Lee's Lieutenants

by Douglas Southall Freeman

  Steuart promptly concluded that the enemy’s movement was preliminary to an assault on the salient, and so advised Johnson, whom he requested to return the artillery that had been withdrawn. John M.Jones’s and Stafford’s men had lost their experienced leaders and perhaps were lacking in similar vigilance. Walker’s brigade was on the extreme left of the divisional front, next Doles, and may not have heard so plainly the mysterious sounds of motion. The alarmed Johnson wrote Ewell that the enemy was massing in his front and repeated Steuart’s request that the artillery be returned at once. Johnson’s staff officer who delivered the message did not feel that Ewell was sufficiently alive to the danger, and he prevailed on Johnson to ride in person to Ewell. By this time Ewell had started Johnson’s message to artillery chief Long, and Johnson was told that the guns would be back in position not later than 2:00 A.M. Yet it was not until 3:30 that the courier reached Long. Within ten minutes his instructions for the dispatch of batteries to the salient were given to Major Richard C. M. Page, and Page got the guns under way with promptness and speed.

  Fog clung close to the ground until about 4:30, when it began to lift slightly. Soon, from the northwest face of the salient, the approaching tramp of many men could be heard. A moment more and there came a mighty cheer, and then the sight of bluecoats advancing in a dense mass. Johnson had sensed the point of extreme danger and ridden up to that part of the line. He exhorted the men to fire fast. The artillery was coming to help, he said; it soon would be there. When, presently, he saw Page’s guns moving up, he sent back to order a gallop straight toward the apex of the salient. As the first gun unlimbered, Captain William Carter sprang forward to help load it. One round was discharged at the advancing enemy. “Stop firing that gun!” a voice shouted. Carter turned … and looked into a score of rifles held by determined men in blue. The enemy already was in the salient and in rear of guns and infantry.

  Federals appeared everywhere the startled Confederates looked. The Union soldiers quickly found a gap in the front of Jones’s brigade, poured through, got behind the Stonewall Brigade, and captured nearly the whole of that famous command. Simultaneously, plunging ahead, they overwhelmed Jones’s men and seized Allegheny Johnson himself. To the right of the salient, where a stronger resistance was offered, part of Maryland Steuart’s brigade, including its commander, were made prisoners. All eight of Cutshaw’s guns and twelve of Page’s fourteen were taken.

  After this brilliant coup de main, thousands of men pressed southward down the salient in pursuit of the Confederates who escaped. The Federals met with little resistance until they reached, midway of the salient, about 5:30 A.M. an incomplete line the existence of which they had no previous knowledge. Already they had achieved much. In three quarters of an hour they had captured 2 general officers, more than 2,000 men, and 20 guns.32

  The Confederates who met the bluecoats at the incomplete line were men of Early’s old division, now under John B. Gordon. After Johnson announced that the Federals were massing in front of the salient, Gordon had sent him Pegram’s brigade. His other troops he disposed where he thought they could be most quickly available. When the attack opened, he threw Robert Johnston’s brigade forward. After it was repulsed, he ordered his old brigade to deploy and demonstrate. So admirably did these troops do their part that the Federal advance was checked momentarily. Gordon meantime recalled Pegram’s brigade and with this and his other troops, he undertook, in confusion approaching chaos, to form a line of battle.

  Gordon thought the fate of the army was in the balance. Grant had broken the front. If he were not checked, the Confederate army would be divided. At any cost the division must charge, halt the enemy, drive him back. He touched his horse and started through the woods to dress his line. At the sight of a familiar figure on a gray mount, Gordon pulled in his animal and saluted. “What do you want me to do, General,” he asked, and began to explain what he was planning. With few words, grim but calm, Lee told him to proceed. As he started away, Gordon observed the commanding general head his horse up the salient, in the direction of the advance the division was to make. He had heard, of course, that Lee wanted to join the charge of the Texans on May 6, and he suspected immediately that Lee intended to do the same thing now.

