He was never ready for an advance and he
always felt proudly triumphant, after having come into touch with the
enemy, that he had accomplished the task of saving his army.
The only thing about which he was neither apprehensive nor doubtful was
his ability as a leader, whether military or political. While he found
it difficult to impress his will upon an opponent in the field,
he was very sturdy with his pen in laying down the law to the
Commander-in-chief (the President) and in emphasising the importance of
his own views not only in things military but in regard to the whole
policy of the government. The peculiarity about the nightmares and
miscalculations of McClellan was that they persisted long after the data
for their correction were available. In a book brought into print years
after the War, when the Confederate rosters were easily accessible in
Washington, McClellan did not hesitate to make the same statements in
regard to the numbers of the Confederate forces opposed to him that he
had brought into the long series of complaining letters to Lincoln in
which he demanded reinforcements that did not exist.
The records now show that at the time of the slow advance of
McClellan's army by the Williamsburg Peninsula, General Magruder had
been able, with a few thousand men and with dummy guns made of logs, to
give the impression that a substantial army was blocking the way to
Richmond.
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