William Alexander Linn, Horace Greeley Founder and Editor of The New York Tribune

[188] but on raw recruits, hurriedly summoned from peaceful pursuits, and who had to be organized, drilled, fed, and sheltered under the direction of officers who were themselves without experience, save what some of them had been taught in the military school. But when a war begins, both sides are generally confident, and the desire of the public is for speedy action. It was so in 1861, and the Tribune soon gave voice to this desire by printing, day after day, on its editorial page, the following advice:

When the advance was made, and the disaster of Bull Run followed, Greeley and the Tribune incurred what might be called a national denunciation. “The battle of Bull Run,” says Parton, “nearly cost the editor of the Tribune his life. Mr. Greeley was almost beside himself with horror,” to which “was added, perhaps, some contrition for having permitted the paper to goad the Government into an advance which events showed to ”