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Title: A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee

Author: John Esten Cooke

Release Date: January 12, 2004 [EBook #10692]

Language: English

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[Illustration]


A LIFE OF GEN. ROBERT E. LEE.

BY JOHN ESTEN COOKE.


  "Duty is the sublimest word in our language."
  "Human virtue should be equal to human calamity."

  LEE.

1876




CONTENTS.


PART I.

_LEE'S EARLY LIFE_.


I.--Introduction

II.--The Lees of Virginia

III.--General "Light-Horse Harry" Lee

IV.--Stratford

V.--Lee's Early Manhood and Career in the United States Army

VI.--Lee and Scott

VII.--Lee resigns

VIII.--His Reception at Richmond

IX.--Lee in 1861

X.--The War begins

XI.--Lee's Advance into Western Virginia

XII.--Lee's Last Interview with Bishop Meade


PART II.

_IN FRONT OF RICHMOND_.


I.--Plan of the Federal Campaign

II.--Johnston is wounded

III.--Lee assigned to the Command--his Family at the White House

IV.--Lee resolves to attack

V.--Stuart's "Ride around McClellan"


PART III.

_ON THE CHICKAHOMINY_.


I.--The Two Armies

II.--Lee's Plan of Assault

III.--The Battle of the Chickahominy

IV.--The Retreat

V.--Richmond in Danger--Lee's Views

VI.--Lee and McClellan--their Identity of Opinion


PART IV.

_THE WAR ADVANCES NORTHWARD_.


I.--Lee's Protest

II.--Lee's Manoeuvres

III.--Lee advances from the Rapidan

IV.--Jackson flanks General Pope

V.--Lee follows

VI.--The Second Battle of Manassas


PART V.

_LEE INVADES MARYLAND_.


I.--His Designs

II.--Lee in Maryland

III.--Movements of the Two Armies

IV.--The Prelude to Sharpsburg

V.--The Battle of Sharpsburg

VI.--Lee and McClellan--their Merits in the Maryland Campaign

VII.--Lee and his Men

VIII.--Lee passes the Blue Ridge

IX.--Lee concentrates at Fredericksburg

X.--The Battle of Fredericksburg

XI.--Final Movements of 1862

XII.--The Year of Battles

XIII.--Lee in December, 1862


PART VI.

_CHANCELLORSVILLE AND GETTYSBURG_.


I.--Advance of General Hooker

II--The Wilderness

III.--Lee's Determination

IV.--Jackson's Attack and Fall

V.--The Battle of Chancellorsville

VI.--Flank Movement of General Sedgwick

VII.--Lee's Generalship and Personal Demeanor during the Campaign

VIII.--Personal Relations of Lee and Jackson

IX.--Circumstances leading to the Invasion of Pennsylvania

X.--Lee's Plans and Objects

XI.--The Cavalry-fight at Fleetwood

XII.--The March to Gettysburg

XIII.--Lee in Pennsylvania

XIV.--Concentration at Gettysburg

XV.--The First Day's Fight at Gettysburg

XVI.--The Two Armies in Position

XVII.--The Second Day

XVIII.--The Last Charge at Gettysburg

XIX.--Lee after the Charge

XX.--Lee's Retreat across the Potomac

XXI.--Across the Blue Ridge again


PART VII.

_LAST CAMPAIGNS OF THE YEAR_ 1863.


I.--The Cavalry of Lee's Army

II.--Lee flanks General Meade

III.--A Race between Two Armies

IV.--The Fight at Buckland

V.--The Advance to Mine Run

VI.--Lee in the Autumn and Winter of 1863


PART VIII.

_LEE'S LAST CAMPAIGNS AND LAST DAYS_.


I.--General Grant crosses the Rapidan

II.--The First Collision in the Wilderness

III.--The Battle of the 6th of May

IV.--The 12th of May

V.--From Spottsylvania to the Chickahominy

VI.--First Battles at Petersburg

VII.--The Siege of Richmond begun

VIII.--Lee threatens Washington

IX.--The Mine Explosion

X.--End of the Campaign of 1864

XI.--Lee in the Winter of 1864-'65

XII.--The Situation at the Beginning of 1865

XIII.--Lee attacks the Federal Centre

XIV.--The Southern Lines broken

XV.--Lee evacuates Petersburg

XVI.--The Retreat and Surrender

XVII.--Lee returns to Richmond

XVIII.--General Lee after the War

XIX.--General Lee's Last Years and Death




_APPENDIX_.

I.--The Funeral of General Lee

II.--Tributes to General Lee




A LIFE

OF

GENERAL ROBERT EDWARD LEE.



PART I.

_LEE'S EARLY LIFE_,




I.

INTRODUCTION.


The name of Lee is beloved and respected throughout the world. Men of
all parties and opinions unite in this sentiment, not only those who
thought and fought with him, but those most violently opposed to his
political views and career. It is natural that his own people should
love and honor him as their great leader and defender in a struggle of
intense bitterness--that his old enemies should share this profound
regard and admiration is due solely to the character of the
individual. His military genius will always be conceded, and his
figure remain a conspicuous landmark in history; but this does not
account for the fact that his very enemies love the man. His private
character is the origin of this sentiment. The people of the North, no
less than the people of the South, feel that Lee was truly great; and
the harshest critic has been able to find nothing to detract from this
view of him. The soldier was great, but the man himself was greater.
No one was ever simpler, truer, or more honest. Those who knew him
best loved him the most. Reserved and silent, with a bearing of almost
austere dignity, he impressed many persons as cold and unsympathetic,
and his true character was long in revealing itself to the world.
To-day all men know what his friends knew during his life--that under
the grave exterior of the soldier, oppressed with care and anxiety,
beat a warm and kindly heart, full of an even extraordinary gentleness
and sweetness; that the man himself was not cold, or stiff, or
harsh, but patient, forbearing, charitable under many trials of his
equanimity, and magnanimous without effort, from the native impulse of
his heart. Friend and foe thus to-day regard him with much the same
sentiment, as a genuinely honest man, incapable of duplicity in
thought or deed, wholly good and sincere, inspired always under all
temptations by that _prisca fides_ which purifies and ennobles, and
resolutely bent, in the dark hour, as in the bright, on the full
performance of his duty. "Duty is the sublimest word in our language,"
he wrote to his son; and, if we add that other august maxim, "Human
virtue should be equal to human calamity," we shall have in a few
words a summary of the principles which inspired Lee.

The crowning grace of this man, who was thus not only great but good,
was the humility and trust in God, which lay at the foundation of his
character. Upon this point we shall quote the words of a gentleman of
commanding intellect, a bitter opponent of the South in the war:

"Lee is worthy of all praise. As a man, he was fearless among men. As
a soldier, he had no superior and no equal. In the course of Nature my
career on earth may soon terminate. God grant that, When the day of
my death shall come, I may look up to Heaven with that confidence and
faith which the life and character of Robert E. Lee gave him. He
died trusting in God as a good man, with a good life, and a pure
conscience."

He had lived, as he died, with this supreme trust in an overruling and
merciful Providence; and this sentiment, pervading his whole being,
was the origin of that august calmness with which he greeted the most
crushing disasters of his military career. His faith and humble trust
sustained him after the war, when the woes of the South wellnigh
broke his great spirit; and he calmly expired, as a weary child falls
asleep, knowing that its father is near.

Of this eminent soldier and man whose character offers so great
an example, a memoir is attempted in this volume. The work will
necessarily be "popular" rather than full and elaborate, as the public
and private correspondence of Lee are not at this time accessible.
These will throw a fuller light on the subject; but sufficient
material is at the disposal of the writer to enable him to present an
accurate likeness of Lee, and to narrate clearly the incidents of his
career. In doing so, the aim of the author is to measure out full
justice to all--not to arouse old enmities, which should be allowed to
slumber, but to treat his subject with the judicial moderation of the
student of history.

A few words will terminate this preface. The volume before the reader
was begun in 1866. The writer first, however, informed General Lee
of his design, and had the honor to receive from him in reply the
assurance that the work "would not interfere with any he might have in
contemplation; he had not written a line of any work as yet, and might
never do so; but, should he write a history of the campaigns of the
Army of Northern Virginia, the proposed work would be rather an
assistance than a hinderance."

As the writer had offered promptly to discontinue the work if it were
not agreeable to General Lee, this reply was regarded in the light of
an assurance that he did not disapprove of it. The composition was,
however, interrupted, and the work laid aside. It is now resumed and
completed at a time when the death of the illustrious soldier adds a
new and absorbing interest to whatever is connected with his character
or career.




II.

THE LEES OF VIRGINIA.


The Lees of Virginia spring from an ancient and respectable family of
Essex, in England.

Of some members of the family, both in the Old World and the New, a
brief account will be given. The origin of an individual explains much
that is striking and peculiar in his own character; and it will be
found that General Lee inherited many of the traits of his ancestors,
especially of some eminent personages of his name in Virginia.

The family pedigree is traced back by Lee, in the life of his father,
to Launcelot Lee, of London, in France, who accompanied William the
Conqueror to England. After the battle of Hastings, which subjected
England to the sway of the Normans, Launcelot Lee, like others, was
rewarded by lands wrested from the subdued Saxons. His estate lay in
Essex, and this is all that is known concerning him. Lionel Lee is the
next member of the family of whom mention is made. He lived during the
reign of Richard Coeur de Lion, and, when the king went on his third
crusade, in the year 1192, Lionel Lee raised a company of gentlemen,
and marched with him to the Holy Land. His career there was
distinguished; he displayed special gallantry at the siege of Acre,
and for this he received a solid proof of King Richard's approbation.
On his return he was made first Earl of Litchfield; the king presented
him with the estate of "Ditchley," which became the name afterward of
an estate of the Lees in Virginia; and, when he died, the armor which
he had worn in the Holy Land was placed in the department of "Horse
Armory" in the great Tower of London.

The name of Richard Lee is next mentioned as one of the followers of
the Earl of Surrey in his expedition across the Scottish border in
1542. Two of the family about this period were "Knights Companions
of the Garter," and their banners, with the Lee arms above, were
suspended in St. George's Chapel in Windsor Castle. The coat-of-arms
was a shield "band sinister battled and embattled," the crest a closed
visor surmounted by a squirrel holding a nut. The motto, which may be
thought characteristic of one of General Lee's traits as a soldier,
was, "_Non incautus futuri_"

Such are the brief notices given of the family in England. They seem
to have been persons of high character, and often of distinction. When
Richard Lee came to Virginia, and founded the family anew there, as
Launcelot, the first Lee, had founded it in England, he brought over
in his veins some of the best and most valiant blood of the great
Norman race.

This Richard Lee, the _princeps_ of the family in Virginia, was,
it seems, like the rest of his kindred, strongly Cavalier in his
sentiments; indeed, the Lees seem always to have been Cavalier. The
reader will recall the stately old representative of the family in
Scott's "Woodstock"--Sir Henry Lee of Ditchley--who is seen stalking
proudly through the great apartments of the palace, in his laced
doublet, slashed boots, and velvet cloak, scowling darkly at the
Puritan intruders. Sir Henry was not a fanciful person, but a real
individual; and the political views attributed to him were those of
the Lee family, who remained faithful to the royal cause in all its
hours of adversity.

It will be seen that Richard Lee, the first of the Virginia Lees, was
an ardent monarchist. He came over during the reign of Charles I., but
returned to England, bequeathing all his lands to his servants; he
subsequently came back to Virginia, however, and lived and died there.
In his will he styles himself "Richard Lee, of Strafford Langton, in
the County of Essex, Esquire." It is not certainly known whether he
sought refuge in Virginia after the failure of the king's cause, or
was tempted to emigrate with a view to better his fortunes in the New
World. Either may have been the impelling motive. Great numbers of
Cavaliers "came over" after the overthrow of Charles at Naseby; but a
large emigration had already taken place, and took place afterward,
induced by the salubrity of the country, the ease of living, and
the cheapness and fertility of the lands on the great rivers, where
families impoverished or of failing fortunes in England might "make
new settlements" and build on a new foundation. This would amply
account for the removal of Richard Lee to Virginia, and for the
ambition he seems to have been inspired with, to build and improve,
without attributing to him any apprehension of probable punishment for
his political course. Very many families had the first-named motives,
and commenced to build great manor-houses, which were never finished,
or were too costly for any one of their descendants to possess. The
abolition of primogeniture, despite the opposition of Pendleton and
others, overthrew all this; and the Lees, like other families, now
possess few of the broad acres which their ancestors acquired.

To return, however, to Richard Lee. He had already visited Virginia in
some official capacity under the royal governor, Sir William Berkeley,
and had been so much pleased with the soil and climate of the country,
that he, as we have said, emigrated finally, and cast his lot in the
new land. He brought a number of followers and servants, and, coming
over to Westmoreland County, in the Northern Neck of Virginia,
"took up" extensive tracts of land there, and set about building
manor-houses upon them.

Among these, it is stated, was the original "Stratford" House,
afterward destroyed by fire. It was rebuilt, however, and became the
birthplace of Richard Henry Lee, and afterward of General Robert E.
Lee. We shall speak of it more in detail after finishing, in a few
words, our notice of Richard Lee, its founder, and the founder of the
Lee family in Virginia. He is described as a person of great force of
character and many virtues--as "a man of good stature, comely visage,
enterprising genius, sound head, vigorous spirit, and generous
nature." This may be suspected to partake of the nature of epitaph;
but, of his courage and energy, the proof remains in the action taken
by him in connection with Charles II. Inheriting, it would seem, in
full measure, the royalist and Cavalier sentiments of his family, he
united with Sir William Berkeley, the royal governor, in the irregular
proclamation of Charles II. in Virginia, a year or two before his
reinstallment on the English throne. He had already, it is reported on
the authority of well-supported tradition, made a voyage across the
Atlantic to Breda, where Charles II. was then in exile, and offered
to erect his standard in Virginia, and proclaim him king there. This
proposition the young monarch declined, shrinking, with excellent good
sense, from a renewal, under less favorable circumstances, of the
struggle which terminated at Worcester. Lee was, therefore, compelled
to return without having succeeded in his enterprise; but he had made,
it seems, a very strong impression in favor of Virginia upon the
somewhat frivolous young monarch. When he came to his throne again,
Charles II. graciously wore a coronation-robe of Virginia silk, and
Virginia, who had proved so faithful to him in the hour of his need,
was authorized, by royal decree, to rank thenceforward, in the British
empire, with England, Scotland, and Ireland, and bear upon her shield
the motto, "_En dat Virginia quartam._"

Richard Lee returned, after his unsuccessful mission, to the Northern
Neck, and addressed himself thenceforward to the management of his
private fortunes and the affairs of the colony. He had now become
possessed of very extensive estates between the Potomac and
Rappahannock Rivers and elsewhere. Besides Stratford, he owned
plantations called "Mocke Neck," "Mathotick," "Paper-Maker's Neck,"
"War Captain's Neck," "Bishop's Neck," and "Paradise," with four
thousand acres besides, on the Potomac, lands in Maryland, three
islands in Chesapeake Bay, an interest in several trading-vessels, and
innumerable indented and other servants. He became a member of the
King's Council, and lived in great elegance and comfort. That he was a
man of high character, and of notable piety for an age of free living
and worldly tendencies, his will shows. In that document he bequeaths
his soul "to that good and gracious God that gave it me, and to my
blessed Redeemer, Jesus Christ, assuredly trusting, in and by His
meritorious death and passion, to receive salvation."

The attention of the reader has been particularly called to the
character and career of Richard Lee, not only because he was the
founder of the family in Virginia, but because the traits of the
individual reappear very prominently in the great soldier whose life
is the subject of this volume. The coolness, courage, energy,
and aptitude for great affairs, which marked Richard Lee in the
seventeenth century, were unmistakably present in the character of
Robert E. Lee in the nineteenth century.

We shall conclude our notice of the family by calling attention to
that great group of celebrated men who illustrated the name in the
days of the Revolution, and exhibited the family characteristics as
clearly. These were Richard Henry Lee, of Chantilly, the famous orator
and statesman, who moved in the American Congress the Declaration of
Independence; Francis Lightfoot Lee, a scholar of elegant attainments
and high literary accomplishments, who signed, with his more renowned
brother, the Declaration; William Lee, who became Sheriff of London,
and ably seconded the cause of the colonies; and Arthur Lee,
diplomatist and representative of America abroad, where he displayed,
as his diplomatic correspondence indicates, untiring energy and
devotion to the interests of the colonies. The last of these brothers
was Philip Ludwell Lee, whose daughter Matilda married her second
cousin, General Henry Lee. This gentleman, afterward famous as
"Light-Horse Harry" Lee, married a second time, and from this union
sprung the subject of this memoir.




III.

GENERAL "LIGHT-HORSE HARRY" LEE.


This celebrated soldier, who so largely occupied the public eye in the
Revolution, is worthy of notice, both as an eminent member of the Lee
family, and as the father of General Robert E. Lee.

He was born in 1756, in the county of Westmoreland--which boasts of
being the birthplace of Washington, Monroe, Richard Henry Lee, General
Henry Lee, and General Robert E. Lee, Presidents, statesmen, and
soldiers--and, after graduating at Princeton College, entered the
army, in 1776, as captain of cavalry, an arm of the service afterward
adopted by his more celebrated descendant, in the United States army.
He soon displayed military ability of high order, and, for the capture
of Paulus's Hook, received a gold medal from Congress. In 1781 he
marched with his "Legion" to join Greene in the Carolinas, carrying
with him the high esteem of Washington, who had witnessed his skilful
and daring operations in the Jerseys. His career in the arduous
campaigns of the South against Cornwallis, and the efficient commander
of his cavalry arm. Colonel Tarleton, may be best understood from
General Greene's dispatches, and from his own memoirs of the
operations of the army, which are written with as much modesty as
ability. From these it is apparent that the small body of the "Legion"
cavalry, under its active and daring commander, was the "eye and ear"
of Greene's army, whose movements it accompanied everywhere, preceding
its advances and covering its retreats. Few pages of military history
are more stirring than those in Lee's "Memoirs" describing Greene's
retrograde movement to the Dan; and this alone, if the hard work at
the Eutaws and elsewhere were left out, would place Lee's fame as a
cavalry officer upon a lasting basis. The distinguished soldier under
whose eye the Virginian operated did full justice to his courage and
capacity. "I believe," wrote Greene, "that few officers, either in
Europe or America, are held in so high a position of admiration as you
are. Everybody knows I have the highest opinion of you as an officer,
and you know I love you as a friend. No man, in the progress of the
campaign, had equal merit with yourself." The officer who wrote those
lines was not a courtier nor a diplomatist, but a blunt and honest
soldier who had seen Lee's bearing in the most arduous straits,
and was capable of appreciating military ability. Add Washington's
expression of his "love and thanks," in a letter written in 1789,
and the light in which he was regarded by his contemporaries will be
understood.

His "Memoirs of the War in the Southern Department" is a valuable
military history and a very interesting book. The movements of Greene
in face of Cornwallis are described with a precision which renders the
narrative valuable to military students, and a picturesqueness which
rivets the attention of the general reader. From these memoirs a
very clear conception of the writer's character may be derived, and
everywhere in them is felt the presence of a cool and dashing nature,
a man gifted with the _mens aequa in arduis_, whom no reverse of
fortune could cast down. The fairness and courtesy of the writer
toward his opponents is an attractive characteristic of the work,[1]
which is written with a simplicity and directness of style highly
agreeable to readers of judgment.[2]

[Footnote 1: See his observations upon the source of his successes
over Tarleton, full of the generous spirit of a great soldier. He
attributes them in no degree to his own military ability, but to the
superior character of his large, thorough-bred horses, which rode over
Tarleton's inferior stock. He does not state that the famous "Legion"
numbered only two hundred and fifty men, and that Tarleton commanded a
much larger force of the best cavalry of the British army.]

[Footnote 2: A new edition of this work, preceded by a life of the
author, was published by General Robert E. Lee in 1869.]

After the war General Henry Lee served a term in Congress; was then
elected Governor of Virginia; returned in 1799 to Congress; and, in
his oration upon the death of Washington, employed the well-known
phrase, "First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of
his countrymen." He died in Georgia, in the year 1818, having made a
journey thither for the benefit of his health.

General Henry Lee was married twice; first, as we have said, to his
cousin Matilda, through whom he came into possession of the old family
estate of Stratford; and a second time, June 18,1793, to Miss Anne
Hill Carter, a daughter of Charles Carter, Esq., of "Shirley," on
James River.

The children of this second marriage were three sons and two
daughters--Charles Carter, _Robert Edward_, Smith, Ann, and Mildred.

[Illustration: "STRATFORD HOUSE." The Birthplace of Gen. Lee.]




IV.

STRATFORD.


Robert Edward Lee was born at Stratford, in Westmoreland County,
Virginia, on the 19th of January, 1807.[1]

[Footnote 1: The date of General Lee's birth has been often given
incorrectly. The authority for that here adopted is the entry in the
family Bible, in the handwriting of his mother.]

Before passing to Lee's public career, and the narrative of the stormy
scenes of his after-life, let us pause a moment and bestow a glance
upon this ancient mansion, which is still standing--a silent and
melancholy relic of the past--in the remote "Northern Neck." As the
birthplace of a great man, it would demand attention; but it has other
claims still, as a venerable memorial of the past and its eminent
personages, one of the few remaining monuments of a state of society
that has disappeared or is disappearing.

The original Stratford House is supposed, as we have said, to have
been built by Richard Lee, the first of the family in the New World.
Whoever may have been its founder, it was destroyed in the time of
Thomas Lee, an eminent representative of the name, early in the
eighteenth century. Thomas Lee was a member of the King's Council, a
gentleman of great popularity; and, when it was known that his house
had been burned, contributions were everywhere made to rebuild it. The
Governor, the merchants of the colony, and even Queen Anne in person,
united in this subscription; the house speedily rose again, at a
cost of about eighty thousand dollars; and this is the edifice still
standing in Westmoreland. The sum expended in its construction must
not be estimated in the light of to-day. At that time the greater part
of the heavy work in house-building was performed by servants of the
manor; it is fair, indeed, to say that the larger part of the work
thus cost nothing in money; and thus the eighty thousand dollars
represented only the English brick, the carvings, furniture, and
decorations.

The construction of such an edifice had at that day a distinct object.
These great old manor-houses, lost in the depths of the country, were
intended to become the headquarters of the family in all time.
In their large apartments the eldest son was to uphold the name.
Generation after generation was to pass, and some one of the old name
still live there; and though all this has passed away now, and
may appear a worn-out superstition, and, though some persons may
stigmatize it as contributing to the sentiment of "aristocracy," the
strongest opponents of that old system may pardon in us the expression
of some regret that this love of the hearthstone and old family
memories should have disappeared. The great man whose character is
sought to be delineated in this volume never lost to the last this
home and family sentiment. He knew the kinships of every one, and
loved the old country-houses of the old Virginia families--plain and
honest people, attached, like himself, to the Virginia soil. We pass
to a brief description of the old house in which Lee was born.

Stratford, the old home of the Lees, but to-day the property of
others, stands on a picturesque bluff on the southern bank of the
Potomac, and is a house of very considerable size. It is built in the
form of the letter H. The walls are several feet in thickness; in the
centre is a saloon thirty feet in size; and surmounting each wing is a
pavilion with balustrades, above which rise clusters of chimneys. The
front door is reached by a broad flight of steps, and the grounds are
handsome, and variegated by the bright foliage of oaks, cedars, and
maple-trees. Here and there in the extensive lawn rises a slender and
ghostly old Lombardy poplar--a tree once a great favorite in Virginia,
but now seen only here and there, the relic of a past generation.

Within, the Stratford House is as antique as without, and, with its
halls, corridors, wainscoting, and ancient mouldings, takes the
visitor back to the era of powder and silk stockings. Such was the
mansion to which General Harry Lee came to live after the Revolution,
and the sight of the old home must have been dear to the soldier's
heart. Here had flourished three generations of Lees, dispensing a
profuse and open-handed hospitality. In each generation some one of
the family had distinguished himself, and attracted the "best company"
to Stratford; the old walls had rung with merriment; the great door
was wide open; everybody was welcome; and one could see there a good
illustration of a long-passed manner of living, which had at least the
merit of being hearty, open-handed, and picturesque. General Harry
Lee, the careless soldier, partook of the family tendency to
hospitality; he kept open house, entertained all comers, and hence,
doubtless, sprung the pecuniary embarrassments embittering an old age
which his eminent public services should have rendered serene and
happy.

Our notice of Stratford may appear unduly long to some readers, but it
is not without a distinct reference to the subject of this volume. In
this quiet old mansion--and in the very apartment where Richard Henry
and Francis Lightfoot Lee first saw the light--Robert E. Lee was born.
The eyes of the child fell first upon the old apartments, the great
grounds, the homely scenes around the old country-house--upon the tall
Lombardy poplars and the oaks, through which passed the wind bearing
to his ears the murmur of the Potomac.

He left the old home of his family before it could have had any very
great effect upon him, it would seem; but it is impossible to estimate
these first influences, to decide the depth of the impression which
the child's heart is capable of receiving. The bright eyes of young
Robert Lee must have seen much around him to interest him and shape
his first views. Critics charged him with family pride sometimes;
if he possessed that virtue or failing, the fact was not strange.
Stratford opened before his childish eyes a memorial of the old
splendor of the Lees. He saw around him old portraits, old plate, and
old furniture, telling plainly of the ancient origin and high position
of his family. Old parchments contained histories of the deeds of his
race; old genealogical trees traced their line far back into the past;
old servants, grown gray in the house, waited upon the child; and, in
a corner of one of the great apartments, an old soldier, gray, too,
and shattered in health, once the friend of Washington and Greene, was
writing the history of the battles in which he had drawn his sword for
his native land.

Amid these scenes and surroundings passed the first years of Robert
E. Lee. They must have made their impression upon his character at
a period when the mind takes every new influence, and grows in
accordance with it; and, to the last, the man remained simple, hearty,
proud, courteous--the _country Virginian_ in all the texture of his
character. He always rejoiced to visit the country; loved horses; was
an excellent rider; was fond of plain country talk, jests, humorous
anecdote, and chit-chat--was the plain country gentleman, in a word,
preferring grass and trees and streams to all the cities and crowds in
the world. In the last year of his life he said to a lady: "My visits
to Florida and the White Sulphur have not benefited me much; but it
did me good to go to the White House, and see _the mules walking
round, and the corn growing_."

We notice a last result of the child's residence now, or visits
afterward to the country, and the sports in which he indulged--the
superb physical health and strength which remained unshaken afterward
by all the hardships of war. Lee, to the last, was a marvel of sound
physical development; his frame was as solid as oak, and stood the
strain of exhausting marches, loss of sleep, hunger, thirst, heat, and
cold, without failing him.

When he died, it was care which crushed his heart; his health was
perfect.




V.

LEE'S EARLY MANHOOD AND CAREER IN THE UNITED STATES ARMY.


Of Lee's childhood we have no memorials, except the words of his
father, long afterward.

"_Robert was always good_," wrote General Henry Lee.[1]

[Footnote 1: To C.C. Lee, February 9, 1817.]

That is all; but the words indicate much--that the good man was
"always good." It will be seen that, when he went to West Point, he
never received a demerit. The good boy was the good young officer, and
became, in due time, the good commander-in-chief.

In the year 1811 General Henry Lee left Stratford, and removed with
his family to Alexandria, actuated, it seems, by the desire of
affording his children facilities for gaining their education. After
his death, in 1818, Mrs. Lee continued to reside in Alexandria; was
a communicant of Christ Church; and her children were taught the
Episcopal catechism by young William Meade, eventually Bishop of
Virginia. We shall see how Bishop Meade, long afterward, recalled
those early days, when he and his pupil, young Robert Lee, were
equally unknown--how, when about to die, just as the war began
in earnest, he sent for the boy he had once instructed, now the
gray-haired soldier, and, when he came to the bedside, exclaimed: "God
bless you, Robert! I can't call you 'general'--I have heard you your
catechism too often!"

Alexandria continued to be the residence of the family until the young
man was eighteen years of age, when it was necessary for him to make
choice of a profession; and, following the bent of his temperament, he
chose the army. Application was made for his appointment from Virginia
as a cadet at West Point. He obtained the appointment, and, in 1825,
at the age of eighteen, entered the Military Academy. His progress in
his studies was steady, and it is said that, during his stay at West
Point, he was never reprimanded, nor marked with a "demerit." He
graduated, in July, 1829, second in his class, and was assigned to
duty, with the rank of lieutenant, in the corps of Engineers.

[Illustration: R.E. LEE, AS A YOUNG OFFICER New York D Apololay & Co.]

He is described, by those who saw him at this time, as a young man of
great personal beauty; and this is probably not an exaggeration, as he
remained to the last distinguished for the elegance and dignity of
his person. He had not yet lost what the cares of command afterward
banished--his gayety and _abandon_--and was noted, it is said, for the
sweetness of his smile and the cordiality of his manners. The person
who gave the writer these details added, "He was a perfect gentleman."
Three years after graduating at West Point--in the year 1832--he
married Mary Custis, daughter of Mr. George Washington Parke Custis,
of Arlington, the adopted son of General Washington; and by this
marriage he came into possession of the estate of Arlington and the
White House--points afterward well known in the war.

The life of Lee up to the beginning of the great conflict of 1861-'65
is of moderate interest only, and we shall not dwell at length upon
it. He was employed on the coast defences, in New York and Virginia;
and, in 1835, in running the boundary line between the States of Ohio
and Michigan. In September, 1836, he was promoted to the rank of first
lieutenant; in July, 1838, to a captaincy; in 1844 he became a member
of the Board of Visitors to the Military Academy; in 1845 he was a
member of the Board of Engineers; and in 1846, when the Mexican War
broke out, was assigned to duty as chief engineer of the Central Army
of Mexico, in which capacity he served to the end of the war.

Up to the date of the Mexican War, Captain Lee had attracted no public
attention, but had impressed the military authorities, including
General Winfield Scott, with a favorable opinion of his ability as a
topographical engineer. For this department of military science he
exhibited endowments of the first class--what other faculties of the
soldier he possessed, it remained for events to show. This opportunity
was now given him in the Mexican War; and the efficient character of
his services may be seen in Scott's Autobiography, where "Captain Lee,
of the Engineers," is mentioned in every report, and everywhere with
commendation. From the beginning of operations, the young officer
seems to have been summoned to the councils of war, and General Scott
particularly mentions that held at Vera Cruz--so serious an affair,
that "a death-bed discussion could hardly have been more solemn."
The passages in which the lieutenant-general mentions Lee are too
numerous, and not of sufficient interest to quote, but two entries
will exhibit the general tenor of this "honorable mention." After
Cerro Gordo, Scott writes, in his official report of the battle: "I am
compelled to make special mention of Captain R.E. Lee, engineer. This
officer greatly distinguished himself at the siege of Vera Cruz; was
again indefatigable during these operations, in reconnoissance as
daring, as laborious, and of the utmost value." After Chapultepec, he
wrote: "Captain Lee, so constantly distinguished, also bore important
orders for me (September 13th), until he fainted from a wound, and the
loss of two nights' sleep at the batteries."

We may add here the statement of the Hon. Reverdy Johnson, that he
"had heard General Scott more than once say that his success in Mexico
was largely due to the skill, valor, and undaunted energy of Robert E.
Lee."

For these services Lee received steady promotion. For meritorious
conduct at Cerro Gordo, he was made brevet major; for the same at
Contreras and Cherubusco, brevet lieutenant-colonel; and,
after Chapultepec, he received the additional brevet of
colonel--distinctions fairly earned by energy and courage.

When the war ended, Lee returned to his former duties in the Engineer
Corps of the U.S.A., and was placed in charge of the works, then
in process of construction, at Fort Carroll, near Baltimore. His
assignment to the duty of thus superintending the military defences
of Hampton Roads, New York Bay, and the approaches to Baltimore, in
succession, would seem to indicate that his abilities as engineer were
highly esteemed. Of his possession of such ability there can be no
doubt. The young officer was not only thoroughly trained in this high
department of military science, but had for his duties unmistakable
natural endowments. This fact was clearly indicated on many occasions
in the Confederate struggle--his eye for positions never failed him.
It is certain that, had Lee never commanded troops in the field, he
would have left behind him the reputation of an excellent engineer.

In 1855 he was called for the first time to command men, for his
duties hitherto had been those of military engineer, astronomer, or
staff-officer. The act of Congress directing that two new cavalry
regiments should be raised excited an ardent desire in the officers of
the army to receive appointments in them, and Lee was transferred from
his place of engineer to the post of lieutenant-colonel in the Second
Cavalry, one of the regiments in question. The extraordinary number
of names of officers in this regiment who afterward became famous
is worthy of notice. The colonel was Albert Sydney Johnston; the
lieutenant-colonel, R.E. Lee; the senior major, William J. Hardee; the
junior major, George H. Thomas; the senior captain, Earl Yan Dorn;
the next ranking captain, Kirby Smith; the lieutenants, Hood, Fields,
Cosby, Major, Fitzhugh Lee, Johnson, Palmer, and Stoneman, all of
whom became general officers afterward on the Southern side, with the
exception of Thomas, and the three last named, who became prominent
generals in the Federal army. It is rare that such a constellation of
famous names is found in the list of officers of a single regiment.
The explanation is, nevertheless simple. Positions in the new
regiments were eagerly coveted by the best soldiers of the army, and,
in appointing the officers, those of conspicuous ability only were
selected. The Second Regiment of cavalry thus became the _corps
d'élite_ of the United States Army; and, after Albert Sydney Johnston,
Robert E. Lee was the ranking officer.

Lee proceeded with his regiment to Texas, remaining there for several
years on frontier duty, and does not reappear again until 1859.

Such was the early career in the army of the soldier soon to
become famous on a greater theatre--that of a thoroughly-trained,
hard-working, and conscientious officer. With the single exception
of his brief record in the Mexican War, his life had been passed in
official duties, unconnected with active military operations. He
was undoubtedly what is called a "rising man," but he had had no
opportunity to display the greatest faculties of the soldier. The
time was coming now when he was to be tested, and the measure of his
faculties taken in one of the greatest wars which darken the pages of
history.

A single incident of public importance marks the life of Lee between
1855 and 1861. This was what is known to the world as the "John Brown
raid"--an incident of the year 1859, and preluding the approaching
storm. This occurrence is too well known to require a minute account
in these pages, and we shall accordingly pass over it briefly,
indicating simply the part borne in the affair by Lee. He was in
Washington at the time--the fall of 1859--on a visit to his family,
then residing at Arlington, near the city, when intelligence came that
a party of desperadoes had attacked and captured Harper's Ferry, with
the avowed intent of arming and inciting to insurrection the slaves
of the neighborhood and entire State. Lee was immediately, thereupon,
directed by President Buchanan to proceed to the point of danger and
arrest the rioters. He did so promptly; found upon his arrival that
Brown and his confederates had shut themselves up in an engine-house
of the town, with a number of their prisoners. Brown was summoned to
surrender, to be delivered over to the authorities for civil trial--he
refused; and Lee then proceeded to assault, with a force of marines,
the stronghold to which Brown had retreated. The doors were driven in,
Brown firing upon the assailants and killing or wounding two; but he
and his men were cut down and captured; they were turned over to the
Virginia authorities, and Lee, having performed the duty assigned him
returned to Washington, and soon afterward to Texas.

He remained there, commanding the department, until the early spring
of 1861. He was then recalled to Washington at the moment when the
conflict between the North and the South was about to commence.




VI.

LEE AND SCOTT.


Lee found the country burning as with fever, and the air hot with
contending passions. The animosity, long smouldering between the two
sections, was about to burst into the flame of civil war; all men were
taking sides; the war of discussion on the floor of Congress was
about to yield to the clash of bayonets and the roar of cannon on the
battle-field.

Any enumeration of the causes which led to this unhappy state of
affairs would be worse than useless in a volume like the present. Even
less desirable would be a discussion of the respective blame to be
attached to each of the great opponents in inaugurating the bitter and
long-continued struggle. Such a discussion would lead to nothing, and
would probably leave every reader of the same opinion as before. It
would also be the repetition of a worn-out and wearisome story. These
events are known of all men; for the political history of the United
States, from 1820, when the slavery agitation began, on the question
of the Missouri restriction, to 1861, when it ended in civil
convulsion, has been discussed, rediscussed, and discussed again, in
every journal, great and small, in the whole country. The person who
is not familiar, therefore, with the main points at issue, must be
ignorant beyond the power of any writer to enlighten him. We need
only say that the election of Abraham Lincoln, the nominee of the
Republican party, had determined the Gulf States to leave the Union.
South Carolina accordingly seceded, on the 20th of December, 1860; and
by the 1st of February, 1861, she had been followed by Mississippi,
Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas. The struggle thus
approached. Military movements began at many points, like those
distant flashes of lightning and vague mutterings which herald the
tempest. Early in February Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi, was
elected President of the Confederate States, at Montgomery. On the
13th of April Fort Sumter surrendered to General Beauregard, and
on the next day, April 14, 1861, President Lincoln issued his
proclamation declaring the Gulf States in rebellion, and calling upon
the States which had not seceded for seventy-five thousand men to
enforce the Federal authority.

Tip to this time the older State of Virginia had persistently resisted
secession. Her refusal to array herself against the General Government
had been based upon an unconquerable repugnance, it seemed, for the
dissolution of that Union which she had so long loved; from real
attachment to the flag which she had done so much to make honorable,
and from a natural indisposition to rush headlong into a conflict
whose whole fury would burst upon and desolate her own soil. The
proclamation of President Lincoln, however, decided her course. The
convention had obdurately refused, week after week, to pass the
ordinance of secession. Now the naked question was, whether Virginia
should fight with or against her sisters of the Gulf States. She was
directed to furnish her quota of the seventy-five thousand troops
called for by President Lincoln, and must decide at once. On the 17th
of April, 1861, accordingly, an ordinance of secession passed the
Virginia Convention, and that Commonwealth cast her fortunes for weal
or woe with the Southern Confederacy.

Such is a brief and rapid summary of the important public events which
had preceded, or immediately followed, Lee's return to Washington in
March, 1861. A grave, and to him a very solemn, question demanded
instant decision. Which side should he espouse--the side of the United
States or that of the South? To choose either caused him acute pain.
The attachment of the soldier to his flag is greater than the civilian
can realize, and Lee had before him the brightest military prospects.
The brief record which we have presented of his military career in
Mexico conveys a very inadequate idea of the position which he had
secured in the army. He was regarded by the authorities at Washington,
and by the country at large, as the ablest and most promising of
all the rising class of army officers. Upon General Winfield Scott,
Commander-in-Chief of the Federal Army, he had made an impression
which is the most striking proof of his great merit. General Scott was
enthusiastic in his expressions of admiration for the young Virginian;
and with the death of that general, which his great age rendered a
probable event at any moment, Lee was sure to become a candidate for
the highest promotion in the service. To this his great ability gave
him a title at the earliest possible moment; and other considerations
operated to advance his fortunes. He was conceded by all to be a
person of the highest moral character; was the descendant of an
influential and distinguished family, which had rendered important
services to the country in the Revolution; his father had been the
friend of Washington, and had achieved the first glories of arms, and
the ample estates derived from his wife gave him that worldly prestige
which has a direct influence upon the fortunes of an individual.
Colonel Lee could thus look forward, without the imputation of
presumption, to positions of the highest responsibility and honor
under the Government. With the death of Scott, and other aged officers
of the army, the place of commander-in-chief would fall to the most
deserving of the younger generation; and of this generation there was
no one so able and prominent as Lee.[1]

[Footnote 1: "General Scott stated his purpose to recommend Lee as his
successor in the chief command of the army."--_Hon. Reverdy Johnson_.]

The personal relations of Lee with General Scott constituted another
powerful temptation to decide him against going over to the Southern
side. We have referred to the great admiration which the old soldier
felt for the young officer. He is said to have exclaimed on one
occasion: "It would be better for every officer in the army, including
myself, to die than Robert Lee." There seems no doubt of the fact that
Scott looked to Lee as his ultimate successor in the supreme command,
for which his character and military ability peculiarly fitted him.
Warm personal regard gave additional strength to his feelings in
Lee's favor; and the consciousness of this regard on the part of his
superior made it still more difficult for Lee to come to a decision.




VII.

LEE RESIGNS.


It is known that General Scott used every argument to persuade Lee not
to resign. To retain him in the service, he had been appointed, on his
arrival at Washington, a full colonel, and in 1860 his name had been
sent in, with others, by Scott, as a proper person to fill the vacancy
caused by the death of Brigadier-General Jessup. To these tempting
intimations that rapid promotion would attend his adherence to the
United States flag, Scott added personal appeals, which, coming from
him, must have been almost irresistible.

"For God's sake, don't resign, Lee!" the lieutenant-general is said
to have exclaimed. And, in the protracted interviews which took place
between the two officers, every possible argument was urged by the
elder to decide Lee to remain firm.

The attempt was in vain. Lee's attachment to the flag he had so long
fought under, and his personal affection for General Scott, were
great, but his attachment to his native State was still more powerful.
By birth a Virginian, he declared that he owed his first duty to her
and his own people. If she summoned him, he must obey the summons. As
long as she remained in the Union he might remain in the United States
Army. When she seceded from the Union, and took part with the Gulf
States, he must follow her fortunes, and do his part in defending her.
The struggle had been bitter, but brief. "My husband has wept tears of
blood," Mrs. Lee wrote to a friend, "over this terrible war; but he
must, as a man and a Virginian, share the destiny of his State, which
has solemnly pronounced for independence."

The secession of Virginia, by a vote of the convention assembled
at Richmond, decided Lee in his course. He no longer hesitated. To
General Scott's urgent appeals not to send in his resignation, he
replied: "I am compelled to. I cannot consult my own feelings in this
matter." He accordingly wrote to General Scott from Arlington, on
the 20th of April, enclosing his resignation. The letter was in the
following words:

    GENERAL: Since my interview with you, on the 18th instant, I have
    felt that I ought not longer to retain my commission in the army.
    I therefore tender my resignation, which I request you will
    recommend for acceptance. It would have been presented at once but
    for the struggle it has cost me to separate myself from a service
    to which I have devoted all the best years of my life, and all the
    ability I possessed.

    During the whole of that time--more than a quarter of a century--I
    have experienced nothing but kindness from my superiors, and the
    most cordial friendship from my comrades. To no one, general, have
    I been as much indebted as to yourself for uniform kindness and
    consideration, and it has always been my ardent desire to merit
    your approbation. I shall carry to the grave the most grateful
    recollections of your kind consideration, and your name and fame
    will always be dear to me.

    Save in defence of my native State, I never desire again to draw
    my sword. Be pleased to accept my most earnest wishes for the
    continuance of your happiness and prosperity, and believe me, most
    truly yours,

    R.E. LEE. LIEUTENANT-GENERAL WINFIELD SCOTT, _Commanding United
    States Army_.

In this letter, full of dignity and grave courtesy, Lee vainly
attempts to hide the acute pain he felt at parting from his friend and
abandoning the old service. Another letter, written on the same day,
expresses the same sentiment of painful regret:

    ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA, _April 20,1861_.

    MY DEAR SISTER: I am grieved at my inability to see you ... I have
    been waiting "for a more convenient season," which has brought to
    many before me deep and lasting regret. Now we are in a state of
    war which will yield to nothing. The whole South is in a state of
    revolution, into which Virginia, after a long struggle, has been
    drawn, and, _though I recognize no necessity for this state of
    things_, and would have forborne and pleaded to the end for
    redress of grievances, real or supposed, yet in my own person I
    had to meet the question, _whether I should take part against my
    native State_. With all my devotion to the Union, and the feeling
    of loyalty and duty of an American citizen, I have not been able
    to make up my mind to raise my hand against my relatives, my
    children, my home. I have, therefore, resigned my commission
    in the army, and, save in defence of my native State, with the
    sincere hope that my poor services may never be needed, I hope I
    may never be called on to draw my sword.

    I know you will blame me, but you must think as kindly of me as
    you can, and believe that I have endeavored to do what I thought
    right. To show you the feeling and struggle it has cost me, I send
    a copy of my letter to General Scott, which accompanied my letter
    of resignation. I have no time for more.... May God guard and
    protect you and yours, and shower upon you every blessing, is the
    prayer of your devoted brother,

    R.E. LEE.

The expression used in this letter--"though I recognize no necessity
for this state of things"--conveys very clearly the political
sentiments of the writer. He did not regard the election of a
Republican President, even by a strictly sectional vote, as sufficient
ground for a dissolution of the Union. It may be added here, that
such, we believe, was the opinion of a large number of Southern
officers at that time. Accustomed to look to the flag as that which
they were called upon to defend against all comers, they were loath to
admit the force of the reasoning which justified secession, and called
upon them to abandon it. Their final action seems to have been taken
from the same considerations which controlled the course of Lee. Their
States called them, and they obeyed.

In resigning his commission and going over to the South, Lee
sacrificed his private fortunes, in addition to all his hopes of
future promotion in the United States Army. His beautiful home,
Arlington, situated upon the heights opposite Washington, must be
abandoned forever, and fall into the hands of the enemy. This old
mansion was a model of peaceful loveliness and attraction. "All
around here," says a writer, describing the place, "Arlington Heights
presents a lovely picture of rural beauty. The 'General Lee house,'
as some term it, stands on a grassy lot, surrounded with a grove of
stately trees and underwood, except in front, where is a verdant
sloping ground for a few rods, when it descends into a valley,
spreading away in beautiful and broad expanse to the lovely Potomac.
This part of the splendid estate is apparently a highly-cultivated
meadow, the grass waving in the gentle breeze, like the undulating
bosom of Old Atlantic. To the south, north, and west, the grounds are
beautifully diversified into hill and valley, and richly stored with
oak, willow, and maple, though the oak is the principal wood. The view
from the height is a charming picture. Washington, Georgetown, and the
intermediate Potomac, are all before you in the foreground."

In this old mansion crowning the grassy hill, the young officer had
passed the happiest moments of his life. All around him were spots
associated with his hours of purest enjoyment. Each object in the
house--the old furniture and very table-sets--recalled the memory of
Washington, and were dear to him. Here were many pieces of the "Martha
Washington china," portions of the porcelain set presented to Mrs.
Washington by Lafayette and others--in the centre of each piece the
monogram "M.W." with golden rays diverging to the names of the old
thirteen States. Here were also fifty pieces, remnants of the set
of one thousand, procured from China by the Cincinnati Society, and
presented to Washington--articles of elaborate decoration in blue and
gold, "with the coat-of-arms of the society, held by Fame, with a blue
ribbon, from which is suspended the eagle of the order, with a green
wreath about its neck, and on its breast a shield representing the
inauguration of the order." Add to these the tea-table used by
Washington and one of his bookcases; old portraits, antique furniture,
and other memorials of the Lee family from Stratford--let the reader
imagine the old mansion stored with these priceless relics, and he
will understand with what anguish Lee must have contemplated what came
duly to pass, the destruction, by rude hands, of objects so dear to
him. That he must have foreseen the fate of his home is certain. To
take sides with Virginia was to give up Arlington to its fate.

There is no proof, however, that this sacrifice of his personal
fortunes had any effect upon him. If he could decide to change his
flag, and dissolve every tie which bound him to the old service, he
could sacrifice all else without much regret. No one will be found to
say that the hope of rank or emolument in the South influenced him.
The character and whole career of the man contradict the idea. His
ground of action may be summed up in a single sentence. He went with
his State because he believed it was his duty to do so, and because,
to ascertain what was his duty, and perform it, was the cardinal maxim
of his life.




VIII.

HIS RECEPTION AT RICHMOND.


No sooner had intelligence of Lee's resignation of his commission
in the United States Army reached Richmond, than Governor Letcher
appointed him major-general of the military forces of Virginia. The
appointment was confirmed by the convention, rather by acclamation
than formal vote; and on the 23d of April, Lee, who had meanwhile
left Washington and repaired to Richmond, was honored by a formal
presentation to the convention.

The address of President Janney was eloquent, and deserves to be
preserved. Lee stood in the middle aisle, and the president, rising,
said:

    "MAJOR-GENERAL LEE: In the name of the people of our native State,
    here represented, I bid you a cordial and heart-felt welcome to
    this hall, in which we may almost yet hear the echoes of the
    voices of the statesmen, the soldiers, and sages of by-gone days,
    who have borne your name, and whose blood now flows in your veins.

    "We met in the month of February last, charged with the solemn
    duty of protecting the rights, the honor, and the interests of the
    people of this Commonwealth. We differed for a time as to the best
    means of accomplishing that object, but there never was, at any
    moment, a shade of difference among us as to the great object
    itself; and now, Virginia having taken her position, as far as
    the power of this convention extends, we stand animated by one
    impulse, governed by one desire and one determination, and that
    is, that she shall be defended, and that no spot of her soil shall
    be polluted by the foot of an invader.

    "When the necessity became apparent of having a leader for our
    forces, all hearts and all eyes, by the impulse of an instinct
    which is a surer guide than reason itself, turned to the old
    county of Westmoreland. We knew how prolific she had been in other
    days of heroes and statesmen. We knew she had given birth to the
    Father of his Country, to Richard Henry Lee, to Monroe, and last,
    though not least, to your own gallant father, and we knew well, by
    your deeds, that her productive power was not yet exhausted.

    "Sir, we watched with the most profound and intense interest the
    triumphal march of the army led by General Scott, to which you
    were attached, from Vera Cruz to the capital of Mexico. We read of
    the sanguinary conflicts and the blood-stained fields, in all
    of which victory perched upon our own banners. We knew of the
    unfading lustre that was shed upon the American arms by that
    campaign, and we know, also, what your modesty has always
    disclaimed, that no small share of the glory of those achievements
    was due to your valor and your military genius.

    "Sir, one of the proudest recollections of my life will be the
    honor that I yesterday had of submitting to this body confirmation
    of the nomination, made by the Governor of this State, of you
    as commander-in-chief of the military and naval forces of this
    Commonwealth. I rose to put the question, and when I asked if this
    body would advise and consent to that appointment, there rushed
    from the hearts to the tongues of all the members an affirmative
    response, which told with an emphasis that could leave no doubt
    of the feeling whence it emanated. I put the negative of the
    question, for form's sake, but there was an unbroken silence.

    "Sir, we have, by this unanimous vote, expressed our convictions
    that you are at this day, among the living citizens of Virginia,
    'first in war.' We pray to God most fervently that you may so
    conduct the operations committed to your Charge that it may soon
    be said of you that you are 'first in peace,' and when that time
    comes you will have earned the still prouder distinction of being
    'first in the hearts of your countrymen.'"

The president concluded by saying that Virginia on that day intrusted
her spotless sword to Lee's keeping, and Lee responded as follows:

"MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN OF THE CONVENTION: Profoundly impressed
with the solemnity of the occasion, for which I must say I was not
prepared, I accept the position assigned me by your partiality. I
would have much preferred had your choice fallen upon an abler man.
Trusting in Almighty God, an approving conscience, and the aid of my
fellow-citizens, I devote myself to the service of my native State, in
whose behalf alone will I ever again draw my sword."

