Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 08.djvu/232

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Southern Historical Society Papers.

which the latter has never admitted. Deducting the losses at Cedar Run, Pope must have had nearly 43,000 men in his three corps. Reno joined him with 8,000 men on August 14th. He had thus, on August 18, the day he began to withdraw behind the Rappahannock, a total of 51,000 men against Lee's 54,000.

General Gordon says; "At this time the Union army was greatly outnumbered by the enemy." He exaggerates the Confederate forces to 63,500, without deigning to give any data for such an estimate, and in the face of the returns given by Colonel Taylor. This error of General Gordon may have been due to want of information, but the opposite one in regard to Pope's strength can hardly be thus explained. He makes Pope's strength, August 18, including Reno, to have been only 42,000 men, in spite of Pope's own official report, from which his numbers are seen to have been 51,000, as above. Thus, by deducting 9,000 from one side and adding it to the other, he finds Pope a reason for retreating that had no foundation in fact.

On his retreat Pope was reinforced as follows (Pope's report):

Reynolds' division, August 23... 2,500

[General Gordon puts it at 4,500.]

Piatt's brigade of Sturgis' division, August 26... 1,100
Heintzelman's and Porter's corps... 18,000

[General Gordon puts them at 19,000.]

  21,600
Strength on the Rappahannock... 51,000
Total... 72,600
Or, taking General Gordon's figures, above... 75,600

Sturgis' division of 10,000, and Cox's of 7,000, were being sent forward to Pope when the breaking of the railroad stopped them. Only one brigade of Sturgis' reached him, but some of Cox's troops were about Manassas Junction. Franklin's and Sumner's corps joined Pope at Centreville after the battle.

Thus it is seen that in the series of fights ending with the 30th August, General Pope had from 73,000 to 75,000 men against the 54,000 of the Confederates. There is no danger that the figures of the Federal forces are too high. General Pope was ever modest in estimating his own numbers. Thus Reynolds' division above, put by him at 2,500 in August, had over 6,000 after the battles around