Undeterred, Ramseur exhorted and pleaded and denounced, to no purpose. Present he stalked back to Stuart, and in brief, angry explanation of what had happened, asked if he might “run over the troops” in his front. Cheerful and approving permission instantly was granted. Ramseur hurried back to his waiting line. Loudly he commanded, “Forward, march!” Without hesitation his North Carolinians broke through the mob, climbed over the entrenchments, and pushed forward. As Bryan Grimes went over the works, he heard a gloomy voice shout, “You may double-quick, but you’ll come back faster than you go!”8
At the same time, two other parts of Rodes’s division were advancing with equal dash. On the left of the Plank Road, Iverson swept ahead, and Colonel Christie, with his 23rd North Carolina, crashed around the rear of an enemy command and made a drive for Fairview, the dominant Federal artillery position nearest Chancellorsville. He failed to get there, but held what he had gained. This advance had the strong, gallant support of Pender and Thomas. On Ramseur’s right, Doles broke loose furiously, with his 4th and 44th Georgia pushing to the south of Fairview and for a time assailing the flank and rear of a strong adversary. Soon Doles had to withdraw, but Christie and Pender and Thomas, with part of Rodes’s own brigade, fought to retain the advanced position near Fairview.
Ramseur pushed his left across the log works of the second Federal line, but met a furious fire. The young North Carolinian had a clear understanding of his position and realized that he must strengthen his right or fall back. If only the troops in the works behind them would sweep out and fill a gap of some 500 or 600 yards between his right and Hazel Grove, all would be well! Several times Ramseur sent back to Colonel Vandeventer to move out Jones’s brigade, and twice he went back in person through a fiery hail. Jones’s men insisted they would not move except on the orders of their own division commander, Colston, who was then on the other flank. In hot wrath, Ramseur had to notify Rodes that unless troops were sent up, his brigade would have to withdraw. Even Rodes, always a commanding figure in battle, could move none of the troops behind the log works.
Happily for the honor of Jackson’s old division, Stuart learned of the sorry state of affairs and galloped up to the Stonewall Brigade. By a combination of authority and showmanship—by exhorting the men to avenge Jackson and by singing, “Old Joe Hooker, won’t you come out of the Wilderness”—Stuart got the troops in motion.
They advanced to the right of Ramseur, where they were most needed, and made possible the orderly withdrawal of his regiments that had exhausted their ammunition. Once started, the men who had fought with Jackson in all his battles continued to press on until they were assailing Fairview. By that time they were alone in their attack. Christie and Doles and all the others who had sought to break the Federal front had done their best but had withdrawn. Colonel John Funk, who had succeeded Paxton at the head of the brigade, found he had lost a third of his troops and that no support seemed forthcoming. His men got the order to withdraw and slowly, unpursued by the enemy, as became veterans, they fell back to the log works.9
All the units of the Second Corps, save Colquitt on the extreme left, now seemed “fought out.” Stuart was forming a new line, issuing rations, replenishing ammunition. He would try again, but he had mustered all the might of seasoned troops and appeared to have failed in his offensive. Then, abruptly—almost miraculously—the last of the Federal artillery, which had been leaving Fairview since 9 o’clock, evacuated that position. At Chancellorsville, where guns were massed, there was a perceptible decline in the volume of fire. Had their ammunition supply failed? It had, but something equally important had happened.
With the intelligent cooperation of Anderson and McLaws, General Lee had extended to the west the left of the First Corps. Lee rode up to Archer’s brigade at Hazel Grove and ordered Archer to attack in the direction of Fairview. Junction of Dick Anderson’s left and Stuart’s right was effected. The united forces now could drive on a concave front against Chancellorsville. Jubilant gunners raced from Hazel Grove to Fairview; yelling infantry poured northward through the woods and eastward on both sides of the Plank Road. By 10:30 or a little later, Lee was at Chancellorsville amid wild scenes of rejoicing. The price of victory had not been unduly high; if only Jackson had been there!10
Jackson had awakened about 9 o’clock that pleasant Sabbath morning. Calm the scene was at the hospital, but rolling and rising and ebbing and echoing was the sound of the guns from Hazel Grove and Fairview. Their bark was the best of tonics for the wounded man. He took some nourishment and displayed a cheering resilience. The prognosis was favorable. None of the surgeons seemed to have any fear for his recovery. He sent all but two of his staff to assist Stuart on the battlefield. Lieutenant Smith was to stay as nurse and companion. Morrison was to go to Richmond to bring Mrs. Jackson and the baby to the general’s bedside.