Such were the modest and dignified expressions of Lee in accepting the
great trust. The reply is brief and simple, but these are very great
merits on such an occasion. No portion of the address contains a
phrase or word denunciatory of the Federal Government, or of the
motives of the opponents of Virginia; and this moderation and absence
of all rancor characterized the utterances of Lee, both oral and
written, throughout the war. He spoke, doubtless, as he felt, and
uttered no expression of heated animosity, because he cherished no
such sentiment. His heart was bleeding still from the cruel trial it
had undergone in abruptly tearing away from the old service to embark
upon civil war; with the emotions of the present occasion, excited by
the great ovation in his honor, no bitterness mingled--or at least, if
there were such bitterness in his heart, he did not permit it to rise
to his lips. He accepted the trust confided to him in terms of dignity
and moderation, worthy of Washington; exchanged grave salutations with
the members of the convention; and then, retiring from the hall where
he had solemnly consecrated his life to his native Commonwealth,
proceeded at once to energetic work to get the State in a posture of
defence.

The sentiment of the country in reference to Lee was even warmer than
that of the convention. For weeks, reports had been rife that he had
determined to adhere to the Federal Government in the approaching
struggle. Such an event, it was felt by all, would be a public
calamity to Virginia; and the general joy may be imagined when it was
known that Lee had resigned and come to fight with his own people. He
assumed command, therefore, of all the Virginia forces, in the
midst of universal public rejoicing; and the fact gave strength
and consistency to the general determination to resist the Federal
Government to the last.




IX.

LEE IN 1861.


At this time--April, 1861--General Lee was fifty-four years of age,
and may be said to have been in the ripe vigor of every faculty.
Physically and intellectually he was "at his best," and in the bloom
of manhood. His figure was erect, and he bore himself with the brief,
somewhat stiff air of command derived from his military education
and service in the army. This air of the professional soldier, which
characterized generally the graduates of West Point, was replaced
afterward by a grave dignity, the result of high command and great
responsibilities. In April, 1861, however, he was rather the ordinary
army officer in bearing than the commander-in-chief.

He had always been remarkable for his manly beauty, both of face and
figure, and the cares of great command had not yet whitened his hair.
There was not a gray hair in his head, and his mustache was dark and
heavy. The rest of his face was clean-shaven, and his cheeks had that
fresh, ruddy hue which indicates high physical health. This was not at
that time or afterward the result of high living. Of all the prominent
personages of his epoch. Lee was, perhaps, the most temperate. He
rarely drank even so much as a single glass of wine, and it was a
matter of general notoriety in the army afterward, that he cared not
what he ate. The ruddy appearance which characterized him from first
to last was the result of the most perfectly-developed physical
health, which no species of indulgence had ever impaired. He used no
tobacco then or afterward, in any shape--that seductive weed which has
been called "the soldier's comfort"--and seemed, indeed, superior
to all those small vices which assail men of his profession. Grave,
silent, with a military composure of bearing which amounted at times,
as we have said, to stiffness, he resembled a machine in the shape of
a man. At least this was the impression which he produced upon those
who saw him in public at this time.

The writer's design, here, is to indicate the personal appearance and
bearing of General Lee on the threshold of the war. It may be said, by
way of summing up all, that he was a full-blooded "West-Pointer" in
appearance; the _militaire_ as distinguished from the civilian; and
no doubt impressed those who held official interviews with him as a
personage of marked reserve. The truth and frankness of the man under
all circumstances, and his great, warm heart, full of honesty and
unassuming simplicity, became known only in the progress of the war.
How simple and true and honest he was, will appear from a letter to
his son, G.W. Custis Lee, written some time before:

"You must study," he wrote, "to be frank with the world; frankness
is the child of honesty and courage. Say just what you mean to do on
every occasion, and take it for granted you mean to do right. If a
friend asks a favor, you should grant it, if it is reasonable; if not,
tell him plainly why you cannot: you will wrong him and wrong yourself
by equivocation of any kind. Never do a wrong thing to make a friend
or keep one; the man who requires you to do so, is dearly purchased at
a sacrifice. Deal kindly, but firmly, with all your classmates; you
will find it the policy which wears best. Above all, do not appear to
others what you are not. If you have any fault to find with any one,
tell him, not others, of what you complain; there is no more dangerous
experiment than that of undertaking to be one thing before a man's
face and another behind his back. We should live, act, and say,
nothing to the injury of any one. It is not only best as a matter of
principle, but it is the path to peace and honor.

"In regard to duty, let me, in conclusion of this hasty letter, inform
you that, nearly a hundred years ago, there was a day of remarkable
gloom and darkness--still known as 'the dark day'--a day when the
light of the sun was slowly extinguished, as if by an eclipse. The
Legislature of Connecticut was in session, and, as its members saw the
unexpected and unaccountable darkness coming on, they shared in the
general awe and terror. It was supposed by many that the last day--the
day of judgment--had come. Some one, in the consternation of the hour,
moved an adjournment. Then there arose an old Puritan legislator,
Davenport, of Stamford, and said that, if the last day had come, he
desired to be found at his place doing his duty, and, therefore, moved
that candles be brought in, so that the House could proceed with
its duty. There was quietness in that man's mind, the quietness of
heavenly wisdom and inflexible willingness to obey present duty. Duty,
then, is the sublimest word in our language. Do your duty in all
things, like the old Puritan. You cannot do more, you should never
wish to do less. Never let me and your mother wear one gray hair for
any lack of duty on your part."

The maxims of this letter indicate the noble and conscientious
character of the man who wrote it. "Frankness is the child of honesty
and courage." "Say just what you mean to do on every occasion." "Never
do a wrong thing to make a friend or keep one." "Duty is the sublimest
word in our language ... do your duty in all things ... you cannot do
more." That he lived up to these great maxims, amid all the troubled
scenes and hot passions of a stormy epoch, is Lee's greatest glory.
His fame as a soldier, great as it is, yields to the true glory of
having placed duty before his eyes always as the supreme object of
life. He resigned his commission from a sense of duty to his native
State; made this same duty his sole aim in every portion of his
subsequent career; and, when all had failed, and the cause he had
fought for was overthrown, it was the consciousness of having
performed conscientiously, and to his utmost, his whole duty, which
took the sting from defeat, and gave him that noble calmness which the
whole world saw and admired. "Human virtue should be equal to human
calamity," were his august words when all was lost, and men's minds
were sinking under the accumulated agony of defeat and despair.
Those words could only have been uttered by a man who made duty the
paramount object of living--the performance of it, the true glory and
crown of virtuous manhood. It may be objected by some critics that
he mistook his duty in espousing the Southern cause. Doubtless many
persons will urge that objection, and declare that the words here
written are senseless panegyric. But that will not affect the truth or
detract from Lee's great character. He performed at least what in his
inmost soul _he_ considered his duty, and, from the beginning of his
career, when all was so bright, to its termination, when all was so
dark, it will be found that his controlling sentiment was, first,
last, and all the time, this performance of duty. The old Puritan,
whose example he admired so much, was not more calm and resolute.
When "the last day" of the cause he fought for came--in the spring of
1865--it was plain to all who saw the man, standing unmoved in the
midst of the general disaster, that his sole desire was to be "found
at his place, and doing his duty."

From this species of digression upon the moral constituents of the
individual, we pass to the record of that career which made the great
fame of the soldier. The war had already begun when Lee took command
of the provisional forces of Virginia, and the collisions in various
portions of the Gulf States between the Federal and State authorities
were followed by overt acts in Virginia, which all felt would be the
real battle-ground of the war. The North entered upon the struggle
with very great ardor and enthusiasm. The call for volunteers to
enforce obedience to the Federal authority was tumultuously responded
to throughout the entire North, and troops were hurried forward to
Washington, which soon became an enormous camp. The war began in
Virginia with the evacuation and attempted destruction of the works at
Harper's Ferry, by the Federal officer in command there. This was on
the 19th of April, and on the next day reinforcements were thrown into
Fortress Monroe; and the navy-yard at Norfolk, with the shipping, set
on fire and abandoned.

Lee thus found the Commonwealth in a state of war, and all his
energies were immediately concentrated upon the work of placing her
in a condition of defence. He established his headquarters in the
custom-house at Richmond; orderlies were seen coming and going; bustle
reigned throughout the building, and by night, as well as by day,
General Lee labored incessantly to organize the means of resistance.
From the first moment, all had felt that Virginia, from her
geographical position, adjoining the Federal frontier and facing the
Federal capital, would become the arena of the earliest, longest, and
most determined struggle. Her large territory and moral influence, as
the oldest of the Southern States, also made her the chief object of
the Federal hostility. It was felt that if Virginia were occupied, and
her people reduced under the Federal authority again, the Southern
cause would be deprived of a large amount of its prestige and
strength. The authorities of the Gulf States accordingly hurried
forward to Richmond all available troops; and from all parts of
Virginia the volunteer regiments, which had sprung up like magic,
were in like manner forwarded by railway to the capital. Every train
brought additions to this great mass of raw war material; large camps
rose around Richmond, chief among which was that named "Camp Lee;" and
the work of drilling and moulding this crude material for the great
work before it was ardently proceeded with under the supervision of
Lee.

An Executive Board, or Military Council, had been formed, consisting
of Governor Letcher and other prominent officials; but these gentlemen
had the good sense to intrust the main work of organizing an army to
Lee. As yet the great question at Richmond was to place Virginia in a
state of defence--to prepare that Commonwealth for the hour of trial,
by enrolling her own people. It will be remembered that Lee held no
commission from the Confederate States; he was major-general of the
Provisional Army of Virginia, and to place this Provisional Army in
a condition to take the field was the first duty before him. It was
difficult, not from want of ardor in the population, but from the want
of the commonest material necessary in time of war. There were
few arms, and but small supplies of ammunition. While the Federal
Government entered upon the war with the amplest resources, the South
found herself almost entirely destitute of the munitions essential
to her protection. All was to be organized and put at once into
operation--the quartermaster, commissary, ordnance, and other
departments. Transportation, supplies of rations, arms, ammunition,
all were to be collected immediately. The material existed, or could
be supplied, as the sequel clearly showed; but as yet there was
almost nothing. And it was chiefly to the work of organizing these
departments, first of all, that General Lee and the Military Council
addressed themselves with the utmost energy.

The result was, that the State found herself very soon in a condition
to offer a determined resistance. The troops at the various camps of
instruction were successively sent to the field; others took their
places, and the work of drilling the raw material into soldiers went
on; supplies were collected, transportation found, workshops for the
construction of arms and ammunition sprung up; small-arms, cannon,
cartridges, fixed and other ammunition, were produced in quantities;
and, in a time which now seems wholly inadequate for such a result,
the Commonwealth of Virginia was ready to take the field against the
Federal Government.




X.

THE WAR BEGINS.


Early in May, Virginia became formally a member of the Southern
Confederacy, and the troops which she had raised a portion of the
Confederate States Army. When Richmond became the capital
soon afterward, and the Southern Congress assembled, five
brigadier-generals were appointed, Generals Cooper, Albert S.
Johnston, Lee, J.E. Johnston, and Beauregard. Large forces had been
meanwhile raised throughout the South; Virginia became the centre
of all eyes, as the scene of the main struggle; and early in June
occurred at Bethel, in Lower Virginia, the first prominent affair, in
which General Butler, with about four thousand men, was repulsed and
forced to retire.

The affair at Bethel, which was of small importance, was followed
by movements in Northern and Western Virginia--the battles at Rich
Mountain and Carrick's Ford; Johnston's movements in the Valley; and
the advance of the main Federal army on the force under Beauregard,
which resulted in the first battle of Manassas. In these events,
General Lee bore no part, and we need not speak of them further than
to present a summary of the results. The Federal design had been to
penetrate Virginia in three columns. One was to advance from the
northwest under General McClellan; a second, under General Patterson,
was to take possession of the Valley; and a third, under General
McDowell, was to drive Beauregard back from Manassas on Richmond. Only
one of these columns--that of McClellan--succeeded in its undertaking.
Johnston held Patterson in check in the Valley until the advance upon
Manassas; then by a flank march the Confederate general hastened to
the assistance of Beauregard. The battle of Manassas followed on
Sunday, the 21st of July. After an unsuccessful attempt to force the
Confederate right, General McDowell assailed their left, making for
that purpose a long _détour_--and at first carried all before him.
Reënforcements were hurried forward, however, and the Confederates
fought with the energy of men defending their own soil. The obstinate
stand made by Evans, Bee, Bartow, Jackson, and their brave associates,
turned the fortunes of the day, and, when reënforcements subsequently
reached the field under General Kirby Smith and General Early, the
Federal troops retreated in great disorder toward Washington.




XI.

LEE'S ADVANCE INTO WESTERN VIRGINIA.


General Lee nowhere appears, as we have seen, in these first great
movements and conflicts. He was without any specific command, and
remained at Richmond, engaged in placing that city in a state of
defence. The works which he constructed proved subsequently of great
importance to the city, and a Northern officer writes of Lee: "While
the fortifications of Richmond stand, his name will evoke admiration;
the art of war is unacquainted with any defence so admirable."

Lee's first appearance in the war, as commander of troops in the
field, took place in the fall of 1861, when he was sent to operate
against the forces under General Rosecrans in the fastnesses of
Western Virginia. This indecisive and unimportant movement has been
the subject of various comment; the official reports were burned in
the conflagration at Richmond, or captured, and the elaborate plans
drawn up by Lee of his intended movement against General Reynolds,
at Cheat Mountain, have in the same manner disappeared. Under these
circumstances, and as the present writer had no personal knowledge of
the subject, it seems best to simply quote the brief statement which
follows. It is derived from an officer of high rank and character,
whose statement is only second in value to that of General Lee
himself:

    "After General Garnett's death, General Lee was sent by the
    President to ascertain what could be done in the trans-Alleghany
    region, and to endeavor to harmonize our movements, etc., in that
    part of the State. He was not ordered to take command of the
    troops, nor did he do so, during the whole time he was there.

    "Soon after his arrival he came to the decided conclusion that
    _that_ was not the line from which to make an offensive movement.
    The country, although not hostile, was not friendly; supplies
    could not be obtained; the enemy had possession of the Baltimore
    and Ohio Railroad, from which, and the Ohio River as a base, he
    could operate with great advantage against us, and our only chance
    was to drive him from the railroad, take possession, and use it
    ourselves. We had not the means of doing this, and consequently
    could only try to hold as much country as possible, and occupy as
    large a force of the enemy as could be kept in front of us. The
    movement against Cheat Mountain, which failed, was undertaken with
    a view of causing the enemy to contract his lines, and enable
    us to unite the troops under Generals Jackson (of Georgia) and
    Loring. After the failure of this movement on our part, General
    Rosecrans, feeling secure, strengthened his lines in that part of
    the country, and went with a part of his forces to the Kanawha,
    driving our forces across the Gauley. General Lee then went to
    that line of operations, to endeavor to unite the troops under
    Generals Floyd and Wise, and stop the movements under Rosecrans.
    General Loring, with a part of his force from Valley Mountain,
    joined the forces at Sewell Mountain. Rosecrans's movement was
    stopped, and, the season for operations in that country being
    over, General Lee was ordered to Richmond, and soon afterward sent
    to South Carolina, to meet the movement of the enemy from Port
    Royal, etc. He remained in South Carolina until shortly before the
    commencement of the campaign before Richmond, in 1862."

The months spent by General Lee in superintending the coast defences
of South Carolina and Georgia, present nothing of interest, and we
shall therefore pass to the spring of 1862, when he returned to
Richmond. His services as engineer had been highly appreciated by the
people of the South, and a writer of the period said: "The time will
yet come when his superior abilities will be vindicated, both to his
own renown and the glory of his country." The time was now at hand
when these abilities, if the individual possessed them, were to have
an opportunity to display themselves.




XII.

LEE'S LAST INTERVIEW WITH BISHOP MEADE.


A touching incident of Lee's life belongs to this time--the early
spring of 1862. Bishop Meade, the venerable head of the Episcopal
Church in Virginia, lay at the point of death, in the city of
Richmond. When General Lee was informed of the fact, he exhibited
lively emotion, for the good bishop, as we have said in the
commencement of this narrative, had taught him his catechism when he
was a boy in Alexandria. On the day before the bishop's death. General
Lee called in the morning to see him, but such was the state of
prostration under which the sick man labored, that only a few of his
most intimate friends were permitted to have access to his chamber. In
the evening General Lee called again, and his name was announced
to Bishop Meade. As soon as he heard it, he said faintly, for
his breathing had become much oppressed, and he spoke with great
difficulty: "I must see him, if only for a few moments."

General Lee was accordingly introduced, and approached the dying man,
with evidences of great emotion in his countenance. Taking the thin
hand in his own, he said:

"How do you feel, bishop?"

"Almost gone," replied Bishop Meade, in a voice so weak that it was
almost inaudible; "but I wanted to see you once more."

He paused for an instant, breathing heavily, and looking at Lee with
deep feeling.

"God bless you! God bless you, Robert!" he faltered out, "and fit you
for your high and responsible duties. I can't call you 'general'--I
must call you 'Robert;' I have heard you your catechism too often."

General Lee pressed the feeble hand, and tears rolled down his cheeks.

"Yes, bishop--very often," he said, in reply to the last words uttered
by the bishop.

A brief conversation followed, Bishop Meade making inquiries in
reference to Mrs. Lee, who was his own relative, and other members
of the family. "He also," says the highly-respectable clergyman who
furnishes these particulars, "put some pertinent questions to General
Lee about the state of public affairs and of the army, showing the
most lively interest in the success of our cause."

It now became necessary to terminate an interview which, in the feeble
condition of the aged man, could not be prolonged. Much exhausted, and
laboring under deep emotion, Bishop Meade shook the general by the
hand, and said:

"Heaven bless you! Heaven bless you! and give you wisdom for your
important and arduous duties!"

These were the last words uttered during the interview. General Lee
pressed the dying man's hand, released it, stood for several minutes
by the bedside motionless and in perfect silence, and then went out of
the room.

On the next morning Bishop Meade expired.

[Illustration: Environs of Richmond.]




PART II.

_IN FRONT OF RICHMOND_.





I.

PLAN OF THE FEDERAL CAMPAIGN.


The pathetic interview which we have just described took place in the
month of March, 1862.

By the latter part of that month, General McClellan, in command of an
army of more than one hundred thousand men, landed on the Peninsula
between the James and York Rivers, and after stubbornly-contested
engagements with the forces of General Johnston, advanced up the
Peninsula--the Confederates slowly retiring. In the latter part of
May, a portion of the Federal forces had crossed the Chickahominy, and
confronted General Johnston defending Richmond.

Such was the serious condition of affairs in the spring of 1862. The
Federal sword had nearly pierced the heart of Virginia, and, as the
course of events was about to place Lee in charge of her destinies,
a brief notice is indispensable of the designs of the adversaries
against whom he was to contend on the great arena of the State.

While the South had been lulled to sleep, as it were, by the battle of
Manassas, the North, greatly enraged at the disaster, had prepared to
prosecute the war still more vigorously. The military resources of the
South had been plainly underestimated. It was now obvious that the
North had to fight with a dangerous adversary, and that the people of
the South were entirely in earnest. Many journals of the North had
ridiculed the idea of war; and one of them had spoken of the great
uprising of the Southern States from the Potomac to the Gulf of Mexico
as a mere "local commotion" which a force of fifty thousand men would
be able to put down without difficulty. A column of twenty-five
thousand men, it was said, would be sufficient to carry all before it
in Virginia, and capture Richmond, and the comment on this statement
had been the battle of Manassas, where a force of more than fifty
thousand had been defeated and driven back to Washington.

It was thus apparent that the war was to be a serious struggle, in
which the North would be compelled to exert all her energies. The
people responded to the call upon them with enthusiasm. All the roving
and adventurous elements of Northern society flocked to the Federal
standard, and in a short time a large force had once more assembled at
Washington. The work now was to drill, equip, and put it in efficient
condition for taking the field. This was undertaken with great energy,
the Congress coöperating with the Executive in every manner. The city
of Washington resounded with the wheels of artillery and the tramp
of cavalry; the workshops were busy night and day to supply arms and
ammunition; and the best officers devoted themselves, without rest, to
the work of drilling and disciplining the mass.

By the spring of 1862 a force of about two hundred thousand men was
ready to take the field in Virginia. General Scott was not to command
in the coming campaigns. He had retired in the latter part of the
year 1861, and his place had been filled by a young officer of
rising reputation--General George B. McClellan, who had achieved the
successes of Rich Mountain and Carrick's Ford in Western Virginia.
General McClellan was not yet forty, but had impressed the authorities
with a high opinion of his abilities. A soldier by profession, and
enjoying the distinction of having served with great credit in the
Mexican War, he had been sent as United States military commissioner
to the Crimea, and on his return had written a book of marked ability
on the military organizations of the powers of Europe. When the
struggle between the North and South approached, he was said--with
what truth we know not--to have hesitated, before determining upon his
course; but it is probable that the only question with him was whether
he should fight for the North or remain neutral. In his politics he
was a Democrat, and the war on the South is said to have shocked his
State-rights view. But, whatever his sentiments had been, he accepted
command, and fought a successful campaign in Western Virginia. From
that moment his name became famous; he was said to have achieved
"two victories in one day," and he received from the newspapers the
flattering name of "the Young Napoleon."

The result of this successful campaign, slight in importance as
it was, procured for General McClellan the high post of
commander-in-chief of the armies of the United States. Operations in
every portion of the South were to be directed by him; and he was
especially intrusted with the important work of organizing the new
levies at Washington. This he performed with very great ability. Under
his vigorous hand, the raw material soon took shape. He gave his
personal attention to every department; and the result, as we have
said, in the early spring of 1862, was an army of more than two
hundred thousand men, for operations in Virginia alone.

The great point now to be determined was the best line of operations
against Richmond. President Lincoln was strongly in favor of an
advance by way of Manassas and the Orange and Alexandria Railroad,
which he thought would insure the safety of the Federal capital. This
was always, throughout the whole war, a controlling consideration with
him; and, regarded in the light of subsequent events, this solicitude
seems to have been well founded. More than once afterward, General
Lee--to use his own expression--thought of "swapping queens," that is
to say, advancing upon Washington, without regard to the capture of
Richmond; and President Lincoln, with that excellent good sense which
he generally exhibited, felt that the loss of Washington would prove
almost fatal to the Federal cause.--Such was the origin of the
President's preference for the Manassas line. General McClellan did
not share it. He assented it seems at first, but soon resolved
to adopt another plan--an advance either from Urbanna on the
Rappahannock, or from West Point on the York. Against his views and
determination, the President and authorities struggled in vain.
McClellan treated their arguments and appeals with a want of ceremony
amounting at times nearly to contempt; he adhered to his own plan
resolutely, and in the end the President gave way. In rueful protest
against the continued inactivity of General McClellan, President
Lincoln had exclaimed, "If General McClellan does not want to use the
army, I would like to borrow it;" and "if something is not soon done,
the bottom will be out of the whole affair."

At last General McClellan carried his point, and an advance against
Richmond from the Peninsula was decided upon. In order to assist this
movement, General Fremont was to march through Northwestern Virginia,
and General Banks up the Valley; and, having thus arranged their
programme, the Federal authorities began to move forward to the great
work. To transport an army of more than one hundred thousand men
by water to the Peninsula was a heavy undertaking; but the ample
resources of the Government enabled them to do so without difficulty.
General McClellan, who had now been removed from his post of
commander-in-chief of the armies of the United States, and assigned to
the command only of the army to operate against Richmond, landed his
forces on the Peninsula, and, after several actions of an obstinate
description, advanced toward the Chickahominy, General Johnston, the
Confederate commander, deliberately retiring. Johnston took up a
position behind this stream, and, toward the end of May, McClellan
crossed a portion of his forces and confronted him.




II.

JOHNSTON IS WOUNDED.


The army thus threatening the city which had become the capital of the
Confederacy was large and excellently equipped. It numbered in all,
according to General McClellan's report, one hundred and fifty-six
thousand eight hundred and thirty-eight men, of whom one hundred and
fifteen thousand one hundred and two were effective troops--that is to
say, present and ready for duty as fighting-men in the field.

Results of such magnitude' were expected from this great army, that
all the resources of the Federal Government had been taxed to bring
it to the highest possible state of efficiency. The artillery was
numerous, and of the most approved description; small-arms of the best
patterns and workmanship were profusely supplied; the ammunition was
of the finest quality, and almost inexhaustible in quantity; and
the rations for the subsistence of the troops, which were equally
excellent and abundant, were brought up in an unfailing stream from
the White House, in General McClellan's rear, over the York River
Railroad, which ran straight to his army.

Such was the admirable condition of the large force under command of
General McClellan. It would be difficult to imagine an army better
prepared for active operations; and the position which it held had
been well selected. The left of the army was protected by the wellnigh
impassable morass of the White-oak Swamp, and all the approaches from
the direction of Richmond were obstructed by the natural difficulties
of the ground, which had been rendered still more forbidding by an
abattis of felled trees and earthworks of the best description. Unless
the right of McClellan, on the northern bank of the Chickahominy, were
turned by the Confederates, his communications with his base at the
White House and the safety of his army were assured. And even the
apparently improbable contingency of such an assault on his right had
been provided for. Other bodies of Federal troops had advanced into
Virginia to coöperate with the main force on the Peninsula. General
McDowell, the able soldier who had nearly defeated the Confederates at
Manassas, was at Fredericksburg with a force of about forty thousand
men, which were to advance southward without loss of time and unite
with General McClellan's right. This would completely insure the
communications of his army from interruption; and it was no doubt
expected that Generals Fremont and Banks would coöperate in the
movement also. Fremont was to advance from Northwestern Virginia,
driving before him the small Confederate force, under Jackson, in the
Valley; and General Banks, then at Winchester, was to cross the Blue
Ridge Mountains, and, posting his forces along the Manassas Railroad,
guard the approaches to Washington when McDowell advanced from
Fredericksburg to the aid of General McClellan. Thus Richmond would be
half encircled by Federal armies. General McClellan, if permitted by
the Confederates to carry out his plan of operations, would soon be in
command of about two hundred thousand men, and with this force it was
anticipated he would certainly be able to capture Richmond.

Such was the Federal programme of the war in Virginia. It promised
great results, and ought, it would seem, to have succeeded. The
Confederate forces in Virginia did not number in all one hundred
thousand men; and it is now apparent that, without the able strategy
of Johnston, Lee, and Jackson, General McClellan would have been in
possession of Richmond before the summer.

Prompt action was thus necessary on the part of the sagacious soldier
commanding the army at Richmond, and directing operations throughout
the theatre of action in Virginia. The officer in question was General
Joseph E. Johnston, a Virginian by birth, who had first held General
Patterson in check in the Shenandoah Valley, and then hastened to the
assistance of General Beauregard at Manassas, where, in right of his
superior rank, he took command. Before the enemy's design to advance
up the Peninsula had been developed, Johnston had made a masterly
retreat from Manassas. Reappearing with his force of about forty
thousand men on the Peninsula, he had obstinately opposed McClellan,
and only retired when he was compelled by numbers to do so, with
the resolution, however, of fighting a decisive battle on the
Chickahominy. In face, figure, and character, General Johnston was
thoroughly the soldier. Above the medium height, with an erect figure,
in a close-fitting uniform buttoned to the chin; with a ruddy face,
decorated with close-cut gray side-whiskers, mustache, and tuft on the
chin; reserved in manner, brief of speech, without impulses of any
description, it seemed, General Johnston's appearance and bearing were
military to stiffness; and he was popularly compared to "a gamecock,"
ready for battle at any moment. As a soldier, his reputation
was deservedly high; to unshrinking personal courage he added a
far-reaching capacity for the conduct of great operations. Throughout
his career he enjoyed a profound public appreciation of his abilities
as a commander, and was universally respected as a gentleman and a
patriot.

General Johnston, surveying the whole field in Virginia, and
penetrating, it would seem, the designs of the enemy, had hastened to
direct General Jackson, commanding in the Valley, to begin offensive
operations, and, by threatening the Federal force there--with
Washington in perspective--relieve the heavy pressure upon the main
arena. Jackson carried out these instructions with the vigor which
marked all his operations. In March he advanced down the Valley in the
direction of Winchester, and, coming upon a considerable force of
the enemy at Kernstown, made a vigorous assault upon them; a heavy
engagement ensued, and, though Jackson was defeated and compelled to
retreat, a very large Federal force was retained in the Valley
to protect that important region. A more decisive diversion soon
followed. Jackson advanced in May upon General Banks, then at
Strasburg, drove him from that point to and across the Potomac; and
such was the apprehension felt at Washington, that President Lincoln
ordered General McDowell, then at Fredericksburg with about forty
thousand men, to send twenty thousand across the mountains to
Strasburg in order to pursue or cut off Jackson.

Thus the whole Federal programme in Virginia was thrown into
confusion. General Banks, after the fight at Kernstown, was kept in
the Valley. After Jackson's second attack upon him, when General Banks
was driven across the Potomac and Washington threatened, General
McDowell was directed to send half his army to operate against
Jackson. Thus General McClellan, waiting at Richmond for McDowell to
join him, did not move; with a portion of his army on one side of the
stream, and the remainder on the other side, he remained inactive,
hesitating and unwilling, as any good soldier would have been, to
commence the decisive assault.

His indecision was brought to an end by General Johnston. Discovering
that the force in his front, near "Seven Pines," on the southern bank
of the Chickahominy, was only a portion of the Federal army, General
Johnston determined to attack it. This resolution was not in
consequence of the freshet in the Chickahominy, as has been supposed,
prompting Johnston to attack while the Federal army was cut in two, as
it were. His resolution, he states, had already been taken, and was,
with or without reference to the rains, that of a good soldier.
General Johnston struck at General McClellan on the last day of May,
just at the moment, it appears, when the Federal commander designed
commencing his last advance upon the city. The battle which took place
was one of the most desperate and bloody of the war. Both sides fought
with obstinate courage, and neither gained a decisive advantage. On
the Confederate right, near "Seven Pines," the Federal line was
broken and forced back; but, on the left, at Fair Oaks Station, the
Confederates, in turn, were repulsed. Night fell upon a field where
neither side could claim the victory. The most that could be claimed
by the Southerners was that McClellan had received a severe check; and
they sustained a great misfortune in the wound received by General
Johnston. He was struck by a fragment of shell while superintending
the attack at Fair Oaks, and the nature of his wound rendered it
impossible for him to retain command of the army. He therefore retired
from the command, and repaired to Richmond, where he remained for a
long time an invalid, wholly unable to continue in service in the
field.

This untoward event rendered it necessary to find a new commander for
the army without loss of time. General Lee had returned some time
before from the South, and to him all eyes were turned. He had had no
opportunity to display his abilities upon a conspicuous theatre--the
sole command he had been intrusted with, that in trans-Alleghany
Virginia, could scarcely be called a real command--and he owed his
elevation now to the place vacated by General Johnston, rather to his
services performed in the old army of the United States, than to any
thing he had effected in the war of the Confederacy. The confidence
of the Virginia people in his great abilities had never wavered, and
there is no reason to suppose that the Confederate authorities were
backward in conceding his merits as a soldier. Whatever may have been
the considerations leading to his appointment, he was assigned on the
3d day of June to the command of the army, and thus the Virginians
assembled to defend the capital of their State found themselves under
the command of the most illustrious of their own countrymen.




III.

LEE ASSIGNED TO THE COMMAND--HIS FAMILY AT THE WHITE HOUSE.


Lee had up to this time effected, as we have shown, almost nothing in
the progress of the war. Intrusted with no command, and employed
only in organizing the forces, or superintending the construction of
defences, he had failed to achieve any of those successes in the field
which constitute the glory of the soldier. He might possess the great
abilities which his friends and admirers claimed for him, but he was
yet to show the world at large that he did really possess them.

The decisive moment had now arrived which was to test him. He was
placed in command of the largest and most important army in the
Confederacy, and to him was intrusted the defence of the capital not
only of Virginia, but of the South. If Richmond were to fall, the
Confederate Congress, executive, and heads of departments, would all
be fugitives. The evacuation of Virginia might or might not follow,
but, in the very commencement of the conflict, the enemy would achieve
an immense advantage. Recognition by the European powers would be
hopeless in such an event, and the wandering and fugitive government
of the Confederacy would excite only contempt.

Such were the circumstances under which General Lee assumed command of
the "Army of Northern Virginia," as it was soon afterward styled. The
date of his assignment to duty was June 3, 1862--three days after
General Johnston had retired in consequence of his wound. Thirty days
afterward the great campaign around Richmond had been decided, and to
the narrative of what followed the appointment of Lee we shall at once
proceed, after giving a few words to another subject connected with
his family.

When General Lee left "Washington to repair to Richmond," he removed
the ladies of his family from Arlington to the "White House" on the
Pamunkey, near the spot where that river unites with the Mattapony to
form the York River. This estate, like the Arlington property, had
come into possession of General Lee through his wife, and as Arlington
was exposed to the enemy, the ladies had taken refuge here, with the
hope that they would be safe from intrusion or danger. The result was
unfortunate. The White House was a favorable "base" for the Federal
army, and intelligence one day reached Mrs. Lee and her family that
the enemy were approaching. The ladies therefore hastened from the
place to a point of greater safety, and before her departure Mrs. Lee
is said to have affixed to the door a paper containing the following
words:

"Northern soldiers who profess to reverence Washington, forbear to
desecrate the home of his first married life, the property of his
wife, now owned by her descendants.

"A GRAND-DAUGHTER OF MRS. WASHINGTON."

When the Federal forces took possession of the place, a Northern
officer, it is said, wrote beneath this:

"A Northern officer has protected your property, in sight of the
enemy, and at the request of your overseer."

The resolute spirit of Mrs. Lee is indicated by an incident which
followed. She took refuge with her daughters in a friend's house near
Richmond, and, when a Federal officer was sent to search the house,
handed to him a paper addressed to "the general in command," in which
she wrote:

"Sir: I have patiently and humbly submitted to the search of my house,
by men under your command, who are satisfied that there is nothing
here which they want. All the plate and other valuables have long
since been removed to Richmond, and are now beyond the reach of any
Northern marauders who may wish for their possession.

"WIFE OF ROBERT LEE, GENERAL C.S.A."

The ladies finally repaired for safety to the city of Richmond, and
the White House was burned either before or when General McClellan
retreated. The place was not without historic interest, as the scene
of Washington's first interview with Martha Custis, who afterward
became his wife. He was married either at St. Peter's Church near by,
or in the house which originally stood on the site of the one now
destroyed by the Federal forces. Its historic associations thus failed
to protect the White House, and, like Arlington, it fell a sacrifice
to the pitiless hand of war.

From this species of digression we come back to the narrative of
public events, and the history of the great series of battles which
were to make the banks of the Chickahominy historic ground. On
taking command, Lee had assiduously addressed himself to the task of
increasing the efficiency of the army: riding incessantly to and
fro, he had inspected with his own eyes the condition of the troops;
officers of the commissary, quartermaster, and ordnance departments
were held to a strict accountability; and, in a short time, the army
was in a high state of efficiency.

"What was the amount of the Confederate force under command of Lee?"
it may be asked. The present writer is unable to state this number
with any thing like exactness. The official record, if in existence,
is not accessible, and the matter must be left to conjecture. It is
tolerably certain, however, that, even after the arrival of Jackson,
the army numbered less than seventy-five thousand. Officers of high
rank and character state the whole force to have been sixty or seventy
thousand only.

It will thus be seen that the Federal army was larger than the
Confederate; but this was comparatively an unimportant fact. The event
was decided rather by generalship than the numbers of the combatants.




IV

LEE RESOLVES TO ATTACK.


General Lee assumed command of the army on the 3d of June. A week
afterward, Jackson finished the great campaign of the Valley, by
defeating Generals Fremont and Shields at Port Republic.

Such had been the important services performed by the famous
"Stonewall Jackson," who was to become the "right arm" of Lee in the
greater campaigns of the future. Retreating, after the defeat of
General Banks, and passing through Strasburg, just as Fremont from the
west, and the twenty thousand men of General McDowell from the east,
rushed to intercept him, Jackson had sullenly fallen back up the
Valley, with all his captured stores and prisoners, and at Cross
Keys and Port Republic had achieved a complete victory over his two
adversaries. Fremont was checked by Ewell, who then hastened across to
take part in the attack on Shields. The result was a Federal defeat
and retreat down the Valley. Jackson was free to move in any
direction; and his army could unite with that at Richmond for a
decisive attack upon General McClellan.

The attack in question had speedily been resolved on by Lee. Any
further advance of the Federal army would bring it up to the very
earthworks in the suburbs of the city; and, unless the Confederate
authorities proposed to undergo a siege, it was necessary to check the
further advance of the enemy by a general attack.

How to attack to the best advantage was now the question. The position
of General McClellan's army has been briefly stated. Advancing up the
Peninsula, he had reached and passed the Chickahominy, and was in
sight of Richmond. To this stream, the natural line of defence of the
city on the north and east, numerous roads diverged from the capital,
including the York River Railroad, of which the Federal commander made
such excellent use; and General McClellan had thrown his left wing
across the stream, advancing to a point on the railroad four or five
miles from the city. Here he had erected heavy defences to protect
that wing until the right wing crossed in turn. The tangled thickets
of the White-oak Swamp, on his left flank, were a natural defence; but
he had added to these obstacles, as we have stated, by felling trees,
and guarding every approach by redoubts. In these, heavy artillery
kept watch against an approaching enemy; and any attempt to attack
from that quarter seemed certain to result in repulse. In front,
toward Seven Pines, the chance of success was equally doubtful. The
excellent works of the Federal commander bristled with artillery, and
were heavily manned. It seemed thus absolutely necessary to discover
some other point of assault; and, as the Federal right beyond the
Chickahominy was the only point left, it was determined to attack, if
possible, in that quarter.

An important question was first, however, to be decided, the character
of the defences, if any, on General McClellan's right, in the
direction of Old Church and Cold Harbor. A reconnoissance in force was
necessary to acquire this information, and General Lee accordingly
directed General Stuart, commanding the cavalry of the army, to
proceed with a portion of his command to the vicinity of Old Church,
in the Federal rear, and gain all the information possible of their
position and defences.




V.

STUART'S "RIDE AROUND McCLELLAN."


General James E.B. Stuart, who now made his first prominent appearance
upon the theatre of the war, was a Virginian by birth, and not yet
thirty years of age. Resigning his commission of lieutenant in the
United States Cavalry at the beginning of the war, he had joined
Johnston in the Valley, and impressed that officer with a high opinion
of his abilities as a cavalry officer; proceeded thence to Manassas,
where he charged and broke a company of "Zouave" infantry; protected
the rear of the army when Johnston retired to the Rappahannock, and
bore an active part in the conflict on the Peninsula. In person he was
of medium height; his frame was broad and powerful; he wore a heavy
brown beard flowing upon his breast, a huge mustache of the same
color, the ends curling upward; and the blue eyes, flashing beneath a
"piled-up" forehead, had at times the dazzling brilliancy attributed
to the eyes of the eagle. Fond of movement, adventure, bright colors,
and all the pomp and pageantry of war, Stuart had entered on the
struggle with ardor, and enjoyed it as the huntsman enjoys the chase.
Young, ardent, ambitious, as brave as steel, ready with jest or
laughter, with his banjo-player following him, going into the hottest
battles humming a song, this young Virginian was, in truth, an
original character, and impressed powerfully all who approached him.
One who knew him well wrote: "Every thing striking, brilliant, and
picturesque, seemed to centre in him. The war seemed to be to Stuart a
splendid and exciting game, in which his blood coursed joyously, and
his immensely strong physical organization found an arena for the
display of all its faculties. The affluent life of the man craved
those perils and hardships which flush the pulses and make the heart
beat fast. He swung himself into the saddle at the sound of the bugle
as the hunter springs on horseback; and at such moments his cheeks
glowed and his huge mustache curled with enjoyment. The romance and
poetry of the hard trade of arms seemed first to be inaugurated when
this joyous cavalier, with his floating plume and splendid laughter,
appeared upon the great arena of the war in Virginia." Precise people
shook their heads, and called him frivolous, undervaluing his great
ability. Those best capable of judging him were of a different
opinion. Johnston wrote to him from the west: "How can I eat or sleep
in peace without _you_ upon the outpost?" Jackson said, when he fell
at Chancellorsville: "Go back to General Stuart, and tell him to act
upon his own judgment, and do what he thinks best, I have implicit
confidence in him." Lee said, when he was killed at Yellow Tavern:
"I can scarcely think of him without weeping." And the brave General
Sedgwick, of the United States Army, said: "Stuart is the best cavalry
officer ever _foaled_ in North America!"

In the summer of 1862, when we present him to the reader, Stuart had
as yet achieved little fame in his profession, but he was burning to
distinguish himself. He responded ardently, therefore, to the order of
Lee, and was soon ready with a picked force of about fifteen hundred
cavalry, under some of his best officers. Among them were Colonels
William H.F. Lee and Fitz-Hugh Lee--the first a son of General Lee, a
graduate of West Point, and an officer of distinction afterward;
the second, a son of Smith Lee, brother of the general, and famous
subsequently in the most brilliant scenes of the war as the gay and
gallant "General Fitz Lee," of the cavalry. With his picked force,
officered by the two Lees, and other excellent lieutenants, Stuart set
out on his adventurous expedition to Old Church. He effected more
than he anticipated, and performed a daring feat of arms in addition.
Driving the outposts from Hanover Court-House, he charged and broke a
force of Federal cavalry near Old Church; pushed on to the York River
Railroad, which he crossed, burning or capturing all Federal stores
met with, including enormous wagon-camps; and then, finding the
way back barred against him, and the Federal army on the alert, he
continued his march with rapidity, passed entirely around General
McClellan's army, and, building a bridge over the Chickahominy,
safely reëntered the Confederate lines just as a large force made its
appearance in his rear. The temporary bridge was destroyed, however,
and Stuart hastened to report to his superiors. His information was
important. General McClellan's right and rear were unprotected by
works of any strength. If the Confederate general desired to attack in
that quarter, there was nothing to prevent.

The results of Stuart's famous "ride around McClellan," as the people
called it, determined General Lee to make the attack on the north bank
of the stream, if he had not already so decided. It was necessary now
to bring Jackson's forces from the Valley without delay, and almost
equally important to mask the movement from General McClellan. To this
end a very simple _ruse_ was adopted. On the 11th of June, Whiting's
division was embarked on the cars of the Danville Railroad at
Richmond, and moved across the river to a point near Belle Isle, where
at that moment a considerable number of Federal prisoners were about
to be released and sent down James River. Here the train, loaded with
Confederate troops, remained for some time, and _the secret_ was
discovered by the released prisoners. General Lee was reënforcing
Jackson, in order that the latter might march on Washington. Such was
the report carried to General McClellan, and it seems to have really
deceived him. [Footnote: "I have no doubt Jackson has been reënforced
from here."--_General McClellan to President Lincoln, June 20th_.]
Whiting's division reached Lynchburg, and was thence moved by railway
to Charlottesville--Jackson marched and countermarched with an
elaborate pretence of advancing down the Valley--at last, one morning,
the astute Confederate, who kept his own counsels, had disappeared; he
was marching rapidly to join Lee on the Chickahominy. Not even his own
soldiers knew what direction they were taking. They were forbidden
by general order to inquire even the names of the towns they passed
through; directed to reply "I don't know" to every question; and it
is said that when Jackson demanded the name and regiment of a soldier
robbing a cherry-tree, he could extract from the man no reply but "I
don't know."

Jackson advanced with rapidity, and, on the 25th of June, was near
Ashland. Here he left his forces, and rode on rapidly to Richmond.
Passing unrecognized through the streets, after night, he went on
to General Lee's headquarters, at a house on the "Nine-mile road,"
leading from the New Bridge road toward Fair Oaks Station; and here
took place the first interview, since the commencement of the war,
between Lee and Jackson.

What each thought of the other will be shown in the course of this
narrative. We shall proceed now with the history of the great series
of battles for which Jackson's appearance was the signal.




PART III.

_ON THE CHICKAHOMINY_.




I.

THE TWO ARMIES.


The Chickahominy, whose banks were now to be the scene of a bitter and
determined conflict between the great adversaries, is a sluggish and
winding stream, which, rising above Richmond, describes a curve around
it, and empties its waters into the James, far below the city. Its
banks are swampy, and thickly clothed with forest or underwood. From
the nature of these banks, which scarcely rise in many places above
the level of the water, the least freshet produces an overflow, and
the stream, generally narrow and insignificant, becomes a sort of
lake, covering the low grounds to the bases of the wooded bluffs
extending upon each side. Numerous bridges cross the stream, from
Bottom's Bridge, below the York River Railroad, to Meadow Bridge,
north of the city. Of these, the Mechanicsville Bridge, about four
miles from the city, and the New Bridge, about nine miles, were points
of the greatest importance.

General McClellan's position has been repeatedly referred to. He had
crossed a portion of his army east of Richmond, and advanced to within
four or five miles of the city. The remainder, meanwhile, lay on the
north bank of the stream, and swept round, in a sort of crescent, to
the vicinity of Mechanicsville, where it had been anticipated General
McDowell would unite with it, thereby covering its right flank, and
protecting the communications with the Federal base at the White
House. That this disposition of the Federal troops was faulty, in face
of adversaries like Johnston and Lee, there could be no doubt. But
General McClellan was the victim, it seems, of the shifting and
vacillating policy of the authorities at Washington. With the arrival
of the forty thousand men under McDowell, his position would have been
a safe one. General McDowell did not arrive; and this unprotected
right flank--left unprotected from the fact that McDowell's presence
was counted on--became the point of the Confederate attack.

The amount of blame, if any, justly attributable to General McClellan,
first for his inactivity, and then for his defeat by Lee, cannot be
referred to here, save in a few brief sentences. A sort of feud
seems to have arisen between himself and General Halleck, the
commander-in-chief, stationed at Washington; and General Halleck then
and afterward appears to have regarded McClellan as a soldier without
decision or broad generalship. And yet McClellan does not seem to
have merited the censure he received. He called persistently for
reinforcements, remaining inactive meanwhile, because he estimated
the Confederate army before him at two hundred thousand men, and
was unwilling to assail this force, under command of soldiers
like Johnston and Lee, until his own force seemed adequate to the
undertaking. Another consideration was, the Confederate position in
front of the powerful earthworks of the city. These works would double
the Confederate strength in case of battle in front of them; and,
believing himself already outnumbered, the Federal commander was
naturally loath to deliver battle until reënforced. The faulty
disposition of his army, divided by a stream crossed by few bridges,
has been accounted for in like manner--he so disposed the troops,
expecting reënforcements. But Jackson's energy delayed these.
Washington was in danger, it was supposed, and General McDowell did
not come. It thus happened that General McClellan awaited attack
instead of making it, and that his army was so posted as to expose him
to the greatest peril.

A last point is to be noted in vindication of this able soldier.
Finding, at the very last moment, that he could expect no further
assistance from the President or General Halleck, he resolved promptly
to withdraw his exposed right wing and change his base of operations
to James River, where at least his communications would be safe. This,
it seems, had been determined upon just before the Confederate attack;
or, if he had not then decided, General McClellan soon determined upon
that plan.

To pass now to the Confederate side, where all was ready for the
great movement. General Lee's army lay in front of Richmond, exactly
corresponding with the front of General McClellan. The divisions of
Magruder and Huger, supported by those of Longstreet and D.H. Hill,
were opposite McClellan's left, on the Williamsburg and York River
roads, directly east of the city. From Magruder's left, extended the
division of General A.P. Hill, reaching thence up the river toward
Mechanicsville; and a brigade, under General Branch lay on Hill's left
near the point where the Brook Turnpike crosses the Chickahominy north
of Richmond. The approaches from the east, northeast, and north, were
thus carefully guarded. As the Confederates held the interior line,
the whole force could be rapidly concentrated, and was thoroughly in
hand, both for offensive or defensive movements.

The army thus held in Lee's grasp, and about to assail its great
Federal adversary, was composed of the best portion of the Southern
population. The rank and file was largely made up of men of education
and high social position. And this resulted from the character of the
struggle. The war was a war of invasion on the part of the North;
and the ardent and high-spirited youth of the entire South threw
themselves into it with enthusiasm. The heirs of ancient families and
great wealth served as privates. Personal pride, love of country,
indignation at the thought that a hostile section had sent an army to
reduce them to submission, combined to draw into the Confederate ranks
the flower of the Southern youth, and all the best fighting material.
Deficient in discipline, and "hard to manage," this force was yet of
the most efficient character. It could be counted on for hard work,
and especially for offensive operations. And the officers placed over
it shared its character.

Among these, General A.P. Hill, a Virginian by birth, was soon to be
conspicuous as commander of the "Light Division," and representative
of the spirit and dash and enthusiasm of the army. Under forty years
of age, with a slender figure, a heavily-bearded face, dark eyes, a
composed and unassuming bearing, characterized when off duty by a
quiet cordiality, he was personally popular with all who approached
him, and greatly beloved, both as man and commander. His chief merit
as a soldier was his dash and impetus in the charge. A braver heart
never beat in human breast; throughout the war he retained the respect
and admiration of the army and the country; and a strange fact in
relation to this eminent soldier is, that his name was uttered by both
Jackson and Lee as they expired.

Associated with him in the battles of the Chickahominy, and to the
end, was the able and resolute Longstreet--an officer of low and
powerful stature, with a heavy, brown beard reaching to his breast,
a manner marked by unalterable composure, and a countenance whose
expression of phlegmatic tranquillity never varied in the hottest
hours of battle. Longstreet was as famous for his bull-dog obstinacy,
as Hill for his dash and enthusiasm. General Lee styled him his "old
war-horse," and depended upon him, as will be seen, in some of the
most critical operations of the war.

Of the young and ardent Virginian, General Magruder, the brave
and resolute North-Carolinian, D.H. Hill, and other officers who
subsequently acquired great reputations in the army, we have no space
at present to speak. All were to coöperate in the assault on General
McClellan, and do their part.

On the night of the 25th of June, all was ready for the important
movement, and the troops rested on their arms, ready for the coming
battle.




II.

LEE'S PLAN OF ASSAULT.


General Lee had been hitherto regarded as a soldier of too great
caution, but his plan for the assault on General McClellan indicated
the possession of a nerve approaching audacity.

Fully comprehending his enemy's strength and position, and aware that
a large portion of the Federal army had crossed the Chickahominy, and
was directly in his front, he had resolved to pass to the north
bank of the stream with the bulk of his force, leaving only about
twenty-five thousand men to protect the city, and deliver battle where
defeat would prove ruinous. This plan indicated nothing less than
audacity, as we have already said; but, like the audacity of the flank
movement at Chancellorsville afterward, and the daring march, in
disregard of General Hooker, to Pennsylvania in 1864, it was founded
on profound military insight, and indicated the qualities of a great
soldier.

Lee's design was to attack the Federal right wing with a part of his
force, while Jackson, advancing still farther to the left, came in on
their communications with the White House, and assailed them on their
right and rear. Meanwhile Richmond was to be protected by General
Magruder with his twenty-five thousand men, on the south bank; if
McClellan fell back down the Peninsula, this force was to cross and
unite with the rest; thus the Federal army would be driven from all
its positions, and the fate of the whole campaign against Richmond
would be decided.

Lee's general order directing the movement of the troops is here
given. It possesses interest as a clear and detailed statement of his
intended operations; and it will be seen that what was resolved on by
the commander in his tent, his able subordinates translated detail by
detail, with unimportant modifications, into action, under his eyes in
the field:

HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA,

_June_ 24, 1862.

GENERAL ORDERS No. 75.

