Stonewall Jackson and the American Civil War
And Jackson’s attitude was that of the Southern people. When the news
of Bull Run reached Richmond, and through the crowds that thronged the
streets passed the tidings of the victory, there was neither wild
excitement nor uproarious joy. No bonfires lit the darkness of the
night; no cannon thundered out salutes; the steeples were silent till
the morrow, and then were heard only the solemn tones that called the
people to prayer. It was resolved, on the day following the battle, by
the Confederate Congress: “That we recognise the hand of the Most High
God, the King of kings and Lord of lords, in the glorious victory with
which He has crowned our arms at Manassas, and that the people of these
Confederate States are invited, by appropriate services on the ensuing
Sabbath, to offer up their united thanksgivings and prayers for this
mighty deliverance.”
The spoils of Bull Run were large; 1,500 prisoners, 25 guns, ten stand
of colours, several thousand rifles, a large quantity of ammunition and
hospital stores, twenty-six waggons, and several ambulances were left
in the victors’ hands. The Federal losses were 460 killed and 1,124
wounded; the Confederate, 387 killed, 1,582 wounded, and 13 missing.
The First Brigade suffered more severely than any other in the Southern
army. Of 3,000 officers and men, 488 were killed or wounded, nearly a
fourth of the total loss.
A few days after the battle Johnston advanced to Centreville, and from
the heights above the broad Potomac his cavalry vedettes looked upon
the spires of Washington.
But it was in vain that the Confederate troopers rode to and fro on the
river bank and watered their horses within sight of the Capitol. The
enemy was not to be beguiled across the protecting stream. But it was
not from fear. Although the disaster had been as crushing as
unexpected, it was bravely met. The President’s demand for another army
was cheerfully complied with. Volunteers poured in from every State.
The men were no longer asked to serve for three months, but for three
years. Washington became transformed into an enormous camp; great
earthworks rose on the surrounding heights; and the training of the new
levies went steadily forward. There was no cry for immediate action.
Men were not wanting who believed that the task of coercion was
impossible. Able statesmen and influential journalists advised the
President to abandon the attempt. But Lincoln, true to the trust which
had been committed to his keeping, never flinched from his resolve that
the Union should be restored. He, too, stood like a wall between his
defeated legions and the victorious foe. Nor was the nation less
determined. The dregs of humiliation had been drained, and though the
draught was bitter it was salutary. The President was sustained with no
half-hearted loyalty. His political opponents raved and threatened; but
under the storm of recrimination the work of reorganising the army went
steadily forward, and the people were content that until the generals
declared the army fit for action the hour of vengeance should be
postponed.
To the South, Bull Run was a Pyrrhic victory. It relieved Virginia of
the pressure of the invasion; it proved to the world that the attitude
of the Confederacy was something more than the reckless revolt of a
small section; but it led the Government to indulge vain hopes of
foreign intervention, and it increased the universal contempt for the
military qualities of the Northern soldiers. The hasty judgment of the
people construed a single victory as proof of their superior capacity
for war, and the defeat of McDowell’s army was attributed to the
cowardice of his volunteers. The opinion was absolutely erroneous. Some
of the Federal regiments had misbehaved, it is true; seized with sudden
panic, to which all raw troops are peculiarly susceptible, they had
dispersed before the strong counterstroke of the Confederates. But the
majority had displayed a sterling courage. There can be little question
that the spirit of the infantry depends greatly on the staunchness of
the artillery. A single battery, pushed boldly forward into the front
of battle, has often restored the vigour of a wavering line. Although
the losses it inflicts may not be large, the moral effect of its
support is undeniable. So long as the guns hold fast victory seems
possible. But when these useful auxiliaries are driven back or captured
a general depression becomes inevitable. The retreat of the artillery
strikes a chill into the fighting line which is ominous of defeat, and
it is a wise regulation that compels the batteries, even when their
ammunition is exhausted, to stand their ground. The Federal infantry at
Bull Run had seen their artillery overwhelmed, the teams destroyed, the
gunners shot down, and the enemy’s riflemen swarming amongst the
abandoned pieces. But so vigorous had been their efforts to restore the
battle, that the front of the defence had been with difficulty
maintained; the guns, though they were eventually lost, had been
retaken; and without the assistance of their artillery, but exposed to
the fire, at closest range, of more than one battery, the Northern
regiments had boldly pushed forward across the Henry Hill. The
Confederates, during the greater part of the battle, were certainly
outnumbered; but at the close they were the stronger, and the piecemeal
attacks of the Federals neutralised the superiority which the invading
army originally possessed.
McDowell appears to have employed 18,000 troops in the attack; Johnston
and Beauregard about the same number.[14]
A comparison of the relative strength of the two armies, considering
that raw troops have a decided advantage on the defensive, detracts, to
a certain degree, from the credit of the victory; and it will hardly be
questioned that had
the tactics of the Federals been better the victory would have been
theirs. The turning movement by Sudley Springs was a skilful manœuvre,
and completely surprised both Johnston and Beauregard. It was
undoubtedly risky, but it was far less dangerous than a direct attack
on the strong position along Bull Run.