By 10 o’clock Jackson felt so much pain in his right side that he asked Dr. McGuire to make an examination. It was probable, the general said, that in the fall of the litter he had struck a stone or the stump of a sapling. McGuire could discover no bruise; there was nothing to indicate a broken rib; breathing seemed to be normal. The surgeon ordered some local applications and felt no special concern.
Chaplain Lacy, on entering the tent, exclaimed, “Oh, General, what a calamity!” Jackson reassured him. The loss of the arm, he said, was by the will of God. He proceeded, almost eagerly, to recount the circumstances of his wounding. He confided that when a bearer tripped and the litter fell, he thought he would die on the field, and gave himself into the hands of his Creator. Perfect peace, said Jackson, had been his—a precious experience.11
Lieutenant Smith then recounted for him news of the battle. The death of Paxton and other well-known officers of the Second Corps Smith announced as gently as he could shape his words. The general was grieved and shaken, but he was even more stirred when Smith gave an account of the charge of the Stonewall Brigade in answer to an exhortation by Stuart. “It was just like them to do so,” Jackson exclaimed; “just like them! They are a noble body of men!”
In early afternoon a courier brought a reply to the dispatch Jackson had sent Lee, announcing his wounding and the transfer of command. By permission, Smith opened it and read: “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 be disabled in your stead. I congratulate you upon the victory, which is due to your skill and energy.”
When Smith stopped reading, Jackson paused for a moment and then—was it from modesty or from a desire that his aide should not see his pleasure over praise from such a source?—he turned his face away. “General Lee,” he said in his quiet, half-muffled voice, “is very kind, but he should give the praise to God.”12
2
JUBE EARLY HAS A RIGHT TO SWEAR
While Jackson affirmed that the commanding general should give the thanks to God, Jube Early was wondering what perverse devil had placed him where he was. In the army’s strangest battle, Early had the most incredible part to play. On the afternoon of April 30 he had received notice from Second Corps headquarters that he was to remain on the ridge of the Rappahannock, and with his own division and Barksdale’s brigade of McLaws’s division was to observe the foe. With him were a corps artillery battalion, part of Pendleton’s reserve guns, and two units of a battalion attached to McLaws’s division. Early’s conclusion was that his infantry and this artillery were to be employed as a containing force while Lee moved with three divisions of Jackson’s Second Corps and three brigades of McLaws to support Anderson and take the offensive against Hooker. For coping with what was manifestly a superior Federal force, Early had about 9,000 men and 56 guns, but he was resolute.
Early had his division posted south of Lee’s Hill, where he believed the attack would be delivered. All four of the brigade commanders were present—John B. Gordon, R. F Hoke, Harry Hays, and Extra Billy S
mith. The bold Snowden Andrews was back after partial recovery from the frightful wound received at Cedar Mountain and was in command of his artillery battalion. Early saw to it that Andrews took full charge of the batteries on the right and General Pendleton confined his energies to the guns on the left. The front extended for no less than six miles.13
Lee’s instructions were explicit: (1) Early was to observe and, if he could, hold the enemy in the vicinity of Fredericksburg, concealing the weakness of his force. (2) If compelled to retreat, Early was to withdraw in the direction of Guiney’s Station and protect the army’s supplies and the railroad. (3) On the morning of May 2 he was to feel the Unionists with his artillery. In the event that the enemy had disappeared or reduced force, Early was to post at Fredericksburg troops sufficient to hold whatever the enemy left and with the remainder of his command march to join Lee.14
The third of these orders involved of necessity a discretion that Lee did not hesitate to entrust or Early to accept. Had not Old Jubilee fought for a time unaided and alone in the van at Cedar Mountain? At Sharpsburg had there not been a critical hour when Early saved from a shattering blow the left flank of Jackson? Surely now, if someone had to remain at Fredericksburg, and Jackson had to go and Longstreet was absent, Early, all in all, was the division commander best qualified to guard the heights and protect the rear of the Confederate forces moving against Hooker.
