May 18, 1863, The New York Herald
The cavalry expedition of Colonel Grierson through Mississippi has proved a great success. We have received a full and graphic description of the affair from Baton Rouge, by the George Washington, which arrived yesterday, and which we publish in another column.
From the tone of a leading editorial in the Richmond Enquirer of Friday, which we published yesterday – equally prophetic and desponding as it is – it is manifest that our cavalry raids are as much, if not more, feared by the enemy than heavy battles in which whole armies are engaged. The effects of these expeditions, as there admitted, are telling fearfully upon the rebel strength. “They (the Union troops) can cause much sorrow, and heart-break our people by expeditions through thinly populated districts destituted of troops.” “They can rob and demoralize us within our own borders.” “The more of our mills, machine shops and railroads they will have destroyed, the more of our national resources they will have ruined and wasted, and the better chance they will have for a irresistible advance at last.” This is the description of the coil which is winding around the rebellion, given by a leading rebel journal.
In addition to our special account of Col. Grierson expedition, we publish further extracts today from Southern papers commenting on the late raids in Georgia, Mississippi and Virginia, showing how disastrous they have been to rebel interests, by the immense destruction of private property, crops, mills, iron works, railroads, bridges and army stores which has marked the track of our cavalry all over these States, as they swept along like a whirlwind from point to point. Even in the unsuccessful attempt to reach Atlanta made by Colonel Streight, in which his whole force was captured, it is acknowledged that the results of his movements, as far as he had gone, were terrible. The destruction of property was enormous. He left nothing but ruin and desolation and a terrified population behind him. An Atlanta paper speaks, with evident fear, of another raid now contemplated into Georgia, the supposed object being to destroy the Georgia State road. Everywhere that our cavalry has penetrated the people have exhibited every symptom of alarm and terror.
Thus this once slighted arm of the service proves itself most efficient, and will soon be more formidable than that of the South where cavalry service is almost a natural element in the character of the people, where almost every man is a trained rider from his youth. Before long the names of Stoneman, Kilpatrick, Buford, Grierson, Averill and other cavalry officers of the Union army will become as famous in the South as those of Stonewall Jackson, Stuart, Morgan and Forrest have been for some time in the North, for deeds of daring and brilliancy. And yet at the beginning of the war there was decided objection on the part of the government to increase or encourage our cavalry force. It was represented that the immense expense necessary would not be remunerated by the value of this branch of the army. It was only the constant pressure of opinion by experienced officers, and the startling examples set by the cavalry of the enemy, which finally induced the military authorities to pay attention to it.
We now see how invaluable our cavalry arm is in crushing out rebellion, and we hope that its interests will not be overlooked, but that its organization will be still further pushed forward, until the United States can boast of as fine a cavalry force as any country in the world.