by S. C. Gwynne
Whatever Hooker’s thoughts, Jackson by this point in his meteoric and still ascendant career cast a large shadow, far larger than the sum of his flesh-and-blood parts. There was something fateful about him, something foreordained, as though he had been born to occupy precisely this moment in time and space, as though his strange and mystical communion with God had granted him special power over both his own men and his enemies. His personal oddities now fueled the legend. Though James Longstreet was a good general and a resolute fighter, he was a prosaic and somewhat colorless human being. Jackson, by contrast—remote, silent, eccentric, and reserved, his hand raised in prayer in the heat of battle—suggested darkness and mystery and magic. Longstreet inspired respect; Jackson, fear and awe. There are several remarkable accounts of him by his own men as he rode to battle on that day, men trying to put into words what it was like to see the living myth as he passed by. North Carolina colonel R. T. Bennett described seeing Jackson on his way to Tabernacle Church that morning, surrounded by the booming cheers of the men. “Suddenly the sound of a great multitude who had raised their voices in accord came over the tips of the bayonets,” he wrote. “The very air of heaven seemed agitated. . . . The horse and his rider cross our vision. The simple Presbyterian Elder, anointed of God, with clenched teeth, a very statue, passes to his transfiguration.”17 Other descriptions of him have this same oddly mystical cast. (“The people of the Confederate states had begun to regard this immortal leader as above the reach of fate,” wrote John Esten Cooke in his 1863 biography.18) Later that day Edward Porter Alexander watched Jackson and Lee ride by together at the head of a column of men, to more wild cheering. His brief description of Jackson in that moment was one of the most memorable of the war. “As a fighter and a leader,” Alexander wrote of the once scorned college professor, “he was all that can ever be given to a man to be.”19
• • •
While Joe Hooker attended to his troop dispositions in the comfort of the Chancellor house that evening, and put the final touches on his prodigious defensive lines, Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson were sitting on a log near the intersection of the Orange Plank and Catharine Furnace Roads, talking. They had met at about 7:00 p.m., after Jackson had called off his attack, and had made their way to a sheltered clearing on the northwest quadrant of the intersection to avoid Federal sharpshooters. Their conference lasted several hours. Staff officers and various generals came and went. Gunshots from the front lines sputtered and finally died out. Darkness fell. Later on, when those observers understood the full historic significance of this conversation, they would strain to remember something—anything—about what they had seen or heard.
The meeting began with a discussion of the day’s battle. Jackson told Lee in detail what he had seen, and expressed his surprise at “the ease with which [the enemy] had been driven back to Chancellorsville,” as Fitzhugh Lee remembered the conversation.20 Jackson believed that Hooker would withdraw by morning. Lee had a different idea. As he saw it, Hooker’s quick retreat simply meant that he wanted to fight a defensive battle. Instead of withdrawing, he was digging in, and daring Lee to attack. Lee was right, as it turned out, and he fully intended to oblige his adversary.
The question was how. As the two generals conversed, Confederate reconnaissance parties were scouting the margins of the Union position, probing for weakness. Hooker’s center was almost absurdly strong, unassailable. There were five army corps on the Chancellorsville front, arrayed in a convex, six-mile-long line manned by nearly two-thirds of the Army of the Potomac and supported by 184 pieces of artillery. Thanks to the abundance of wood, and plenty of leisure time to cut and haul it, Union lines bristled with field fortifications, abatis, and obstructions of various designs, a defender’s dream. The army’s left, in the form of George Meade’s tough 5th Corps, was anchored stoutly on the Rappahannock, which meant that it could not be turned.
