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A new Secret Service—the ‘military information bureau resting after the hard work of the Gettysburg campaign’
After Pinkerton's departure from the Army of the Potomac, the secret-service department was allowed to fall into hopeless neglect.
All organization vanished.
When General Hooker assumed command there was hardly a record or document of any kind at headquarters to give information of what the Confederates were doing.
Hooker was as ignorant of what was going on just across the Rappahannock as if his opponents had been in China.
With the energy that marked his entire course of organization, he put Colonel George H. Sharpe, of the 120th New York regiment, in charge of a special and separate bureau, known as Military Information.
Sharpe was appointed deputy provost-marshal-general.
From March 30, 1863, until the close of the war, the Bureau of Military Information, Army of the Potomac, had no other head.
Gathering a staff of keen-witted men, chiefly from the ranks, Sharpe never let his commanding
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general suffer for lack of proper information as to the strength and movements of Lee's army.
The Confederate advance into Pennsylvania, in June, taxed the resources of the bureau greatly.
Scouts and special agents, as well as signal-men, were kept in incessant action, locating and following the various detachments of the invading force.
It was a difficult matter to estimate, from the numerous reports and accounts received daily, just what Lee was trying to do. The return to Virginia brought some relief to the secret-service men. In August, while Lee hastened back to the old line of the Rapidan, Colonel Sharpe lay at Bealeton, and here the army photographer took his picture, as above, on the extreme left.
Next to him sits John C. Babcock; the right-hand figure is that of John McEntee, detailed from the 80th New York Infantry.
These men were little known, but immensely useful. |
