dependent companies-advance with confidence upon the enemy's capital. I shall, nevertheless, advance; but whether beyond Puebla, will depend on intervening information and reflection. The general panic given to the enemy at Cerro Gordo still remaining, I think it probable that we shall go to Mexico, or, if the enemy recover from that, we must renew the consternation by another blow."

Thus, like Cortez, finding myself isolated and abandoned, and again like him, always afraid that the next ship or messenger might recall or farther cripple me, I resolved no longer to depend on Vera Cruz or home, but to render my little army "a self-sustaining machine"-as I informed everybody, including the head of the War Department-and advance to Puebla.

It was in reference to the foregoing serious causes of complaint and others to be found in my reports at large-particularly in respect to money for the disbursing staff officers, clothing, and Mr. Trist, commissioner-that I concluded my report from Puebla, June 4, in these words:

"Considering the many cruel disappointments and mortification I have been made to feel since I left Washington, and the total want of support or sympathy on the part of the War Department, which I have so long experienced, I beg to be recalled from this army the moment it may be safe for any person to embark at Vera Cruz; which, I suppose, will be early in November. Probably all field operations will be over long before that time."

But my next report (July 25th) from Puebla, has, no doubt, in the end, been deemed more unpardonable by the department. In that paper, after speaking of the "happy change in my relations, both official and private, with Mr. Trist," I continued:

"Since about the 26th ultimo, [June,] our intercourse has been frequent and cordial, and I found him [Mr. T.] able, discreet, courteous, and amiable. At home it so chanced that we had had but the slightest possible acquaintance with each other. Hence, more or less of reciprocal prejudice, and of the existence of his feelings towards me, I knew (by private letters) before we met, that at least a part of the cabinet had a full intimation.

"Still, the pronounced misunderstanding between Mr. Trist and myself could not have occurred, but for other circumstances: 1. His being obliged to send forward your letter of April 14th, instead of delivering it in person, with the explanatory papers which he desired to communicate. 2. His bad health in May and June, which, I am happy to say, has now become good; and 3. The extreme mystification into which your letter-and particularly an interlineation-unavoidably threw me.

"So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly willing that all I have heretofore written to the department about Mr. Trist, should be suppressed. I make this declaration as due to my present esteem for that gentlemen; but ask no favor, and desire none, at the Lands of the department. Justice to myself, however tardy, I shall

take care to have done.

"I do not acknowledge the justice of either of your rebukes con

tained in the letter of May 31, [in relation to Mr. Trist and the prisoners at Cerro Gordo,] and that I do not here triumphantly vindicate myself, is not from the want of will, means, or ability, but

time.

"The first letter (dated February 22) received from you at Vera Cruz, contained a censure, and I am now rebuked for the unavoidable—nay, wise, if it had not been unavoidable-release on parole of the prisoners taken at Cerro Gordo; even before one word of commendation from government has reached this army on account of its gallant conduct in the capture of those prisoners. [No such commendation has yet been received, February, 1848.] So, in regular progression, I may-should the same army gallantly bear me into the city of Mexico, in the next six or seven weeks, which is probable, if we are not arrested by a peace or a truce-look to be dismissed from the service of my country! You will perceive that I am aware (as I have long been) of the dangers which hang over me at home; but I, too, am a citizen of the United States, and well know the obligations imposed, under all circumstances, by an enlightened patriotism.

"In respect to money, I beg again to report that the chief commissary (Captain Grayson) of this army has not received a dollar from the United States, since we landed at Vera Cruz, March 9. He now owes more than $200,000, and is obliged to purchase, on credit, at great disadvantages. The chief quartermaster (Captain Irwin) has received perhaps $60,000 dollars, and labors under like incumbrances. Both have sold drafts to small amounts, and borrowed largely of the pay department, which has received about half the money estimated for. Consequently the troops have some four months' pay due them. Our poverty, or the neglect of the disbursing departments at home, has been made known, to our shame, in the papers of the capital here, through a letter from Lieutenant Colonel Hunt, that was found on the person of the special messenger from Washington.

