, at which hour he sent a dispatch to Washington, and
then rode to the front ten or twelve miles away. The failure to be
"equal to the emergency" was not in his men. Twenty-four hours, as
it turned out, was the whole difference between saving and losing
Harper's Ferry with its ten or twelve thousand men and its
unestimated munitions and stores. It may be that the commanders of
the garrison were in fault, and that a more stubborn resistance
should have been made. It may be that Halleck ought to have ordered
the place to be evacuated earlier, as McClellan suggested.
Nevertheless, at noon of the 13th McClellan had it in his power to
save the place and interpose his army between the two wings, of the
Confederates with decisive effect on the campaign. He saw that it
was an "emergency," but did not call upon his men for any
extraordinary exertion. Harper's. Ferry surrendered, and Lee united
the wings of his army beyond the Antietam before the final and
general engagement was forced upon him.
At my camp in front of Middletown, I received no orders looking to a
general advance on the 14th; but only to support, by a detachment,
Pleasonton's cavalry in a reconnoissance toward Turner's Gap.
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