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[We had intended to have published in this No. of our Papers
General Longstreet's letter to the
Philadelphia Times. For while we are, of course, under no obligation to
copy what is published elsewhere, we are desirous of getting at the whole truth, and wish to give every side a fair hearing.
But the great length of
General Longstteet's article compells us to postpone it for another issue.
Meantime,
General Longstreet's paper has been widely circulated, and it is due to fairness and a proper desire to aid the seach for truth that we should give, as we do without note or comment of our own, the following rejoinder of
General Early.]
After the foregoing review was in the hands of the printer, an article entitled “The campaign of
Gettysburg,” purporting to be by
General James Longstreet, appeared in the
Philadelphia Weekly Times of November the 3rd, which requires some notice at my hands.
That article is not from
General Longstreet's own pen, as is very apparent to those who are familiar with his style of writing, and of the fact I have the assurance from a quarter that leaves no doubt on the subject.
The data and material for the article, however, were furnished by him and put in form by another.
Ie is therefore responsible for its statements and utterances.
The excuse for the appearance of the article is stated as follows:
After giving a letter, written on the 24th of July, 1863, to his uncle, he says:
I sincerely regret that I cannot still rest upon that letter.
But I have been so repeatedly and so rancorously assailed by those whose intimacy with the Commanding-General in that battle gives an apparent importance to their assaults, that I feel impelled by a sense of duty to give to the public a full and comprehensive narration of the campaign from its beginning to its end; especially when I reflect that the publication of the truth cannot now, as it might have done then, injure the cause for which we fought the battle.
The temper towards
General Lee in which the article was written, or rather procured to be written, is shown by the following extract from an editorial notice of some additions to the article received after it was in print, contained in the same number of the
Times: