e whipped in the open field by one-fourth
their number of Richmond clerks and artisans!--boys and old men who had
never before been under fire--still the object of that raid remains a
blot even upon the page of this uncivilized warfare. It were useless to
enter into details of facts so well and clearly proved. That the orders
of Dahlgren's men were to release the prisoners, burn, destroy and
murder, the papers found on his dead body showed in plainest terms.

No wonder, then, that many in Richmond drew comfort from soothing
belief in special Providence, when three trained columns of picked
cavalry were turned back in disgraceful flight, by a handful of
invalids, old men and boys!

The feeling in Richmond against the raiders was bitter and universal.
Little vindictive, in general, the people clamored that arson and
murder--as set forth in Dahlgren's orders--merited more serious
punishment than temporary detention and highflown denunciation. The
action of the Government in refusing summary vengeance on the
cavalrymen captured, was indubitably just and proper. Whatever their
object, and whatever their orders, they were captured in arms and were
but prisoners of war; and, besides, they had not really intended more
than dozens of other raiders had actually accomplished on a smaller
scale.

But the people would not see this. They murmured loudly against the
weakness of not making these men an example. And more than one of the
papers used this as the handle for violent abuse of the Government and
of its chief.

At last all preparations were complete; and the northern army--as
perfect in equipment, drill and discipline as if it had never been
defeated--came down to the Rapidan.

Grant divided his army into three corps, under Hancock, Warren and
Sedgwick; and on the 5th May, his advance crossed the river, only to
find Lee quietly seated in his path. Then commenced that series of
battles, unparalleled for bloody sacrifice of men and obstinacy of
leader--a series of battles that should have written General Grant the
poorest strategist who had yet inscribed his name on the long roll of
reverses. And yet, by a strange fatality, they resulted in making him a
hero to the unthinking masses of his countrymen.

Lee's right rested on the Orange road; and an attempt, after the
crossing, to turn it, was obstinately repulsed during the entire day,
by Heth and Wilcox. During the night Hancock's corps crossed the river,
and next mornin