I. General Jackson's command will proceed to-morrow from Ashland
toward the Slash Church, and encamp at some convenient point west of
the Central Railroad. Branch's brigade, of A.P. Hill's division, will
also, to-morrow evening, take position on the Chickahominy, near Half
Sink. At three o'clock Thursday morning, 26th instant, General Jackson
will advance on the road leading to Pale Green Church, communicating
his march to General Branch, who will immediately cross the
Chickahominy, and take the road leading to Mechanicsville. As soon as
the movements of these columns are discovered, General A.P. Hill, with
the rest of his division, will cross the Chickahominy near Meadow
Bridge, and move direct upon Mechanicsville. To aid his advance, the
heavy batteries on the Chickahominy will at the proper time open
upon the batteries at Mechanicsville. The enemy being driven from
Mechanicsville, and the passage across the bridge opened, General
Longstreet, with his division and that of General D.H. Hill, will
cross the Chickahominy at or near that point--General D.H. Hill moving
to the support of General Jackson, and General Longstreet supporting
General A.P. Hill--the four divisions keeping in communication with
each other, and moving in _echelon_ on separate roads, if practicable;
the left division in advance, with skirmishers and sharp-shooters
extending in their front, will sweep down the Chickahominy and
endeavor to drive the enemy from his position above New Bridge;
General Jackson, bearing well to his left, turning Beaver Dam Creek,
and taking the direction toward Cold Harbor. They will then press
forward toward York River Railroad, closing upon the enemy's rear and
forcing him down the Chickahominy. Any advance of the enemy toward
Richmond will be prevented by vigorously following his rear, and
crippling and arresting his progress.

II. The divisions under Generals Huger and Magruder will hold their
positions in front of the enemy against attack, and make such
demonstrations, Thursday, as to discover his operations. Should
opportunity offer, the feint will be converted into a real attack;
and, should an abandonment of his intrenchments by the enemy be
discovered, he will be closely pursued.

III. The Third Virginia cavalry will observe the Charles City road.
The Fifth Virginia, the First North Carolina, and the Hampton Legion
cavalry will observe the Darbytown, Varina, and Osborne roads. Should
a movement of the enemy, down the Chickahominy, be discovered, they
will close upon his flank, and endeavor to arrest his march.

IV. General Stuart, with the First, Fourth, and Ninth Virginia
cavalry, the cavalry of Cobb's Legion, and the Jeff Davis Legion, will
cross the Chickahominy, to-morrow, and take position to the left
of General Jackson's line of march. The main body will be held in
reserve, with scouts well extended to the front and left. General
Stuart will keep General Jackson informed of the movements of the
enemy on his left, and will coöperate with him in his advance.
The Sixteenth Virginia cavalry, Colonel Davis, will remain on the
Nine-mile road.

V. General Ransom's brigade, of General Holmes's command, will be
placed in reserve on the Williamsburg road, by General Huger, to whom
he will report for orders.

VI. Commanders of divisions will cause their commands to be provided
with three days' cooked rations. The necessary ambulances and
ordinance-trains will be ready to accompany the divisions, and receive
orders from their respective commanders. Officers in charge of all
trains will invariably remain with them. Batteries and wagons will
keep on the right of the road. The Chief-Engineer, Major Stevens, will
assign engineer officers to each division, whose duty it will be to
make provision for overcoming all difficulties to the progress of the
troops. The staff-departments will give the necessary instructions to
facilitate the movements herein directed.

By command of General LEE: R.H. CHILTON, _A.A. General_.

This order speaks for itself, and indicates Lee's plan of battle in
all its details. Further comment is unnecessary; and we proceed to
narrate the events which followed. In doing so, we shall strive to
present a clear and intelligible account of what occurred, rather than
to indulge in the warlike splendors of style which characterized the
"army correspondents" of the journals during the war. Such a treatment
of the subject is left to others, who write under the influence of
partisan afflatus, rather than with the judicious moderation of
the historian. Nor are battles themselves the subjects of greatest
interest to the thoughtful student. The combinations devised by great
commanders are of more interest than the actual struggles. We have
therefore dwelt at greater length upon the plans of Generals Lee
and McClellan than we shall dwell upon the actual fighting of their
armies.




III.

THE BATTLE OF THE CHICKAHOMINY.


On the morning of the 26th of June, 1862, all was ready for the great
encounter of arms between the Confederates and the Federal forces on
the Chickahominy. General Jackson had been delayed on his march from
the mountains, and had not yet arrived; but it was known that he was
near, and would soon make his appearance; and, in the afternoon,
General Lee accordingly directed that the movement should commence.
At the word, General A.P. Hill moved from his camps to Meadow Bridge,
north of Richmond; crossed the Chickahominy there, and moved rapidly
on Mechanicsville, where a small Federal force, behind intrenchments,
guarded the head of the bridge. This force was not a serious obstacle,
and Hill soon disposed of it. He attacked the Federal works, stormed
them after a brief struggle, and drove the force which had occupied
them back toward Beaver Dam Creek, below. The Mechanicsville bridge
was thus cleared; and, in compliance with his orders from Lee, General
Longstreet hastened to throw his division across. Hill had meanwhile
pressed forward on the track of the retreating enemy, and, a mile or
two below, found himself in front of a much more serious obstruction
than that encountered at the bridge, namely, the formidable position
held by the enemy on Beaver Dam Creek.

The ground here is of a peculiar character, and admirably adapted for
a defensive position against an enemy advancing from above. On the
opposite side of a narrow valley, through which runs Beaver Dam Creek,
rises a bold, almost precipitous, bluff, and the road which the
Confederates were compelled to take bends abruptly to the right when
near the stream, thus exposing the flank of the assaulting party to a
fire from the bluff. As Hill's column pushed forward to attack this
position, it was met by a determined fire of artillery and small-arms
from the crest beyond the stream, where a large force of riflemen, in
pits, were posted, with infantry supports. Before this artillery-fire,
raking his flanks and doing heavy execution, Hill was compelled to
fall back. It was impossible to cross the stream in face of the
fusillade and cannon. The attack ended after dark with the withdrawal
of the Confederates; but at dawn Hill resumed the struggle, attempting
to cross at another point, lower down the stream. This attempt was in
progress when the Federal troops were seen rapidly falling back from
their strong position; and intelligence soon came that this was in
consequence of the arrival of Jackson, who had passed around the
Federal right flank above, and forced them to retire toward the main
body of the Federal army below.

No time was now lost. The memorable 27th of June had dawned clear and
cloudless, and the brilliant sunshine gave promise of a day on which
no interference of the elements would check the bloody work to be
performed. Hill advanced steadily on the track of the retiring Federal
forces, who had left evidences of their precipitate retreat all along
the road, and, about noon, came in front of the very powerful position
of the main body of the enemy, near Cold Harbor.

General McClellan had drawn up his forces on a ridge along the
southern bank of Powhite Creek, a small water-course which, flowing
from the northeast, empties below New Bridge into the Chickahominy.
His left, nearest the Chickahominy, was protected by a deep ravine in
front, which he had filled with sharp-shooters; and his right rested
upon elevated ground, near the locality known as Maghee's House. In
front, the whole line of battle, which described a curve backward to
cover the bridges in rear, was protected by difficult approaches. The
ground was either swampy, or covered with tangled undergrowth, or
both. The ridge held by the Federal forces had been hastily fortified
by breastworks of felled trees and earth, behind which the long lines
of infantry, supported by numerous artillery, awaited the attack.

The amount of the Federal force has been variously stated. The
impression of the Confederates differed from the subsequent statements
of Federal writers. "The principal part of the Federal army," says
General Lee, in his report, "was now on the north side of the
Chickahominy." The force has been placed by Northern writers at only
thirty, or at most thirty-five thousand. If this was the whole number
of troops engaged, from first to last, in the battle, the fact is
highly creditable to the Federal arms, as the struggle was long
doubtful. No doubt the exact truth will some day be put upon record,
and justice will be done to both the adversaries.

The Federal force was commanded by the brave and able General
Fitz-John Porter, with General Morell commanding his right, General
Sykes his left, and General McCall forming a second line. Slocum's
division, and the brigades of Generals French and Meagher, afterward
reënforced Porter, who now prepared, with great coolness, for the
Confederate attack.

The moment had come. A.P. Hill, pressing forward rapidly, with
Longstreet's division on the right, reached Cold Harbor, in front of
the Federal centre, about noon. Hill immediately attacked, and an
engagement of the most obstinate character ensued. General Lee,
accompanied by General Longstreet, had ridden from his headquarters,
on the Nine-mile road, to the scene of action, and now witnessed in
person the fighting of the troops, who charged under his eye, closing
in in a nearly hand-to-hand conflict with the enemy. This was, no
doubt, the first occasion on which a considerable portion of the men
had seen him--certainly in battle--and that air of supreme calmness
which always characterized him in action must have made a deep
impression upon them. He was clad simply, and wore scarcely any badges
of rank. A felt hat drooped low over the broad forehead, and the eyes
beneath were calm and unclouded. Add a voice of measured calmness, the
air of immovable composure which marked the erect military figure,
evidently at home in the saddle, and the reader will have a correct
conception of General Lee's personal appearance in the first of the
great battles of his career.

Hill attacked with that dash and obstinacy which from this time
forward characterized him, but succeeded in making no impression on
the Federal line. In every assault he was repulsed with heavy loss.
The Federal artillery, which was handled with skill and coolness,
did great execution upon his column, as it rushed forward, and the
infantry behind their works stood firm in spite of the most determined
efforts to drive them from the ridge. Three of Hill's regiments
reached the crest, and fought hand to hand over the breastworks, but
they were speedily repulsed and driven from the crest, and, after two
hours' hard fighting, Hill found that he had lost heavily and effected
nothing.

It was now past two o'clock in the afternoon, and General Lee listened
with anxiety for the sound of guns from the left, which would herald
the approach of General Jackson. Nothing was heard from that quarter,
however, and affairs were growing critical. The Confederate attack had
been repulsed--the Federal position seemed impregnable--and "it became
apparent," says General Lee, "that the enemy were gradually gaining
ground." Under these circumstances, General McClellan might
adopt either one of the two courses both alike dangerous to the
Confederates. He might cross a heavy force to the assistance of
General Porter, thus enabling that officer to assume the offensive;
or, finding Lee thus checked, he might advance on Magruder, crush the
small force under him, and seize on Richmond, which would be at his
mercy. It was thus necessary to act without delay, while awaiting the
appearance of Jackson. General Lee, accordingly, directed General
Longstreet, who had taken position to the right of Cold Harbor, to
make a feint against the Federal left, and thus relieve the pressure
on Hill. Longstreet proceeded with promptness to obey the order;
advanced in face of a heavy fire, and with a cross-fire of artillery
raking his right from over the Chickahominy, and made the feint which
had been ordered by General Lee. It effected nothing; and, to attain
the desired result, it was found necessary to turn the feint into a
real attack. This Longstreet proceeded to do, first dispersing with a
single volley a force of cavalry which had the temerity to charge his
infantry. As he advanced and attacked the powerful position before
him, the roar of guns, succeeded by loud cheers, was heard on the left
of Lee's line.

Jackson had arrived and thrown his troops into action without delay.
He then rode forward to Cold Harbor, where General Lee awaited him,
and the two soldiers shook hands in the midst of tumultuous cheering
from the troops, who had received intelligence that Jackson's corps
had joined them. The contrast between the two men was extremely
striking. We have presented a brief sketch of Lee's personal
appearance upon the occasion--of the grave commander-in-chief, with
his erect and graceful seat in the saddle, his imposing dignity of
demeanor, and his calm and measured tones, as deliberate as though he
were in a drawing-room. Jackson was a very different personage. He was
clad in a dingy old coat, wore a discolored cadet-cap, tilted almost
upon his nose, and rode a rawboned horse, with short stirrups, which
raised his knees in the most ungraceful manner. Neither in his face
nor figure was there the least indication of the great faculties of
the man, and a more awkward-looking personage it would be impossible
to imagine. In his hand he held a lemon, which he sucked from time to
time, and his demeanor was abstracted and absent.

As Jackson approached, Lee rode toward him and greeted him with a
cordial pressure of the hand.

"Ah, general," said Lee, "I am very glad to see you. I hoped to be
with you before!"

Jackson made a twitching movement of his head, and replied in a few
words, rather jerked from the lips than deliberately uttered.

Lee had paused, and now listened attentively to the long roll of
musketry from the woods, where Hill and Longstreet were engaged; then
to the still more incessant and angry roar from the direction of
Jackson's own troops, who had closed in upon the Federal forces.

"That fire is very heavy," said Lee. "Do you think your men can stand
it?"

Jackson listened for a moment, with his head bent toward one shoulder,
as was customary with him, for he was deaf, he said, in one ear, "and
could not hear out of the other," and replied briefly:

"They can stand almost any thing! They can stand that!"

He then, after receiving General Lee's instructions, immediately
saluted and returned to his corps--Lee remaining still at Cold Harbor,
which was opposite the Federal centre.

[Illustration: Lee and Jackson at Cold harbor.]

The arrival of Jackson changed in a moment the aspect of affairs
in every part of the field. Whitney's division of his command took
position on Longstreet's left; the command of General D.H. Hill, on
the extreme right of the whole line, and Ewell's division, with part
of Jackson's old division, supported A.P. Hill. No sooner had these
dispositions been made, than General Lee ordered an attack along the
whole line. It was now five or six o'clock, and the sun was sinking.
From that moment until night came, the battle raged with a fury
unsurpassed in any subsequent engagement of the war. The Texan troops,
under General Hood, especially distinguished themselves. These,
followed by their comrades, charged the Federal left on the bluff,
and, in spite of a desperate resistance, carried the position. "The
enemy were driven," says General Lee, "from the ravine to the first
line of breastworks, over which one impetuous column dashed, up to the
intrenchments on the crest." Here the Federal artillery was captured,
their line driven from the hill, and in other parts of the field a
similar success followed the attack. As night fell, their line gave
way in all parts, and the remnants of General Porter's command
retreated to the bridges over the Chickahominy.

The first important passage of arms between General McClellan and
General Lee--and it may be added the really decisive one--had
terminated in a great success on the side of the Confederates.




IV.

THE RETREAT.


The battle of Cold Harbor--or, as General Lee styles it in his report,
the "battle of the Chickahominy"--was the decisive struggle between
the great adversaries, and determined the fate of General McClellan's
campaign against Richmond.

This view is not held by writers on the Northern side, who represent
the battle in question as only the first of a series of engagements,
all of pretty nearly equal importance, and mere incidents attending
General McClellan's change of base to the shores of the James River.
Such a theory seems unfounded. If the battle at Cold Harbor had
resulted in a Federal victory, General McClellan would have advanced
straight on Richmond, and the capture of the city would inevitably
have followed. But at Cold Harbor he sustained a decisive defeat.
His whole campaign was reversed, and came to naught, from the events
occurring between noon and nightfall on the 27th of June. The result
of that obstinate encounter was not a Federal success, leading to the
fall of Richmond, but a Federal defeat, which led to the retreat to
the James River, and the failure of the whole campaign against the
Confederate capital.

It is conceded that General McClellan really intended to change his
base; but after the battle of Cold Harbor every thing had changed.
He no longer had under him a high-spirited army, moving to take up
a stronger position, but a weary and dispirited multitude of human
beings, hurrying along to gain the shelter of the gunboats on the
James River, with the enemy pursuing closely, and worrying them at
every step. To the condition of the Federal army one of their own
officers testifies, and his expressions are so strong as wellnigh
to move the susceptibilities of an opponent. "We were ordered to
retreat," says General Hooker, "and it was like the retreat of a
whipped army. We retreated like a parcel of sheep; everybody on the
road at the same time; and a few shots from the rebels would have
panic-stricken the whole command."[1]

[Footnote 1: Report of the Committee on the Conduct of the War, part
i., p. 580.]

Such was the condition of that great army which had fought so bravely,
standing firm so long against the headlong assaults of the flower
of the Southern troops. It was the battle at Cold Harbor which had
produced this state of things, thereby really deciding the result
of the campaign. To attribute to that action, therefore, no more
importance than attached to the engagements on the retreat to James
River, seems in opposition to the truth of history.

We shall present only a general narrative of the famous retreat which
reflected the highest credit upon General McClellan, and will remain
his greatest glory. He, at least, was too good a soldier not to
understand that the battle of the 27th was a decisive one. He
determined to retreat, without risking another action, to the banks
of the James River, where the Federal gunboats would render a second
attack from the Confederates a hazardous undertaking; and, "on the
evening of the 27th of June," as he says in his official report,
"assembled the corps commanders at his headquarters, and informed
them of his plan, its reasons, and his choice of route, and method of
execution." Orders were then issued to General Keyes to move with his
corps across the White-Oak Swamp Bridge, and, taking up a position
with his artillery on the opposite side, cover the passage of the rest
of the troops; the trains and supplies at Savage Station, on the
York River Railroad, were directed to be withdrawn; and the corps
commanders were ordered to move with such provisions, munitions,
and sick, as they could transport, on the direct road to Harrison's
Landing.

These orders were promptly carried out. Before dawn on the 29th the
Federal army took up the line of march, and the great retrograde
movement was successfully begun. An immense obstacle to its success
lay in the character of the country through which it was necessary to
pass. White Oak Swamp is an extensive morass, similar to that skirting
the banks of the Chickahominy, and the passage through it is over
narrow, winding, and difficult roads, which furnish the worst possible
pathways for wagons, artillery, or even troops. It was necessary,
however, to use these highways or none, and General McClellan
resolutely entered upon his critical movement.

General Lee was yet in doubt as to his opponent's designs, and the
fact is highly creditable to General McClellan. A portion of the
Federal army still remained on the left bank of the Chickahominy, and
it might be the intention of McClellan to push forward reënforcements
from the Peninsula, fight a second battle for the protection of his
great mass of supplies at the White House, or, crossing his whole army
to the left bank of the Chickahominy by the lower bridges, retreat
down the Peninsula by the same road followed in advancing. All that
General Lee could do, under these circumstances, was to remain near
Cold Harbor with his main body, send a force toward the York River
road, on the eastern bank of the Chickahominy, to check any Federal
attempt to cross there, and await further developments.

It was not until the morning of the 29th that General McClellan's
designs became apparent. It was then ascertained that he had commenced
moving toward James River with his entire army, and Lee issued prompt
orders for the pursuit. While a portion of the Confederate army
followed closely upon the enemy's rear, other bodies were directed to
move by the Williamsburg and Charles City roads, and intercept him,
or assail his flanks. If these movements were promptly made, and no
unnecessary delay took place, it was expected that the Federal army
would be brought to bay in the White-Oak Swamp, and a final victory be
achieved by the Confederates.

These complicated movements were soon in full progress, and at
various points on the line of retreat fierce fighting ensued. General
Magruder, advancing to Savage Station, an important depot of Federal
stores, on the York River Railroad, encountered on the 29th, the
powerful Federal rear-guard, which fought obstinately until night,
when it retired. Next day Generals Longstreet and A.P. Hill had pushed
down the Long Bridge road, and on the next day (June 30th) came on the
retreating column which was vigorously engaged. From the character
of the ground, little, however, was effected. The enemy fought with
obstinate courage, and repulsed every assault. The battle raged until
after nightfall, when the Federal army continued to retreat.

These actions were the most important, and in both the Confederates
had failed to effect any important results.

Even Jackson, who had been delayed, by the destruction of the
Chickahominy bridges, in crossing to the south bank from the vicinity
of Cold Harbor, and had followed in rear of the rest of the army,
found himself checked by General McClellan's admirable disposition
for the protection of his rear. Jackson made every effort to strike a
decisive blow at the Federal rear in the White-Oak Swamp, but he found
a bridge in his front destroyed, the enemy holding the opposite side
in strong force, and, when he endeavored to force a passage, the
determined fire from their artillery rendered it impossible for him to
do so. General McClellan had thus foiled the generalship of Lee,
and the hard fighting of Stonewall Jackson. His excellent military
judgement had defeated every attempt made to crush him. On the 1st of
July he had successfully passed the terrible swamp, in spite of all
his enemies, and his army was drawn up on the wellnigh impregnable
heights of Malvern Hill.

A last struggle took place at Malvern Hill, and the Confederate
assault failed at all points. Owing to the wooded nature of the
ground, and the absence of accurate information in regard to it, the
attack was made under very great difficulties and effected nothing.
The Federal troops resisted courageously, and inflicted heavy loss
upon the assailing force, which advanced to the muzzles of the Federal
cannon, but did not carry the heights; and at nightfall the battle
ceased, the Confederates having suffered a severe repulse.

On the next morning, General McClellan had disappeared toward
Harrison's Landing, to which he conducted his army safely, without
further molestation, and the long and bitter struggle was over.




V.

RICHMOND IN DANGER--LEE'S VIEWS.


We have presented a sufficiently full narrative of the great battles
of the Chickahominy to enable the reader to form his own opinion of
the events, and the capacity of the two leaders who directed them.
Full justice has been sought to be done to the eminent military
abilities of General McClellan, and the writer is not conscious that
he has done more than justice to General Lee.

Lee has not escaped criticism, and was blamed by many persons for not
putting an end to the Federal army on the retreat through White-Oak
Swamp. To this criticism, it may be said in reply, that putting an
end to nearly or quite one hundred thousand men is a difficult
undertaking; and that in one instance, at least, the failure of one of
his subordinates in arriving promptly, reversed his plans at the most
critical moment of the struggle. General Lee himself, however, states
the main cause of failure: "Under ordinary circumstances," he says,
"the Federal army should have been destroyed. Its escape is due to the
causes already stated. Prominent among them is the want of timely and
correct information. This fact, attributed chiefly to the character
of the country, enabled General McClellan skilfully to conceal his
retreat, and to add much to the obstruction with which Nature had
beset the way of our pursuing columns. But regret that more was not
accomplished, gives way to gratitude to the Sovereign Ruler of the
Universe for the results achieved."

The reader will form his own opinion whether Lee was or was not
to blame for this want of accurate information, which would seem,
however, to be justly attributable to the War Department at Richmond,
rather than to an officer who had been assigned to command only three
or four weeks before. Other criticisms of Lee referred to his main
plan of operations, and the danger to which he exposed Richmond by
leaving only twenty-five thousand men in front of it, when he began
his movement against General McClellan's right wing, beyond the
Chickahominy. General Magruder, who commanded this force of
twenty-five thousand men left to guard the capital, expressed
afterward, in his official report, his views of the danger to which
the city had been exposed. He wrote:

"From the time at which the enemy withdrew his forces to this side
of the Chickahominy, and destroyed the bridges, to the moment of his
evacuation, that is, from Friday night until Saturday morning, I
considered the situation of our army as extremely critical and
perilous. The larger portion of it was on the opposite side of
the Chickahominy. The bridges had been all destroyed; but one was
rebuilt--the New Bridge--which was commanded fully by the enemy's guns
from Goulding's; and there were but twenty-five thousand men between
his army of one hundred thousand and Richmond.... Had McClellan massed
his whole force in column, and advanced it against any point of our
line of battle, as was done at Austerlitz under similar circumstances
by the greatest captain of any age, though the head of his column
would have suffered greatly, its momentum would have insured him
success, and the occupation of our works about Richmond, and
consequently the city, might have been his reward. His failure to do
so is the best evidence that our wise commander fully understood the
character of his opponent."

To this portion of General Magruder's report General Lee appended the
following "Remarks" in forwarding it:

"General Magruder is under a misapprehension as to the separation of
troops operating on the north side of the Chickahominy from those
under himself and General Huger on the south side. He refers to this
subject on pages 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7, of his report.

"The troops on the two sides of the river were only separated until we
succeeded in occupying the position near what is known as New Bridge,
which occurred before twelve o'clock M. on Friday, June 27th, and
before the attack on the enemy at Gaines's Mill.

"From the time we reached the position referred to, I regarded
communication between the two wings of our army as reëstablished.

"The bridge referred to, and another about three-quarters of a mile
above, were ordered to be repaired before noon on Friday, and the New
Bridge was sufficiently rebuilt to be passed by artillery on Friday
night, and the one above it was used for the passage of wagons,
ambulances, and troops, early on Saturday morning.

"Besides this, all other bridges above New Bridge, and all the fords
above that point, were open to us."

To this General Magruder subsequently responded as follows:

"New Bridge was finished on Friday evening, the 27th, instead of
Saturday, 28th of June.

"I wrote from memory in reference to the time of its being finished.

"It was reported to me that the bridge three-quarters of a mile above
was attempted to be crossed by troops (I think Ransom's brigade), on
Saturday morning, from the south to the north side, but that, finding
the bridge or the approach to it difficult, they came down and crossed
at New Bridge on the same morning.

"My statement in regard to these bridges was not intended as a
criticism on General Lee's plan, but to show the position of the
troops, with a view to the proper understanding of my report, and to
prove that the enemy might have reasonably entertained a design, after
concentrating his troops, to march on Richmond."

We shall not detain the reader by entering upon a full discussion of
the interesting question here raised. General Lee, as his observations
on General Magruder's report show, did not regard Richmond as exposed
to serious danger, and was confident of his ability to recross the
Chickahominy and go to its succor in the event of an attack on the
city by General McClellan. Had this prompt recrossing of the stream
here, even, been impracticable, it may still be a question whether
General Lee did not, in his movement against the Federal right wing
with the bulk of his army, follow the dictates of sound generalship.
In war, something must be risked, and occasions arise which render
it necessary to disregard general maxims. It is one of the first
principles of military science that a commander should always keep
open his line of retreat; but the moment may come when his best policy
is to burn the bridges behind him. Of Lee's movement against General
McClellan's right, it may be said that it was based on the broadest
good sense and the best generalship. The situation of affairs rendered
an attack in some quarter essential to the safety of the capital,
which was about to be hemmed in on all sides. To attack the left of
General McClellan, promised small results. It had been tried and had
failed; his right alone remained. It was possible, certainly, that he
would mass his army, and, crushing Magruder, march into Richmond;
but it was not probable that he would make the attempt. The Federal
commander was known to be a soldier disposed to caution rather than
audacity. The small amount of force under General Magruder was a
secret which he could not be expected to know. That General Lee took
these facts into consideration, as General Magruder intimates, may or
may not have been the fact; and the whole discussion may be fairly
summed up, perhaps, by saying that success vindicated the course
adopted. "Success, after all, is the test of merit," said the brave
Albert Sydney Johnston, and Talleyrand compressed much sound reasoning
in the pithy maxim, "Nothing succeeds like success."

On the 2d of July the campaign was over, and General McClellan must
have felt, in spite of his hopeful general orders to the troops, and
dispatches to his Government, that the great struggle for Richmond had
virtually ended. A week before, he had occupied a position within a
few miles of the city, with a numerous army in the highest spirits,
and of thorough efficiency. Now, he lay on the banks of James River,
thirty miles away from the capital, and his army was worn out by the
tremendous ordeal it had passed through, and completely discouraged.
We have not dwelt upon the horrors of the retreat, and the state of
the army, which Northern writers painted at the time in the gloomiest
colors. For the moment, it was no longer the splendid war-engine it
had been, and was again afterward. Nothing could be done with it,
and General McClellan knew the fact. Without fresh troops, a renewed
advance upon Richmond was a mere dream.

No further attack was made by General Lee, who remained for some
days inactive in the hot forests of Charles City. His reasons for
refraining from a new assault on General McClellan are summed up in
one or two sentences of his report: "The Federal commander," he says,
"immediately began to fortify his position, which was one of great
natural strength, flanked on each side by a creek, and the approach to
his front commanded by the heavy guns of his shipping, in addition
to those mounted in his intrenchments. It was deemed inexpedient to
attack him, and in view of the condition of our troops, who had been
marching and fighting almost incessantly for seven days under the
most trying circumstances, it was determined to withdraw, in order to
afford them the repose of which they stood so much in need."

On the 8th of July, General Lee accordingly directed his march back
toward Richmond, and the troops went into camp and rested.




VI.

LEE AND McCLELLAN--THEIR IDENTITY OF OPINION.


General Lee had thus, at the outset of his career, as commander of the
Confederate army, saved the capital by a blow at the enemy as sudden
as it was resistless. The class of persons who are never satisfied,
and delight in fault-finding under all circumstances, declared that
a great general would have crushed the enemy on their retreat; these
certainly were in a minority; the people at large greeted Lee as the
author of a great deliverance worked out for them, and, on his return
to Richmond, he was received with every mark of gratitude and honor.
He accepted this public ovation with the moderation and dignity which
characterized his demeanor afterward, under all circumstances, either
of victory or defeat. It was almost impossible to discover in his
bearing at this time, as on other great occasions, any evidences
whatever of elation. Success, like disaster, seemed to find him calm,
collected, and as nearly unimpressible as is possible for a human
being.

The character of the man led him to look upon success or failure with
this supreme composure, which nothing seemed able to shake; but in
July, 1862, he probably understood that the Confederate States were
still as far as ever from having achieved the objects of the war.
General McClellan had been defeated in battle, but the great resources
of the United States Government would enable it promptly to put other
and larger armies in the field. Even the defeated army was still
numerous and dangerous, for it consisted, according to McClellan's
report, of nearly or quite ninety thousand men; and the wise brain of
its commander had devised a plan of future operations which
promised far greater results than the advance on Richmond from the
Chickahominy.

We shall touch, in passing, on this interesting subject, but shall
first ask the reader's attention to a communication addressed, by
General McClellan, at this time to President Lincoln. It is one of
those papers which belong to history, and should be placed upon
record. It not only throws the clearest light on the character and
views of General Lee's great adversary, but expresses with admirable
lucidity the sentiments of a large portion of the Federal people at
the time. The President had invited a statement of General McClellan's
views on the conduct of the war, and on July 7th, in the very midst of
the scenes of disaster at Harrison's Landing, McClellan wrote these
statesmanlike words:

"This rebellion has assumed the character of a war; as such it should
be regarded, and it should be conducted upon the highest principles
know to Christian civilization. It should not be a war looking to the
subjugation of the people of any State in any event. It should not be
at all a war upon population, but against armed forces and political
organization. Neither confiscation of property, political executions,
territorial organizations of States, nor forcible abolition of
slavery, should be contemplated for a moment. In prosecuting the war
all private property and unarmed persons should be strictly protected,
subject only to the necessity of military operations. All private
property taken for military use should be paid or receipted for;
pillage and waste should be treated as high crimes; all unnecessary
trespass sternly prohibited, and offensive demeanor by the military
toward citizens promptly rebuked. Military arrests should not be
tolerated, except in places where active hostilities exist, and oaths
not required by enactments constitutionally made should be neither
demanded nor received. Military government should be confined to the
preservation of public order and the protection of political right.
Military power should not be allowed to interfere with the relations
of servitude, either by supporting or impairing the authority of the
master, except for repressing disorder, as in other cases. Slaves
contraband under the Act of Congress, seeking military protection,
should receive it. The right of the Government to appropriate
permanently to its own service claims to slave-labor should be
asserted, and the right of the owner to compensation therefor should
be recognized.

"This principle might be extended upon grounds of military necessity
and security to all the slaves of a particular State, thus working
manumission in such State; and in Missouri, perhaps in Western
Virginia also, and possibly even in Maryland, the expediency of such a
measure is only a question of time.

"A system of policy thus constitutional, and pervaded by the
influences of Christianity and freedom, would receive the support of
almost all truly loyal men, would deeply impress the rebel masses
and all foreign nations, and it might be humbly hoped that it would
commend itself to the favor of the Almighty.

"Unless the principles governing the future conduct of our struggle
shall be made known and approved, the effort to obtain requisite
forces will be almost hopeless. A declaration of radical views,
especially upon slavery, will rapidly disintegrate our present armies.

"The policy of the Government must be supported by concentrations
of military power. The national forces should not be dispersed in
expeditions, posts of occupation, and numerous armies; but should be
mainly collected into masses, and brought to bear upon the armies
of the Confederate States. Those armies thoroughly defeated, the
political structure which they support would soon cease to exist.

    "In carrying out any system of policy which you may form, you will
    require a commander-in-chief of the army--one who possesses your
    confidence, understands your views, and who is competent to
    execute your orders, by directing the military forces of the
    nation to the accomplishment of the objects by you proposed. I do
    not ask that place for myself. I am willing to serve you in such
    positions as you may assign me, and I will do so as faithfully
    as ever subordinate served superior. I may be on the brink of
    eternity, and, as I hope forgiveness from my Maker, I have written
    this letter with sincerity toward you, and from love for my
    country."

This noble and earnest exposition of his opinion, upon the proper mode
of conducting the war, will reflect honor upon General McClellan when
his military achievements are forgotten. It discusses the situation
of affairs, both from the political and military point of view, in a
spirit of the broadest statesmanship, and with the acumen of a great
soldier. That it had no effect, is the clearest indication upon which
the war was thenceforward to be conducted.

The removal of General McClellan, as holding views opposed to the
party in power, is said to have resulted from this communication.
It certainly placed him in open antagonism to General Halleck, the
Federal Secretary of War, and, as this antagonism had a direct effect
upon even connected with the subject of our memoir, we shall briefly
relate now it was now displayed.

Defeated on the Chickahominy, and seeing little to encourage an
advance, on the left bank of the James, upon Richmond, General
McClellan proposed to cross that river and operate against the capital
and its communications, near Petersburg. The proof of McClellan's
desire to undertake this movement, which afterward proved so
successful under General Grant, is found in a memorandum, by General
Halleck himself, of what took place on a visit paid by him to
McClellan, at Harrison's Landing, on July 25, 1862.

"I stated to him," says General Halleck, "that the object of my visit
was to ascertain from him his views and wishes in regard to future
operations. He said that he proposed to cross the James River at that
point, attack Petersburg, and cut off the enemy's communications by
that route South, making no further demonstration for the present
against Richmond. I stated to him very frankly my views in regard to
the manner and impracticability of the plan;" and nothing further, it
seems, was said of this highly "impracticable" plan of operations. It
became practicable afterward under General Grant; McClellan was not
permitted to essay it in July, 1862, from the fact that it had been
resolved to relieve him from command, or from General Halleck's
inability to perceive its good sense.

General Lee's views upon this subject coincided completely with those
of General McClellan. He expressed at this time, to those in his
confidence, the opinion that Richmond could be assailed to greater
advantage from the South, as a movement of the enemy in that direction
would menace her communications with the Gulf States; and events
subsequently proved the soundness of this view. Attacks from all
other quarters failed, including a repetition by General Grant of
McClellan's attempt from the side of the Chickahominy. When General
Grant carried out his predecessor's plan of assailing the city from
the direction of Petersburg, he succeeded in putting an end to the
war.




PART IV.

_THE WAR ADVANCES NORTHWARD_




I.

LEE'S PROTEST.


General Lee remained in front of Richmond, watching General McClellan,
but intelligence soon reached him from the upper Rappahannock that
another army was advancing in that quarter, and had already occupied
the county of Culpepper, with the obvious intention of capturing
Gordonsville, the point of junction of the Orange and Alexandria and
Virginia Central Railroads, and advancing thence upon Richmond.

The great defeat on the Chickahominy had only inspired the Federal
authorities with new energy. Three hundred thousand new troops
were called for, large bounties were held out as an inducement to
enlistment, negro-slaves in regions occupied by the United States
armies were directed to be enrolled as troops, and military commanders
were authorized to seize upon whatever was "necessary or convenient
for their commands," without compensation to the owners. This
indicated the policy upon which it was now intended to conduct the
war, and the army occupying Culpepper proceeded to carry out the new
policy in every particular.

This force consisted of the troops which had served under Generals
Banks, McDowell, and Fremont--a necleus--and reënforcements from the
army of McClellan, together with the troops under General Burnside,
were hastening to unite with the newly-formed army. It was styled the
"Army of Virginia," and was placed under command of Major-General John
Pope, who had hitherto served in the West. General Pope had procured
the command, it is said, by impressing the authorities with a high
opinion of his energy and activity. In these qualities, General
McClellan was supposed to be deficient; and the new commander, coming
from a region where the war was conducted on a different plan, it was
said, would be able to infuse new life into the languid movements in
Virginia. General Pope had taken special pains to allay the fears of
the Federal authorities for the safety of Washington. He intended
to "lie off on the flanks" of Lee's army, he said, and render it
impossible for the rebels to advance upon the capital while he
occupied that threatening position. When asked if, with an army like
General McClellan's, he would find any difficulty in marching through
the South to New Orleans, General Pope replied without hesitation, "I
should suppose not."

This confident view of things seems to have procured General Pope his
appointment, and it will soon be seen that he proceeded to conduct
military operations upon principles very different from those
announced by General McClellan. War, as carried on by General Pope,
was to be war _à l'outrance._ General McClellan had written: "The war
should not be at all a war upon population, but against armed forces
... all private property, taken for military use, should be paid for;
pillage and waste should be treated as high crimes; all unnecessary
trespass sternly prohibited, and offensive demeanor by the military
toward citizens promptly rebuked." The new commander intended to act
upon a very different principle, and to show that he possessed more
activity and resolution than his predecessor.

General Pope's assumption of the command was signalized by much pomp
and animated general orders. He arrived in a train decked out with
streamers, and issued an order in which he said to the troops: "I
desire you to dismiss from your minds certain phrases which I am sorry
to find much in vogue among you. I hear constantly of taking strong
positions and holding them, _of lines of retreat and bases of
supplies_. Let us discard such ideas. The strongest position which
a soldier should desire to occupy is the one from which he can most
easily advance upon the enemy. Let us study the probable line of
retreat of our opponents, _and leave our own to take care of itself.
Let us look before, and not behind. Disaster and shame look in the
rear_." The result, as will be seen, furnished a grotesque commentary
upon that portion of General Pope's order which we have italicized. In
an address to the army, he added further: "I have come to you from the
West, where we have always seen the backs of our enemies--from an army
whose business it has been to seek the adversary, and beat him when
found--where policy has been attack, and not defence. I presume I have
been called here to pursue the same system."

Such was the tenor of General Pope's orders on assuming
command--orders which were either intended seriously as an
announcement of his real intentions, or as a blind to persuade the
Confederates that his force was large.

Unfortunately for the region in which he now came to operate, General
Pope did not confine himself to these flourishes of rhetoric. He
proceeded to inaugurate a military policy in vivid contrast to General
McClellan's. His "expatriation orders" directed that all male citizens
disloyal to the United States should be immediately arrested; the oath
of allegiance to the United States Government should be proffered
them, and, "if they furnished sufficient security for its observance,"
they should be set free again. If they refused the oath, they should
be sent beyond the Federal lines; and, if afterward found within his
lines, they should be treated as spies, "and shot, their property
to be seized and applied to the public use." All communication
with persons living within the Southern lines was forbidden; such
communication should subject the individual guilty of it to be treated
as _a spy_. Lastly, General Pope's subordinates were directed to
arrest prominent citizens, and hold them as hostages for the good
behavior of the population. If his soldiers were "bushwhacked"--that
is to say, attacked on their foraging expeditions--the prominent
citizens thus held as hostages were to _suffer death_.

It is obvious that war carried on upon such principles is rapine.
General Pope ventured, however, upon the new programme; and a foreign
periodical, commenting upon the result, declared that this commander
had prosecuted hostilities against the South "in a way that cast
mankind two centuries back toward barbarism." We shall not pause to
view the great outrages committed by the Federal troops in Culpepper.
They have received thus much comment rather to introduce the following
communication to the Federal authorities, from General Lee, than
to record what is known now to the Old World as well as the New.
Profoundly outraged and indignant at these cruel and oppressive acts,
General Lee, by direction of the Confederate authorities, addressed,
on the 2d of August, the following note to General Halleck:

    HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF THE C.S., /

    NEAR RICHMOND, VA., _August_ 2, 1862.;

    _To the General commanding the U.S. Army, Washington_:

    GENERAL: In obedience to the order of his Excellency, the
    President of the Confederate States, I have the honor to make you
    the following communication:

    On the 22d of July last a cartel for a general exchange of
    prisoners was signed by Major-General John A. Dix, on behalf of
    the United States, and by Major-General D.H. Hill, on the part of
    this government. By the terms of that cartel it is stipulated that
    all prisoners of war hereafter taken shall be discharged on parole
    until exchanged. Scarcely had the cartel been signed, when the
    military authorities of the United States commenced a practice
    changing the character of the war, from such as becomes civilized
    nations, into a campaign of indiscriminate robbery and murder.

    A general order issued by the Secretary of War of the United
    States, in the city of Washington, on the very day that the cartel
    was signed in Virginia, directs the military commanders of
    the United States to take the property of our people, for the
    convenience and use of the army, without compensation.

    A general order issued by Major-General Pope, on the 23d of July
    last, the day after the date of the cartel, directs the murder of
    our peaceful citizens as spies, if found quietly tilling their
    farms in his rear, even outside of his lines.

    And one of his brigadier-generals, Steinwehr, has seized innocent
    and peaceful inhabitants, to be held as hostages, to the end that
    they may be murdered in cold blood if any of his soldiers
    are killed by some unknown persons whom he designates as
    "bushwhackers." Some of the military authorities seem to suppose
    that their end will be better attained by a savage war in which no
    quarter is to be given, and no age or sex is to be spared, than by
    such hostilities as are alone recognized to be lawful in modern
    times. We find ourselves driven by our enemies by steady progress
    toward a practice which we abhor, and which we are vainly
    struggling to avoid.

    Under these circumstances, this Government has issued the
    accompanying general order, which I am directed by the President
    to transmit to you, recognizing Major-General Pope and his
    commissioned officers to be in the position which they have chosen
    for themselves--that of robbers and murderers, and not that of
    public enemies, entitled, if captured, to be treated as prisoners
    of war. The President also instructs me to inform you that we
    renounce our right of retaliation on the innocent, and will
    continue to treat the private soldiers of General Pope's army as
    prisoners of war; but if, after notice to your Government that
    they confine repressive measures to the punishment of commissioned
    officers who are willing to participate in these crimes, the
    savage practices threatened in the orders alluded to be persisted
    in, we shall reluctantly be forced to the last resort of accepting
    the war on the terms chosen by our enemies, until the voice of an
    outraged humanity shall compel a respect for the recognized usages
    of war. While the President considers that the facts referred to
    would justify a refusal on our part to execute the cartel by which
    we have agreed to liberate an excess of prisoners of war in our
    hands, a sacred regard for plighted faith, which shrinks from the
    semblance of breaking a promise, precludes a resort to such an
    extremity, nor is it his desire to extend to any other forces of
    the United States the punishment merited by General Pope and such
    commissioned officers as choose to participate in the execution of
    his infamous order.

    I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

    R.E. LEE, _General commanding_.

This communication requires no comment. It had the desired effect,
although General Halleck returned it as couched in language too
insulting to be received. On the 15th of August, the United States War
Department so far disapproved of General Pope's orders as to direct
that "no officer or soldier might, without proper authority, leave his
colors or ranks to take private property, or to enter a private house
for the purpose, under penalty of death."




II.

LEE'S MANOEUVRES.


General Pope had promptly advanced, and his army lay in Culpepper, the
right reaching toward the Blue Ridge, and the left extending nearly to
the Rapidan.

The campaign now became a contest of brains between Lee and the
Federal authorities. Their obvious aim was to leave him in doubt
whether a new advance was intended under McClellan from James River,
or the real movement was to be against Richmond from the North. Under
these circumstances, General Lee remained with the bulk of his army
in front of Richmond; but, on the 13th of July, sent Jackson with two
divisions in the direction of Gordonsville. The game of wits had thus
begun, and General Lee moved cautiously, looking in both directions,
toward James River and the Upper Rappahannock. As yet the real design
of the enemy was undeveloped. The movement of General Pope might or
might not be a real advance. But General McClellan remained inactive,
and, on the 27th of July, A.P. Hill's division was sent up to
reënforce Jackson--while, at the same time, General D.H. Hill,
commanding a force on the south bank of the James River, was directed
to make demonstrations against McClellan's communications by opening
fire on his transports.

The moment approached now when the game between the two adversaries
was to be decided. On the 2d of August, Jackson assumed the offensive,
by attacking the enemy at Orange Court-House; and, on the 5th, General
McClellan made a prompt demonstration to prevent Lee from sending him
further reinforcements. A large Federal force advanced to Malvern
Hill, and was drawn up there in line of battle, with every indication
on the part of General McClellan of an intention to advance anew upon
Richmond. Lee promptly went to meet him, and a slight engagement
ensued on Curl's Neck. But, on the next morning, the Federal army had
disappeared, and the whole movement was seen to have been a feint.

This state of indecision continued until nearly the middle of August.
An incident then occurred which clearly indicated the enemy's
intentions. General Burnside was known to have reached Hampton Roads
from the Southern coast with a considerable force, and the direction
which his flotilla now took would show the design of the Federal
authorities. If a new advance was intended from the James, the
flotilla would ascend that river; if General Pope's army was looked to
for the real movement, General Burnside would go in that direction.
The secret was discovered by the afterward celebrated Colonel John S.
Mosby, then a private, and just returned, by way of Fortress Monroe,
from prison in Washington. He ascertained, when he disembarked, that
Burnside's flotilla was about to move toward the Rappahannock, and,
aware of the importance of the information, hastened to communicate
it to General Lee. He was admitted, at the headquarters of the latter
near Richmond, to a private interview, and when General Lee had
finished his conversation with the plain-looking individual, then
almost unknown, he was in possession of the information necessary to
determine his plans. The Rappahannock, and not the James, was seen
to be the theatre of the coming campaign, and General Lee's whole
attention was now directed to that quarter.

Jackson had already struck an important blow there, coöperating
vigorously, as was habitual with him, in the general plan of action.
General McClellan had endeavored by a feint to hold Lee at Richmond.
By a battle now, Jackson hastened the retreat of the army under
McClellan from James River. With his three divisions, Jackson crossed
the Rapidan, and, on the 9th of August, attacked the advance force of
General Pope at Cedar Mountain. The struggle was obstinate, and at
one time Jackson's left was driven back, but the action terminated at
nightfall in the retreat of the Federal forces, and the Confederate
commander remained in possession of the field. He was too weak,
however, to hold his position against the main body of the Federal
army, which was known to be approaching; he accordingly recrossed
the Rapidan to the vicinity of Gordonsville, and here he was
soon afterward joined by General Lee, with the great bulk of the
Confederate army.

Such were the events which succeeded the battles of the Chickahominy,
transferring hostilities to a new theatre, and inaugurating the great
campaigns of the summer and autumn of 1862 in Northern Virginia and
Maryland.




III.

LEE ADVANCES FROM THE RAPIDAN.


General Lee, it will thus be seen, had proceeded in his military
manoeuvres with the utmost caution, determined to give his adversaries
no advantage, and remain in front of the capital until it was free
from all danger. But for the daring assault upon General McClellan,
on the Chickahominy, his critics would no doubt have charged him with
weakness and indecision now; but, under any circumstances, it is
certain that he would have proceeded in the same manner, conducting
operations in the method which his judgment approved.

At length the necessity of caution had disappeared. General Burnside
had gone to reënforce General Pope, and a portion of McClellan's army
was believed to have followed. "It therefore seemed," says
General Lee, "that active operations on the James were no longer
contemplated," and he wisely concluded that "the most effectual way to
relieve Richmond from any danger of attack from that quarter would
be to reënforce General Jackson, and advance upon General Pope." In
commenting upon these words, an able writer of the North exclaims:
"Veracious prophecy, showing that _insight_ which is one of the
highest marks of generalship!" The movement, indeed, was the right
proceeding, as the event showed; and good generalship may be defined
to be the power of seeing what is the proper course, and the decision
of character which leads to its adoption.

General Lee exhibited throughout his career this mingled good judgment
and daring, and his cautious inactivity was now succeeded by one
of those offensive movements which, if we may judge him, by his
subsequent career, seemed to be the natural bent of his character.
With the bulk of his army, he marched in the direction of General
Pope; the rest were speedily ordered to follow, and active operations
began for driving the newly-formed Federal "Army of Virginia" back
toward Washington.

We have presented Lee's order for the attack on General McClellan, and
here quote his order of march for the advance against General Pope,
together with a note addressed to Stuart, commanding his cavalry, for
that officer's guidance.

HEADQUARTERS ARMY NORTHERN VIRGINIA,

_August_ 19, 1862.

SPECIAL ORDER No. 185.

I. General Longstreet's command, constituting the right wing of
the army, will cross the Rapidan at Raccoon Ford, and move in the
direction of Culpepper Court-House. General Jackson's command,
constituting the left wing, will cross at Summerville Ford, and move
in the same direction, keeping on the left of General Longstreet.
General Anderson's division will cross at Summerville Ford, follow the
route of General Jackson, and act in reserve. The battalion of light
artillery, under Colonel S.D. Lee, will take the same route. The
cavalry, under General Stuart, will cross at Morton's Ford, pursue the
route by Stevensburg to Rappahannock Station, destroy the railroad
bridge, cut the enemy's communications, telegraph line, and,
operating toward Culpepper Court-House, will take position on General
Longstreet's right.

II. The commanders of each wing will designate the reserve for their
commands. Medical and ammunition wagons will alone follow the troops
across the Rapidan. The baggage and supply trains will be parked under
their respective officers, in secure positions on the south side, so
as not to embarrass the different roads.

III. Cooked rations for three days will be carried in the haversacks
of the men, and provision must be made for foraging the animals.
Straggling from the ranks is strictly prohibited, and commanders will
make arrangements to secure and punish the offenders.

IV. The movements herein directed will commence to-morrow, 20th
instant, at dawn of day.

By command of General R.E. Lee:

A.P. MASON, _A.A. G_.

HEADQUARTERS CRENSHAW'S FARM,}
           _August_ 19, 1862.}

_General J.E.B. Stuart, commanding Cavalry_:

General: I desire you to rest your men to-day, refresh your horses,
prepare rations and every thing for the march to-morrow. Get what
information you can of fords, roads, and position of the enemy, so
that your march can be made understandingly and with vigor. I send to
you Captain Mason, an experienced bridge-builder, etc., whom I think
will be able to aid you in the destruction of the bridge, etc. When
that is accomplished, or when in train of execution, as circumstances
permit, I wish you to operate back toward Culpepper Court-House,
creating such confusion and consternation as you can, without
unnecessarily exposing your men, till you feel Longstreet's right.
Take position there on his right, and hold yourself in reserve, and
act as circumstances may require. I wish to know during the day how
you proceed in your preparations. They will require the personal
attention of all your officers. The last reports from the
signal-stations yesterday evening were, that the enemy was breaking
up his principal encampments, and moving in direction of Culpepper
Court-House.

Very respectfully, etc., R.E. LEE, _General_.

These orders indicate General Lee's design--to reach the left flank
of the enemy, prevent his retreat by destroying the bridges on the
Rappahannock, and bring him to battle in the neighborhood of Culpepper
Court-House. The plan failed in consequence of a delay of two days,
which took place in its execution--a delay, attributed at that time,
we know not with what justice, to the unnecessarily deliberate
movements of the corps commanded by General Longstreet. This delay
enabled the enemy to gain information of the intended movement; and
when General Lee advanced on the 20th of August, instead of on the
18th, as he had at first determined to do, it was found that General
Pope had broken up his camps, and was in rapid retreat. Lee followed,
and reached the Rappahannock only to find that the Federal army had
passed that stream. General Pope, who had promised to conduct none but
offensive operations, and never look to the rear, had thus hastened
to interpose the waters of the Rappahannock between himself and his
adversary, and, when General Lee approached, he found every crossing
of the river heavily defended by the Federal infantry and artillery.

