Darkness at Chancellorsville

by Ralph Peters

  Now here he was, on horseback and wearing a general’s stars. Liberty had a real army at last.

  The column ahead stopped abruptly.

  Schurz raised a hand to halt his division but let his subordinates call the order back through his brigades. The endless stopping and starting and stopping again was the fate of any trailing corps on a march, that was a given, but he did wish Howard’s staff would keep him informed. He never knew when there might be time to let the men fall out and cook their coffee.

  Not that he was fond of his present surroundings. The thickets and dwarf pines along their route were unsettling, the landscape the army had entered felt blighted and wronged, unlike anything Schurz had yet seen in Virginia. Nor was the road an engineering marvel.

  He felt a child’s urge to hurry on.

  Schimmelfennig rode up from the First Brigade, huge beard flecked with mud. Sidling his mount near to his commander’s horse, the brigadier unleashed a cannonade:

  “Verdammt noch mal, Herr General, diese Scheisser haben doch keine Ahnung…”

  Damn it, General, these shits have no idea …

  Schurz smiled indulgently but didn’t reply. Brigadier General Alexander Schimmelfennig was a fellow Forty-Eighter, but one with superior military credentials. They’d first met in Kaiserslautern, where Schimmelfenning had held the higher rank. An officer of the Prussian army and veteran of two famed regiments, he’d deserted to fight on the people’s side, only to be wounded thrice and condemned to death in absentia. Fellow émigrés, they had become great friends over the years.

  Schimmelfennig still had a whiff of the Prussian about him, though. In front of their subordinates, he was flawlessly correct when addressing Schurz. Only among their intimates—Forty-Eighters every one—would he call him “Carl.” And Schurz had to rein him in now and then, explaining that this strange behemoth of an American army could not be ruled by discipline alone. These men, these new-made Americans, were volunteers, their youthful dreams of a better world reawakened. They were men who believed in liberty, in this remarkable Union that had sheltered them and let them prosper. But they also were older than most native-born recruits, not boys but men with families, solid burghers who’d left established professions for their ideals. They were brave, but their courage was of a settled sort; it was not the heedless daring of the young. Each man had much to lose and expected orders to make sense. But orders often didn’t.

  Schurz needed Schimmelfennig to tread lightly. He had doubts inadmissible to anyone about their new chain of command—about Howard, above all. He didn’t need more discontent, since the men remained sour over Sigel’s departure. “Kluger Franz” had been their ideal, and now that he was gone, they imagined virtues for Sigel he’d never possessed. Sigel was a good man who’d made a poor soldier, and Schurz intended to learn from the example.

  For all that, his soldiers had endured the past night’s soaking with no more than common gripes. And in the lulls between squalls, one Sängerverein after another had raised old melodies from their lost world, plaintive songs of snows and roses and impossible loves. Few things made Germans happier than melancholy music.

  The march, the fresh air, the small successes … even the rain and the shared discomfort … it all seemed magically good for their morale. That morning, his sodden troops had stepped off with spirit, alight with a sense of purpose. His division would be fine. And so would the rest of the Eleventh Corps.

  He had to believe that.

  “Ist doch eine Schweinerei,” Schimmelfennig tried again, in a mood to chatter. “Die verstehen keine Marsch-Disziplin, keine Ordnung.” The brigadier shook his head. “Ich frage Euch, Herr General: Was ist denn das fuer eine polnische Wirtschaft?”

  It’s all a piggery. They don’t understand march-discipline or order in the least. I ask you, General: What kind of Polish management is this?

  “Don’t let Kriz hear you speaking badly of Poles,” Schurz cautioned. “Your fellow brigade commander might send you a challenge.”

  “Ach, der Kriz is a good man. I say nothing against him. He makes his brigade good.”

  “Better than yours, some say.”

  “Maybe he is good. But not so good.”

  The two men laughed.

  “Well, he’s Polish. Don’t forget.”

  “Der Herr Oberst Krzyzanowski lets no man forget.” Schimmelfennig nodded toward the wagons halted ahead. “And I would like to know, bitte, what the devil goes on now?”

