During the twelfth Meade ascertained that Confederate infantry were moving around his flank, and he started northward to protect his rear. Stuart had anticipated this and hoped now that he might assail shrewdly a retreating foe. On the morning of October 13 he received orders to make a reconnaissance in force toward Catlett’s Station, the scene of one of his great adventures the preceding summer. By mid-afternoon Stuart had reached a point within sight of Catlett’s Station and of Warrenton Junction simultaneously. What he saw was enough to make him drop his jaw and grip his sword hilt. Along the railroad, the enemy’s thousands were spread northward. The greater part, perhaps the whole of Meade’s army, was in retreat toward Manassas! Between Catlett’s and Warrenton Junction was an immense park of wagons, such a park as cavalrymen dream about in happy sleep. Stuart looked and sensed a triumph: If Lee moved down that night from Warrenton, he could strike the Federals in motion! He dispatched Major Reid Venable to ride immediately to General Lee and tell him of the opportunity.
Until Lee knew the enemy’s position and could begin his march, the cavalry must keep in the background. Stuart had seven guns and two brigades and he believed he might strike a hard blow if he could arrange a surprise; but the gain would be unreckonably greater if Lee could employ the two corps of infantry against the sprawling, exposed files that were plodding northward. So reasoned Jeb. The next development was as unexpected as that first sight of the incredible park of wagons: A courier rode up and reported that when Venable had reached Auburn Mills, en route to Warrenton, he had found the village in the hands of the Federals. Venable sent word that he was making a detour and had every confidence he could get through to Warrenton, but he wished Stuart to know that the enemy was between the Confederate cavalry and Lee. To rejoin the army, Stuart’s butternut troopers must ride through or around the enemy. Instead of a night march to descend on the enemy, there might be a hard ride to evade them.
Further scouting reports indicated, in the confusion and the gathering twilight, that there were Federal troops on the retreat on roads to the east, west, north, and south. To be sure, their lines of march were not dangerously close together. From north to south, Stuart might have as many as five open miles. His range east and west was approximately that, but scarcely more. Manifestly there was no quick way of slipping from this pen. Troopers, horses, seven guns, the ambulances and ordnance wagons must be hidden until the enemy was gone or a line of escape was found.
Search for a concealed refuge began. To the east of Auburn Mills a little valley was found, with an entrance well concealed by woods. With little noise the men moved into the valley. Soon it was almost as quiet as it had been before the Confederates arrived, but from the nearby road came the groan of wagon wheels and the sound of marching men’s talk. The Federal column was not more than 150 yards distant. As scores of the marching Federals had lanterns, the scene was picturesque even if the outlook was dangerous. Proposals for cutting their way out were entertained and rejected. Besides, if Major Venable had reached army headquarters, Lee might attack from the west at dawn. If the cavalry remained within striking distance of the enemy, they might do great damage. It was best, then, for Stuart to stay where he was for the night and to look to the main army to succor him by attacking the enemy. Jeb sent off six messengers, one after another, to slip through the Federal column and ride to Warrenton to inform Lee of the plight of the cavalry. This done, Stuart and his men prepared to “outwatch the stars.”
