Stonewall Jackson and the American Civil War
limit of their endurance. “In the fence corners, under the trees, and
around the waggons they threw themselves down, many too weary to eat,
and forgot, in profound slumber, the trials, the dangers, and the
disappointments of the day.”[22]
Jackson, when the last sounds of battle had died away, followed his
troops. Halting by a camp-fire, he stood and warmed himself for a time,
and then, remounting, rode back to Bartonsville. Only one staff
officer, his chief commissary, Major Hawks, accompanied him. The rest
had dropped away, overcome by exhaustion. “Turning from the road into
an orchard, he fastened up his horse, and asked his companion if he
could make a fire, adding, ‘We shall have to burn fence-rails
to-night.’ The major soon had a roaring fire, and was making a bed of
rails, when the general wished to know what he was doing. ‘Finding a
place to sleep,’ was the reply. ‘You seem determined to make yourself
and those around you comfortable,’ said Jackson. And knowing the
general had fasted all day, he soon obtained some bread and meat from
the nearest squad of soldiers, and after they had satisfied their
hunger, they slept soundly on the rail-bed in a fence-corner.”
Such was the battle of Kernstown, in which over
1,200 men were killed and wounded, the half of them Confederates. Two
or three hundred prisoners fell into the hands of the Federals. Nearly
one-fourth of Jackson’s infantry was _hors de combat,_ and he had lost
two guns. His troops were undoubtedly depressed. They had anticipated
an easy victory; the overwhelming strength of the Federals had
surprised them, and their losses had been severe. But no regret
disturbed the slumbers of their leader. He had been defeated, it was
true; but he looked further than the immediate result of the
engagement. “I feel justified in saying,” he wrote in his short report,
“that, though the battle-field is in the possession of the enemy, yet
the most essential fruits of the victory are ours.” As he stood before
the camp-fire near Newtown, wrapped in his long cloak, his hands behind
his back, and stirring the embers with his foot, one of Ashby’s
youngest troopers ventured to interrupt his reverie. “The Yankees don’t
seem willing to quit Winchester, General!” “Winchester is a very
pleasant place to stay in, sir!” was the quick reply. Nothing daunted,
the boy went on: “It was reported that they were retreating, but I
guess they’re retreating after us.” With his eyes still fixed on the
blazing logs: “I think I may say I am satisfied, sir!” was Jackson’s
answer; and with no further notice of the silent circle round the fire,
he stood gazing absently into the glowing flames. After a few minutes
the tall figure turned away, and without another word strode off into
the darkness.
That Jackson divined the full effect of his attack would be to assert
too much. That he realised that the battle, though a tactical defeat,
was strategically a victory is very evident. He knew something of
Banks, he knew more of McClellan, and the bearing of the Valley on the
defence of Washington had long been uppermost in his thoughts. He had
learned from Napoleon to throw himself into the spirit of his enemy,
and it is not improbable that when he stood before the fire near
Newtown he had already foreseen, in some degree at least, the events
that would follow the news of his attack at Kernstown.
The outcome of the battle was indeed far-reaching. “Though the battle
had been won,” wrote Shields, “still I could not have believed that
Jackson would have hazarded a decisive engagement, so far from the main
body, without expecting reinforcements; so, to be prepared for such a
contingency, I set to work during the night to bring together all the
troops within my reach. I sent an express after Williams’ division,
requesting the rear brigade, about twenty miles distant, to march all
night and join me in the morning. I swept the posts in rear of almost
all their guards, hurrying them forward by forced marches, to be with
me at daylight.”[23]
General Banks, hearing of the engagement on his way to Washington,
halted at Harper’s Ferry, and he also ordered Williams’ division to
return at once to Winchester.
One brigade only,[24] which the order did not reach, continued the
march to Manassas. This counter-movement met with McClellan’s approval.
He now recognised that Jackson’s force, commanded as it was, was
something more than a mere corps of observation, and that it was
essential that it should be crushed. “Your course was right,” he
telegraphed on receiving Banks’ report. “As soon as you are strong
enough push Jackson hard and drive him well beyond Strasburg. . . . The
very moment the thorough defeat of Jackson will permit it, resume the
movement on Manassas, always leaving the whole of Shields’ command at
or near Strasburg and Winchester until the Manassas Gap Railway is
fully repaired. Communicate fully and act vigorously.”[25]
8,000 men (Williams’ division) were thus temporarily withdrawn from the
force that was to cover Washington from the south. But this was only
the first step. Jackson’s action had forcibly attracted the attention
of the Federal Government to the Upper Potomac. The President was
already contemplating the transfer of Blenker’s division from McClellan
to Fremont; the news of Kernstown decided the
question, and at the end of March these 9,000 men were ordered to West
Virginia, halting at Strasburg, in case Banks should then need them, on
their way.[26] But even this measure did not altogether allay Mr.
