George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Major-General United States Army
George Gordon Meade, Ed.

[101] There are many points in General Worth's character that I admire exceedingly. He is a gallant and brave soldier, but he wants ordinary judgment; he is irritable and deficient in self-command.

As to General Taylor, my feelings towards him are of a friendly nature, though among his most prominent defects is the entire and utter ignorance of the use to which the staff department can be put, and especially my own corps. Did he have his own way, we should be perfectly useless; not from any unfriendly feeling on his part towards us, but from absolute ignorance of what we can be required to do, and perfect inability to make any use of the information we do obtain. He has, however, with him some few officers upon whose judgment he relies, and they every now and then manage to argue him into employing us. Let one fact illustrate this. We arrived at our camp opposite Matamoras on the 28th of March; we broke it up on the 1st of May, remaining there one whole month. During this time, from the commencement to the end, my individual efforts were repeatedly made, as well as were those of other officers, to induce him to reflect upon the subject of bridges, and in the absence of a pontoon train, which Congress was debating about giving us, to call upon his engineer officers for plans for crossing the river with such materials as were at hand. All of us were ready to give our ideas, and to make the necessary preparations and experiments; but, no, the old gentleman would never listen or give it a moment's attention. The consequence was, when the enemy were routed, and the question asked him, could we get over the river, there were no preparations, and we were detained nine days, sending to Point Isabel after planks to make flats, and even then, had not the enemy retired and allowed us to cross with his own boats, we should have been twice as long getting over as we were. Here is the General's defect. Had he known how to use his engineers the month we were lying in camp, he would have had us at work experimenting, and when any plan proved successful, had a bridge constructed and put in depot, and then on the tenth, in three or four hours, the whole army, artillery and all, could have been crossed, and the Mexican army prevented from retreating with some twelve pieces of artillery.

This is only for yourself, for I am utterly opposed to telling tales out of school; but at the same time, if you wish to know my opinions, I must refer to facts to sustain them.

General Taylor is a gallant, brave old man, who knows not what fear is. Take him for all in all, however, I repeat what I have before