route, and subsequently by way of Romney, and along the B. & O. road. The Legislature of West Virginia passed a unanimous vote of thanks in recognition of his services in defending the State, which was followed soon after by a similar vote of thanks from the Legislature of the State of Ohio.

In 1862 he submitted a plan for the campaign of that year auxiliary to that for the movements of the Army of the Potomac, which plan was highly approved by the general-in-chief and by the War Depart

ment.

Early in April, 1862, he was ordered to Washington and sent to find and conduct Blencker's Division to General Fremont.

He submitted to the War Department a plan for the application of the forces under Generals McDowell, Banks, and Fremont to occupy the Shenandoah Valley and threaten communications with the South.

In May, 1862, he was ordered to report to General Halleck, who commanded our army in front of Corinth, Mississippi. Was put in command of two divisions (Stanley's and Paine's) in front of that city, and when it was vacated by Bragg and Beauregard he led the infantry pursuit until ordered to stop.

In June, 1862, he was placed in command of the Army of the Mississippi, consisting of four divisions.

In September, 1862, with two small divisions he confronted General Sterling Price, and fought the battle of Iuka.

In connection with the mention of his general system of army management, it may be stated that he originated the making of photoprinting maps, and furnished his subordinate commanders with information maps of the regions of military operations; established convalescent hospitals for the treatment or discharge of chronic cases; organized colored men into squads of twenty-five each, and equipped and employed them as engineer troops; employed escaped colored women in laundries and as cooks for hospitals, etc.

On October 3d and 4th, 1862, with four divisions, he fought the battle of Corinth.

By order of the President he was placed in command of the Department of the Cumberland and Army of the Ohio, relieving General Buell, October 30, 1862. He reorganized this army, and established an Inspector-General's system by detail from the line, also a Topographical Department by detail of Brigade, Division, and Corps Engineers, and a Pioneer Corps by detail of officers and men from the infantry. He also reorganized both the cavalry and artillery.

On December 31, 1862, and January 1 and 2, 1863, he fought the battle of Stone River, against the Confederates under General Bragg, and drove him behind the line of Duck river.

From June 23 to July 7, 1863, he conducted the campaign of Tullahoma, by which Bragg was driven out of his intrenched camps (at Shelbyville and Tullahoma) in Middle Ten

nessee.

After the battle of Stone River he was tendered, almost simultaneously, a unanimous

vote of thanks from Congress and from the States of Ohio and Indiana.

From July 7, 1863, to August 14, 1863, he was bringing forward supplies, perfecting the organization of the army, and manoeuvring for Chattanooga, giving special attention to the rebuilding of a railroad, as a necessary pre-requisite to success.

From August 14 to September 22, 1863, he made the campaign of Chattanooga, and fought the battle of Chickamauga, manoeuvring the Confederates out of the objective point covered by Lookout Range and the Tennessee river.

For his services at Chickamauga, he received a unanimous vote of thanks from the National House of Representatives.

After the battle of Chickamauga, he was engaged in making the preliminary arrangements to constitute Chattanooga a new main depot, by water and rail connections with Nashville, Louisville, and Cincinnati.

Between October, 1863, and January 27, 1864, he presided over the great Western Sanitary Fair at Cincinnati, which raised $325,000 for objects of beneficence to Union soldiers. He also presided over the Mississippi Valley Sanitary Fair, which raised $525,000 for the same cause.

On the 27th of January, 1864, he was placed in command of the Department of Missouri, in which capacity he succeeded in defeating all the objects and purposes of Price in Missouri, defeated him on the Big Blue and at Maris des Cygnes, and drove him out in a state of disorganization, from which he never recovered.

He was also successful in exposing and defeating the objects of the Order of American Knights.

In January, 1866, he was mustered out as Major-General of Volunteers and resigned as Brigadier-General in United States Army in 1867. He was afterwards made Brevet Major-General.

