Friday, September 21, 2012

September 20, 1862


September 20, 1862:  In a letter to his wife, Gen. McClellan writes: “I feel some little pride in having with a beaten and demoralized army defeated Lee so utterly, and saved the North so completely.”  He adds, believing that he can now capitalize on his political stock:  “I have insisted that Stanton shall be removed and that Halleck shall give way to me as Commander in Chief. I will not serve under him – for he is an incompetent fool – in no way fit for the important place he holds.”


---Gen. Halleck asks what McClellan is doing, having received almost no details since the battle three days earlier.  McClellan answers:

I regret that you find it necessary to couch every dispatch I have the honor to receive from you, in a spirit of fault finding, and that you have not yet found leisure to say one word in commendation of the recent achievements of this Army, or even to allude to them.
 

---Near Shepherdstown, Virginia, Confederate troops under A.P. Hill spar with troops from FitzJohn Porter’s corps for an hour.

 

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