One of General McClellan's severest critics, Gen. John G. Barnard, in an elaborate review of the campaign, wrote: "It was a blunder unparalleled to expose Porter's corps to fight a battle by itself on the 27th against overwhelming forces of the enemy. With perfect ease that corps might have been brought over on the night of the 26th, and, if nothing more brilliant could have been thought of, the movement to the James might have been in full tide of execution on the 27th. A more propitious moment could not have been chosen, for, besides Jackson's own forces, A. P. Hill's and Longstreet's corps were on the left bank of the Chickahominy on the night of the 26th. Such a movement need not have been discovered to the enemy till far enough advanced to insure success. At any rate, he could have done no better in preventing it than he actually did afterward.... He has spent weeks in building bridges which establish a close connection between the wings of his army, and then fights a great battle with a smaller fraction of his army than when he had a single available bridge, and that remote. He, with great labor, constructs 'defensive works' in order that he 'may bring the greatest possible numbers into action,' and again exhibits his ability to utilize his means by keeping sixty-five thousand men idle behind them, while thirty-five thousand, unaided by 'defensive works' of any kind, fight the bulk of his adversary's forces, and are, of course, overwhelmed by 'superior numbers.' We believe there were few commanding officers of the Army of the Potomac who did not expect to be led offensively against the enemy on the 26th or 27th. Had such a movement been made, it is not improbable that, if energetically led, we should have gone into Richmond. Jackson and A. P. Hill could not have got back in time to succor Magruder's command, if measures of most obvious propriety had been taken to prevent them. We might have beaten or driven Magruder's twenty-five thousand men and entered Richmond, and then, reinforced by the great moral acquisition of strength this success would have given, have fought Lee and reëstablished our communications. At any rate, something of this kind was worth trying.... Our army is now concentrated on the James; but we have another day's fighting before us, and this day we may expect the concentrated attack of Lee's whole army. We know not at what hour it will come--possibly late, for it requires time to find out our new position and to bring together the attacking columns--yet we know not when it will come. Where, this day, is the commanding general? Off, with Captain Rodgers, to select 'the final positions of the army and its depots.' He does not tell us that it was on a gunboat, and that this day not even 'signals' would keep him in communication with his army, for his journey was ten or fifteen miles down the river; and he was thus absent till late in the afternoon. This is the first time we ever had reason to believe that