Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 12.djvu/134

120 road, bivouacked with them in the pelting storm, went with them into the leaden and iron hail of battle, ministered to them in the loathsome hospitals, labored among them in those glorious revivals which made well nigh every camp vocal with God's praises, resulting in the professed conversion of over 15,000 men; rejoiced with them in that long series of brilliant victories which have illustrated brightest pages of American history, and wept with them when Lee was "compelled to yield to overwhelming numbers and resources." Since the war I have carefully studied the official reports on both sides and everything that has been published which throws any light on the history of that army. I am prepared, therefore, not only to fully indorse General Hooker's opinion of the infantry of the army of Northern Virginia, but to go further and say that our artillery, though inferior in guns, ammunition and equipment, was always a match for that to which it was opposed; that the men who rode with Turner Ashby, Wade Hampton and Fitz Lee, or "followed the feather" of "Jeb" Stuart, though greatly inferior in mount and equipment to the Federal cavalry, were masters of the situation on any fair field; and that the army of Northern Virginia as a whole, was, in gallant dash, steady resistance, patient endurance, heroic courage, and all other qualities which go to make up the best soldiers, not only unrivaled, as the gallant general says, by the army of the Potomac, but the equals of any other army that ever marched under any flag, or fought for any cause.

And I give equal honor to the other armies of the Confederacy. The men who defended Fort Sumter and Charleston and Savannah and Mobile and Fort Fisher; who fought under Albert Sidney Johnston, Beauregard, Bragg, Joseph E. Johnston, Hood, Stephen D. Lee, Pemberton, Van Dora, Price, Dick Taylor, Kirby Smith, Forrest, Joe Wheeler, John Morgan, and others, were the peers of those who followed Lee and Stonewall Jack-