Winfield Scott's First Battle

By the time of the Civil War Gen. Winfield Scott, hero of the Mexican War and veteran of the War of 1812 and various Indian wars, was too old and infirmed to take the field as an army commander. He did provide valuable advice to President Lincoln and was largely responsible for shaping Union strategy early in the war. This story, taken from a period newspaper, describes Scott's first engagement.

Gen. Winfield Scott

One of Winfield Scott’s schoolmasters, James Hargrove, a Quaker, labored hard to curb the passion and mould the character of young Winfield to usefulness and virtue. This excellent man was of small stature and greatly esteemed by his pupils. One day, when Scott was about eighteen years old, he chanced to see, at a public gathering, his master undergoing a severe handling by a half-drunken bully on a charge of having run a false division line (as county line surveyor). The Quaker acted as a consistent non-combatant and his assailant had it all his own way till young Scott came up, and by a single blow, brought him to the ground, stunned, and nearly sobered. The fellow, being allowed to rise, now advanced upon the stripling, and the Quaker, true to his principles, jumped between the combatants. Finding his friend the more belligerent party, he seized and so encumbered him that the bully partially hit him several times, when, by a sudden movement, the Quaker was thrown off and the bully again flattened.

The noise caused a crowd to rush to the spot and when the original cowardly attack became known, the bystanders were so indignant that the Quaker and his pupil had to exert the greatest efforts to save the bully from further punishment and perhaps death. When the master and pupil met again sometime afterwards, the former expressed his congratulations in reference to this affair in true Quaker style: “Friend Winfield, I always told  thee not to fight; but, as thou wouldst fight, I am glad that thou were not beaten.”