They Called Him Stonewall

by Davis, Burke;

  Ewell would not sit still, and in the late hours of the day ordered his skirmish line forward, until it lay in the position the enemy had occupied during the night. Frémont was behaving strangely, and seeming to invite attack, but it could not be delivered. Ewell, already nettled by his dilemma, was galled by the fury with which old Trimble beset him.

  Trimble had been garrulously urging an attack all day, and he besieged Ewell with pleas for a night assault. When Ewell refused permission, Trimble went to Jackson, who said only, “Consult General Ewell and be guided by him.” Ewell again shook his head, telling Trimble that he had fought well during the day, and attempting to explain the army’s holding action. Trimble shouted: “Drive Frémont tonight, or he’s going to press the army in the morning. You’d better fight one army at the time.” He went off muttering about Jackson’s hare-brained plans to time his blows against first one foe and then the other. He was almost the last sound of the night, growling his discontent.

  The staff had a closer look at Jackson’s spirit in the waning hours of fighting, near by at Cross Keys. Sitting his horse above the landscape of Port Republic, watching and waiting, the General turned to the Reverend Dabney.

  “Wouldn’t it be a blessed thing if the Lord would give us a glorious victory today?”

  No one heard Dabney’s reply, but a boy lieutenant who gazed in fascination wrote:

  “Jackson’s expression was that of a child hoping to receive some favor.”

  The General had little time for prayer or recapitulation tonight. He knew his casualties were light, and that the army was still ready for battle. (It developed that Ewell’s loss was 287 men, only 48 dead; the Federals reported 664 casualties.)

  Jackson stayed up late, studying means of assisting the Lord. His thoughts roved over the predicament of General Frémont, who had withdrawn so gingerly when smashed on one flank. And he dwelt, with greater respect, on the situation of the approaching General Shields. If he could concentrate the army tomorrow, by hurriedly withdrawing Ewell across the river, he might be able to whip Shields here at Port Republic. It would require some soldiering.

  6

  PORT REPUBLIC

  Near daylight of June ninth, Jim heard Jackson at his prayers. The General soon rose and went in person to see his orders carried out, for he had conceived a swift double blow, which must be executed with precision because of the nearness of the enemy and the looping of the rivers.

  Jackson ordered Ewell to begin shifting his men at the first light of day, from Cross Keys across the bridge of North River, through Port Republic, and thence over a temporary bridge of wagons on South River—so that they could be flung against Shields, who approached from the east. To check the hesitant Frémont in Ewell’s rear, Jackson left a small force at Cross Keys—Trimble’s brigade and two regiments under Colonel J. M. Patton, whom Old Jack had so lately scolded for his admiration of enemy gallantry.

  The leading force against Shields would be the men of the old Stonewall Brigade, under General Winder. If all went well, Jackson would defeat Shields in the morning and, by afternoon, could wheel about once more and fall upon Frémont. They could thus destroy the two Union armies.

  Jackson was careful to add, however, that the rear guard of Trimble and Patton, if pushed by Frémont, should burn the North River bridge behind them, retreating slowly into Port Republic.

  When he had given orders to Ewell, Jackson sent the wagon train over the hard trail into the mountains—except for the wagons needed for the bridging of the river. He had watched the sleepy troops at their work in the dark, hurtling water. The men stripped the bodies from the wagons and hooked their beds together until there was a bridge over the stream. It looked a bit rickety, but it should serve.

  Near 2 A.M. Jackson had seen Colonel Patton and given him specific orders for the rear-guard fighting.

  “I want you to throw out all your men as skirmishers, if necessary, Patton. Make a great show, and make the enemy think you have the whole army behind you. Hold your position if you can, and if he forces you back, take another and defend it the same way. And I will be back with you in the morning.”

  “The brigade is small, General, and there’s precious little cover for it between here and the river. How long do you think I must hold?”

  “By the blessing of Providence I hope to be back by ten o’clock,” Jackson said.

  The General went to the river, as if fascinated by the work of the men on the bridge. Some of his officers saw him sitting Sorrel in the moonlight, absorbed in the progress of the work. He was late getting to bed and was then disturbed.

