“I would cheerfully take the dictatorship and agree to lay down my life when the country is saved;” while in the same letter he adds, with the most naive unconsciousness of his hallucination:  “I am not spoiled by my unexpected new position.”

Coming to the national capital in the hour of deepest public depression over the Bull Run defeat, McClellan was welcomed by the President, the cabinet, and General Scott with sincere friendship, by Congress with a hopeful eagerness, by the people with enthusiasm, and by Washington society with adulation.  Externally he seemed to justify such a greeting.  He was young, handsome, accomplished, genial and winning in conversation and manner.  He at once manifested great industry and quick decision, and speedily exhibited a degree of ability in army organization which was not equaled by any officer during the Civil War.  Under his eye the stream of the new three years’ regiments pouring into the city went to their camps, fell into brigades and divisions, were supplied with equipments, horses, and batteries, and underwent the routine of drill, tactics, and reviews, which, without the least apparent noise or friction, in three months made the Army of the Potomac a perfect fighting machine of over one hundred and fifty thousand men and more than two hundred guns.

Recognizing his ability in this work, the government had indeed given him its full confidence, and permitted him to exercise almost unbounded authority; which he fully utilized in favoring his personal friends, and drawing to himself the best resources of the whole country in arms, supplies, and officers of education and experience.  For a while his outward demeanor indicated respect and gratitude for the promotion and liberal favors bestowed upon him.  But his phenomenal rise was fatal to his usefulness.  The dream that he was to be the sole savior of his country, announced confidentially to his wife just two weeks after his arrival in Washington, never again left him so long as he continued in command.  Coupled with this dazzling vision, however, was soon developed the tormenting twofold hallucination:  first, that everybody was conspiring to thwart him; and, second, that the enemy had from double to quadruple numbers to defeat him.

For the first month he could not sleep for the nightmare that Beauregard’s demoralized army had by a sudden bound from Manassas seized the city of Washington.  He immediately began a quarrel with General Scott, which, by the first of November, drove the old hero into retirement and out of his pathway.  The cabinet members who, wittingly or unwittingly, had encouraged him in this he some weeks later stigmatized as a set of geese.  Seeing that President Lincoln was kind and unassuming in discussing military questions, McClellan quickly contracted the habit of expressing contempt for him in his confidential letters; and the feeling rapidly grew until it reached a mark of open disrespect.  The same trait manifested itself in his making exclusive confidants of only two or three of his subordinate generals, and ignoring the counsel of all the others; and when, later on, Congress appointed a standing committee of leading senators and representatives to examine into the conduct of the war, he placed himself in a similar attitude respecting their inquiry and advice.