In face of this large force occupying a commanding position on the
heights, General Lee made no effort to cross. He determined, he says,
"not to attempt the passage of the river at that point with the army,"
but to "seek a more favorable place to cross, higher up the river, and
thus gain the enemy's right." This manoeuvre was intrusted to Jackson,
whose corps formed the Confederate left wing. Jackson advanced
promptly to the Warrenton Springs Ford, which had been selected as
the point of crossing, drove away a force of the enemy posted at the
place, and immediately began to pass the river with his troops. The
movement was however interrupted by a severe rain-storm, which swelled
the waters of the Rappahannock, and rendered a further prosecution of
it impracticable. General Lee was thus compelled to give up that plan,
and ordered Jackson to withdraw the force which had crossed. This was
done, and General Lee was now called upon to adopt some other method
of attack; or to remain inactive in face of the enemy.

But to remain inactive was impossible. The army must either advance
or retire; information which had just reached the Confederate general
rendered one of these two proceedings indispensable. The information
referred to had been obtained by General Stuart. The activity and
energy of this officer, especially in gaining intelligence, now
proved, as they proved often afterward, of the utmost importance to
Lee. Stuart had been directed by General Lee to make an attack, with a
cavalry force, on the Orange and Alexandria Railroad, in the enemy's
rear; he had promptly carried out his orders by striking the Federal
communications at Catlett's Station, had destroyed there all that he
found, and torn up the railroad, but, better than all, had captured
a box containing official papers belonging to General Pope. These
papers, which Stuart hastened--marching day and night, through storm
and flood--to convey to General Lee, presented the clearest evidence
of the enemy's movements and designs. Troops were hastening from every
direction to reënforce General Pope, the entire force on James River
especially was to be brought rapidly north of the Rappahannock, and
any delay in the operations of the Confederates would thus expose them
to attack from the Federal forces concentrated from all quarters in
their front.

[Illustration: Map--Upper Rappahannock]




IV.

JACKSON FLANKS GENERAL POPE.


It was thus necessary to act with decision, and General Lee resolved
upon a movement apparently of the most reckless character. This was to
separate his army into two parts, and, while one remained confronting
the enemy on the Rappahannock, send the other by a long circuit to
fall on the Federal rear near Manassas. This plan of action was
opposed to the first rule of the military art, that a general should
never divide his force in the face of an enemy. That Lee ventured to
do so on this occasion can only be explained on one hypothesis, that
he did not highly esteem the military ability of his opponent. These
flank attacks undoubtedly, however, possessed a great attraction for
him, as they did for Jackson, and, in preferring such movement, Lee
was probably actuated both by the character of the troops on both
sides and by the nature of the country. The men of both armies were
comparatively raw levies, highly susceptible to the influence of
"surprise," and the appearance of an enemy on their flanks, or in
their rear, was calculated to throw them into disorder. The wooded
character of the theatre of war generally rendered such movements
practicable, and all that was requisite was a certain amount of daring
in the commander who was called upon to decide upon them. This daring
Lee repeatedly exhibited, and the uniform success of the movements
indicates his sound generalship.

To command the force which was now to go on the perilous errand of
striking General Pope's rear, General Lee selected Jackson, who had
exhibited such promptness and decision in the campaigns of the Valley
of Virginia. Rapidity of movement was necessary above all things,
and, if any one could be relied upon for that, it was the now famous
Stonewall Jackson. To him the operation was accordingly intrusted, and
his corps was at once put in motion. Crossing the Rappahannock at an
almost forgotten ford, high up and out of view of the Federal right,
Jackson pushed forward day and night toward Manassas, reached
Thoroughfare Gap, in the Bull Run Mountain, west of that place, passed
through, and completely destroyed the great mass of supplies in the
Federal depot at Manassas. The whole movement had been made with
such rapidity, and General Stuart, commanding the cavalry, had so
thoroughly guarded the flank of the advancing column from observation,
that Manassas was a mass of smoking ruins almost before General Pope
was aware of the real danger. Intelligence soon reached him, however,
of the magnitude of the blow aimed by Lee, and, hastily breaking
up his camps on the Rappahannock, he hurried to attack the force
assailing his communications.

The first part of General Lee's plan had thus fully succeeded. General
Pope, who had occupied every ford of the Rappahannock, so as to render
the passage difficult, if not impossible, had disappeared suddenly, to
go and attack the enemy in his rear. General Lee promptly moved in
his turn, with the great corps under Longstreet, and pushed
toward Manassas, over nearly the same road followed by Jackson.

[Illustration: T.J. Jackson]




V.

LEE FOLLOWS.


The contest of generalship had now fully begun, and the brain of
General Lee was matched against the brain of General Pope. It is no
part of the design of the writer of this volume to exalt unduly the
reputation of Lee, and detract from the credit due his adversaries.
Justice has been sought to be done to General McClellan; the same
measure of justice will be dealt out to his successors on the Federal
side; nor is it calculated to elevate the fame of Lee, to show that
his opponents were incapable and inefficient. Of General Pope,
however, it must be said that he suffered himself to be outgeneralled
in every particular; and the pithy comment of General Lee, that he
"did not appear to be aware of his situation," sums up the whole
subject.

It is beyond our purpose to enter upon any thing resembling a detailed
narrative of the confused and complicated movements of the various
corps of the army under General Pope. These have been the subject of
the severest criticism by his own followers. We shall simply notice
the naked events. Jackson reached Manassas on the night of August
26th, took it, and on the next day destroyed the great depot. General
Pope was hastening to protect it, but was delayed by Ewell at Bristoe,
and a force sent up from Washington, under the brave General Taylor,
was driven off with loss. Then, having achieved his aim, Jackson fell
back toward Sudley.

If the reader will look at the map, he will now understand the
exact condition of affairs. Jackson had burned the Federal depot of
supplies, and retired before the great force hastening to rescue them.
He had with him about twenty thousand men, and General Pope's force
was probably triple that number. Thus, the point was to hold General
Pope at arm's-length until the arrival of Lee; and, to accomplish this
great end, Jackson fell back beyond Groveton. There he formed line of
battle, and waited.

It is obvious that, under these circumstances, the true policy of
General Pope was to obstruct Thoroughfare Gap, the only road by which
Lee could approach promptly, and then crush Jackson. On the night of
the 27th, General McDowell was accordingly sent thither with forty
thousand men; but General Pope ordered him, on the next morning, to
Manassas, where he hoped to "bag the whole crowd," he said--that is
to say, the force under Jackson. This was the fatal mistake made by
General Pope. Thoroughfare Gap was comparatively undefended. While
General Pope was marching to attack Jackson, who had disappeared, it
was the next thing to a certainty that General Lee would attack _him_.

All parties were thus moving to and fro; but the Confederates enjoyed
the very great advantage over General Pope of knowing precisely
how affairs stood, and of having determined upon their own plan of
operations. Jackson, with his back to the mountain, was waiting for
Lee. Lee was approaching rapidly, to unite the two halves of his army.
General Pope, meanwhile, was marching and countermarching, apparently
ignorant of the whereabouts of Jackson,[1]

General Lee, in personal command of Longstreet's corps, reached the
western end of Thoroughfare Gap about sunset, on the 28th, and the
sound of artillery from the direction of Groveton indicated that
Jackson and General Pope had come in collision. Jackson had himself
brought on this engagement by attacking the flank of one of General
Pope's various columns, as it marched across his front, over the
Warrenton road, and this was the origin of the sound wafted to General
Lee's ears as he came in sight of Thoroughfare. It was certainly
calculated to excite his nerves if they were capable of being excited.
Jackson was evidently engaged, and the disproportion between his
forces and those of General Pope rendered such an engagement extremely
critical. Lee accordingly pressed forward, reached the Gap, and the
advance force suddenly halted: the Gap was defended. The Federal force
posted here, at the eastern opening of the Gap, was small, and wholly
inadequate for the purpose; but this was as yet unknown to General
Lee. His anxiety under these circumstances must have been great.
Jackson might be crushed before his arrival. He rode up to the
summit of the commanding hill which rises just west of the Gap, and
dismounting directed his field-glass toward the shaggy defile in
front.

[Footnote 1: "Not knowing at the time where was the enemy."--_General
Porter_.] and undecided what course to pursue.

[Illustration: Lee Reconnoitring at Throughfare Gap.]

The writer of these pages chanced to be near the Confederate commander
at this moment, and was vividly impressed by the air of unmoved
calmness which marked his countenance and demeanor. Nothing in the
expression of his face, and no hurried movement, indicated excitement
or anxiety. Here, as on many other occasions, Lee impressed the writer
as an individual gifted with the most surprising faculty of remaining
cool and unaffected in the midst of circumstances calculated to arouse
the most phlegmatic. After reconnoitring for some moments without
moving, he closed his glass slowly, as though he were buried in
reflection, and deliberating at his leisure, and, walking back slowly
to his horse, mounted and rode down the hill.

The attack was not delayed, and flanking columns were sent to cross
north of the Gap and assail the enemy's rear. But the assault in front
was successful. The small force of the enemy at the eastern opening of
the Gap retired, and, by nine o'clock at night, General Longstreet's
corps was passing through.

All the next morning (August 29th), Longstreet's troops were coming
into position on the right of Jackson, under the personal supervision
of Lee. By noon the line of battle was formed.[1] Lee's army was
once more united. General Pope had not been able to crush less than
one-half that army, for twenty-four hours nearly in his clutches, and
it did not seem probable that he would meet with greater success, now
that the whole was concentrated and held in the firm hand of Lee.

[Footnote 1: The hour of Longstreet's arrival has been strangely a
subject of discussion. The truth is stated in the reports of Lee,
Longstreet, Jones, and other officers. But General Pope was ignorant
of Longstreet's presence _at five in the evening_; and General Porter,
his subordinate, was dismissed from the army for not at that hour
attacking Jackson's right, declared by General Pope to be undefended.
Longstreet was in line of battle by noon.]




VI.

THE SECOND BATTLE OF MANASSAS.


Lee's order of battle for the coming action was peculiar. It resembled
an open V, with the opening toward the enemy--Jackson's corps forming
the left wing, and extending from near Sudley, to a point in rear of
the small village of Groveton, Longstreet's corps forming the right
wing, and reaching from Jackson's right to and beyond the Warrenton
road which runs to Stonebridge.

The field of battle was nearly identical with that of July 21, 1861.
The only difference was, that the Confederates occupied the ground
formerly held by the Federal troops, and that the latter attacked, as
Johnston and Beauregard had attacked, from the direction of Manassas,
and the tableland around the well-known Henry House.

The Southern order of battle seems to have contemplated a movement on
one or both of General Pope's flanks while he attacked in front. An
assault on either wing would expose him to danger from the other,
and it will be seen that the fate of the battle was decided by this
judicious arrangement of the Confederate commander.

The action began a little after noon, when the Federal right,
consisting of the troops of Generals Banks, Sigel, and others,
advanced and made a vigorous attack on Jackson's left, under A.P.
Hill. An obstinate conflict ensued, the opposing lines fighting almost
bayonet to bayonet, "delivering their volleys into each other at the
distance of ten paces." At the first charge, an interval between two
of Hill's brigades was penetrated by the enemy, and that wing of
Jackson's corps was in great danger of being driven back. This
disaster was, however, prevented by the prompt stand made by two or
three regiments; the enemy was checked, and a prompt counter-charge
drove the Federal assaulting columns back into the woods.

The attempt to break Jackson's line at this point was not, however,
abandoned. The Federal troops returned again and again to the
encounter, and General Hill reported "six separate and distinct
assaults" made upon him. They were all repulsed, in which important
assistance was rendered by General Early. That brave officer attacked
with vigor, and, aided by the fire of the Confederate artillery from
the elevated ground in Jackson's rear, drove the enemy before him with
such slaughter that one of their regiments is said to have carried
back but three men.

This assault of the enemy had been of so determined a character, that
General Lee, in order to relieve his left, had directed Hood and
Evans, near his centre, to advance and attack the left of the
assaulting column. Hood was about to do so, when he found a heavy
force advancing to charge his own line. A warm engagement followed,
which resulted in the repulse of the enemy, and Hood followed them a
considerable distance, inflicting heavy loss.

It was now nearly nine o'clock at night, and the darkness rendered
further operations impossible. The troops which had driven the enemy
were recalled from their advanced position, the Southern line was
reformed on the same ground occupied at the commencement of the
action, and General Lee prepared for the more decisive struggle of the
next day.

Morning came (August 30th), but all the forenoon passed without a
resumption of the battle. Each of the adversaries seemed to await some
movement on the part of the other, and the Federal commander made
heavy feints against both the Confederate right and left, with the
view of discovering some weak point, or of inducing Lee to lay himself
open to attack. These movements had, however, no effect. Lee remained
obstinately in his strong position, rightly estimating the advantage
it gave him, and no doubt taking into consideration the want of
supplies General Pope must labor under, a deficiency which rendered a
prompt assault on his part indispensable. The armies thus remained in
face of each other, without serious efforts upon either side, until
nearly or quite the hour of three in the afternoon.

General Pope then resumed the assault on Lee's left, under Jackson,
with his best troops. The charge was furious, and a bloody struggle
ensued; but Jackson succeeded in repulsing the force. It fell back in
disorder, but was succeeded by a second and a third line, which rushed
forward at the "double-quick," in a desperate attempt to break the
Southern line. These new attacks were met with greater obstinacy than
at first, and, just as the opponents had closed in, a heavy fire was
directed against the Federal column by Colonel S.D. Lee, commanding
the artillery at Lee's centre. This fire, which was of the most rapid
and destructive character, struck the enemy in front and flank at
once, and seemed to sweep back the charging brigades as they came. The
fire of the cannon was then redoubled, and Jackson's line advanced
with cheers. Before this charge, the Federal line broke, and Jackson
pressed forward, allowing them no respite.

General Lee then threw forward Longstreet, who, knowing what was
expected of him, was already moving. The enemy were pressed thus in
front and on their flank, as Lee had no doubt intended, in forming his
peculiar line. The corps of Jackson and Longstreet closed in like two
iron arms; the Federal forces were driven from position to position;
the glare of their cannon, more and more distant, indicated that they
had abandoned further contest, and at ten at night the darkness put an
end to the battle and pursuit. General Pope was retreating with his
defeated forces toward Washington.

On the next day, Lee dispatched Jackson to turn Centreville and cut
off the retreat of General Pope. The result was a severe engagement
near Germantown, which was put an end to by a violent storm. General
Pope, now reënforced by the commands of Generals Sumner and Franklin,
had been enabled to hold his ground until night. When, on the next day
(September 2d), the Confederates advanced to Fairfax Court-House,
it was found that the entire Federal army was in rapid retreat upon
Washington.

Such had been the fate of General Pope.




PART V.

_LEE INVADES MARYLAND_.




I.

HIS DESIGNS.


The defeat of General Pope opened the way for movements not
contemplated, probably, by General Lee, when he marched from Richmond
to check the advance in Culpepper. His object at that time was
doubtless simply to arrest the forward movement of the new force
threatening Gordonsville. Now, however, the position of the pieces
on the great chess-board of war had suddenly changed, and it was
obviously Lee's policy to extract all the advantage possible from the
new condition of things.

He accordingly determined to advance into Maryland--the fortifications
in front of Washington, and the interposition of the Potomac, a
broad stream easily defended, rendering a movement in that direction
unpromising. On the 3d of September, therefore, and without waiting to
rest his army, which was greatly fatigued with the nearly continuous
marching and fighting since it had left the Rapidan, General Lee moved
toward Leesburg, crossed his forces near that place, and to the
music of the bands playing the popular air, "Maryland, my Maryland,"
advanced to Frederick City, which he occupied on the 7th of September.

Lee's object in invading Maryland has been the subject of much
discussion, one party holding the view that his sole aim was to
surround and capture a force of nine or ten thousand Federal troops
stationed at Harper's Ferry; and another party maintaining that he
proposed an invasion of Pennsylvania as far as the Susquehanna,
intending to fight a decisive battle there, and advance thereafter
upon Philadelphia, Baltimore, or Washington. The course pursued by an
army commander is largely shaped by the progress of events. It can
only be said that General Lee, doubtless, left the future to
decide his ultimate movements; meanwhile he had a distinct and
clearly-defined aim, which he states in plain words.

His object was to draw the Federal forces out of Virginia first. The
movement culminating in the victory over the enemy at Manassas had
produced the effect of paralyzing them in every quarter. On the coast
of North Carolina, in Western Virginia, and in the Shenandoah Valley,
had been heard the echo of the great events in Middle and Northern
Virginia. General Burnside's force had been brought up from the
South, leaving affairs at a stand-still in that direction; and,
contemporaneously with the retreat of General Pope, the Federal forces
at Washington and beyond had fallen back to the Potomac. This left
the way open, and Lee's farther advance, it was obvious, would now
completely clear Virginia of her invaders. The situation of affairs,
and the expected results, are clearly stated by General Lee:

"The war was thus transferred," he says, "from the interior to the
frontier, and the supplies of rich and productive districts made
accessible to our army. To prolong a state of affairs in every way
desirable, and not to permit the season for active operations to pass
without endeavoring to inflict other injury upon the enemy, the best
course appeared to be the transfer of the army into Maryland."

The state of things in Maryland was another important consideration.
That great Commonwealth was known to be sectionally divided in its
sentiment toward the Federal Government, the eastern portion adhering
generally to the side of the South, and the western portion generally
to the Federal side. But, even as high up as Frederick, it was hoped
that the Southern cause would find adherents and volunteers to march
under the Confederate banner. If this portion of the population had
only the opportunity to choose their part, unterrified by Federal
bayonets, it was supposed they would decide for the South. In any
event, the movement would be important. The condition of affairs in
Maryland, General Lee says, "encouraged the belief that the presence
of our army, however inferior to that of the enemy, would induce the
Washington Government to retain all its available force to provide for
contingencies which its course toward the people of that State gave
it reason to apprehend," and to cross the Potomac "might afford us an
opportunity to aid the citizens of Maryland in any efforts they might
be disposed to make to recover their liberty."

It may be said, in summing up on this point, that Lee expected
volunteers to enroll themselves under his standard, tempted to do so
by the hope of throwing off the yoke of the Federal Government, and
the army certainly shared this expectation. The identity of sentiment
generally between the people of the States of Maryland and Virginia,
and their strong social ties in the past, rendered this anticipation
reasonable, and the feeling of the country at the result afterward was
extremely bitter.

Such were the first designs of Lee; his ultimate aim seems as clear.
By advancing into Maryland and threatening Baltimore and Washington,
he knew that he would force the enemy to withdraw all their troops
from the south bank of the Potomac, where they menaced the Confederate
communications with Richmond; when this was accomplished, as it
clearly would be, his design was, to cross the Maryland extension of
the Blue Ridge, called there the South Mountain, advance by way of
Hagerstown into the Cumberland Valley, and, by thus forcing the enemy
to follow him, draw them to a distance from their base of supplies,
while his own communications would remain open by way of the
Shenandoah Valley. This was essentially the same plan pursued in
the campaign of 1863, which terminated in the battle of Gettysburg.
General Lee's movements now indicated similar intentions. He doubtless
wished, in the first place, to compel the enemy to pursue him--then
to lead them as far as was prudent--and then, if circumstances were
favorable, bring them to decisive battle, success in which promised to
open for him the gates of Washington or Baltimore, and end the war.

It will now be seen how the delay caused by the movement of Jackson
against Harper's Ferry, and the discovery by General McClellan of the
entire arrangement devised by Lee for that purpose, caused the failure
of this whole ulterior design.

[Illustration: Map--Map of the MARYLAND CAMPAIGN.]




II.

LEE IN MARYLAND.


The Southern army was concentrated in the neighborhood of Frederick
City by the 7th of September, and on the next day General Lee issued
an address to the people of Maryland.

We have not burdened the present narrative with Lee's army orders and
other official papers; but the great force and dignity of this address
render it desirable to present it in full:

    HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA,}
   NEAR FREDERICKTOWN, _September_ 8, 1862.}

    _To the People of Maryland_:

    It is right that you should know the purpose that has brought the
    army under my command within the limits of your State, so far as
    that purpose concerns yourselves.

    The people of the Confederate States have long watched with the
    deepest sympathy the wrongs and outrages that have been inflicted
    upon the citizens of a Commonwealth allied to the States of the
    South by the strongest social, political, and commercial ties.

    They have seen, with profound indignation, their sister State
    deprived of every right, and reduced to the condition of a
    conquered province. Under the pretence of supporting the
    Constitution, but in violation of its most valuable provisions,
    your citizens have been arrested and imprisoned upon no charge,
    and contrary to all forms of law. The faithful and manly protest
    against this outrage, made by the venerable and illustrious
    Marylanders--to whom in better days no citizen appealed for right
    in vain--was treated with scorn and contempt. The government
    of your chief city has been usurped by armed strangers; your
    Legislature has been dissolved by the unlawful arrest of its
    members; freedom of the press and of speech have been suppressed;
    words have been declared offences by an arbitrary desire of the
    Federal Executive, and citizens ordered to be tried by military
    commission for what they may dare to speak.

    Believing that the people of Maryland possessed a spirit too lofty
    to submit to such a government, the people of the South have long
    wished to aid you in throwing off this foreign yoke, to enable
    you again to enjoy the inalienable rights of freemen, and restore
    independence and sovereignty to your State.

    In obedience to this wish, our army has come among you, and is
    prepared to assist you, with the power of its arms, in regaining
    the rights of which you have been despoiled. This, citizens
    of Maryland, is our mission, so far as you are concerned. No
    constraint upon your free will is intended--no intimidation will
    be allowed. Within the limits of this army, at least, Marylanders
    shall once more enjoy their ancient freedom of thought and speech.
    We know no enemies among you, and will protect all of every
    opinion. It is for you to decide your destiny, freely, and without
    constraint. This army will respect your choice, whatever it may
    be; and, while the Southern people will rejoice to welcome you to
    your natural position among them, they will only welcome you when
    you come of your own free will.

    R.E. LEE, _General commanding_.

This address, full of grave dignity, and highly characteristic of the
Confederate commander, was in vivid contrast with the harsh orders of
General Pope in Culpepper. The accents of friendship and persuasion
were substituted for the "rod of iron." There would be no coercive
measures; no arrests, with the alternative presented of an oath to
support the South, or instant banishment. No intimidation would be
permitted. In the lines of the Southern army, at least, Marylanders
should enjoy freedom of thought and speech, and every man should
"decide his destiny freely, and without constraint."

This address, couched in terms of such dignity, had little effect
upon the people. Either their sentiment in favor of the Union was too
strong, or they found nothing in the condition of affairs to encourage
their Southern feelings. A large Federal force was known to be
advancing; Lee's army, in tatters, and almost without supplies,
presented a very uninviting appearance to recruits, and few joined his
standard, the population in general remaining hostile or neutral.

The condition of the army was indeed forlorn. It was worn down by
marching and fighting; the men had scarcely shoes upon their feet;
and, above the tattered figures, flaunting their rags in the sunshine,
were seen gaunt and begrimed faces, in which could be read little of
the "romance of war." The army was in no condition to undertake
an invasion; "lacking much of the material of war, feeble in
transportation, poorly provided with clothing, and thousands of them
destitute of shoes," is Lee's description of his troops. Such was the
condition of the better portion of the force; on the opposite side of
the Potomac, scattered along the hills, could be seen a weary, ragged,
hungry, and confused multitude, who had dragged along in rear of the
rest, unable to keep up, and whose miserable appearance said little
for the prospects of the army to which they belonged.

From these and other causes resulted the general apathy of the
Marylanders, and Lee soon discovered that he must look solely to his
own men for success in his future movements. He faced that conviction
courageously; and, without uttering a word of comment, or indulging in
any species of crimination against the people of Maryland, resolutely
commenced his movements looking to the capture of Harper's Ferry and
the invasion of Pennsylvania.[1]

[Footnote 1: The reader will perceive that the intent to _invade_
Pennsylvania is repeatedly attributed in these pages to General Lee.
His own expression is, "by _threatening_ Pennsylvania, to induce
the enemy," etc. That he designed invasion, aided by the recruits
anticipated in Maryland, seems unquestionable; since, even after
discovering the lukewarmness of the people there by the fact that few
joined his standard, he still advanced to Hagerstown, but a step from
the Pennsylvania line. These facts have induced the present writer to
attribute the design of actual invasion to Lee with entire confidence;
and all the circumstances seem to him to support that hypothesis.]

The promises of his address had been kept. No one had been forced to
follow the Southern flag; and now, when the people turned their backs
upon it, closing the doors of the houses in the faces of the Southern
troops, they remained unmolested. Lee had thus given a practical proof
of the sincerity of his character. He had promised nothing which he
had not performed; and in Maryland, as afterward in Pennsylvania,
in 1863, he remained firm against the temptation to adopt the harsh
course generally pursued by the commanders of invading armies. He
seems to have proceeded on the principle that good faith is as
essential in public affairs as in private, and to have resolved that,
in any event, whether of victory or disaster, his enemies should not
have it in their power to say that he broke his plighted word, or
acted in a manner unbecoming a Christian gentleman.

Prompt action was now necessary. The remnants of General Pope's army,
greatly scattered and disorganized by the severe battle of Manassas,
had been rapidly reformed and brought into order again, and to this
force was added a large number of new troops, hurried forward from the
Northern States to Washington. This new army was not to be commanded
by General Pope, who had been weighed and found wanting in ability to
contend with Lee. The force was intrusted to General McClellan, in
spite of his unpopularity with the Federal authorities; and the urgent
manner in which he had been called upon to take the head of affairs
and protect the Federal capital, is the most eloquent of all
commentaries upon the position which he held in the eyes of the
country and the army. It was felt, indeed, by all that the Federal
ship was rolling in the storm, and an experienced pilot was necessary
for her guidance. General McClellan was accordingly directed, after
General Pope's defeat, to take command of every thing, and see to the
safety of Washington; and, finding himself at length at the head of an
army of about one hundred thousand men, he proceeded, after the manner
of a good soldier, to protect the Federal capital by advancing into
upper Maryland in pursuit of Lee.




III.

MOVEMENTS OF THE TWO ARMIES.


General Lee was already moving to the accomplishment of his designs,
the capture of Harper's Ferry, and an advance into the Cumberland
Valley.

His plan to attain the first-mentioned object was simple, and promised
to be successful. Jackson was to march around by way of "Williamsport
and Martinsburg," and thus approach from the south. A force was
meanwhile to seize upon and occupy the Maryland Heights, a lofty
spot of the mountain across the Potomac, north of the Ferry. In like
manner, another body of troops was to cross the Potomac, east of the
Blue Ridge, and occupy the Loudon Heights, looking down upon Harper's
Ferry from the east. By this arrangement the retreat of the enemy
would be completely cut off in every direction. Harper's Ferry must
be captured, and, having effected that result, the whole Confederate
force, detached for the purpose, was to follow the main body of this
army in the direction of Hagerstown, to take part in the proposed
invasion of Pennsylvania.

This excellent plan failed, as will be seen, from no fault of the
great soldier who devised it, but in consequence of unforeseen
obstacles, and especially of one of those singular incidents which
occasionally reverse the best-laid schemes and abruptly turn aside the
currents of history.

Jackson and the commanders coöperating with him moved on September
10th. General Lee then with his main body crossed the South Mountain,
taking the direction of Hagerstown. Meanwhile, General McClellan had
advanced cautiously and slowly, withheld by incessant dispatches from
Washington, warning him not to move in such a manner as to expose that
city to danger. Such danger existed only in the imaginations of the
authorities, as the army in advancing extended its front from the
Potomac to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. General McClellan,
nevertheless, moved with very great precaution, feeling his way, step
by step, like a man in the dark, when on reaching Frederick City,
which the Confederates had just evacuated, good fortune suddenly came
to his assistance. This good fortune was the discovery of a copy of
General Lee's orders of march for the army, in which his whole plan
was revealed. General McClellan had therein the unmistakable evidence
of his opponent's intentions, and from that moment his advance was as
rapid as before it had been deliberate.

The result of this fortunate discovery was speedily seen. General Lee,
while moving steadily toward Hagerstown, was suddenly compelled to
turn his attention to the mountain-passes in his rear. It had not been
the intention of Lee to oppose the passage of the enemy through the
South Mountain, as he desired to draw General McClellan as far as
possible from his base, but the delay in the fall of Harper's
Ferry now made this necessary. It was essential to defend the
mountain-defiles in order to insure the safety of the Confederate
troops at Harper's Ferry; and Lee accordingly directed General
D.H. Hill to oppose the passage of the enemy at Boonsboro Gap, and
Longstreet was sent from Hagerstown to support him.

An obstinate struggle now ensued for the possession of the main South
Mountain Gap, near Boonsboro, and the roar of Jackson's artillery from
Harper's Ferry must have prompted the assailants to determined efforts
to force the passage. The battle continued until night (September
14th), and resulted in heavy loss on both sides, the brave General
Reno, of the United States army, among others, losing his life.
Darkness put an end to the action, the Federal forces not having
succeeded in passing the Gap; but, learning that a column of the enemy
had crossed below and threatened him with an attack in flank, General
Lee determined to retire in the direction of Sharpsburg, where Jackson
and the forces coöperating with him could join the main body of the
army. This movement was effected without difficulty, and Lee notices
the skill and efficiency of General Fitz Lee in covering the rear with
his cavalry. The Federal army failed to press forward as rapidly as
it is now obvious it should have done. The head of the column did
not appear west of the mountain until eight o'clock in the morning
(September 15th), and, nearly at the same moment ("the attack began at
dawn; in about two hours the garrison surrendered," says General Lee),
Harper's Ferry yielded to Jackson.

Fast-riding couriers brought the welcome intelligence of Jackson's
success to General Lee, as the latter was approaching Sharpsburg,
and official information speedily came that the result had been
the capture of more than eleven thousand men, thirteen thousand
small-arms, and seventy-three cannon. It was probably this large
number of men and amount of military stores falling into the hands of
the Confederates which afterward induced the opinion that Lee's sole
design in invading Maryland had been the reduction of Harper's Ferry.

General McClellan had thus failed, in spite of every effort which he
had made, to relieve Harper's Ferry,[1] and no other course remained
now but to follow Lee and bring him to battle. The Federal army
accordingly moved on the track of its adversary, and, on the afternoon
of the same day (September 15th), found itself in sight of Lee's
forces drawn up on the western side of Antietam Creek, near the
village of Sharpsburg.

[Footnote 1: All along the march he had fired signal-guns to inform
the officer in command at Harper's Ferry of his approach.]

At last the great opponents were in face of each other, and a battle,
it was obvious, could not long be delayed.




IV.

THE PRELUDE TO SHARPSBURG.


General Lee had once more sustained a serious check from the skill and
soldiership of the officer who had conducted the successful retreat of
the Federal army from the Chickahominy to James River.

The defeat and dispersion of the army of General Pope on the last day
of August seemed to have opened Pennsylvania to the Confederates. On
the 15th of September, a fortnight afterward, General McClellan, at
the head of a new army, raised in large measure by the magic of his
name, had pursued the victorious Confederate, checked his further
advance, and, forcing him to abandon his designs of invasion, brought
him to bay a hundred miles from the capital. This was generalship,
it would seem, in the true acceptation of the term, and McClellan,
harassed and hampered by the authorities, who looked but coldly upon
him, could say, with Coriolanus, "Alone I did it."

Lee was thus compelled to give up his movement in the direction of
Pennsylvania, and concentrate his army to receive the assault of
General McClellan. Jackson, marching with his customary promptness,
joined him with a portion of the detached force on the next day
(September 16th), and almost immediately those thunders which prelude
the great struggles of history began.

General Lee had drawn up his army on the high ground west of the
Antietam, a narrow and winding stream which flows, through fields
dotted with homesteads and clumps of fruit and forest trees, to the
Potomac. Longstreet's corps was posted on the right of the road from
Sharpsburg to Boonsboro, his right flank guarded by the waters of the
stream, which here bends westward; on the left of the Boonsboro road
D.H. Hill's command was stationed; two brigades under General Hood
were drawn up on Hill's left; and when Jackson arrived Lee directed
him to post his command on the left of Hood, his right resting on the
Hagerstown road, and his left extending backward obliquely toward the
Potomac, here making a large bend, where Stuart with his cavalry and
horse-artillery occupied the ground to the river's bank.

This arrangement of his troops was extremely judicious, as the sequel
proved. It was probable that General McClellan would direct his main
attack against the Confederate left, with the view of turning that
flank and hemming in the Southern army, or driving it into the river.
By retiring Jackson's left, Lee provided for this contingency, and it
will be seen that the design attributed by him to his adversary was
that determined upon.

General McClellan occupied the ground on the eastern bank of the
Antietam. He had evidently massed his forces opposite the Confederate
left, but a heavy order of battle stood opposite the centre and right
of Lee, where bridges crossed the stream.

The respective numbers of the adversaries can be stated with accuracy.
"Our forces at the battle of Antietam," said General McClellan, when
before the committee of investigation afterward, "were, total in
action, eighty-seven thousand one hundred and sixty-four."

General Lee says in his report: "This great battle was fought by less
than forty thousand men on our side."

Colonel Walter H. Taylor, a gentleman of the highest character, and
formerly adjutant-general of the army, makes the Confederate numbers
somewhat less. In a memorandum before the writer, he says:

Our strength at Sharpsburg. I think this is correct:

  Jackson _(including A.P. Hill_)    10,000

  Longstreet                              12,000

  D.H. Hill and Walker                    7,000
                                          ______
  Effective infantry                      29,000

  Cavalry and artillery                    8,000
                                          ______
  Total of all arms                       37,000

This disproportion was very great, amounting, as it did, to more than
two for one. But this was unavoidable. The Southern army had been worn
out by their long marching and fighting. Portions of the command were
scattered all over the roads of Northern Virginia, wearily dragging
their half-clothed limbs and shoeless feet toward Winchester, whither
they were directed to repair. This was the explanation of the fact
that, in spite of the ardent desire of the whole army to participate
in the great movement northward, Lee had in line of battle at
Sharpsburg "less than forty thousand men."

General McClellan made a demonstration against his adversary on the
evening of the 16th, before the day of the main struggle. He threw his
right, commanded by General Hooker, across the Antietam at a point out
of range of fire from the Confederates, and made a vigorous attack
on Jackson's two divisions lying near the Hagerstown road running
northward, and thus parallel with Lee's line of battle. A brief
engagement took place in the vicinity of the "Dunker Church," in a
fringe of woods west of the road, but it was too late to effect any
thing of importance; night fell, and the engagement ceased. General
Hooker retaining his position on the west side of the stream.

The opposing lines then remained at rest, waiting for the morning
which all now saw would witness the commencement of the more serious
conflict.




V.

THE BATTLE OF SHARPSBURG.


The battle of Sharpsburg, or Antietam, for it is known by both names,
began at early dawn on the 17th of September.

General McClellan had obviously determined to direct his main assault
against the Confederate left, a movement which General Lee had
foreseen and provided for,[1] and at dawn commenced a rapid fire of
artillery upon that portion of the Confederate line. Under cover
of this fire, General Hooker then advanced his infantry and made
a headlong assault upon Jackson's line, with the obvious view of
crushing that wing of Lee's army, or driving it back on Sharpsburg and
the river. The Federal force making this attack, or advancing promptly
to support it, consisted of the corps of Generals Hooker, Mansfield,
and Sumner, and numbered, according to General Sumner, forty thousand
men, of whom eighteen thousand belonged to General Hooker's corps.

[Footnote 1: "In anticipation of a movement to turn the line of
Antietam, Hood's two brigades had been transferred from the right to
the left," etc.--_Lee_.]

Jackson's whole force was four thousand men. Of the truth of this
statement of the respective forces, proof is here given:

"I have always believed," said General Sumner afterward, before the
war committee, "that, instead of sending these troops into that action
in driblets, had General McClellan authorized me to march _there forty
thousand men_ on the left flank of the enemy," etc.

"Hooker formed his corps of _eighteen thousand_ men," etc., says Mr.
Swinton, the able and candid Northern historian of the war.

Jackson's force is shown by the Confederate official reports. His
corps consisted of Ewell's division and "Jackson's old division."
General Jones, commanding the latter, reported: "The division at the
beginning of the fight numbered not over one thousand six hundred
men." Early, commanding Ewell's division,[1] reported the three
brigades to number:

  Lawton's                   1,150

  Hayes's                      550

  Walker's                     700

                             2,400

  "Old Division," as above   1,600

  Jackson's corps            4,000

[Footnote 1: After General Lawton was disabled.]


This was the entire force carried by General Jackson into the fight,
and these four thousand men, as the reader will perceive, bore the
brunt of the first great assault of General McClellan.

Just as the light broadened in the east above the crest of mountains
rising in rear of the Federal lines. General Hooker made his assault.
His aim was plainly to drive the force in his front across the
Hagerstown road and back on the Potomac, and in this he seemed
about to succeed. Jackson had placed in front Ewell's division of
twenty-four hundred men. This force received General Hooker's charge,
and a furious struggle followed, in which the division was nearly
destroyed. A glance at the casualties will show this. They were
remarkable. General Lawton, division commander, was wounded and
carried from the field; Colonel Douglas, brigade commander, was
killed; Colonel Walker, also commanding brigade, was disabled;
Lawton's brigade lost five hundred and fifty-four killed and wounded
out of eleven hundred and fifty, and five out of six regimental
commanders. Hayes's brigade lost three hundred and twenty-three out of
five hundred and fifty, and all the regimental commanders. Walker's
brigade lost two hundred and twenty-eight out of less than seven
hundred, and three out of four regimental commanders; and, of the
staff-officers of the division, scarcely one remained.

In an hour after dawn, this heavy slaughter had been effected in
Ewell's division, and the detailed statement which we have given will
best show the stubborn resistance offered by the Southern troops.
Still, they were unable to hold their ground, and fell back at last
in disorder before General Hooker, who pressed forward to seize the
Hagerstown road and crush the whole Confederate left. He was met,
however, by Jackson's Old Division of sixteen hundred men, who had
been held in reserve; and General Lee hastened to the point threatened
Hood's two small brigades, one of which. General Hood states, numbered
but eight hundred and sixty-four men. With this force Jackson now met
the advancing column of General Hooker, delivering a heavy fire
from the woods upon the Federal forces. In face of this fire they
hesitated, and Hood made a vigorous charge, General Stuart opening at
the same time a cross-fire on the enemy with his horse-artillery. The
combined fire increased their disorganization, and it now turned into
disorder. Jackson seized the moment, as always, throwing forward his
whole line, and the enemy were first checked, and then driven back in
confusion, the Confederates pursuing and cheering.

The first struggle had thus resulted in favor of the
Confederates--with about six thousand they had repulsed eighteen
thousand--and it was obvious to General McClellan that, without
reinforcements, his right could not hold its ground. He accordingly,
just at sunrise, sent General Mansfield's corps to the aid of General
Hooker, and at nine o'clock General Sumner's corps was added, making
in all forty thousand men.

The appearance of affairs at this moment was discouraging to the
Federal commander. His heavy assaulting column had been forced back
with great slaughter; General Hooker had been wounded and borne
from the field; General Mansfield, while forming his line, had been
mortally wounded; and now, at nine o'clock, when the corps of General
Sumner arrived, the prospect was depressing. Of the condition of the
Federal forces, General Sumner's own statement conveys a very distinct
conception: "On going upon the field," said General Sumner, before the
war committee, "I found that General Hooker's corps had been dispersed
and routed. I passed him some distance in the rear, where he had been
carried wounded, but I saw nothing of his corps at all, as I
was advancing with my command on the field. I sent one of my
staff-officers to find where they were, and General Ricketts, the only
officer we could find, stated that he could not raise three hundred
men of the corps." General Mansfield's corps also had been checked,
and now "began to waver and break."

Such had been the result of the great Federal assault, and it was
highly creditable to the Confederate arms. With a comparatively
insignificant force, Jackson had received the attack of the entire
Federal right wing, and had not only repulsed, but nearly broken to
pieces, the large force in his front.

The arrival of General Sumner, however, completely changed the face of
affairs, and, as his fresh troops advanced, those which had been so
roughly handled by Jackson had an opportunity to reform. This was
rapidly effected, and, having marshalled his troops, General Sumner,
an officer of great dash and courage, made a vigorous charge. From
this moment the battle began to rage with new fury. General Lee had
sent to the left the brigades of Colquitt, Ripley, and McRae, and with
these, the troops of Hood, and his own shattered division, Jackson
presented a stubborn front, but his loss was heavy. General Starke,
of the Old Division, was killed; the brigade, regimental, and company
officers fell almost without an exception, and the brigades dwindled
to mere handfuls.

Under the great pressure, Jackson was at length forced back. One of
General Sumner's divisions drove the right of the Confederates beyond
the Hagerstown road, and, at this moment the long struggle seemed
ended; the great wrestle in which the adversaries had so long
staggered to and fro, advancing and retreating in turn, seemed at last
virtually decided in favor of the Federal arms.

This was undoubtedly the turning-point of the battle of Sharpsburg,
and General Lee had witnessed the conflict upon his left with great
anxiety. It was impossible, however, to send thither more troops than
he had already sent. As will be seen in a moment, both his centre
and right were extremely weak. A.P. Hill and General McLaws had not
arrived from Harper's Ferry. Thus the left had been reënforced to the
full extent of Lee's ability, and now that portion of his line seemed
about to be crushed.

Fortunately, however, General McLaws, who had been delayed longer than
was expected by General Lee, at last arrived, and was hurried to the
left. It was ten o'clock, and in that one hour the fighting of an
entire day seemed to have been concentrated. Jackson was holding his
ground with difficulty when the divisions of McLaws and Walker were
sent to him. As soon as they reached the field, they were thrown into
action, and General Lee had the satisfaction of witnessing a new order
of things. The advance--it might rather be called the onward rush--of
the Federal line was checked. Jackson's weary men took fresh heart;
that great commander promptly assumed the offensive, and, advancing
his whole line, drove the enemy before him until he reoccupied the
ground from which General Sumner had forced him to retire.

From the ground thus occupied, the Federal forces were unable to
dislodge him, and the great struggle of "the left at Sharpsburg" was
over. It had begun at dawn and was decided by ten or eleven o'clock,
and the troops on both sides had fought as resolutely as in any other
action of the war. The event had been decided by the pertinacity of
the Southern troops, and by the prompt movement of reënforcements by
General Lee from his right and centre. Posted near his centre, he
had surveyed at one glance the whole field of action; the design of
General McClellan to direct his main assault upon the Confederate left
was promptly penetrated, and the rapid concentration of the Southern
forces in that quarter had, by defeating this movement, decided the
result of the battle.

Attacks on the Confederate centre and right followed that upon the
left. In the centre a great disaster was at one time imminent. Owing
to a mistake of orders, the brave General Rhodes had drawn back his
brigade posted there--this was seen by the enemy--and a sudden
rush was made by them with the view of piercing Lee's centre. The
promptness and courage of a few officers and a small body of troops
defeated this attempt. General D.H. Hill rallied a few hundred men,
and opened fire with a single gun, and Colonel Cooke faced the enemy
with his regiment, "standing boldly in line," says General Lee,
"without a cartridge." The stand made by this small force saved the
army from serious disaster; the Federal line retired, but a last
assault was soon begun, this time against the Confederate right. It
continued in a somewhat desultory manner until four in the evening,
when, having massed a heavy column under General Burnside, opposite
the bridge in front of Lee's right wing, General McClellan forced the
bridge and carried the crest beyond.

The moment was critical, as the Confederate force at this point
was less than three thousand men. But, fortunately, reënforcements
arrived, consisting of A.P. Hill's forces from Harper's Ferry. These
attacked the enemy, drove him from the hill across the Antietam again;
and so threatening did the situation at that moment appear to General
McClellan, that he is said to have sent General Burnside the message:
"Hold your ground! If you cannot, then the bridge, to the last man.
Always the bridge! If the bridge is lost, all is lost!"

The urgency of this order sufficiently indicates that the Federal
commander was not without solicitude for the safety of his own left
wing. Ignorant, doubtless, of the extremely small force which had thus
repulsed General Burnside, in all four thousand five hundred men, he
feared that General Lee would cross the bridge, assail his left, and
that the hard-fought day might end in disaster to his own army. That
General Lee contemplated this movement, in spite of the disproportion
of numbers, is intimated in his official report. "It was nearly dark,"
he says, "and the Federal artillery was massed to defend the bridge,
with General Porter's corps, consisting of fresh troops, behind it.
Under these circumstances," he adds, "it was deemed injudicious to
push our advantage further in the face of fresh troops of the enemy
much exceeding our own."

The idea of an advance against the Federal left was accordingly
abandoned, and a movement of Jackson's command, which Lee directed,
with the view of turning the Federal right, was discontinued from the
same considerations. Night had come, both sides were worn out, neither
of the two great adversaries cared to risk another struggle, and the
bitterly-contested battle of Sharpsburg was over.

The two armies remained facing each other throughout the following
day. During the night of this day, Lee crossed with his army back into
Virginia. He states his reasons for this: "As we could not look for a
material increase of strength," he says, "and the enemy's force could
be largely and rapidly augmented, it was not thought prudent to wait
until he should be ready again to offer battle."

General McClellan does not seem to have been able to renew the
struggle at that time. "The next morning," he says, referring to the
day succeeding the battle, "I found that our loss had been so great,
and there was so much disorganization in some of the commands, that I
did not consider it proper to renew the attack that day."

This decision of General McClellan's subjected him subsequently to
very harsh criticism from the Federal authorities, the theory having
obtained at Washington that he had had it in his power, by renewing
the battle, to cut Lee to pieces. Of the probability of such a
result the reader will form his own judgment. The ground for such a
conclusion seems slight. The loss and disorganization were, it would
seem, even greater on the Federal than on the Confederate side, and
Lee would have probably been better able to sustain an attack than
General McClellan to make it. It will be seen that General Meade
afterward, under circumstances more favorable still, declined to
attack Lee at Williamsport. If one of the two commanders be greatly
censured, the other must be also, and the world will be always apt
to conclude that they knew what could be effected better than the
civilians.

But General McClellan did make an attempt to "crush Lee," such as the
authorities at Washington desired, and its result may possibly throw
light on the point in discussion.

On the night of the 19th, Lee having crossed the Potomac on the night
of the 18th, General McClellan sent a considerable force across the
river near Shepherdstown, which drove off the Confederate artillery
there, and at daylight formed line of battle on the south bank,
protected by their cannon north of the river. Of the brief but bloody
engagement which followed--an incident of the war little dwelt upon in
the histories--General A.P. Hill, who was sent by Lee to repulse the
enemy, gives an animated account. "The Federal artillery, to the
number of seventy pieces," he says, "lined the opposite heights, and
their infantry was strongly posted on the crest of the Virginia hills.
When he advanced with his division, he was met by the most tremendous
fire of artillery he ever saw," but the men continued to move on
without wavering, and the attack resulted in the complete rout of the
enemy, who were "driven pell-mell into the river," the current of
which was "blue with floating bodies." General Hill chronicles this
incident in terms of unwonted eloquence, and declares that, by the
account of the enemy themselves, they lost "three thousand men killed
and drowned from one brigade," which appears to be an exaggeration.
His own loss was, in killed and wounded, two hundred and sixty-one.

This repulse was decisive, and General McClellan made no further
attempt to pursue the adversary, who, standing at bay on the soil of
Virginia, was still more formidable than he had been on the soil of
Maryland. As we have intimated on a preceding page, the result of this
attempt to pursue would seem to relieve General McClellan from the
criticism of the Washington authorities. If he was repulsed with heavy
slaughter in his attempt to strike at Lee on the morning of September
20th, it is not probable that an assault on his adversary on September
18th would have had different results.

No further crossing at that time was undertaken by the Federal
commander. His army was moved toward Harper's Ferry, an important base
for further operations, and Lee's army went into camp along the banks
of the Opequan.




VI.

LEE AND McCLELLAN--THEIR MERITS IN THE MARYLAND CAMPAIGN.


General Lee and his adversary had displayed conspicuous merit in the
campaign thus terminated, and we shall pause for a moment to glance
back upon this great passage at arms.

To give precedence to General McClellan, he had assembled an army,
after the defeat at Manassas, with a promptness for which only his
own great personal popularity can adequately account, had advanced to
check Lee, and had fully succeeded in doing so; and had thus not only
protected the fertile territory of Pennsylvania from invasion, but had
struck a death-blow for the time to any designs General Lee might have
had to advance on the Federal capital. If the situation of affairs at
that moment be attentively considered, the extreme importance of these
results will not fail to appear. It may perhaps be said with justice,
that General McClellan had saved the Federal cause from decisive
defeat. There was no army to protect Washington but the body of troops
under his command; these were largely raw levies, which defeat would
have broken to pieces, and thus the way would have been open for
Lee's march upon Washington or toward Philadelphia--a movement whose
probable result would have been a treaty of peace and the independence
of the Southern Confederacy. All these hopes were reversed by
McClellan's rapid march and prompt attack. In the hours of a single
autumn day, on the banks of the Antietam, the triumphant advance of
the Confederates was checked and defeated. And, if the further fact be
considered that the adversary thus checkmated was Lee, the military
ability of General McClellan must be conceded. It is the fashion, it
would appear, in some quarters, to deny him this quality. History will
decide.

The merit of Lee was equally conspicuous, and his partial failure in
the campaign was due to circumstances over which he had no control.
His plan, as was always the case with him, was deep-laid, and every
contingency had been provided for. He was disappointed in his aim by
three causes which he could not foresee. One was the great diminution
of his force, owing to the rapidity of his march, and the incessant
fighting; another, the failure in obtaining recruits in Maryland; and
a third, the discovery by General McClellan of the "lost dispatch,"
as it is called, which revealed Lee's whole plan to his adversary. In
consequence of the "finding" of the order of march, McClellan advanced
with such rapidity that the laggards of the Southern army on the hills
north of Leesburg had no opportunity of joining the main body. The
gaps in the ranks of the army thus made were not filled up by Maryland
recruits; Lee fell back, and his adversary followed, no longer fearful
of advancing too quickly; Jackson had no time after reducing Harper's
Ferry to rejoin Lee at Hagerstown; thus concentration of his troops,
and a battle somewhere near Sharpsburg, were rendered a necessity with
General Lee.

In this tissue of adverse events, the discovery of the order of march
by General McClellan occupies a very prominent place. This incident
resembles what the French call a fatality. Who was to blame for the
circumstance still remains a mystery; but it may be said with entire
certainty that the brave officer upon whom it was charged was entirely
guiltless of all fault in the matter.

[Footnote: The officer here referred to is General D.H. Hill. General
McClellan said in his testimony afterward, before the congressional
committee: "When at Frederick, we found the original order issued to
D.H. Hill," etc. The inference was thus a natural one that General
Hill was to blame, but that officer has proved clearly that he had
nothing to do with the affair. He received but one copy of the order,
which was handed to him by General Jackson in person, and, knowing its
great importance, he placed it in his pocket-book, and still retains
it in his possession. This fact is conclusive, since General Hill
could not have "lost" what he continues to hold in his hands. This
mystery will be cleared up at some time, probably; at present, but one
thing is certain, that General Hill was in no manner to blame. The
present writer desires to make this statement as explicit as possible,
as, in other accounts of these transactions, he was led by General
McClellan's language to attribute blame to General Hill where he
deserved none.]

Whatever may have been the secret history of the "lost dispatch,"
however, it certainly fell into General McClellan's hands, and largely
directed the subsequent movements of the opposing armies.