Up to the time of the battle of Chickamauga there was, neither with the government nor amongst the people, a single doubt as to the genius or ability of Rosecrans. Every step he had taken had been a suecessful step. Every campaign and every battle had added to his laurels and his glory. Rich Mountain had developed that penetrating sagacity without which no man can ever rise to distinction as a soldier. In the subsequent campaign in West Virginia he had with wonderful skill baffled and defeated the officer who subsequently became the renowned Commander-in-chief of the Confederate armies. At Iuka and Corinth his daring energy had blazed forth like a star, guiding the way to two shining victories. At Stone river he had assailed the rebel army under Gen. Bragg in its own chosen position, retrieved by his personal exertions what on the first day's conflict had seemed to be disastrous defeat, inspired the soul of every soldier under him with his own lofty resolve to conquer or die, and with matchless vigor, energy and skill fairly compelled success to

alight upon the Union standards, and gained a victory which electrified the nation and the world. In the Tullahoma campaign he had exhibited a talent for strategy equal to Napoleon in the campaign of Ulm, and without the loss of a regiment, a gun or a stand of colors, had driven Bragg from his whole line of entrenched camps, and expelled him from Middle Tennessee.

Rosecrans had been too successful. He had raised himself to too exalted a height. The fatal halo of supposed invincibility glimmered around his head. No soldier ever was or ever will be absolutely invincible, but he who is believed to be so must maintain the reputation or fall to a lower level than what he rose from. Nay, he must not merely succeed thereafter in attaining the object at which he aims; he must attain it in the manner that public opinion marks out for him, and scarcely dare achieve less than the impossible.

The limits of this sketch will not permit a discussion of the campaign in August and September, 1863, and only the conclusions can be set down, which, by a prolonged and conscientious study of the whole history of that campaign, have been arrived at.

The object that Rosecrans had in view when he commenced his great movement on the 23d of August, 1863, was to relieve East Tennessee from Confederate occupation and get possession of that central key to the Confederacy, the city of Chattanooga. The place was defended by Gen. Bragg's army, which from the first was fully equal in numbers to that under Rosecrans and soon became greatly superior. The all-knowing soldier who commanded the Union army knew from the first that Bragg could easily be reinforced, that every effort would be made by the Confederate government to save Chattanooga, and that his own force was inadequate to the mighty task he had before him. Hence he begged, pleaded and implored for reinforcements which were within easy reach, which were persistently denied him, but which when the campaign was ended came up in such numbers that had a third of them been sent to Rosecrans before he began his march across the Tennessee and the mountains to manoeuvre Bragg out of Chattanooga, would have enabled him not only to get possession of that stronghold, but to utterly destroy the army opposed to him.

Chattanooga could not be obtained without a battle. To assail it directly would be simply madness. Rosecrans therefore began that splendid series of manoeuvres to the southward of the city which carried his army into Georgia and threatened the Confederate communications with Atlanta. Bragg retired out of the city and marched southward, taking up such position that he could, at any time, return on shorter lines and compel Rosecrans to fight a battle for the prize. The Union general expected this, and had prepared accordingly. But while he was concentrating his army, that which he had clearly foreseen occurred. From every quarter of the Confed

eracy troops were hurried to Bragg's assistance. From Mississippi, from Mobile, from Savannah they came, and from Virginia the powerful corps of Gen. Longstreet was hurried to North Georgia to overwhelm the comparatively feeble army under Rosecrans. In round numbers, 40,000 Union soldiers were to contend with 75,000 Confederates, to see which would finally hold Chattanooga.

Before the Union army was fully concentrated the Confederates assailed it, and the awful battle of Chickamauga began. The first day the assailants were repelled at all points. The second day they rushed through a gap in our lines caused by a miswording or misunderstanding of orders, and separating the right wing of our army from the centre, overwhelmed that wing. Our centre and left stood firm; Rosecrans seeing this and that the enemy who had overwhelmed our right might push up the valley (which the right had been covering) into Chattanooga, hastened to rally the right, to get the troops left behind in Chattanooga as guards to our stores and reserve artillery, in proper shape, and to prepare a new position for the army at Rossville in case the centre and left should also be compelled to retreat. It was here he showed the greatness of the true soldier who leaves nothing to chance; it was here he specially proved his worthiness for the highest command. As fast as he could do so, he urged portions of the rallied troops to the assistance of that part of the army which still held the field; he sent word of all he was doing to the brave Thomas, who was so grandly resisting the enemy's onset, and gave new courage and confidence to that veteran by assuring him when he felt he could no longer hold his position on the field the new lines would be ready for his reception. It was this knowledge that inspired Thomas with the stern determination not to retreat in the face of the foe at all. And he did not retreat. He held his own until nightfall, suffering dreadful loss, but always inflicting more than he suffered, and when the last effort of the foe had been repelled, retiring leisurely to the new lines which the genius of Rosecrans had marked out for the army.

