THE REMINISCENCES OF CARL SCHURZ
good.” But how he could have put into an official report statements so palpably false and so malicious was beyond my comprehension. It was cowardly at the same time, for if Hooker's allegations were true, or believed by him to be true, it was his obvious duty not only to call the division and the brigade commanders by name, but to cause them to be tried by court martial for undutiful conduct in the presence of the enemy. What brigade was meant in the report as guilty of such conduct? Was it Tyndale's, which really had run into a bog, but which was promptly extricated, and then by General Hooker's own order, acknowledged by him, took and occupied a gap in the hills? Or was it Hecker's brigade, which, on its way to Geary's position, was held back by General Hooker himself and was permitted to proceed only long after Geary's fight had ceased, and had never been stopped by any swamp? I had hardly finished reading the report when my brave friend Colonel Hecker, pale with anger, rushed into my tent, paper in hand, and with quivering lip swore that he would rather die than submit to so infamous an outrage as this imputation. I suggested to Hecker that he address to me a written protest against this untruthful report, in the calmest language he could command, and a short statement of the facts, together with a demand for a court of inquiry, and I sat down at once to write a letter to General Hooker containing an emphatic remonstrance against his report, in which I declared that, “believing that Colonel Hecker and his command did on that occasion all they were ordered to do, and did it with conscientiousness and alacrity, I begged leave to assume the responsibility for their conduct, if any mistakes or any violation of orders had been committed. If, indeed, anybody must be blamed, I would rather claim the blame entirely for myself, than permit it to fall, even by construction, upon my subordinate commanders and their men,
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