Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 40.djvu/335

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The Rev. Dr. McKim has done well to write this little book. It has become of late years too much the tendency to exaggerate the numbers, and to minimize the valor and ability of the Confederate Army, and it is the right and the duty of every surviving Confederate soldier to refute, by all sound arguments, the conclusions reached by General Adams, Colonel Livermore, in his work, "Numbers and Losses in the Civil War in America," and others. General Lee rightly said, in his letter to Gen. Early (p. 70 of Dr. McKim's book), "It will be difficult to get the world to understand the odds against which we fought." Even now, fifty years after the close of the war, it remains difficult, and Gen. Adams calls it a mistake to suppose that the Confederate States were crushed by overwhelming resources and numbers." (Dr. McKim, p. 9 ad fin.) Against this statement I merely place the first paragraph of that immortal "General Order No. 9," which is as true now as when it was first written: