of the
most radical measures, and which steadily tended to weaken the
Democratic party in the loyal States.

SECRETARY CAMERON RESIGNS.

At the height of the excitement in Congress over the engagement at
Ball's Bluff there was a change in the head of the War Department.
The disasters in the field and the general impatience for more
decisive movements on the part of our armies led to the resignation
of Secretary Cameron. He was in his sixty-third year, and though
of unusual vigor for his age, was not adapted by education or habit
to the persistent and patient toil, to the wearisome detail of
organization, to the oppressive increase of responsibility,
necessarily incident to military operations of such vast proportions
as were entailed by the progress of the war. He was nominated as
Minister to Russia, and on the eleventh day of January, 1862, was
succeeded in the War Department by Edwin M. Stanton.

Mr. Stanton signalized his entrance upon duty by extraordinary
vigor in war measures, and had the good fortune to gain credit for
many successes which were the result of arrangements in progress
and nearly perfected under his predecessor. A week after he was
sworn in, an important victory was won at Mill Springs, Kentucky,
by General George H. Thomas. The Confederate commander, General
Zollicoffer, was killed, and a very decisive check was put to a
new development of Secession sympathy which was foreshadowed in
Kentucky. A few days later, on the 27th of January, under the
inspiration of Mr. Stanton, the President issued a somewhat remarkable
order commanding "a general movement of the land and naval forces
of the United States against the insurgent forces on the 22d of
February." He especially directed that the army at and about
Fortress Monroe, the Army of the Potomac, the Army of Western
Virginia, the army near Munfordsville, Kentucky, the army and
flotilla at Cairo, and the naval force in the Gulf of Mexico be
ready for a movement on that day. The order did not mean what was
stated on its face. It was evidently intended to mislead somebody.

The Illinois colonel who had taken possession of Paducah in the
preceding September was now known as Brigadier-General Grant. He
had been made prominent by a daring fight at Belmont, Missouri, on
the 7th of November (1861) against a largely superior force under
the command of the Confederate General Pillow. For the numbe