The October dawn mercifully cloaked the road and the valley in thick fog. When it was light enough to see through the woods, there was a sharp skirmish with a surprised Federal command. Stuart determined that a swift movement on a wide arc might carry the two brigades out of danger. Quickly on word of command the ambulances and ordnance wagons were readied, the guns were limbered up, and the column was off. Around the flank of the Federals the graycoats dashed—and encountered scarcely a challenging shot. After that, rejoining Lee was merely a matter of keeping awake in the saddle long enough to reach field headquarters.26
The cavalry achieved little during the infantry’s unhappy experience at Bristoe and in the days immediately following, and Lee’s report of this period barely mentioned the mounted arm. Better luck came to Stuart on the withdrawal. On October 19, at Buckland Mills on Broad Run, his command and Fitz Lee’s combined in an ambush of an unsuspecting column of Federal cavalry. As the Southerners dashed at them, the startled Federals drew rein, turned, and fled in confusion. Always afterward Stuart’s men called their pursuit the “Buckland Races.” Colonel Blackford complained that “We got only 250 prisoners and eight or ten ambulances.”27
During the Bristoe campaign the cavalry’s new divisional organization had justified itself in spite of the contretemps when Fitz Lee fired into Stuart’s lines at Brandy. The new brigadiers had been competent, though none had performed any feat of special brilliance. Near the close of his report, Stuart described an ominous condition: “The matter of greatest concern to me during this short and eventful campaign was the subject of forage for the horses. Operating in a country worn out in peace, but now more desolate in war, it is remarkable how the horses were able to keep up.”28 Subsistence for the animals was failing. So was the supply of horses. A man who lost his horse might find the purchase of another almost impossible. A rising percentage of the cavalry slowly were to revert to the status of infantry. Stuart did not know it, but his organization had been expanded at a time when his mobility was beginning to decline and his ranks to thin. He might not be able to repeat the “Buckland Races.”
CHAPTER 29
Tests and Trials of Winter
1
JUBE EARLY’S BAD DAYS AND GOOD
The infantry had no consolation for the disappointments of the futile march to Bristoe Station. On the contrary, as soon as the army was back on the line of the Rappahannock, it sustained a disaster unlike any experienced by the troops in all their marching and fighting. Every rank and grade from headquarters to guardhouse was humiliated.
The scene was Rappahannock Bridge, the crossing of the Orange and Alexandria Railroad. Farther down the Rappahannock, in the vicinity of Kelly’s Ford, the ground on the north bank so fully commanded the southern side that Confederates posted there could not prevent the passage of the river by a strong Federal force at any time. The best that could be done at Kelly’s was to hold off the enemy long enough for troops to take position in rear of the ford. Because this situation subjected the Confederate army to the danger of surprise whenever it was on the Rappahannock, the high command retained on the north bank of the river at Rappahannock Bridge a tête-de-pont where it could hold part of Meade’s army while it concentrated against the Unionists who attacked at Kelly’s. So long as this bridgehead was retained, a crossing farther down the Rappahannock was hazardous for the Federals.1
The position, two redoubts and a line of rifle pits, was held on November 7 by Harry Hays’s brigade of Early’s division, a trustworthy command of Louisiana veterans. They had access to the south bank of the river by a pontoon bridge that stretched in rear of the main redoubt. This bridge was beyond the range of any of the Federal batteries and was covered by batteries on the south side of the river. On the Confederate shore the army extended for several miles opposite the crossing. Hill was to the west, Ewell to the east. Rodes had command of the sector that included Kelly’s. The bridgehead and the position opposite it were in Jubal Early’s care.
About noon on the seventh of November the Federals began a demonstration at Kelly’s Ford and soon pushed a considerable force of infantry to the southern side. Rodes had poor luck trying to reinforce the regiment in the rifle pits with another, but manned his main position and notified headquarters. Ewell hurried to the scene. Upstream, Early received word that the enemy in force was approaching the bridgehead. He put his troops in motion for the site, to which he hastened. En route he met and conferred briefly with Lee, and then crossed to the exposed redoubts and rifle pits. Brief reconnaissance show
ed Old Jubilee the enemy drawing near. Hays manifestly would need reinforcements. To aid him, Early returned to the south bank and sent the first units that arrived, the greater part of Hoke’s brigade. Hoke himself was detached, but his men, under Colonel Archibald C. Godwin, marched confidently across the pontoon bridge and into the works. The dispatch of any further reinforcements seemed to Lee to be unnecessary. Early agreed.2
It appeared the Federals had put more guns into action and crossed their fire on part of the Confederate line. In some concern, Early sent Major Samuel Hale, Jr., across the river to ascertain what this meant. As the insistent darkness of autumn began to descend, Early could see flashes of musketry close by the rifle pits but could make out nothing decisive. Presently he and General Lee agreed that the fire was slackening. This they took to mean that the enemy had given up the attack. If so, it would not be renewed that evening. The Federals never delivered night attacks against the Army of Northern Virginia. In that belief, Lee started for his headquarters. When Major Hale returned, it was to report that he had seen both Hays and Godwin. They had faced heavy attacks but had captured most of the men in the first line thrown against them and thought their lines secure.