  Colonel John D. Imboden, chief of one of Jackson’s experimental mountain artillery units—a mule battery—visited headquarters in the early morning. He tiptoed through the upper hall of the house where Jackson’s staff slept. A sentry had directed him to a room where he might find Sandie Pendleton. Instead, when he opened the door, Imboden saw Jackson stretched on a bed in full dress, still wearing a sword and boots. A stubby candle cast dim light. Imboden was withdrawing when Jackson spoke.

  “Who’s that?”

  The officer identified himself and apologized.

  “That’s all right, Imboden. It’s time to be up. I’m glad to see you. Were the men up as you passed camp?”

  “Yes, General. And cooking.”

  “Good. That’s right. We move at daybreak. Sit down. I want to talk to you.”

  Jackson then spoke with emotion of Ashby’s death, his voice trailing off into silence.

  “General, you made a most glorious winding up of your month’s work yesterday.”

  “Yes. God blessed our army again yesterday, and I hope with His protection to do even better today.”

  He then astonished Imboden by giving him a detailed plan of battle. Jackson ended by ordering him to take his mule battery to a ravine on the Luray road, where the enemy might pass if forced back. In that event, Imboden could tear the Federal lines with shell where Jackson would otherwise be unable to reach them. Old Jack then rose and went to the front.

  General E. B. Tyler’s blue lines lay atop the second ridge which rose beyond the Shenandoah, with his right in open fields by the river and his left in a deep woodland, high on the hilltop, near an old charcoal furnace. His men held dominating ground on all parts of the line; the flanks were well covered, and on the left a six-gun battery waited for indiscreet Rebels.

  Jackson’s men moved to assault this position in the cool early morning, their commander riding in their midst. He was going today as a guide, for he had refused to give even General Winder specific directions. When Winder asked for orders to fight Jackson’s battle, Old Jack said only, “I will lead you.”

  For a mile and a half they went on, leaving Port Republic behind. They came into sight of the Federal center at a place known as The Lewis Farm. Soaring above them were two tall mountain terraces, the second higher than the first. Blue uniforms were fleetingly exposed over the face of the rear slope. From the first glance, the troops knew that bloody work was ahead.

  Jackson’s men drove off the Union skirmishers, but soon found that these men on the hills were not to be confused with the skittish Germans of General Frémont. Tyler, a civilian fur dealer, commanded tough Western troops from Ohio and West Virginia, with a heavy sprinkling of Irishmen. They were not overawed by the appearance of Jackson, and in the first serious brush they tore apart the lines of the old Stonewall Brigade. The Federal guns from the charcoal clearing swept the open, and the musket fire was as fierce as any the Army of the Valley ever faced. Some outfits began to waver. Jackson held on, however; he gave no sign of regret that he had not waited until his support was at hand. The fresh brigades of Ewell were still not within sight.

  Taylor and his men heard the firing while they were at breakfast, and he brought them forward. The Louisianan took his first look at the field:

  “From the mountain, clothed to its base with undergrowth and timber, a level—clear, open and smooth—extended to the rive
r. Half a mile north, a gorge, through which flowed a small stream, cut the mountain at right angle … and on an elevated plateau of the shoulder were placed six guns.… Federal lines, their right touching the river, were advancing steadily, with banners flying and arms gleaming in the sun. A gallant show, they came on. Winder’s and another brigade, with a battery, opposed them. This small force was suffering cruelly, and its skirmishers were driven in on their thin supporting line.”

  Just as the Union troops were countercharging, Taylor met Jackson. The commander was in a curious pose, Taylor recorded: his reins loose, his head down as if in prayer. Jackson looked up.

  “Delightful excitement,” he said.

  “I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself, General, but you may have an indigestion of fun if that big battery is not silenced.”

  Jackson beckoned Jed Hotchkiss and sent him to guide Taylor and his men up the slope, where they might take the Union guns in the flank.

  Jackson moved on. He passed the few men of Imboden in their ravine and saw that they were having “a remarkable time.” At each passing shell, the mules went wild, plunging and screaming and lashing so with their heels that it took three or four men to hold one of the heavily loaded beasts.