Thus Lee looked to the Union right, where he soon found exactly what he was looking for. Jeb Stuart’s subordinate, Brigadier General Fitzhugh Lee, whose cavalry had been doing the main reconnaissance, had discovered something extraordinary out there: rebel horsemen controlled virtually all the roads on the Confederate left, right up to the Federal picket lines, and thus the “eyes and ears” on Hooker’s right flank belonged entirely to the Confederacy. This was partly—though not entirely—because much of the Union cavalry corps was off with its commander George Stoneman trying to disrupt Confederate supply lines. Stoneman’s expedition would turn out to be an epic failure and one of the worst tactical mistakes of the war. But no one knew that yet; no one in the Union high command, in fact, had heard anything from Stoneman. Lee knew only that he was abroad with his troopers making mischief somewhere in central Virginia. But Lee now knew for certain that Hooker had left himself virtually blind in the west. Seeking advice on the terrain, Lee and Jackson summoned Reverend Tucker Lacy, whose family owned land in the area. Lacy explained that a marching column looping to the south and west could trace a long arc from Catharine Furnace that would reach the Orange Turnpike at Wilderness Tavern, about five miles west of Chancellorsville.21 This confirmed what Lee and Jackson had heard from Stuart and Fitzhugh Lee, and would put the Confederate troops well beyond Hooker’s right wing. Robert E. Lee soon made his decision: he would send Jackson on a march around the Union right. Though he did not know exactly where that was, he had a clear enough idea from what Fitzhugh Lee had told him. He would leave the details of the flanking movement, and subsequent attack, up to Jackson.22 Jeb Stuart and his cavalry would screen his movements. Lee issued marching orders for the next day. Then the two generals made a simple camp in the pine woods. They spread saddle blankets on the ground, covered themselves with their overcoats, and used their saddles as pillows.
Sometime after midnight, Tucker Lacy, who had camped near Jackson and Lee, awoke to find a small fire burning, and Jackson sitting alone in front of it on a Union hardtack box. “Sit down,” Jackson said. “I want to talk to you.” He explained that he needed more information about the roads west of Catharine Furnace. Jackson was worried that the route Lacy had suggested might bring his column too near the Federal pickets. Wasn’t there a way farther to the south that would make them less visible?23 Lacy said he did not know but he did know someone who could plot such a route: Charles C. Wellford, the proprietor of Catharine Furnace, the only operating ironworks in the area. Jackson roused his mapmaker Hotchkiss and dispatched him and Lacy to the Wellford house, two miles away. There Wellford indeed suggested a better way—a road through the thickets that he had recently reopened to haul wood and iron ore—that would be invisible to just about anyone in the area. Wellford volunteered his son as a guide. Hotchkiss and Lacy galloped back to camp with the news, where they found Lee and Jackson both awake and sitting on hardtack boxes by the fire. Hotchkiss pulled up a third box and spread his map out on it, showing the generals this secret passage to the enemy’s rear.
As Hotchkiss recalled, when he had finished his presentation, Lee turned to Jackson.
“General Jackson, what do you propose to do?” Lee asked.
“Go around here,” Jackson replied, pointing to Wellford’s suggested route on the map.
“What do you propose to make the movement with?”
“With my whole command.”
“What will you leave me?”
“The divisions of Anderson and McLaws.”
There was a pause as Lee reflected on the high-risk plan they were so calmly discussing. He had divided his army once in February, sending Longstreet south. He had divided it again the previous day, leaving Jubal Early with his single division on the heights of Fredericksburg. Now he had decided not only to divide his army a third time, but also to march the largest part of it directly across his enemy’s front, roughly similar to what Edwin Sumner and John Sedgwick had done with the Union 2nd Corps at Antietam, where Jackson had slaughtered them like animals. Lee was betting—it was one of the most daring and perilous bets of the war—
that Hooker would wait to be attacked.
“Well, go ahead,” Lee said.
