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what would have become of Jackson’s right deprived of Longstreet’s activesupport, which barely enabled Jackson to hold the ground that afternoon,Longstreet himself falling back at least a mile from our front at 1 o’clock thatnight after several hours of severe fighting ?
I shall not discuss the various statements concerning the time of Long-street’s arrival on the field. That he may have been there in person at thehour he mentions is of course possible; but that his corps was with him, thatit was in line of battle at any such hour, or was in any such condition to fightas Porter was, can neither be truthfully asserted nor successfully maintained.Whatever Porter supposed to be Longstreet’s position, however, in no respecttouches his obligation to move forward under the circumstances and forceLongstreet to develop what he really had, which he (Porter) certainly didnot know and had taken no measures to know. The severe fighting on hisright, which he heard and interpreted into a defeat for the Union army, didnot permit him to rest idle on the field with his troops in column and with nosufficient effort even to find out anything of the field in front of him.
If a mere impression that the enemy is in heavy force and that an attackor further advance might be hazardous is a sufficient reason for a corps com-mander to keep out of a battle, raging in his hearing, especially when hethinks that his friends are being defeated, it is extremely difficult to see howany army commander would venture to engage in battle at all, unless hecould ascertain in advance and keep himself acquainted during the day withthe impressions of his corps commanders about the propriety of going intothe battle. Certainly Porter did not know at that time that Longstreet wasin his front, and his non-action was based on fancy, and not on any factthat he knew.
But wherever Longstreet was in the morning, it is certain that at 4 o’clockthat day, or about 4 o’clock, according to his own official report, he withdrewthe larger part of his force and advanced to Jackson’s right flank to resist thelast attack of the Union army on Jackson’s line, and that for several hours hewas engaged in a severe battle on our left, utterly ignoring Porter and pre-senting his right flank to Porter’s attack during that whole time. He seemsalso to have entirely forgotten that he was “ held in check,” as he was good-natured enough to say he was years afterward. During these long hoursGeneral Porter still remained idle with his corps in column, and many ofthem lying on the ground, for ease of position probably, as they were notunder fire.
Taking the enemy’s own account of the battle that afternoon, which lastedseveral hours, and its result, it is not unreasonable to say that, if GeneralPorter had attacked Longstreet’s right with ten or twelve thousand men whilethe latter was thus engaged, the effect would have been conclusive. Porter’scase is the first I have ever known, or that I find recorded in military history,in which the theory has been seriously put forth that the hero of a battleis the man who keeps out of it. With this theory in successful operation,war will be stripped of most of its terrors, and a pitched battle need not bemuch more dangerous to human life than a militia muster.