From what is here written, it will be seen that Lee was not justly
chargeable with the result of the Maryland campaign. He had provided
for every thing as far as lay in his power. Had he not been
disappointed in events to be fairly anticipated, it seemed his force
would have received large accessions, his rear would have closed up,
and the advance into Pennsylvania would have taken place. Instead
of this, he was forced to retire and fight a pitched battle at
Sharpsburg; and this action certainly exhibited on Lee's part military
ability of the highest order. The force opposed to him had been at
least double that of his own army, and the Federal troops had fought
with a gallantry unsurpassed in any other engagement of the war. That
their assault on Lee failed, was due to the fighting qualities of his
troops and his own generalship. His army had been manoeuvred with a
rapidity and precision which must have excited even the admiration of
the distinguished soldier opposed to him. He had promptly concentrated
his forces opposite every threatened point in turn, and if he had not
been able to carry out the axiom of Napoleon, that a commander should
always be superior to the enemy at the point of contact, he had at
least done all that was possible to effect that end, and had so far
succeeded as to have repulsed if not routed his adversary. This is
the main feature to be noticed in Lee's handling of his troops at
Sharpsburg. An unwary or inactive commander would have there suffered
decisive defeat, for the Confederate left wing numbered, throughout
the early part of the battle, scarcely more than four thousand men,
while the column directed against it amounted first to eighteen
thousand, and in all to forty thousand men. To meet the impact of
this heavy mass, not only desperate fighting, but rapid and skilful
manoeuvring, was necessary. The record we have presented will enable
the reader to form his own opinion whether Lee was equal to this
emergency involving the fate of his army.

Military critics, examining this great battle with fair and candid
eyes, will not fail, we think, to discern the truth. That the Southern
army, of less than forty thousand men, repulsed more than eighty
thousand in the battle of Sharpsburg, was due to the hard fighting of
the smaller force, and the skill with which its commander manoeuvred
it.




VII.

LEE AND HIS MEN.


General Lee and his army passed the brilliant days of autumn in the
beautiful valley of the Shenandoah. This region is famous for its
salubrity and the beauty of its scenery. The mountain winds are pure
and invigorating, and the forests, which in the season of autumn
assume all the colors of the rainbow, inspire the mind with the most
agreeable sensations. The region, in fact, is known as the "Garden of
Virginia," and the benign influence of their surroundings was soon
seen on the faces of the troops.

A Northern writer, who saw them at Sharpsburg, describes them as
"ragged, hungry, and in all ways miserable;" but their forlorn
condition, as to clothing and supplies of every description, made no
perceptible difference in their demeanor now. In their camps along
the banks of the picturesque little stream called the Opequan, which,
rising south of Winchester, wanders through beautiful fields and
forests to empty into the Potomac, the troops laughed, jested, sang
rude camp-ballads, and exhibited a joyous indifference to their
privations and hardships, which said much for their courage and
endurance. Those who carefully considered the appearance and demeanor
of the men at that time, saw that much could be effected with such
tough material, and had another opportunity to witness, under
circumstances calculated to test it, the careless indifference, to the
past as well as the future, peculiar alike to soldiers and children.
These men, who had passed through a campaign of hard marches and
nearly incessant battles, seemed to have forgotten all their troubles
and sufferings. The immense strain upon their energies had left them
apparently as fresh and efficient as when the campaign begun. There
was no want of rebound; rather an excessive elasticity and readiness
to undertake new movements. They had plainly acquired confidence in
themselves, rightly regarding the event of the battle of Sharpsburg,
where they were so largely outnumbered, as highly honorable to them,
and they had acquired still greater confidence in the officers who
commanded them.

We shall hereafter speak more particularly of the sentiment of the
troops toward General Lee at this period of his connection with the
army. The great events of the war continually modified the relations
between him and his men; as they came to know him better and better,
he steadily rose in their admiration and regard. At this time--the
autumn of 1862--it may be said that the troops had already begun to
love their leader, and had bestowed upon him as an army commander
their implicit confidence.

Without this confidence on the part of his men, a general can effect
little; with it, he may accomplish almost any thing. The common
soldier is a child, and feels that the directing authority is above
him; that he should look upon that authority with respect and
confidence is the first necessity of effecting military organization.
Lee had already inspired the troops with this sentiment, and it was
mainly the secret of his often astounding successes afterward. The
men universally felt that their commander was equal to any and every
emergency. Such a repute cannot be usurped. Troops measure their
leaders with instinctive acumen, and a very astonishing accuracy. They
form their opinions for themselves on the merits of the question; and
Lee had already impressed the army with a profound admiration for his
soldiership. From this to the sentiment of personal affection the
transition was easy; and the kindness, consideration, and simplicity
of the man, made all love him. Throughout the campaign, Lee had not
been heard to utter one harsh word; a patient forbearance and kindness
had been constantly exhibited in all his dealings with officers and
men; he was always in front, indifferent plainly to personal
danger, and the men looked now with admiring eyes and a feeling of
ever-increasing affection on the erect, soldierly figure in the plain
uniform, with scarce any indication of rank, and the calm face,
with its expression of grave dignity and composure, which remained
unchanged equally on the march and in battle. It may be said that,
when he assumed command of the army before Richmond, the troops
had taken him on trust; now they had come to love him, and when he
appeared the camps buzzed, the men ran to the road, called out to each
other: "There goes Mas' Robert!" or "Old Uncle Robert!" and cheers
followed him as he rode by.

The country generally seemed to share the opinion of the army. There
was exhibited, even at this early period of the war, by the people at
large, a very great admiration and affection for General Lee. While
in the Shenandoah Valley, where Jackson was beloved almost beyond
expression, Lee had evidences of the position which he occupied in the
eyes of the people, which must have been extremely gratifying to him.
Gray-haired men came to his camp and uttered prayers for his health
and happiness as the great leader of the South; aged ladies greeted
him with faltering expressions full of deep feeling and pathetic
earnestness; and, wherever he went, young girls and children received
him with their brightest smiles. The august fame of the great soldier,
who has now passed away, no doubt renders these memories of personal
interviews with him dear to many. Even the most trifling incidents are
cherished and kept fresh by repetition; and the writer of these
pages recalls at the moment one of these trifles, which may possibly
interest some readers. There stood and still stands an ancient and
hospitable homestead on the south bank of the Opequan, the hearts
of whose inmates, one and all, were ardently with the South in her
struggle. Soon after Sharpsburg, General Lee one day visited the old
manor-house crowning the grassy hill and overshadowed by great oaks;
Generals Jackson, Longstreet, and Stuart, accompanied him, and the
reception which he met with, though we cannot describe it, was such as
would have satisfied the most exacting. The children came to him and
held out their small hands, the ladies divided their attention between
him and the beloved "hero of the Valley," Jackson; and the lady of the
manor could only express her sense of the great honor of receiving
such company, by declaring, with a smile, that the dinner resembled
the famous _breakfast at Tillietudlem_ in Scott's "Old Mortality."
General Lee highly enjoyed this, and seemed disposed to laugh when
the curious fact was pointed out to him that he had seated himself at
table in a chair with an open-winged _United States eagle_ delineated
upon its back. The result of this visit, it appeared afterward, was a
sentiment of great regard and affection for the general personally by
all at the old country-house. Old and young were charmed by his grave
sweetness and mild courtesy, and doubtless he inspired the same
sentiment in other places.

His headquarters were at this time in a field some miles from
Winchester. An Englishman, who visited him there, described the
general and his surroundings with accuracy, and, from the account
printed in _Blackwood's Magazine_, we quote the following sentences:

"In visiting the headquarters of the Confederate generals, but
particularly those of General Lee, any one accustomed to see European
armies in the field cannot fail to be struck with the great absence
of all the 'pomp and circumstance of war' in and around their
encampments. Lee's headquarters consisted of about seven or eight
pole-tents, pitched with their backs to a stake fence, upon a piece
of ground so rocky that it was unpleasant to ride over it, its only
recommendation being a little stream of good water which flowed
close by the general's tent. In front of the tents were some three
four-wheeled wagons, drawn up without any regularity, and a number
of horses roamed loose about the field. The servants, who were, of
course, slaves, and the mounted soldiers, called 'couriers,' who
always accompany each general of division in the field, were
unprovided with tents, and slept in or under the wagons. Wagons,
tents, and some of the horses, were marked 'U.S.,' showing that
part of that huge debt in the North has gone to furnishing even the
Confederate generals with camp equipments. No guard or sentries were
to be seen in the vicinity; no crowd of aides-de-camp loitering about,
making themselves agreeable to visitors, and endeavoring to save their
generals from receiving those who had no particular business. A large
farm-house stands close by, which, in any other army, would have been
the general's residence _pro tem_., but, as no liberties are allowed
to be taken with personal property in Lee's army, he is particular in
setting a good example himself. His staff are crowded together, two or
three in a tent; none are allowed to carry more baggage than a small
box each, and his own kit is but very little larger. Every one who
approaches him does so with marked respect, although there is none
of that bowing and flourishing of forage caps which occurs in the
presence of European generals; and, while all honor him, and place
implicit faith in his courage and ability, those with whom he is most
intimate feel for him the affection of sons to a father. Old General
Scott was correct in saying that, when Lee joined the Southern cause,
it was worth as much as the accession of twenty thousand men to the
'rebels.' Since then every injury that it was possible to inflict, the
Northerners have heaped upon him. Notwithstanding all these personal
losses, however, when speaking of the Yankees, he neither evinced
any bitterness of feeling, nor gave utterance to a single violent
expression, but alluded to many of his former friends and companions
among them in the kindest terms. He spoke as a man proud of the
victories won by his country, and confident of ultimate success, under
the blessing of the Almighty, whom he glorified for past successes,
and whose aid he invoked for all future operations."

The writer adds that the troops "regarded him in the light of
infallible love," and had "a fixed and unshakable faith in all he
did--a calm confidence of victory when serving under him." The
peculiarly interesting part of this foreign testimony, however, is
that in which the writer speaks of General Lee's religious sentiment,
of his gratitude for past mercies, and prayers for the assistance of
the Almighty in the hours of conflict still to come. This point we
shall return to, endeavoring to give it that prominence which it
deserves. At present we shall leave the subject of General Lee, in
his private and personal character, and proceed to narrate the last
campaign of the year 1862.




VIII.

LEE PASSES THE BLUE RIDGE


From the central frontier of his headquarters, near Winchester, the
key of the lower Valley, General Lee was able to watch at once the
line of the Potomac in his front, beyond which lay General McClellan's
army, and the gaps of the Blue Ridge on his right, through which it
was possible for the enemy, by a rapid movement, to advance and attack
his flank and rear.

If Lee had at any time the design of recrossing into Maryland, he
abandoned it. General McClellan attributed that design to him. "I have
since been confirmed in the belief," he wrote, "that if I had crossed
the Potomac below Harper's Ferry in the early part of October, General
Lee would have recrossed into Maryland." Of Lee's ability to thus
reënter Maryland there can be no doubt. His army was rested,
provisioned, and in high spirits; the "stragglers" had rejoined their
commands, and it is certain that the order for a new advance would
have been hailed by the mercurial troops with enthusiasm. No such
order was, however, issued, and soon the approach of winter rendered
the movement impossible.

More than a month thus passed, the two armies remaining in face of
each other. No engagement of any importance occurred during this
period of inactivity, but once or twice the Federal commander sent
heavy reconnoitring forces across the Potomac; and Stuart, now
mounting to the zenith of his reputation as a cavalry-officer,
repeated his famous "ride around McClellan," on the Chickahominy.

The object of General Lee in directing this movement of the cavalry
was the ordinary one, on such occasions, of obtaining information and
inflicting injury upon the enemy. Stuart responded with ardor to the
order. He had conceived a warm affection for General Lee, mingled with
a respect for his military genius nearly unbounded, and at this time,
as always afterward, received the orders of his commander for active
operations with enthusiasm. With about eighteen hundred troopers
and four pieces of horse-artillery, Stuart crossed the Potomac above
Williamsport, marched rapidly to Chambersburg, in Pennsylvania, where
he destroyed the machine-shops, and other buildings containing a large
number of arms and military stores; and continued his way thence
toward Frederick City, with the bold design of completely passing
around the Federal army, and recrossing the river east of the Blue
Ridge. In this he succeeded, thanks to his skill and audacity, in
spite of every effort of the enemy to cut off and destroy him.
Reaching White's Ford, on the Potomac, north of Leesburg, he disposed
his horse-artillery so as to cover this movement, cut his way through
the Federal cavalry disputing his passage, and recrossed into Virginia
with a large number of captured horses, and without losing a man.

This expedition excited astonishment, and a prominent officer of
the Federal army declared that he would not have believed that
"horse-flesh could stand it," as the distance passed over in about
forty-eight hours, during which considerable delay had occurred at
Chambersburg, was nearly or quite one hundred miles. General McClellan
complained that his orders had not been obeyed, and said that after
these orders he "did not think it possible for Stuart to recross," and
believed "the destruction or capture of his entire force perfectly
certain."

Soon afterward the Federal commander attempted reconnoissances in
his turn. A considerable force of infantry, supported by artillery,
crossed the Potomac and advanced to the vicinity of the little village
of Leetown, but on the same evening fell back rapidly, doubtless
fearful that Lee would interpose a force between them and the river
and cut off their retreat. This was followed by a movement of the
Federal cavalry, which crossed at the same spot and advanced up the
road leading toward Martinsburg. These were met and subsequently
driven back by Colonel W.H.F. Lee, son of the general. A third and
more important attempt to reconnoitre took place toward the end of
October. General McClellan then crossed a considerable body of troops
both at Shepherdstown and Harper's Ferry; the columns advanced to
Kearneysville and Charlestown respectively, and near the former
village a brief engagement took place, without results. General
McClellan, who had come in person as far as Charlestown, then returned
with his troops across the Potomac, and further hostilities for the
moment ceased.

These reconnoissances were the prelude, however, of an important
movement which the Federal authorities had been long urging General
McClellan to make. Although the battle of Sharpsburg had been
indecisive in one acceptation of the term, in another it had been
entirely decisive. A drawn battle of the clearest sort, it yet decided
the future movements of the opposing armies. General Lee had invaded
Maryland with the design of advancing into Pennsylvania--the result of
Sharpsburg was, that he fell back into Virginia. General McClellan
had marched from Washington with no object but an offensive-defensive
campaign to afford the capital protection; he was now enabled to
undertake anew the invasion of Virginia.

To the success of such a movement the Federal commander seems rightly
to have considered a full and complete equipment of his troops
absolutely essential. He was directed at once, after Sharpsburg, to
advance upon Lee. He replied that it was impossible, neither his men
nor his horses had shoes or rations. New orders came--General Halleck
appearing to regard the difficulties urged by General McClellan as
imaginary. New protests followed, and then new protests and new orders
again, until finally a peremptory dispatch came. This dispatch was,
"Cross the Potomac and give battle to the enemy or drive him south,"
an order bearing the impress of the terse good sense and rough
directness of the Federal President. This order it was necessary in
the end to obey, and General McClellan, having decided in favor of
a movement across the Potomac east instead of west of the mountain,
proceeded, in the last days of October, to cross his army. His plan
was excellent, and is here set forth in his own words:

"The plan of campaign I adopted during this advance," he says, "was
to move the army well in hand, parallel to the Blue Ridge, taking
Warrenton as the point of direction for the main army, seizing each
pass on the Blue Ridge by detachments as we approached it, and
guarding them after we had passed, as long as they would enable the
enemy to trouble our communications with the Potomac.... We depended
upon Harper's Ferry and Berlin for supplies until the Manassas Gap
Railway was reached. When that occurred, the passes in our rear were
to be abandoned, and the army massed ready for action or movement in
any direction. It was my intention, if, upon reaching Ashby's or any
other pass, the enemy were in force between it and the Potomac, in the
Valley of the Shenandoah, to move into the Valley and endeavor to gain
their rear."

From this statement of General McClellan it will be seen that his plan
was judicious, and displayed a thorough knowledge of the country in
which he was about to operate. The conformation of the region is
peculiar. The Valley of the Shenandoah, in which Lee's army lay
waiting, is separated from "Piedmont Virginia," through which General
McClellan was about to advance, by the wooded ramparts of the Blue
Ridge Mountains, passable only at certain points. These _gaps_, as
they are called in Virginia, are the natural doorways to the Valley;
and as long as General McClellan held them, as he proposed to do,
by strong detachments, he would be able both to protect his own
communications with the Potomac, and, if he thought fit to do so,
enter the Valley and assail the Confederate rear. That he ever
seriously contemplated the latter design is, however, extremely
doubtful. It is not credible that he would have undertaken to "cut
off" Lee's whole army; and, if he designed a movement of that
description against any portion of the Southern army which might be
detached, the opportunity was certainly presented to him by Lee, when
Jackson was left, as will be seen, at Millwood.

No sooner had General McClellan commenced crossing the Potomac, east
of the mountain, than General Lee broke up his camp along the Opequan,
and moved to check this new and formidable advance into the heart of
Virginia. It was not known, however, whether the whole of the Federal
forces had crossed east of the Blue Ridge; and, to guard against a
possible movement on his rear from the direction of Harper's Ferry,
as well as on his flank through the gaps of the mountain, Lee sent
Jackson's corps to take position on the road from Charlestown to
Berryville, where he could oppose an advance of the enemy from either
direction. The rest of the army then moved guardedly, but rapidly,
across the mountain into Culpepper.

Under these circumstances, General McClellan had an excellent
opportunity to strike a heavy blow at Jackson, who seemed to invite
that movement by crossing soon afterward, in accordance with
directions from Lee, one of his divisions to the east side of the
mountain on the Federal rear. That General McClellan did not strike
is not creditable to him as a commander. The Confederate army was
certainly divided in a very tempting manner. Longstreet was in
Culpepper on the 3d of November, the day after General McClellan's
rear-guard had passed the Potomac, and nothing would seem to have been
easier than to cut the Confederate forces by interposing between them.
By seizing the Blue Ridge gaps, and thus shutting up all the avenues
of exit from the Valley, General McClellan would have had it in his
power, it would seem, to crush Jackson; or if that wily commander
escaped, Longstreet in Culpepper was exposed to attack. General
McClellan did not embrace this opportunity of a decisive blow, and Lee
seems to have calculated upon the caution of his adversary. Jackson's
presence in the Valley only embarrassed McClellan, as Lee no doubt
intended it should. No attempt was made to strike at him. On the
contrary, the Federal army continued steadily to concentrate upon
Warrenton, where, on the 7th of November, General McClellan was
abruptly relieved of the command.

He was in his tent, at Rectortown, at the moment when the dispatch was
handed to him--brought by an officer from Washington through a heavy
snow-storm then falling. General Ambrose E. Burnside was in the tent.
McClellan read the dispatch calmly, and, handing it indifferently to
his visitor, said, "Well, Burnside, you are to command the army."

Such was the abrupt termination of the military career of a commander
who fills a large space in the history of the war in Virginia. The
design of this volume is not such as to justify an extended notice of
him, or a detailed examination of his abilities as a soldier. That he
possessed military endowments of a very high order is conceded by most
persons, but his critics add that he was dangerously prone to caution
and inactivity. Such was the criticism of his enemies at Washington
and throughout the North, and his pronounced political opinions had
gained him a large number. It may, however, be permitted one who can
have no reason to unduly commend him, to say that the retreat to
James River, and the arrest of Lee in his march of invasion toward
Pennsylvania, seem to indicate the possession of something more than
"inactivity," and of that species of "caution" which achieves success.
It will probably, however, be claimed by few, even among the
personal friends of this general, that he was a soldier of the first
ability--one competent to oppose Lee.

As to the personal qualities of General McClellan, there seems to be
no difference of opinion. He was a gentleman of high breeding, and
detested all oppression of the weak and non-combatants. Somewhat prone
to _hauteur_, in presence of the importunities of the Executive and
other civilians unskilled in military affairs, he was patient, mild,
and cordial with his men. These qualities, with others which he
possessed, seem to have rendered him peculiarly acceptable to the
private soldier, and it is certain that he was, beyond comparison, the
most popular of all the generals who, one after another, commanded the
"Army of the Potomac."




IX.

LEE CONCENTRATES AT FREDERICKSBURG.


In returning from the Valley, General Lee had exhibited that
combination of boldness and caution which indicates in a commander the
possession of excellent generalship.

One of two courses was necessary: either to make a rapid march with
his entire army, in order to interpose himself between General
McClellan and what seemed to be his objective point, Gordonsville; or,
to so manoeuvre his forces as to retard and embarrass his adversary.
Of these, Lee chose the latter course, exposing himself to what seemed
very great danger. Jackson was left in the Valley, and Longstreet sent
to Culpepper; under these circumstances, General McClellan might have
cut off one of the two detached bodies; but Lee seems to have read
the character of his adversary accurately, and to have felt that a
movement of such boldness would not probably be undertaken by him.
Provision had nevertheless been made for this possible contingency.
Jackson was directed by Lee, in case of an attack by General
McClellan, to retire, by way of Strasburg, up the Valley, and so
rejoin the main body. That this movement would become necessary,
however, was not, as we have said, contemplated. It was not supposed
by Lee that his adversary would adopt the bold plan of crossing the
Blue Ridge to assail Jackson; thus, to leave that commander in
the Valley, instead of being a military blunder, was a stroke of
generalship, a source of embarrassment to General McClellan, and a
standing threat against the Federal communications, calculated to clog
the movements of their army. That Lee aimed at this is obvious from
his order to Jackson to cross a division to the eastern side of the
Blue Ridge, in General McClellan's rear. When this was done, the
Federal commander abandoned, if he had ever resolved upon, the design
of striking in between the Confederate detachments, as is claimed
by his admirers to have been his determination; gave up all idea of
"moving into the Valley and endeavoring to gain their rear;" and from
that moment directed his whole attention to the concentration of his
army near Warrenton, with the obvious view of establishing a new
base, and operating southward on the line of the Orange and Alexandria
Railroad.

Lee's object in these manoeuvres, besides the general one of
embarrassing his adversary, seems to have been to gain time, and thus
to render impossible, from the lateness of the season, a Federal
advance upon Richmond. Had General McClellan remained in command, it
is probable that this object would have been attained, and the battle
of Fredericksburg would not have taken place. The two armies would
have lain opposite each other in Culpepper and Fauquier respectively,
with the Upper Rappahannock between them throughout the winter; and
the Confederate forces, weary and worn by the long marches and hard
combats of 1862, would have had the opportunity to rest and recover
their energies for the coming spring.

The change of commanders defeated these views, if they were
entertained by General Lee. On assuming command, General Burnside
conceived the project, in spite of the near approach of winter, of
crossing the Rappahannock at Fredericksburg, and marching on Richmond.
This he now proceeded to attempt, by steadily moving from Warrenton
toward the Lower Rappahannock, and the result, as will be seen, was a
Federal disaster to wind up this "year of battles."

We have spoken with some particularity of the character and military
abilities of General McClellan, the first able commander of the
Federal forces in Virginia. Of General Burnside, who appears but
once, and for a brief space only, on that great theatre, it will be
necessary to say only a few words. A modest and honorable soldier,
cherishing for General McClellan a cordial friendship, he was
unwilling to supersede that commander, both from personal regard and
distrust of his own abilities. He had not sought the position, which
had rather been thrust upon him. He was "surprised" and "shocked," he
said, at his assignment to the command; he "did not want it, it had
been offered to him twice before, and he did not feel that he could
take it; he had told them that he was not competent to command such
an army as this; he had said the same over and over again to the
President and the Secretary of War." He was, however, directed to
assume command, accepted the responsibility, and proceeded to
carry out the unexpected plan of advancing upon Richmond by way of
Fredericksburg.

To cover this movement, General Burnside made a heavy feint as though
designing to cross into Culpepper. This does not seem to have deceived
Lee, who, on the 17th of November, knew that his adversary was moving.
No sooner had the fact been discovered that General Burnside was
making for Fredericksburg, than the Confederate commander, by a
corresponding movement, passed the Rapidan and hastened in the same
direction. As early as the 17th, two divisions of infantry, with
cavalry and artillery, were in motion. On the morning of the 19th,
Longstreet's corps was sent in the same direction; and when, on
November 20th, General Burnside arrived with his army, the Federal
forces drawn up on the hills north of Fredericksburg saw, on the
highlands south of the city, the red flags and gray lines of their old
adversaries.

As General Jackson had been promptly directed to join the main body,
and was already moving to do so, Lee would soon be able to oppose
General Burnside with his whole force.

Such were the movements of the opposing armies which brought them face
to face at Fredericksburg. Lee had acted promptly, and, it would seem,
with good judgment; but the question has been asked, why he did not
repeat against General Burnside the strategic movement which
had embarrassed General McClellan, and arrest the march upon
Fredericksburg by threatening, with the detachment under Jackson,
the Federal rear. The reasons for not adopting this course will be
perceived by a glance at the map. General Burnside was taking up a
new base--Aquia Creek on the Potomac--and, from the character of the
country, it was wholly impossible for Lee to prevent him from doing
so. He had only to fall back before Jackson, or any force moving
against his flank or rear; the Potomac was at hand, and it was not
in the power of Lee to further annoy him. The latter accordingly
abandoned all thought of repeating his old manoeuvre, moved Longstreet
and the other troops in Culpepper toward Fredericksburg, and,
directing Jackson to join him there, thus concentrated his forces
directly in the Federal front with the view of fighting a pitched
battle, army against army.

This detailed account of Lee's movements may appear tedious to some
readers, but it was rather in grand tactics than in fighting battles
that he displayed his highest abilities as a soldier. He uniformly
adopted the broadest and most judicious plan to bring on battle, and
personally directed, as far as was possible, every detail of his
movements. When the hour came, it may be said of him that he felt he
had done his best--the actual fighting was left largely in the hands
of his corps commanders.

The feints and slight encounters preceding the battle of
Fredericksburg are not of much interest or importance. General
Burnside sent a force to Port Royal, about twenty-five miles below the
city, but Lee promptly detached a portion of his army to meet it, if
it attempted to cross, and that project was abandoned. No attempt was
made by General Burnside to cross above, and it became obvious that he
must pass the river in face of Lee or not at all.

Such was the condition of affairs at Fredericksburg in the first days
of December.




X.

THE BATTLE OF FREDERICKSBURG.


To a correct understanding of the interesting battle of
Fredericksburg, a brief description of the ground is essential.

The city lies on the south bank of the Rappahannock, which here makes
a considerable bend nearly southward; and along the northern bank,
opposite, extends a range of hills which command the city and the
level ground around it. South of the river the land is low, but from
the depth of the channel forms a line of bluffs, affording good
shelter to troops after crossing to assail a force beyond. The only
good position for such a force, standing on the defensive, is a range
of hills hemming in the level ground. This range begins near the
western suburbs of the city, where it is called "Marye's Hill," and
sweeps round to the southward, gradually receding from the stream,
until, at Hamilton's Crossing, on the Richmond and Potomac Railroad, a
mile or more from the river, it suddenly subsides into the plain. This
plain extends to the right, and is bounded by the deep and difficult
channel of Massaponnax Creek. As Marye's Hill is the natural position
for the left of an army posted to defend Fredericksburg, the crest
above Hamilton's Crossing is the natural position for the right
of such a line, care being taken to cover the extreme right with
artillery, to obstruct the passage of the ground between the crest and
the Massaponnax.

[Illustration: Map--Battle of Fredericksburg.]

Behind the hills on the north side General Burnside's army was posted,
having the railroad to Aquia Creek for the transportation of their
supplies. On the range of hills which we have described south of the
city, General Lee was stationed, the same railroad connecting him with
Richmond. Longstreet's corps composed his left wing, and extended
from Marye's Hill to about the middle of the range of hills. There
Jackson's line began, forming the right wing, and extending to the
termination of the range at Hamilton's Crossing. On Jackson's right,
to guard the plain reaching to the Massaponnax, Stuart was posted with
cavalry and artillery.

The numbers of the adversaries at Fredericksburg can be stated with
accuracy upon one side, but not upon the other. General Lee's force
may be said to have been, in round numbers, about fifty thousand of
all arms. It could scarcely have exceeded that, unless he received
heavy reënforcements after Sharpsburg; and the present writer
has never heard or read that he received reënforcements of any
description. The number, fifty thousand, thus seems to have been the
full amount of the army. That of General Burnside's forces seems to
have been considerably larger. The Federal army consisted of the
First, Second, Third, Fifth, Sixth, Ninth, and Eleventh Corps; the
latter a corps of reserve and large. If these had been recruited to
the full number reported by General McClellan at Sharpsburg, and the
additional troops (Fifth and Eleventh Corps) be estimated, the Federal
army must have exceeded one hundred thousand men. This estimate is
borne out by Federal authorities. "General Franklin," says a Northern
writer, "had now with him about one-half the whole army;" and General
Meade says that Franklin's force "amounted to from fifty-five thousand
to sixty thousand men," which would seem to indicate that the whole
army numbered from one hundred and ten thousand to one hundred and
twenty thousand men.

A strong position was obviously essential to render it possible for
the Southern army, of about fifty thousand men, to successfully oppose
the advance of this force of above one hundred thousand. Lee had found
this position, and constructed earthworks for artillery, with the view
of receiving the attack of the enemy after their crossing. He was
unable to obstruct this crossing in any material degree; and he states
clearly the grounds of this inability. "The plain of Fredericksburg,"
he says, "is so completely commanded by the Stafford heights, that no
effectual opposition could be made to the construction of bridges,
or the passage of the river, without exposing our troops to the
destructive fire of the numerous batteries of the enemy.... Our
position was, therefore, selected with a view to resist the enemy's
advance after crossing, and the river was guarded only by a
force sufficient to impede his movements until the army could be
concentrated."

The brief description we have presented of the character of the ground
around Fredericksburg, and the position of the adversaries, will
sufficiently indicate the conditions under which the battle was
fought. Both armies seem to have been in excellent spirits. That of
General Burnside had made a successful march, during which they had
scarcely seen an enemy, and now looked forward, probably, to certain
if not easy victory. General Lee's army, in like manner, had undergone
recently no peculiar hardships in marching or fighting; and, to
whatever cause the fact may be attributed, was in a condition of the
highest efficiency. The men seemed to be confident of the result of
the coming conflict, and, in their bivouacs on the line of battle, in
the woods fringing the ridge which they occupied, laughed, jested,
cheered, on the slightest provocation, and, instead of shrinking from,
looked forward with eagerness to, the moment when General Burnside
would advance to attack them. This buoyant and elastic spirit in the
Southern troops was observable on the eve of nearly every battle of
the war. Whether it was due to the peculiar characteristics of the
race, or to other causes, we shall not pause here to inquire; but the
fact was plain to the most casual observation, and was never more
striking than just before Fredericksburg, unless just preceding the
battle of Gettysburg.

Nothing of any importance occurred, from the 20th of November, when
General Burnside's army was concentrated on the heights north of
Fredericksburg, until the 11th of December, when the Federal army
began crossing the Rappahannock to deliver battle. Lee's reasons for
not attempting to resist the passage of the river have been given
above. The plain on which it would have been necessary to draw up
his army, in order to do so, was too much exposed to the numerous
artillery of the enemy on the northern bank. Lee resolved, therefore,
not to oppose the crossing of the Federal troops, but to await their
assault on the commanding ground west and south of the city.

On the morning of December 11th, before dawn, the dull boom of Lee's
signal-guns indicated that the enemy were moving, and the Southern
troops formed line of battle to meet the coming attack. General
Burnside had made arrangements to cross the river on pontoon bridges,
one opposite the city, and another a mile or two lower down the
stream. General Franklin, commanding the two corps of the left Grand
Division, succeeded, without trouble, in laying the lower bridge, as
the ground did not permit Lee to offer material obstruction; and this
large portion of the army was now ready to cross. The passage of the
stream at Fredericksburg was more difficult. Although determined not
to make a serious effort to prevent the enemy from crossing, General
Lee had placed two regiments of Barksdale's Mississippians along the
bank of the river, in the city, to act as sharp-shooters, and impede
the construction of the pontoon bridges, with the view, doubtless, of
thus giving time to marshal his troops. The success of this device
was considerable. The workmen, busily engaged in laying the Federal
pontoons, were so much interrupted by the fire of the Confederate
marksmen--who directed their aim through the heavy fog by the noise
made in putting together the boats--that, after losing a number of
men, the Federal commander discontinued his attempt. It was renewed
again and again, without success, as before, when, provoked apparently
by the presence of this hornet's nest, which reversed all his plans,
General Burnside, about ten o'clock, opened a furious fire of
artillery upon the city. The extent of this bombardment will be
understood from the statement that one hundred and forty-seven pieces
of artillery were employed, which fired seven thousand three hundred
and fifty rounds of ammunition, in one instance piercing a single
small house with fifty round-shot. An eye-witness of this scene says:
"The enemy had planted more than a hundred pieces of artillery on the
hills to the northern and eastern sides of the town, and, from an
early hour in the forenoon, swept the streets with round-shot, shell,
and case-shot, firing frequently a hundred guns a minute. The quick
puffs of smoke, touched in the centre with tongues of flame, ran
incessantly along the lines of their batteries on the slopes, and,
as the smoke slowly drifted away, the bellowing roar came up in one
continuous roll. The town was soon fired, and a dense cloud of smoke
enveloped its roofs and steeples. The white church-spires still rose
serenely aloft, defying shot or shell, though a portion of one of them
was torn off. The smoke was succeeded by lurid flame, and the crimson
mass brought to mind the pictures of Moscow burning." The same writer
says: "Men, women, and children, were driven from the town, and
hundreds of ladies and children were seen wandering, homeless, and
without shelter, over the frozen highway, in thin clothing, knowing
not where to find a place of refuge."

[Illustration: FREDERICKSBURG]

General Lee watched this painful spectacle from a redoubt to the right
of the telegraph road, not far from his centre, where a shoulder
jutting out from the ridge, and now called "Lee's Hill," afforded
him a clear view of the city. The destruction of the place, and the
suffering of the inhabitants, aroused in him a deep melancholy,
mingled with exasperation, and his comment on the scene was probably
as bitter as any speech which he uttered during the whole war.
Standing, wrapped in his cape, with only a few officers near, he
looked fixedly at the flames rising from the city, and, after
remaining for a long time silent, said, in his grave, deep voice:
"These people delight to destroy the weak, and those who can make no
defence; it just suits them."

General Burnside continued the bombardment for some hours, the
Mississippians still holding the river-bank and preventing the laying
of the pontoons, which was again begun and again discontinued. At
about four in the afternoon, however, a force was sent across in
barges, and by nightfall the city was evacuated by Lee, and General
Burnside proceeded rapidly to lay his pontoon bridge, upon which his
army then began to pass over. The crossing continued throughout the
next day, not materially obstructed by the fire of Lee's artillery,
as a dense fog rendered the aim of the cannoneers unreliable. By
nightfall (of the 12th) the Federal army was over, with the exception
of General Hooker's Centre Grand Division, which was held in reserve
on the north bank. General Burnside then proceeded to form his line of
battle. It stretched from the western suburbs of Fredericksburg down
the river, along what is called the River road, for a distance of
about four miles, and consisted of the Right Grand Division, under
General Sumner, at the city, and the Left Grand Division, under
General Franklin, lower down, and opposite Lee's right. General
Franklin's Grand Division numbered, according to General Meade, from
fifty-five to sixty thousand men; the numbers of Generals Sumner and
Hooker are not known to the present writer, but are said by Federal
authorities, as we have stated, to have amounted together to about the
same.

At daybreak, on the morning of December 13th, a muffled sound, issuing
from the dense fog covering the low ground, indicated that the Federal
lines were preparing to advance.

To enable the reader to understand General Burnside's plan of attack,
it is necessary that brief extracts should be presented from his
orders on the occasion, and from his subsequent testimony before the
committee on the conduct of the war. Despite the length of time since
his arrival at Fredericksburg--a period of more than three weeks--the
Federal commander had, it appears, been unable to obtain full and
accurate information of the character of the ground occupied by Lee,
and thus moved very much in the dark. He seems to have formed his plan
of attack in consequence of information from "a colored man." His
words are: "The enemy had cut a road along in the rear of the line of
heights where we made our attack.... I obtained, from a colored man
at the other side of the town, information in regard to this new road
which proved to be correct. I wanted to obtain possession of that
new road, and that was my reason for making an attack on the extreme
left." It is difficult for those familiar with the ground referred to,
to understand how this "new road," a mere country bridle-path, as it
were, extending along in the rear of Lee's right wing, could have been
regarded as a topographical feature of any importance. The road,
which remains unchanged, and may be seen by any one to-day, was
insignificant in a military point of view, and, in attaching such
importance to seizing it, the Federal commander committed a grave
error.

What seems to have been really judicious in his plan, was the turning
movement determined on against Lee's right, along the old Richmond
road, running from the direction of the river past the end of the
ridge occupied by the Confederates, and so southward. To break through
at this point was the only hope of success, and General Burnside had
accordingly resolved, he declared, upon "a rapid movement down the old
Richmond road" with Franklin's large command. Unfortunately, however,
this wise design was complicated with another, most unwise, to send
forward _a division_, first, to seize the crest of the ridge near the
point where it sinks into the plain. On this crest were posted the
veterans of Jackson, commanded in person by that skilful soldier.
Three lines of infantry, supported by artillery, were ready to receive
the Federal attack, and, to force back this stubborn obstacle, General
Burnside sent a division. The proof is found in his order to General
Franklin at about six o'clock on the morning of the battle: "Send
out a division at least ... to seize, if possible, the heights near
Captain Hamilton's," which was the ground whereon Jackson's right
rested.

An attack on the formidable position known as Marye's Hill, on Lee's
left, west of Fredericksburg, was also directed to be made by the same
small force. The order to General Sumner was to "form a column of
_a division_, for the purpose of pushing in the direction of the
Telegraph and Plank roads, for the purpose of seizing the heights in
the rear of the town;" or, according to another version, "up the Plank
road to its intersection with the Telegraph road, where they will
divide, with the object of seizing the heights on both sides of those
roads."

The point of "intersection" here referred to was the locality of what
has been called "that sombre, fatal, terrible stone wall," just under
Marye's Hill, where the most fearful slaughter of the Federal forces
took place. Marye's Hill is a strong position, and its importance was
well understood by Lee. Longstreet's infantry was in heavy line of
battle behind it, and the crest bristled with artillery. There was
still less hope here of effecting any thing with "a division" than on
the Confederate right held by Jackson.

General Burnside seems, however, to have regarded success as probable.
He added in his order: "Holding these heights, with the heights near
Captain Hamilton's, will, I hope, compel the enemy to evacuate the
whole ridge between these points." In his testimony afterward, he said
that, in the event of failure in these assaults on Lee's flanks, he
"proposed to make a direct attack on their front, and drive them out
of their works."

These extracts from General Burnside's orders and testimony clearly
indicate his plan, which was to assail both Lee's right and left, and,
in the event of failure, direct a heavy blow at his centre. That the
whole plan completely failed was mainly due, it would seem, to the
inconsiderable numbers of the assaulting columns.

We return now to the narrative of the battle which these comments have
interrupted.

General Lee was ready to receive the Federal attack, and, at an early
hour of the morning, rode from his headquarters, in rear of his
centre, along his line of battle toward the right, where he probably
expected the main assault of the enemy to take place. He was clad in
his plain, well-worn gray uniform, with felt hat, cavalry-boots, and
short cape, without sword, and almost without any indications of his
rank. In these outward details, he differed much from Generals Jackson
and Stuart, who rode with him. The latter, as was usual with him, wore
a fully-decorated uniform, sash, black plume, sabre, and handsome
gauntlets. General Jackson, also, on this day, chanced to have
exchanged his dingy old coat and sun-scorched cadet-cap for a new
coat[1] covered with dazzling buttons, and a cap brilliant with a
broad band of gold lace, in which (for him) extraordinary disguise his
men scarcely knew him.

[Footnote 1: This coat was a present from Stuart.]

As Lee and his companions passed along in front of the line of battle,
the troops cheered them. It was evident that the army was in excellent
spirits, and ready for the hard work which the day would bring. Lee
proceeded down the old Richmond, or stage road--that mentioned in
General Burnside's order as the one over which his large flanking
column was to move--and rode on with Stuart until he was near the
River road, running toward Fredericksburg, parallel to the Federal
line of battle. Here he stopped, and endeavored to make out, through
the dense fog covering the plain, whether the Federal forces were
moving. A stifled hum issued from the mist, but nothing could be seen.
It seemed, however, that the enemy's skirmishers--probably concealed
in the ditches along the River road--had sharper eyes, as bullets
began to whistle around the two generals, and soon a number of black
specks were seen moving forward. General Lee remained for some time
longer, in spite of the exposure, conversing with great calmness and
gravity with Stuart, who was all ardor. He then rode back slowly,
passed along his line of battle, greeted wherever he was seen with
cheers, and took his position on the eminence in his centre, near the
Telegraph road, the same commanding point from which he had witnessed
the bombardment of Fredericksburg.

The battle did not commence until ten o'clock, owing to the dense fog,
through which the light of the sun could scarcely pierce. At that hour
the mist lifted and rolled away, and the Confederates posted on the
ridge saw a heavy column of infantry advancing to attack their right,
near the Hamilton House. This force was Meade's division, supported
by Gibbon's, with a third in reserve, General Franklin having put in
action as many troops as his orders ("a division at least") permitted.
General Meade was arrested for some time by a minute but most annoying
obstacle. Stuart had placed a single piece of artillery, under Major
John Pelham, near the point where the old Richmond and River roads
meet--that is, directly on the flank of the advancing column--and this
gun now opened a rapid and determined fire upon General Meade. Major
Pelham--almost a boy in years--continued to hold his exposed position
with great gallantry, although the enemy opened fire upon him with
several batteries, killing a number of his gunners. General Lee
witnessed this duel from the hill on which he had taken his stand, and
is said to have exclaimed, "It is glorious to see such courage in one
so young!" [Footnote: General Lee's opinion of Major Pelham appears
from his report, in which he styles the young officer "the gallant
Pelham," and says: "Four batteries immediately turned upon him, but
he sustained their heavy fire with the unflinching courage that ever
distinguished him." Pelham fell at Kelly's Ford in March, 1863.]

Pelham continued the cannonade for about two hours, only retiring when
he received a peremptory order from Jackson to do so; and it would
seem that this one gun caused a considerable delay in the attack.
"Meade advanced across the plain, but had not proceeded far," says Mr.
Swinton, "before he was compelled to stop and silence a battery that
Stuart had posted on the Port Royal road." Having brushed away this
annoying obstacle, General Meade, with a force which he states to have
amounted to ten thousand men, advanced rapidly to attack the hill upon
which the Confederates awaited him. He was suffered to approach within
a few hundred yards, when Jackson's artillery, under Colonel Walker,
posted near the end of the ridge, opened a sudden and furious fire,
which threw the Federal line into temporary confusion. The troops soon
rallied, however, and advanced again to the attack, which fell on
Jackson's front line under A.P. Hill. The struggle which now ensued
was fierce and bloody, but, a gap having been left between the
brigades of Archer and Lane, the enemy pierced the opening, turning
the left of one brigade and the right of the other, pressed on,
attacked Gregg's brigade of Hill's reserve, threw it into confusion,
and seemed about to carry the crest. Gregg's brigade was quickly
rallied, however, by its brave commander, who soon afterward fell,
mortally wounded; the further progress of the enemy was checked, and,
Jackson's second line rapidly advancing, the enemy were met and forced
back, step by step, until they were driven down the slope again. Here
they were attacked by the brigades of Hoke and Atkinson, and driven
beyond the railroad, the Confederates cheering and following them into
the plain. The repulse had been complete, and the slope and ground
in front of it were strewed with Federal dead. They had returned as
rapidly as they had charged, pursued by shot and shell, and General
Lee, witnessing the spectacle from his hill, murmured, in his grave
and measured voice: "It is well this is so terrible! we should grow
too fond of it!"

The assault on the Confederate right had thus ended in disaster, but
almost immediately another attack took place, whose results were more
bloody and terrible still. As General Meade fell back, pursued by the
men of Jackson, the sudden roar of artillery from the Confederate left
indicated that a heavy conflict had begun in that quarter. The Federal
troops were charging Marye's Hill, which was to prove the Cemetery
Hill of Fredericksburg. This frightful charge--for no other adjective
can describe it--was made by General French's division, supported by
General Hancock. The Federal troops rushed forward over the broken
ground in the suburbs of the city, and, "as soon as the masses became
dense enough,"[1] were received with a concentrated artillery fire
from the hill in front of them. This fire was so destructive that it
"made gaps that could be seen at the distance of a mile." The charging
division had advanced in column of brigades, and the front was nearly
destroyed. The troops continued to move forward, however, and had
nearly reached the base of the hill, when the brigades of Cobb and
Cooke, posted behind a stone wall running parallel with the Telegraph
road, met them with a sudden fire of musketry, which drove them back
in terrible disorder. Nearly half the force was killed or lay disabled
on the field, and upon the survivors, now in full retreat, was
directed a concentrated artillery-fire from, the hill.

[Footnote 1: Longstreet.]

In face of this discharge of cannon, General Hancock's force,
supporting French, now gallantly advanced in its turn. The charge
lasted about fifteen minutes, and in that time General Hancock lost
more than two thousand of the five thousand men of his command. The
repulse was still more bloody and decisive than the first. The second
column fell back in disorder, leaving the ground covered with their
dead.

General Burnside had hitherto remained at the "Phillips House," a mile
or more from the Rappahannock. He now mounted his horse, and, riding
down to the river, dismounted, walked up and down in great agitation,
and exclaimed, looking at Marye's Hill: "That crest must be carried
to-night."[1]

[Footnote 1: The authority for this incident is Mr. William Swinton,
who was present.]

In spite of the murderous results of the first charges, the Federal
commander determined on a third. General Hooker's reserve was ordered
to make it, and, although that officer protested against it, General
Burnside was immovable, and repeated his order. General Hooker
sullenly obeyed, and opened with artillery upon the stone wall at the
foot of the hill, in order to make a breach in it. This fire continued
until nearly sunset, when Humphrey's division was formed for the
charge. The men were ordered to throw aside their knapsacks, and not
to load their guns, "for there was no time there to load and fire,"
says General Hooker. The word was given about sunset, and the division
charged headlong over the ground already covered with dead. A few
words will convey the result. Of four thousand men who charged,
seventeen hundred and sixty were left dead or wounded on the field.
The rest retreated, pursued by the fire of the batteries and infantry;
and night fell on the battle-field.

This charge was the real termination of the bloody battle of
Fredericksburg, but, on the Confederate right, Jackson had planned and
begun to execute a decisive advance on the force in his front. This he
designed to undertake "precisely at sunset," and his intention was
to depend on the bayonet, his military judgment or instinct having
satisfied him that the _morale_ of the Federal army was destroyed. The
advance was discontinued, however, in consequence of the lateness of
the hour and the sudden artillery-fire which saluted him as he began
to move. A striking feature of this intended advance is the fact that
Jackson had placed his artillery _in front_ of his line of battle,
intending to attack in that manner.

As darkness settled down, the last guns of Stuart, who had defended
the Confederate right flank with about thirty pieces of artillery,
were heard far in advance, and apparently advancing still. The Federal
lines had fallen back, wellnigh to the banks of the river, and there
seems little room to doubt that the _morale_ of the men was seriously
impaired. "From what I knew of our want of success upon the right,"
says General Franklin, when interrogated on this point, "and the
demoralized condition of the troops upon the right and centre, as
represented to me by their commanders, I confess I believe the order
to recross was a very proper one."

General Burnside refused to give the order; and, nearly overwhelmed,
apparently, by the fatal result of the attack, determined to form the
ninth corps in column of regiments, and lead it in person against
Marye's Hill, on the next morning. Such a design, in a soldier of
ability, indicates desperation. To charge Marye's Hill with a corps in
column of regiments, was to devote the force to destruction. It was
nearly certain that the whole command would be torn to pieces by the
Southern artillery, but General Burnside seems to have regarded the
possession of the hill as worth any amount of blood; and, in face of
the urgent appeals of his officers, gave orders for the movement. At
the last moment, however, he yielded to the entreaties of General
Sumner, and abandoned his bloody design.

Still it seemed that the Federal commander was unable to come to the
mortifying resolution of recrossing the Rappahannock. The battle
was fought on the 13th of December, and until the night of the 15th
General Burnside continued to face Lee on the south bank of the
river--his bands playing, his flags flying, and nothing indicating an
intention of retiring. To that resolve he had however come, and on the
night of the 15th, in the midst of storm and darkness, the Federal
army recrossed to the north bank of the Rappahannock.




XI FINAL MOVEMENTS OF 1862


The battle of Fredericksburg was another defeat of the Federal
programme of invasion, as decisive, and in one sense as disastrous, as
the second battle of Manassas. General Burnside had not lost as many
men as General Pope, and had not retreated in confusion, pursued by a
victorious enemy; but, brief as the conflict had been--two or three
hours summing up all the real fighting--its desperate character, and
the evident hopelessness of any attempt to storm Lee's position,
profoundly discouraged and demoralized the Northern troops. We have
quoted the statement of General Franklin, commanding the whole left
wing, that from "the demoralized condition of the troops upon the
right and centre, as represented to him by their commanders, he
believed the order to recross was a very proper one." Nor is there
any ground to suppose that the feeling of the left wing was greatly
better. That wing of the army had not suffered as heavily as the
right, which had recoiled with such frightful slaughter from Marye's
Hill; but the repulse of General Meade in their own front had been
equally decisive, and the non-success of the right must have reacted
on the left, discouraging that also. Northern writers, in a position
to ascertain the condition of the troops, fully bear out this view:
"That the _morale_ of the Army of the Potomac became seriously
impaired after the disaster at Fredericksburg," says Mr. Swinton, the
able and candid historian of the campaign, "was only too manifest.
Indeed, it would be impossible to imagine a graver or gloomier, a more
sombre or unmusical body of men than the Army of the Potomac a month
after the battle. And, as the days went by, despondency, discontent,
and all evil inspirations, with their natural consequent, desertion,
seemed to increase rather than to diminish, until, for the first time,
the Army of the Potomac could be said to be really demoralized."
General Sumner noticed that a spirit of "croaking" had become diffused
throughout the forces. For an army to display that tendency clearly
indicates that the troops have lost the most important element of
victory--confidence in themselves and their leader. And for this
sentiment there was valid reason. Columns wholly inadequate in numbers
had been advanced against the formidable Confederate positions,
positions so strong and well defended that it is doubtful if thrice
the force could have made any impression upon them, and the result
was such as might have been expected. The men lost confidence in the
military capacity of their commander, and in their own powers. After
the double repulse at Marye's Hill and in front of Jackson, the
troops, looking at the ground strewed with dead and wounded, were
in no condition to go forward hopefully to another struggle which
promised to be equally bloody.

The Southern army was naturally in a condition strongly in contrast
with that of their adversary. They had repulsed the determined assault
of the Federal columns with comparative ease on both flanks. Jackson's
first line, although pierced and driven back, soon rallied, and
checked the enemy until the second line came up, when General Meade
was driven back, the third line not having moved from its position
along the road near the Hamilton House. On the left, Longstreet had
repulsed the Federal charge with his artillery and two small brigades.
The loss of the Confederates in both these encounters was much
less than that of their adversaries[1], a natural result of the
circumstances; and thus, instead of sharing the depression of their
opponents, the Southern troops were elated, and looked forward to
a renewal of the battle with confidence in themselves and in their
leader.

