early
alike here. I know of none who sympathize with the so-called peace
party. It is universally damned, for there is no soldier so ignorant
that he does not know and feel that this party is prolonging the war by
stimulating his enemies. A child can see this. The rebel papers, which
every soldier occasionally obtains, prove it beyond a peradventure.

20. Mrs. General Negley, it appears, has been allowed to visit her
husband. Mrs. General McCook is said to be coming.

Received a public document, in which I find all the reports of the
battle of Stone river, and, I am sorry to say, my report is the poorest
and most unsatisfactory of the whole lot. The printer, as if for the
purpose of aggravating me beyond endurance, has, by an error of
punctuation, transformed what I considered a very considerable and
creditable action, into an inconsiderable skirmish. The report should
read:

"On the second and third days my brigade was in
front, a portion of the time skirmishing. On the
night of January 3d, two regiments, led by myself,
drove the enemy from their breastworks in the edge
of the woods."

This appears in the volume as follows:

"On the second and third days my brigade was in
front a portion of the time. Skirmishing on the
night of January 3d, two regiments, led my myself,
drove the enemy from the breastworks in the edge
of the woods."

Thus, by taking the last word of one sentence and making it the first
word of another, the intelligent compositor belittles a night fight for
which I thought my command deserved no inconsiderable credit. I regret
now that I did not take the time to make an elaborate report of the
operations of my brigade, describing all the terrible situations in
which it had been placed, and dwelling with special emphasis on the
courage and splendid fighting of the men. In contrast with my stupidly
modest report, is that of Brigadier-General Spears. He does not hesitate
to claim for his troops all the credit of the night engagement referred
to; and yet while my men stormed the barricade of logs, and cleaned out
the woods, his were lying on their faces fully two hundred yards in the
rear, and I should never have known that they were even that near the
enemy if his raw soldiers had not fired an occasional shot into us from
behind. If General Spears was with his men, he must have known that his
report