  Back, swiftly, Gordon rode and confronted his chief. “General Lee, this is no place for you. Go back, General; we will drive them back!” He spoke so that his men might hear, and the troops were calling now to Lee to “go back.” Lee would not move. Finally Gordon saw a sergeant take Traveller’s bridle and lead the animal toward the rear. Lee said nothing but did not resist. Gordon could turn again to his troops. “Forward! Guide-right!” he shouted. Soon the line was moving steadily, irresistibly, up the salient.33

  Gordon’s line was too short to cover the width of the salient. On his left Rodes came into action by changing the front of Daniel and then of Ramseur from west to north. The right of the First Corps was moved into the salient to occupy the ground left vacant by the shift of Ramseur. Rodes’s North Carolinians swept up the salient, said Ewell, in a “charge of unsurpassed gallantry.” To strengthen the counterattack, Nat Harris, a new brigadier, brought up his Mississippians to Ramseur’s right. Mahone followed Harris; McGowan was placed in rear in support. Later, to relieve some of the exhausted troops, Bratton’s and Humphreys’s brigades of the First Corps were sent to the salient.

  Confederate works at the Mule Shoe or Bloody Angle, Spotsylvania Court House, May 10-12, 1864. The numerals indicate: (1) immediate objective of attack by Upton, May 10; (2) “the Apex,” approximate point of Federal penetration, May 12; (3) “Gordons Line,” or “Incomplete Line,” May 12; (4) the line constructed May 12 and occupied that night; (5) “Heth’s Salient.”

  Their fire seemed merely to heighten the fury of the fight. “The rain poured heavily, and an incessant fire was kept upon us from front and flank. The enemy still held the works on the right of the angle, and fired across the traverses.” Before that fire and the blast of artillery many went down. Robert Johnston had fallen early; Daniel was mortally wounded; McGowan was shot again; Ramseur received a ball through his arm; James A. Walker was removed from the field dripping blood; Abner Perrin was killed. In all the bloody fighting of the two armies there never had been such a struggle as this. “Many were shot and stabbed through crevices and holes between the logs; men mounted the works, and with muskets rapidly handed them kept up a continuous fire until they were shot down, when others would take their places and continue the deadly work.”

  On the right of the salient, Gordon with the help of Wilcox’s division of the Third Corps drove the enemy almost to the apex. An attack by the IX Corps was repulsed with ease. An attempt to organize a counterstroke failed. By mid-afternoon many soldiers were so weary that they went through the motions of combat and scarcely knew what they were doing. To some, death seemed preferable to another hour of din and stench and blood. Veterans said afterward that the entire war had offered no scene to equal that fight at the apex of the salient. All the troops, even survivors of the first onslaught, were told they must remain at the front till a line across the base of the salient was strong enough to afford adequate defense. That order seemed a death sentence. Till darkness, till 9 o’clock, the bitter exchange of fire continued. Ten o’clock scarcely brought a slackening. At II word was, “Not yet.” It was past midnight when the survivors, staggering and wild-eyed, fell back to the new line.34

  They had bought at heavy cost a re-establishment of the front. Killed, wounded, and captured Confederates must have exceeded 5,000 that day. Included were some of the best troops and ablest leaders of the army. Allegheny Johnson had resisted to the last and then with good heart ate a breakfast provided by his old friend Seth Williams of Grant’s staff. Maryland Steuart, refusing the courtesy of one-time friend Winfield Scott Hancock, passed unceremoniously into the custody of the provost marshal. Steuart would be missed; even more would Johnson be. To replace the slain brigadiers Abner Perrin and Junius Daniel might
not be an easy task. Many of the injuries of the day were deplorably serious. No wonder, after those ghastly hours, the Confederates spoke not of the “Mule Shoe” but of the “Bloody Angle.” A division, in effect, had been destroyed. By this battle and the struggle in the Wilderness, the command of the infantry, which had been weakened at Gettysburg, now was shattered to a degree no one realized at the time. Nor was the only loss of the fatal month of May sustained in the dripping forests of Spotsylvania. News as dire as any from the salient had reached headquarters on the twelfth from Richmond.