[Footnote 1: "Our loss during the operation, since the movements
of the enemy began, amounts to about eighteen hundred killed and
wounded."--_Lee's Report_. Federal authorities state the Northern loss
at a little over twelve thousand; the larger part, no doubt, in the
attack on Marye's Hill.]

It is not necessary to offer much comment upon the manner in which
General Burnside had attacked. He is said, by his critics, not to
have, at the time, designed the turning movement against General Lee's
right, upon which point the present writer is unable to decide. That
movement would seem to have presented the sole and only chance of
success for the Federal arms, as the successful advance of General
Franklin's fifty-five or sixty thousand men up the old Richmond road
would have compelled Lee to retire his whole right wing, to protect it
from an assault in flank and reverse. What dispositions he would have
made under these circumstances must be left to conjecture; but, it is
certain that the blow would have proved a serious one, calling for the
display of all his military ability. In the event, however, that this
was the main great aim of General Burnside, his method of carrying out
his design insured, it would seem, its failure. Ten thousand men only
were to clear the way for the flanking movement, in order to effect
which object it was necessary to crush Jackson. So that it may be said
that the success of the plan involved the repulse of one-half Lee's
army with ten thousand men.

The assault on Marye's Hill was an equally fatal military mistake.
That the position could not be stormed, is proved by the result of the
actual attempt. It is doubtful if, in any battle ever fought by any
troops, men displayed greater gallantry. They rushed headlong, not
only once, but thrice, into the focus of a frightful front and cross
fire of artillery and small-arms, losing nearly half their numbers in
a few minutes; the ground was littered with their dead, and yet the
foremost had only been able to approach within sixty yards of the
terrible stone wall in advance of the hill. There they fell, throwing
up their hands to indicate that they saw at last that the attempt to
carry the hill was hopeless.

These comments seem justified by the circumstances, and are made with
no intention of casting obloquy upon the commander who, displaying
little ability, gave evidences of unfaltering courage. He had urged
his inability to handle so large an army, but the authorities had
forced the command upon him; he had accepted it and done his best,
and, like a brave soldier, determined to lead the final charge in
person, dying, if necessary, at the head of his men.

General Lee has not escaped criticism any more than General Burnside.
The Southern people were naturally dissatisfied with the result--the
safe retreat of the Federal army--and asked why they had not been
attacked and captured or destroyed. The London _Times_, at that
period, and a military critic recently, in the same journal, declared
that Lee had it in his power to crush General Burnside, "horse, foot,
and dragoons," and, from his failure to do so, argued his want of
great generalship. A full discussion of the question is left by the
present writer to those better skilled than himself in military
science. It is proper, however, to insert here General Lee's own
explanation of his action:

"The attack on the 13th," he says, "had been so easily repulsed, and
by so small a part of our army, that it was not supposed the enemy
would limit his efforts to one attempt, which, in view of the
magnitude of his preparations, and the extent of his force, seemed to
be comparatively insignificant. Believing, therefore, that he would
attack us, it was not deemed expedient to lose the advantages of
our position and expose the troops to the fire of his inaccessible
batteries beyond the river, by advancing against him. But we were
necessarily ignorant of the extent to which he had suffered, and only
became aware of it when, on the morning of the 16th, it was discovered
that he had availed himself of the darkness of night, and the
prevalence of a violent storm of wind and rain, to recross the river."

This statement was no doubt framed by General Lee to meet the
criticisms which the result of the battle occasioned. In conversing
with General Stuart on the subject, he added that he felt too great
responsibility for the preservation of his troops to unnecessarily
hazard them. "No one knows," he said, "how _brittle_ an army is."

The word may appear strange, applied to the Army of Northern Virginia,
which had certainly vindicated its claim, under many arduous trials,
to the virtues of toughness and endurance. But Lee's meaning was
plain, and his view seems to have been founded on good sense. The
enemy had in all, probably, two hundred pieces of artillery, a large
portion of which were posted on the high ground north of the river.
Had Lee descended from his ridge and advanced into the plain to
attack, this large number of guns would have greeted him with a rapid
and destructive fire, which must have inflicted upon him a loss as
nearly heavy as he had inflicted upon General Burnside at Marye's
Hill. From such a result he naturally shrunk. It has been seen that
the Federal troops, brave as they were, had been demoralized by such
a fire; and Lee was unwilling to expose his own troops to similar
slaughter.

There is little question, it seems, that an advance of the description
mentioned would have resulted in a conclusive victory, and the
probable surrender of the whole or a large portion of the Federal
army. Whether the probability of such a result was sufficient to
compensate for the certain slaughter, the reader will decide for
himself. General Lee did not think so, and did not order the advance.
He preferred awaiting, in his strong position, the second assault
which General Burnside would probably make; and, while he thus waited,
the enemy secretly recrossed the river, rendering an attack upon them
by Lee impossible.

General Burnside made a second movement to cross the
Rappahannock--this time at Banks's Ford, above Fredericksburg--in the
inclement month of January; but, as he might have anticipated, the
condition of the roads was such that it was impossible to advance. His
artillery, with the horses dragging the pieces, sank into the almost
bottomless mud, where they stuck fast--even the foot-soldiers found it
difficult to march through the quagmire--and the whole movement was
speedily abandoned.

When General Burnside issued the order for this injudicious advance,
two of his general officers met, and one asked:

"What do you think of it?"

"It don't seem to have the _ring_" was the reply.

"No--the bell is broken," the other added.

This incident, which is given on the authority of a Northern writer,
probably conveys a correct idea of the feeling of both the
officers and men of General Burnside's army. The disastrous day of
Fredericksburg had seriously injured the troops.

"The Army of the Potomac," the writer adds, "was sadly fractured, and
its tones had no longer the clear, inspiring ring of victory."




XII.

THE YEAR OF BATTLES.


The stormy year 1862 had terminated, thus, in a great Confederate
success. In its arduous campaigns, following each other in rapid
succession, General Lee had directed the movements of the main great
army, and the result of the year's fighting was to gain him that high
military reputation which his subsequent movements only consolidated
and increased.

A rapid glance at the events of the year in their general outlines
will indicate the merit due the Southern commander. The Federal plan
of invasion in the spring had been extremely formidable. Virginia was
to be pierced by no less than four armies--from the northwest, the
Shenandoah Valley, the Potomac, and the Peninsula--the whole force to
converge upon Richmond, the "heart of the rebellion." Of these, the
army of General McClellan was the largest and most threatening. It
advanced, with little opposition, until it reached the Chickahominy,
crossed, and lay in sight of Richmond. The great force of one hundred
and fifty thousand men was about to make the decisive assault, when
Lee attacked it, and the battle which ensued drove the Federal army
to a point thirty miles from the city, with such loss as to render
hopeless any further attempt to assail the capital.

Such was the first act of the drama; the rest speedily followed. A new
army was raised promptly by the Federal authorities, and a formidable
advance was made against Richmond again, this time from the direction
of Alexandria. Lee was watching General McClellan when intelligence of
the new movement reached him. Remaining, with a portion of his troops,
near Richmond, he sent Jackson to the Rapidan. The battle of Cedar
Mountain resulted in the repulse of General Pope's vanguard; and,
discovering at last that the real danger lay in the direction of
Culpepper, Lee moved thither, drove back General Pope, flanked him,
and, in the severe battle of Manassas, routed his army, which was
forced to retire upon Washington.

Two armies had thus been driven from the soil of Virginia, and the
Confederate commander had moved into Maryland, in order to draw the
enemy thither, and, if practicable, transfer the war to the heart of
Pennsylvania. Unforeseen circumstances had defeated the latter of
these objects. The concentration on Sharpsburg was rendered necessary;
an obstinately-fought battle ensued there; and, not defeated, but
forced to abandon further movements toward Pennsylvania, Lee had
retired into Virginia, where he remained facing his adversary. This
was the first failure of Lee up to that point in the campaigns of the
year; and an attentive consideration of the circumstances will show
that the result was not fairly attributable to any error which he
had committed. Events beyond his control had shaped his action, and
directed all his movements; and it will remain a question whether the
extrication of his small force from its difficult position did not
better prove Lee's generalship than the victory at Manassas.

The subsequent operations of the opposing armies indicated clearly
that the Southern forces were still in excellent fighting condition;
and the movements of Lee, during the advance of General McClellan
toward Warrenton, were highly honorable to his military ability.
With a force much smaller than that of his adversary, he greatly
embarrassed and impeded the Federal advance; confronted them on the
Upper Rappahannock, completely checking their forward movement in that
direction; and, when they moved rapidly to Fredericksburg, crossed the
Rapidan promptly, reappearing in their front on the range of hills
opposite that city. The battle which followed compensated for the
failure of the Maryland campaign and the drawn battle of Sharpsburg.
General Burnside had attacked, and sustained decisive defeat. The
stormy year, so filled with great events and arduous encounters, had
thus wound up with a pitched battle, in which the enemy suffered a
bloody repulse; and the best commentary on the decisive character of
this last struggle of the year, was the fault found with General Lee
for not destroying his adversary.

In less than six months Lee had thus fought four great pitched
battles--all victories to his arms, with the exception of Sharpsburg,
which was neither a victory nor a defeat. The result was thus highly
encouraging to the South; and, had the Army of Northern Virginia had
its ranks filled up, as the ranks of the Northern armies were, the
events of the year 1862 would have laid the foundation of assured
success. An inquiry into the causes of failure in this particular is
not necessary to the subject of the volume before the reader. It is
only necessary to state the fact that the Army of Northern Virginia,
defending what all conceded to be the territory on which the decisive
struggle must take place, was never sufficiently numerous to follow up
the victories achieved by it. At the battles of the Chickahominy the
army numbered at most about seventy-five thousand; at the second
Manassas, about fifty thousand; at Sharpsburg, less than forty
thousand; and at Fredericksburg, about fifty thousand. In the
following year, it will be seen that these latter numbers were at
first but little exceeded, and, as the months passed on, that they
dwindled more and more, until, in April, 1865, the whole force in line
of battle at Petersburg was scarcely more than thirty thousand men.

Such had been the number of the troops under command of Lee in 1862.
The reader has been informed of the number of the Federal force
opposed to him. This was one hundred and fifty thousand on the
Chickahominy, of whom one hundred and fifteen thousand were effective;
about one hundred thousand, it would seem, under General Pope, at the
second battle of Manassas; eighty-seven thousand actually engaged at
the battle of Sharpsburg; and at Fredericksburg from one hundred and
ten to one hundred and twenty thousand.

These numbers are stated on the authority of Federal officers or
historians, and Lee's force on the authority of his own reports, or of
gentlemen of high character, in a situation to speak with accuracy.
Of the truth of the statements the writer of these pages can have no
doubt; and, if the fighting powers of the Northern and Southern troops
be estimated as equal, the fair conclusion must be arrived at that Lee
surpassed his adversaries in generalship.

The result, at least, of the year's fighting, had been extremely
encouraging to the South, and after the battle of Fredericksburg no
attempts were made to prosecute hostilities during the remainder
of the year. The scheme of crossing above Fredericksburg proved a
_fiasco_, beginning and ending in a day. Thereafter all movements
ceased, and the two armies awaited the return of spring for further
operations.




XIII.

LEE IN DECEMBER, 1862.


Before passing to the great campaigns of the spring and summer of
1863, we propose to say a few words of General Lee, in his private and
personal character, and to attempt to indicate the position which
he occupied at this time in the eyes of the army and the country.
Unknown, save by reputation, when he assumed command of the forces in
June, 1862, he had now, by the winter of the same year, become one of
the best-known personages in the South. Neither the troops nor the
people had perhaps penetrated the full character of Lee; and they seem
to have attributed to him more reserve and less warmth and impulse
than he possessed; but it was impossible for a human being, occupying
so prominent a station before the general eye, to hide, in any
material degree, his main great characteristics, and these had
conciliated for Lee an exalted and wellnigh universal public regard.
He was felt by all to be an individual of great dignity, sincerity,
and earnestness, in the performance of duty. Destitute plainly of that
vulgar ambition which seeks personal aggrandizement rather than the
general good, and dedicated as plainly, heart and soul, to the cause
for which he fought, he had won, even from those who had denounced
him for the supposed hesitation in his course in April, 1861, and had
afterward criticised his military operations, the repute of a truly
great man, as well as of a commander of the first ability. It was felt
by all classes that the dignity of the Southern cause was adequately
represented in the person and character of the commander of her most
important army. While others, as brave and patriotic, no doubt, but of
different temperament, had permitted themselves to become violent and
embittered in their private and public utterances in reference to the
North, Lee had remained calm, moderate, and dignified, under every
provocation. His reports were without rhodomontade or exaggeration,
and his tone uniformly modest, composed, and uninflated. After his
most decisive successes, his pulse had remained calm; he had written
of those successes with the air of one who sees no especial merit in
any thing which he has performed; and, so marked was this tone of
moderation and dignity, that, in reading his official reports to-day,
it seems wellnigh impossible that they could have been written in the
hot atmosphere of a war which aroused the bitterest passions of the
human soul.

Upon this point of Lee's personal and official dignity it is
unnecessary to dwell further, as the quality has long since been
conceded by every one acquainted with the character of the individual,
in the Old World and the New. It is the trait, perhaps, the most
prominent to the observer, looking back now upon the individual; and
it was, doubtless, this august moderation, dignity, and apparent
exemption from natural infirmity, which produced the impression upon
many persons that Lee was cold and unimpressible. We shall speak, in
future, at greater length of his real character than is necessary in
this place; but it may here be said, that the fancy that he was cold
and unimpressible was a very great error. No man had stronger or
warmer feelings, or regarded the invasion of the South with greater
indignation, than himself. The sole difference was, that he had
his feelings under greater control, and permitted no temptation to
overcome his sense of that august dignity and composure becoming
in the chief leader of a great people struggling for independent
government.

The sentiment of the Southern people toward Lee may be summed up in
the statement that they regarded him, in his personal and private
character, with an admiration which was becoming unbounded, and
reposed in him, as commander of the army, the most implicit
confidence.

These expressions are strong, but they do not convey more than the
truth. And this confidence was never withdrawn from him. It remained
as strong in his hours of disaster as in his noontide of success.
A few soured or desponding people might lose heart, indulge in
"croaking," and denounce, under their breath, the commander of
the army as responsible for failure when it occurred; but these
fainthearted people were in a small minority, and had little
encouragement in their muttered criticisms. The Southern people, from
Virginia to the utmost limits of the Gulf States, resolutely persisted
in regarding Lee as one of the greatest soldiers of history, and
retained their confidence in him unimpaired to the end.

The army had set the example of this implicit reliance upon Lee as
the chief leader and military head of the Confederacy. The brave
fighting-men had not taken his reputation on trust, but had seen him
win it fairly on some of the hardest-contested fields of history. The
heavy blow at General McClellan on the Chickahominy had first shown
the troops that they were under command of a thorough soldier. The
rout of Pope at Manassas had followed in the ensuing month. At
Sharpsburg, with less than forty thousand men, Lee had repulsed the
attack of nearly ninety thousand; and at Fredericksburg General
Burnside's great force had been driven back with inconsiderable loss
to the Southern army. These successes, in the eyes of the troops,
were the proofs of true leadership, and it did not detract from Lee's
popularity that, on all occasions, he had carefully refrained from
unnecessary exposure of the troops, especially at Fredericksburg,
where an ambitious commander would have spared no amount of bloodshed
to complete his glory by a great victory. Such was Lee's repute as
army commander in the eyes of men accustomed to close scrutiny of
their leaders. He was regarded as a thorough soldier, at once brave,
wise, cool, resolute, and devoted, heart and soul, to the cause.

Personally, the commander-in-chief was also, by this time, extremely
popular. He did not mingle with the troops to any great extent, nor
often relax the air of dignity, somewhat tinged with reserve, which
was natural with him. This reserve, however, never amounted to
stiffness or "official" coolness. On the contrary, Lee was markedly
free from the chill demeanor of the martinet, and had become greatly
endeared to the men by the unmistakable evidences which he had given
them of his honesty, sincerity, and kindly feeling for them. It
cannot, indeed, be said that he sustained the same relation toward the
troops as General Jackson. For the latter illustrious soldier, the men
had a species of familiar affection, the result, in a great degree, of
the informal and often eccentric demeanor of the individual. There
was little or nothing in Jackson to indicate that he was an officer
holding important command. He was without reserve, and exhibited none
of that formal courtesy which characterized Lee. His manners, on the
contrary, were quite informal, familiar, and conciliated in return a
familiar regard. We repeat the word _familiar_ as conveying precisely
the idea intended to be expressed. It indicated the difference between
these two great soldiers in their outward appearance. Lee retained
about him, upon all occasions, more or less of the commander-in-chief,
passing before the troops on an excellent and well-groomed horse, his
figure erect and graceful in the saddle, for he was one of the best
riders in the army; his demeanor grave and thoughtful; his whole
bearing that of a man intrusted with great responsibilities and the
general care of the whole army. Jackson's personal appearance and air
were very different. His dress was generally dingy: a faded cadet-cap
tilted over his eyes, causing him to raise his chin into the air; his
stirrups were apt to be too short, and his knees were thus elevated
ungracefully, and he would amble along on his rawboned horse with a
singularly absent-minded expression of countenance, raising, from time
to time, his right hand and slapping his knee. This brief outline of
the two commanders will serve to show the difference between them
personally, and it must be added that Jackson's eccentric bearing was
the source, in some degree, of his popularity. The men admired him
immensely for his great military ability, and his odd ways procured
for him that familiar liking to which we have alluded.

It is not intended, however, in these observations to convey the idea
that General Lee was regarded as a stiff and unapproachable personage
of whom the private soldiers stood in awe. Such a statement would not
express the truth. Lee was perfectly approachable, and no instance is
upon record, or ever came to the knowledge of the present writer, in
which he repelled the approach of his men, or received the humblest of
them with any thing but kindness. He was naturally simple and kind,
with great gentleness and patience; and it will not be credible,
to any who knew the man, that he ever made any difference in his
treatment of those who approached him from a consideration of their
rank in the army. His theory, expressed upon many occasions, was, that
the private soldiers--men who fought without the stimulus of rank,
emolument, or individual renown--were the most meritorious class of
the army, and that they deserved and should receive the utmost respect
and consideration. This statement, however, is doubtless unnecessary.
Men of Lee's pride and dignity never make a difference in their
treatment of men, because one is humble, and the other of high rank.
Of such human beings it may be said that _noblesse oblige_.

The men of the army had thus found their commander all that they could
wish, and his increasing personal popularity was shown by the greater
frequency with which they now spoke of him as "Marse Robert," "Old
Uncle Robert," and by other familiar titles. This tendency in troops
is always an indication of personal regard; these nicknames had been
already showered upon Jackson, and General Lee was having his turn.
The troops regarded him now more as their fellow-soldier than
formerly, having found that his dignity was not coldness, and that he
would, under no temptation, indulge his personal convenience, or fare
better than themselves. It was said--we know not with what truth--that
the habit of Northern generals in the war was to look assiduously to
their individual comfort in selecting their quarters, and to take
pleasure in surrounding themselves with glittering staff-officers,
body-guards, and other indications of their rank, and the
consideration which they expected. In these particulars Lee differed
extremely from his opponents, and there were no evidences whatever,
at his headquarters, that he was the commander-in-chief, or even an
officer of high rank. He uniformly lived in a tent, in spite of
the urgent invitations of citizens to use their houses for his
headquarters; and this refusal was the result both of an indisposition
to expose these gentlemen to annoyance from the enemy when he himself
retired, and of a rooted objection to fare better than his troops.
They had tents only, often indeed were without even that much
covering, and it was repugnant to Lee's feelings to sleep under a good
roof when the troops were so much exposed. His headquarters tent,
at this time (December, 1862), as before and afterward, was what is
called a "house-tent," not differing in any particular from those used
by the private soldiers of the army in winter-quarters. It was pitched
in an opening in the wood near the narrow road leading to Hamilton's
Crossing, with the tents of the officers of the staff grouped near;
and, with the exception of an orderly, who always waited to summon
couriers to carry dispatches, there was nothing in the shape of a
body-guard visible, or any indication that the unpretending group of
tents was the army headquarters.

Within, no article of luxury was to be seen. A few plain and
indispensable objects were all which the tent contained. The covering
of the commander-in-chief was an ordinary army blanket, and his fare
was plainer, perhaps, than that of the majority of his officers and
men. This was the result of an utter indifference, in Lee, to personal
convenience or indulgence. Citizens frequently sent him delicacies,
boxes filled with turkeys, hams, wine, cordials, and other things,
peculiarly tempting to one leading the hard life of the soldier, but
these were almost uniformly sent to the sick in some neighboring
hospital. Lee's principle in so acting seems to have been to set the
good example to his officers of not faring better than their men;
but he was undoubtedly indifferent naturally to luxury of all
descriptions. In his habits and feelings he was not the self-indulgent
man of peace, but the thorough soldier, willing to live hard, to sleep
upon the ground, and to disregard all sensual indulgence. In his other
habits he was equally abstinent. He cared nothing for wine, whiskey,
or any stimulant, and never used tobacco in any form. He rarely
relaxed his energies in any thing calculated to amuse him; but, when
not riding along his lines, or among the camps to see in person that
the troops were properly cared for, generally passed his time in close
attention to official duties connected with the well-being of the
army, or in correspondence with the authorities at Richmond. When he
relaxed from this continuous toil, it was to indulge in some quiet and
simple diversion, social converse with ladies in houses at which he
chanced to stop, caresses bestowed upon children, with whom he was
a great favorite, and frequently in informal conversation with his
officers. At "Hayfield" and "Moss Neck," two hospitable houses below
Fredericksburg, he at this time often stopped and spent some time in
the society of the ladies and children there. One of the latter, a
little curly-headed girl, would come up to him always to receive her
accustomed kiss, and one day confided to him, as a personal friend,
her desire to kiss General Jackson, who blushed like a girl when Lee,
with a quiet laugh, told him of the child's wish. On another occasion,
when his small friend came to receive his caress, he said, laughing,
that she would show more taste in selecting a younger gentleman than
himself, and, pointing to a youthful officer in a corner of the room,
added, "There is the handsome Major Pelham!" which caused that modest
young soldier to blush with confusion. The bearing of General Lee
in these hours of relaxation, was quite charming, and made him warm
friends. His own pleasure and gratification were plain, and gratified
others, who, in the simple and kindly gentleman in the plain gray
uniform, found it difficult to recognize the commander-in-chief of the
Southern army.

These moments of relaxation were, however, only occasional. All the
rest was toil, and the routine of hard work and grave assiduity went
on month after month, and year after year, with little interruption.
With the exceptions which we have noted, all pleasures and
distractions seemed of little interest to Lee, and to the present
writer, at least, he seemed on all occasions to bear the most striking
resemblance to the traditional idea of Washington. High principle and
devotion to duty were plainly this human being's springs of action,
and he went through the hard and continuous labor incident to army
command with a grave and systematic attention, wholly indifferent, it
seemed, to almost every species of diversion and relaxation.

This attempt to show how Lee appeared at that time to his solders, has
extended to undue length, and we shall be compelled to defer a full
notice of the most interesting and beautiful trait of his character.
This was his humble and profound piety. The world has by no means done
him justice upon this subject. No one doubted during the war that
General Lee was a sincere Christian in conviction, and his exemplary
moral character and life were beyond criticism. Beyond this it is
doubtful if any save his intimate associates understood the depth
of his feeling on the greatest of all subjects. Jackson's strong
religious fervor was known and often alluded to, but it is doubtful
if Lee was regarded as a person of equally fervent convictions and
feelings. And yet the fact is certain that faith in God's providence
and reliance upon the Almighty were the foundation of all his actions,
and the secret of his supreme composure under all trials. He was
naturally of such reserve that it is not singular that the extent of
this sentiment was not understood. Even then, however, good men
who frequently visited him, and conversed with him upon religious
subjects, came away with their hearts burning within them. When the
Rev. J. William Jones, with another clergyman, went, in 1863, to
consult him in reference to the better observance of the Sabbath in
the army, "his eye brightened, and his whole countenance glowed with
pleasure; and as, in his simple, feeling words, he expressed his
delight, we forgot the great warrior, and only remembered that we were
communing with an humble, earnest Christian." When he was informed
that the chaplains prayed for him, tears started to his eyes, and he
replied: "I sincerely thank you for that, and I can only say that I
am a poor sinner, trusting in Christ alone, and that I need all the
prayers you can offer for me."

On the day after this interview he issued an earnest general order,
enjoining the observance of the Sabbath by officers and men, urging
them to attend public worship in their camps, and forbidding the
performance on Sunday of all official duties save those necessary
to the subsistence or safety of the army. He always attended public
worship, if it were in his power to do so, and often the earnestness
of the preacher would "make his eye kindle and his face glow." He
frequently attended the meetings of his chaplains, took a warm
interest in the proceedings, and uniformly exhibited, declares one
who could speak from personal knowledge, an ardent desire for the
promotion of religion in the army. He did not fail, on many occasions,
to show his men that he was a sincere Christian. When General Meade
came over to Mine Run, and the Southern army marched to meet him, Lee
was riding along his line of battle in the woods, when he came upon a
party of soldiers holding a prayer-meeting on the eve of battle. Such
a spectacle was not unusual in the army then and afterward--the rough
fighters were often men of profound piety--and on this occasion
the sight before him seems to have excited deep emotion in Lee. He
stopped, dismounted--the staff-officers accompanying him did the
same--and Lee uncovered his head, and stood in an attitude of profound
respect and attention, while the earnest prayer proceeded, in the
midst of the thunder of artillery and the explosion of the enemy's
shells.[1]

[Footnote 1: These details are given on the authority of the Rev. J.
William Jones, of Lexington, Va.]

[Illustration: Lee at the Soldiers' Prayer Meeting.]

Other incidents indicating the simple and earnest piety of Lee will be
presented in the course of this narrative. The fame of the soldier has
in some degree thrown into the background the less-imposing trait of
personal piety in the individual. No delineation of Lee, however,
would be complete without a full statement of his religious principles
and feelings. As the commander-in-chief of the Army of Northern
Virginia, he won that august renown which encircles his name with a
halo of military glory, both in America and Europe. His battles and
victories are known to all men. It is not known to all that the
illustrious soldier whose fortune it was to overthrow, one after
another, the best soldiers of the Federal army, was a simple, humble,
and devoted Christian, whose eyes filled with tears when he was
informed that his chaplains prayed for him; and who said, "I am a poor
sinner, trusting in Christ alone, and need all the prayers you can
offer for me."




PART VI.

CHANCELLORSVILLE AND GETTYSBURG




I.

ADVANCE OF GENERAL HOOKER.


Lee remained throughout the winter at his headquarters in the woods
south of Fredericksburg, watching the Northern army, which continued
to occupy the country north of the city, with the Potomac River as
their base of supplies.

With the coming of spring, it was obviously the intention of the
Federal authorities to again essay the crossing of the Rappahannock at
some point either above or below Fredericksburg; and as the movement
above was less difficult, and promised more decisive results, it was
seen by General Lee that this would probably be the quarter from
which he might expect an attack. General Stuart, a soldier of sound
judgment, said, during the winter, "The next battle will take place at
Chancellorsville," and the position of Lee's troops seemed to indicate
that this was also his own opinion. His right remained still "opposite
Fredericksburg," barring the direct approach to Richmond, but his left
extended up the Rappahannock beyond Chancellorsville, and all the
fords were vigilantly guarded to prevent a sudden flank movement by
the enemy in that direction. As will be seen, the anticipations of Lee
were to be fully realized. The heavy blow aimed at him, in the first
days of spring, was to come from the quarter in which he had expected
it.

The Federal army was now under command of General Joseph Hooker, an
officer of dash, energy, excellent administrative capacity, and,
Northern writers add, extremely prone to "self-assertion." General
Hooker had harshly criticised the military operations both of
General McClellan on the Chickahominy, and of General Burnside at
Fredericksburg, and so strong an impression had these strictures made
upon the minds of the authorities, that they came to the determination
of intrusting the command of the army to the officer who made them,
doubtless concluding that his own success would prove greater than
that of his predecessors. This opinion seemed borne out by the first
proceedings of General Hooker. He set to work energetically to
reorganize and increase the efficiency of the army, did away
with General Burnside's defective "grand division" arrangement,
consolidated the cavalry into an effective corps, enforced strict
discipline among officers and men alike, and at the beginning of
spring had brought his army to a high state of efficiency. His
confident tone inspired the men; the depression resulting from the
great disaster at Fredericksburg was succeeded by a spirit of buoyant
hope, and the army was once more that great war-engine, ready for any
undertaking, which it had been under McClellan.

It numbered, according to one Federal statement, one hundred and
fifty-nine thousand three hundred men; but according to another, which
appears more reliable, one hundred and twenty thousand infantry and
artillery, and twelve thousand cavalry; in all, one hundred and
thirty-two thousand troops. The army of General Lee was considerably
smaller. Two divisions of Longstreet's corps had been sent to Suffolk,
south of James River, to obtain supplies in that region, and this
force was not present at the battle of Chancellorsville. The actual
numbers under Lee's command will appear from the following statement
of Colonel Walter H. Taylor, assistant adjutant-general of the army:

    Our strength at Chancellorsville:
      Anderson and McLaws........................... 13,000
      Jackson (Hill, Rodes, and Trimble)............ 21,000
      Early (Fredericksburg)........................  6,000
                                                    _______
                                                     40,000
      Cavalry and artillery.........................  7,000
                                                    _______
      Total of all arms............................. 47,000

As the Federal infantry numbered one hundred and twenty thousand,
according to the smallest estimate of Federal authorities, and Lee's
infantry forty thousand, the Northern force was precisely three times
as large as the Southern.

[Illustration: Map--Battle of Chancellorsville.]

General Hooker had already proved himself an excellent administrative
officer, and his plan of campaign against Lee seemed to show that he
also possessed generalship of a high order. He had determined to pass
the Rappahannock above Fredericksburg, turn Lee's flank, and thus
force him to deliver battle under this disadvantage, or retire upon
Richmond. The safe passage of the stream was the first great object,
and General Hooker's dispositions to effect this were highly
judicious. A force of about twenty thousand men was to pass the
Rappahannock at Fredericksburg, and thus produce upon Lee the
impression that the Federal army was about to renew the attempt in
which they had failed under General Burnside. While General Lee's
attention was engaged by the force thus threatening his right, the
main body of the Northern army was to cross the Rappahannock and
Rapidan above Chancellorsville, and, sweeping down rapidly upon
the Confederate left flank, take up a strong position between
Chancellorsville and Fredericksburg. The column which had crossed at
the latter point to engage the attention of the Confederate commander,
was then to recross to the northern bank, move rapidly to the upper
fords, which the advance of the main body would by that time have
uncovered; and, a second time crossing to the southern bank, unite
with the rest. Thus the whole Federal army would be concentrated
on the southern bank of the Rappahannock, and General Lee would be
compelled to leave his camps on the hills of the Massaponnax, and
fight upon ground dictated by his adversary. If he did not thus accept
battle, but one other course was left. He must fall back in the
direction of Richmond, to prevent his adversary from attacking his
rear, and capturing or destroying his army.

In order to insure the success of this promising plan of attack, a
strong column of well-mounted cavalry was to cross in advance of the
army and strike for the railroads in Lee's rear, connecting him with
Richmond and the Southwest. Thus flanked or cut off, and with all his
communications destroyed, it seemed probable that General Lee would
suffer decisive defeat, and that the Federal army would march in
triumph to the capture of the Confederate capital.

This plan was certainly excellent, and seemed sure to succeed. It was,
however, open to some criticism, as the event showed. General Hooker
was detaching, in the beginning of the movement, his whole cavalry
force for a distant operation, and dividing his army by the _ruse_
at Fredericksburg, in face of an adversary not likely to permit that
great error to escape him. While advancing thus, apparently to the
certain destruction of Lee, General Hooker was leaving a vulnerable
point in his own armor. Lee would probably discover that point, and
aim to pierce his opponent there. At most, General Hooker was wrapping
in huge folds the sword of Lee, not remembering that there was danger
to the _cordon_ as well as to the weapon.

Such was the plan which General Hooker had devised to bring back that
success of the Federal arms in the spring of 1863 which had attended
them in the early spring of 1862. At this latter period a heavy cloud
rested upon the Confederate cause. Donaldson and Roanoke Island, Fort
Macon, and the city of New Orleans, had then fallen; at Elkhorn,
Kernstown, Newbern, and other places, the Federal forces had achieved
important successes. These had been followed, however, by the Southern
victories on the Chickahominy, at Manassas, and at Fredericksburg.
Near this last-named spot now, where the year had wound up with so
mortifying a Federal failure, General Hooker hoped to reverse events,
and recover the Federal glories of the preceding spring.

Operations began as early as the middle of March, when General
Averill, with about three thousand cavalry, crossed the Rappahannock
at Kelly's Ford, above its junction with the Rapidan, and made a
determined attack upon nearly eight hundred horsemen there, under
General Fitz Lee, with the view of passing through Culpepper, crossing
the Rapidan, and cutting Lee's communications in the direction of
Gordonsville. The obstinate stand of General Fitz Lee's small force,
however, defeated this object, and General Averill was forced to
retreat beyond the Rappahannock again with considerable loss, and
abandon his expedition. In this engagement fell Major John Pelham, who
had been styled in Lee's first report of the battle of Fredericksburg
"the gallant Pelham," and whose brave stand on the Port Royal road had
drawn from Lee the exclamation, "It is glorious to see such courage in
one so young." Pelham was, in spite of his youth, an artillerist of
the first order of excellence, and his loss was a serious one, in
spite of his inferior rank.

After this action every thing remained quiet until toward the end of
April--General Lee continuing to hold the same position with his right
at Fredericksburg, his left at the fords near Chancellorsville, and
his cavalry, under Stuart, guarding the banks of the Rappahannock in
Culpepper. On the 27th of April, General Hooker began his forward
movement, by advancing three corps of his army--the Fifth, Eleventh,
and Twelfth--to the banks of the river, near Kelly's Ford; and, on the
next day, this force was joined by three additional corps--the First,
Third, and Sixth--and the whole, on Wednesday (the 29th), crossed the
river without difficulty. That this movement was a surprise to Lee,
as has been supposed by some persons, is a mistake. Stuart was an
extremely vigilant picket-officer, and both he and General Lee were in
the habit of sending accomplished scouts to watch any movements in the
Federal camps. As soon as these movements--which, in a large army,
cannot be concealed--took place, information was always promptly
brought, and it was not possible that General Hooker could move three
large army corps toward the Rappahannock, as he did on April 27th,
without early knowledge on the part of his adversary of so important a
circumstance.

As the Federal infantry thus advanced, the large cavalry force began
also to move through Culpepper toward the Central Railroad in Lee's
rear. This column was commanded by General Stoneman, formerly a
subordinate officer in Lee's old cavalry regiment in the United States
Army; and, as General Stoneman's operations were entirely separate
from those of the infantry, and not of much importance, we shall here
dismiss them in a few words. He proceeded rapidly across Culpepper,
harassed in his march by a small body of horse, under General William
H.F. Lee; reached the Central Railroad at Trevillian's, below
Gordonsville, and tore up a portion of it; passed on to James River,
ravaging the country, and attempted the destruction of the Columbia
Aqueduct, but did not succeed in so doing; when, hearing probably of
the unforeseen result at Chancellorsville, he hastened back to the
Rapidan, pursued and harassed as in his advance, and, crossing,
regained the Federal lines beyond the Rappahannock.

To return to the movements of the main Federal force, under the
personal command of General Hooker. This advanced rapidly across the
angle between the two rivers, with no obstruction but that offered by
the cavalry under Stuart, and on Thursday, April 30th, had crossed the
Rapidan at Germanna and Ely's Fords, and was steadily concentrating
around Chancellorsville. At the same time the Second Corps, under
General Couch, was preparing to cross at United States Ford, a few
miles distant; and General Sedgwick, commanding the detached force at
Fredericksburg, having crossed and threatened Lee, in obedience to
orders, now began passing back to the northern bank again, in order to
march up and join the main body. Thus all things seemed in train to
succeed on the side of the Federal army. General Hooker was over with
about one hundred thousand men--twenty thousand additional troops
would soon join him. Lee's army seemed scattered, and not "in hand"
to oppose him; and there was some ground for the ebullition of joy
attributed to General Hooker, as he saw his great force massing
steadily in the vicinity of Chancellorsville. To those around him he
exclaimed: "The rebel army is now the legitimate property of the Army
of the Potomac. They may as well pack up their haversacks and make for
Richmond, and I shall be after them!"

In a congratulatory order to his troops, he declared that they
occupied now a position so strong that "the enemy must either
ingloriously fly, or come out from behind his defences and give us
battle on our own ground, where certain destruction awaits him."

Such were the joyful anticipations of General Hooker, who seems to
have regarded the campaign as virtually ended by the successful
passage of the river. His expressions and his general order would seem
to indicate an irrepressible joy, but it is doubtful if the skilful
soldiers under him shared this somewhat juvenile enthusiasm. The gray
cavalier at Fredericksburg was not reported to be retiring, as was
expected. On the contrary, the Southern troops seemed to be moving
forward with the design of accepting battle.

Lee had determined promptly upon that course as soon as Stuart sent
him information of the enemy's movements. Chancellorsville was at once
seen to be the point for which General Hooker was aiming, and Lee's
dispositions were made for confronting him there and fighting a
pitched battle. The brigades of Posey and Mahone, of Anderson's
Division, had been in front of Banks's and Ely's Fords, and this force
of about eight thousand men was promptly ordered to fall back on
Chancellorsville. At the same time Wright's brigade was sent up to
reënforce this column; but the enemy continuing to advance in great
force, General Anderson, commanding the whole, fell back from
Chancellorsville to Tabernacle Church, on the road to Fredericksburg,
where he was joined on the next day by Jackson, whom Lee had sent
forward to his assistance.

The _ruse_ at Fredericksburg had not long deceived the Confederate
commander. General Sedgwick, with three corps, in all about twenty-two
thousand men, had crossed just below Fredericksburg on the 29th, and
Lee had promptly directed General Jackson to oppose him there. Line of
battle was accordingly formed in the enemy's front beyond Hamilton's
Crossing; but as, neither on that day nor the next, any further
advance was made by General Sedgwick, the whole movement was seen to
be a feint to cover the real operations above. Lee accordingly turned
his attention in the direction of Chancellorsville. Jackson, as we
have related, was sent up to reënforce General Anderson, and Lee
followed with the rest of the army, with the exception of about six
thousand men, under General Early, whom he left to defend the crossing
at Fredericksburg.

Such were the positions of the opposing forces on the 1st day of May.
Each commander had displayed excellent generalship in the preliminary
movements preceding the actual fighting. At last, however, the
opposing lines were facing each other, and the real struggle was about
to begin.




II.

THE WILDERNESS.


The "Wilderness," as the region around Chancellorsville is called, is
so strange a country, and the character of the ground had so important
a bearing upon the result of the great battle fought there, that a
brief description of the locality will be here presented.

The region is a nearly unbroken expanse of dense thicket pierced only
by narrow and winding roads, over which the traveller rides, mile
after mile, without seeing a single human habitation. It would seem,
indeed, that the whole barren and melancholy tract had been given up
to the owl, the whippoorwill, and the moccasin, its original tenants.
The plaintive cries of the night-birds alone break the gloomy silence
of the desolate region, and the shadowy thicket stretching in
every direction produces a depressing effect upon the feelings.
Chancellorsville is in the centre of this singular territory, on
the main road, or rather roads, running from Orange Court-House to
Fredericksburg, from which latter place it is distant about ten miles.
In spite of its imposing name, Chancellorsville was simply a large
country-house, originally inhabited by a private family, but afterward
used as a roadside inn. A little to the westward the "Old Turnpike"
and Orange Plank-road unite as they approach the spot, where they
again divide, to unite a second time a few miles to the east, where
they form the main highway to Fredericksburg. From the north come in
roads from United States and Ely's Fords; Germanna Ford is northwest;
from the south runs the "Brock Road" in the direction of the Rapidan,
passing a mile or two west of the place.

The whole country, the roads, the chance houses, the silence, the
unending thicket, in this dreary wilderness, produce a sombre effect.
A writer, familiar with it, says: "There all is wild, desolate, and
lugubrious. Thicket, undergrowth, and jungle, stretch for miles,
impenetrable and untouched. Narrow roads wind on forever between
melancholy masses of stunted and gnarled oak. Little sunlight shines
there. The face of Nature is dreary and sad. It was so before the
battle; it is not more cheerful to-day, when, as you ride along, you
see fragments of shell, rotting knapsacks, rusty gun-barrels, bleached
bones, and grinning skulls.... Into this jungle," continues the same
writer, "General Hooker penetrated. It was the wolf in his den, ready
to tear any one who approached. A battle there seemed impossible.
Neither side could see its antagonist. Artillery could not move;
cavalry could not operate; the very infantry had to flatten their
bodies to glide between the stunted trees. That an army of one hundred
and twenty thousand men should have chosen that spot to fight forty
thousand, and not only chosen it, but made it a hundred times more
impenetrable by felling trees, erecting breastworks, disposing
artillery _en masse_ to sweep every road and bridle-path which led to
Chancellorsville--this fact seemed incredible."

It was no part of the original plan of the Federal commander to permit
himself to be cooped up in this difficult and embarrassing region,
where it was impossible to manoeuvre his large army. The selection of
the Wilderness around Chancellorsville, as the ground of battle, was
dictated by Lee. General Hooker, it seems, endeavored to avoid being
thus shut up in the thicket, and hampered in his movements. Finding
that the Confederate force, retiring from in front of Ely's and United
States Fords, had, on reaching Chancellorsville, continued to fall
back in the direction of Fredericksburg, he followed them steadily,
passed through the Wilderness, and, emerging into the open country
beyond, rapidly began forming line of battle on ground highly
favorable to the manoeuvring of his large force in action. A glance at
the map will indicate the importance of this movement, and the great
advantages secured by it. The left of General Hooker's line, nearest
the river, was at least five miles in advance of Chancellorsville, and
commanded Banks's Ford, thereby shortening fully one-half the distance
of General Sedgwick's march from Fredericksburg, by enabling him to
use the ford in question as a place of crossing to the south bank, and
uniting his column with the main body. The centre and right of the
Federal army had in like manner emerged from the thickets of the
Wilderness, and occupied cleared ground, sufficiently elevated to
afford them great advantages.

This was in the forenoon of the 1st of May, when there was no force in
General Hooker's front, except the eight thousand men of Anderson
at Tabernacle Church. Jackson had marched at midnight from the
Massaponnax Hills, with a general order from Lee to "attack and
repulse the enemy," but had not yet arrived. There was thus no serious
obstacle in the path of the Federal commander, who had it in his
power, it would seem, to mass his entire army on the commanding ground
which his vanguard already occupied. Lee was aware of the importance
of the position, and, had he not been delayed by the feint of General
Sedgwick, would himself have seized upon it. As it was, General Hooker
seemed to have won the prize in the race, and Lee would, apparently,
be forced to assail him on his strong ground, or retire in the
direction of Richmond.

The movements of the enemy had, however, been so rapid that Lee's
dispositions seem to have been made before they were fully developed
and accurately known to him. He had sent forward Jackson, and now
proceeded to follow in person, leaving only a force of about six
thousand men, under Early, to defend the crossing at Fredericksburg.
The promptness of these movements of the Confederate commander is
noticed by Northern writers. "Lee, with instant perception of the
situation," says an able historian, "now seized the masses of his
force, and, with the grasp of a Titan, swung them into position, as
a giant might fling a mighty stone from a sling." [Footnote: Mr.
Swinton, in "Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac." Whether the force
under Lee could be justly described as "mighty," however, the reader
will form his own opinion.]

Such were the relative positions of the two armies on the 1st of May:
General Hooker's forces well in advance of Chancellorsville, and
rapidly forming line of battle on a ridge in open country; General
Lee's, stretching along the whole distance, from Fredericksburg to
Tabernacle Church, and certainly not in any condition to deliver
or accept battle. The Federal commander seemed to have clearly
outgeneralled his adversary, and, humanly speaking, the movements of
the two armies, up to this time, seemed to point to a decisive Federal
success.

General Hooker's own act reversed all this brilliant promise. At the
very moment when his army was steadily concentrating on the favorable
ground in advance of Chancellorsville, the Federal commander, for some
reason which has never been divulged, sent a peremptory order that
the entire force should fall back into the Wilderness. This order,
reversing every thing, is said to have been received "with mingled
amazement and incredulity" by his officers, two of whom sent him word
that, from the great advantages of the position, it should be "held at
all hazards." General Hooker's reply was, "Return at once." The army
accordingly fell back to Chancellorsville.

This movement undoubtedly lost General Hooker all the advantages which
up to that moment he had secured. What his motive for the order in
question was, it is impossible for the present writer to understand,
unless the approach of Lee powerfully affected his imagination, and he
supposed the thicket around Chancellorsville to be the best ground to
receive that assault which the bold advance of his opponent appeared
to foretell. Whatever his motive, General Hooker withdrew his lines
from the open country, fell back to the vicinity of Chancellorsville,
and began to erect elaborate defences, behind which to receive Lee's
attack.

In this backward movement he was followed and harassed by the forces
of Jackson, the command of Anderson being in front. Jackson's maxim
was to always press an enemy when he was retiring; and no sooner had
the Federal forces begun to move, than he made a prompt attack. He
continued to follow them up toward Chancellorsville until nightfall,
when the fighting ceased, the Confederate advance having been pushed
to Alrich's house, within about two miles of Chancellorsville. Here
the outer line of the Federal works was found, and Jackson paused. He
was unwilling at so late an hour to attempt an assault upon them with
his small force, and, directing further movements to cease, awaited
the arrival of the commander-in-chief.

Lee arrived, and a consultation was held. The question now was, the
best manner, with a force of about thirty-five thousand, to drive the
Federal army, of about one hundred thousand, beyond the Rappahannock.




III.

LEE'S DETERMINATION.


On this night, of the 1st of May, the situation of affairs was strange
indeed.

General Hooker had crossed the Rappahannock with a force of one
hundred and twenty thousand infantry, and had, without obstruction,
secured a position so strong, he declared, that Lee must either
"ingloriously fly," or fight a battle in which "certain destruction
awaited him." So absolutely convinced, indeed, was the Federal
commander, of the result of the coming encounter, that he had
jubilantly described the Southern army as "the legitimate property of
the Army of the Potomac," which, in the event of the retreat of the
Confederates, would "be after them." There seemed just grounds for
this declaration, whatever question may have arisen of the good taste
displayed by General Hooker in making it. The force opposed to him was
in all about forty-seven thousand men, but, as cavalry take small
part in pitched battles, Lee's fighting force was only about forty
thousand. To drive back forty thousand with one hundred and twenty
thousand would not apparently prove difficult, and it was no doubt
this conviction which had occasioned the joyous exclamation of General
Hooker.

But his own act, and the nerve of his adversary, had defeated every
thing. Instead of retreating with his small force upon Richmond, Lee
had advanced to accept or deliver battle. This bold movement, which
General Hooker does not seem to have anticipated, paralyzed his
energies. He had not only crossed the two rivers without loss, but
had taken up a strong position, where he could manoeuvre his army
perfectly, when, in consequence of Lee's approach with the evident
intent of fighting, he had ceased to advance, hesitated, and ended by
retiring. This is a fair summary of events up to the night of the 1st
of May. General Hooker had advanced boldly; he was now falling back.
He had foretold that his adversary would "ingloriously fly;" and that
adversary was pressing him closely. The Army of the Potomac, he had
declared, would soon be "after" the Army of Northern Virginia; but,
from the appearance of things at the moment, the Army of Northern
Virginia seemed "after" the Army of the Potomac. We use General
Hooker's own phrases--they are expressive, if not dignified. They
are indeed suited to the subject, which contains no little of the
grotesque. That anticipations and expressions so confident should have
been met with a "commentary of events" so damaging, was sufficient,
had the occasion not been so tragic, to cause laughter in the gravest
of human beings.

Lee's intent was now unmistakable. Instead of falling back from the
Rappahannock to some line of defence nearer Richmond, where the force
under Longstreet, at Suffolk, might have rejoined him, with other
reënforcements, he had plainly resolved, with the forty or fifty
thousand men of his command, to meet General Hooker in open battle,
and leave the event to Providence. A design so bold would seem to
indicate in Lee a quality which at that time he was not thought to
possess--the willingness to risk decisive defeat by military movements
depending for their success upon good fortune alone. Such seemed now
the only _deus ex machina_ that could extricate the Southern army from
disaster; and a crushing defeat at that time would have had terrible
results. There was no other force, save the small body under
Longstreet and a few local troops, to protect Richmond. Had Lee been
disabled and afterward pressed by General Hooker, it is impossible to
see that any thing but the fall of the Confederate capital could have
been the result.

From these speculations and comments we pass to the narrative of
actual events. General Hooker had abandoned the strong position in
advance of Chancellorsville, and retired to the fastnesses around
that place, to receive the Southern attack. His further proceedings
indicated that he anticipated an assault from Lee. The Federal troops
had no sooner regained the thicket from which they had advanced in
the morning, than they were ordered to erect elaborate works for the
protection of infantry and artillery. This was promptly begun, and by
the next morning heavy defences had sprung up as if by magic. Trees
had been felled, and the trunks interwoven so as to present a
formidable obstacle to the Southern attack. In front of these works
the forest had been levelled, and the fallen trunks were left lying
where they fell, forming thus an _abatis_ sufficient to seriously
delay an assaulting force, which would thus be, at every step of
the necessarily slow advance, under fire. On the roads piercing the
thicket in the direction of the Confederates, cannon were posted, to
rake the approaches to the Federal position. Having thus made his
preparations to receive Lee's attack, General Hooker awaited that
attack, no doubt confident of his ability to repulse it.

His line resembled in some degree the two sides of an oblong
square--the longer side extending east and west in front, that is to
say, south of Chancellorsville, and the shorter side north and south
nearly, east of the place. His right, in the direction of Wilderness
Tavern, was comparatively undefended, as it was not expected that Lee
would venture upon a movement against that remote point. This line,
it would appear, was formed with a view to the possible necessity of
falling back toward the Rappahannock. A commander determined to risk
everything would, it seems, have fronted Lee boldly, with a line
running north and south, east of Chancellorsville. General Hooker's
main front was nearly east and west, whatever may have been his object
in so establishing it.

On the night of the 1st of May, as we have said, Lee and Jackson held
a consultation to determine the best method of attacking the Federal
forces on the next day. All the information which they had been able
to obtain of the Federal positions east and south of Chancellorsville,
indicated that the defences in both these quarters were such as
to render an assault injudicious. Jackson had found his advance
obstructed by strong works near Alrich's house, on the road running
eastward from the enemy's camps; and General Stuart and General
Wright, who had moved to the left, and advanced upon the enemy's front
near the point called "The Furnace," had discovered the existence of
powerful defences in that quarter also. They had been met by a fierce
and sudden artillery-fire from Federal epaulements; and here, as to
the east of Chancellorsville, the enemy had evidently fortified their
position.

