ral-
in-Chief, with all other commanders and subordinates of land and
naval forces, will severally be held to their strict and full
responsibilities for prompt execution of this order.

"Abraham Lincoln."

Conservative commanding officers criticised this Presidential order
as an assumption on Mr. Lincoln's part of the direction of the war
in the field, and the naming of a day for the army and navy to move
was denounced an unwise and a notice to the enemy. Under other
circumstances, the President would have been open to criticism from
a strategist's standpoint, but the particular circumstances and
the state of the country and the public mind warranted his action.
Foreign interference or recognition of the Confederacy was threatened.
No decided Union victory had been won. McClellan had held the Army
of the Potomac idle for six months in sight of the White House.
Halleck at St. Louis, in command of a large and important department,
had long talked of large plans and so far had executed none.
Matters were at a standstill in Western Virginia. Buell was, so
far, giving little promise of an early forward movement.

The Confederate forces held advanced positions in Missouri and high
up on the Mississippi. They were fortified at Forts Henry and
Donelson, on the Tennessee and the Cumberland respectively, and at
Bowling Green and other important places in Kentucky. They still
held the Upper Kanawha, the Greenbrier country, Winchester, and
other points in the Shenandoah Valley. The Confederate Army was
holding McClellan almost within the fortifications south of the
Potomac at Washington. The President was held responsible for the
inactivity of the army. Under other circumstances, with other army
commanders, the order would not have been issued. It served to
notify these commanders that the army must attack the enemy, and
it advised the country of the earnestness of the President to
vigorously prosecute the war, and thus aided enlistments, inspired
confidence, and warned meddling nations to keep hands off.(15)

On January 28, 1862, both General Grant and Commodore A. H. Foote,
Flag Officer United States Naval Forces in the Western waters,
wired Halleck at St. Louis that, with his permission, Fort Henry
on the Tennessee could be taken by them. Authority being obtained,
they invested and attacked it by gunboats on the river side and
with the army by land. The fire of the gunboats silenced the
batteries, and all the