But ability, native or acquired, forced its way to the front; and the
requisite experience was gradually gained, for the school was one where
the trade was quickly taught. Said Gen. Meade on one occasion, "The art
of war must be acquired like any other. Either an officer must learn it
at the academy, or he must learn it by experience in the field.
Provided he has learned it, I don't care whether he is a West-Pointer,
or not."
In the East, then, the army had been led by McDowell, McClellan, Pope,
and Burnside, to victory and defeat equally fruitless. The one
experiment so far tried, of giving the Army of the Potomac a leader from
the West, culminating in the disaster of the second Bull Run, was not
apt to be repeated within the year. That soldier of equal merit and
modesty, whom the Army of the Potomac had been gradually educating as
its future and permanent leader, was still unpretentiously commanding a
corps, and learning by the successes and failures of his superiors.
And who shall say that the results accomplished by Grant, Sherman,
Thomas, Sheridan, and Meade, were not largely due to their good fortune
in not being too early thrust to the front? "For," as says Swinton,
"it was inevitable that the first leaders should be sacrificed to the
nation's ignorance of war.
Pages:
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26