The retention of the Fourth Division between Washington and Centreville
would seem to have been a blunder; another 5,000 men on the field of
battle should certainly have turned the scale. But more men were hardly
wanted. The Federals during the first period of the fight were strong
enough to have seized the Henry Hill. Bee, Bartow, Evans, and Hampton
had been driven in, and Jackson alone stood fast. A strong and
sustained attack, supported by the fire of the regular batteries, must
have succeeded.[15] The Federal regiments, however, were practically
incapable of movement under fire. The least change of position broke
them into fragments; there was much wild firing; it was impossible to
manœuvre; and the courage of individuals proved a sorry substitute for
order and cohesion. The Confederates owed their victory simply and
solely to the fact that their enemies had not yet learned to use their
strength.
The summer months went by without further fighting on the Potomac; but
the camps at Fairfax and at Centreville saw the army of Manassas
thinned by furloughs and by sickness. The Southern youth had come out
for battle, and the monotonous routine of the outpost line and the
parade-ground was little to their taste. The Government dared not
refuse the numberless applications for leave of absence, the more so
that in the crowded camps the sultry heat of the Virginia woodlands
bred disease of a virulent type. The First Brigade seems to have
escaped from all these evils. Its commander found his health improved
by his life in the open air. His wound
had been painful. A finger was broken, but the hand was saved, and some
temporary inconvenience alone resulted. As he claimed no furlough for
himself, so he permitted no absence from duty among his troops. “I
can’t be absent,” he wrote to his wife, “as my attention is necessary
in preparing my troops for hard fighting, should it be required; and as
my officers and soldiers are not permitted to visit their wives and
families, I ought not to see mine. It might make the troops feel that
they are badly treated, and that I consult my own comfort, regardless
of theirs.”
In September his wife joined him for a few days at Centreville, and
later came Dr. White, at his invitation, to preach to his command.
Beyond a few fruitless marches to support the cavalry on the outposts,
of active service there was none. But Jackson was not the man to let
the time pass uselessly. He had his whole brigade under his hand, a
force which wanted but one quality to make it an instrument worthy of
the hand that wielded it, and that quality was discipline. Courage and
enthusiasm it possessed in abundance; and when both were untrained the
Confederate was a more useful soldier than the Northerner. In the South
nearly every man was a hunter, accustomed from boyhood to the use of
firearms. Game was abundant, and it was free to all. Sport in one form
or another was the chief recreation of the people, and their pastoral
pursuits left them much leisure for its indulgence. Every great
plantation had its pack of hounds, and fox-hunting, an heirloom from
the English colonists, still flourished. His stud was the pride of
every Southern gentleman, and the love of horse-flesh was inherent in
the whole population. No man walked when he could ride, and hundreds of
fine horsemen, mounted on steeds of famous lineage, recruited the
Confederate squadrons.
But, despite their skill with the rifle, their hunter’s craft, and
their dashing horsemanship, the first great battle had been hardly won.
The city-bred Northerners, unused to arms and uninured to hardship, had
fought with extraordinary determination; and the same want of
discipline that had driven them in rout to Washington had
dissolved the victorious Confederates into a tumultuous mob.[16] If
Jackson knew the worth of his volunteers, he was no stranger to their
shortcomings. His thoughts might be crystallised in the words of
Wellington, words which should never be forgotten by those nations
which depend for their defence on the services of their citizen
soldiery.
“They want,” said the great Duke, speaking of the Portuguese in 1809,
“the habits and the spirit of soldiers,—the habits of command on one
side, and of obedience on the other—mutual confidence between officers
and men.”
In order that during the respite now offered he might instil these
habits into his brigade, Jackson neither took furlough himself nor
granted it to others. His regiments were constantly exercised on the
parade-ground. Shoulder to shoulder they advanced and retired, marched
and countermarched, massed in column, formed line to front or flank,
until they learned to move as a machine, until the limbs obeyed before
the order had passed from ear to brain, until obedience became an
instinct and cohesion a necessity of their nature. They learned to
listen for the word of the officer, to look to him before they moved
hand or foot; and, in that subjection of their own individuality to the
will of their superior, they acquired that steadiness in battle, that
energy on the march, that discipline in quarters which made the First
Brigade worthy of the name it had already won. “Every officer and
soldier,” said their commander, “who is able to do duty ought to be
busily engaged in military preparation by hard drilling, in order that,
through the blessing of God, we may be victorious in the battles which
in His all-wise providence may await us.”
Jackson’s tactical ideas, as regards the fire of infantry, expressed at
this time, are worth recording. “I rather think,” he said, “that fire
by file [independent firing] is best on the whole, for it gives the
enemy an idea that the