the other
to the Purdy road from Pittsburg Landing, intersecting it at a
point not far from the right of our army under General Sherman,
as it was encamped when the battle began.

Before starting for Colonel Thayer's camp, orders were given by
you to Captain Lyman, A.Q.M., on your staff, for a horse to be
saddled and kept in readiness, in case a messenger should come
down the river with orders from General Grant to you.

Now for the order. Badeau says that a staff officer was
dispatched to General Wallace with verbal orders for him to
march by the nearest road parallel with the river. The order may
have been given verbally by General Grant to his staff officer,
but was not so delivered to you, nor did it direct you to march
by the nearest road parallel with the river. At about 11
o'clock, A.M., while at the camp of Colonel Thayer, I was
directed by you to go to Colonel M.L. Smith. I met Captain
Baxter, A.Q.M., who stopped me and handed me a paper saying, "I
wish you would take this to General Wallace." I took the paper,
read it and returned it to him, saying, I could not do so, as I
was on my way under orders from General Wallace. At the same
time I turned in my saddle, and pointed out a group of horsemen,
telling the Captain that you were among them. I went to Colonel
Smith, delivered my orders, and returning, met the Captain
again. I very distinctly remember that this order directed you
to move forward _and join General Sherman's right on the Purdy
road_ and form your line of battle at right angles with the
river; and then act as circumstances would dictate. Now the
shortest possible route by which you could reach the point
designated in the order was the one taken, viz: that one leading
from Colonel Thayer's camp (on the Adamsville road from Crump's
Landing), to the Purdy road (from Pittsburg Landing), a distance
of about five miles; whereas the distance to the point to which
you was to march as designated in the order, _via_ Pittsburg
Landing, would have been at least twelve miles. Perhaps I should
here state that this order was not signed by any one, but coming
as it did through one of the Staff Officers of the Commanding
General, could not be questioned. I would also state in this
connection, that when I met Captain Baxter first, I asked him
how things were going. He replied that Grant was driving the
enemy at all points. Had this been the case, the order as
delivered by Captain Baxter would have been all right, as we
could then have joined General Sherman as directed therein.
Within ten minutes after the receipt of the order, the troops
were on the road.

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