"The army is also suffering greatly from the want of necessary clothing, including blankets, and great-coats. The new troops, (those who have last arrived,) as destitute as the others, were first told that they would find abundant supplies at New Orleans; next, at Vera Cruz, and finally here; whereas, we now have, perhaps, a thousand hands engaged in making shoes and (out of bad materials and at high cost) pantaloons. These articles, about 3,000 pairs of each, are absolutely necessary to cover the nakedness of the troops. "February 28th, off Lobos, I wrote to Brigadier General Brooke, to direct the quartermaster at New Orleans to send to me large supplies of clothing. March 16 and 23, General Brooke replied that the quartermaster at New Orleans, had 'neither clothing nor shoes,' and that he was 'fearful that unless they have been sent out to you direct, you will be much disappointed."

"Some small quantity of clothing, perhaps one-fifth of our wants, came to Vera Cruz, from some quarter, and followed us to Jalapa and this place."

I must here specially remark, that this report, No. 30, tho

forwarded the night of its date, (July 25,) seems to have miscarried. Perceiving, about November 27, that it was not acknowledged by the department, I caused a duplicate to be made, signed it, and sent it off by the same conveyance with my despatch No. 36, and the charges against Brevet Major General Worth, Major General Pillow, and Brevet Lieutenant Colonel Duncan, together with the appeal against me, of the former. All these papers are acknowledged by the department in the same letter, January 13, that recalls me.

It was that budget of papers that caused the blow of power, so long suspended, to fall on a devoted head. The three arrested officers, and he who had endeavored to enforce a necessary discipline against them, are all to be placed together before the same court. The innocent and the guilty, the accuser and the accused, the judge and his prisoners, are dealt with alike. Most impartial justice! But there is a discrimination with a vengeance! While the parties are on trial-if the appealer is to be tried at all, which seems doubtful-two are restored to their corps-one of them with his brevet rank, and I am deprived of my command. There can be but one step more in the same direction; throw the rules and articles of war into the fire, and leave all ranks in the army free to engage in denunciations, and a general scramble for precedence, authority, and executive favor. The pronunciamento, on the part of my factious juniors, is most triumphant.

My recall-under the circumstances a severe punishment before trial, but to be followed by a trial here that may run into the autumn, and on matters I am but partially permitted to know by the department and my accusers-is very ingeniously placed on two grounds: 1. My own request, meaning that of June 4, (quoted above, and there was no other before the department,) which had been previously (July 12) acknowledged and rebukingly declined. 2. The arrest of Brevet Major General Worth, for writing to the department, "under the pretext and form of an appeal," an open letter, to be sent through me, in which I was grossly and falsely accused of "malice" and "conduct unbecoming an officer and gentleman," in the matter of the general order, No. 349, on the subject of puffing letters for the newspapers at home.

On that second point, the letter from the department of January 13 is more than ingenious; it is elaborate, subtle, and profound; a professional dissertation, with the rare merit of teaching principles, until now, wholly unknown to military codes and treatises, and of course to all mere soldiers, however great their experience in the field.

I have not, in this place, time to do more than hint at the fatal consequences of the novel doctrine in question. According to the department, any factious junior may, at his pleasure, in the midst of the enemy, using "the pretext and form of an appeal" against his commander, insult and outrage him to the grossest extent, though he be the general-in-chief, and charged with the conduct of the most critical operations, and that commander may not arrest the incipient mutineer until he shall have first laid down his own au

thority, and submitted himself to a trial, or wait, at least, until a distant period of leisure for a judicial examination of the appeal! And this is precisely the case under consideration. The department, in its eagerness to condemn me, could not take time to learn of the experienced that the general-in-chief who once submits to an outrage from a junior, must lay his account to suffer the like from all the vicious under him; at least, down to a rank that may be supposed without influence in high quarters beyond the army. But this would not be the whole mischief to the public service. Even the great mass of the spirited, intelligent, and well affected, among his brothers in arms, would soon reduce such commander to utter imbecility, by holding him in just scorn and contempt for his recreancy to himself and country. And are discipline and efficiency of no value in the field?

