“The military value of a partisan’s work is not measured by the amount of property destroyed, or the number of men killed or captured, but by the number he keeps watching.  Every soldier withdrawn from the front to guard the rear of an army is so much taken from its fighting strength.

“I endeavored, as far as I was able, to diminish this aggressive power of the army of the Potomac, by compelling it to keep a large force on the defensive.  I assailed its rear, for there was its most vulnerable point.  My men had no camps.  If they had gone into camp, they would soon have all been captured....  A blow would be struck at a weak or unguarded point, and then a quick retreat.  The alarm would spread through the sleeping camp, the long roll would be beaten or the bugles would sound to horse, there would be mounting in hot haste and a rapid pursuit.  But the partisans generally got off with their prey.  Their pursuers were striking at an invisible foe.  I often sent small squads at night to attack and run in the pickets along a line of several miles.  Of course, these alarms were very annoying, for no human being knows how sweet sleep is but a soldier.  I wanted to use and consume the Northern cavalry in hard work.  I have often thought that their fierce hostility to me was more on account of the sleep I made them lose than the number we killed and captured.”

* * * * *

“My purpose was to weaken the armies invading Virginia, by harassing their rear.  As a line is only as strong as its weakest point, it was necessary for it to be stronger than I was at every point, in order to resist my attacks....  It is just as legitimate to fight an enemy in the rear as in front.  The only difference is in the danger.  Now, to prevent all these things from being done, heavy detachments must be made to guard against them.”

* * * * *

“The line that connects an army with its base of supplies is the heel of Achilles—­its most vital and vulnerable point.  It is a great achievement in war to compel an enemy to make heavy detachments to guard it....”

* * * * *

“Having no fixed lines to guard or defined territory to hold, it was always my policy to elude the enemy when they came in search of me, and carry the war into their own camps.”

* * * * *

“These operations were erratic simply in not being in accordance with the fixed rules taught by the academies; but in all that I did there was a unity of purpose, and a plan which my commanding general understood and approved.”

* * * * *