Nothing was asked which was not promptly and lavishly given. After three
months of earnest effort, assisted by the best military and civil talent
of the country, by the whole army organization, by scientific soldiers
and an accomplished and experienced staff, a column of thirty thousand
men, with thirty-four pieces of artillery and but four hundred cavalry,
was moved a distance of twenty-two miles. Though it had been in camp
several weeks, up to a few days before its departure it was without
brigade or division organization, and ignorant of any evolutions except
those of the battalion. It was sent forward without equipage, without a
sufficient commissariat or an adequate medical establishment. This armed
mob was led against an intrenched foe, and driven back in wild and
disgraceful defeat,--a defeat which has prolonged the war for a year,
called for a vast expenditure of men and treasure, and now to our
present burdens seems likely to add those of a foreign war. The authors
of this great disaster remain unpunished, and, except in the opinions of
the public, unblamed; while nearly all the officers who led the
ill-planned, ill-timed, and badly executed enterprise have received
distinguished promotions, such as the soldier never expects to obtain,
except as the reward of heroic and successful effort.

When General Fremont reached St. Louis, the Federal militia were
returning to their homes, and a confident foe pressed upon every salient
point of an extended and difficult defensive position. Drawing his
troops from a few sparsely settled and impoverished States, denied
expected and needed assistance in money and material from the General
Government, he overcame every obstacle, and at the end of eight weeks
led forth an army of thirty thousand men, with five thousand cavalry and
eighty-six pieces of artillery. Officers of high rank declared that this
force could not leave its encampments by reason of the lack of supplies
and transportation; but he conveyed them one hundred and ninety miles by
rail, marched them one hundred and thirty-five miles, crossing a broad
and rapid river in five days, and in three months from his assumption of
the command, and in one month after leaving St. Louis, placed them in
presence of the enemy,--not an incoherent mass, but a well-ordered and
compact army, upon whose valor, steadfastness, and discipline the fate
of the nation might safely have been pledged.

If General Fremont was not tried by t