  Once or twice Imboden tried to fire the mountain guns from the backs of the animals—but the mules would have none of it. With the report, they plunged into the air and fell to the ground, rolling until they rid themselves of the guns. The battery could hit no targets, and the men were enraged by the solemn questions of infantrymen who were enjoying the sight: “Now, what’s supposed to go off first, the guns, or the mules?”

  Jackson peered into the ravine while the mule rebellion was at its height. “Colonel, you seem to be having some sort of trouble down there.” The ravine echoed with laughter. Jackson went on, leaving an order to take the distraught animals up the mountain.

  The General then galloped toward the river, where his old brigade, now under Winder, was in serious trouble. He went into the ranks as if the enemy did not exist, waving his hat, shouting, “The Stonewall Brigade never retreats! Follow me!” The men went to their old position.

  It was not long since an Alabama private had written home, scorning the Yankees: “We whip them every time we meet, no matter how great their numbers, or how few ours. The infernal scoundrels can’t stand the bayonet—they scamper like a herd of cattle.”

  There was none of that today. It was hand to hand, a murderous surging of the blue and gray files. For the first time Jackson’s men found themselves outnumbered at the crucial point of a battlefield, and they grappled with troops who asked no quarter. Dozens of Rebels fell under fire of the guns on the charcoal clearing above. Captain Poague’s teams galloped into a wheat field, guns were unlimbered, and Jackson’s artillery blazed in reply. But only two of the guns were of sufficient range to reach the Union cannon on the hill and the rest were withdrawn. The troops fought on at a grave disadvantage; Jackson sent two Virginia regiments up the hillside in a second effort to silence the guns. A battery attempted to follow the climbing men, but was forced to turn back by a tangle of laurel and rhododendron. For several minutes Jackson watched his line take the punishment, helpless to drive back the enemy. If he did not have the long-overdue support, Winder’s brigade might be driven from the field.

  At the rear, where Jackson sent officers to hurry reinforcements, the advance was slower than ever. The Reverend Dabney was there, shouting vainly in an effort to speed the men. Officers defied him, refusing to make their men wade the breast-deep stream as he commanded; the maddeningly slow crossing continued, the troops slipping in single file over the wagons.

  After half an hour at the front, Jackson still had not heard from his flanking parties on the hill, and Winder’s men were driven back. The Federals were on the point of victory.

  Winder got a depressing message from Colonel Allen, who had taken the Second and Fourth Virginia regiments up the mountainside. They had reached the enemy flank but had flushed three strong Federal regiments which had charged, scattering the Virginians so badly that they were withdrawn to reform.

  It was already too late to carry out Jackson’s design of battle. It was ten thirty. He could no longer hope to overcome Shields and then fall back upon Frémont—only good fortune would save his army this morning. Taylor was the lone hope.

  Taylor and the Louisianans found serious climbing on the steep slopes, plunging in and out of ravines. At last they stumbled within sight of the enemy guns. Taylor ordered an attack. His men crossed a ravine in the face of cannon fire, swarmed about the guns and clashed with Federal infantry, but could not hold on. They were thrown back again and were once more bled until they disappeared in the laurel thickets. But they were not through. Taylor led them back twice more. In the second attack, Taylor used the last man of his reserves, even the musicians, who had scant use for their instruments today. A drummer boy joined the melee about the cannon, where men fought with fists, knives, stones against the Federal artillerymen with their flailing sponge-staffs.

  As Taylor turned the captured guns down the solid blue lines now exposed to him, General Ewell came galloping up from the rear at the head of a large body of troops. The Federals on the hill, however, had a few moments respite, for Taylor was thrown back from the captured guns once more.

  Taylor saw “the enemy, arrested in his advance by our attack … had countermarched, and … came into full view of our situation. Wheeling to the right, with colors advanced, like a solid wall he marched straight upon us. There seemed nothing left but to set our backs to the mountain and die hard.”

