He gave his orders from one point to another, so that when General Halleck, who was then in military command, was notified by Mr. Lincoln that the whole force was to be moved from the Mississippi up the Tennessee river he stood ready for the movement. In February, 1862, the armies moved up the Tennessee, then to Fort Donelson, and then back up the Tennessee to Hamburgh, and two miles from there they fought the battle of Pittsburgh Landing, as pointed out in my plan. Had the movement been strictly carried out from the foot of the Muscle Shoals, in Alabama, Vicksburgh could have been reduced, or Mobile, and the whole thing ended in the spring of 1862 as easily as in 1865, and with the same result. In a recent publication General Sherman has admitted this fact. At the fall of Fort Henry the country was thoroughly aroused as it never had been before. It was clearly seen that the end was approaching. Richmond was then within reach through Tennessee. For this General McClellan had been waiting. Before this no power on earth could have captured Richmond, and no one knew this better than General McClellan. When the National armies had penetrated into the heart of the South, within two miles of the Memphis and Charleston railroad, the result was plain to every mind. The old flag displayed in the presence of a million of slaves, who had before been necessarily on the side of their owners, made the fact doubly secure. All hearts were jubilant, and Roscoe Conkling then offered his celebrated resolutions in the House of Representatives to ascertain who it was that had designed these military movements so fruitful in great results; whether they came from Washington or elsewhere; by whom they were designed and what they were intended to accomplish. Judge Olin replied that if it was Mr. Conkling's design to find out who had done this work he could learn by inquiring at the War Department, for certainly the Secretary of War or the President must know all about it; but it was sufficient for the present to know that some one had designed these movements, and that the country was now in the enjoyment of the blessings that had resulted from them. Hon. Thaddeus Stevens moved that the resolutions of Mr. Conkling, making inquiry, be referred to the Military Committee of the House. During the discussion the plan was attributed to one person and another, but no satisfactory proof could be given on any side. I was present through it all and could at any moment have satisfied Congress and the world as to the authorship of the plan, but from prudential reasons I refrained from uttering a word. It was decided to refer the question to the Military Committee of the House, and there the matter slept."