he staff officers of the latter, as if they had been the only means
of communication. This was not only insolent but a military offence,
had Burnside chosen to prosecute it. He also asserts that the troops
on our part of the line had been defeated and were at the turnpike
at the base of the mountain in retreat when he went forward. At the
close of his report, after declaring that "the forcing of the
passage of South Mountain will be classed among the most brilliant
and satisfactory achievements of this army," he adds, "its principal
glory will be awarded to the First Corps." [Footnote: Official
Records, vol. xix. pt. i. pp. 214-215.]

Nothing is more justly odious in military conduct than embodying
slanders against other commands in an official report. It puts into
the official records misrepresentations which cannot be met because
they are unknown, and it is a mere accident if those who know the
truth are able to neutralize their effect. In most cases it will be
too late to counteract the mischief when those most interested learn
of the slanders. All this is well illustrated in the present case.
Hooker's report got on file months after the battle, and it was not
till the January following that Burnside gave it his attention. I
believe that none of the division commanders of the Ninth Corps
learned of it till long afterward. I certainly did not till 1887, a
quarter of a century after the battle, when the volume of the
official records containing it was published. Burnside had asked to
be relieved of the command of the Army of the Potomac after the
battle of Fredericksburg unless Hooker among others was punished for
insubordination. As in the preceding August, the popular sentiment
of that army as an organization was again, in Mr. Lincoln's
estimation, too potent a factor to be opposed, and the result was
the superseding of Burnside by Hooker himself, though the President
declared in the letter accompanying the appointment that the
latter's conduct had been blameworthy. It was under these
circumstances that Burnside learned of the false statements in
Hooker's report of South Mountain, and put upon file his stinging
response to it. His explicit statement of the facts will settle that
question among all who know the reputation of the men, and though
unprincipled ambition was for a time successful, that time was so
short and things were "set even" so soon that the ultimate result is
one that lovers of justice may find comf