Stonewall Jackson and the American Civil War
[19] Balloons, which had been first used in the Peninsular campaign,
were not much dreaded by the Confederates. “The experience of twenty
months’ warfare has taught them how little formidable such engines of
war are.” Special Correspondent of the _Times_ at Fredericksburg,
January 1, 1863.
[20] O.R., vol. xxv, p. 306.
[21] O.R., vol. xxv, p. 764.
[22] _Memoirs of the Confederate War._ Heros von Boreke.
[23] O.R., vol. xxv, p. 324.
[24] O.R., vol. xxv, pp. 323, 336.
[25] _Ibid.,_ p. 326. The telegraph, however, appears to have worked
badly, and dispatches took several hours to pass from Falmouth to
Chancellorsville.
[26] _Ibid.,_ p. 327.
[27] The following letter (O.R., vol. xxv, p. 337) is interesting as
showing the state of mind into which the commanders of detached forces
are liable to be thrown by the absence of information:—
“Headquarters, First Corps, May 1, 1863.
“Major-General Sedgwick,—I think the proper view to take of affairs is
this: If they have not detached more than A. P. Hill’s division from
our front, they have been keeping up appearances, showing weakness,
with a view of delaying Hooker, and tempting us to make an attack on
their fortified position, and hoping to destroy us and strike for our
depôt over our bridges. We ought therefore, in my judgment, _to know
something of what has transpired on our right._
“JOHN F. REYNOLDS, _Major-General._”
[28] Dispatch of Chief of the Staff to Hooker, dated 4 p.m., May 1.
O.R., vol. xxv, p. 326.
Chapter XXIV
CHANCELLORSVILLE_ (continued)_
At a council of war held during the night at Chancellorville House, the
Federal generals were by no means unanimous as to the operations of the
morrow. Some of the generals advised an early assault. Others favoured
a strictly defensive attitude. Hooker himself wished to contract his
lines so as to strengthen them; but as the officers commanding on the
right were confident of the strength of their intrenchments, it was at
length determined that the army should await attack in its present
position.
Three miles down the plank road, under a grove of oak and pine, Lee and
Jackson, while their wearied soldiers slept around them, planned for
the fourth and the last time the overthrow of the great army with which
Lincoln still hoped to capture Richmond. At this council there was no
difference of opinion. If Hooker had not retreated before the
morning—and Jackson thought it possible he was already demoralised—he
was to be attacked. The situation admitted of no other course. It was
undoubtedly a hazardous operation for an inferior force to assault an
intrenched position; but the Federal army was divided, the right wing
involved in a difficult and unexplored country, with which the
Confederate generals and staff were more or less familiar, and an
opportunity so favourable might never recur. “Fortune,” says Napoleon,
“is a woman, who must be wooed while she is in the mood. If her favours
are rejected, she does not offer them again.” The only question was
where the attack should be delivered. Lee himself had reconnoitred the
enemy’s left. It was very utrong, resting on the Rappahannock, and
covered by a
stream called Mineral Spring Run. Two of Jackson’s staff officers had
reconnoitred the front, and had pronounced it impregnable, except at a
fearful sacrifice of life. But while the generals were debating, Stuart
rode in with the reports of his cavalry officers, and the weak point of
the position was at once revealed. General Fitzhugh Lee, to whose skill
and activity the victory of Chancellorsville was in great part due, had
discovered that the Federal right, on the plank road, was completely in
the air; that is, it was protected by no natural obstacle, and the
breastworks faced south, and south only. It was evident that attack
from the west or north-west was not anticipated, and Lee at once seized
upon the chance of effecting a surprise.
Yet the difficulties of the proposed operation were very great. To
transfer a turning column to a point from which the Federal right might
be effectively outflanked necessitated a long march by the narrow and
intricate roadways of the Wilderness, and a division of the Confederate
army into two parts, between which communication would be most
precarious. To take advantage of the opportunity the first rule of war
must be violated. But as it has already been said, the rules of war
only point out the dangers which are incurred by breaking them; and, in
this case, before an enemy on the defensive from whom the separation
might be concealed until it is too late for him to intervene, the risks
of dispersion were much reduced. The chief danger lay in this, that the
two wings, each left to its own resources, might fail to act in
combination, just as within the past twenty-four hours Hooker and
Sedgwick had failed. But Lee knew that in Jackson he possessed a
lieutenant whose resolution was invincible, and that the turning
column, if entrusted to his charge, would be pushed forward without
stop or stay until it had either joined hands with the main body, or
had been annihilated.
Moreover, the battle of Fredericksburg had taught both armies that the
elaborate constructions of the engineer are not the only or the most
useful resources of fortification. Hooker had ordered his position to
be intrenched in the hope
that Lee and Jackson, following Burnside’s example, would dash their
divisions into fragments against them and thus become an easy prey.
Lee, with a broader appreciation of the true tactical bearing of ditch
and parapet, determined to employ them as a shelter for his own force
until Jackson’s movement was completed, and the time had come for a
general advance. Orders were at once sent to General McLaws to cover
his front, extending across the pike and the plank roads, with a line
of breastworks; and long before daylight the soldiers of his division,
with the scanty means at their disposal, were busy as beavers amongst
the timber.
