Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 01.djvu/420

412 December 31, 1874

To the Virginia Division of the Association

of the Army of Northern Virginia:

In the oration delivered by Colonel Marshall at your fourth annual meeting, I am accused of assailing the fame of General Lee in three passages of a book published by me last spring. As a Virginian by birth, and especially as a Southern soldier who once served in the Army of Northern Virginia, I am not disposed to leave uncontradicted such an accusation, made to such an audience. Press of business and sickness made me unable to defend myself until now.

[General Johnston's reply to two other points made by Colonel Marshall is omitted as not bearing on the discussion concerning General Lee's numbers.] The third passage assailed by Colonel Marshall is, with the two notes included by him, on pages 145—6—viz:

I made these statements from confidence in General Lee's military wisdom, and on the testimony of the officers enumerated above. Colonel Marshall impugns such authority.

I asserted, and now maintain, that General Lee postponed his attack until June 26th, to strengthen his army to his utmost before doing so, and acted like a wise general in bringing to it the troops enumerated. Colonel Marshall, on the contrary, gives the impression that he was idle almost four weeks, while McClellan was increasing his numbers and fortifying his positions. I assert that General Lee employed the twenty-six days in question like a general, by greatly reducing the enemy's numerical superiority. Colonel Marshall's effort to discredit my statements indicate that General Lee had little object in the delay, or accomplished very little by it. Colonel Marshall says, on the evidence of subsequent returns,