ANTIETAM, VICKSBURG, GETTYSBURG.
It is true that while good strokes were made in the West, the East did not do her part to put down the foe¹ as soon as she might have done, and this was laid to lead-ers, for the troops were brave and read-y to fight when they had a chance.
What was called “The Pen-in-su-lar Cam-paign” made a start ’twixt the York Riv-er and the James Riv-er, on land which forms a pen-in-su-la.
Here through the spring and sum-mer of 1862, Mc-Clel-lan held large for-ces. There was much fight-ing, and at one time the Un-ion for-ces were with-in eight miles of Rich-mond, but in the end they had to fall back and with-draw from the Pen-in-su-la.
Pres-i-dent Lin-coln at length felt that Mc-Clel-lan was no match for the Con-fed-er-ate Gen-er-als, Lee and “Stone-wall” Jack-son. So he had to put a new man at the head of the ar-my in the East. This man was Gen. Pope who had done well in the West.
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Then came the sec-ond Bull Run fight, Au-gust 29 and 30, 1862. The foe won. Lin-coln found Pope “not up to the mark,” as a lead-er, and so put Mc-Clel-lan back once more.
It was on the 16th and 17th of Sept. 1862, that Mc-Clel-lan and Lee fought at An-tie-tam Creek², near Sharps-burg, in Ma-ry-land. This was one of the most se-vere bat-tles of the war. On Sept. 18, Lee with-drew a-cross the Po-to-mac, and Mc-Clel-lan slow-ly went af-ter him.
The Pres-i-dent had wait-ed in hopes that a “vic-to-ry” would come to the ar-my of the East, ere he made known his plan of free-ing slaves in some of the states. His own words are, “I had made a sol-emn vow³ to God that if Lee were driv-en back from Ma-ry-land I would crown the re-sult by a dec-la-ra-tion of free-dom to the slaves.”
So when the An-tie-tam fight came, and Lee and troops were driv-en back from Ma-ry-land, it gave so much hope to the Un-ion cause that Lin-coln felt it was the time to send forth⁴ the “draft” he made two months be-fore. This pa-per said that on the first day of Jan-u-a-ry, 1863, all slaves in those states which had left the
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 Un-ion should be free. The slaves in those states which had not gone off, such as Mis-sou-ri and Ken-tuc-ky, were not then to be free.
It had been thought by some that harm would come from this pa-per, but it did not. It was a wise move, and a bold one, and brought much good.

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