  CHAPTER 31

  Richmond Threatened

  1

  “I HAD RATHER DIE THAN BE WHIPPED”

  Into the desperate fighting of the Wilderness and Spotsylvania, the cavalry had entered with its organization changed to conform to the return of Rooney Lee. When he was captured while recuperating from the wound received at Brandy Station, he had ranked as a brigadier general. In January John R. Chambliss, Jr., had been given Rooney’s brigade. Now that the second son of the commanding general was an exchanged prisoner, provision had to be made for him. The prompt decision of the War Department was to advance him to the rank of major general and supply him a division by reducing the brigades of the divisions to two each. Exception was made in the case of Wade Hampton because he was receiving South Carolina reinforcements that could not be placed acceptably in another division; his command, therefore, was Young’s, Rosser’s, and Butler’s brigades. Fitz Lee’s division was reduced to Lomax’s and Wickham’s brigades. Rooney Lee had his own old command, now Chambliss’s and James Gordon’s North Carolina regiments.1

  None of Stuart’s brigades was now under the man who had commanded it a year previously; few of his personal staff had served with him that long. Von Borcke had not recovered sufficiently from a wound suffered in the Pennsylvania campaign to resume his duties. Channing Price was dead. Pelham was no more. Norman FitzHugh was quartermaster of the cavalry. William Blackford had resigned to become lieutenant colonel of a regiment of engineer troops. John Esten Cooke remained but was not happy. Henry McClellan was the backbone of the staff. The most useful recent addition, certainly the one closest to Stuart, was the assistant inspector general, Major Andrew Reid Venable, almost universally called Reid Venable. With these men and some young aides Jeb was content, but headquarters lacked the old hilarity, the old buoyancy of spirit even. The war was becoming too serious! Grant’s new cavalry commander, Phil Sheridan, was flinty. He had novel conceptions of firepower and of the function of mounted troops, and he took excellent care of his horses. His fighting was hard and intelligent.

  In the first stages of combat in the Wilderness, the Confederates met their stronger adversary with vigor. On May 5, Rosser acquitted himself with honor in a brisk fight. On the sixth and seventh the butternut cavalry again were assailed by superior force on the Confederate right. Most of the fighting was on foot. All of it was furious. The rolling character of those clashes carried the opposing mounted forces toward Spotsylvania where, on the eighth, Stuart’s men stood off the Union cavalry and an increasing force of infantry until the arrival of Anderson and the First Corps. Stuart did his utmost to get the arriving First Corps into position, and at Anderson’s request he directed operations on the left of the line.

  Early the next day, May 9, Stuart received news that Sheridan’s cavalry had proceeded to the Telegraph Road on which they had turned southward. Wickham’s brigade at once undertook pursuit. Jeb already had taken Gordon from Hampton and he had to leave Rosser and the cadre of Young to cover the flanks of Lee’s army. Few as were his available men, Stuart spurred toward the Telegraph Road. There he and Fitz Lee, with the brigades of Lomax and Gordon, joined Wickham. Federal strength, said residents, was immense. The column covered thirteen miles of road.

  Sheridan had turned now from the Telegraph Road and taken the route to Beaver Dam on the Virginia Central Railroad. Bad news this was because Lee had his advance base at that point. That was not the worst prospect. If Sheridan merely were making a raid on Beaver Dam, he scarcely would have taken so many troops with him. He might be proceeding toward Richmond. If so, at least a part of the cavalry must interpose between him and the capital. Stuart concluded that Fitz Lee with two brigades should follow the enemy at least for a few hours, while he himself took Gordon’s brigade and made for Davenport’s Bridge on the North Anna, whence he could ascertain whether Sheridan was advancing on Richmond.

  On the morning of the tenth Stuart pushed southward to Beaver Dam Station. There he rejoined Fitz Lee and again concentrated his men, who numbered between 4,000 and 5,000; but what he saw at Beaver Dam sickened him. Several units of Sheridan’s command had reached the advanced base during the night. The few Confederate guards ignited the stores there. About 915,000 rations of meat and 504,000 of bread were consumed by fire while Southern boys lay hungry in the woods around Spotsylvania. A grievous blow this was, nor was this the full measure of loss and hardship. What the guards at Beaver Dam could not burn, Sheridan’s men destroyed—the army’s reserve medical supplies, more than 100 railroad cars, and two locomotives. Sheridan recovered, also, 378 Federal prisoners.2

  Although Jeb was humiliated, of course, that an enterprising enemy had reached the advance base, nothing was to be gained now by camping amid the ashes. Sheridan had gone southward, in the direction of Richmond. The Confederates must follow and defeat him. Jeb spared himself time for a brief visit to the nearby Fontaine plantation, where Mrs. Stuart was a guest. After a few minutes’ private conversation he kissed her and bade her a most affectionate good-bye. Somber thoughts pursued him as he rode away. He never expected to outlive the war, he told Reid Venable, and he did not want to survive if the South were conquered.