  “I’d like to know myself,” Schurz admitted. “But I suspect that General Howard’s rather busy.”

  All morning, they’d heard ripples of shots in the distance, but each exchange had faded into nothing. For all the annoying halts, the army’s march was progressing impressively.

  At the mention of their corps commander’s name, though, Schimmelfennig glowered. His face seemed to retreat still farther behind the wall of beard. Schurz felt his smile swelling again—his true smile, not the one he’d mastered for politics. Alex was easy enough to understand: The red-faced silence masked a struggle between the former Prussian officer who would never dare speak ill of a superior and the new-made American aching to blurt out exactly how he felt about Major General Oliver Otis Howard.

  Schurz felt trapped in the middle, bound by a formal loyalty that he struggled to feel in his heart. He leaned forward in his saddle and stroked his mount’s neck.

  “General Howard’s a brave man, Alex.”

  “Any man can lose an arm,” the brigadier spit out. Then he shrank back, appalled at his own words. “Ich bitte um Vergebung, Herr General. Dass war unverschaemt.”

  I beg forgiveness, General. That was shameless.

  Schurz let it pass. But he put a slight chill in his voice. “If you want to get on with General Howard, I suggest you restrict yourself to English.” He turned to face his subordinate more fully. “He needs time, Alex. To get to know the corps, to settle in. Meanwhile, it’s our duty to support him, you know that better than I do. He just needs time.”

  Schimmelfennig opened his mouth to speak but checked himself. Schurz knew what his friend had intended to say: “We don’t have time.”

  There was nothing to be done and the words were best left unspoken.

  His horse shied mildly and swished its tail. Schurz took off his glasses and held the lenses up to the light: impossible to keep them clean on the march. “The men have to accept the fact that Sigel’s not coming back. He called Lincoln’s bluff and failed. General Howard has the corps now, and he’s likely to keep it. Help the men face it, start with your officers.”

  Schimmelfennig waved off a fly. “He may have the command, but he does not like it, the men see this.” He leaned closer, as if to tap Schurz on the knee, and lowered his voice so nearby aides wouldn’t hear. “You know what his staff Burschen say of us? They call the other regiments their ‘white troops.’ Even the Irish. What does that make us, then?”

  “They’ll learn,” Schurz said. It wasn’t much of an answer.

  It was, indeed, a strange corps, with its near equality in German and non-German regiments. Nor had it been long with the Army of the Potomac, making it doubly the outsider among the corps serving under Hooker. The Eleventh Corps had served in the Valley, where Fremont had botched things badly, leaving the Germans with a taint of failure.

  Schurz tried again. “He’s proud. They all are, the West Point men. And General Howard has a legitimate complaint. He’s senior on the Army rolls, he expected to command a premier corps. And one much larger. Instead, he got us.”

  “So terrible a thing, is it?”

  “No. It’s a fine corps. But it’s also the smallest.” Schurz’s smile returned in force. “Full of Germans, too. Come now, Alex. The campaign’s going well. Even the weather’s set to improve, I think. Let him see us in a fight and Howard will come around.”

  The former Prussian officer grunted. “He only sees the new men, his men. Those he brings along with him.” The brigadier all but snarled, “This Barl
ow, such an arrogant young Schwein…”

  “Renowned for bravery, as well.”

  “I’ve known my share of brave fools.” He looked at Schurz. “We both have.”

  The truth was that Schurz was tired of defending Howard. But it remained his duty. Nor did the fact that Howard treated him as an exception—a well-spoken, influential friend of Lincoln’s—blind him to the accuracy of Schimmelfennig’s remarks. Howard’s coterie, imposed on the corps, made little effort to hide their disdain. A colonel had complained in his presence that “Germans all smell like piss.”

  The column ahead began to move, but Major General Carl Schurz, late lieutenant of the Baden-Palatinate revolutionary army and former United States minister to Spain, waited for the last teamster to his front to snap his whip. Only then did he wave his division on.

  Turning to Schimmelfennig a last time, he said:

  “None of it matters, as long as we fight well.” Schurz forced another smile. “Now go back to your brigade, before it wanders off.”

  Eleven a.m.

