I have endeavored to explain the circumstances of the Western command in Missouri as they existed at the time when I was in the Northwestern States, in order that the double action of the North and West may be understood. I, of course, was not in the secret of any official persons; but I could not but feel sure that the government in Washington would have been glad to have removed Fremont at once from the command, had they not feared that by so doing they would have created a schism, as it were, in their own camp, and have done much to break up the integrity or oneness of Northern loyalty. The Western people almost to a man desired abolition. The States there were sending out their tens of thousands of young men into the army with a prodigality as to their only source of wealth which they hardly recognized themselves, because this to them was a fight against slavery. The Western population has been increased to a wonderful degree by a German infusion--so much so that the Western towns appear to have been peopled with Germans. I found regiments of volunteers consisting wholly of Germans. And the Germans are all abolitionists. To all the men of the West the name of Fremont is dear. He is their hero and their Hercules. He is to cleanse the stables of the Southern king, and turn the waters of emancipation through the foul stalls of slavery. And therefore, though the Cabinet in Washington would have been glad for many reasons to have removed Fremont in October last, it was at first scared from committing itself to so strong a measure. At last, however, the charges made against him were too fully substantiated to allow of their being set on one side; and early in November, 1861, he was superseded. I shall be obliged to allude again to General Fremont's career as I go on with my narrative.
At this time the North was looking for a victory on the Potomac;but they were no longer looking for it with that impatience which in the summer had led to the disgrace at Bull's Run. They had recognized the fact that their troops must be equipped, drilled, and instructed; and they had also recognized the perhaps greater fact that their enemies were neither weak, cowardly, nor badly officered. I have always thought that the tone and manner with which the North bore the defeat at Bull's Run was creditable to it.
It was never denied, never explained away, never set down as trifling. "We have been whipped," was what all Northerners said;"we've got an almighty whipping, and here we are." I have heard many Englishmen complain of this--saying that the matter was taken almost as a joke, that no disgrace was felt, and that the licking was owned by a people who ought never to have allowed that they had been licked. To all this, however, I demur. Their only chance of speedy success consisted in their seeing and recognizing the truth.
Had they confessed the whipping, and then sat down with their hands in their pockets--had they done as second-rate boys at school will do, declare that they had been licked, and then feel that all the trouble is over--they would indeed have been open to reproach. The old mother across the water would in such case have disowned her son. But they did the very reverse of this. "I have been whipped," Jonathan said, and he immediately went into training under a new system for another fight.