It only remained, then, to determine the route and the strength of the
outflanking force; and here it may be observed that the headquarters
staff appears to have neglected certain precautions for which there had
been ample leisure. So long ago as March 19 a council of war had
decided that if Hooker attacked he would do so by the upper fords, and
yet the Wilderness, lying immediately south of the points of passage,
had not been adequately examined. Had Jackson been on the left wing
above Fredericksburg, instead of on the right, near Hamilton’s
Crossing, we may be certain that accurate surveys would have been
forthcoming. As it was, the charts furnished to the Commander-in-Chief
were untrustworthy, and information had to be sought from the
country-people.
May 2. 2.30 a.m. “About daylight on May 2,” says Major Hotchkiss,
“General Jackson awakened me, and requested that I would at once go
down to Catherine Furnace, which is quite near, and where a Colonel
Welford lived, and ascertain if there was any road by which we could
secretly pass round Chancellorsville to the vicinity of Old Wilderness
Tavern. I had a map, which our engineers had prepared from actual
surveys, of the surrounding country, showing all the public roads, but
with few details of the intermediate topography. Reaching Mr.
Welford’s, I aroused him from his bed, and soon learned that he himself
had recently opened a road through the woods in that direction for the
purpose of hauling cord-wood and iron ore to his furnace. This I
located on the map, and having
asked Mr. Welford if he would act as a guide if it became necessary to
march over that road, I returned to head-quarters.
3.30 a.m. “When I reached those I found Generals Lee and Jackson in
conference, each seated on a cracker box, from a pile which had been
left there by the Federals the day before. In response to General
Jackson’s request for my report, I put another cracker box between the
two generals, on which I spread the map, showed them the road I had
ascertained, and indicated, so far as I knew it, the position of the
Federal army. General Lee then said, ‘General Jackson, what do you
propose to do?’ He replied, ‘Go around here,’ moving his finger over
the road which I had located upon the map. General Lee said, ‘What do
you propose to make this movement with?’ ‘With my whole corps,’ was the
answer. General Lee then asked, ‘What will you leave me?’ ‘The
divisions of Anderson and McLaws,’ said Jackson. General Lee, after a
moment’s reflection, remarked, ‘Well, go on,’ and then, pencil in hand,
gave his last instructions. Jackson, with an eager smile upon his face,
from time to time nodded assent, and when the Commander-in-Chief ended
with the words, ‘General Stuart will cover your movement with his
cavalry,’ he rose and saluted, saying, ‘My troops will move at once,
sir.’”[1] The necessary orders were forthwith dispatched. The trains,
parked in open fields to the rear, were to move to Todd’s Tavern, and
thence westward by interior roads; the Second Army Corps was to march
in one column, Rodes’ division in front, and A. P. Hill’s in rear; the
First Virginia Cavalry, with whom was Fitzhugh Lee, covered the front;
squadrons of the 2nd, the 3rd, and the 5th were on the right;
Hotchkiss, accompanied by a squad of couriers, was to send back
constant reports to General Lee; the commanding officers were impressed
with the importance of celerity and secrecy; the ranks were to be kept
well closed up, and all stragglers were to be bayoneted.
4.5 a.m. The day had broken without a cloud, and as the troops began
their march in the fresh May morning, the green vistas of the
Wilderness, grass under foot, and thick foliage overhead, were dappled
with sunshine. The men, comprehending intuitively that a daring and
decisive movement was in progress, pressed rapidly forward, and General
Lee, standing by the roadside to watch them pass, saw in their
confident bearing the presage of success. Soon after the first
regiments had gone by Jackson himself appeared at the head of his
staff. Opposite to the Commander-in-Chief he drew rein, and the two
conversed for a few moments. Then Jackson rode on, pointing in the
direction in which his troops were moving. “His face,” says an
eyewitness, “was a little flushed, as it was turned to General Lee, who
nodded approval of what he said.” Such was the last interview between
Lee and Jackson.
Then, during four long hours, for the column covered at least ten
miles, the flood of bright rifles and tattered uniforms swept with
steady flow down the forest track. The artillery followed, the guns
drawn by lean and wiry horses, and the ammunition waggons and
ambulances brought up the rear. In front was a regiment of cavalry, the
5th Virginia, accompanied by General Fitzhugh Lee; on the flanks were
some ten squadrons, moving by the tracks nearest the enemy’s outposts;
a regiment of infantry, the 23rd Georgia, was posted at the cross-roads
near Catherine Furnace; and the plank road was well guarded until
Anderson’s troops came up to relieve the rear brigades of the Second
Army Corps.
Meanwhile, acting under the immediate orders of General Lee, and most
skilfully handled by McLaws and Anderson, the 10,000 Confederates who
had been left in position opposite the Federal masses kept up a brisk
demonstration. Artillery was brought up to every point along the front
which offered space for action; skirmishers, covered by the timber,
engaged the enemy’s pickets, and maintained a constant fire, and both
on the pike and the river road the lines of battle, disposed so as to
give an impression of great strength, threatened instant assault.
Despite all precautions, however, Jackson’s movement did
not escape the notice of the Federals.