  In this fighting spirit, Stuart continued to receive reports of the Federals’ advance. He speculated on Sheridan’s possible alternatives. Perhaps he was aiming at Richmond, but his route suggested also that he might strike the R.F. & P. and the Virginia Central railroads between Hanover Junction and the capital. Stuart consequently divided his forces again: Gordon must hang on the rear of the enemy; Fitz Lee with Lomax and Wickham must move by way of Hanover Junction and get across Sheridan’s path. Stuart was not without hope of defeating the Federals. He reasoned that if they advanced on Richmond, he could assail their rear while the garrison of the capital contested their advance. If they contented themselves with cutting the railroads, he would press their escape.

  The column reached Hanover Junction not long before 9:00 P.M. The enemy was reported on the South Anna River, within nineteen miles of Richmond. By 1 o’clock on the morning of May II, Stuart had the troopers pushing south again on the Telegraph Road. Soon he was on the ground of the start of the first of his great adventures under Lee, the “ride around McClellan.” These mounted Federals were stronger and more daring than ever they had been. They were closer to Richmond now. Stuart told himself, in his romantic way, that he must save the women and children of the city.

  At Ashland Stuart learned that the enemy had raided the town during the night, destroying a locomotive and a train of cars and tearing up the track of the R.F. & P. for six miles. The issue was at hand! If some of Sheridan’s troops were this close to Richmond, the others would be encountered quickly. Jeb urged the troopers forward. About 7:00 A.M. the sound of firing was heard from the direction of the South Anna. An hour later the head of the Southern column reached Yellow Tavern, where the Mountain Road from the west and the Telegraph Road from Fredericksburg joined the Brook Turnpike running to Richmond. If Sheridan was ahead of Stuart, the Federals would have moved, in all probability, by one of those roads or the other. Natives said the bluecoats had been seen on neither.3

  Stuart examined the ground around Yellow Tavern and considered his tactical problem. As Sheridan had not preceded him, Jeb had now to abandon the plan of attacking the Federals in the rear while the Richmond garrison stopped them in front. By 11 o’clock all the indications were that Sheridan’s main force was arriving
over the Mountain Road. Stuart made his dispositions—a compromise between a frontal and a flank position. He placed Wickham on the right and Lomax on the left. Gordon was assumed to be engaged with the enemy’s rear guard. Two Confederate brigades had to contend against the undetermined strength of Sheridan.

  Sheridan’s raid and Stuart’s pursuit, May 9-11, 1864.

  The first Federal attack against the position on the Telegraph Road was beaten off by the 5th Virginia in a hand-to-hand grapple that stirred both Stuart’s pride and his apprehension. Henry Pate commanded the 5th, an able man and a furious fighter. Between him and Stuart had developed a bitterness of feeling. Stuart now rode over to Pate to commend him for his firmness and to ask him to hold the position until reinforcements could be sent. The colonel listened and then walked over to Jeb and held out his hand. Gladly and cordially Stuart grasped it and, on the instant, effaced all difference. Now at one point the enemy assailed the line in an effort to find the weakest spot. Then the “feeling out” was shifted. This went on and on. Southern losses mounted. Pate again beat off the hard-striking blue-coats—but in so doing yielded his life.4

  Though he expected to be compelled to repulse more attacks, Stuart told his chief of staff, Henry McClellan, that he would hang on Sheridan’s flank. If the troops in the Richmond defenses delivered a strong attack, he could take the offensive and, with good fortune, cripple the blue cavalry. There came now a lull in the fight, but nobody was deceived by it. In particular, Lomax’s men on the left were on the alert; theirs was the most vulnerable position. But the first evidence of renewed attack was against the center and right. Stuart rode to the scene and in his gay, confident manner, encouraged the soldiers. Presently Reid Venable spoke up: The general was exposing himself needlessly on horseback, a conspicuous target. Stuart answered laughingly, “I don’t reckon there is any danger!” Apparently there never had been any. He had been fighting for three years and never had been touched by a Federal missile.