Lincoln’s apprehensions. McClellan had assured him, on April 1, that
73,000 men would be left for the defence of the capital and its
approaches. But in the original arrangement, with which the President
had been satisfied, Williams was to have been brought to Manassas, and
Shields alone left in the Shenandoah Valley. Under the new distribution
the President found that the force at Manassas would be decreased by
two brigades; and, at the same time, that while part of the troops
McClellan had promised were not forthcoming, a large portion of those
actually available were good for nothing. The officer left in command
at Washington reported that “nearly all his force was imperfectly
disciplined; that several of the regiments were in a very disorganised
condition; that efficient artillery regiments had been removed from the
forts, and that he had to relieve them with very new infantry
regiments, entirely unacquainted with the duties of that arm.”[27]
Lincoln submitted the question to six generals of the regular army,
then present in Washington; and these officers replied that, in their
opinion, “the requirement of the President that this city shall be left
entirely secure has not been fully complied with.”[28]
On receiving this report, Lincoln ordered the First Army Corps, 37,000
strong, under General McDowell, to remain at Manassas in place of
embarking for the Peninsula; and thus McClellan, on the eve of his
advance on Richmond, found his original force of 150,000 reduced by
46,000 officers and men. Moreover, not content with detaching McDowell
for a time, Lincoln, the next day, assigned that general to an
independent command, covering the approaches to Washington; Banks,
also, was withdrawn from
McClellan’s control, and directed to defend the Valley. The original
dissemination of the Federal forces was thus gravely accentuated, and
the Confederates had now to deal with four distinct armies,
McClellan’s, McDowell’s, Banks’, and Fremont’s, dependent for
co-operation on the orders of two civilians, President Lincoln and his
Secretary of War. And this was not all. McDowell had been assigned a
most important part in McClellan’s plan of invasion. The road from
Fortress Monroe was barred by the fortifications of Yorktown. These
works could be turned, however, by sending a force up the York River.
But the passage of the stream was debarred to the Federal transports by
a strong fort at Gloucester Point, on the left bank, and the capture of
this work was to be the task of the First Army Corps. No wonder that
McClellan, believing that Johnston commanded 100,000 men, declared that
in his deliberate judgment the success of the Federal cause was
imperilled by the order which detached McDowell from his command.
However inadequately the capital might be defended, it was worse than
folly to interfere with the general’s plans when he was on the eve of
executing them. The best way of defending Washington was for McClellan
to march rapidly on Richmond, and seize his adversary by the throat. By
depriving him of McDowell, Lincoln and his advisers made such a
movement difficult, and the grand army of invasion found itself in a
most embarrassing situation. Such was the effect of a blow struck at
the right place and the right time, though struck by no more than 3,000
bayonets.
The battle of Kernstown was undoubtedly well fought. It is true that
Jackson believed that he had no more than four regiments of infantry, a
few batteries, and some cavalry before him. But it was a skilful
manœuvre, which threw three brigades and three batteries, more than
two-thirds of his whole strength, on his opponent’s flank. An ordinary
general would probably have employed only a small portion of his force
in the turning movement. Not so the student of Napoleon. “In the
general’s haversack,” says one of Jackson’s staff, “were always three
books: the Bible,
Napoleon’s Maxims of War, and Webster’s Dictionary—for his spelling was
uncertain—and these books he constantly consulted.” Whether the
chronicles of the Jewish kings threw any light on the tactical problem
involved at Kernstown may be left to the commentators; but there can be
no question as to the Maxims. To hurl overwhelming numbers at the point
where the enemy least expects attack is the whole burden of Napoleon’s
teaching, and there can be no doubt but that the wooded ridge,
unoccupied save by a few scouts, was the weakest point of the defence.
The manœuvre certainly surprised the Federals, and it very nearly beat
them. Tyler’s brigade was unsupported for nearly an hour and a half.
Had his battalions been less staunch, the tardy reinforcements would
have been too late to save the day. Coming up as they did, not in a
mass so strong as to bear all before it by its own inherent weight, but
in successive battalions, at wide intervals of time, they would
themselves have become involved in a desperate engagement under adverse
circumstances. Nor is Kimball to be blamed that he did not throw
greater weight on Jackson’s turning column at an earlier hour. Like
Shields and Banks, he was unable to believe that Jackson was
unsupported. He expected that the flank attack would be followed up by
one in superior numbers from the front. He could hardly credit that an
inferior force would deliberately move off to a flank, leaving its line
of retreat to be guarded by a few squadrons, weakly supported by
infantry; and the audacity of the assailant had the usual effect of
deceiving the defender.
Kernstown, moreover, will rank as an example of what determined men can
do against superior numbers. The Confederates on the ridge, throughout
the greater part of the fight, hardly exceeded 2,000 muskets. They were
assailed by 3,000, and proved a match for them. The 3,000 were then
reinforced by at least 3,000 more, whilst Jackson could bring up only
600 muskets to support an already broken line. Nevertheless, these
6,000 Northerners were so roughly handled that there was practically no
pursuit. When the Confederates fell back every one of the
Federal regiments had been engaged, and there were no fresh troops
wherewith to follow them. Jackson was perfectly justified in reporting
that “Night and an indisposition of the enemy to press further
terminated the battle.”[29]