e argued that Johnston could move
upon Baltimore a column 100,000 strong, which he could meet with only
60,000 or 70,000. Later in October he marked the Confederates up to
150,000. He estimated his own requirement at a "total effective force"
of 208,000 men, which implied "an aggregate, present and absent, of
about 240,000 men." Of these he designed 150,000 as a "column of active
operations;" the rest were for garrisons and guards. He said that in
fact he had a gross aggregate of 168,318, and the "force present for
duty was 147,695." Since the garrisons and the guards were a fixed
number, the reduction fell wholly upon the movable column, and reduced
"the number disposable for an advance to 76,285." Thus he made himself
out to be fatally overmatched. But he was excessively in error. In the
autumn Johnston's effective force was only 41,000 men, and on December
1, 1861, it was 47,000.[152]

Such comparisons, advanced with positiveness by the highest authority,
puzzled Mr. Lincoln. They seemed very strange, yet he could not disprove
them, and was therefore obliged to face the perplexing choice which was
mercilessly set before him: "either to go into winter quarters, or to
assume the offensive with forces greatly inferior in number" to what
was "desirable and necessary." "If political considerations render the
first course unadvisable, the second alone remains." The general's most
cheering admission was that, by stripping all other armies down to the
lowest numbers absolutely necessary for a strict defensive, and by
concentrating all the forces of the nation and all the attention of the
government upon "the vital point" in Virginia, it might yet be possible
for this "main army, whose destiny it [was] to decide the
controversy,... to move with a reasonable prospect of success before the
winter is fairly upon us." A direct assertion of impossibility,
provocative of denial or discussion, would have been less disheartening.

In passing, it may be remarked that McClellan's prevision that the
ultimate arbitrament of the struggle must occur in Virginia was correct.
But in another point he was wrong, and unfortunately this was of more
immediate consequence, because it corroborated him in his purpose to
delay till he could make success a certainty. He hoped that when he
moved, he should be able to win one or two overwhelming victories, to
capture Richmond, and to crush the rebellion in a few weeks. It was a
brilliant and captivatin