The next day the Confederate forces, who did not know that they had gained any victory, and who had really retired from the battle-field at night as far as our own soldiers had retired, came slowly and cautiously up towards the new Union lines, took a careful look at them, heard the loud cheers of the Union legion as Rosecrans rode along them, and decided not to attack! The great object of the campaign, the great prize of the battle, namely, the city of Chattanooga, was in possession of the National troops, and never again went out of their hands.

And this was the campaign, this the battle, with which some have associated the terms "failure" and "defeat!" The gallant Army of the Cumberland had crossed a great river, toiled over two chains of mountains, and, under the leadership of the brightest military genius that the war developed, had com

pletely deceived the enemy and manoeuvred him by masterly strategy out of his stronghold, then had baffled all his efforts to regain it, had fought nearly double its own numbers for two days, suffering a loss of 15,000 men and inflicting a loss of more than 18,000 upon the enemy, had held the field until it retired of its own choice and after all firing had ceased, then leisurely assumed the new position which its great leader had prepared, and then defiantly awaited another attack which its awfully punished foe did not dare to make. And it held the city it had won and for which the battle was fought. Was all this failure and defeat? The blood of every soldier who fell upon that gory field cries out against the falsehood!

Abraham Lincoln's clear eye perceived the truth; he saw that the skill of Rosecrans had assured relief to East Tennessee, had cut the line of the enemy's defence by rail, had secured the key that was to unlock the treasure-house of the foe, and had opened the way to the very heart of the Confederacy. He telegraphed Rosecrans, as well he might, "be of good cheer; we have unabated confidence in your soldiers, in your officers and in you.'

And Rosecrans was of good cheer, and immediately devised the plans for reopening communications along the line of the Nashville and Chattanooga railroad, plans which others afterwards executed; for the clearsighted Lincoln yielded to some sinister influence; and the brilliant leader of the Army of the Cumberland, after a campaign which in all its aspects was one of the most successful known to history, and in the very midst of the city which his valor and genius had won, found himself summarily relieved of his command! It was the one act of measureless injustice and wrong which, while not Abraham Lincoln's fault, stains the annals of his otherwise spotless career.

On resigning his commission General Rosecrans went to California and became a citizen of that State. He was offered and declined the Democratic nomination for governor of California in 1867. He was also offered the nomination for governor by the convention of Independent Republicans held at Marysville, and declined. In 1868 he was nominated and confirmed as United States minister to Mexico, without consultation or knowledge on his part until officially notified thereof. He accepted this appointment on condition that he should be allowed carte-blanche to represent the

good will of the American republic towards Mexico.

In 1869 he returned to California and resumed the practice of his profession, namely, that of civil and mining engineering. It should be stated, however, that during his residence in Mexico he became thoroughly convinced that the mutual prosperity of Mexico and the United States would be promoted by the progress of Mexico under her own autonomy, and, acting in accordance with his carte-blanche, he urged the Mexican cabinet and other leaders to further and foster the construction of railroads. His efforts in this direction met with such success that the initiative period of Mexican development in this regard dates from the time of these earnest efforts on his part.

In 1869 he was also offered and declined the Democratic nomination for Governor of Ohio. In 1870 he memorialized Congress, urging the encouragement of commerce with Mexico. In 1872-3, at the instance of influential people in this country, and on the invitation of the president of Mexico, he supervised the legislation in favor of railroad construction among the various States of that republic. As a result of his presence in the country, and counsel given by means of public discussion in the prominent newspapers of the republic, the legislatures of seventeen Mexican States passed unanimously resolutions urging the government to take favorable legislative action for encouraging the construction of railroads in Mexico. In six other States, whose legislatures were not in session, the governors sent, officially, strong messages to the general government in favor of the fostering of such enterprises. Thus, practically, in twenty-three States favorable legislation was enacted asking the government to encourage railroad construction.

In 1881 he was urged by the workingmen of California to allow his name to be used by the Democratic party as a candidate for the Forty-eighth Congress, and on his consent thereto was nominated and elected. He was re-elected to the Forty-ninth Congress. During each of his congressional terms he was assigned, as representative, to important legislative and political duties. In June, 1885, he was appointed by President Cleveland to the position of Register of the United States Treasury, the duties of which office he is now performing with characteristic thoroughness and efficiency. Thus his career has been as useful and honorable in peace as it was patriotic and glorious in war.