To George G. Meade1Jump to section
My dear Sir: Washington, March 29. 1864.
Your letter to Col. Townsend, inclosing a slip from the Herald, and asking a Court of Inquiry, has been laid before [me] by the Secretary of War, with the request that I would consider it. It is quite natural that you should feel some sensibility on the subject; yet I am not impressed, nor do I think the country is impressed, with the belief that your honor demands, or the public interest demands, such an Inquiry. The country knows that, at all events, you have done good service; and I believe it agrees with me that it is much better for you [to] be engaged in trying to do more, than to be diverted, as you necessarily would be, by a Court of Inquiry. Yours truly A. LINCOLN
Annotation
[1] ALS, NHi. On March 15, 1864, General Meade wrote Assistant Adjutant General Edward D. Townsend:
``I inclose herewith a slip from the New York Herald, containing a communication signed `Historicus,' purporting to give an account of the battle of Gettysburg. . . . For the past fortnight the public press . . . has been teeming with articles, all having for their object assaults upon my reputation as an officer, and tending to throw discredit upon my operations at Gettysburg. . . .
``I have not noticed any of these attacks, and should not now . . . but that the character of the communication . . . bears such manifest proofs that it was written either by some one present at the battle, or dictated . . . and having access . . . to confidential papers that were never issued to the army, much less made public.
``I cannot resist the belief that this letter was either written or dictated by Maj. Gen. D. E. Sickles. . . .
``I have to ask, therefore, that the Department will take steps to ascertain whether . . . Sickles has authorized or indorses this communication, and, in the event of his replying in the affirmative, I have to request of the President . . . a court of inquiry. . . .'' (OR, I, XXVII, I, 127-28).
The three-column clipping from the New York Herald of March 12, 1864,