Page:Memoirs of Henry Villard, volume 1.djvu/416

382 It clearly appears from the foregoing narrative that Franklin's failure on the left was the result of the same causes that brought about our discomfiture on the right. Here, as there, the offensive strength was spent in successive fruitless assaults, with limited forces, upon strong rebel positions. Happily, only three of Franklin's divisions were subjected to this waste of blood, while seven divisions were used up under Sumner and Hooker. But the rebel defences above Fredericksburg were much more formidable and less approachable than those confronting the left, and hence made the attempt to take them by front assaults, a priori, a grievous error. With Franklin the case was different. For, while it cannot be absolutely maintained that an attack in main force, such as he had himself recommended to General Burnside, would have been successful, a favorable outcome was possible, whereas the attacks in detail by divisions were foredoomed to repulse. These were the hard facts: only three of the eight divisions at the disposal of Franklin took part in the action; the movement of Doubleday proved useless, the enemy not being in strength in that direction; and not a shot was fired by Smith's infantry, except on the skirmish line.

Franklin's course brought on another of those numerous painful and humiliating controversies that mark the ill-starred career of the Army of the Potomac. No blame can attach to this commander for taking the indefinite orders he received from Burnside in the morning to mean a reconnoissance in force only. But two other orders from the Commander-in-chief were orally delivered to him at about 2 P.M., by Captain Goddard, aide-de-camp, in these words: “Tell General Franklin, with my compliments, that I wish him to make a vigorous attack with his whole force. Our right is hard pressed.” This order appears to have been based on the report of another aide-de-camp who had been sent by Burnside to Franklin for information about the doings of the latter's command, and who had reported that General Smith's corps was not engaged. Franklin