columns that he was enabled to make in the afternoon, after he had gone to that flank, and Sykes had had two hours for his movement from the right to the left, before Longstreet's advance began; and it is wholly untenable. It is very apparent that General Longstreet has not the remotest conception of the importance of celerity in preparing for and conducting an attack. According to his own admission, he received at 11 o'clock in the forenoon the positive order to make the attack, and yet it took him until 4 o'clock in the afternoon to get ready for that attack. Imagine Stonewall Jackson taking five hours to reconnoitre the enemy's position and get his own troops in position before beginning his advance, after making the circuit to get on Hooker's right flank at Chancellorsville, thus giving the latter time to be informed of the movent and to prepare for receiving the projected blow, and what, can it be supposed, would have been the result? Is it not manifest that instead of the brilliant victory which crowned the career of that immortal hero, there would have been a disastrous repulse?
General Longstreet's repugnance to making the attack, and his foreboding of failure, were very potent causes of the want of success when the attack was made. It was his duty to have accepted the plans of the Commanding General without question, and undertaken their execution at once, with the determination to do all in his power to insure their success. That he did not do so, but presumed to question the wisdom of General Lee's decision, and oppose to it his own judgment, is abundantly established by his own repeated declarations. He went into the fight, from the beginning, with the expectation of losing, and hence he lost. One who determines to achieve success at all hazards, has won half the battle, while he who goes to the performance of any undertaking with no hope of success is not likely to succeed under the most favorable circumstances. This is alike applicable to the case of the sluggard school-boy who thinks his task too heavy, and therefore will not try to learn his lesson, and that of the reluctant Corps Commander who goes to the performance of the duty assigned him with the belief that he is charged with a hopeless undertaking.
General Longstreet's complaint, now, that he was not promptly supported, and therefore failed, is a little singular, as he insists that there was no chance of success from the beginning. The uncertainty with which all his movements were attended, and his almost interminable delay, rendered it impossible for any one to know when he was ready or had actually begun, and the complaint therefore comes from him with a very bad grace. He who is at fault is very generally apt to lay the blame on others for what is due to his own shortcomings.
There is again in this second article an allusion to "our line of battle having been broken through the advice of General Early." By this is meant the posting of two of my brigades in a position to protect our left flank, which was very much exposed before the arrival of Stuart's cavalry. This has been fully explained heretofore, and the fact shown that these two brigades never constituted any part of our line; so that it was not broken by their being
