How vaunt and prophecy were fulfilled, all the world knows now. A more
miserable waste of apparently ample means and material has seldom been
recorded in the annals of modern war. General Hooker stands forth the
worthy rival of that mighty monarch, who,
"With fifty thousand men,
Marched up the hill and then--marched down again."
But of the two, the exploit of the American strategist is much the most
brilliant and memorable; his preparations and blunders were conducted on
a vaster scale, and, Varus-like, scorning the triviality of a bloodless
disgrace, he left sixteen thousand dead, wounded, and missing behind in
his retreat.
The defeated General may well pray to be saved from his friends: the
strongest ground of condemnation might be drawn from the excuses of some
of these injudicious partisans. Not more than a third of the Federal
forces was, they say, at any one time engaged: yet Hooker's last words
to his troops, before going into action, boasted that the enemy must,
perforce, fight him on his own ground. The Federal commander recognized,
perhaps not less than his opponent, the importance of the simple old
tactic--bringing a superior force to bear on detached or weak points of
the adverse line--which has entered, under one form or another, into
most great military combinations since war became a science; but he
appears to have been utterly incapable of reducing theory to practice.
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