May 20, 1863, The New York Herald
The Correspondence of Mr. G.W. Hosmer.
CAMP NEAR FALMOUTH, May 13, 1863.
THE ORDER TO CROSS THE RAPPAHANNOCK ISSUED AND COUNTERMANDED.
Distinctly and certainly – as forcibly as possible, in fact – the Army of the Potomac is not south of the Rappahannock river. How the statement that it was could have been so spread and believed at the north I do not know; but the statement was false. Perhaps it was given out from Washington that an order for the army to pass the river once more had been issued, and it was not given out that the order was countermanded almost immediately. Some whispers of such an order and countermand are heard in camp.
WHERE WE REALLY ARE – THE FEELING IN THE ARMY.
Here we are, dropped noiselessly at random on the hills and in the valleys, between Fitz Hugh’s house on the left and Fitz Hugh’s house on the right – not exactly in our old camps, but near enough to them to know how they smell. Here we are, and the army feels – this Sixth corps part of it – much as it always has felt after battle – it feels ready to fight. It feels that it has done its duty, and that if the chance had been given to the Sixth corps, and the staunch old soldier who command it, they alone could have changed the issue of the nine days. Ah! if this corps – composed of Couch’s old division (now Newton’s), Smith’s old division (now Howe’s ), and Brooks’ division – if it had only been where the Eleventh corps was! If the fight that this corps made on Monday had been put in the place of the fight that the Eleventh corps did not make on Sunday! But perhaps it is contraband to indulge in imaginations of what might have been.
Yesterday the enemy’s pickets called out to ours, across the river, that we might […..] the whole army over any time, except the fellows that carried the heights.” They don’t want Sedgwick any more.
WAITING FOR NEWS – THE PAPERS SUPPRESSED.
One thing the army misses very much at the present time, and that is – the news. After battles it has always hitherto indulged deeply in the natural luxury of reading what it had done. This it cannot do now; for the papers are suppressed; they are contraband – particularly the HERALD – and not only are the newsboys not permitted to sell them, but they are taken out of the mail. Do they fear that the papers will demoralize the army? They know very well that the stuff that demoralization is made of is not to be found in the Army of the Potomac. After days of disaster, with the enemy all around it, two or three regiments of this army will get together, and fight as if they had the world to back them and had never known defeat. From this I except the Eleventh corps – as I mean the old Army of the Potomac. The Eleventh corps is part of the Army of Virginia – a recent addition to the Army of the Potomac – and it appears to be bogus. Demoralization is not the trouble then; but it is clearly felt that this last campaign won’t stand criticism. They fear the truth.
GEN. HOOKER AND THE WRITER of this once fell into a conversation upon truth in the army. Gen. McClellan was in command at that time. It was on the 25th of June, 1862. That was the first day of the seven days. Gen. Hooker stood in the open space behind the earthwork that Casey had lost in the battle of the Seven Pines, and near to one of those high square houses known to the rebs as Barker. Grover and Sickles were fighting in front, and now and then a shell burst near us. In this scene and under these circumstances Gen. Hooker asked the writer he could tell the[…..] truth.” The writer answered that he always made the attempt. It was a ridiculous answer; for the question had no reference to our volition or mental ability to shame the devil. It meant, as the General made clear to us further on, “Will headquarters let you write and publish what you believe to be true?” Headquarters did make a little fuss now and then in these times about what was written; but it only had reference to what the enemy might learn – not what the country and the army might know. Strictures were never made upon what was said about a battle after the battle had been fought, and we never heard of orders for the arrest of correspondents when they said that […..] one had blundered.”
MANAGEMENT THEN AND NOW.
In this respect we are of opinion that the management of the army one year ago will contrast very favorably with its management at the present time.
MAJOR BASSETT ALIVE.
In my account of the battle of May 3 on the Heights of Fredericksburg I said that Major Bassett, of the Eighty-second Pennsylvania Volunteers, was killed. Major Bassett is alive and well. Yet the account of his death came to me from a man in his regiment who helped to carry his body off the field, and was substantiated by another man who had taken the Major’s money from his pocket to send it to his family.
To the latter man the Major had given his money before he went into action; but how the first man’s illusion originated I can’t say.
Certainly the Major had a fair right to be shot. As the regiment moved forward to the charge he seized the colors from the color bearer and rushed forward with them with so much ardor that in a few seconds he was some distance in advance of the foremost of his men, and so stood out very conspicuously, colors in hand, be the aim of every dangerous […..] shot.”
The weather is very hot.