  Confederate lines, Fredericksburg

  “I can drive them into the river, General,” Jackson said, kicking mud from a boot. “Put an end to this. I could do it now, before they cross more men.”

  Yes, Jackson could do it. Lee was confident of that. But at what cost? The Federal artillery massed on the heights across the river would slaughter any attackers who neared its bank. Better to leave a few hundred yards of ground to those blue hordes than to lose irreplaceable men without necessity. Terrain could be retaken, but men could not be resurrected before the Lord was ready.

  Jackson was ever eager to fight, to smite an enemy viewed in Old Testament terms. Such enthusiasm was invaluable, but Lee could not spare soldiers, let alone more regimental officers, short of true necessity. The past year’s casualty lists had been mortifying. Malvern Hill, Sharpsburg …

  The answer was to let Jackson reckon the matter for himself. Lee’s reply would have to communicate more than his words expressed.

  “We faced the same dilemma in December, General Jackson. Their massed artillery. But for that, we should have destroyed their army.” Lee paused, to let Jackson remember, while he chose his next words with care. “But if you think you can effect anything … I will give orders for the attack.”

  As slow of speech as he was swift in battle, Jackson nodded and said, “I’ll study it. I’ll make a study of it. I’ll report to you, General.”

  Jackson had understood him. Tom Jackson was the one man who always did. Locking his hands behind his back, Lee said, “What presses upon us now … is the need to determine where General Hooker will strike. Where his major blow will be delivered.”

  “Won’t be here,” Jackson said. “Not the main attack.” He gestured toward the busybody foe, some men stripped of their tunics and digging, others dressing ranks out of battery range. “That’s Sedgwick, Sixth Corps. Supporting wing, my opinion. Sedgwick’s trusted. Won’t act foolish. Meant to tug on our ankles, fix us in place.” Jackson pulled his cap’s brim lower in conclusive punctuation.

  Jackson’s instincts about Hooker’s plan reinforced what Lee suspected, that Hooker’s prime attack would come from above, that his opponent meant to leap out of the Wilderness and approach Fredericksburg from the rear, trapping the army. But it did not do to suspect: He had to know. And the information he needed was slow to arrive and contradictory. Hooker had screened his advance with remarkable skill. And Stuart … had not been at his best.

  Light rain teased their party and moved on.

  Lee considered Jackson again, this ineffable man so many had thought incapable, even crazed. His altered appearance remained as jarring as it had seemed yesterday, when Jackson first appeared in a fine new uniform, startling those used to seeing him in rags. The only scrap that had survived the renewal was his battered kepi.

  Finery did not suit the man, he looked like a child playing dress-up. Upon the handsome uniform’s debut, staff men had laughed to tears behind Jackson’s back. Lee had put a stop to that with one look.

  “I have ordered General Anderson to entrench,” Lee resumed, suppressing the rheumatic pain that came ever more often. “I’ve sent engineers to lay out positions and forwarded all the reinforcements at hand. He must purchase us time, to clarify matters.” He looked earthward. “Should our apprehensions be realized…”

  “Move quick as we have to,” Jackson said. It wasn’t a brag but confidence.

  Jackson kept returning his gaze to the Federals along the river, these intruders in his realm, these Midianites. His desire to fight them felt all but uncontrollable.

  Yet Jackson would control himself, Lee knew. The man’s strength of will was remarkable, not merely iron, but steel. An odd man, Jackson, graceless, but touched with immense gifts.

  The corps commander tugged his cap again. It signaled impatience, a yearning to act. At times, it seemed the weathered visor, drawn down over that vast expanse of forehead, would hide Jackson’s face completely. Lee had, upon one occasion, indulged himself and asked Jackson why he wore his cap in that manner. Jackson had taken the question as seriously as a discussion of strategy. As guileless among peers as he was cunning on a battlefield, the fellow had answered:

  “I slump, sir. Wicked habit. Unseemly. Pull the brim down, I have to stay bolt upright. If I mean to see anything.”

  Returning to the present, Lee said, “Inform me, General, if those people cross more troops. That would tell us much. Come to me later this afternoon, I shall welcome your counsel.”

