“I know them well,” said Cump. “Jefferson Davis, George Pendleton, McClellan, Lee, Stanton, Braxton Bragg, and Dick Taylor. They are all Whigs-turned-Democrats who share the late Stephen Douglas’ vision of a ‘Confederate Union of Sovereign States.’ That means talking up the theory of States Rights while maintaining the National Authority with an iron hand. It’s what Thomas Jefferson and James Madison did to New England with the Embargo. It’s what Andrew Jackson did with South Carolina during the Nullification Crisis. Jefferson Davis will follow that tradition of talking ‘States Rights’ while lowering the boom on any state that tries to exercise them!”
“We have two issues to settle here, then,” said Thad Stevens. He stopped tapping his cane. “The first is what to do about getting the Confederates out of New England. That is a question of how to fight a battle. The next, and larger question, is how do we fight the war. We’ve proven we can beat the Confederates on the battlefield. They’re can’t out-fight us, so they’re out-strategizing us by attacking us where we’re defenseless. We’ve got to match their thinking on a strategic level or they will nibble us way to nothing even if we beat them on every battlefield.”
Lincoln stood up and walked to the center of the parlor and stood next to Cump to face the group.
“Thad, you presented these questions exactly as we need to understand them. As my itinerant schoolteacher used to say after each lesson during my ‘schooling by littles:’ Let’s sum it up. We’ve learned that the Confederate Union has mobilized larger armies than we have; that they have mobilized their economy to support those armies; and that they will not be easily discouraged from prosecuting their war against us. We will have to match them in raising armies and getting them into the field.”
“We have the same number of people they do,” replied Hamlin. “If they can put that many men in the field, then so can we.”
“At the moment we are less united than they are, though,” Lincoln reminded them. “We still have many Democratic voters who are not enthusiastic about our cause. We can only hope to win them over little by little. In the meantime we must rely on the voters who cast their ballots for us. We need to get substantially all of the able-bodied among those men into the field if we’re going to fight the Confederates in a fair proportion of numbers.”
“The rally at Columbus helped,” said John Sherman. “It drew enough men into our armies to defeat the Confederates on the Wabash.” He looked at his brother. “And it persuaded Cump to fight for us, which made a difference.”
“Thanks, John, for getting him up here,” acknowledged the President. “God only knows where we’d be if Lee had talked him into fighting for their side.”
“We need to organize more of these rallies with the President and the Heroes of Delphi,” suggested Senator Lyman Trumbull.
“Mr. Hay, talk to the governors about arranging a tour by the Heroes of Delphi accompanied by officials of this administration, possibly including myself,” said Lincoln. “Be sure to include Iowa and Minnesota. We need to be thinking more towards organizing our efforts in the Trans-Mississippi.”
“Excellent,” said Thad Stevens. “Now let’s return to the question of what we are going to do about the Confederates in New England. We have a reserve army in training in Albany. And it would seem that we have a surplus of men in Philadelphia and New York since those fronts are likely to remain quiet now that the Confederates have committed their National Army to New England.”
“What do you think, Cump?” asked the President. “Can we muster enough men from Albany and Philadelphia to drive the Confederates out of New England?”
Cump paced in a circle as he thought through how to explain the situation without appearing either defeatist or raising unrealistic expectations of success.
“Of course that will depend on how many men the Confederates have brought to New England and whether or not they make any mistakes in deploying them. The difficulty is that West Point trains its officers to have an eye for fortifying the best defensive ground. Recent improvements in artillery and rifled muskets have made frontal assaults against fortified positions a difficult proposition. The Confederates understand that and have adjusted their tactics to deception rather than direct attack. I expect that McClellan’s hope is that we will beat our brains out attacking him head-on.
“I think our best strategy now would be to nullify the Confederate hold on New England by evacuating our people out of there. If we get our people out of Boston it won’t be any more valuable to the Confederates than a piece of desert sand on the Llano Estado. Let the Confederates allocate their National Army to holding empty cities in New England. That will take their army out of the war as surely as if we had annihilated it to last man in battle. While their army sits idle we can use ours to strike them elsewhere.”
“We’re conceding Boston and the other New England ports to the enemy without a fight!” exclaimed Senator Sumner, shaking his head. “And we’re asking our people to march out of their homes to God-knows-where? That’s a tall order, even for people who are steadfastly loyal to us.”
“I don’t like it either,” concurred Thad Stevens, “But I would rather have those people working for us inside our lines than accommodating themselves to the Confederates as too many New Yorkers have decided to do. Let’s get those people inside our lines, trained as an army, and then execute Cump’s idea to strike the Confederates. The only way we’re finally going to get them off our territory is to make them tie their men down defending their own territory against our attacks.”
Lincoln raised his hand. “Let’s begin that discussion with the topic that this meeting was scheduled to address — Sherman’s plan to realign our forces in Indiana so as to push the Confederates back toward Louisville. Sherman, please explain your proposal.”
Cump positioned himself near the wall map.
“I proposed to the President that we should change commands in Indiana, promoting Schofield to command the army, while transferring McDowell to command Schofield’s division. I proposed that we should divide the reserve army around Chicago into two equal parts. We should send two divisions to Grant to replace his losses, and send the other two to Indiana, allowing us to pull Mitchel’s army out of the line.”
Sherman put his finger on the line from Indianapolis to Cincinnati, then traced the line from Cincinnati to Louisville along the Ohio River.
“We should garrison Cincinnati and the heights across the river in Kentucky. Then we should advance down the Ohio River and retake Madison. That will unhinge the Confederate line in Indiana.”
The Cabinet and Congressmen sat upright. Faces that had shown lines of worry over the news from New England brightened.
“It’s the same question on Fremont’s front,” added Lincoln. “Fremont wants to attack the Confederates either on the Delmarva or Shenandoah. I haven’t authorized Fremont to advance because I did not want to complicate the prospects of negotiating peace with the Confederates. But, as the Confederates have decided that peace is no longer on the table, then that reason for holding back Fremont has become moot.”
“I say turn him loose to advance as far as he is able,” advised Stevens. “ And tell him to liberate the slaves that come within his lines! We must set the slaves free to fight with us! We must force the Confederates to tie down their armies protecting every slave plantation within a hundred miles of the front. Every man they keep on station defending their own territory is one less they’ll have to send against us.”
“I agree,” said Lincoln. “But how can we expand the war to the enemies’ country while still doing what is necessary to protect our own? I do not honestly believe that we have so far managed the war satisfactorily from Cleveland. We’ve allocated too many men to the idle front at Philadelphia and too few for New England.”