In fine, my son, I have good military authority for saying that
these rebel officers, after their wisdom had been carried away by
the whisky, put on ladies' dresses and so conducted themselves that
General Early, in order to get them out, and put a stop to the
riotous proceedings, was compelled to apply the torch to the house
of Mr. Blair. Let this sad result be a warning to all generals, sent
to either threaten or capture the capital of a nation.
Have I not satisfied you, my son, that Mr. Davis sent the wrong man
to take Washington? A more sanguine general, knowing that he had
been sent from Richmond to threaten and, if possible, capture
Washington, and having come so far and routed all the troops sent to
oppose him, and arrived within sight of the coveted prize, at a time
when he must have known the weakness of the defenses, would have
risked an attack in force and would have succeeded. I say he would
have succeeded; for, by all the rules of war, the capital ought to
have fallen. Let it be remembered also, that during that memorable
Tuesday, when the rattle of small arms and the booming of cannon
from Fort Stevens were calling patriotic citizens to the front to do
their duty, the engineer-in-chief and other of the high officials of
the War Department were busy packing up the records of their
offices, preparatory to their removal to the gunboats.
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