From field headquarters at the rear of the center of the line, Jackson had been watching the artillery duel and the futile attempt of Winder’s men to advance along the road. His battle blood was up. He knew now that the issue was close. With reluctance he had abandoned all hope of finishing off Shields in time to attack Frémont, and couriers were spurring toward Cross Keys with orders for Trimble to hurry to Port Republic, burn the bridge over North River, and join Jackson. Soon came word from Winder that he was greatly outnumbered and must have reinforcements. Providentially there appeared Harry Hays’s 7th Louisiana, coming up at the head of Taylor’s brigade. Jackson immediately dispatched Hays to Winder, and in a few minutes saw Taylor riding toward him at the head of his other regiments. Jackson turned to Jed Hotchkiss and said tersely, “Take General Taylor around and take those batteries.” Hotchkiss and Taylor turned at once to the approaching brigade and started it up the ridge and into the laurel thickets.35
Could Winder hold his position on the plain until Taylor stormed the battery? He saw his best prospect of preventing an assault was to deliver one. With a cheer the 7th Louisiana rushed forward, the 5th and 27th Virginia keeping pace. Poague’s short-range guns and a section of Carpenter’s battery strained through the wheat field to the rear of the infantry. The troops reached a fence and there had to halt in the face of a combined artillery and rifle fire. All they could do was precariously to hold on. Unless Taylor attacked soon, Winder would be compelled to give ground. Minutes passed. Some of Winder’s men began to crawl away from the fence, and he ordered the artillery back to safety—just in time. There was a swift break. The Louisianians and the two Virginia regiments streamed back through the wheat. Their organization disappeared. Winder and the regimental officers wheeled and veered, pleaded and shouted and commanded—all was futile. To the left and front pursuing Federals now were visible, coming on fast and persistently.
Dangerous the situation was, but if it could be preserved for a few moments it could be redeemed. The second brigade of Ewell’s division already had reached the scene of action. Ewell had started two regiments in support of Taylor, but he had always an eye for danger and a heart for a comrade in difficulties. The instant he saw the Federals pushing forward in pursuit of Winder’s broken line, he unhesitatingly threw the two regiments against the Federal flank. They took the advancing enemy by surprise, they halted him, they hurled him back. But formation was not lost in the withdrawal and the Union line quickly was dressed to face Ewell. With steadiness and a hot fire the Federals advanced again and drove Ewell’s men back into the wood. Poague’s gunners had to leave one of their pieces and scamper for cover.
Battle of Port Republic, June 9,1862
A gun abandoned, a famous brigade worsted—was the battle to be lost also? If the Federals continued to press on, and Taylor did not attack their flank, then, as the least of possible calamities, the Stonewall Brigade would be routed shamefully. Even Jackson had to admit to himself that the plight of Winder was critical.36
At that moment, a mile to the east, Taylor was on the edge of the tangled woodland not far from the Federal battery. To his disappointment he saw that he had not progressed far enough to take the guns from the rear; he was on the flank of the battery, and across a ravine from it. His military instinct told him he could not afford to wait. Reckless as the venture might be, he would make a dash for the coal hearth. Out the Louisianians went, more in a spring than at a dash. Before the enemy realized that a column was near, the still-smoking fieldpieces were seized. Turn them! was the order. Give the enemy his own medicine! But now the Federals were surging back, and the Louisiana boys had to run. Soon Taylor led them in a second rush for the guns. The opposing troops came to grips with bayonet, with clubbed musket, even with the ramrods of the pieces. The Federals were too strong to worst, and swearing and bloody the Confederates dropped back to the woods.
Once more, with a wild shout, the thin line rushed down the grade, over the ravine, and on to the coal hearth. The Confederates stormed the guns and then drew a line to face the woods from which the enemy twice had rushed out to repulse them. Anxious seconds dragged into minutes. No countercharge came. The guns were Taylor’s! Then, to the west, a gun was rolled out within plain view, not 350 yards away, and opened on the coaling. Exposed as Taylor’s men were, they could not face this fire; for the third time they tumbled over the ravine and back up the hillside.