And that was all there was to it. Lee made some final notes for the orders he would have to issue. Then Jackson saluted and said, “My troops will move at once, sir.”24
Moving at once was actually impossible, considering how much work it was going to take to get three divisions all marching and pointed in the same direction. At about seven o’clock on the chilly morning of May 2 the lead elements of the 2nd Corps crossed the narrow Plank Road on their way to Catharine Furnace and beyond. General Lee sat on his horse by the side of the road, watching. When Jackson rode up, the two men conversed briefly—whatever they said is lost to history—then Jackson pointed toward the enemy’s lines and rode on. With him went 29,400 men along with 27 batteries with 108 guns. Riding on his flank were three and a half regiments of Jeb Stuart’s cavalry. In all Jackson had 33,000 men. By agreement, he had left Lee with a meager 15,000 to face the bulk of Hooker’s army. Jackson’s corps was stripped down for combat. It carried only ammunition wagons and ambulances, no baggage or commissary wagons. The men marched at a rate that would cover a mile in twenty-five minutes, resting ten minutes each hour. As a North Carolina private recalled,
We went swiftly forward through the Wilderness, striking now and then a dim path or road. Strict silence was enforced, the men only being allowed to speak in whispers. Occasionally a courier would spur his tired horse past us as we twisted through the bush. For hours at a time we neither saw nor heard anything.25
The column wound forward along narrow paths that had been cut through the dense woods, an enormous, silent body of men making its way west. Jackson, riding at the head of the column, stopped to pick up his guide, Charles Wellford. When he galloped past his men he did so with his cap held high, while his men all raised theirs in silent tribute. It was not an easy march. Temperatures rose, and the length and narrowness of the column meant that every piece of uneven terrain and every mudhole would cause it to string out, leading to endless halting and starting, halting and starting.26 The last of Jackson’s troops, under A. P. Hill, did not leave until eleven o’clock. Still, they pressed forward with minimal straggling: Jackson had made sure of that by placing his regimental commanders in the rear.
As the hours passed, Jackson was mostly silent. But he would occasionally join the conversation of the officers who rode with him. One of them noted how many former VMI faculty and students were with the 2nd Corps on its march. Division commanders Robert Rodes and Raleigh Colston had both been professors there. Rodes, a VMI graduate, had left his teaching job there when the full professorship he wanted was given to newcomer Thomas J. Jackson in 1851. Colston had accompanied Jackson and his cadets when they traveled to Richmond in April 1861. Artillery chief Stapleton Crutchfield had been a student of Jackson’s. Cavalry colonel Tom Munford had been the ranking cadet at VMI when Jackson had first arrived, had treated the odd new professor kindly, and the two had become friends. Brigadier General James H. Lane had been a student of Jackson’s and later taught mathematics at VMI. There were, in fact, twenty brigadiers and colonels of line and staff that day who were VMI graduates. Jackson, pleased with this notion, turned to Munford and said, “Colonel, the Institute will be heard from today.” At about 2:30 p.m. the head of Jackson’s column came to a halt at the Orange Plank Road, three miles west of Chancellorsville.
• • •
May 2 was an odd day for Joseph Hooker, as much for what did not happen as for what did. He remained supremely confident in his position, had passed this confidence on to his general officers, and they all agreed that their success was virtually guaranteed. For once they had reliable estimates of rebel troop strength and knew they held better than a two-to-one advantage over Lee. They knew that Longstreet was too far away to make any difference. They held immensely strong defensive positions that extended all the way to the Rappahannock and shielded their own supply lines. Hooker’s main concern was Stoneman, riding with ten thousand men somewhere in the rebel rear but unheard from for four days. Hooker expected he would hear very soon that his cavalry commander had succeeded and that the rebel communications had been cut, which meant that Fighting Joe once again held both the initiative and the upper hand.
For the moment he could only do his best to shore up his position. That meant strengthening his right, which consisted of O. O. “Otis” Howard’s 11th Corps, a weak fighting force full of German-speaking Germans. He was known as the “Christian General,” a man who, like Jackson, prayed before and during battle, and spoke of war in religious terms. Unlike Jackson, he was an ineffectual commander. It was no accident that Hooker had stationed him well west of Chancellorsville in what must have seemed to him the middle of nowhere and certainly far from whatever fighting was likely to take place. Still, he had taken pains to strengthen this wing of his army. At about 1:00 a.m. he had sent an order to General John Reynolds, in command of the 1st Corps and still deployed on the Fredericksburg front. Reynolds was to move before daylight and march his entire 16,900-man force upriver, past Chancellorsville, and take a new position on the right rear of the 11th Corps. They would arrive by midafternoon on May 2. This meant that the questionable Howard would be well backed up. It also meant that the Union right, instead of being in the air, where it now was, would be strongly anchored on the Rapidan River three miles west of its confluence with the Rappahannock.27
This was a very good idea, especially since Hooker’s troops in Fredericksburg had clearly failed to hold the Confederate forces there in place. But Hooker was once again the victim of the inept and inconsistent Union Signal Corps. Reynolds did not receive his telegraph until daylight, which meant that his men would not be in place in Chancellorsville until very late afternoon or evening. Hooker’s chief of staff, Dan Butterfield, called this lapse “one of the most unfortunate that has occurred.”
