But when
it comes to fighting the army at Chancellorsville, let whoso will keep
his loyalty to Hooker, without protest from me. I claim for myself and
the bulk of my comrades the right, equally without protest, sneers,
or resolutions, to express my loyalty to the rank and file, my loyalty
to the officers, and my loyalty to the army as a whole. And I claim,
moreover, the right, without protest, sneers, or resolutions, to show
that on this field it was the general commanding, and not the army,
whose lapses caused defeat. Not that I object to these Fast-Day
resolutions. I believe that I can still struggle onward in life,
even under the contempt of their authors. But partisanship in matters
of history is a boomerang which always flies back to whack its thrower.
And Fast Day's performance was baldly partisan.
I am satisfied to abide the verdict of all soldiers, of all citizens,
who ever studied the facts of this campaign. What ever the action of
any meeting of old soldiers may be under partial knowledge of facts,
under the influence of heated or sectional discussion, or under the
whipping-in of a member of Hooker's staff, I do not believe that with
the issue squarely put before them, and the facts plainly stated,
any but a very inconsiderable fraction, and that not the most
intelligent one, of the men of the Army of the Potomac, will give their
suffrage to what has been suddenly discovered to be loyalty due to
Gen.
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