Taylor determined that if he could not hold the battery position, he would give the force on his flank so hot a reception that it could not recover the guns. Against him the Federals skillfully threw all the strength they could muster; their approaching line appeared as a solid wall. “There seemed,” said Taylor afterward, “nothing left but to set our backs to the mountain and die hard.” Just then Dick Ewell came crashing on his horse through the woods. Behind him were the 44th and 58th Virginia. With this reinforcement Taylor quickly determined not to await attack but to deliver it. By happy chance his assault was delivered precisely when Winder’s fire and that of his artillery began to blast the blue flank. The Federals halted uncertainly and then fell back. Taylor’s men and the Virginians seized the guns on the coaling, found charges and ramrods, and in a few minutes turned them on the retreating enemy. Ewell himself, his beak shining with joy, got off his horse and served one of the fieldpieces. As the Federals disappeared, Jackson rode up to Taylor, shook his hand as at Winchester, and promised the captured guns should be attached to the Louisiana brigade.37
With Jackson always at the front, the pursuit pushed northward for four miles, until the woods closed in on both sides of the road so that further progress was almost impossible. The cavalry kept up the chase for another four miles. About 450 prisoners, some wagons, one field gun, and 800 muskets were the army’s reward. Carefully Jackson collected this booty and marched back to Port Republic, where he found Trimble’s and Patton’s men. Obedient to Jackson’s orders, they had left their line near Cross Keys to cross, and then burn, the North River bridge. Frémont, following fast, had found no way of crossing or of giving help to Shields.38
A close action this Battle of Port Republic had been, and a costly one! The Federals, it developed, comprised two small brigades, 3,000 men and 16 guns, under Brigadier General E. B. Tyler, and they had fought admirably. On the morning of the ninth Tyler had received orders from Shields to retire, but before he could do so, Jackson had been upon him. In the battle itself Tyler’s killed and wounded were few. On his retreat he had lost about 20 per cent of his force as prisoners. His total casualties were 1,018. The remnant that made its way back to Luray was in sad plight. Jackson, for his part, had suffered in excess of 800 casualties, which was more than he had sustained in any other action of the campaign.39
On June 10 word came that Frémont had started a retreat down the Valley. To be near at hand in the event Frémont was attempting to deceive, Jackson established his camps between South River and Middle River, near Weyer’s Cave and Mount Meridian. In this lush and beautiful country he rested his men, held a day of thanksgiving, and with the humblest of privates participated in brigade communion. “God has been our shield,” he told Mrs. Jackson, “and to His name be all the glory.”
Not all of Jackson’s expressions in the aftermath of the battles were at this pitch. The day after the Battle of Port Republic he told his exhaustless quartermaster “Old John” Harman to collect the small arms scattered over the field. When Harman reported, he said, “General, a good many of them look like our own arms.” Jackson exploded instantly. Shields, he said, had many similar weapons; he wanted to hear no more of such talk! Harman angrily replied that he would not be addressed in such manner, and he tendered his resignation. Jackson, explaining that he had been annoyed by frequent references to the arms his men had thrown away, would not accept the paper, and for the moment Harman was willing to leave the matter there.40
Less violent though no less indicative of Jackson’s fighting spirit was a conversation with Ewell. It was reported
that in the Port Republic fighting Ewell had so admired the gallant behavior of a Federal officer that he told his men not to kill so fine a foe. Jackson sent for Ewell and told him not to do such a thing again. Said Jackson: “The brave and gallant Federal officers are the very kind that must be killed. Shoot the brave officers and the cowards will run away and take the men with them.”41
Still a third unpleasant incident concerned Sidney Winder. When that officer asked leave to go to Richmond for a few days on private business, Jackson brusquely refused him. Winder, already resentful over Jackson interfering with his discharge of command, became offended and tendered his resignation. Dick Taylor, convinced that so capable an officer should not be allowed to leave the army, went to Jackson, dwelt on the plenitude of the glory won during the campaign, and appealed to Jackson’s magnanimity: “Observing him closely, I caught a glimpse of the man’s inner nature. It was but a glimpse … yet in that moment I saw an ambition boundless as Cromwell’s, and as merciless…. No reply was made to my effort for Winder.” But that night, Taylor added, “a few lines came from Winder, to inform me that Jackson had called on him, and his resignation was withdrawn.”42
Jackson’s mind concentrated now on the possibilities Lee was suggesting of employing the victorious Army of the Valley in front of Richmond. Lee wrote on June 8 to propose that the troops on the Shenandoah be prepared for a movement to the capital. Before this reached Jackson, the actions at Cross Keys and Port Republic had been won and been reported to Richmond. Lee reasoned immediately that this double victory would permit Jackson to take the offensive again and that the Army of the Valley would need reinforcement. He decided to send Jackson two good brigades in addition to Alexander Lawton’s brigade of Georgians and a North Carolina battalion previously ordered to the Valley. With the approval of Mr. Davis, a troop movement under W.H.C. Whiting began on the eleventh.
