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it will secure a noble heritage of peace and prosperity to our country and our children.
Through the Red Sea, not around it, lies the appointed way to the Land of Promise, and it will be steadfastly trodden by a brave and loyal people.
That
Greeley approved this patriotic programme, there is no reason to doubt, but that he penned it can hardly be conceived.
It is as certain as any unproven thing can be that it was
Dana's brain which conceived it and
Dana's hand that wrote it.
About the middle of May, 1861, the
Tribune began to discuss the feasibility of a movement on
Richmond; by the first of June it had begun to cry, “Onward,” and by the end of that month its columns bristled with:
... The Nation's war-cry-Forward to Richmond!
Forward to Richmond!
The Rebel Congress must not be allowed to meet there on July 20th!
By that date the place must be held by the National army!
And this was kept up with but little variation till the defeat of
McDowell's army at
Bull Run put a violent end to it.
It was for years supposed that
Dana himself wrote the article, “Forward to
Richmond,” but
Dana said, in later years, that it was written by a regular contributor,
Fitz-Henry Warren, of
Iowa.
There is not the slightest doubt, however, that
Dana was directly responsible for its publication, and for its constant reiteration in the columns of the
Tribune. It is also certain that when disaster overtook the national army,
Greeley made haste to declare, in a letter dated July 23d, filling an entire column of the
Tribune, over his own signature:
... I wish to be distinctly understood as not seeking to be relieved from any responsibility for urging the advance
