I have
accomplished in this respect more than the General-in-Chief asked, or
could well be expected, in face of an Enemy far superior in numbers,
with no line of communication to protect."

In another dispatch, to Assistant Adjutant-General Townsend (with
General Scott), he says, that same afternoon of Thursday, the 18th: "I
have succeeded, in accordance with the wishes of the General-in-Chief,
in keeping General Johnston's Force at Winchester. A reconnaissance in
force, on Tuesday, caused him to be largely re-enforced from Strasburg."

Again, on Friday, the 19th, he informs Colonel Townsend that: "The
Enemy, from last information, are still at Winchester, and being
re-enforced every night."

It is not until Saturday, the 20th of July, that he telegraphs to
Townsend: "With a portion of his force, Johnston left Winchester, by the
road to Millwood, on the afternoon of the 18th." And he adds the
ridiculous statement: "His whole force was about 35,200."

Thus, despite all the anxious care of General Scott, to have Johnston's
Army detained in the Shenandoah Valley, it has escaped Patterson so
successfully, and entirely, that the latter does not even suspect its
disappearance until the day before the pitched Battle of Bull Run is
fought! Its main body has actually reached Manassas twenty-four hours
before Patterson is aware that it has left Winchester!

And how is it, that Johnston gets away from Patterson so neatly? And
when does he do it?

[The extraordinary conduct of General Patterson at this critical
period, when everything seemed to depend upon his exertions, was
afterward the subject of inquiry by the Joint-Committee on the
Conduct of the War. The testimony taken by that Committee makes it
clear, to any unprejudiced mind, that while Patterson himself may
have been loyal to the Union, he was weak enough to be swayed from
the path of duty by some of the faithless and unpatriotic officers
with whom he had partly surrounded himself--and especially by Fitz
John Porter, his Chief-of-staff. Let us examine the sworn
testimony of two or three witnesses on this point.

General CHARLES W. SANFORD, who was second in command under
Patterson, and in command of Patterson's Left Wing, testified [see
pages 54-66, Report on Conduct of the War, Vol. 3, Part 2,] that he
was at a Council of War held at the White House, June 29th, when
the propriety of