Hale added that coming back over the bridge he found a few of Hays’s men who asserted that their line had been broken. He thought they were skulkers. With that, Early bade another staff officer, Major John Daniel, go to the pontoon bridge and get any news the fugitives brought. Daniel was soon back. Near the bridge, he said, he had met Hays, who told him the line was broken, the Louisiana brigade overwhelmed, the Federals closing in on Godwin.
Early was appalled. He could not believe Hays’s veterans beaten so quickly, or Hoke’s in a foredoomed fight. It was an impossible situation, but it was impossible to do anything for them! It would have been folly to attempt to cross the bridge, “and I could not open with the guns on the south side, as it was so very dark … we would have been as apt to fire into our own men as into the enemy.” Soon the fire died away. Cheers rose above the wind. Godwin’s men were prisoners. From the two brigades not more than 600 escaped.3
With the bridgehead lost and the enemy already on the south side of the Rappahannock at Kelly’s Ford, the Southern army had to retreat. It moved that night and recrossed the Rapidan the next night. There, still smarting, the command could appraise the disaster at Rappahannock Bridge. Early had 1,674 killed, wounded, and captured. At Kelly’s Ford the loss among Rodes’s men was 349. For the two divisions that made 2,023, a figure that outraged the Second Corps and shocked the entire army. Said Sandie Pendleton, “It is absolutely sickening, and I feel personally disgraced by the issue of the late campaign, as does every one in the command. Oh, how every day is proving the value of General Jackson to us!”4
No blame could be put on the soldiers. As Lee said in his report, “The courage and good conduct of the troops engaged have been too often tried to admit of question.” Hays, as always, handled his men well. After he was surrounded and a prisoner, his horse took fright and ran. When the enemy began to fire at him, Hays decided he might as well try to reach the bridge, because he could not be in greater danger there than in the midst of shouting enemies. He escaped unhurt. Colonel Godwin, resisting with a remnant of sixty or seventy of his men, was overcome with his weapons in his hands.
Early felt that he was in no way responsible for the disaster. “I am conscious of having done all in my power to defend the position,” he said in his report, “but I must candidly confess that I did concur in the opinion of the commanding general that the enemy did not have enterprise enough to attempt any serious attack after dark, as such attacks are so foreign to his usual policy….” He added that his troops could not have been withdrawn with safety “after the enemy had gained their immediate front.” Lee accepted substantially the explanation given by Early.5
The real explanation of the reverse was one which, even after their experience at Gettysburg, the Confederates were unwilling to admit: At Rappahannock Bridge a sound Federal plan of attack had been executed admirably by courageous men. So well handled were the assaulting troops, numbering only 2,100, that they were able to occupy the first line of rifle pits without firing a shot. At Kelly’s Ford the Federals had moved in overwhelming strength and encountered little resistance.
About three weeks after the Federals had advanced from the Rappahannock, they threatened a blow on the line of the Rapidan. On November 26, cavalry scouts reported the enemy in movement for the lower fords of the Rapidan. The possibility of such a move had been considered. Lines of defense had been chosen. Officers were on the alert. Dick Ewell was absent on account of sickness, but his corps was in Jube Early’s care. At the moment it was impossible to ascertain whether Meade intended to move on Richmond or whether he merely was preparing to turn the right wing of the Southern army. An advance toward the enemy was dictated by either contingency. Early was to take the lead because the Second Corps was on the right and nearer the Federals. Hill was to follow Early.
