ture. It
is abundantly evident, however, from the history of the times and from
contemporaneous documents published in the Records, that neither the
working arrangements by which Butler commanded an army from his
headquarters at Fortress Monroe or in the field while the major part of
it, under the command of Smith, was co-operating with the Army of the
Potomac, nor his relations with either his superiors or subordinates,
were at all satisfactory. In the nature of the case, they could not be.
Butler was a lawyer and politician accustomed to browbeat where he
could not persuade. He and Smith while starting out as friends, early
came to distrust each other. Smith, who was as before stated on
intimate terms at general headquarters, made his views fully known from
time to time, and especially in a frank and manly letter of July 2,
1884, to both Rawlins and Grant, and from the correspondence of the
latter with Halleck, it is certain that both sympathized with Smith at
first. It was evidently at Grant's request to Halleck, then acting as
chief of staff and military adviser at Washington, that Smith was
assigned to the Eighteenth Corps, and at Grant's request that he was
relieved from it, without explanation. The undisputed fact is that the
countermanding order was issued after a personal interview between
Grant and Butler, the details of which are only partly known, and that
no further explanation consistent with the continuance of friendly
relations between Grant and Smith has ever been given.

The inference to be drawn from the records, the correspondence, the
conversations and the writings of all the parties thereto, is that the
representations of Butler, and especially his comments upon Smith's
criticism of the battles and management of the campaign, were the
principal factors in convincing Grant that the best way out of the
complications was to relieve Smith and restore Butler to full command.
This way had been foreseen and suggested by Smith himself for he had
asked more than once to be relieved from further service in the field
on account of ill health, which made it impossible for him to undergo
exposure to the hot sun, but his request had been denied, doubtless
from a sincere desire on Grant's part to have the advantages of his
services in the solution of the complicated problem which yet
confronted the army. Had this request been granted when made, or had it
been granted afterwards, and placed on the ground of a pers