I was again back at the "Cedars," after the rapid and shifting scenes
which I have endeavored to place before the reader.
The tragic incidents befalling the actors in this drama, had most
absorbed my attention; but sitting now in my tent, with the newspapers
before me, I looked at the fight in which I had participated, from the
general and historic point of view.
That heavy advance on the Boydton road, beyond Lee's right, had been
simultaneous with a determined assault on the Confederate left, north
of James River, and on Lee's centre opposite Petersburg; and now the
extracts from Northern journals clearly indicated that the movement was
meant to be decisive.
"I have Richmond by the throat!" General Grant had telegraphed; but
there was good ground to believe that the heavy attack, and the
eloquent dispatch, were both meant to "make capital" for the
approaching Presidential election.
These memoirs, my dear reader, are written chiefly to record some
incidents which I witnessed during the war. I have neither time nor
space for political comments. But I laid my hand yesterday, by
accident, on an old number of the _Examiner_ newspaper; and it chanced
to contain an editorial on the fight just described, with some
penetrating views on the "situation" at that time.
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