The Daily Dispatch: April 17, 1862., [Electronic resource]

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A year of War.

The North has been making war upon the South for a year. It begun the war at the wrong season — in the spring — although even then it promised itself entire success in sixty days. But the winter was the period when it had all to hope for, and when we had most to dread. It had the whole spring and summer to make ready, to build its armadas, to disciplines its hosts. It never doubted that by the end of the winter its power would be fairly established throughout the whole South. Its preparations and its efforts have been gigantic, its expenditures have been enormous. But the winter has come and gone, and the South remains as defiant as ever and indomitable. Even Virginia has not yet fallen in their hands. The city of Nashville is theirs, but they have met a Corinth. McClellan's enormous host is not yet in Richmond, which, if it fall into their hands, would be only a city of forty thousand inhabitants, not the Southern Confederacy. Nor is McClellan here yet. A lion is in his path. He has changed his front from the Potomac to the Peninsula; he may have to change again before long. Meantime the spring has come; the burning sun of the South will soon spread havoc among the invaders of the South, and the diseases of the climate will prove more terrible than an army with banners.