Early had to decide where he would dispose his few troops on his line of six miles. His judgment was that the main assault would be on his right, and consequently he determined to leave his entire division between Hamilton’s Crossing and Deep Run. The stretch of a mile and a half between Deep Run and Lee’s Hill on the left Early thought he could protect with a thin picket-line, because he could cover that part of the front with a crossfire of artillery. Barksdale and the greater part of the artillery must watch Lee’s Hill and Marye’s Heights. On May 1 the battalion of the Washington Artillery came up; the guns of the New Orleans men, added to those already in position, should make the heights impregnable.
In the clear dawn of May 2, Early was prepared and hopeful: If the answer of the Federals to his test bombardment was feeble or perfunctory, he intended to start two of his brigades to join Lee. The answer to his “feeling-out fire” was listless, and the Unionists on his right were observed withdrawing behind the protecting bank of the river. Before he could act on this, Barksdale and Pendleton reported a concentration of Federal troops at Falmouth, opposite the upper end of Fredericksburg. The two expressed the opinion that the enemy might be preparing to throw pontoons in that vicinity to assail the Confederate left.
They had joined Early on Lee’s Hill to speculate on the Federals’ plan when, about 11:00 A.M., straight from army headquarters, arrived Colonel R. H. Chilton, chief of staff. He communicated what he described as verbal orders from Lee: Early was to march toward Chancellorsville with his entire force, except Pendleton’s artillery and one brigade of infantry. The bulk of the artillery, especially the heavy pieces, must be started for a place of safety down the R.E &P. Railroad.
The parson-gunner and, even more, Old Jube, were stunned by these instructions. It was impossible, Early argued, to withdraw his force in daylight without being observed by the Federals. As soon as he abandoned the position the Unionists would occupy Fredericksburg and Marye’s Heights. Chilton replied that General Lee presumably had decided that the advantage of having Early with him outweighed the loss of Fredericksburg, which could be recovered easily after Hooker had been defeated. Early still could not bring himself to believe that Lee had set aside the plain orders given him earlier. Was it possible Chilton had misinterpreted the verbal orders? Chilton was sure there could be no mistake. “This,” Early afterward wrote, “was very astounding to us….”15
It was now between n and 12 o’clock on the second of May. Jackson at that hour was well advanced on his march to the left of Hooker. Lee was playing a fine game of bluff with Anderson’s and McLaws’s divisions, trying to make the Unionists believe he was preparing to attack in that sector. Early was nonplussed. He could not see the logic of his orders, but the chief of staff insisted they were explicit and positive. Foolish as abandonment of the Fredericksburg front appeared to be, orders were orders; Lee must know more about the operation than Early could.
Early devoted himself to getting off his foot troops covertly. As Barksdale’s 21st Mississippi could not be withdrawn from Fredericksburg without attracting attention, it must stay where it was. Harry Hays’s brigade most conveniently could be left in the lines. The rest of the infantry was made ready to start, and by late afternoon the last of them were in motion toward the Plank Road. Now, abruptly, came another disconcerting messenger. He brought a dispatch from Lee, written after Chilton had returned and reported on the orders given to Early. Those orders, Lee wrote, reflected a misunderstanding by Colonel Chilton. It had not been intended that Early withdraw from Fredericksburg unless this could be done with safety. The discretion given Early still was to be exercised.
How profusely Old Jube swore the records do not show. He was in a quandary. The enemy, he assumed, had occupied—or was in the act of seizing—his abandoned works. These he could not hope with his small force to recapture. If he went back and made the effort and failed, he would deprive Lee of any use of his division. The start, under misapprehension of orders, had been foolish; an attempt to go back might be equally so. Let the column go on!