In the early afternoon of the twenty-seventh Rodes’s division and Early’s, under Harry Hays, were the first to establish contact with the enemy in the vicinity of Locust Grove, a settlement about seven miles southwest of Wilderness Church. The decision of General Lee was to await the arrival of Allegheny Johnson’s division before engaging the Federals. Rodes and Hays accordingly formed line of battle, and when Johnson came up the head of his column formed on Rodes’s left and rear. The center and rear of his column on the road constituted virtually a refused flank for the Second Corps.6
The rearmost of these brigades was Maryland Steuart’s, which contained some splendid troops that had not always been well led. Shortly after noon, Johnson received from Steuart a report that he was under fire from the left. Johnson started at once for Steuart’s position. He followed the sound rule of the vigilant commander—when in doubt, see for yourself. He found Steuart skirmishing heavily, ordered him to redeploy to parallel the enemy’s line, and as quickly as possible recalled the other brigades of the division and placed them on the right of Steuart.
A stubborn and confused action followed. At first the Confederates repulsed two attacks. Then Johnson directed that the division take the offensive. Because of the tangled terrain, this involved a somewhat complicated maneuver in which brigades and even regiments became separated. The battle line swung like a pendulum. Regiments advanced, drifted apart, and fell back. Jube Early had to confess afterward that he “could not see any portion of the troops engaged.” At length, more from bewilderment than from punishment, most of the Confederates fell back a few hundred yards to a fence-line. There they repulsed all attacks till darkness put an end to the fight. This affair of Payne’s Farm was costly. Maryland Steuart was wounded lightly in the arm and John M. Jones in the head. Total casualties for Johnson’s division were 545. By holding the road in this meeting engagement, said Early, Old Allegheny “saved the whole corps from a very serious disaster.”7
Skirmishing was in progress all the while on the front of the Second Corps, east of Mine Run. All the indications were of a wintry battle, a Fredericksburg fought in the forest. Early had previously examined the vicinity with an eye to its defense and knew that the west bank of Mine Run offered better positions than could be found at Locust Grove. He accordingly moved back the Second Corps and Dick Anderson’s supporting division on the night of November 27. Lee directed Early on the twenty-eighth to retire a short distance farther to a line that had been selected previously as the strongest available in that district.
Rain fell all day on the twenty-eighth. When the downpour ceased, temperature dropped to extreme chill. The wind rose. Shivering graycoats steeled themselves and piled higher the parapets behind which they intended, come what might, to hold against their attacking adversary. Except for a cannonade of about an hour on the twenty-ninth, the Union troops made no move. The thirtieth passed without incident. Blue columns appeared to march now to the left and now to the right, but the forest was so thick that no
thing could be seen clearly. When December 1 passed without a Federal attack, Lee decided to assume the initiative. Wilcox’s and Anderson’s divisions were shifted to the extreme right, whence it was thought they could turn the Federal left. An anxious night of preparation ended in a dawn of disappointment. The Federals had retreated. Nor in that tangled country could they be overtaken in their withdrawal across the Rapidan.8
The reasons given by Meade for the retirement were varied. Throughout the operation he had suffered disappointments and failure of logistics. Delays were frequent. General G. K. Warren told Meade that he could turn the Confederate right easily, and Meade concentrated heavily on his left for the movement. On the thirtieth, when all was prepared, a message was handed him from Warren: “I advise against making the attack here. The full light of the sun shows me that I cannot succeed.” Meade was astounded. By the time he could return the troops to their former positions, he believed Lee had made the Confederate position more nearly impregnable. “It was my deliberate judgment that I ought not to attack,” he confided manfully to his wife. “I acted on that judgment, and I am willing to stand or fall by it at all hazards.”9
The Confederate commanders were disappointed at Meade’s unpunished escape. In Ewell’s absence, Jube Early had handled the Second Corps with apparent ease and with moderate efficiency. On November 27 the terrain was so confused and the situation so uncertain that Early’s caution in leaving Johnson to fight his own battle was explicable and probably justified. There was at the time no suggestion that Early, acting as corps commander, was too much inclined to fight a battle by divisions. His admission that he “could not see any portion of the troops engaged” did suggest one of the few defects of Early as a soldier. He had a poor sense of direction. On more than one battlefield it is possible that what appeared to have been tardiness was due to his inability to grasp quickly the guiding features of the ground over which he was to operate.
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