conditions of safety when I should begin an offensive
campaign.

When I took command of the Army of the Shenandoah its infantry force
comprised the Sixth Corps, one division of the Nineteenth Corps, and
two divisions from West Virginia. The Sixth Corps was commanded
by Major-General Horatio G. Wright; its three divisions by
Brigadier-Generals David A. Russell, Geo. W. Getty, and James B.
Ricketts. The single division of the Nineteenth Corps had for its
immediate chief Brigadier-General William Dwight, the corps being
commanded by Brigadier-General Wm. H. Emory. The troops from West
Virginia were under Brigadier-General George Crook, with Colonels
Joseph Thoburn and Isaac H. Duval as division commanders, and though
in all not more than one fair-sized division, they had been
designated, on account of the department they belonged to, the Army of
West Virginia. General Torbert's division, then arriving from the
Cavalry Corps of the Army of the Potomac, represented the mounted arm
of the service, and in the expectation that Averell would soon join me
with his troopers, I assigned General Torbert as chief of cavalry, and
General Wesley Merritt succeeded to the command of Torbert's division.

General Wright, the commander of the Sixth Corps, was an officer of
high standing in the Corps of Engineers, and had seen much active
service during the preceding three years. He commanded the
Department of the Ohio throughout the very trying period of the
summer and fall of 1862, and while in that position he, with
other prominent officers, recommended my appointment as a
brigadier-general. In 1863 he rendered valuable service at the battle
of Gettysburg, following which he was assigned to the Sixth Corps, and
commanded it at the capture of the Confederate works at Rappahannock
Station and in the operations at Mine Run. He ranked me as a
major-general of volunteers by nearly a year in date of commission,
but my assignment by the President to the command of the army in the
valley met with Wright's approbation, and, so far as I have ever
known, he never questioned the propriety of the President's action.
The Sixth Corps division commanders, Getty, Russell, and Ricketts,
were all educated soldiers, whose records, beginning with the Mexican
War, had already been illustrated in the war of the rebellion by
distinguished service in the Army of the Potomac.

General Emory was a veteran, having graduated at the Military Academy
in 18