Under these circumstances, it was necessary to discover, if possible,
some more favorable opening for an attack. There remained but one
other--General Hooker's right, west of Chancellorsville; but to divide
the army, as would be necessary in order to attack in that quarter,
seemed an undertaking too hazardous to be thought of. To execute such
a plan of assault with any thing like a hope of success, General Lee
would be compelled to detach considerably more than half of his entire
force. This would leave in General Hooker's front a body of troops too
inconsiderable to make any resistance if he advanced his lines, and
thus the movement promised to result in the certain destruction of
one portion of the army, to be followed by a triumphant march of the
Federal forces upon Richmond. In the council of war between Lee and
Jackson, on the night of the 1st of May, these considerations were
duly weighed, and the whole situation discussed. In the end,
the hazardous movement against General Hooker's right, beyond
Chancellorsville, was determined upon. This was first suggested, it is
said, by Jackson--others have attributed the suggestion to Lee. The
point is not material. The plan was adopted, and Lee determined to
detach a column of about twenty-one thousand men, under Jackson, to
make the attack on the next day. His plan was to await the arrival
of Jackson at the point selected for attack, meanwhile engaging the
enemy's attention by demonstrations in their front. When Jackson's
guns gave the signal that he was engaged, the force in front of the
enemy was to advance and participate in the assault; and thus, struck
in front and flank at once. General Hooker, it was hoped, would be
defeated and driven back across the Rappahannock.

There was another possible result, the defeat of Lee and Jackson by
General Hooker. But the desperate character of the situation rendered
it necessary to disregard this risk.

By midnight this plan had been determined upon, and at dawn Jackson
began to move.

JACKSON'S ATTACK AND FALL.

On the morning of the 2d of May, General Lee was early in the saddle,
and rode to the front, where he remained in personal command of the
force facing the enemy's main line of battle throughout the day.

This force consisted of the divisions of Anderson and McLaws, and
amounted to thirteen thousand men. That left at Fredericksburg, as we
have said, under General Early, numbered six thousand men; and the
twenty-one thousand which Jackson had taken with him, to strike at the
enemy's right, made up the full body of troops under Lee, that is to
say, a little over forty thousand, artillerymen included. The cavalry,
numbering four or five thousand, were, like the absent Federal
cavalry, not actually engaged.

In accordance with the plan agreed upon between Lee and Jackson, the
force left in the enemy's front proceeded to engage their attention,
and desultory fighting continued throughout the day. General
Lee meanwhile awaited the sound of Jackson's guns west of
Chancellorsville, and must have experienced great anxiety at this
trying moment, although, with his accustomed self-control, he
displayed little or none. We shall now leave this comparatively
interesting portion of the field, and invite the attention of the
reader to the movements of General Jackson, who was about to strike
his last great blow, and lose his own life in the moment of victory.

Jackson set out at early dawn, having under him three divisions,
commanded by Rhodes and Trimble, in all about twenty-one thousand men,
and directed his march over the Old Mine road toward "The Furnace,"
about a mile or so from and in front of the enemy's main line. Stuart
moved with his cavalry on the flank of the column, with the view of
masking it from observation; and it reached and passed "The Furnace,"
where a regiment with artillery was left to guard the road leading
thence to Chancellorsville, and repel any attack which might be made
upon the rear of the column. Just as the rear-guard passed on, the
anticipated attack took place, and the regiment thus left, the
Twenty-third Georgia, was suddenly surrounded and the whole force
captured. The Confederate artillery, however, opened promptly upon the
assailing force, drove it back toward Chancellorsville, and Jackson
proceeded on his march without further interruption. He had thus been
seen, but it seems that the whole movement was regarded by General
Hooker as a retreat of the Confederates southward, a bend in the road
at this point toward the south leading to that supposition.

"We know the enemy is flying," General Hooker wrote, on the afternoon
of this day, to General Sedgwick, "trying to save his trains; two of
Sickles's divisions are among them."

Soon after leaving "The Furnace," however, Jackson, following the same
wood-road, turned westward, and, marching rapidly between the walls of
thicket, struck into the Brock road, which runs in a direction nearly
northwest toward Germanna and Ely's Fords. This would enable him to
reach, without discovery, the Orange Plank-road, or Old Turnpike, west
of Chancellorsville, as the woods through which the narrow highway
ran completely barred him from observation. Unless Federal spies were
lurking in the covert, or their scouting-parties of cavalry came in
sight of the column, it would move as secure from discovery as though
it were a hundred miles distant from the enemy; and against the
latter danger of cavalry-scouts, Stuart's presence with his horsemen
provided. The movement was thus made without alarming the enemy, and
the head of Jackson's column reached the Orange Plank-road, near
which point General Fitz Lee invited Jackson to ride up to a slight
elevation, from which the defences of the enemy were visible. Jackson
did so, and a glance showed him that he was not yet sufficiently upon
the enemy's flank. He accordingly turned to an aide and said, pointing
to the Orange Plank-road: "Tell my column to cross that road."

The column did so, continuing to advance toward the Rapidan until it
reached the Old Turnpike running from the "Old Wilderness Tavern"
toward Chancellorsville. At this point, Jackson found himself full on
the right flank of General Hooker, and, halting his troops, proceeded
promptly to form line of battle for the attack. It was now past four
in the afternoon, and the declining sun warned the Confederates to
lose no time. The character of the ground was, however, such as to
dismay any but the most resolute, and it seemed impossible to execute
the intended movement with any thing like rapidity in such a jungle.
On both sides of the Old Turnpike rose a wall of thicket, through
which it was impossible to move a regular line of battle. All the
rules of war must be reversed in face of this obstacle, and the
assault on General Hooker's works seemed destined to be made in column
of infantry companies, and with the artillery moving in column of
pieces.

Despite these serious obstacles, Jackson hastened to form such order
of battle as was possible, and with Rodes's division in front,
followed by Colston (Trimble) and Hill, advanced steadily down the
Old Turnpike, toward Chancellorsville. He had determined, not only to
strike the enemy's right flank, but to execute, if possible, a still
more important movement. This was, to extend his lines steadily to
the left, swing round his left wing, and so interpose himself between
General Hooker and the Rapidan. This design of unsurpassed boldness
continued to burn in Jackson's brain until he fell, and almost his
last words were an allusion to it.

The Federal line of works, which the Confederates thus advanced to
assault, extended across the Old Turnpike near the house of Melzi
Chancellor, and behind was a second line, which was covered by the
Federal artillery in the earthworks near Chancellorsville. The
Eleventh Corps, under General Howard, was that destined to receive
Jackson's assault. This was made at a few minutes past five in the
evening, and proved decisive. The Federal troops were surprised at
their suppers, and were wholly unprepared. They had scarcely time to
run to their muskets, which were stacked[1] near at hand, when Rodes
burst upon them, stormed their works, over which the troops marched
almost unresisted, and in a few minutes the entire corps holding the
Federal right was in hopeless disorder. Rodes pressed on, followed by
the division in his rear, and the affair became rather a hunt than a
battle. The Confederates pursued with yells, killing or capturing all
with whom they could come up; the Federal artillery rushed off at a
gallop, striking against tree-trunks and overturning, and the army
of General Hooker seemed about to be hopelessly routed. This is
the account given by Northern writers, who represent the effect of
Jackson's sudden attack as indescribable. It had a serious effect, as
will be subsequently shown, on the _morale_ both of General Hooker and
his army. While opposing the heavy demonstrations of General Lee's
forces on their left and in front, this storm had burst upon them from
a quarter in which no one expected it; they were thus caught between
two fires, and, ignorant as they were of the small number of the
Confederates, must have regarded the army as seriously imperilled.

[Footnote 1: "Their arms were stacked, and the men were away from
them and scattered about for the purpose of cooking their
suppers."--_General Hooker_.]

Jackson continued to pursue the enemy on the road to Chancellorsville,
intent now upon making his blow decisive by swinging round his left
and cutting off the Federal army from the Rappahannock. It was
impossible, however, to execute so important a movement until his
troops were well in hand, and the two divisions which had made the
attack had become mixed up in a very confused manner. They were
accordingly directed to halt, and General A.P. Hill, whose division
had not been engaged, was sent for and ordered to advance to the
front, thus affording the disordered divisions an opportunity to
reform their broken lines.

Soon after dispatching this order, Jackson rode out in front of his
line, on the Chancellorsville road, in order to reconnoitre in person,
and ascertain, if possible, the position and movements of the enemy,
then within a few hundred yards of him. It was now between nine and
ten o'clock at night. The fighting had temporarily ceased, and the
moon, half-seen through misty clouds, lit up the dreary thickets, in
which no sound was heard but the incessant and melancholy cries of the
whippoorwills. Jackson had ridden forward about a hundred yards in
advance of his line, on the turnpike, accompanied by a few officers,
and had checked his horse to listen for any sound coming from the
direction of Chancellorsville, when suddenly a volley was fired by his
own infantry on the right of the road, apparently directed at him
and his companions, under the impression that they were a Federal
reconnoitring-party. Several of the party fell from their horses,
and, wheeling to the left, Jackson galloped into the wood to escape a
renewal of the fire. The result was melancholy. He passed directly in
front of his men, who had been warned to guard against an attack of
cavalry. In their excited state, so near the enemy, and surrounded by
darkness, Jackson was supposed to be a Federal cavalryman. The men
accordingly fired upon him, at not more than twenty paces, and wounded
him in three places--twice in the left arm, and once in the right
hand. At the instant when he was struck he was holding his bridle with
his left hand, and had his right hand raised, either to protect his
face from boughs, or in the strange gesture habitual to him in battle.
As the bullets passed through his arm he dropped the bridle of his
horse from his left hand, but seized it again with the bleeding
fingers of his right hand, when the animal, wheeling suddenly, darted
toward Chancellorsville. In doing so he passed beneath the limb of a
pine-tree, which struck the wounded man in the face, tore off his cap,
and threw him back on his horse, nearly dismounting him. He succeeded,
however, in retaining his seat, and regained the road, where he was
received in the arms of Captain Wilbourn, one of his staff-officers,
and laid at the foot of a tree.

The fire had suddenly ceased, and all was again still. Only Captain
Wilbourn and a courier were with Jackson, but a shadowy figure
on horseback was seen in the edge of the wood near, silent and
motionless. When Captain Wilbourn called to this person, and directed
him to ride back and see what troops had thus fired upon them, the
silent figure disappeared, and did not return. Who this could have
been was long a mystery, but it appears, from a recent statement of
General Revere, of the Federal army, that it was himself. He had
advanced to the front to reconnoitre, had come on the group at the
foot of the tree, and, receiving the order above mentioned, had
thought it prudent not to reveal his real character. He accordingly
rode into the wood, and regained his own lines.

A few words will terminate our account of this melancholy event in the
history of the war--the fall of Jackson. He was supported to the rear
by his officers, and during this painful progress gave his last order.
General Pender recognized him, and stated that he feared he could
not hold his position. Jackson's eye flashed, and he replied with
animation, "You must hold your ground, General Pender! You must hold
your ground, sir!"

He was now so weak as to be unable to walk, even leaning on the
shoulders of his officers. He was accordingly placed on a litter,
and borne toward the rear. Before the litter had gone far a furious
artillery-fire swept the road from the direction of Chancellorsville,
and the bearers lowered it to the earth and lay down beside it. The
fire relaxing, they again moved, but one of the bearers stumbled over
a root and let the litter fall. Jackson groaned, and as the moonlight
fell upon his face it was seen to be so pale that he appeared to be
about to die. When asked if he was much hurt, he opened his eyes,
however, and said, "No, my friend, don't trouble yourself about me."

He was then borne to the rear, placed in an ambulance, and carried to
the hospital at the Old Wilderness Tavern, where he remained until he
was taken to Guinea's station, where he died.

Such was the fate of Lee's great lieutenant--the man whom he spoke of
as his "right arm"--whose death struck a chill to the hearts of the
Southern people from which they never recovered.




V.

THE BATTLE OF CHANCELLORSVILLE.


General Lee was not informed of the misfortune which had befallen his
great lieutenant until toward daybreak on the next morning.

This fact was doubtless attributable to the difficult character of
the country; the interposition of the Federal army between the two
Confederate wings, which rendered a long détour necessary in reaching
Lee; and the general confusion and dismay attending Jackson's fall.
It would be difficult, indeed, to form an exaggerated estimate of the
condition of Jackson's corps at this time. The troops had been thrown
into what seemed inextricable disorder, in consequence of the darkness
and the headlong advance of the Second (Calston's) Division upon the
heels of Rhodes, which had resulted in a complete intermingling of
the two commands; and, to make matters worse, General A.P. Hill, the
second in command, had been wounded and disabled, nearly at the
same moment with Jackson, by the artillery-fire of the enemy. This
transferred the command, of military right, to the brave and skilful
General Rhodes, the ranking officer after Hill; but Rhodes was only a
brigadier-general, and had, for that reason, never come into personal
contact with the whole corps, who knew little of him, and was not
aware of Jackson's plans, and distrusted, under these circumstances,
his ability to conduct to a successful issue so vitally important an
operation as that intrusted to this great wing of the Southern army.
Stuart, who had gone with his cavalry toward Ely's Ford to make a
demonstration on the Federal rear, was therefore sent for, and rode
as rapidly as possible to the scene of action, and the command was
formally relinquished to him by General Rhodes. Jackson sent Stuart
word from Wilderness Tavern to "act upon his own judgment, and do
what he thought best, as he had implicit confidence in him;" but,
in consequence of the darkness and confusion, it was impossible for
Stuart to promptly reform the lines, and thus all things remained
entangled and confused.

It was essential, however, to inform General Lee of the state of
affairs, and Jackson's chief-of-staff, Colonel Pendleton, requested
Captain Wilbourn, who had witnessed all the details of the painful
scene in the wood, to go to General Lee and acquaint him with what
had taken place, and receive his orders. From a MS. statement of this
meritorious officer, we take these brief details of the interview:

Lee was found lying asleep in a little clump of pines near his front,
covered with an oil-cloth to protect him from the dews of the night,
and surrounded by the officers of his staff, also asleep. It was
not yet daybreak, and the darkness prevented the messenger from
distinguishing the commander-in-chief from the rest. He accordingly
called for Major Taylor, Lee's adjutant-general, and that officer
promptly awoke when he was informed of what had taken place. As the
conversation continued, the sound awoke General Lee, who asked, "Who
is there?" Major Taylor informed him, and, rising upon his elbow, Lee
pointed to his blankets, and said: "Sit down here by me, captain, and
tell me all about the fight last evening."

He listened without comment during the recital, but, when it was
finished, said with great feeling: "Ah! captain, any victory is dearly
bought which deprives us of the services of General Jackson, even for
a short time."

From this reply it was evident that he did not regard the wounds
received by Jackson as of a serious character--as was natural, from
the fact that they were only flesh-wounds in the arm and hand--and
believed that the only result would be a temporary absence of his
lieutenant from command. As Captain Wilbourn continued to speak of the
incident, Lee added with greater emotion than at first: "Ah! don't
talk about it; thank God it is no worse!"

He then remained silent, but seeing Captain Wilbourn rise, as if to
go, he requested him to remain, as he wished to "talk with him some
more," and proceeded to ask a number of questions in reference to the
position of the troops, who was in command, etc. When informed that
Rhodes was in temporary command, but that Stuart had been sent for, he
exclaimed: "Rhodes is a gallant, courageous, and energetic officer;"
and asked where Jackson and Stuart could be found, calling for paper
and pencil to write to them. Captain Wilbourn added that, from what he
had heard Jackson say, he thought he intended to get possession, if
possible, of the road to United States Ford in the Federal rear, and
so cut them off from the river that night, or early in the morning. At
these words, Lee rose quickly and said with animation, "These people
must be pressed to-day."

It would seem that at this moment a messenger--probably Captain
Hotchkiss, Jackson's skilful engineer--arrived from Wilderness Tavern,
bringing a note from the wounded general. Lee read it with much
feeling, and dictated the following reply:

    GENERAL: I have just received your note informing me that you were
    wounded. I cannot express my regret at the occurrence. Could I
    have directed events, I should have chosen, for the good of the
    country, to have been disabled in your stead.

    I congratulate you upon the victory, which is due to your skill
    and energy. R.E. LEE, _General_.

This was dispatched with a second note to Stuart, directing him to
assume command, and press the enemy at dawn. Lee then mounted his
horse, and, just as the day began to break, formed line of battle
opposite the enemy's front, his line extending on the right to
the plank-road running from Chancellorsville in the direction of
Fredericksburg. This force, under the personal command of Lee,
amounted, as we have said, originally to about thirteen thousand men;
and, as their loss had not been very severe in the demonstrations made
against the enemy on the preceding days, they were in good condition.
The obvious course now was to place the troops in a position which
would enable them, in the event of Stuart's success in driving the
Federal right, to unite the left of Lee's line with the right of
Stuart, and so press the Federal army back on Chancellorsville and the
river. We shall now return to the left wing of the army, which, in
spite of the absence of the commanding general, was the column of
attack, which was looked to for the most important results.

In response to the summons of the preceding night, Stuart had come
back from the direction of Ely's Ford, at a swift gallop, burning with
ardor at the thought of leading Jackson's great corps into battle. The
military ambition of this distinguished commander of Lee's horse was
great, and he had often chafed at the jests directed at the cavalry
arm, and at himself as "only a cavalry-officer." He had now presented
to him an opportunity of showing that he was a trained soldier,
competent by his nerve and military ability to lead any arm of the
service, and greeted the occasion with delight. The men of Jackson had
been accustomed to see that commander pass slowly along their lines
on a horse as sedate-looking as himself, a slow-moving figure, with
little of the "poetry of war" in his appearance. They now found
themselves commanded by a youthful and daring cavalier on a spirited
animal, with floating plume, silken sash, and a sabre which gleamed in
the moonlight, as its owner galloped to and fro cheering the men and
marshalling them for the coming assault As he led the lines afterward
with joyous vivacity, his sabre drawn, his plume floating proudly, one
of the men compared him to Henry of Navarre at the battle of Ivry. But
Stuart's spirit of wild gayety destroyed the romantic dignity of the
scene. He led the men of Jackson against General Hooker's breastworks
bristling with cannon, singing "Old Joe Hooker, will you come out of
the Wilderness!"

This sketch will convey a correct idea of the officer who had now
grasped the bâton falling from the hand of the great marshal of
Lee. It was probable that the advance of the infantry under such a
commander would partake of the rush and rapidity of a cavalry-charge;
and the sequel justified this view.

At early dawn the Southern lines began to move. Either in consequence
of orders from Lee, or following his own conception, Stuart reversed
the movement of Jackson, who had aimed to swing round his left and cut
off the enemy. He seemed to have determined to extend his right, with
the view of uniting with the left of Anderson's division under Lee,
and enclosing the enemy in the angle near Chancellorsville. Lee had
moved at the same moment on their front, advancing steadily over all
obstacles, and a Northern writer, who witnessed the combined attack,
speaks of it in enthusiastic terms: "From the large brick house
which gives the name to this vicinity," says the writer, speaking
of Chancellorsville, "the enemy could be seen, sweeping slowly but
confidently, determinedly and surely, through the clearings which
extended in front. Nothing could excite more admiration for the
qualities of the veteran soldiers than the manner in which the enemy
swept out, as they moved steadily onward, the forces which were
opposed to them. We say it reluctantly, and for the first time, that
the enemy have shown the finest qualities, and we acknowledge on this
occasion their superiority in the open field to our own men. They
delivered their fire with precision, and were apparently inflexible
and immovable under the storm of bullets and shell which they were
constantly receiving. Coming to a piece of timber, which was occupied
by a division of our own men, half the number were detailed to clear
the woods. It seemed certain that here they would be repulsed, but
they marched right through the wood, driving our own soldiers out, who
delivered their fire and fell back, halted again, fired, and fell back
as before, seeming to concede to the enemy, as a matter of course, the
superiority which they evidently felt themselves. Our own men fought
well. There was no lack of courage, but an evident feeling that they
were destined to be beaten, and the only thing for them to do was to
fire and retreat."

This description of the steady advance of the Southern line applies
rather to the first portion of the attack, which compelled the front
line of the Federal army to retire to the stronger ground in rear.
When this was reached, and the troops of Lee saw before them the last
citadel, the steady advance became a rush. The divisions of Anderson
and McLaws, on the right, made a determined charge upon the great
force under Generals Hancock, Slocum, and others, in that quarter, and
Stuart closed in on the Federal right, steadily extending his line to
join on to Anderson.

The spectacle here was superb. As the troops rushed on, Stuart
shouted, "Charge! and remember Jackson!" and this watchword seemed to
drive the line forward. With Stuart leading them, and singing, in
his joyous voice, "Old Joe Hooker, will you come out of the
Wilderness!"--for courage, poetry, and seeming frivolity, were
strangely mingled in this great soldier--the troops went headlong
at the Federal works, and in a few moments the real struggle of the
battle of Chancellorsville had begun.

From this instant, when the lines, respectively commanded in person
by Lee and by Stuart, closed in with the enemy, there was little
manoeuvring of any description. It was an open attempt of Lee, by hard
fighting, to crush in the enemy's front, and force them back upon the
river. In this arduous struggle it is due to Stuart to say that his
generalship largely decided the event, and the high commendation which
he afterward received from General Lee justifies the statement. As his
lines went to the attack, his quick military eye discerned an elevated
point on his right, from which it appeared an artillery-fire woulden
filade the Federal line. About thirty pieces of cannon were at once
hastened to this point, and a destructive fire opened on the lines
of General Slocum, which threw his troops into great confusion. So
serious was this fire that General Slocum sent word to General Hooker
that his front was being swept away by it, to which the sullen
response was, "I cannot make soldiers or ammunition!"

General Hooker was indeed, it seems, at this moment in no mood to take
a hopeful view of affairs. The heavy assault of Jackson appears to
have as much demoralized the Federal commander as his troops. During
the night he had erected a semicircular line of works, in the form of
a redan, in his rear toward the river, behind which new works he no
doubt contemplated falling back. He now awaited the result of the
Southern attack, leaning against a pillar of the porch at the
Chancellorsville House, when a cannon-ball struck the pillar, throwing
it down, and so stunning the general as to prevent him from retaining
the command, which was delegated to General Couch.

[Illustration: Chancellorsville]

The fate of the day had now been decided. The right wing of the
Southern army, under Lee, had gradually extended its left to meet the
extension of Stuart's right; and this junction of the two wings having
been effected, Lee took personal command of all, and advanced his
whole front in a decisive assault. Before this the Federal front gave
way, and the disordered troops were huddled back--now only a confused
and disorganized mass--upon Chancellorsville. The Southern troops
pursued with yells, leaping over the earthworks, and driving all
before them. A scene of singular horror ensued. The Chancellorsville
House, which had been set on fire by shell, was seen to spout flame
from every window, and the adjoining woods had, in like manner, caught
fire, and were heard roaring over the dead and wounded of both sides
alike. The thicket had become the scene of the cruellest of all
agonies for the unfortunates unable to extricate themselves. The whole
spectacle in the vicinity of the Chancellorsville House, now in Lee's
possession, was frightful. Fire, smoke, blood, confused yells, and
dying groans, mingled to form the dark picture.

Lee had ridden to the front of his line, following up the enemy, and
as he passed before the troops they greeted him with one prolonged,
unbroken cheer, in which those wounded and lying upon the ground
united. In that cheer spoke the fierce joy of men whom the hard combat
had turned into blood-hounds, arousing all the ferocious instincts
of the human soul. Lee sat on his horse, motionless, near the
Chancellorsville House, his face and figure lit up by the glare of the
burning woods, and gave his first attention, even at this exciting
moment, to the unfortunates of both sides, wounded, and in danger of
being burned to death. While issuing his orders on this subject, a
note was brought to him from Jackson, congratulating him upon his
victory. After reading it, with evidences of much emotion, he turned
to the officer who had brought it and said: "Say to General Jackson
that the victory is his, and that the congratulation is due to him."

The Federal army had fallen back in disorder, by this time, toward
their second line. It was about ten o'clock in the morning, and
Chancellorsville was in Lee's possession.

FLANK MOVEMENT OF GENERAL SEDGWICK.

Lee hastened to bring the Southern troops into order again, and
succeeded in promptly reforming his line of battle, his front
extending, unbroken, along the Old Turnpike, facing the river.

His design was to press General Hooker, and reap those rich rewards of
victory to which the hard fighting of the men had entitled them. Of
the demoralized condition of the Federal forces there can be no doubt,
and the obvious course now was to follow up their retreat and endeavor
to drive them in disorder beyond the Rappahannock.

The order to advance upon the enemy was about to be given, when a
messenger from Fredericksburg arrived at full gallop, and communicated
intelligence which arrested the order just as it was on Lee's lips.

A considerable force of the enemy was advancing up the turnpike from
Fredericksburg, to fall upon his right flank, and upon his rear in
case he moved beyond Chancellorsville. The column was that of General
Sedgwick. This officer, it will be remembered, had been detached to
make a heavy demonstration at Fredericksburg, and was still at that
point, with his troops drawn up on the southern bank, three miles
below the city, on Saturday night, while Jackson was fighting. On that
morning General Hooker had sent for Reynolds's corps, but, even in
the absence of this force, General Sedgwick retained under him about
twenty-two thousand men; and this column was now ordered to storm the
heights at Fredericksburg, march up the turnpike, and attack Lee in
flank.

General Sedgwick received the order at eleven o'clock on Saturday
night, about the time when Jackson was carried wounded to the rear. He
immediately made his preparations to obey, and at daylight moved up
from below the city to storm the ridge at Marye's, and march straight
upon Chancellorsville. In the first assaults he failed, suffering
considerable loss from the fire of the Southern troops under General
Barksdale, commanding the line at that point; but, subsequently
forming an assaulting column for a straight rush at the hill, he went
forward with impetuosity; drove the Southern advanced line from behind
the "stone wall," which Generals Sumner and Hooker had failed in
reaching, and, about eleven in the morning, stormed Marye's Hill, and
killed, captured, or dispersed, the entire Southern force there. The
Confederates fought hand to hand over their guns with the enemy for
the possession of the crest, but their numbers were inadequate; the
entire surviving force fell back over the Telegraph road southward,
and General Sedgwick promptly advanced up the turnpike leading from
Fredericksburg to Chancellorsville, to assail General Lee.

It was the intelligence of this threatening movement which now reached
Lee, and induced him to defer further attack at the moment upon
General Hooker. He determined promptly to send a force against General
Sedgwick, and this resolution seems to have been based upon sound
military judgment. There was little to be feared now from General
Hooker, large as the force still was under that officer. He was
paralyzed for the time, and would not probably venture upon any
attempt to regain possession of Chancellorsville. With General
Sedgwick it was different. His column was comparatively fresh, was
flushed with victory, and numbered, even after his loss of one
thousand, more than twenty thousand men. Compared with the entire
Federal army, this force was merely a detachment, it was true, but it
was a detachment numbering as many men, probably, as the effective of
Lee's entire army at Chancellorsville. He had carried into that fight
about thirty-four thousand men. His losses had been heavy, and the
commands were much shaken. To have advanced under these circumstances
upon General Hooker, without regard to General Sedgwick's twenty
thousand troops, inspired by recent victory, would have resulted
probably in disaster.

These comments may detract from that praise of audacity accorded to
Lee in making this movement. It seems rather to have been the dictate
of common-sense; to have advanced upon General Hooker would have been
the audacity.

It was thus necessary to defer the final blow at the main Federal army
in his front, and General Lee promptly detached a force of about five
brigades to meet General Sedgwick, which, with Early's command, now in
rear of the Federal column, would, it was supposed, suffice.

This body moved speedily down the turnpike to check the enemy, and
encountered the head of his column about half-way, near Salem Church.
General Wilcox, who had been sent by Lee to watch Banks's Ford, had
already moved to bar the Federal advance. When the brigades sent by
Lee joined him, the whole force formed line of battle: a brisk action
ensued, continuing from about four in the afternoon until nightfall,
when the fighting ceased, and General Sedgwick made no further attempt
to advance on that day.

These events took place, as we have said, on Sunday afternoon, the
day of the Federal defeat at Chancellorsville. On Monday morning (May
4th), the theatre of action on the southern bank of the Rappahannock
presented a very remarkable complication. General Early had been
driven from the ridge at Fredericksburg; but no sooner had General
Sedgwick marched toward Chancellorsville, than Early returned and
seized upon Marye's Heights again. He was thus in General Sedgwick's
rear, and ready to prevent him from recrossing the Rappahannock at
Fredericksburg. Sedgwick meanwhile was moving to assail Lee's flank
and rear, and Lee was ready to attack General Hooker in front. Such
was the singular entanglement of the Northern and Southern forces on
Monday morning after the battle of Chancellorsville. What the result
was to be the hours of that day were now to decide.

Lee resolved first, if possible, to crush General Sedgwick, when it
was his design to return and make a decisive assault upon General
Hooker. In accordance with this plan, he on Monday morning went in
personal command of three brigades of Anderson's division, reached the
vicinity of Salem Church, and proceeded to form line of battle with
the whole force there. Owing to unforeseen delays, the attack was not
begun until late in the afternoon, when the whole line advanced upon
General Sedgwick, Lee's aim being to cut him off from the river. In
this he failed, the stubborn resistance of the Federal forces enabling
them to hold their ground until night. At that time, however, they
seemed to waver and lose heart, whether from receiving intelligence of
General Hooker's mishap, or from other causes, is not known. They were
now pressed by the Southern troops, and finally gave way. General
Sedgwick retreated rapidly but in good order to Banks's Ford, where a
pontoon had been fortunately laid, and this enabled him to cross his
men. The passage was effected under cover of darkness, the Southern
cannon firing upon the retreating column; and, with this, ended the
movement of General Sedgwick.

On Tuesday morning Lee returned with his men toward Chancellorsville,
and during the whole day was busily engaged in preparation for a
decisive attack upon General Hooker on the next morning.

When, however, the Southern sharp-shooters felt their way, at
daylight, toward the Federal position, it was found that the works
were entirely deserted.

General Hooker had recrossed the river, spreading pine-boughs on the
pontoon bridge to muffle the sound of his artillery-wheels.

So the great advance ended.




VII.

LEE'S GENERALSHIP AND PERSONAL DEMEANOR DURING THE CAMPAIGN.


The movements of the two armies in the Chancellorsville campaign, as
it is generally styled, have been so fully described in the foregoing
pages, that little comment upon them is here necessary. The main
feature which attracts attention, in surveying the whole series of
operations, is the boldness, amounting to apparent recklessness, of
Lee; and, first, the excellent generalship, and then the extraordinary
tissue of military errors, of General Hooker.

Up to the 1st of May, when he emerged from the Chancellorsville
thicket, every thing had succeeded with the Federal commander, and
deserved to succeed. He had successfully brought over his great force,
which he himself described as the "finest army on the planet," and
occupied strong ground east of Chancellorsville, on the road to
Fredericksburg. General Sedgwick was absent at the latter place with a
strong detachment of the army, but the main body covered Banks's Ford,
but twelve miles from the city, and by the afternoon of this day the
whole army might have been concentrated. Then the fate of Lee would
seem to have been decided. He had not only a very small army, but
that army was scattered, and liable to be cut off in detail. General
Sedgwick menaced his right at Fredericksburg--General Hooker was in
front of his left near Chancellorsville--and to crush one of these
wings before the other could come to its assistance seemed a work of
no very great difficulty. General Hooker appears, however, to have
distrusted his ability to effect this result, and, finding that
General Lee was advancing with his main body to attack him, retired,
from his strong position in the open country, to the dense thicket
around Chancellorsville. That this was a grave military error there
can be no doubt, as, by this retrograde movement, General Hooker not
only discouraged his troops, who had been elated by his confident and
inspiring general orders, but lost the great advantage of the open
country, where his large force could be successfully manoeuvred.

Lee took instant advantage of this fault in his adversary, and boldly
pressed the force retiring into the Wilderness, where, on the night
of the 1st of May, General Hooker was shut up with his army. This
unforeseen result presented the adversaries now in an entirely new
light. The Federal army, which had been promised by its commander
a speedy march upon Richmond in pursuit of Lee, had, instead of
advancing, made a backward movement; and Lee, who it had been supposed
would retreat, was now following and offering them battle.

The daring resolution of Lee, to divide his army and attack the
Federal right, followed. It would seem unjust to General Hooker
greatly to blame him for the success of that blow, which could not
have been reasonably anticipated. In determining upon this, one of
the most extraordinary movements of the war, General Lee proceeded in
defiance of military rules, and was only justified in his course by
the desperate character of the situation of affairs. It was impossible
to make any impression upon General Hooker's front or left, owing to
the elaborate defences in both quarters; it was, therefore, necessary
either to retire, or attack in a different direction. As a retreat,
however, upon Richmond would have surrendered to the enemy a large and
fertile tract of country, it was desirable, if possible, to avoid that
alternative; and the attack on the Federal right followed. The results
of this were truly extraordinary. The force routed and driven back in
disorder by General Jackson was but a single corps, and that corps, it
is said, not a legitimate part of the old Army of the Potomac; but the
disorder seems to have communicated itself to the whole army, and to
have especially discouraged General Hooker. In describing the scene
in question, we refrained from dwelling upon the full extent of the
confusion into which the Federal forces were thrown: some sentences,
taken from Northern accounts, may lead to a better understanding of
the result. After Jackson's assault, a Northern historian says: "The
open plain around Chancellorsville presented such a spectacle as
a simoom sweeping over the desert might make. Through the dusk of
nightfall a rushing whirlwind of men and artillery and wagons swept
down the road, past headquarters, and on toward the fords of the
Rappahannock; and it was in vain that the staff opposed their persons
and drawn sabres to the panic-stricken fugitives." Another writer, an
eye-witness, says the spectacle presented was that of "solid columns
of infantry retreating at double-quick; a dense mass of beings flying;
hundreds of cavalry-horses, left riderless at the first discharge from
the rebels, dashing frantically about in all directions; scores of
batteries flying from the field; battery-wagons, ambulances, horses,
men, cannon, caissons, all jumbled and tumbled together in one
inextricable mass--the stampede universal, the disgrace general."

After all, however, it was but one corps of the Federal army which
had been thus thrown into disorder, and General Hooker had no valid
grounds for distrusting his ability to defeat Lee in a more decisive
action. There are many reasons for coming to the conclusion that he
did from that moment distrust his powers. He had courageously hastened
to the assailed point, ordering the men to "throw themselves into the
breach," and receive Jackson's troops "on the bayonet;" but, after
this display of soldierly resolution, General Hooker appears to have
lost some of that nerve which should never desert a soldier, and on
the same night sent engineers to trace out a new line of defences in
his rear, to which, it seems, he already contemplated the probability
of being forced to retire. Why he came to take this depressed view
of the situation of affairs, it is difficult to say. One of General
Sedgwick's corps reached him on this night, and his force at
Chancellorsville still amounted to between ninety and one hundred
thousand men, about thrice that of Lee. No decisive trial of strength
had yet taken place between the two armies; and yet the larger force
was constructing defences in rear to protect them from the smaller--a
circumstance not tending, it would seem, to greatly encourage the
troops whose commander was thus providing for a safe retreat.

The subsequent order to General Sedgwick to march up from
Fredericksburg and assail Lee's right was judicious, and really
saved the army from a great disaster. Lee was about to follow up the
discouraged forces of General Hooker as they fell back toward the
river; and, as the Southern army was flushed with victory, the
surrender of the great body might have ensued. This possible result
was prevented by the flank movement of General Sedgwick, and some
gratitude for assistance so important from his able lieutenant would
have seemed natural and graceful in General Hooker. This view of the
subject does not seem, however, to have been taken by the Federal
commander. He subsequently charged the defeat of Chancellorsville upon
General Sedgwick, who he declared had "failed in a prompt compliance
with his orders."[1] The facts do not bear out this charge, as the
reader has seen. General Sedgwick received the order toward midnight
on Saturday, and, at eleven o'clock on Sunday morning, had passed
over that stubborn "stone wall" which, in the battle of the preceding
December, General Hooker's column had not even been able to reach;
had stormed Marye's Hill, which General Hooker had described, in
vindication of his own failure to carry the position, as "masonry," "a
fortification," and "a mountain of rock;" and had marched thereafter
so promptly as to force Lee, in his own defence, to arrest the second
advance upon the Federal main body, and divert a considerable force to
meet the attack on his flank.

[Footnote 1: General Hooker in Report of the Committee on the Conduct
of the War, Part I., page 130. This great collection is a valuable
repository of historic details, and contains the explanation of many
interesting questions.]

After the repulse of General Sedgwick, and his retreat across
the Rappahannock, General Hooker seems to have been completely
discouraged, and hastened to put the river between himself and Lee.
His losses in the battles of Saturday and Sunday had amounted to
seventeen thousand one hundred and ninety-seven killed and wounded and
missing, fourteen pieces of artillery, and twenty thousand stand
of arms. The Confederate loss was ten thousand two hundred and
eighty-one. Contrary to the ordinary course of things the assailing
force had lost a less number of men than that assailed.

The foregoing reflections, which necessarily involve a criticism of
General Hooker, arise naturally from a review of the events of the
campaign, and seem justified by the circumstances. There can be no
inducement for the present writer to underrate the military ability of
the Federal commander, as that want of ability rather detracts from
than adds to the merit of General Lee in defeating him. It may be
said, indeed, that without these errors and shortcomings of General
Hooker, Lee, humanly speaking, must have been either defeated or
forced to retire upon Richmond.

After giving full weight, however, to all the advantages derived from
the extraordinary Federal oversights and mistakes, General Lee's merit
in this campaign was greater, perhaps, than in any other during his
entire career. Had he left behind him no other record than this, it
alone would have been sufficient to have conferred upon him the first
glories of arms, and handed his name down to posterity as that of one
of the greatest soldiers of history. It is difficult to discover a
single error committed by him, in the whole series of movements, from
the moment when General Sedgwick crossed at Fredericksburg, to the
time of General Hooker's retreat beyond the Rappahannock. It may
appear that there was unnecessary delay in permitting Tuesday to pass
without a final advance upon General Hooker, in his second line of
intrenchments; but, no doubt, many circumstances induced Lee to defer
this attack--the fatigue of his troops, consequent upon the fighting
of the four preceding days, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday; the
necessity of reforming his battalions for the final blow; and the
anticipation that General Hooker, who still had at his command a
force of more than one hundred thousand men, would not so promptly
relinquish his campaign, and retire.

With the exception of this error, if it be such, Lee had made no
single false step in the whole of his movements. The campaign was
round, perfect, and complete--such as a student of the art of war
might pore over, and analyze as an instance of the greatest principles
of military science "clothed in act." The most striking features of
Lee's movements were their rapidity and audacity. It had been the
fashion with some persons to speak of Lee as slow and cautious in his
operations, and this criticism had not been completely silenced even
in the winter of 1862, when his failure to crush General Burnside
afforded his detractors another opportunity of repeating the old
charge. After the Chancellorsville campaign these fault-finders were
silenced--no one could be found to listen to them. The whole
Southern movement completely contradicted their theory. At the first
intelligence of the advance of General Hooker's main body across the
upper Rappahannock, Lee rode rapidly in that direction, and ordered
his troops at the fords of the river to fall back to Chancellorsville.
He then returned, and, finding that General Sedgwick had crossed at
Fredericksburg, held a prompt consultation with Jackson, when it was
decided at once to concentrate the main body of the army in front of
General Hooker's column. At the word, Jackson moved; Lee followed. On
the 1st of May, the enemy were pressed back upon Chancellorsville; on
the 2d, his right was crushed, and his army thrown into confusion; on
the 3d, he was driven from Chancellorsville, and, but for the flank
movement of General Sedgwick, which Lee was not in sufficient force to
prevent, General Hooker would, upon that same day, Sunday, have in all
probability suffered a decisive defeat.

In the course of four days Lee had thus advanced, and checked, and
then attacked and repulsed with heavy slaughter, an army thrice
as large as his own. On the last day of April he had been nearly
enveloped by a host of about one hundred and twenty thousand men. On
the 3d day of May their main body was in disorderly retreat; and at
daylight on the morning of the 6th there was not a Federal soldier,
with the exception of the prisoners taken, on the southern bank of the
Rappahannock.

During all these critical scenes, when the fate of the Confederate
capital, and possibly of the Southern cause, hung suspended in the
balance, General Lee preserved, as thousands of persons can testify,
the most admirable serenity and composure, without that jubilant
confidence displayed by General Hooker in his address to the troops,
and the exclamations to his officers. Lee was equally free from gloom
or any species of depression. His spirits seemed to rise under the
pressure upon him, and at times he was almost gay. When one of General
Jackson's aides hastened into his tent near Fredericksburg, and with
great animation informed him that the enemy were crossing the
river, in heavy force in his front, he seemed to be amused by that
circumstance, and said, smiling: "Well, I _heard_ firing, and I was
beginning to think it was time some of you lazy young fellows were
coming to tell me what it was all about. Say to General Jackson that
he knows just as well what to do with the enemy as I do."

The commander-in-chief who could find time at such a moment to
indulge in _badinage_, must have possessed excellent nerve; and this
composure, mingled with a certain buoyant hopefulness, as of one sure
of the event, remained with Lee throughout the whole great wrestle
with General Hooker. He retained to the end his simple and quiet
manner, divested of every thing like excitement. In the consultation
with Jackson, on the night of the 1st of May, when the crisis was so
critical, his demeanor indicated no anxiety; and when, as we have
said, the news came of Jackson's wound, he said simply, "Sit
down here, by me, captain, and tell me all about the fight last
evening"--adding, "Ah! captain, any victory is dearly bought which
deprives us of the services of General Jackson even for a short
time. Don't talk about it--thank God, it is no worse!" The turns of
expression here are those of a person who permits nothing to disturb
his serenity, and indulges his gentler and tenderer feelings even
in the hot atmosphere of a great conflict. The picture presented is
surely an interesting and beautiful one. The human being who uttered
the good-natured criticism at the expense of the "lazy young fellows,"
and who greeted the news of Jackson's misfortune with a sigh as tender
as that of a woman, was the soldier who had "seized the masses of his
force with the grasp of a Titan, and swung them into position as a
giant might fling a mighty stone." To General Hooker's threat to crush
him, he had responded by crushing General Hooker; nearly surrounded by
the huge cordon of the Federal army, he had cut the cordon and emerged
in safety. General Hooker with his one hundred thousand men had
retreated to the north bank of the Rappahannock, and, on the south
bank, Lee with his thirty thousand remained erect, threatening, and
triumphant.

We have not presented in these pages the orders of Lee, on various
occasions, as these papers are for the most part of an "official"
character, and not of great interest to the general reader. We shall,
however, occasionally present these documents, and here lay before the
reader the orders of both General Hooker and General Lee, after the
battle of Chancellorsville, giving precedence to the former. The order
of the Federal commander was as follows:

    HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF THE POTOMAC, _May_ 6,1863.

    The major-general commanding tenders to this army his
    congratulations on its achievements of the last seven days. If it
    has not accomplished all that was expected, the reasons are
    well known to the army. It is sufficient to say, they were of a
    character not to be foreseen or prevented by human sagacity or
    resources.

    In withdrawing from the south bank of the Rappahannock, before
    delivering a general battle to our adversaries, the army has given
    renewed evidence in its confidence in itself, and its fidelity to
    the principles it represents.

    By fighting at a disadvantage, we would have been recreant to our
    trust, to ourselves, to our cause, and to our country. Profoundly
    loyal, and conscious of its strength, the Army of the Potomac will
    give or decline battle whenever its interests or honor may command
    it.

    By the celerity and secrecy of our movements, our advance and
    passage of the river were undisputed, and on our withdrawal not
    a rebel dared to follow us. The events of the last week may well
    cause the heart of every officer and soldier of the army to swell
    with pride.

    We have added new laurels to our former renown. We have made long
    marches, crossed rivers, surprised the enemy in his intrenchments,
    and, whenever we have fought, we have inflicted heavier blows than
    those we have received.

    We have taken from the enemy five thousand prisoners, and fifteen
    colors, captured seven pieces of artillery, and placed _hors de
    combat_ eighteen thousand of our foe's chosen troops.

    We have destroyed his depots filled with vast amounts of stores,
    damaged his communications, captured prisoners within the
    fortifications of his capital, and filled his country with fear
    and consternation.

    We have no other regret than that caused by the loss of our brave
    companions, and in this we are consoled by the conviction that
    they have fallen in the holiest cause ever submitted to the
    arbitration of battle.

    By command of Major-General HOOKER:

    S. WILLIAMS, _Assistant Adjutant-General_

General Lee's order was as follows:

    HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA,

    _May_ 7,1863.

    With heart-felt gratification, the general commanding expresses to
    the army his sense of the heroic conduct displayed by officers and
    men during the arduous operations in which they have just been
    engaged.

    Under trying vicissitudes of heat and storm you attacked the
    enemy, strongly intrenched in the depths of a tangled wilderness,
    and again on the hills of Fredericksburg, fifteen miles distant,
    and by the valor that has triumphed on so many fields forced him
    once more to seek safety beyond the Rappahannock. While this
    glorious victory entitles you to the praise and gratitude of the
    nation, we are especially called upon to return our grateful
    thanks to the only Giver of victory, for the signal deliverances
    He has wrought.

    It is therefore earnestly recommended that the troops unite on
    Sunday next in ascribing unto the Lord of hosts the glory due unto
    His name.

    Let us not forget, in our rejoicing, the brave soldiers who have
    fallen in defence of their country; and, while we mourn their
    loss, let us resolve to emulate their noble example.

    The army and the country alike lament the absence for a time of
    one to whose bravery, energy, and skill, they are so much indebted
    for success.

    The following letter from the President of the Confederate States
    is communicated to the army, as an expression of his appreciation
    of their success:

    "I have received your dispatch, and reverently unite with you in
    giving praise to God for the success with which He has crowned our
    arms. In the name of the people I offer my cordial thanks, and the
    troops under your command, for this addition to the unprecedented
    series of great victories which our army has achieved. The
    universal rejoicing produced by this happy result will be mingled
    with a general regret for the good and the brave who are numbered
    among the killed and the wounded."

    R.E. LEE, _General_.




VIII.

PERSONAL RELATIONS OF LEE AND JACKSON.


The most important incident of the great battle of Chancellorsville
was the fall of Jackson. The services of this illustrious soldier had
now become almost indispensable to General Lee, who spoke of him
as his "right arm;" and the commander-in-chief had so long been
accustomed to lean upon the strong shoulder of his lieutenant, that
now, when this support was withdrawn, he seems to have felt the loss
of it profoundly.

In the war, indeed, there had arisen no soldier who so powerfully drew
the public eye as Jackson. In the opinion of many persons, he was a
greater and abler commander than Lee himself; and, although such
an opinion will not be found to stand after a full review of the
characters and careers of the two leaders, there was sufficient ground
for it to induce many fair and intelligent persons to adopt it.
Jackson had been almost uniformly successful. He had conducted to a
triumphant issue the arduous campaign of the Valley, where he was
opposed in nearly every battle by a force much larger than his own;
and these victories, in a quarter so important, and at a moment so
critical, had come, borne on the wind of the mountain, to electrify
and inspire the hearts of the people of Richmond and the entire
Confederacy. Jackson's rapid march and assault on General McClellan's
right on the Chickahominy had followed; he then advanced northward,
defeated the vanguard of the enemy at Cedar Mountain, led the great
column of Lee against the rear of General Pope, destroyed Manassas,
held his ground until Lee arrived, and bore an important part in the
battle which ensued. Thence he had passed to Maryland, fallen upon
Harper's Ferry and captured it, returned to fight with Lee at
Sharpsburg, and in that battle had borne the brunt of the enemy's main
assault with an unbroken front. That the result was a drawn battle,
and not a Southern defeat, was due to Lee's generalship and Jackson's
fighting. The retrograde movement to the lowland followed, and Jackson
was left in the Valley to embarrass McClellan's advance. In this he
perfectly succeeded, and then suddenly reappeared at Fredericksburg,
where he received and repulsed one of the two great assaults of the
enemy. The battle of Chancellorsville followed, and Lee's statement
of the part borne in this hard combat by Jackson has been given. The
result was due, he said, not to his own generalship, but to the skill
and energy of his lieutenant, whose congratulations he refused to
receive, declaring that the victory was Jackson's.

Here had at last ended the long series of nearly unbroken victories.
Jackson had become the _alter ego_ of Lee, and it is not difficult
to understand the sense of loss felt by the commander-in-chief. In
addition to this natural sentiment, was deep regret at the death of
one personally dear to him, and to whom he was himself an object of
almost reverent love. The personal relations of Lee and Jackson had,
from first to last, remained the same--not the slightest cloud had
ever arisen to disturb the perfect union in each of admiration and
affection for the other. It had never occurred to these two great
soldiers to ask what their relative position was in the public
eye--which was most spoken of and commended or admired. Human nature
is weak at best, and the fame of Jackson, mounting to its dazzling
zenith, might have disturbed a less magnanimous soul than Lee's. There
is not, however, the slightest reason to believe that Lee ever gave
the subject a thought. Entirely free from that vulgar species of
ambition which looks with cold eyes upon the success of others, as
offensive to its own _amour-propre_ Lee never seems to have instituted
any comparison between himself and Jackson--greeted praise of his
famous lieutenant with sincere pleasure--and was the first upon
every occasion, not only to express the fullest sense of Jackson's
assistance, and the warmest admiration of his genius as a soldier, but
to attribute to him, as after the battle of Chancellorsville, _all_
the merit of every description.

It is not possible to contemplate this august affection and admiration
of the two soldiers for each other, without regarding it as a greater
glory to them than all their successes in arms. Lee's opinion of
Jackson, and personal sentiment toward him, have been set forth in the
above sentences. The sentiment of Jackson for Lee was as strong or
stronger. He regarded him with mingled love and admiration. To excite
such feelings in a man like Jackson, it was necessary that Lee should
be not only a soldier of the first order of genius, but also a good
and pious man. It was in these lights that Jackson regarded his
commander, and from first to last his confidence in and admiration for
him never wavered. He had defended Lee from the criticism of unskilled
or ignorant persons, from the time when he assumed command of the
army, in the summer of 1862. At that time some one spoke of Lee, in
Jackson's presence, as "slow." The criticism aroused the indignation
of the silent soldier, and he exclaimed: "General Lee is _not_ 'slow.'
No one knows the weight upon his heart--his great responsibilities.
He is commander-in-chief, and he knows that, if an army is lost, it
cannot be replaced. No! there may be some persons whose good opinion
of me may make them attach some weight to my views, and, if you ever
hear that said of General Lee, I beg you will contradict it in my
name. I have known General Lee for five-and-twenty years. He is
cautious. He ought to be. But he is _not_ 'slow.' Lee is a phenomenon.
He is the only man whom I would follow blindfold!"

The abrupt and energetic expressions of Jackson on this occasion
indicate his profound sense of the injustice done Lee by these
criticisms; and it would be difficult to imagine a stronger statement
than that here made by him. It will be conceded that he himself was
competent to estimate soldiership, and in Jackson's eyes Lee was
"a phenomenon--the only man whom he would follow blindfold." The
subsequent career of Lee seems to have strengthened and intensified
this extreme admiration. What Lee advised or did was always in
Jackson's eyes the very best that could be suggested or performed. He
yielded his own opinions, upon every occasion, with perfect readiness
and cheerfulness to those of Lee, as to the master-mind; loved him,
revered him, looked up to him, and never seems to have found fault
with him but upon one occasion--when he received Lee's note of
congratulation after Chancellorsville. He then said: "General Lee is
very kind; but he should give the glory to God."

