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the enemy, and prepared them to run the moment our people showed a bold front, which it required all Ord's efforts and some time to get them to do. Ord says if they had charged when he first ordered them, he would have captured the whole battery and lots of prisoners.
You will see therefore that the result proves the justness of my prediction.
Owing to the success of our artillery, the men were gotten up to the charging point.
Had the artillery of the enemy been served as ours was, and committed the same devastation, he could not have kept his command together five minutes. In other words, it is success in the beginning of an action which keeps volunteers together, and disaster or being checked is sure to throw them into confusion or cause them to run.
Among the wounded was an officer, and from his person was taken a letter which was evidently written by a person of intelligence and position.
It speaks of their fortifications at Centreville, says they are prepared for McClellan's attack, that whilst they know an attack from him would be a military faux pas and cannot but result disastrously, yet their hopes are based upon the knowledge of the pressure that is being brought to bear on him by the people of the North, who are ignorant of war and deluded with an overweening sense of their own power and a blind contempt for their enemy.
This letter has been sent to McClellan.
We have heard nothing from them since our return.
Sunday, December 22.
We have nothing new since the Dranesville affair, of which the papers will give you a full account.
It is said McClellan is very much pleased, and McCall now expects to be reinstated in favor.
I suppose, if I applied, I might get a forty-eight-hours' leave and spend a day with you; but what would be our feelings if during that time anything were to occur and my brigade be in action without me?
The uncertainty of affairs, and the impossibility of foreseeing what is going to take place even twenty-four hours ahead, prevent me from making any application.
I wrote to you some days ago to distribute * * * among the children, which I hope they will receive in time to make their Christmas purchases.
It is my wish that they should have everything done for them to promote healthy enjoyment, and that the season of childhood, the brightest of our existence, should be to them as happy as we can make it, knowing that sorrows, cares and anxieties will do 