That day Lee began his offensive. McClellan retreated, but instead of returning to his base at White House Landing on the Pamunkey River, he moved south to Harrison’s Landing on the James, 35 miles from Richmond, where Union gunboats could fend off pursuers. On June 30, as the fighting raged and news from the front was scarce, Lincoln called at the Patent Office, where D. W. Bartlett saw him with “a peculiar look of pain, anxiety and discouragement on his countenance.” In the final battle of the Seven Days, at Malvern Hill, Lee rashly hurled his men against an exceptionally strong Union position from which artillery cut the attackers down; their bodies covered the field like windrows. (The doomed assault grimly foreshadowed George Pickett’s charge at Gettysburg one year and two days later.) Instead of following up with a counterattack that might well have allowed him to capture Richmond, McClellan retreated to Harrison’s Landing, where he established a new base. In doing so, he abandoned 2,500 wounded men and destroyed tons of precious material. As the bad news poured into Washington, Lincoln summoned Gustavus Fox, an excellent raconteur, whose amusing anecdotes cheered him up.
Source: Abraham Lincoln ∶ A Life ▫𓂃