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GENERAL GRANT TO FITZ JOHN PORTER.

REASONS WHY HIS MIND UNDERWENT A CHANGE——HOPING FOR PORTER'S VINDICATION.

General Grant has written the following letter to General Fitz John Porter:
 
New-York, Nov. 3, 1883.

General F.J. Porter, Morristown, N.J.

DEAR GENERAL: As there is now some discussion as to the probable reasons for my change of mind in regard to your case, now pending before the people of the United States, I deem it proper that I should give them myself.

In the first place, I never believed you to be a traitor, as many affected to believe. I thought I knew you too well to believe for one moment that you would accept the pay, rank and command you held for the purpose of betraying the cause you were professing to serve. Then, too, your services had been too conspicuous as a staff officer at the beginning of the war, and as a commander of troops later, to support such a theory for a moment.

But, I did believe that General Pope was so odious to some of the officers in the East that a cordial support was not giben him by them. I was disposed too accept the verdict of a court martial composed as the one which tried you was. Some of the members of that court I knew personally and had great confidence in their judgement and justice. I supposed you had shared in this feeling toward Pope, and, while not more guilty than others, you were unfortunate in being placed in a position where specifications could be made showing this hostility.

After the close of the war, when I was requested to read your new defence, I read it with the feeling above described. At the same time I read the other side as prepared——or furnished——by General Pope. This gave maps showing the positions of the two armies substantially as shown by the first of the diagrams presented by Mr. Lord, of San Francisco——from whom I copied in the article in your case——and did not indicate the presence of any other force than Jackson's. Then, too, it appeared that you had actually received an order at about 5 or half past 5 in the afternoon of August 29 to attack the enemy's flank, and that too, at a time when a fierce battle was raging in the front. I was first shaken in my views, however, when such a man as General Tery, who unites the lawyer with the soldier and man of high character and ability, and who had believed as I had——and possibly worse——after many weeks of investigation, should entirely vindicate you, and be sustained, too, by men of the known ability of his colleagues on the board. Until in 1881 I re-examined for myself, my belief was that on the 29th of August 1862, a great battle was fought between General Pope, commanding the Union forces, and General Jackson, commanding the Confederate forces, that you with a corps of twelve or more thousand men stood in a position across the right flank of Jackson, and where you could easily get into his rear; that you received an order to do so about 5 or half-past 5 o'clock, which you refused to obey because of clouds of dust in your front, which, you contended, indicated an enemy in superior force to you; that you allowed Pope to get beaten while you stood idly looking on without raising an arm to help him. With this understanding and without a doubt as to the correctness of it, I condemned you. Now, on a full investigation fo the facts, I find that the battle was fought on the 30th of August; that your corps, commanded directly by you in person, lost a greater percentage than any other corps engaged; that the half-past 4 order of the day before did not reach you until nightfall; that your immediate superior had cautioned you early in the day that you were too far out to the front then; that General Pope had cautioned you against bringing on an engagement except under such circumstances as he described, and that in any event you must be prepared to fall back behind Bull Run that night, where it would be necessary for you to be to receive supplies; that from 11 o'clock of the 29th you were confronted by a force of twice your own number, of whose presence you had positive proof while General Pope did not know of it.
This last fact is shown by the wording of the half-past four order. It directed you to attack the enemy's right and to get into his rear. General Pope's circular of the morning of the 29th said that General Lee was advancing by way of Thoroughfare Gap. At the rate at which he was moving he would be up the night of the 30th or morning of the 31st. In his testimony before the court-martial which tried you he said, under oath, that he did not know of the arrival of Lee's command until 6 o'clock of the 29th, an hour and a half after he had dictated the order for your attack. His circular and testimony prove conclusively that Johnson and Jackson alone was the enemy he intended you to attack. Your knowledge of this fact, as well as of the fact that you had another force, quite double yours in addition, in your front, would have been sufficient justification for your not attacking, even if the order had been received in time. Of course this would not apply if a battle had been raging between Jackson and Pope. At the hour you received the order all was quiet.
 
This very short, hastily written and incomplete summary shows why and when my mind underwent a change. I have no doubt now but the change would have taken place in 1867 if I had then made an investigation. I regret now that I did not understand your case then as I do now. Your whole life since your trial, as well as your services before, disproves the great burden of the charges then sustained by a court-martial. As long as I have a voice it shall be raised in your support, without any reference to the effect upon me or others. Your restoration to the Army simply I would regard as a very inadequate and unjust reparation. While men——one at least——have been restored to the Army because of their gallantry and wounds after conviction and sentence not only to be dismissed, but to be continued in a penitentiary, and when there is no doubt of their guilt, and given all their pay for the years they were out of the service, I can see no reason for your having less. I hope for you a thorough vindication, not only by Congress, but in the minds of your countrymen.

Faithfully yours,   
U. S. Grant.
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with snow. I went to my studio and painted on a copy of the picture of my mother painted after death. Edith Cook came up on the W.S. evening train to spend a day or two with Sara 

... He delivered his address sitting 

Transcription Notes:
I transcribed the beginning of the last sentence to complete the hyphenated word with the last syllable from the following page. The preceding section of the writing after the clipping has to be transcribed still.