three years' forces be pushed forward both east and west; Manassas
and Harper's Ferry and the intermediate lines of communication be seized
and held; and a joint movement organized from Cincinnati on East
Tennessee, and from Cairo on Memphis.

Meanwhile, General McClellan was ordered from West Virginia to
Washington, where he arrived on July 26, and assumed command of the
Division of the Potomac, comprising the troops in and around Washington
on both sides of the river. He quickly cleared the city of stragglers,
and displayed a gratifying activity in beginning the organization of the
Army of the Potomac from the new three years' volunteers that were
pouring into Washington by every train. He was received by the
administration and the army with the warmest friendliness and
confidence, and for awhile seemed to reciprocate these feelings with
zeal and gratitude.

XVII

General Scott's Plans--Criticized as the "Anaconda"--The Three Fields of
Conflict--Fremont Appointed Major-General--His Military Failures--Battle
of Wilson's Creek--Hunter Ordered to Fremont--Fremont's
Proclamation--President Revokes Fremont's Proclamation--Lincoln's Letter
to Browning--Surrender of Lexington--Fremont Takes the Field--Cameron's
Visit to Fremont--Fremont's Removal

The military genius and experience of General Scott, from the first,
pretty correctly divined the grand outline of military operations which
would become necessary in reducing the revolted Southern States to
renewed allegiance. Long before the battle of Bull Run was planned, he
urged that the first seventy-five regiments of three months' militia
could not be relied on for extensive campaigns, because their term of
service would expire before they could be well organized. His outline
suggestion, therefore, was that the new three years' volunteer army be
placed in ten or fifteen healthy camps and given at least four months of
drill and tactical instruction; and when the navy had, by a rigid
blockade, closed all the harbors along the seaboard of the Southern
States, the fully prepared army should, by invincible columns, move down
the Mississippi River to New Orleans, leaving a strong cordon of
military posts behind it to keep open the stream, join hands with the
blockade, and thus envelop the principal area of rebellion in a
powerful military grasp which would paralyze and effectually kill the
insurrection. Even while suggesting this plan, however, the general
admitted t