Hey everyone, welcome to the 75th episode of our Civil War podcast. I'm Rich.

I'm Tracy. Hello y'all. Thanks for tuning into the podcast. Last week we started to look at the ordeal of Brigadier General Charles Stone.

And in connection with that, we also spent a bit of time talking about the joint committee on the conduct of the war.

This week will continue with General Stone story.

We've already mentioned how Stone earned the enmity of two powerful Republicans, both from Massachusetts, Governor John Andrew and Senator Charles Sumner.

Sumner would use his influence with the committee on the conduct of the war to ensure Stone's downfall.

After its creation in December 1861, one of the first items on the committee's agenda was investigating the disastrous federal defeat at Ballsbluff.

The officer most to blame for the debacle, Colonel Edward Baker, had been a sitting U.S. Senator and a personal friend of Abraham Lincoln.

Baker was killed during the battle and turned into a martyred hero, so the committee searched for a scapegoat for the defeat settled upon Baker's superior officer, Charles Stone.

And so, unfortunately for Charles Stone, the committee's desire to assign blame for Ballsbluff and Senator Sumner's wish to settle a personal score coalesced and the result was a travesty of an investigation.

Stone never really had a chance.

Between December 27, 1861 and February 27, 1862, the committee examined 39 witnesses, few of whom had actually been present at Ballsbluff.

Two of the witnesses were men with personal grudges against Stone.

One was an officer who had already been cashiered and the other was an officer who would be cashiered in May 1862.

Although both had been disciplined quite rightly by Stone for various offenses against military discipline, the committee nonetheless allowed both men to testify against him.

Both men went so far as to question Stone's loyalty to the Union and to claim that he was a secret secessionist.

In fact, the committee members asked witnesses leading questions which encouraged them to second-guess Stone's decisions and to question both his competence and loyalty.

Not a single witness could give any actual direct evidence of Stone's disloyalty, but then weighed in his colleagues on the committee refused to be deterred.

Even heurstite testimony was treated as legitimate evidence.

The committee members had convinced themselves that the disaster at Ballsbluff had been no accident and they only gave weight to evidence that confirmed their suspicions that blamed the defeat on Stone and painted a picture of Colonel Baker being a victim, not of his own rashness, but of a betrayal by his superior officer.

On January 27, three of the committee members met with the new Secretary of War Edwin Stanton to present the evidence against Stone.

The next day, January 28, Stanton ordered George McClellan to relieve Stone of his command, arrest him and hold him, quote, in close custody until further orders end quote.

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