  Jackson saluted, but his attention remained riveted on the Yankees. Like a cat tensed and ready to spring upon a bird.

  Lee could not depart without a few courtesies, a touch of affection for this awkward Gideon.

  “Mrs. Jackson is safely away, I believe?”

  “In Richmond, sir,” Jackson said, in a voice abruptly gentled. “With my little girl.”

  “Their visit adorned this army. We hope to see them again, when conditions permit.”

  Jackson shrugged, embarrassed.

  Lee turned to go, breaking up a confabulation between Marshall, his military secretary, and Jackson’s young man, Pendleton. Valiant, if a bit lumbering—not of the very best family, though respectable—Pendleton had been reported smitten by a local belle. Lee hoped the boy would live to enjoy a marriage. Many men would not survive this week.

  It took all of Lee’s self-control not to share his desperation, but his officers—even Jackson—had to believe that he was unshakable.

  As Lee remounted, a string of Federal batteries opened up from the heights beyond the river, out of range and firing at nothing, with ammunition to waste. Yes, they mean to keep our attention, Lee told himself. Jackson’s right, this crossing’s a fraud.

  It was time to turn his attention to the west.

  Two p.m.

  Chancellorsville

  “Slocum, I’m glad to see you,” Meade called as his fellow corps commander rode up with his staff. Elated by the army’s progress, the Philadelphian dropped his accustomed reserve. “Damn me if I’ve had a better day in this blasted army.…”

  The instant he’d dismounted, Slocum pulled off his riding gloves and tossed them to an orderly. The women clustered on the porch of the big house caught his eye, missies in full skirts and full of temper.

  “Don’t look like they’re glad to see me,” Slocum said, with a nod to the belles.

  Meade snorted. “Mad as hornets. Told ’em Joe would need the house for his headquarters. And didn’t I get a lecture on Bobby Lee and how we’ll all be scooting back north five times as fast as we came.”

  Slocum turned to his nearest aide and pointed to a yard pump. “See if the water’s fit for a man to drink.” He took off his hat, wiped his forehead, and swept back his hair. Slocum’s look was that of an English border lord, old stock, with eyes ever a bit weary.

  “We’ve got him, Lee’s bagged,” Meade continued. “My divisions are up, they’re ready to go
on.” He gestured toward his three division commanders, assembled for further orders. “I can have Charlie’s men on the move in twenty minutes.” He felt almost gleeful. “This is splendid, Slocum, truly splendid. Hurrah for old Joe, he’s done it! We’re on their flank, with nothing in our way. Clear roads ahead, nothing but a scattering of bushwhackers.” He stepped closer to the Twelfth Corps commander, his senior by date of commission. “You take the Plank Road for Fredericksburg, and my men can take the Pike. Or vice versa, as you prefer. And we’ll get out of this Wilderness, hit Lee on better ground.”

  Meade noticed, belatedly, that Slocum wasn’t smiling. On the contrary, he looked funereal.

  A faint shake of Slocum’s head ruined the day.

  “George … we’re not going anywhere, not today. This is it, we’re done. My orders are to assume command upon arrival at Chancellorsville. Temporarily, of course. We’re to take up a line of battle here and not move one step forward without Joe’s orders.”

  Meade was astonished. Shocked. “Good Lord … that’s insane. Henry, that’s madness. A ‘line of battle’ here? In this jungle? We need to get out of these tangles as fast as we can. It’s … it’s pure—”

  “It’s an order, George.” Slocum waved to his chief of staff. “Give me General Hooker’s latest missive. No, hand it directly to General Meade.”

  Meade read the message in horror:

  The General directs that no advance be made from Chancellorsville until the columns are concentrated. He expects to be at Chancellorsville tonight. The maps indicate that a formidable position can be taken there.

  “Good Christ,” Meade said. He looked over their surroundings in disbelief. Except for the open field below the house, there was no terrain that favored a defense. One could not even see through the vegetation, let alone fight in it.

  “Things do look different on a map,” Slocum allowed. He glanced around dismissively. “Chancellorsville? One big, ramshackle house?”

  “This simply can’t be,” Meade said. “We can’t stop here. It’s a gift to Robert E. Lee.…”