Major-General David Hunter was fixed upon as the right man to reform Siegel’s disordered army and correct his mistakes.  Hunter had patriotism enough, and no man doubted his courage.  He was earnest in the defense of right, even zealous in the cause of his country, and quick in the punishment of traitors, with whom he was not in very high favor.  The general took command of this disordered army, and so managed as to get a little discipline and some degree of order into it.  Now, it has always seemed to me, my son, that you could put a general to no more severe trial than to place him at the head of an army demoralized by the inefficiency of his predecessor and expect him to fight battles and gain victories.  And yet General Hunter did this and to the satisfaction of the country.  Had he been less active with the torch, his reward in history would have been much higher.

Well, my son, the general marched with his army, and reorganized it as he marched.  And he met the enemy, and he fought him, and fought him well, and whipped him well, and drove him back up the valley, to the very gates of Lynchburg.  But there, my son, he stopped.  His supplies had given out, and the enemy had detached a large force, and sent it to reinforce the rebel army at Lynchburg.  Our great Chief of Staff at Washington had promised that this should not be done, without timely notice being sent to Hunter.  But it was done, and done without any notice being sent by the Chief of Staff, whose spies were found wanting when most needed.  General Sheridan, too, was detached from the Army of the Potomac with two brigades of cavalry, and sent to form a junction with and succor Hunter.  But the Chief of Staff failed to send Hunter any information concerning this movement, and hence Hunter was kept in ignorance of its design.  Sheridan was driven back before superior numbers, and failed to carry out the plan of his instructions.  Had Hunter received information of this movement, he would not only have saved Sheridan from defeat, but, having formed a junction with him near Charlottesville, could leave beaten the enemy and gone where he pleased.  So much for what the Chief of Staff ought to have done but did not do.

Of course the gates of Lynchburg were swung wide open, and there was nothing for the famous Early, who commanded the rebel hosts, to do, but to come out and brush Hunter away from before them.  And he did this, and more than this.  He cut Hunter’s communications, and sent him flying over a different road, to the Ohio River, in search of supplies.

And it was now, my son, that the veritable Jubal, known to his old classmates at West Point as the late Mr. Early, saw the road open, and the great prize before him.  Scorning, as it were, to pursue Hunter, he marched directly for Washington by the most direct road.