by Rosecrans as a fact, I said then Negley ought to be shot; and he answered, "That is my opinion." He added that he should have him punished; yet he determined to do nothing more than apply to have him relieved and ordered elsewhere.
Besides, there was a more serious obstacle to Rosecrans's acting decisively in the fact that, if Crittenden and McCook had gone to Chattanooga, he had gone also. It might be said in his excuse, that, under the circumstances of the sudden rout, it was perfectly proper for the commanding general to go to the rear to prepare the next line of defence; still Rosecrans felt that that excuse could not entirely clear him either in his own eyes or in those of the army. In fact, it was perfectly plain that, while the subordinate commanders would not resign if he was retained in the chief command, as I believe they certainly would have done if McCook and Crittenden had not been relieved, their respect for him as a general had received an irreparable blow.
The dissatisfaction with Rosecrans seemed to me to put the army into a very dangerous condition; and, in writing to Mr. Stanton on September 27th, I said that, if it was decided to change the chief commander, I would suggest that some Western commander of high rank and great prestige, like Grant, would be perferable as Rosecrans's successor to one who had hitherto commanded in the East alone.
POPULARITY OF GENERAL THOMAS.
The army, however, had its own candidate for Rosecrans's position. General Thomas had risen to the highest point in their esteem, as he had in that of everyone cognizant of his conduct on that unfortunate and glorious day; and I saw that, should there be a change in the chief command, there was no other man whose appointment would be so welcome. I earnestly recommended Mr. Stanton that, in event of a change, Thomas's merits be considered. He was certainly an officer of the very highest qualities, soldierly and personally. He was a man of the greatest dignity of character. He had more the character of George Washington than any other man I ever knew. At the same time, he was a delightful man to be with; there was no artificial dignity about Thomas. He was a West Point graduate and very well educated. He was very set in his opinions, yet he was not impatient with anybody—a noble character.
In reply to my recommendation of Thomas, I received a telegram from the Secretary of War, saying: "I wish you to go directly to see General Thomas, and say to him that his services, his abilities, his character, his unselfishness, have always been most cordially appreciated by me, and that it is not my fault that he has not long since had command of an independent army."
I went at once over to General Thomas's headquarters with the message. I remember that I got there just after they had finished dinner; the table was not cleared off, but there was nobody in the dining-room. When General Thomas came in, I read to him the telegram from the Secretary. He was too much affected by it to reply immediately. After a moment he said:
"Mr. Dana, I wish you would say to the Secretary of War that I am greatly affected by this expression of his confidence; that I should have long since liked to have an independent command; but what I should have desired would have been the command of an army that I could myself have organized, disciplined, distributed, and combined. I wish you would add also that I would not like to take the command of an army where I should be exposed to the imputation of having intrigued or of having exercised any effort to supplant my previous commander."
This was on October 4th. Four days later General Thomas sent a confidential friend to me, saying rumors had come to him that he was to be put in Rosecrans's place; that, while he would gladly accept any other command to which Mr. Stanton should see fit to assign him, he could not consent to become the successor of General Rosecrans. He would not do anything to give countenance to the suspicion that he had intrigued against his commander's interest. He declared that he had perfect confidence in the fidelity and capacity of General Rosecrans.
A CHANGE IN THE ORGANIZATION OF THE ARMY.
The first change in the Army of the Cumberland was an order from Washington consolidating the Twentieth and Twenty-first Corps, and placing the heroic Granger in command. The news reached Chattanooga on October 5th, in the Nashville newspaper, and, not having been previously promulgated, it caused a sensation. The consolidation of the two