When he received Lee’s letter of the eighth, Jackson saw one useful alternative, one only, to transferring his army to Richmond, and that was to relieve the capital by a heavy counteroffensive that would carry him into the enemy’s country. If his strength could be raised to 40,000, he would cross the Blue Ridge and proceed northward until he found a convenient gap that would put him in the rear of Banks’s army. Having disposed of Banks, Jackson planned to invade western Maryland and Pennsylvania. This was essentially the same plan, strategically, that he had sent Boteler to Richmond to advocate after the Battle of Winchester. He now sent the same messenger with his report on his present situation; so doing, Boteler would suggest informally the bolder but necessarily secret design. “By this means,” Jackson told his emissary, “Richmond can be relieved and the campaign transferred to Pennsylvania.”43
For the next step Jackson had to wait on Richmond. On June 16 the first of the reinforcements under Lawton reported to him, and the next day regiments began to arrive from the Richmond front. Whiting had chosen E. M. Law’s brigade and Hood’s brigade, to which the Hampton Legion was attached. These were as good soldiers as the Army of Northern Virginia had. Hardly had Jackson welcomed these veterans than a decision on the proposals sent Lee by Colonel Boteler was received.
Writing on the sixteenth, Lee expressed the opinion that it would be difficult for Jackson to strike Frémont and Shields where they then were and then break off to join the Army of Northern Virginia in time for the attack that soon must be made on McClellan. “Unless McClellan can be driven out of his intrenchments,” Lee explained, “he will move by positions under cover of his heavy guns within shelling distance of Richmond. I know of no surer way of thwarting him than that proposed.” Nothing was said about the proposal to invade Pennsylvania. Colonel Boteler was left to state verbally to Jackson that the pressure on Richmond prevented the detachment of enough troops for a large-scale offensive.44
Jackson lost no time in obeying this discretionary order. With precautions to keep all early information of his withdrawal from reaching the enemy, he set the columns in motion for the Virginia Central Railroad. On the morning of June 18 he was in Staunton, and by 5:00 P.M. in Waynesboro.
3
“THE HERO OF THE SOUTH”
The next morning, in high spirits, Jackson rode on to Mechum River Station, nine miles west of Charlottesville, and there climbed aboard the postal car of a troop train bound eastward. As the wheels of the train wailed on their way toward Richmond, a candid student who wished to learn the lessons that every campaign teaches of the art of war might well have asked four questions of the silent general in the postal car. The student would not have received an answer, but he would have been prepared, in a measure, for what was soon to happen in the woods and swamps of the Chickahominy.
First among the questions raised by the Valley campaign: Was Jackson’s artillery well handled on May 23 at Front Royal? Before long-range fire in any volume could be opened, the retreating Federals were gone completely. Colonel Crutchfield, frankly admitting that the Confederate guns were “badly served and did no execution,” excused his lack of familiarity with Ewell’s batteries on the ground that he had only recently assumed his duties.45 Although that fact extenuates, it does not excuse. The indictment has to stand: In a situation where rifled guns might be required, no effort had been made to see that equipment of this type was close to the head of the column. Who was to blame—Jackson, or Crutchfield, or both?