This affection and admiration were fully returned by General Lee, who
consulted Jackson upon every occasion, and confided in him as his
personal friend. There was seldom any question between them of
superior and subordinate--never, except when the exigency required
that the decision should be made by Lee as commander-in-chief.
Jackson's supreme genius, indeed, made this course natural, and no
further praise is due Lee in this particular, save that of modesty and
good sense; but these qualities are commendable and not universal.
He committed the greatest undertakings to Jackson with the utmost
confidence, certain that he would do all that could be done; and some
words of his quoted above express this entire confidence. "Say
to General Jackson," he replied to the young staff-officer at
Fredericksburg, "that he knows just as well what to do with the enemy
as I do."

Lee's personal affection was strikingly displayed after the battle
of Chancellorsville, when Jackson lay painfully, but no one supposed
mortally, wounded, first at Wilderness Tavern, and then at Ginney's.
Prevented from visiting the wounded man, by the responsibilities of
command, now all the greater from Jackson's absence, and not regarding
his hurt as serious, as indeed it did not appear to be until toward
the last, Lee sent him continual messages containing good wishes
and inquiries after his health. The tone of these messages is very
familiar and affectionate, and leaves no doubt of the character of the
relations between the two men.

"Give him my affectionate regards," he said to one officer, "and tell
him to make haste and get well, and come back to me as soon as he can.
He has lost his left arm, but I have lost my right."

When the wound of the great soldier took a bad turn, and it began to
be whispered about that the hurt might prove fatal, Lee was strongly
moved, and said with deep feeling: "Surely General Jackson must
recover! God will not take him from us, now that we need him so much.
Surely he will be spared to us, in answer to the many prayers which
are offered for him!"

He paused after uttering these words, laboring evidently under very
deep and painful emotion. After remaining silent for some moments,
he added: "When you return I trust you will find him better. When
a suitable occasion offers, give him my love, and tell him that I
wrestled in prayer for him last night, as I never prayed, I believe,
for myself."

The tone of these messages is, as we have said, that of familiar
affection, as from one valued friend to another. The expression, "Give
him my love," is a Virginianism, which is used only when two persons
are closely and firmly bound by long association and friendship. Such
had been the case with Lee and Jackson, and in the annals of the war
there is no other instance of a friendship so close, affectionate, and
unalloyed.

Jackson died on the 10th of May, and the unexpected intelligence
shocked Lee profoundly. He mourned the death of the illustrious
soldier with a sorrow too deep almost to find relief in tears; and
issued a general order to the troops, which was in the following
words:

    With deep grief the commanding general announces to the army the
    death of Lieutenant-General T.J. Jackson, who expired on the 10th
    inst., at quarter-past three P.M. The daring, skill, and energy
    of this great and good soldier, by the decree of an All-wise
    Providence, are now lost to us. But, while we mourn his death, we
    feel that his spirit still lives, and will inspire the whole army
    with his indomitable courage and unshaken confidence in God, as
    our hope and strength. Let his name be a watchword to his corps,
    who have followed him to victory on so many fields. Let his
    officers and soldiers emulate his invincible determination to
    do every thing in defence of our beloved country. R.E. LEE,
    _General_.

It is probable that the composition of this order cost General Lee one
of the severest pangs he ever experienced.




IX.

CIRCUMSTANCES LEADING TO THE INVASION OF PENNSYLVANIA.


The defeat of General Hooker at Chancellorsville was the turning-point
of the war, and for the first time there was apparently a possibility
of inducing the Federal Government to relinquish its opposition to the
establishment of a separate authority in the South. The idea of the
formation of a Southern Confederacy, distinct from the old Union, had,
up to this time, been repudiated by the authorities at Washington as a
thing utterly out of the question; but the defeat of the Federal arms
in the two great battles of the Rappahannock had caused the most
determined opponents of separation to doubt whether the South could
be coerced to return to the Union; and, what was equally or more
important, the proclamations of President Lincoln, declaring the
slaves of the South free, and placing the United States virtually
under martial law, aroused a violent clamor from the great Democratic
party of the North, who loudly asserted that all constitutional
liberty was disappearing.

This combination of non-success in military affairs and usurpation by
the Government emboldened the advocates of peace to speak out plainly,
and utter their protest against the continuance of the struggle,
which they declared had only resulted in the prostration of all
the liberties of the country. Journals and periodicals, violently
denunciatory of the course pursued by the Government, all at once made
their appearance in New York and elsewhere. A peace convention was
called to meet in Philadelphia. Mr. Vallandigham, nominee of the
Democratic party for Governor of Ohio, eloquently denounced the whole
policy of endeavoring to subjugate the sovereign States of the South;
and Judge Curtis, of Boston, formerly Associate Judge of the Supreme
Court of the United States, published a pamphlet in which the Federal
President was stigmatized as a usurper and tyrant. "I do not see,"
wrote Judge Curtis, "that it depends upon the Executive decree whether
a servile war shall be invoked to help twenty millions of the white
race to assert the rightful authority of the Constitution and laws of
their country over those who refuse to obey them. But I do see that
this proclamation" (emancipating the Southern slaves) "asserts the
power of the Executive to make such a decree! I do not perceive how it
is that my neighbors and myself, residing remote from armies and their
operations, and where all the laws of the land may be enforced by
constitutional means, should be subjected to the possibility of
arrest and imprisonment and trial before a military commission, and
punishment at its discretion, for offences unknown to the law--a
possibility to be converted into a fact at the mere will of the
President, or of some subordinate officer, clothed by him with this
power. But I do perceive that this Executive power is asserted.... It
must be obvious to the meanest capacity that, if the President of
the United States has an _implied_ constitutional right, as
Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy, in time of war, to disregard
any one positive prohibition of the Constitution, or to exercise any
one power not delegated to the United States by the Constitution,
because in his judgment he may thereby 'best subdue the enemy,' he
has the same right, for the same reason, to disregard each and every
provision of the Constitution, and to exercise all power _needful in
his opinion_ to enable him 'best to subdue the enemy.' ... The time
has certainly come when the people of the United States _must_
understand and _must_ apply those great rules of civil liberty which
have been arrived at by the self-devoted efforts of thought and action
of their ancestors during seven hundred years of struggle against
arbitrary power."

So far had reached the thunder of Lee's guns at Chancellorsville.
Their roar seemed to have awakened throughout the entire North the
great party hitherto lulled to slumber by the plea of "military
necessity," or paralyzed by the very extent of the Executive
usurpation which they saw, but had not had heart to oppose. On all
sides the advocates of peace on the basis of separation were heard
raising their importunate voices; and in the North the hearts of the
people began to thrill with the anticipation of a speedy termination
of the bloody and exhausting struggle. The occasion was embraced by
Mr. Stephens, Vice-President of the Confederate States, to propose
negotiations. This able gentleman wrote from Georgia on the 12th of
June to President Davis, offering to go to Washington and sound the
authorities there on the subject of peace. He believed that the moment
was propitious, and wished to act before further military movements
were undertaken--especially before any further projects of invasion by
Lee--which would tend, he thought, to silence the peace party at the
North, and again arouse the war spirit. The letter of Mr. Stephens
was written on the 12th of June, and President Davis responded by
telegraph a few days afterward, requesting Mr. Stephens to come to
Richmond. He reached that city on the 22d or 23d of June, but by that
time Lee's vanguard was entering Maryland, and Gettysburg speedily
followed, which terminated all hopes of peace.

The plan of moving the Southern army northward, with the view of
invading the Federal territory, seems to have been the result of many
circumstances. The country was elated with the two great victories of
Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, and the people were clamorous for
active operations against an enemy who seemed powerless to stand the
pressure of Southern steel. The army, which had been largely augmented
by the return of absentees to its ranks, new levies, and the recall
of Longstreet's two divisions from Suffolk, shared the general
enthusiasm; and thus a very heavy pressure was brought to bear upon
the authorities and on General Lee, in favor of a forward movement,
which, it was supposed, would terminate in a signal victory and a
treaty of peace.

Lee yielded to this view of things rather than urged it. He was not
opposed to an offensive policy, and seems, indeed, to have shared the
opinion of Jackson that "the Scipio Africanus policy" was the best for
the South. His theory from the beginning of the war had been, that the
true policy of the South was to keep the enemy as far as possible
from the interior, fighting on the frontier or on Federal soil, if
possible. That of the South would there thus be protected from the
ravages of the enemy, and the further advantage would accrue, that the
Confederate capital, Richmond, would at all times be safe from danger.
This was an important consideration, as events subsequently showed.
As long as the enemy were held at arm's-length, north of the
Rappahannock, Richmond, with her net-work of railroads connecting with
every part of the South, was safe, and the Government, undisturbed in
their capital, remained a power in the eyes of the world. But, with an
enemy enveloping the city, and threatening her lines of communication,
the tenure of the place by the Government was uncertain. When General
Grant finally thus enveloped the city, and laid hold upon the
railroads, Lee's army was defeated, and the Government became
fugitive, which alone would have struck a mortal blow to its prestige
and authority.

It was to arrive at these results, which his sagacity discerned, that
Lee always advocated such movements as would throw back the enemy, and
drive him, if possible, from the soil of Virginia. Another important
consideration was the question of supplies. These were at all times
deficient in the Confederate armies, and it was obviously the best
policy to protect as much territory, from which supplies might be
drawn, as possible. More than ever before, these supplies were now
needed; and when General Lee sent, in May or June, a requisition for
rations to Richmond, the commissary-general is said to have endorsed
upon the paper, "If General Lee wishes rations, let him seek them in
Pennsylvania."

The considerations here stated were the main inducements for
that great movement northward which followed the battle of
Chancellorsville. The army and country were enthusiastic; the
Government rather followed than led; and, throughout the month of May,
Lee was busily engaged in organizing and equipping his forces for the
decisive advance. Experience had now dictated many alterations and
improvements in the army. It was divided into three _corps d'armée_,
each consisting of three divisions, and commanded by an officer with
the rank of lieutenant-general. Longstreet remained at the head of his
former corps, Ewell succeeded Jackson in command of "Jackson's old
corps," and A.P. Hill was assigned to a third corps made up of
portions of the two others. The infantry was thus rearranged in a
manner to increase greatly its efficiency, and the artillery arm
was entirely reorganized. The old system of assigning one or more
batteries or battalions to each division or corps was done away with,
and the artillery of the army was made a distinct command, and placed
under General W.N. Pendleton, a brave and energetic officer, who was
thenceforward Lee's "chief of artillery." The last arm, the cavalry,
was also increased in efficiency; and, on the last day of May,
General Lee had the satisfaction of finding himself in command of a
well-equipped and admirably-officered army of sixty-eight thousand
three hundred and fifty-two bayonets, and nearly ten thousand cavalry
and artillery--in all, about eighty thousand men. Never before had
the Southern army had present for duty, as fighting men, so large a
number, except just before the battles on the Chickahominy. There was,
however, this great difference between the army then and at this time:
in those first months of 1862, it was made up largely of raw troops
who had never heard the discharge of a musket in their lives: while
now, in May, 1863 the bulk of the army consisted of Lee's veterans,
men who had followed him through the fire of Manassas, Sharpsburg,
Fredericksburg, and Chancellorsville, and could be counted on
to effect any thing not absolutely beyond human power. General
Longstreet, conversing after the war with a gentleman of the North,
declared as much. The army at that time, he said, was in a condition
to undertake _any thing_.




X.

LEE'S PLANS AND OBJECTS.


The great game of chess was now about to commence, and, taking an
illustration from that game, General Lee is reported to have said that
he believed he would "swap queens," that is, advance and attempt to
capture the city of Washington, leaving General Hooker at liberty, if
he chose so to do, to seize in turn upon Richmond. What the result of
so singular a manoeuvre would have been, it is impossible to say; it
would certainly have proved one of the strangest incidents of a war
fruitful in varied and shifting events.

Such a plan of operations, however, if ever seriously contemplated
by Lee, was speedily abandoned. He nowhere makes mention of any such
design in his published reports, and he probably spoke of it only in
jest. His real aim in the great movement now about to commence, is
stated with brevity and reserve--then absolutely necessary--but also
with sufficient clearness, in his official report. The position of
the enemy opposite Fredericksburg was, he says, such as to render an
attack upon him injudicious. It was, therefore, desirable to manoeuvre
him out of it--force him to return toward Maryland--and thus free
the country of his forces. A further result was expected from this
movement. The lower Shenandoah Valley was occupied by the enemy under
General Milroy, who, with his headquarters at Winchester, harassed the
whole region, which he ruled with a rod of iron. With the withdrawal
of the Federal army under General Hooker, and before the advance of
the Confederates, General Milroy would also disappear, and the fertile
fields of the Valley be relieved. The whole force of the enemy would
thus, says Lee, "be compelled to leave Virginia, and possibly to draw
to its support troops designed to operate against other parts of the
country." He adds: "In this way it was supposed that the enemy's plan
of campaign for the summer would be broken up, and part of the season
of active operations be consumed in the formation of new combinations
and the preparations that they would require. In addition to these
advantages, it was hoped that other valuable results might be attained
by military success," that is to say, by a battle which Lee intended
to fight when circumstances were favorable. That he expected to fight,
not merely to manoeuvre the enemy from Virginia, is apparent from
another sentence of the report. "It was thought," he says, "that the
corresponding movements on the part of the enemy, to which those
contemplated by us would probably give rise, might _offer a fair
opportunity to strike a blow at the army therein, commanded by General
Hooker_" the word "therein" referring to the region "north of the
Potomac." In the phrase, "other valuable results which might be
attained by military success," the reference is plainly to the
termination of the contest by a treaty of peace, based upon the
independence of the South.

These sentences, taken from the only publication ever made by Lee
on the subject of the Gettysburg campaign, express guardedly, but
distinctly, his designs. He aimed to draw General Hooker north of the
Potomac, clear the Valley, induce the enemy to send troops in other
quarters to the assistance of the main Federal army, and, when the
moment came, attack General Hooker, defeat him if possible, and thus
end the war. That a decisive defeat of the Federal forces at that time
in Maryland or Pennsylvania, would have virtually put an end to the
contest, there seems good reason to believe. Following the Southern
victories of Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, a third bloody
disaster would, in all human probability, have broken the resolution
of the Federal authorities. With Lee thundering at the gates of
Washington or Philadelphia, and with the peace party encouraged to
loud and importunate protest, it is not probable that the war would
have continued. Intelligent persons in the North are said to have so
declared, since the war, and the declaration seems based upon good
sense.

Before passing from this necessary preface to the narrative of events,
it is proper to add that, in the contemplated battle with General
Hooker, when he had drawn him north of the Potomac, Lee did not intend
to assume a _tactical offensive_, but to force the Federal commander,
if possible, to make the attack. [Footnote: "It had not been intended
to fight a general battle at such a distance from our base, unless
attacked by the enemy."--_Lee's Report_] From this resolution he was
afterward induced by circumstances to depart, and the result is known.

What is above written will convey to the reader a clear conception of
Lee's views and intentions in undertaking his last great offensive
campaign; and we now proceed to the narrative of the movements of the
two armies, and the battle of Gettysburg.




XI.

THE CAVALRY-FIGHT AT FLEETWOOD.


Lee began his movement northward on the 3d day of June, just one month
after the battle of Chancellorsville. From this moment to the time
when his army was concentrated in the vicinity of Gettysburg, his
operations were rapid and energetic, but with a cautious regard to the
movements of the enemy.

Pursuing his design of manoeuvring the Federal army out of Virginia,
without coming to action, Lee first sent forward one division of
Longstreet's corps in the direction of Culpepper, another then
followed, and, on the 4th and 5th of June, Ewell's entire corps was
sent in the same direction--A.P. Hill remaining behind on the south
bank of the Rappahannock, near Fredericksburg, to watch the enemy
there, and bar the road to Richmond. These movements became speedily
known to General Hooker, whose army lay north of the river near that
point, and on the 5th he laid a pontoon just below Fredericksburg,
and crossed about a corps to the south bank, opposite Hill. This
threatening demonstration, however, was not suffered by Lee to arrest
his own movements. Seeing that the presence of the enemy there was
"intended for the purpose of observation rather than attack," and only
aimed to check his operations, he continued the withdrawal of his
troops, by way of Culpepper, in the direction of the Shenandoah
Valley.

A brilliant pageant, succeeded by a dramatic and stirring incident,
was now to prelude the march of Lee into the enemy's territory. On
the 8th of June, the day of the arrival of Lee's head of column in
Culpepper, a review of Stuart's cavalry took place in a field east of
the court-house. The review was a picturesque affair. General Lee was
present, sitting his horse, motionless, on a little knoll--the erect
figure half concealed by the short cavalry-cape falling from his
shoulders, and the grave face overshadowed by the broad gray
hat--while above him, from a lofty pole, waved the folds of a large
Confederate flag. The long column of about eight thousand cavalry was
first drawn up in line, and afterward passed in front of Lee at a
gallop--Stuart and his staff-officers leading the charge with sabres
at tierce point, a species of military display highly attractive to
the gallant and joyous young commander. The men then charged in mimic
battle the guns of the "Stuart Horse-Artillery," which were posted
upon an adjoining hill; and, as the column of cavalry approached,
the artillerists received them with a thunderous discharge of blank
ammunition, which rolled like the roar of actual battle among the
surrounding hills. This sham-fight was kept up for some time, and no
doubt puzzled the enemy on the opposite shore of the Rappahannock. On
the next morning--either in consequence of a design formed before the
review, or to ascertain what this discharge of artillery meant--two
divisions of Federal cavalry, supported by two brigades of "picked
infantry," were sent across the river at Kelly's and Beverley's Fords,
east of the court-house, to beat up the quarters of Stuart and find
what was going on in the Southern camps.

The most extensive cavalry-fight, probably, of the whole war,
followed. One of Stuart's brigades, near Beverley's Ford, was nearly
surprised and resolutely attacked at daylight by Buford's division,
which succeeded in forcing back the brigade a short distance toward
the high range called Fleetwood Hill, in the rear. From this eminence,
where his headquarters were established, Stuart went to the front at a
swift gallop, opened a determined fire of artillery and sharp-shooters
upon the advancing enemy, and sent Hampton's division to attack them
on their left. Meanwhile, however, the enemy were executing a rapid
and dangerous movement against Stuart's, rear. General Gregg,
commanding the second Federal cavalry division, crossed at Kelly's
Ford below, passed the force left in that quarter, and came in
directly on Stuart's rear, behind Fleetwood Hill. In the midst of the
hard fight in front, Stuart was called now to defend his rear. He
hastened to do so by falling back and meeting the enemy now charging
the hill. The attack was repulsed, and the enemy's artillery charged
in turn by the Southerners. This was captured and recaptured two or
three times, but at last remained in the hands of Stuart.

General Gregg now swung round his right, and prepared to advance
along the eastern slope of the hill. Stuart had, however, posted his
artillery there, and, as the Federal line began to move, arrested
it with a sudden and destructive fire of shell. At the same time a
portion of Hampton's division, under the brave Georgian, General
P.M.B. Young, was ordered to charge the enemy. The assault was
promptly made with the sabre, unaided by carbine or pistol fire, and
Young cut down or routed the force in front of him, which dispersed
in disorder toward the river. The dangerous assault on the rear of
Fleetwood Hill was thus repulsed, and the advance of the enemy on the
left, near the river, met with the same ill success. General W.H.F.
Lee, son of the commanding general, gallantly charged them in that
quarter, and drove them back to the Rappahannock, receiving a severe
wound, which long confined him to his bed. Hampton had followed the
retreating enemy on the right, under the fire of Stuart's guns from
Fleetwood Hill; and by nightfall the whole force had recrossed the
Rappahannock, leaving several hundred dead and wounded upon the field.
[Footnote: The Southern loss was also considerable. Colonel Williams
was killed, Generals Lee and Butler severely wounded--the latter
losing his foot--and General Stuart's staff had been peculiarly
unfortunate. Of the small group of officers, Captain Farley was
killed, Captain White wounded, and Lieutenant Goldsborough captured.
The Federal force sustained a great loss in the death of the gallant
Colonel Davis, of the Eighth New-York Cavalry, and other officers.]

This reconnoissance in force--the Federal numbers probably amounting
to fifteen thousand--had no other result than the discovery of the
fact that Lee had infantry in Culpepper. Finding that the event of the
fight was critical, General Lee had moved a body of infantry in the
direction of the field of action, and the gleam of the bayonets was
seen by the enemy. The infantry was not, however, engaged on either
side, unless the Federal infantry participated in the initial skirmish
near Beverley's Ford, and General Lee's numbers and position were not
discovered.

We have dwelt with some detail upon this cavalry combat, which was an
animated affair, the hand-to-hand encounter of nearly twenty thousand
horsemen throughout a whole day. General Stuart was censured at the
time for allowing himself to be "surprised," and a ball at Culpepper
Court-House, at which some of his officers were present several days
before, was pointed to as the origin of this surprise. The charge was
wholly unjust, Stuart not having attended the ball. Nor was there any
truth in the further statement that "his headquarters were captured"
in consequence of his negligence. His tents on Fleetwood Hill were all
sent to the rear soon after daylight; nothing whatever was found there
but a section of the horse-artillery, who fought the charging cavalry
with sabres and sponge-staffs over the guns; that Fleetwood Hill
was at one time in the hands of the enemy, was due not to Stuart's
negligence, but to the numbers and excellent soldiership of General
Gregg, who made the flank and rear attack while Stuart was breasting
that in front.

These detached statements, which may seem unduly minute, are made in
justice to a brave soldier, who can no longer defend himself.




XII.

THE MARCH TO GETTYSBURG.


This attempt of the enemy to penetrate his designs had not induced
General Lee to interrupt the movement of his infantry toward the
Shenandoah Valley. The Federal corps sent across the Rappahannock at
Fredericksburg, still remained facing General Hill; and, two days
after the Fleetwood fight. General Hooker moved up the river with his
main body, advancing the Third Corps to a point near Beverley's Ford.
But these movements were disregarded by Lee. On the same day Ewell's
corps moved rapidly toward Chester Gap, passed through that defile in
the mountain, pushed on by way of Front Royal, and reached Winchester
on the evening of the 13th, having in three days marched seventy
miles.

The position of the Southern army now exposed it to very serious
danger, and at first sight seemed to indicate a deficiency of
soldiership in the general commanding it. In face of an enemy whose
force was at least equal to his own,[Footnote: General Hooker stated
his "effective" at this time to have been diminished to eighty
thousand infantry.] Lee had extended his line until it stretched over
a distance of about one hundred miles. When Ewell came in sight of
Winchester, Hill was still opposite Fredericksburg, and Longstreet
half-way between the two in Culpepper. Between the middle and rear
corps was interposed the Rapidan River, and between the middle and
advanced corps the Blue Ridge Mountains. General Hooker's army was on
the north bank of the Rappahannock, well in hand, and comparatively
massed, and the situation of Lee's army seemed excellent for the
success of a sudden blow at it.

It seems that the propriety of attacking the Southern army while
thus _in transitu_, suggested itself both to General Hooker and to
President Lincoln, but they differed as to the point and object of the
attack. In anticipation of Lee's movement, General Hooker had written
to the President, probably suggesting a counter-movement across the
Rappahannock, somewhere near Fredericksburg, to threaten Richmond, and
thus check Lee's advance. This, however. President Lincoln refused to
sanction.

"In case you find Lee coming to the north of the Rappahannock,"
President Lincoln wrote to General Hooker, "I would by no means cross
to the south of it. I would not take any risk of being entangled upon
the river, _like an ox jumped half over a fence, and liable to be torn
by dogs, front and rear, without a fair chance to gore one way or kick
the other_"

Five days afterward the President wrote: "I think Lee's army, and not
Richmond, is your true objective point. If he comes toward the Upper
Potomac, fight him when opportunity offers. If he stays where he is,
_fret him and fret him_."

When intelligence now reached Washington that the head of Lee's column
was approaching the Upper Potomac, while the rear was south of the
Rappahannock, the President wrote to General Hooker: "_If the head of
Lee's army is at Martinsburg, and the tail of it on the plank road_
between Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, the _animal must be very
slim somewhere--could you not break him?_"

General Hooker did not seem to be able to determine upon a decisive
course of action, in spite of the tempting opening presented to him by
Lee. It would seem that nothing could have been plainer than the good
policy of an attack upon Hill at Fredericksburg, which would certainly
have checked Lee's movement by recalling Longstreet from Culpepper,
and Ewell from the Valley. But this bold operation did not appear to
commend itself to the Federal authorities. Instead of reënforcing the
corps sent across at Fredericksburg and attacking Hill, General Hooker
withdrew the corps, on the 13th, to the north bank of the river, got
his forces together, and began to fall back toward Manassas, and even
remained in ignorance, it seems, of all connected with his adversary's
movements. Even as late as the 17th of June, his chief-of-staff,
General Butterfield, wrote to one of his officers; "Try and hunt up
somebody from Pennsylvania who knows something, and has a cool enough
head to judge what is the actual state of affairs there with regard to
the enemy. _My impression is, that Lee's movement on the Upper Potomac
is a cover for a cavalry-raid on the south side of the river.... We
cannot go boggling around until we know what we are going after._"

Such was the first result of Lee's daring movement to transfer
military operations to the region north of the Potomac. A Northern
historian has discerned in his plan of campaign an amount of boldness
which "seemed to imply a great contempt for his opponent." This
is perhaps a somewhat exaggerated statement of the case. Without
"boldness" a commander is but half a soldier, and it may be declared
that a certain amount of that quality is absolutely essential to
successful military operations. But the question is, Did Lee expose
himself, by these movements of his army, to probable disaster, if his
adversary--equal to the occasion--struck at his flank? A failure of
the campaign of invasion would probably have resulted from such an
attack either upon Hill at Fredericksburg, or upon Longstreet in
Culpepper, inasmuch as Ewell's column, in that event, must have fallen
back. But a _defeat_ of the combined forces of Hill and Longstreet,
who were within supporting distance of each other, was not an event
which General Hooker could count upon with any degree of certainty.
The two corps numbered nearly fifty thousand men--that is to say,
two-thirds of the Southern army; General Hooker's whole force was
but about eighty thousand; and it was not probable that the
eighty thousand would be able to rout the fifty thousand, when at
Chancellorsville less than this last number of Southerners had
defeated one hundred and twenty thousand.

There seems little reason to doubt that General Lee took this view of
the subject, and relied on Hill and Longstreet to unite and repulse
any attack upon them, while Ewell's great "raiding column" drove
forward into the heart of the enemy's territory. That the movement was
bold, there can certainly be no question; that it was a reckless and
hazardous operation, depending for its success, in Lee's eyes, solely
on the supposed inefficiency of General Hooker, does not appear.
These comments delay the narrative, but the subject is fruitful in
suggestion. It may be pardoned a Southern writer if he lingers over
this last great offensive movement of the Southern army. The last, it
was also one of the greatest and most brilliant. The war, therefore,
was to enter upon its second stage, in which the South was to simply
maintain the defensive. But Lee was terminating the first stage of
the contest by one of those great campaigns which project events and
personages in bold relief from the broad canvas, and illumine the
pages of history.

Events were now in rapid progress. Ewell's column--the sharp head of
the Southern spear--reached Winchester on the 13th of June, and
Rodes, who had been detached at Front Royal to drive the enemy from
Berryville, reached the last-named village on the same day when the
force there retreated to Winchester. On the next morning Early's
division attacked the forces of Milroy at Winchester, stormed and
captured their "Star Fort," on a hill near the place, and so complete
was the rout of the enemy that their commander, General Milroy, had
scarcely time to escape, with a handful of his men, in the direction
of the Potomac.

For this disaster the unfortunate officer was harshly criticised by
General Hooker, who wrote to his Government, "In my opinion, Milroy's
men will fight better _under a soldier_."

After thus clearing the country around Winchester, Ewell advanced
rapidly on Martinsburg, where he took a number of prisoners and some
artillery. The captures in two days had been more than four thousand
prisoners and twenty-nine cannon, with four hundred horses and a large
amount of stores. Ewell continued then to advance, and, entering
Maryland, sent a portion of his cavalry, under General Imboden,
westward, to destroy the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, and another
body, under General Jenkins, in advance, toward Chambersburg.
Meanwhile, the rest of the army was moving to join him. Hill, finding
that the enemy had disappeared from his front near Fredericksburg,
hastened to march from that vicinity, and was sent forward by Lee, on
the track of Ewell, passing in rear of Longstreet, who had remained
in Culpepper. The latter was now directed by Lee to move along
the eastern side of the Blue Ridge, and, by occupying Ashby's and
Snicker's Gaps, protect the flank of the column in the Valley from
attack--a work in which Stuart's cavalry, thrown out toward the enemy,
assisted.

Such was the posture of affairs when General Hooker's chief-of-staff
became so much puzzled, and described the Federal army as "boggling
around," and not knowing "what they were going after." Lee's whole
movement, it appears, was regarded as a feint to "cover a cavalry-raid
on the south side of the river"--a strange conclusion, it would seem,
in reference to a movement of such magnitude. It now became absolutely
necessary that Lee's designs should be unmasked, if possible; and
to effect this object Stuart's cavalry force, covering the southern
flank, east of the Blue Ridge, must be driven back. This was
undertaken in a deliberate manner. Three corps of cavalry, with a
division of infantry and a full supply of artillery, were sent forward
from the vicinity of Manassas, to drive Stuart in on all the roads
leading to the mountain. A fierce struggle followed, in which Stuart,
who knew the importance of his position, fought the great force
opposed to him from every hill and knoll. But he was forced back
steadily, in spite of a determined resistance, and at Upperville a
hand-to-hand sabre-fight wound up the movement, in which the Federal
cavalry was checked, when Stuart fell back toward Paris, crowned the
mountain-side with his cannon, and awaited a final attack. This was
not, however, made. Night approaching, the Federal force fell back
toward Manassas, and on the next morning Stuart followed them, on the
same road over which he had so rapidly retreated, beyond Middleburg.

Lee paid little attention to these operations on his flank east of
the mountains, but proceeded steadily, in personal command of his
infantry, in the direction of the Cumberland Valley. Ewell was moving
rapidly toward Harrisburg, with orders to "take" that place "if he
deemed his force adequate,"[1] General Jenkins, commanding cavalry,
preceding the advance of his infantry. He had thus pierced the enemy's
territory, and it was necessary promptly to support him. Hill
and Longstreet were accordingly directed to pass the Potomac at
Shepherdstown and Williamsport. The columns united at Hagerstown, and
on the 27th of June entered Chambersburg.

[Footnote 1: This statement of Lee's orders is derived by the writer
from Lieutenant-General Ewell.]

General Hooker had followed, crossing the Potomac, opposite Leesburg,
at about the moment when Lee's rear was passing from Maryland into
Pennsylvania. The direction of the Federal march was toward Frederick,
from which point General Hooker could move in either one of two
directions--either across the mountain toward Boonsboro, which would
throw him upon Lee's communications, or northward to Westminster, or
Gettysburg, which would lead to an open collision with the invading
army in a pitched battle.

At this juncture of affairs, just as the Federal army was
concentrating near Frederick, General Hooker, at his own request, was
relieved from command. The occasion of this unexpected event seems to
have been a difference of opinion between himself and General
Halleck, the Federal general-in-chief, on the question whether the
fortifications at Harper's Ferry should or should not be abandoned.
The point at issue would appear to have been unimportant, but ill
feeling seems to have arisen: General Hooker resented the action
of the authorities, and requested to be relieved; his request was
complied with, and his place was filled by Major-General George G.
Meade.

[Illustration: Map--Sketch of the Country Around GETTYSBURG.]

General Meade, an officer of excellent soldiership, and enjoying the
repute of modesty and dignity, assumed command of the Federal army,
and proceeded rapidly in pursuit of Lee. The design of moving directly
across the South Mountain on Lee's communications, if ever entertained
by him, was abandoned. The outcry from Pennsylvania drew him perforce.
Ewell, with one division, had penetrated to Carlisle; and Early, with
another division, was at York; everywhere the horses, cattle, and
supplies of the country, had been seized upon for the use of the
troops; and General Meade was loudly called upon to go to the
assistance of the people thus exposed to the terrible rebels. His
movements were rapid. Assuming command on June 28th, he began to
move on the 29th, and on the 30th was approaching the town of
Gettysburg.[1]

[Footnote 1: The movements of the Federal commander were probably
hastened by the capture, about this time at Hagerstown, of a dispatch
from President Davis to General Lee. Lee, it seems, had suggested
that General Beauregard should be sent to make a demonstration in the
direction of Culpepper, and by thus appearing to threaten Washington,
embarrass the movements of the Northern army. To this suggestion the
President is said to have replied that he had no troops to make such
a movement; and General Meade had thus the proof before him that
Washington was in no danger. The Confederacy was thus truly
unfortunate again, as in September, 1862, when a similar incident came
to the relief of General McClellan.]




XIII.

LEE IN PENNSYLVANIA.


Lee, in personal command of the corps of Hill and Longstreet, had
meanwhile moved on steadily in the direction of the Susquehanna, and,
reaching Chambersburg on the 27th of June, "made preparations to
advance upon Harrisburg."

At Chambersburg he issued an order to the troops, which should find a
place in every biography of this great soldier. The course pursued
by many of the Federal commanders in Virginia had been merciless and
atrocious beyond words. General Pope had ravaged the counties north
of the Rappahannock, especially the county of Culpepper, in a manner
which reduced that smiling region wellnigh to a waste; General Milroy,
with his headquarters at Winchester, had so cruelly oppressed the
people of the surrounding country as to make them execrate the very
mention of his name; and the excesses committed by the troops of these
officers, with the knowledge and permission of their commanders, had
been such, said a foreign writer, as to "cast mankind two centuries
back toward barbarism."

Now, the tables were turned, and the world looked for a sudden and
merciless retaliation on the part of the Southerners. Lee was in
Pennsylvania, at the head of an army thirsting to revenge the
accumulated wrongs against their helpless families. At a word from
him the fertile territory of the North would be made to feel the iron
pressure of military rule, proceeding on the theory that retaliation
is a just principle to adopt toward an enemy. Fire, slaughter, and
outrage, would have burst upon Pennsylvania, and the black flag, which
had been virtually raised by Generals Pope and Milroy, would have
flaunted now in the air at the head of the Southern army.

Instead of permitting this disgraceful oppression of non-combatants,
Lee issued, at Chambersburg, the following general order to his
troops:

HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA,

CHAMBERSBURG, PA., _June_ 27, 1863.

The commanding general has observed with much satisfaction the conduct
of the troops on the march, and confidently anticipates results
commensurate with the high spirit they have manifested. No troops
could have displayed greater fortitude, or better performed the
arduous marches of the past ten days. Their conduct in other respects
has, with few exceptions, been in keeping with their character as
soldiers, and entitles them to approbation and praise.

There have, however, been instances of forgetfulness, on the part of
some, that they have in keeping the yet unsullied reputation of
the army, and that the duties exacted of us by civilization and
Christianity are not less obligatory in the country of the enemy than
in our own.

The commanding general considers that no greater disgrace could befall
the army, and, through it, our whole people, than the perpetration of
the barbarous outrages on the innocent and defenceless, and the wanton
destruction of private property, that have marked the course of the
enemy in our own country. Such proceedings not only disgrace the
perpetrators, and all connected with them, but are subversive of the
discipline and efficiency of the army, and destructive of the ends of
our present movements. It must be remembered that we make war only
upon armed men, and that we cannot take vengeance for the wrongs our
people have suffered without lowering ourselves in the eyes of all
whose abhorrence has been excited by the atrocities of our enemy,
without offending against Him to whom vengeance belongeth, without
whose favor and support our efforts must all prove in vain.

The commanding general, therefore, earnestly exhorts the troops to
abstain, with most scrupulous care, from unnecessary or wanton injury
to private property; and he enjoins upon all officers to arrest and
bring to summary punishment all who shall in any way offend against
the orders on this subject.

R.E. LEE, _General_.

The noble maxims and truly Christian spirit of this paper will
remain the undying glory of Lee. Under what had been surely a bitter
provocation, he retained the calmness and forbearance of a great soul,
saying to his army: "The duties exacted of us by civilization and
Christianity are not less obligatory in the country of the enemy than
in our own.... No greater disgrace could befall the army, and through
it our whole people, than the perpetration of outrage upon the
innocent and defenceless.... We make war only upon armed men, and
cannot take vengeance for the wrongs our people have suffered without
offending against Him to whom vengeance belongeth, without whose favor
and support our efforts must all prove in vain."

Such were the utterances of Lee, resembling those we might attribute
to the ideal Christian warrior; and, indeed, it was such a spirit that
lay under the plain uniform of the great Virginian. What he ordered
was enforced, and no one was disturbed in his person or property. Of
this statement many proofs could be given. A Pennsylvania farmer said
to a Northern correspondent, in reference to the Southern troops: "I
must say they acted like gentlemen, and, their cause aside, I would
rather have forty thousand rebels quartered on my premises than one
thousand Union troops." From the journal of Colonel Freemantle,
an English officer accompanying the Southern army, we take these
sentences:

"In passing through Greencastle we found all the houses and windows
shut up, the natives in their Sunday clothes, standing at their doors
regarding the troops in a very unfriendly manner. I saw no straggling
into the houses, nor were any of the inhabitants disturbed or annoyed
by the soldiers. Sentries were placed at the doors of many of the
best houses, to prevent any officer or soldier from getting in on any
pretence.... I entered Chambersburg at 6 P.M.... Sentries were placed
at the doors of all the principal houses, and the town was cleared
of all but the military passing through or on duty.... No officer or
soldier under the rank of a general is allowed in Chambersburg without
a special order from General Lee, which he is very chary of giving,
and I hear of officers of rank being refused this pass.... I went into
Chambersburg again, and witnessed the singularly good behavior of the
troops toward the citizens. I heard soldiers saying to one another
that they did not like being in a town in which they were very
naturally detested. To any one who has seen, as I have, the ravages
of the Northern troops in Southern towns, this forbearance seems most
commendable and surprising."

A Northern correspondent said of the course pursued by General
Jenkins, in command of Ewell's cavalry: "By way of giving the devil
his due, it must be said that, although there were over sixty acres
of wheat and eighty acres of corn and oats in the same field, he
protected it most carefully, and picketed his horses so that it could
not be injured. No fences were wantonly destroyed, poultry was not
disturbed, nor did he compliment our blooded cattle so much as to test
the quality of their steak and roast."

Of the feeling of the troops these few words from the letter of an
officer written to one of his family will convey an idea: "I felt
when I first came here that I would like to revenge myself upon these
people for the devastation they have brought upon our own beautiful
home--that home where we could have lived so happily, and that we
loved so much, from which their vandalism has driven you and my
helpless little ones. But, though I had such severe wrongs and
grievances to redress, and such great cause for revenge, yet, when
I got among these people, I could not find it in my heart to molest
them."

Such was the treatment of the people of Pennsylvania by the Southern
troops in obedience to the order of the commander-in-chief. Lee
in person set the example. A Southern journal made the sarcastic
statement that he became irate at the robbing of cherry-trees; and, if
he saw the _top rail_ of a fence lying upon the ground as he rode by,
would dismount and replace it with his own hands.




XIV.

CONCENTRATION AT GETTYSBURG.


This was the position of the great adversaries in the last days of
June. Lee was at Chambersburg, in the Cumberland Valley, about to
follow Ewell, who was approaching Harrisburg. Early had captured York;
and the Federal army was concentrating rapidly on the flank of the
Southern army, toward Gettysburg.

Lee had ordered the movement of Early upon York, with the object of
diverting the attention of the Federal commander from his own rear,
in the Cumberland Valley. The exact movements and position of General
Meade were unknown to him; and this arose in large measure from the
absence of Stuart's cavalry. This unfortunate incident has given rise
to much comment, and Stuart has been harshly criticised for an alleged
disobedience of Lee's plain orders. The question is an embarrassing
one. Lee's statement is as follows: "General Stuart was left to guard
the passes of the mountains" (Ashby's and other gaps in the Blue
Ridge, in Virginia), "and observe the movements of the enemy, whom
he was instructed to harass and impede as much as possible should
he attempt to cross the Potomac. _In that event, General Stuart was
directed to move into Maryland, crossing the Potomac east or west of
the Blue Ridge, as in his judgment should be best, and take position
on the right of our column as it advanced._"

This order was certainly plain up to a certain point. Stuart was
to harass and embarrass the movements of the enemy, in case they
attempted to cross to the north bank of the Potomac. When they did
cross, he also was to pass the river, either east or west of the Blue
Ridge, "as in his judgment should seem best." So far the order was
unmistakable. The river was to be crossed at such point as Stuart
should select, either on the lower waters, or in the Valley. Lee
added, however, that this movement should be made in such a manner as
to enable Stuart to "take position on the right of our column as it
advanced"--the meaning appearing to be that the cavalry should move
_between_ the two armies, in order to guard the Southern flank as it
advanced into the Cumberland Valley. Circumstances arose, however,
which rendered it difficult for Stuart to move on the line thus
indicated with sufficient promptness to render his services valuable.
The enemy crossed at Leesburg while the Southern cavalry was near
Middleburg; and, from the jaded condition of his horses, Stuart feared
that he would be unable, in case he crossed above, to place his column
between the two armies then rapidly advancing. He accordingly took the
bold resolution of passing the Potomac _below_ Leesburg, designing to
shape his course due northward toward Harrisburg, the objective point
of the Southern army. This he did--crossing at Seneca Falls--but on
the march he was delayed by many incidents. Near Rockville he stopped
to capture a large train of Federal wagons; at Westminster and
Hanovertown he was temporarily arrested by combats with the Federal
cavalry; and, ignorant as he was of the concentration of Lee's troops
upon Gettysburg, he advanced rapidly toward Carlisle, where, in the
midst of an attack on that place, he was recalled by Lee.

Such were the circumstances leading to, and the incidents attending,
this movement. The reader must form his own opinion of the amount
of blame to be justly attached to Stuart. He always declared, and
asserted in his report of these occurrences, that he had acted in
exact obedience to his orders; but, on the contrary, as appears from
General Lee's report, those orders were meant to prescribe a different
movement. He had marched in one sense on "the right" of the Southern
column "as it advanced;" but in another sense he had not done so.
Victory at Gettysburg would have silenced all criticism of this
difference of construction; but, unfortunately, the event was
different, and the strictures directed at Stuart were natural. The
absence of the cavalry unquestionably embarrassed Lee greatly; but, in
his report, he is moderate and guarded, as usual, in his expressions.
"The absence of cavalry," he says, "rendered it impossible to obtain
accurate information" of General Meade's movements; and "the march
toward Gettysburg was conducted more slowly than it would have been
had the movements of the Federal army been known."

[Illustration: Map--Battle of GETTYSBURG]

To return now to the movements of Lee's infantry, after the arrival of
the main body at Chambersburg. Lee was about to continue his advance
in the direction of Harrisburg, when, on the night of the 29th, his
scouts brought him intelligence that the Federal army was rapidly
advancing, and the head of the column was near the South Mountain. A
glance at the map will indicate the importance of this intelligence.
General Meade would be able, without difficulty, in case the Southern
army continued its march northward, to cross the South-Mountain range,
and place himself directly in Lee's rear, in the Cumberland Valley.
Then the Southern forces would be completely intercepted--General
Meade would be master of the situation--and Lee must retreat east of
the mountain or cut his way through the Federal army.

A battle was thus clearly about to be forced upon the Southern
commander, and it only remained for him to so manoeuvre his army as to
secure a position in which he could receive the enemy's attack with
advantage. Lee accordingly put his column in motion across the
mountain toward Gettysburg, and, sending couriers to Ewell and Early
to return from Harrisburg and York toward the same point, made his
preparations to take position and fight.

On the morning of the 1st day of July, this was then the condition of
affairs. General Meade was advancing with rapidity upon the town
of Gettysburg, and Lee was crossing the South Mountain, opposite
Chambersburg, to meet him.

When the heads of the two columns came together in the vicinity of
Gettysburg, the thunders of battle began.




XV.

THE FIRST DAY'S FIGHT AT GETTYSBURG.


The sanguinary struggle which now ensued between the Army of Northern
Virginia and the Army of the Potomac continued for three days, and the
character of these battles, together with their decisive results, have
communicated to the events an extraordinary interest. Every fact has
thus been preserved, and the incidents of the great combat, down to
the most minute details, have been placed upon record. The subject is,
indeed, almost embarrassed by the amount of information collected and
published; and the chief difficulty for a writer, at this late day, is
to select from the mass such salient events as indicate clearly the
character of the conflict.

This difficulty the present writer has it in his power to evade,
in great measure, by confining himself mainly to the designs and
operations of General Lee. These were plain and simple. He had been
forced to relinquish his march toward the Susquehanna by the dangerous
position of General Meade so near his line of retreat; this rendered
a battle unavoidable; and Lee was now moving to accept battle,
designing, if possible, to secure such a position as would give him
the advantage in the contest. Before he succeeded in effecting this
object, battle was forced upon him--not by General Meade, but by
simple stress of circumstances. The Federal commander had formed the
same intention as that of his adversary--to accept, and not deliver,
battle--and did not propose to fight near Gettysburg. He was, rather,
looking backward to a strong position in the direction of Westminster,
when suddenly the head of his column became engaged near Gettysburg,
and this determined every thing.

A few words are necessary to convey to the reader some idea of the
character of the ground. Gettysburg is a town, nestling down in a
valley, with so many roads centring in the place that, if a circle
were drawn around it to represent the circumference of a wheel, the
roads would resemble the spokes. A short distance south of the town is
a ridge of considerable height, which runs north and south, bending
eastward in the vicinity of Gettysburg, and describing a curve
resembling a hook. From a graveyard on this high ground it is called
Cemetery Hill, or Ridge. Opposite this ridge, looking westward, is a
second and lower range called Seminary Ridge. This extends also north
and south, passing west of Gettysburg. Still west of Seminary Ridge
are other still lower ranges, between which flows a small stream
called Willoughby Run; and beyond these, distant about ten miles, rise
the blue heights of the South Mountain.

Across the South Mountain, by way of the village of Cashtown, Lee, on
the morning of the 1st of July, was moving steadily toward Gettysburg,
when Hill, holding the front, suddenly encountered the head of the
enemy's column in the vicinity of Willoughby Run. This consisted of
General Buford's cavalry division, which had pushed on in advance
of General Reynolds's infantry corps, the foremost infantry of the
Federal army, and now, almost before it was aware of Hill's presence,
became engaged with him. General Buford posted his horse-artillery
to meet Hill's attack, but it soon became obvious that the Federal
cavalry could not stand before the Southern infantry fire, and General
Reynolds, at about ten in the morning, hastening forward, reached
the field. An engagement immediately took place between the foremost
infantry divisions of Hill and Reynolds. A brigade of Hill's, from
Mississippi, drove back a Federal brigade, seizing upon its artillery;
but, in return, Archer's brigade was nearly surrounded, and several
hundred of the men captured. Almost immediately after this incident
the Federal forces sustained a serious loss; General Reynolds--one
of the most trusted and energetic lieutenants of General Meade--was
mortally wounded while disposing his men for action, and borne from
the field. The Federal troops continued, however, to fight with
gallantry. Some of the men were heard exclaiming, "We have come to
stay!" in reference to which, one of their officers afterward said,
"And a very large portion of them never left that ground."[1]

[Footnote 1: General Doubleday: Report of Committee on the Conduct of
the War, Part I., p. 307.]

Battle was now joined in earnest between the two heads of column, and
on each side reënforcements were sent forward to take part in this
unexpected encounter. Neither General Lee nor General Meade had
expected or desired it. Both had aimed, in manoeuvring their forces,
to select ground suitable for receiving instead of making an attack,
and now a blind chance seemed about to bring on a battle upon ground
unknown to both commanders. When the sound of the engagement was first
heard by Lee, he was in the rear of his troops at the headquarters
which Hill had just vacated, near Cashtown, under the South Mountain.
The firing was naturally supposed by him to indicate an accidental
collision with some body of the enemy's cavalry, and, when
intelligence reached him that Hill was engaged with the Federal
infantry, the announcement occasioned him the greatest astonishment.
General Meade's presence so near him was a circumstance completely
unknown to Lee, and certainly was not desired by him. But a small
portion of his forces were "up." Longstreet had not yet passed the
mountain, and the forces of General Ewell, although that officer
had promptly fallen back, in obedience to his orders, from the
Susquehanna, were not yet in a position to take part in the
engagement. Under these circumstances, if the whole of General Meade's
army had reached Gettysburg, directly in Lee's front, the advantage in
the approaching action must be largely in favor of the Federal army,
and a battle might result in a decisive Confederate defeat.

No choice, however, was now left General Lee. The head of his
advancing column had come into collision with the enemy, and it was
impossible to retire without a battle. Lee accordingly ordered Hill's
corps to be closed up, and reënforcements to be sent forward rapidly
to the point of action. He then mounted his horse and rode in the
direction of the firing, guided by the sound, and the smoke which rose
above the tranquil landscape.

It was a beautiful day and a beautiful season of the year. The fields
were green with grass, or golden with ripening grain, over which
passed a gentle breeze, raising waves upon the brilliant surface. The
landscape was broken here and there by woods; in the west rose the
blue range of the South Mountain; the sun was shining through showery
clouds, and in the east the sky was spanned by a rainbow. This
peaceful scene was now disturbed by the thundering of artillery and
the rattle of musketry. The sky was darkened, here and there, by
clouds of smoke rising from barns or dwelling-houses set on fire by
shell; and beneath rose red tongues of flame, roaring in response to
the guns.

Each side had now sent forward reinforcements to support the
vanguards, and an obstinate struggle ensued, the proportions of the
fight gradually increasing, until the action became a regular battle.
Hill, although suffering from indisposition, which the pallor of his
face indicated, met the Federal attack with his habitual resolution.
He was hard pressed, however, when fortunately one of General Ewell's
divisions, under Rodes, débouched from the Carlisle road, running
northward from Gettysburg, and came to his assistance. Ewell had just
begun to move from Carlisle toward Harrisburg--his second division,
under Early, being at York--when a dispatch from Lee reached him,
directing him to return, and "proceed to Gettysburg or Cashtown, as
his circumstances might direct." He promptly obeyed, encamped within
about eight miles of Gettysburg on the evening of the 30th, and was
now moving toward Cashtown, where Johnson's division of his corps then
was, when Hill sent him word that he needed his assistance. Rodes was
promptly sent forward to the field of action. Early was ordered to
hurry back, and Rodes soon reached the battle-field, where he formed
his line on high ground, opposite the Federal right.

The appearance of this important reënforcement relieved Hill, and
caused the enemy to extend his right to face Rodes. The Federal line
thus resembled a crescent, the left half, fronting Hill, toward the
northwest; and the right, half-fronting Rodes, toward the north--the
town of Gettysburg being in rear of the curve. An obstinate attack was
made by the enemy and by Rodes at nearly the same moment. The loss
on both sides was heavy, but Rodes succeeded in shaking the Federal
right, when Early made his appearance from the direction of York. This
compelled the Federal force to still farther extend its right, to meet
the new attack. The movement greatly weakened them. Rodes charged
their centre with impetuosity; Early came in on their right, with
Gordon's brigade in front, and under this combined attack the Federal
troops gave way, and retreated in great disorder to and through
Gettysburg, leaving the ground covered with their dead and wounded to
the number of about five thousand,