Another, even more damaging mistake would be made that morning. Starting at about 8:00 a.m., Union observers sitting in tall trees began reporting an unusual and unanticipated event taking place behind rebel lines: the apparent movement south and west of a large Confederate column, complete with artillery and trains. Though most of Jackson’s route of march was cloaked even from these treeborne scouts, there was one section of road that ran along high, open ground just east of Catharine Furnace where the column became briefly visible. The reports were passed quickly up the line. An hour and a half later, 3rd Corps commander Major General Daniel Sickles personally observed the column through field glasses and secured permission from Hooker to open fire on it with his artillery. Taking no chances, Hooker sent a message to Otis Howard, saying, “we have good reason to suppose that the enemy is moving to our right” and observing that “the disposition you have made of your corps has been with a view to a front attack by the enemy. If he should throw himself on your flank . . . determine upon the position you will take in that event.” He reminded Howard to keep reserves “well in hand to meet this contingency.” Howard read the order, discussed it briefly with one of his generals, then more or less disregarded it. He sent an officer from the Signal Corps a mile to the west but did not reposition any of his troops. His feeling, shared by others, was that the density of the Wilderness around him would be defense enough.
Sickles, meanwhile, wanted to know more about this odd troop movement. At midday he asked for and received permission from Hooker to attack the Confederate column with infantry. Actually this was the tail of Jackson’s column, which had been swinging past Catharine Furnace for more than five hours. Jackson had had the foresight to leave the 23rd Georgia Regiment behind to secure this vulnerable, open area, and now the Georgians collided with Sickles’s attacking force. There was a sharp, extended fight near the Catharine Furnace in which 296 of the Georgians were taken prisoner. But they did the job Jackson had intended them to do, which was to keep the Union forces away from the marching column. Except for one broken-down caisson, every piece of Jackson’s force passed unscathed.
Even better for the success of Lee’s plan was the conclusion that Sickles drew from his engagement with the 23rd Georgia. At about 1:30 p.m. he reported that what he was witnessing was actually a rebel retreat. The enemy’s troops, after all, were seen moving in a southerly direction, and had their trains with them. It only made sense. Sickles’s message got to Hooker’s headquarters at about 2:00 p.m., at which point the Union high command, too, became convinced that Lee was retreating toward Gordonsville. (Maybe this was because Lee’s supply lines had been cut, Hooker fantasized, and his enemy was marching to the Orange and Alexandria line to restore them.) Further evidence to support this interpretation were reports of Jubal Early’s sudden disengagement from the Fredericksburg front. They happened to be true, though the movement was entirely unintentional. As it turned out, Lee’s chief of staff, Robert Chilton, had misinterpreted Lee’s wishes. Lee had wanted Early to watch the Federals closely, and if they seemed to be departing for Chancellorsville, he was to leave a small holding force in place and join Lee. The orders were discretionary. But what Early got from Chilton was a peremptory directive to immediately fall back, even though the 6th Corps was still in front of him. By 4:45 p.m. the Union command knew for certain that Early was leaving, which seemed to be final, conclusive proof of the rebel withdrawal. Orders had already gone out alerting Union commanders to replenish food and ammunition and to be ready to pursue the retreating rebel army the next morning. Now there was no doubt at all.
Lee also benefited from the eventual escalation of the fight Sickles had started at Catharine Furnace. It soon drew in not only elements from Richard Anderson’s Confederate divisions but also, more important, involved some twenty-five thousand Federal troops, many of whom had been stripped from the Union left, leaving a mile-wide gap in the line just east of Howard’s 11th Corps. Though the fighting involved advances and retreats, much pounding of artillery, and expenditure of powder and bullets, nothing much came of it. But it had the effect of leaving Otis Howard, late that afternoon, quite isolated and alone on the Union right.