246 



CONGRESS, U. S. 



fact that General Scott was forced to fight this 

 battle. I will tell the gentleman what occurred 

 yesterday morning in the presence of my friends 

 McClernand, Logan, and "Washburne, of Illinois, 

 and also in the presence of the President of the 

 United States and the Secretary of "War. I will 

 try and repeat what was said. General Scott 

 said : ' Sir, I am the greatest coward in Amer- 

 ica.' I rose from my seat immediately. ' Stop, 

 sir,' said he, ' I will prove it ; I have fought this 

 battle, sir, against my judgment; I think the 

 President of the United States ought to remove 

 me to-day for doing it. As God is my judge, 

 after my superiors had determined to fight it, I 

 did all in my power to make the army efficient. 

 I deserve removal because I did not stand up, 

 when my army was not in condition for fight- 

 ing, and resist it to the last.' If the gentleman 

 controverts what I say, I furnish the evidence, 

 the proof. Here are the gentlemen present who 

 heard this conversation. There is your Secre- 

 tary of "War and your President. He said that 

 he ought to be removed because he had fought 

 the battle against his judgment. I stand here 

 to vindicate him. 



" I am indebted to the gentleman from Mis- 

 souri for the compliment which he has passed 

 upon me. I desire to say for myself that I 

 stand here the remains of three generations 

 that have fallen in battle. The bones of my 

 father and grandfather bleach upon the battle- 

 fields where they fell beneath the flag of my 

 country. I have stood beneath its folds at 

 home and abroad in the storm of battle, and, 

 with God's blessing, I will stand beneath it to 

 the end, and defend it with my life against for- 

 eign or domestic foe." 



Mr. Washburne : " As my colleague has re- 

 ferred to that conversation, I hope he will state 

 to the House what the President said to Gen- 

 eral Scott." 



Mr. Eichardson : " I will state it. The Pres- 

 ident said : ' Your conversation seems to imply 

 that I forced you to fight this battle.' General 

 Scott then said : ' I have never served a Presi- 

 dent who has been kinder to me than you have 

 been.' But, sir, he did not relieve the Cabinet 

 from the imputation of having forced him to 

 fight this battle. He paid a compliment to 

 President Lincoln personally ; and, Mr. Speak- 

 er, standing here in my place, I desire to say of 

 Abraham Lincoln and I have known him from 

 boyhood's hour till now if you let him alone, 

 he is an honest man ; but I am afraid he has 

 not the will to stand up against the wily poli- 

 ticians who surround him and knead him to 

 their purposes." 



On a subsequent day this subject came up 

 again in the House, when Mr. Eichardson said 

 in explanation, he did not intend to charge that 

 General Scott, even by implication, declared 

 that President Lincoln had contributed to force 

 him into the battle of Bull Run. 



Mr. Blair, of Missouri, replied : " I allude to 

 this matter for a double purpose. I find that 

 the gentleman is reported as stating that Gen- 



eral Scott intended to pay a personal compli- 

 ment to Mr. Lincoln ; but that he did not exon- 

 erate the Cabinet. 



" I say that all that has been said on that oc- 

 casion goes to show that General Scott did 

 intend to exonerate the President from the 

 allegation that he had forced him into a fight. 

 I undertake to say that such is the fact, and I 

 want it to go upon the record." 



Mr. Eichardson : " Let us have no misunder- 

 standing about this matter. My colleagues un- 

 derstood that I gave the language as near as I 

 could. "Whether I have been correctly reported 

 or not, I do not know. If I did not then make 

 the correct statement, let me do it now. 



" I did not understand General Scott, nor did 

 I mean so to be understood, as implying that 

 the President had forced him. to fight that bat- 

 tle." 



Mr. Blair : " That is the very essence of this 

 matter. But I go further, in reference to what 

 occurred prior to that battle, and say that the 

 President, after he had information that Gen- 

 eral Johnston had escaped through the hands 

 of General Patterson, and had joined General 

 Beauregard on Friday evening, went to General 

 Scott and suggested the propriety of waiting 

 until Patterson's corps could come up and rein- 

 force the army that was then before Manassas; 

 but so firmly fixed was General Scott's deter- 

 mination to attack the enemy then and there, 

 that the President's suggestion was disregarded. 

 The Secretary of "War also returned from the 

 field before the battle, and endeavored to in- 

 duce General Scott to send forward reinforce- 

 ments ; he urged it again and again ; and finally 

 succeeded in having five regiments sent, two 

 of which reached Centreville before the retreat 

 commenced. I make these statements, and I 

 make them for the purpose of preventing Gen- 

 eral Scott from being exhibited to the country, 

 as has been attempted to be done by his friends, 

 as assailing the President and his Administra- 

 tion. This conversation, as reported in the 

 speech of the gentleman from Illinois and that 

 speech has other marks indicating a design to 

 attack the Administration holds out General 

 Scott as assailing the President and the Cab- 

 inet. 



" But I have another purpose far more impor- 

 tant ; and that is, that the President shall retain 

 the confidence of the people of this country of 

 all who are in favor of preserving the Union ; 

 but as long as he is held out as interposing and 

 forcing the Commanding General to fight a bat- 

 tle against his will, he cannot command that 

 confidence. "When the country' knows the truth, 

 as they will know, that the President did not 

 take the responsibility to order a battle before 

 our troops were prepared for it, he will retain, 

 as he deserves, the confidence of the people of 

 this country in the war." 



The Senate bill " to confiscate property used 

 for insurrectionary purposes " was reported 

 ba?k by the Judiciary Committee with an 

 amendment in the nature of a substitute. It 