The second question is more inclusive: Was or was not the cavalry efficient during the campaign? Maryland Steuart certainly made a poor showing on May 24 for the number of sabers he had at his command. The next day he refused to obey direct orders from headquarters and would not move until Ewell approved. On June 1 and 2 mismanagement led to the 2nd and 6th Virginia being taken from Steuart and placed under Ashby. More fundamentally, the campaign was marred by failure to employ in strength a force which, if united and well led, could have capitalized all the gains the infantry made by hard marching and gallant fighting.
Against this may be set down many admirable achievements. Wherever Ashby himself was engaged, there was brilliance; elsewhere, the handling of the mounted forces leaves the critic convinced that something was wrong. Certain adverse conditions could have been corrected or controlled, in large part, had the cavalry been organized properly. It was not. Ashby lacked nothing in devotion, but he was essentially a combat officer and not an administrator. How far was Jackson to be blamed for permitting the cavalry organization to become so highly personal to Ashby that it was unwieldy and ineffective? Jackson realized early that the cavalry was undisciplined and could not be handled as if it were a single regiment. He sought to change this, but when faced with Ashby’s resignation he canceled the orders; he believed that if he relieved Ashby the cavalry would be even less efficient. The price he had to pay was a heavy one. At no time during the campaign, if Ashby chanced to be absent, was Jackson able to count on the cavalry as he could, for example, on Taylor’s or Winder’s infantry.
Of the specific shortcomings of the cavalry on the critical days of the campaign, especially May 24 and 25, the most serious was the imprudent dispersal of Ashby’s command. The only possible excuse for scattering Ashby’s men would be the presence with Jackson of the two cavalry regiments under Steuart. The personality of Maryland Steuart thus has bearing on these events. Of the reasons for his refusal to advance on the twenty-fifth, existing records give no hint. The natural assumption is that he was the type of soldier, after thirteen years’ service in the cavalry, who was trained to the absolute letter of printed regulations, who insists, no matter how dire the emergency, that every order come “through channels.” It is difficult to escape the conclusion that his experience as a captain of cavalry had not qualified him for higher command. As head of two regiments, plus part of Ashby’s force, he was still a captain.
With the fullest credit for the many daring and dazzling acts of Ashby, the cavalry failed to achieve maximum results in the operations from Front Royal to Port Republic because it was organized in a manner that Jackson knew to be d
efective but did not feel himself justified at the moment in revising. The cavalry did less than it should because, in the second place, Ashby scattered his command too widely and thereby left to Steuart a task which that officer did not discharge with competence and cooperation.
Jackson promptly transferred the cavalry to Ashby, yet no charges were preferred against Steuart. Why was that? So many instances were there of the sternest discipline on Jackson’s part that a third broad question arises: As an autonomous army commander, was Jackson wise and successful in his handling of his officers? The answer must be in the negative. Jackson sought to bring Loring to court-martial; he visited like punishment on Dick Garnett after Kernstown; he protested against the return of Taliaferro to command; he provoked the tender of Winder’s resignation. That was a bad record, an indictment of many counts. Along with these examples of sternness, not to say of severity, the outcome of the clash with Ashby and Jack-son’s failure to take any action against Steuart appear in curious contrast.
The explanation would seem to be simple: Jackson was a stiff disciplinarian, and he always followed that bent unless he believed the Southern cause would suffer worse by the imposition of discipline than by the neglect of it. This tacit policy accounts, by his own admission, for his treatment of Ashby, and probably for his leniency toward Steuart. Jackson shared in the desire of his government to enlist Marylanders and to bring their state into the Confederacy. As a Maryland soldier of standing, Steuart was expected to have large influence, especially on recruitment. If he were arrested as a failure, Marylanders of Southern sympathy would be disillusioned and resentful. Considerations of policy outweighed personalities. Where these considerations did not appear, Jackson’s rule was to hold his officers to the most rigid standards of military conduct.
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