But it was not my request of June 4, nor report No. 30, (of July 25,) so largely quoted from above, nor yet the appeal of one pronunciado, that has at length brought down upon me this visitation, so clearly predicted. That appeal, no doubt, had its merits, considering it came from an erratic brother-a deserter from the other extreme-who, having just made his peace with the true faith, was bound to signalize apostacy by acceptable denunciations of one for whom, up to Vera Cruz, he had professed (and not without cause) the highest obligations. (It was there he learned from me that I was doomed at Washington, and straightway the apostate began to seek, through a quarrel, the means of turning that knowledge to his own benefit.) No, there was (recently) still another element associated in the work, kept, as far as practicable, out of the letter of recall; an influence proceeding from the other arrested general, who is quite willing that it should generally be understood (and who shall gainsay his significant acquiescence?) that all rewards and punishments in this army were, from the first, to follow his recommendations. This the more powerful of the pronunciados against No. 349 well knew, at the time, as I soon knew that he was justly obnoxious not only to the animadversions of that order, but to other censures of yet a much graver character.

In respect to this general, the letter of recall observes, parenthetically, but with an acumen worthy of more than "a hasty" notice, that some of my specifications of his misconduct "are hardly consistent with your [my] official reports and commenda

tions."

Seemingly this is a most just rebuke. But, waiting for the trials, I will here briefly state, that unfortunately I followed that general's own reports, written and oral; that my confidence lent him in advance, had been but very slightly shaken as early as the first week in October; that up to that time, from our entrance into this city, I had been at the desk, shut out from personal intercourse with my brother officers, and that it was not till after that confinement that facts, conduct, and motives, began to pour in upon.

me.

A word as to the 5th article of war. 1 can truly say that in this and other communications, I have not designed the slightest

disrespect to the commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States. No doubt he, like myself and all others, may fall. into mistakes as to particular men; and I cannot, having myself been behind the curtain, admit the legal fiction that all acts of a secretary are the acts of the President. Yet, in my defensive statements, I have offered no wanton discourtesy to the head of the War Department, although that functionary is not in the enumeration of the above mentioned article.

Closing my correspondence with the department until after the approaching trial,

I have the honor to remain, respectfully, your most obedient

servant,

Hon. SECRETARY OF WAR.

WINFIELD SCOTT.

The Secretary of War to General Scott.

WAR DEPARTMENT, Washington, April 21, 1848.

SIR: It would not be respectful to you to pass unnoticed your extraordinary letter of the 24th of February, nor just to myself to permit it to remain unanswered on the files of this department.

To attempt to dispel the delusions which you seem to have long pertinaciously cherished, and to correct the errors into which you have fallen, devolves upon me a duty which I must not decline; but in performing it I mean to be as cautious as you profess to have been, to abstain from any "wanton discourtesy," and I hope to be alike successful. Your prudent respect for the "5th article of war" has induced you to hold me ostensibly responsible for many things which, you are aware, are not fairly chargeable to me. The device you have adopted to assail the President, by aiming your blows at the Secretary of War, does more credit to your ingenuity as an accuser, than to your character as a soldier. A premeditated contrivance to avoid responsibility does not indicate an intention not to do wrong.

The general aspect of your letter discloses an evident design to create a belief that you were drawn forth from your quiet position. in a bureau of this department, and assigned to the command of our armies in Mexico, for the purpose of being sacrificed; and that, to accomplish this end, "neglects, disappointments, injuries, and rebukes" were "inflicted" on you, and the necessary means of prosecuting the war with success withheld; or, in other words, that the government, after preferring you to any other of the gallant generals within the range of its choice, had labored to frustrate its own plans, to bring defeat upon its own armies, and involve itself in ruin and disgrace, for an object so unimportant in its bearing upon public affairs. A charge so entirely preposterous, so utterly repugnant to all the probabilities of human conduct, calls for no

refutation.