  Jackson and Winder were alert, however, and threw all the men on the field against the Federal flank. It was then that Ewell emerged, bringing with him men of the Forty-fourth and Fifty-eighth Virginia regiments, which had been earlier driven off. Ewell had burned the North River bridge in the face of the timid Frémont.

  In this instant, with co-ordination as precise as if it had been planned in Jackson’s headquarters the night previous, three assaults fell upon the Federals, and the fierce, skillful fighting of the men of Shields over the five hours went for naught.

  Taylor jumped forward with the Louisiana troops, Ewell came in next to him, and Jackson hurried Winder forward with the main force. The Yankee lines wavered. They did not flee, but stumbled off over the rows of dead, toward the route of retreat. Within ten minutes, Jackson’s defeat had become an overwhelming victory.

  Despite heavy casualties in his crack regiments, Jackson was delighted. Behind him lay Frémont, baffled, beaten with the scantiest of fighting; and in front of him was Shields, the most formidable of his Valley opponents, going into retreat.

  Not only had Jackson escaped the trap the Union had built for him; he had severely mauled the two hunters. The twin coup he had planned for today had been impossible; but his army, after all, had accomplished miracles.

  He must have been aware, at the moment of victory on this backwoods field, that the eyes of the nation were turning upon him, the lone general in the year’s bloody panorama on Virginia soil who seemed to know what he was about. In the heady music of the Rebel Yell raised by his troops on this battlefield, the General who had sought so avidly to curb his ambition must have realized that the Confederacy was beginning to chant a new battle cry which gave it new hope in the unequal struggle: Jackson is invincible.

  The people of the South made him overnight into a legendary hero; hardly one of them had more than an inkling of the true nature of the man behind the intriguing nickname.

  7

  WHENCE THE CONQUEROR

  Nothing in the making of Tom Jackson had been easy. His first American ancestor of record was a huge Irishman, one John Jackson, who emigrated from obscurity to Cecil County, Maryland, in 1748, and was shunted toward the wilderness. By 1769, he had staked a tomahawk claim—blazing his boundaries on the virgin bark of giant trees—along the Buckhannon River and Turkey Run, not far from what was to become the town of Weston, West V
irginia. Buffalo destroyed his first corn patch, but John returned to settle. With two sons he fought in the Revolution, helped to clear out the Indian tribes, and left large tracts of land to his heirs.

  Edward, son of John, was the grandfather of General Thomas J. Jackson, and it was in Edward’s time that the family began to prosper. Jackson men were Congressmen and judges and tax collectors. Edward was a county surveyor and sat in the Virginia legislature; a brother, John G. Jackson, married Mary Payne, the sister of Dolly Madison.

  Years later, before he had cloaked his ambition with discretion, young Tom Jackson was to look back on these times when he declared to a kinsman:

  “I have some hopes that our ancient reputation may be revived.”

  Edward Jackson’s son Jonathan, a young lawyer of Clarksburg, (West) Virginia, was, in view of his father’s property, a man of promise. He married Julia Beckwith Neale from a near-by farm in 1818. Julia was said to have ancestors who were soldiers in the service of the British Crown—professionals; but there were no records. Jonathan had begun well: A basic education at the Randolph Academy in Clarksburg, and a reading of law in the office of his uncle, the judge who had married into the Madison Administration. Admitted to the bar at twenty, Jonathan was for a time a Federal tax collector. He had raised a company of cavalry for the War of 1812, but was not called to duty.

  Four children were born to Jonathan and Julia: Elizabeth, Warren, Thomas, Laura. Thomas was born January 21, 1824, in Clarksburg, with Dr. James McCalley in attendance. The mother named him for her father, Thomas Neale. He was to reach manhood before adding the name of his own father.

  The boy was three when Elizabeth died of an undiagnosed fever. The father tended her, contracted the disease, and within two weeks was dead, leaving his family penniless because of his unfortunate way with money and property, and a weakness for signing the notes of friends. The widow clung to her cottage home in Clarksburg by operating a little private school and by sewing for her neighbors. She gave this up after two years and married an even less successful lawyer, Captain Blake Woodson. Her new husband caught on as clerk of court in Fayette County to the west and took her with him.