Summary:
General in Chief Winfield Scott writes George B. McClellan, commanding forces in West Virginia during July, 1861, regarding plans to advance on Staunton.

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Gen. McCLELLAN,
Beverly, Va.:

July 18, 1861.

Your suggestions in respect to Staunton would be admirable, like your other conceptions and acts, with support. McDowell yesterday drove the enemy beyond Fairfax Court-House. He will attack the entrenched camp at the Manassas Junction to-day. Beaten there, the enemy may retreat both upon Richmond and the Shenandoah Valley, where Patterson is doing nothing. He will lose eighteen regiments by discharges in about a week. I may re-enforce him in that time sufficiently to enable you, with him, to bag Johnston in that valley if the latter has not been permitted to send his principal force to Beauregard. If you come to Staunton, and McDowell's victory at the Junction be complete, he may, with Patterson, give you a hand about Winchester. I will telegraph you again to-day.

WINFIELD SCOTT.

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Bibliographic Information : Letter Reproduced from The War of The Rebellion: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series 1, Volume 2, Serial No. 2, Pages 743, Broadfoot Publishing Company, Wilmington, NC, 1997.