A mile the exasperated Early rode with his men along the Plank Road and then—another messenger. This one had a note from Barksdale, whose brigade was following Early’s division. The enemy was reported to be advancing against the heights in great strength, and Pendleton and Hays had informed Barksdale that without immediate relief all the artillery left behind would be captured. The courier added that Barksdale was hurrying back to help Hays. Early had to make a decision on the changed basis: The enemy might not yet have occupied the heights. What was to be done? Old Jube debated the question with himself and decided he had a sufficient chance of success to justify him in securing his old positions—and thereby of protecting Lee’s rear. A courier was hurried off to Lee with a report of what was being done, and on the Plank Road the troops and the trains were turned around and started back to the ridge of the Rappahannock.
On arrival, to his relief, Early found that the Federals had not advanced at Fredericksburg and, on the Confederate right, had not proceeded beyond the Richmond Stage Road. Warm was the welcome given the returned column by Hays and Pendleton. A singular episode appeared to have been closed with more of good luck than the Confederates could have hoped to enjoy. Exasperating and nerve-wearing had been the result of Colonel Chilton’s curious and never-explained misunderstanding of orders, but it had involved no loss of life or of ground.16
Before daylight on May 3, Early was aroused by Barksdale, who was not in a placid mood. Earlier, when a lieutenant had come to his quarters and asked if he was asleep, Barksdale had barked: “No, sir! Who could sleep with a million of armed Yankees around him?” Now he told Early that the Federals had laid a pontoon bridge at Fredericksburg and were moving over. The attack would be delivered in rear of the town, the Mississippian predicted; reinforcements were needed there. Old Jube meditated and then told Barksdale that Hays’s Louisiana brigade would be ordered to the left. Barksdale could place it where his judgment of the ground told him it would be most useful. One brigade seemed the maximum that Early could afford to shift to the left, if the main Federal attack was to be on the right; but the reinforcement was the minimum with which Barksdale could hope to offer successful resistance. At the moment, with somewhat formidable artillery but no more than 1,500 infantry, he was occupying a front of about three miles.17
Early’s deployment, Fredericksburg, morning of May 3.
Almost before Early had sufficient daylight for reconnaissance, a rattle of picket fire and then infantry volleys and the roar of awakened cannon announced an attack on Marye’s Heights. Ten taut minut
es sufficed to show that this assault was premature. It was beaten off readily. The success was a bracer for the Confederates. Still better was the stimulant of news Early now received—that the main army had won a victory the previous evening and hoped on the third to complete a triumph. Early ordered announcement of this made to his troops.
The attack assuredly was coming, Early told himself, and it probably was going to be on his right which, in December, all the Confederate commanders had known to be vulnerable. Hooker, it was reasonable to assume, would not repeat Burnside’s costly blunder of an attack on the heights. Early felt that he must make ready for a stubborn defense of Jackson’s old lines. For a time, Barksdale and Pendleton reported frequently that all was well on the left. Their batteries were keeping the enemy at a distance. Ere long, Barksdale sent word that a Union column had moved out of Fredericksburg to turn the Confederate flank. Hays’s men had arrived, filed into the trenches, and repulsed the enemy. Barksdale and Pendleton, who had their post of command on Lee’s Hill, assured Early that they could hold their ground.18
Time slipped on. The hands of Early’s watch were climbing toward 11:00 A.M. Six hours of skirmishing and demonstrations had passed. Everything seemed favorable … except that no further reports had come to Early from Barksdale. Northward, in front of Marye’s Heights, the Federals still were banging away, but they had been doing that all morning. Was anything amiss? Early began to fume, perhaps to swear, and at length he determined to ride toward Lee’s Hill and see the situation for himself. As he started, a courier arrived from General Pendleton: The enemy had been repulsed; the position could be held. Almost before Early could draw a deep breath of relief, W. G. Callaway, one of his staff he had sent to the left, rode up with a rush. He had just left Lee’s Hill, he said, and had seen the enemy mounting Marye’s Heights and he knew the position was lost!
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