The grand struggle at
Fort Donelson, as we have already said, was one every way creditable to our arms.
There never was, perhaps, a more obstinately contested fight.
The enemy gained one of the dearest of victories, with the odds of 80,000 to 12,000 in his favor.
Yet his prisoners but little exceed the list of his killed and wounded.
This fact is plainly being confessed by the enemy himself.
All concede now last the surrender was a military and physical necessity, and that it attaches no blame to the brave and accomplished.
General Buckner, who entered the war on the
Southern side at perhaps a greater personal sacrifice than any other officer of his rank in the army.
The loss to our cause of so capable an officer as he, is generally deplored.
But his remaining to surrender the small army in the fort and share their fate, in the face of the peculiar perils of his own case, entitle him alike to the admiration and sympathy of his countrymen.
Amidst the regrets at the disaster, resulting from an imprudently chosen position for defence — the placing of gallant men in a trap, as at
Hatteras and
Roanoke Island — by the mistakes of incompetent engineers or officials — it was gratifying that three of our
Generals and the greater part of
Floyd's Brigade escaped the clutches of the enemy.
The question of military discipline and duty involved in the matter of the transfer of command by
Gens. Floyd and
Pillow to
Buckner, we leave to military men; but we are sure all will indulge the hope that the release from command of the two former will be of a most temporary character.
Floyd has fought bravely, and
Rosecrans has been compelled to confess that he was most seriously annoyed by him in his western campaign last summer.
No officer of the day has more energy, we are sure, and none enters the service with more patriotic devotion to the cause, than
Gen. Floyd.
Indeed, the country owes him an obligation for his measures as
Secretary of War for the defence of the
South which it can never repay.
He foresaw and foretold, as we know, the result of the sampaign in
Kentucky; and used his efforts to prevent, in some degree, the extent of our discomfiture there.
Pillow is a vam man, but a brave and patiotic one.
He is a man of talents and indomitable perseverance, and is entitled to some especial consideration on the score of the trouble and disquietude he gave
General Scott immediately after the
Mexican war. He annoyed the hero of
Lundy's Lane so much that he is said to have forgotten his wounds and failed to call attention to them for four whole weeks ! In the prolonged court-martial which he forced upon the
Lieutenant-General, he got the better of him all the time, and left him at the close not as much of consolation for the tribulation he had endured as may be contained in a grain of mustard seed.
Scott has more vanity than
Pillow, (1) but also more sensitiveness.
So
Pillow, who is very smart, established a raw upon the towering General that gave him more pain than all his other wounds combined.
Everybody hopes that men who have really deserved so much of their country may be assigned, at the earliest possible moment, to duty.
The country is in peril, and it is no time to lose the services of any man.
