Soldiers, I regret to leave you. Most sincerely I thank you for the regard and confidence you have invariably shown me. I deeply regret that I shall not have the honor to lead you to the victory which you are just about to win, but I shall claim to share with you in the joy of every triumph, and trust always to be fraternally remembered by my companions in arms. J. C. FREMONT, Major-General, U. S. Army. 285 He left at once for St Louis, with his Body Guard for an escort. Though these men had been enlisted for three years, they were ordered by Gen. McClellan to be mustered out, and Maj. Zagonyi was offered the Colonelcy of a new regiment. The time and manner of the removal enabled Gen. Fremont's ardent partisans to complain loudly that he was relieved on the eve of a battle in which he would have accomplished great things, and was thus denied an opportunity to achieve lasting fame and render essential service to the country. The evidence, however, is conclusive that at that time Price was at Pineville, fully 50 miles away, and in the midst of a very rough country, instead of being in Fremont's immediate front, as Fremont certainly supposed. Whether he would have accepted battle after Fremont had reached him at Pineville, is a matter of conjecture. The pressure in favor of Fremont continued strong enough, however, to bring about the offer of a new command to him the following year, but it was grotesquely shrunken from the proud proportions of that from which he had been relieved. It was styled the Mountain Department, and embraced a large portion of West Virginia. Even in this restricted area he again failed to give satisfaction. June 8, 1862, he fought an indecisive battle against Stonewall Jackson at Cross Keys, took umbrage at being placed under the command of Gen. John Pope, whom he had once commanded, asked to be relieved from command, and joined the ranks of the bitter critics of President Lincoln's Administration, though still retaining his commission and pay as a Major-General. He still thought his was a name to conjure with, and May 31,1864, accepted the nomination for President from a convention of dissatisfied Republicans assembled at Cleveland, resigning his commission at last, June 4, 1864. 286 The chill reception with which the country received his nomination at last disillusionized even him, and in September he withdrew from the field, to clear the way for Lincoln's re-election. He then became connected with the promotion of a Pacific railway over the southern of the routes which he had surveyed, lost his money and property in the course of time, appealed to Congress for relief, and in 1890 was by special act put on the retired list of the Army with the rank of Major-General. 237 CHAPTER XIV. THE SAD RETREAT FROM SPRINGFIELD.