New York Tribune journalist Henry E. Wing struggled through Union lines to report the Union defeat at the Battle of the Wilderness in early May 1864. Union troops held him at Union Mills, until a telegram arrived that asked Wing to tell President Lincoln where General Grant was now located. Wing offered to report everything he knew in return for permission to file a 100-word report on the battle. In Wing's own words:
"A locomotive was sent down for me, and about two o'clock in the morning I reached the White House, where the President had gathered his official family to meet me. As I stepped into the room where they were seated my glance caught a quick gleam of surprise and apprehension in Mr. Lincoln's eyes, and I was awakened to a sense of my disreputable appearance. My hair was disheveled, my shabby old coat was dusty and wrinkled, my pantaloons, much too long, were folded back at the bottom and gathered about my ankles with pieces of cotton twine, and my coarse shoes were coated three or four layers thick with 'sacred soil.' I had met, perhaps, every one of this company at public functions or in private interviews, but not one of them recognized me in this garb. As my glance swept around the group it rested on the genial countenance of a particular friend, Mr. Gideon Welles, of Hartford, Connecticut, the Honorable Secretary of the Navy. As I advanced and accosted him he identified me by my voice. He then presented me, with much embarrassing formality, to the others."
"A half hour or more was spent in description of the movements of the troops, and in explanation, from a large map on the wall, of the situation at the time when I left. Then, as the company was dispersing, I turned to Mr. Lincoln, and said: Mr. President, I have a personal word for you."
"The others withdrew and he closed the door and advanced toward me. As he stood there I realized as never before how tall he was. I looked up into his impassive face, ready to deliver Grant's message. He took a short, quick step toward me, and, stooping to bring his eyes level with mine, whispered, in tones of intense, impatient interest, 'What is it?'"
"I was so moved that I could hardly stammer: General Grant told me to tell you, from him, that, whatever happens, there is to be no turning back."
"The vision that opened through those wonderful eyes from a great soul glowing with a newly kindled hope is the likeness of Mr. Lincoln that I still hold in my memory, and ever shall. And that hope was never to be extinguished. Others had 'turned back.' Every other one had. But there had come an end of that fatal folly."
"Mr. Lincoln put his great, strong arms about me and, carried away in the exuberance of his gladness, imprinted a kiss upon my forehead. We sat down again; and then I disclosed to him, as I could not do except in the light of that pledge of the great commander, all the disheartening details of that dreadful day in the wilderness. But I could assure him that the Army of the Potomac, in all its history, was never in such hopeful spirit as when they discovered, as the close of a day of disappointment, that they were not to 'turn back.
Bonus: Winfield Scott, Ulysses S. Grant, William Sherman, John A. Schofield
(Nelson A. Miles served as a two-star general in the Civil War, but was only made three star, or Lieutenant General, in 1900.)
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