THE COUNCIL OF WAK ON THE SECOND DAY.
3 1 3
excellent position of Stevens’s 12-pounders at the head of the ravine, whichenabled him to sweep it, the arrival of Carroll’s brigade sent unasked by Han-cock,—a happy inspiration, as this line had been weakened to send supportsboth to Greene and Sickles,— and the failure of Rodes to cooperate with Early,caused the attack to miscarry. The cannoneers of the two batteries, so sum-marily ousted, rallied and recovered their guns by a vigorous attack — withpistols by those who had them, by others with handspikes, rammers, stones,and even fence-rails — the “ Dutchmen ” showing that they were in no wayinferior to their “ Yankee ” comrades, who had been taunting them ever sinceChancellorsville. After an hour’s desperate fighting the enemy was driven outwith heavy loss, Avery being among the killed. At the close of this secondday a consultation of corps commanders was held at Meade ’s headquarters.I was not present, although summoned, but was informed that the vote wasunanimous to hold our lines and to await an attack for at least one day beforetaking the offensive, and Meade so decided. [Continuation on p. 369.]
THE COUNCIL OF WAR ON THE SECOND DAY. J
C[OON after all firing had ceased a staff-officer^ from army headquarters met General Hancocka nd myself and summoned us both to GeneralMeade ’s headquarters, where a council was to beheld. We at once proceeded there, and soon after°ur arrival all the corps commanders were assem-bled in the little front room of the Liester House —Hewton, who had been assigned to the command°f the First Corps over Doubleday, his senior;Hancock, Second; Birney, Third ; Sykes, Fifth;Sedgwick, who had arrived during the day with]he Sixth, after a long inarch from Manchester;Howard, Eleventh; and Slocum, Twelfth, besides® e neral Meade , General Butterfield, chief of staff;barren, chief of engineers; A. S. Williams, Twelfth~' or Ps> and myself, Second. It will be seen that~y° corps were doubly represented, the Second byHancock and myself, and the Twelfth by Slocuma nd Williams. These twelve were all assembled ina little room not more than ten or twelve feet square,^uth a bed in one corner, a small table on one side,a chair or two. Of course all could not sit° Wn ; some did, some lounged on the bed, and*°we stood up, while Warren, tired out and suffer-la g from a wound in the neck, where a piece ofe ll had struck him, lay down in the corner of the[°° m and went sound asleep, and I don’t thinkeai ‘d any of the proceedings.
Thed:
lscussion was at first very informal and in the
shape of conversation, during which each one madecomments on the fight and told what he knew ofhe condition of affairs. In the course of this dis-cussion Newton expressed the opinion that “thisno place to fight a battle in.” General Newtonas an officer of engineers (since chief-engineer ofe army), and was rated by me, and I supposeos ^ others, very highly as a soldier. The asser-lQ n, therefore, coming from such a source, ratherJTaken
MAJOR-GENERAL, U. S. V.
startled me, and I eagerly asked what his objectionsto the position were. The objections he stated, asI recollect them, related to some minor details ofthe line, of which I knew nothing except so far asmy own front was concerned, and with those I wassatisfied; but the prevailing impression seemed tobe that the place for the battle had been in ameasure selected for us. Here we are; now whatis the' best thing to do ? It soon became evidentthat everybody was in favor of remaining wherewe were and giving battle there. General Meade himself said very little, except now and then tomake some comment, but I cannot recall that heexpressed any decided opinion upon any point, pre-ferring apparently to listen to the conversation.After the discussion had lasted some time, Butter-field suggested that it would, perhaps, be "well toformulate the question to be asked, and GeneralMeade assenting he took apiece of paper, on whichhe had been making some memoranda, and wrotedown a question; when he had done he read it offand formally proposed it to the council.
I had never been a member of a council of warbefore (nor have I been since) and did not feel veryconfident I was properly a member of this one; butI had engaged in the discussion, and found myself(Warren being asleep) the junior member in it.By the custom of war the junior member votes first,as on courts-martial; and when Butterfield read offhis question, the substance of which was, “ Shouldthe army remain in its present position or take upsome other 1 ” he addressed himself first to me foran answer. To say “ Stay and fight ” was to ignorethe objections made by General Newton, and I there-fore answered somewhat in this way: “Remainhere, and make such correction in our position asmay be deemed necessary, but take no step whicheven looks like retreat.” The question was put to
by permission from the “ Philadelphia Weekly Press ” of July 6th, 1887, and condensed.— Editors.v °l. III. 21