Richmond Whig

CASE

Richmond,

Va., 11th Feb., 1864.

ADJ'T AND INSP'R GENL'S OFFICE,

RICHMOND, VA., Feb. 10, 1864.

GENERAL ORDERS, No.19.

The following address of the President is published for the information of the army.

By order.

S. COOPER,

(Signed) A. Adj't and Insp'r Gen'l.

Soldiers of the Armies of the Confederate States:

You have achieved many noble triumphs. You have won glorious victories over vastly more numerous hosts. You have cheerfully borne privations and toils to which you were unused. You have readily submitted to restraints upon your individual will, that the citizen might better perform his duty to the State as a soldier.—

To all these you have lately added another triumph, the noblest of human conquests—a victory over yourselves.

No mightier effort than this could have been expected from you: As the time drew near when you who first entered the service might claim relief from arduous labors and restoration to the endearments of home, you have heeded only the call of your suffering country. Again, you come to tender your services for the public defence—a free offering which only such patriotism as yours could make—a triumph worthy of you and of the cause to which you are devoted.

With heartfelt gratification I received the testimonials of confidence and regard with which you have recently addressed me. To some of those first received, separate acknowledgments were returned. But it is now apparent that a like generous enthusiasm pervades the whole army, and that cheerily the only exception to such magnanimous tender will be of those who, having originally entered for the war, cannot display anew their zeal in the public service. It is, therefore, deemed appropriate, and it is hoped will be equally acceptable, to make a general acknowledgment, instead of successive special responses.

Would that it were possible to render my thanks to you in person, and in the name of our common country, as well as in my own, while pressing the hand of each war-worn veteran, to recognize his title to your love, gratitude and admiration.

But, though this may not be done, you will not mistake the emotions which you have called forth, when I assure you of my profound gratitude. Separated from you by the duties of my position, and debarred from sharing with you in your dangers, your sufferings and your privations in the field. With pride and affection my heart has accompanied you in every advance upon the enemy, and in every retreat which your necessities required. With exultation it has marked your every heroic achievement, and with sorrow it has mourned your every noble sacrifice.

Yet, never in the toilsome march, nor in the weary watch, nor in the desperate assault, have you rendered a service so conspicuous in results as in this last display of the highest qualities of devotion and self-sacrifice which can adorn the character of the warrior patriot.

Already the pulse of the whole people beats in unison with yours. Already they compare your spontaneous and unanimous offer of your lives, for the defence of your Country, with the halting and reluctant service of the mercenaries who are purchased by the enemy at the price of higher bounties than have hitherto been known in war. Animated by this contrast, they exhibit clearer confidence and more resolute bearing. Even the murmurs of the weak and timid, who shrink from the trials which make strong, are silenced by the spectacle which you present. Your brave battle cry will ring loud and clear through the land of the enemy, as well as our own; will silence the vainglorious boastings of their corrupt partisans and pensioned press; and will do justice to the calumny by which they seek to persuade a deluded people that you are ready to purchase dishonorable safety by degrading submission.

Soldiers! The coming spring campaign will open under auspices well calculated to sustain your hopes. Your resolution needs nothing to fortify it. With ranks replenished under the influence of your example, and by the aid of your representatives, who give earnest of their purpose by legislation largely to your strength, you may come to the final struggle with the confidence justified by the memory of past victories. Of the issue there can be no doubt. Your enemy has no such incentive to action as that which animates you; and on the other hand, debt, taxation, repetition of heavy drafts, dissensions, the memory of past victories, occasioned by the strife for power, by the pursuit of the spoils of office, by the thirst for the plunder of the public treasury; and, above all, the consciousness of a bad cause, must tell with fearful force upon the over-strained energies of the enemy.

His campaign is hedged in on either side by the most formidable difficulties. Exhausted by the enormous demands of the war, his exhausted resources both in men and money, be far less formidable than those of the last two years, when unimpaired means were used with boundless prodigality, and with results which are suggested by the mention of the glorious names of Shiloh, and Perryville, and Murfreesboro', Fredericksburg, and Chancellorsville, and Chickamauga, and the Chickahominy, and Manassas, and Vicksburg.

Soldiers! Assured success awaits us in our holy struggle for Liberty and Independence, and for the preservation of all that renders life desirable to honorable men. When that success shall be achieved, it will be due, under Divine Providence, not to you alone, but to your children and your children's children in long generations to come, will enjoy blessings derived from you, that will preserve your memory ever-living in their hearts.

Citizens! defend the homes, the liberties and the altars of the Confederacy! That the God whom we all humbly worship may shield you with his Fatherly care, and preserve you for safe return to the peaceful enjoyment of your friends and the associations of those you most love, is the earnest prayer of your Commander-in-Chief.

JEFFERSON DAVIS.