Without doubt this would have been a judicious course to pursue, but it was not for Jackson to initiate such a movement.  He had been ordered by General Lee to move along the road to White Oak Swamp, to endeavour to force his way to the Long Bridge road, to guard Lee’s left flank from any attack across the fords or bridges of the lower Chickahominy, and to keep on that road until he received further orders.  These further orders he never received; and it was certainly not his place to march to the Charles City road until Lee, who was with Longstreet, sent him instructions to do so.  “General Jackson,” says Dr. McGuire, “demanded of his subordinates implicit, blind obedience.  He gave orders in his own peculiar, terse, rapid way, and he did not permit them to be questioned.  He obeyed his own superiors in the same fashion.  At White Oak Swamp he was looking for some message from General Lee, but he received none, and therefore, as a soldier, he had no right to leave the road which had been assigned to him.  About July 18, 1862, the night before we started to Gordonsville, Crutchfield, Pendleton (assistant adjutant-general), and myself were discussing the campaign just finished.  We were talking about the affair at Frayser’s Farm, and wondering if it would have been better for Jackson with part of his force to have moved to Longstreet’s aid.  The general came in while the discussion was going on, and curtly said:  “If General Lee had wanted me he could have sent for me.”  It looked the day after the battle, and it looks to me now, that if General Lee had sent a staff officer, who could have ridden the distance in forty minutes, to order Jackson with three divisions to the cross roads, while D.H.  Hill and the artillery watched Franklin, we should certainly have crushed McClellan’s army.  If Lee had wanted Jackson to give direct support to Longstreet, he could have had him there in under three hours.  The staff officer was not sent, and the evidence is that General Lee believed Longstreet strong enough to defeat the Federals without direct aid from Jackson."* (* Letter to the author.) Such reasoning appears incontrovertible.  Jackson, be it remembered, had been directed to guard the left flank of the army “until further orders.”  Had these words been omitted, and he had been left free to follow his own judgment, it is possible that he would have joined Huger on the Charles City road with three divisions.  But in all probability he felt himself tied down by the phrase which Moltke so strongly reprobates.  Despite Dr. McGuire’s statement Jackson knew well that disobedience to orders may sometimes be condoned.  It may be questioned whether he invariably demanded “blind” obedience.  “General,” said an officer, “you blame me for disobedience of orders, but in Mexico you did the same yourself.”  “But I was successful,” was Jackson’s reply; as much as to say that an officer, when he takes upon himself the responsibility of ignoring the explicit instructions of his superior, must be morally certain