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The question of throwing troops into
Richmond is contingent upon reverses in the West and Southeast.
The immediate necessity for such a movement is not anticipated.
Very respectfully yours,
On the same day I sent the following telegram:
Your letter of the 13th received this day, being the first information of your retrograde movement.
I have no report of your reconnaissance, and can suggest nothing as to the position you should take except it should be as far in advance as consistent with your safety.
To further inquiry from
General Johnston as to where he should take position, I replied that I would go to his headquarters in the field, and found him on the south bank of the river, to which he had retired, in a position possessing great natural advantages.
An elevated bank commanded the north side of the river, overlooking the bridge, and an open field beyond it, across which the enemy must pass to reach the bridge, which, if left standing, was an invitation to seek that crossing.
Upon inquiring whether the south bank of the river continued to command the other side down to
Fredericksburg,
General Johnston answered that he did not know; that he had not been at
Fredericksburg since he passed there in a stage on his way to
West Point, when he was first appointed a cadet.
I then proposed that we should go to
Fredericksburg, to inform ourselves upon that point.
On arriving at
Fredericksburg, a reconnaissance soon manifested that the hills on the opposite side commanded the town and adjacent river bank, and therefore
Fredericksburg could only be defended by an army occupying the opposite hills, for which our force was inadequate.
In returning to the house of
Barton, where I was a guest, I found a number of ladies had assembled there to welcome me, and who, with anxiety, inquired as to the result of our reconnaissance.
Upon learning that the town was not considered defensible against an enemy occupying the heights on the other side, and that our force was not sufficient to hold those heights against such an attack as might be anticipated, the general answer was, with a self-sacrificing patriotism too much admired to be forgotten, “If the good of our cause requires the defense of the town to be abandoned, let it be done.”
The purposes of the enemy were then unknown to us. If
General Johnston's expectation of a hostile advance in great force should be realized, our
